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We sit down on the porch, and Juliana positions herself behind Charlie and begins a complicated weaving with her hands. Charlie is all smiles and childish banter. Suddenly her face freezes and she looks up at Juliana in fear.
“What happened to you?” she asks in a whisper.
Juliana looks at me questioningly, then back down to Charlie with a reassuring smile.
“What do you mean, sweetie?” she asks. “Nothing happened to me.”
“You used to be dead,” Charlie says, with tears in her eyes.
We’re shocked by her statement and the assured way she says it. Juliana looks at me. I shrug, not sure what to say. What can be said in a moment like this?
“Did Cassandra tell you that?” Juliana asks carefully.
“No,” she answers in a quiet voice. “I saw it when you touched me. I saw that you used to be dead and then you weren’t anymore. I didn’t know people could come back to life.”
“It’s a really long story,” Juliana tells her, breezing over this very important information Charlie has shared. That’s Juliana, though. She’s calm in a crisis. “Why don’t I walk you back to Pocus’s house and I’ll tell you a little about it?”
They stand up, and Charlie grabs her hand. I watch them walk down the long driveway and disappear beyond the trees. I look at Cassandra, who smiles at me.
“I like her,” she says. “She’s so weird!”
Weird, indeed. I have so many questions.
CHAPTERTHIRTEEN
Icome down the stairs of Pocus and Abigail’s house just in time to see Charlie happily walking through the door. What the hell?
“Where have you been?” I ask her, apprehensively.
My heart races in my chest and my head spins. What if someone saw her? Little Daisy is at daycare, and Charlie promised not to leave the house alone. I almost growl out in frustration and anger. After everything we’ve survived so far, how could she leave the house like that?
“Why do you care?” she fumes. “You’ve barely talked to me since we got here.”
Her words cut deeply. I haven’t meant to neglect her the last few days, but I’ve been calling in every favor and getting every contact I could to find Charlie a home. I’m running out of options. We’re running out of time. Of course, she assumes I don’t care about her, but I’m working myself to the bone trying to find her a good home.
“Charlie,” I reprimand through gritted teeth. “We don’t know these people. You can’t wander around by yourself without me knowing your whereabouts.”
“I wasn’t alone,” she grumbles petulantly. “I was with Cassandra.”
“Daisy’s imaginary friend?” I wrack my brain to figure out who in the hell Cassandra is.
“She’s not an imaginary friend. She’s a ghost,” Charlie responds, as if this is the most natural thing in the world.
I’m going to be sick. Charlie can see ghosts now, too? This is too much. I’ve never had to work with a kid with that kind of gift. I’m not sure what the hell I’m supposed to do with that information. Of course, I know ghosts exist, but to see one and speak to one? It’s too much.
I sit on the bottom step and drop my head into my hands. How much longer can I keep this up? I won’t stop until Charlie has a safe place to go, but how long will that take? How much more do I have left in me?
“Please, just tell me where you were,” I say as patiently as I can muster.
Her face clouds with distrust. She takes a deep breath and looks down at her shoes. After a moment, she opens her mouth.
“I was at the other house,” she says quietly, causing my stomach to lurch. “Cassandra walked me over because she was worried about her friend, Hex. He got into a bad fight. She wanted to see him when he got home.”
She says this in one, quick breath, as if she already knows she’s in trouble. But there’s more. She steels herself to keep going.
“Then Hex and his wife came home and I talked to them. They’re really, really nice. His wife braided my hair. She used to be dead, but now she’s alive again. It’s really cool! I’ve never met anyone like that before.”
She sounds excited and happy. I hate that I have to be the bad guy. I hate to burst her happy bubble and tell her these people are not safe. For one thing, the other house, the clubhouse as they call it, is where the members of the motorcycle gang live. Grown men who know nothing but trouble. Drugs and booze and women going in and out, probably.
