The Blue Girl (38 page)

“I didn’t die
that
long ago.”

“Whatever.”

“But back to how you dealt with the
anamithim
”
he says.

We’re a couple of blocks from the apartment now. I wonder what people would see, if there was anyone around to look our way. Adrian would probably be totally invisible to them, so it’d just be this blue girl, walking along with her hands in her pockets, talking to herself. All I need is a shopping cart and I’d have all the makings of a bag lady in training.

“I was flying by the seat of my pants,” I tell him. “Right up until I came into the room where you all were, I was thinking maybe we could use the paint to make a stronger warding circle—just to protect us .You know, something that wouldn’t get scuffed or blown away like salt.”

“So why did you throw it on them?”

“I don’t know. I guess because if they weren’t going to come near me with my blue skin, I just figured throwing it on them would really screw them up.”

“And your backup plan was ...?”

I shake my head. “No backup plan. I tend to run on instinct, which is why I threw out all the earlier plans we had and went with my gut when I thought of the paint.” He gives a slow nod.

“Instinct,” he repeats.

“It’s not going to be everybody’s choice, but it works for me.”

“Even when following it seems crazy, or maybe a little scary?”

“I guess. It would depend on the situation.”

He nods again.

“I’m afraid to die,” he says.

“But you’re—”

“Already dead. I know. So it’s completely weird. Except I’m not completely dead, because I never went on to wherever it is that we go next.”

“You said that when we first met. I don’t really blame you for hanging around—not if you’ve worked a deal where you can put it off. Who wants everything to be over?”

“Except they say that dying’s just the start of another, even more interesting journey.”

“Who does? People who haven’t died yet, that’s who.”

He shakes his head. “No, the angels do.”

And then I remember what he told me about them. “You’re going on,” I say. “You’re going to get them to show you the way.”

“I’m scared to, but I know it’s what I should do. I mean, really, what’s left for me here? All I do is haunt the same stupid school I hated when I was alive.”

“Yeah, but—”

“But I just didn’t want to do it by myself. I know we’re not really friends, but you’re pretty much the closest thing I’ve got. That’s why I asked you to come.”

Which is so sad that I don’t know what to say.

“Do you mind?” he asks.

“No. I guess not. I mean, I’m flattered that you asked.”

“If it’s too freaky, I understand.”

“No,” I say with more certainty. “I can do this for you. And I do think of you as a friend. You pissed me off some, but we’re still talking, right?”

“I should warn you, this is going to get a little weird.”

“Anamithim
weird?”

“No. It’s just that when an angel shows up, the world changes a bit. It ... becomes
less,
you could say. There’s hardly any sound, and everything goes black and white like an old movie.”

“Ho-kay.”

“But it’s not dangerous.”

“Go for it,” I tell him. “I won’t wig out on you.”

He turns into the next alleyway and stops when we’ve walked halfway down it.

“This is where your angel lives?” I have to ask.

“No, it’s just a quiet place, out of the way. I have to call him to me now—I just need to say his name three times. He said he wouldn’t come to me again, no matter how much I called to him, but I’m hoping he will this one last time.”

So he does just that. Calls out this name, “John Narraway,” three times.

Nothing happens.

“Maybe,” he says, “you could call with me?”

“Doing that isn’t going to get me all tangled up in some new fairy-tale weirdness, is it? Because trust me, I’ve learned my lesson.”

“The angels aren’t like that,” he says. “They can’t even harm ghosts like me. All they can do is try to convince us that it’s time for us to go on, and they wouldn’t bother with you, because you’re still alive.”

“Okay. I’ll give it a shot.”

Adrian gives us a count so we can start at the same time, and then we call the angel’s name, “John Narraway,” which is way more prosaic than I would have expected. I’m thinking Gabriel. Now there’s a good angel name. Or maybe Raphael, though wasn’t he also a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle? Jared would know.

We repeat the name. Do it a third time.

I wait a few moments, then turn to Adrian. I’m about to say something like how we gave it a shot, but it looks like the angel’s a no-show and maybe we should just try again some other time, only that’s when it comes creeping up on us.

It’s night, and it’s already quiet, but there’s no mistaking this silence for anything natural. I’m looking at the far end of the alley and as I watch, the yellowy glow of the streetlight loses its color, which is way eerier than you might think it would be, considering everything’s pretty much black and white at night anyway. You don’t realize how much color the night holds until it all goes away.

I turn at the sound of footsteps.

He looks like an ordinary guy, nothing special, except he’s carrying a fiddle case. Almost middle-aged; just a little older than Mom, I’d guess. He has one of those totally nondescript faces that you’d never think about again, once you turn away, but he does have this stern look down really well. He takes one look at me, then turns his attention to Adrian. “Thanks for coming this one last time,” Adrian says. The angel gives a brusque nod. I can tell there’s bad feeling between them, but I don’t want to know about it. I’ve decided to turn a new leaf and totally be the mind-your-own-business girl. At least when it comes to this kind of thing. You know, angels and ghosts and blue girls, oh my. “What is she doing here?” the angel says.

“I asked her to see me off.”

“Don’t worry,” I say. “I won’t get in the way.”

He looks at me again. “How can you see me? Only the dead can see us.”

Oh, that’s just great.

“I’d better still be alive,” I tell Adrian, “or I’m really going to punch you.” I turn to the angel, and add, “The dead can punch each other, right?”

“This is Imogene,” Adrian says.

The angel nods. “I see. The one who—”

“Sent the
anamithim
packing,” Adrian finishes for him. Except, from the look on the angel’s face, that’s not what
he
was about to say.

“But that’s impossible,” the angel says.

“Impossible
pretty much sums up Imogene.”

As the angel gives me a considering look, I try to decide if I should take Adrian’s comment as a compliment.

“I see what you mean,” the angel says before I can make up my mind. He returns his attention to Adrian, and adds, “So you’re really ready?”

Adrian nods. “And Imogene can come, right?”

“If she sent a crowd of
anamithim
packing, how could
I
stop her?”

“Hello?” I say. “I’m standing right here. Maybe you could include me in the conversation instead of just talking about me?”

The angel smiles. “Of course. Follow me.”

He sets off back down the alley. Adrian reaches for my hand. I hesitate—I mean, what’s there to hold on to?— except when I put my hand out to his, real fingers curl around mine.

“What’s going on here?” I ask as we fall in step behind the angel. “How come I can feel your hand?”

“This is a borderworld,” the angel says over his shoulder. “Spirits have more substance in a place such as this.”

Weird. But these days, what isn’t?

*    *    *

It’s a totally disconcerting walk we take. I recognize where we are most of the time, but it’s all black and white, and everything’s silent except for our footsteps and a faint hum like a wind coming from a few streets over. There’s no one else around—I mean,
no one.
Not a late-night straggler. Not a cab or a police cruiser.

I’m about to ask how much farther we have to go, when we turn a corner and my gaze is pulled to the far end of this new street. I no longer know where we are, and
for sure
I’ve never seen anything like this before. It’s an immense stone archway, rearing twenty or thirty feet high, and between its pillars, the air shimmers like a heat mirage. There are all kinds of colors in that light that you don’t see at first. It seems mostly gold, but then you realize the gold is flecked with every other color you can imagine and some that I don’t even think are supposed to be in the spectrum that can be seen by the human eye. But I can see them right now.

“Wow,” I say.

It just gets more amazing, the closer we get. And here’s a funny thing. When the gate is finally looming right over us, everything that’s touched by the light regains its normal color. There’s sound, too, but now it’s this indescribable low resonating hum that I can feel in my chest, like when a bass guitar’s turned up way loud. Only this is a constant sound, so I feel like I’m vibrating in time with it.

I turn to look at Adrian, but I’m not sure he’s seeing and feeling what I am because he’s got this scared look in his eyes.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

He nods. “You know, seeing your courage back at the school the other night is what’s given me the courage to do this.”

I want to say, I wish everybody’d stop talking about how brave and smart and everything I’m supposed to be. What happened on Halloween was just dumb luck. But I know he needs to go through these gates, and I know his thinking I’m brave is what’s letting him believe he can do this. So I just squeeze his hand, then draw him close for a hug.

“Send me a postcard,” I say.

“Yeah, I ...”

He hugs me back, then steps away. He looks from me to the angel.

“So I just walk through?” he asks.

The angel nods.

Adrian turns back to me. I can’t read what’s in his eyes anymore. The light coming through the gates is reflecting too strongly in them.

“I like to pretend,” he says, “that if I hadn’t died  ...  you know, if we’d met when I was alive ... we might have been friends.”

“Absolutely,” I tell him.

He looks like he’s got something else to say, but then he just smiles and walks away, into the light.

There’s a flare as he steps through, so bright that it leaves me blinking with the afterflash. I hear a joyous sound. Then he’s gone, and I find I have what feels like this big hole in my chest and I’m crying. I don’t even know why.

“It’s always hardest for those who must stay behind,” the angel says.

But that’s not it. I’m not sad that he’s really dead now, or that I’ll miss him, even though I’ve got this empty feeling inside. I’m not sad at all, really, or if I am, it’s a bittersweet kind of sadness. It’s thinking of him living by himself for all those years, a lonely ghost in a school he hated, with no companions except for the mean-spirited fairies who were responsible for his death in the first place. He went through all of that, when he could have had this.

I wipe my eyes on the sleeve of my sweater and look at the angel. The residue of the bright flash is pretty much gone, and I can see properly again.

“Whatever,” I say.

“You are an interesting individual,” he tells me. “You’re so very
here,
so very present. And you certainly take all of this very much in stride.”

“After the week I just had,” I tell him, “this seems almost normal.” But then I look at the gate again. “Well, except for that ...”

I turn away again to look at him, because that’s way easier.

“You’re not exactly my picture of an angel,” I say. “I’m not an angel. I just help the lost dead to move on.”

“Like on that show
Dead Like Me
.”

“We don’t get television here—”

“It’s on cable, anyway.”

“—and I doubt it’s anything the same.”

“So how you’d get the job?”

“I was like your friend Adrian. I wasn’t ready to go on. But then, when I was ready, I realized it was more important to help others overcome their fears.”

“How’d you die?”

“I was hit by a car.”

I don’t really know what to say, so I just nod.

He goes on. “I think it’s always harder for those of us who were taken before our time. You know, suddenly, in an accident.”

Like diving off the roof of a school, I think.

“We don’t accept what’s happened,” he explains, “and so we aren’t ready to move on.”

“I get it.”

“Well, no offense,” he says, “but I hope we never see each other again.”

I smile. “I plan to be an old, old lady before I go.”

“I hope that works out for you.”

He steps up to me and puts his hand on the top of my head. Before I can back off, or ask him what he thinks he’s doing, I have this moment of vertigo—like when Pelly took me traveling through the back of the closet—and the next thing I know, I’m in my room, standing at the window.

Like it was all a dream, except I’m still dressed in my jeans and sweater.

Okay, I think. That was weird. Maybe the weirdest thing yet out of all of this.

I check my reflection in the dresser mirror.

Still blue-skinned and blue-haired.

Maybe I should dye my hair orange before I go to school. I mean, if you’re going to stand out, you might as well
really
stand out.

Instead, I get ready for bed.

Lying there, I think about that light that Adrian walked into. I think about people dying, lost and alone like he did. I think about all the people who are like him right now, living somewhere, all by themselves, no friends, no family. Maybe not even a home. Just a cardboard box in some doorway.

There’s a lot worse things than being a blue girl.

I want to go into Mom’s and Jared’s bedrooms and tell them I love them, but they’ll just think I’m weird, waking them up at, what? I look at the bedside clock—three in the morning. I can’t call Maxine either because I’d probably wake her mom.

But there is someone I can call.

I dial Thomas’s number. He’s got a roommate, but their bedrooms are on opposite sides of their apartment. The phone rings a couple of times on his end before his sleepy voice comes on the line.