Authors: Nikki Jefford
Gray waited across the hall for the dismissal bell to ring.
She folded her arms over her chest and stared down any classmate who dared glance her way, including Shay Baxter. Once Nolan walked out with her bag she dropped her arms. He smiled as he crossed the hall and handed the bag over.
“Thanks, I couldn’t go back in there,” Gray said.
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Um.” Nolan looked at his feet.
“Just kidding,” Gray said. “God, that was humiliating.”
Nolan swept his bangs back. “What happened? You’ve never had trouble speaking French before.”
“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Gray said, staring down the hall. “I don’t know French. Well, besides
bonjour
,
oui,
and now
pourquoi
.” She looked at Nolan. “Do you think there’s a spell for instant language fluency?”
Nolan’s brows jumped. He looked around quickly and stepped closer to Gray. “Maybe we shouldn’t be talking about that around here.”
Gray stared him in the eyes. What she really wanted was to tell him she was back. If Charlene could tell Ryan, Gray ought to be allowed to tell Nolan. The hallway probably wasn’t the right place to do it. Nolan already looked startled that she’d addressed him at all. Was Charlene that intimidating? And he’d all but had an epileptic fit when she mentioned the word
magic
in public. Imagine his reaction if she did something really crazy like go invisible?
Gray instantly thought of Raj. He delighted in magical misbehavior. But McKenna was still an unsolved mystery. Why had he run after her one day and ignored her the next? Maybe Charlene had scared him off. It wasn’t like she could ask her. Well, she could write her questions down in Charlene’s designated communications notebook.
But Gray didn’t want to bring up Raj with Charlene. Some questions were better left unanswered.
Nolan Knapp suddenly seemed feeble-minded compared to Raj. Live a little. That was Gray’s philosophy since dying, anyway. She lifted her chin. “Have I said something to make you uncomfortable? My, what a good little warlock you are.”
She saw his frown deepen, whether at being called a warlock in public or the obvious set down she couldn’t be sure. “
Merci
for the assistance with my bag.”
Hey, she knew a fifth French word.
Gray turned on her heel and walked away before Nolan could answer. She wanted to believe that her snooty words were all part of the act she was putting on, but the truth was Nolan had frustrated her.
As promised, Ryan appeared in two more of her classes. Before the day was out Gray had been groped no less than ten times by Blake, gotten slapped on the ass by Pete Sutherland (just how many guys was her sister sleeping with at school?), endured Brittany and Kiki’s mean-spirited blather, and worst yet, had nothing but a chocolate Slim Fast for lunch. At least Blake spent lunch with his homeboys. If he’d tried to feel her up in the cafeteria, Gray would’ve been way too tempted to throw the shake in his face.
Speaking of the boyfriend, he was waiting for her after the last bell rang. Gray had to turn her back to him to get inside Charlene’s locker and Blake took that opportunity to run his hand down her back and hover over her ass.
His hand didn’t linger long before he began scratching at his head. The smile on Gray’s face was hidden with her head inside the locker. So maybe she’d given Blake a slight case of the itchies across that thick skull of his. She couldn’t exactly slap him across the face. Not unless she wanted Charlene to murder her in her sleep.
Her smile expanded. Charlene couldn’t touch her.
Gray shut her locker and pushed past Blake. “Hey,” he said, falling into step beside her and sliding an arm around her waist. “Wanna come over… maybe fool around?” He pulled her against his side.
“Sorry, Blake, I have plans.”
He stopped abruptly. “With who?”
“Myself.”
Blake grinned slowly. “Oh, yourself, huh?” He began poking her in different places. “And what do you have planned for yourself. A little rub and poke?”
“Blake, stop it!” Gray stomped her foot on the ground as she spoke.
Without warning, Blake stopped and sighed. “All right, what’d I do now?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why don’t you just tell me so I can stop guessing?”
Gray followed the movements of students in their rain coats exiting the building. If only she could be so lucky. She turned to Blake and tried to speak in her most convincing voice. “You didn’t do anything. I just have plans, okay?”
“Right,” he said, straightening up. “Fine. See you tomorrow.”
Yeah, and why don’t you go fuck Jenna Hocking?
Okay, where did that come from? It wasn’t like Blake was Gray’s boyfriend. But he was cheating on her sister. Her cheating sister. Ugh, Gray was stuck inside Charlene’s own sleazy high school soap opera. Maybe this was hell.
What she needed was to get her body back.
“Hey, Mom,” Gray said from Charlene’s cell phone.
“Gray.” Mom’s voice lifted on her name. “How was school?”
“Trippy.”
“Are you on your way home?”
“Actually I’m headed to the cemetery.”
Silence.
“Mom?”
“Yeah,” she said quietly. “I’m here.”
“Where’s my body?”
“Your body?”
“Where am I buried?” Yeah, so the words sounded weird to her, too.
“At St. Ann’s Cemetery. Next to your father. I wanted you to be next to family.” Mom’s voice cracked. “Come home first and we’ll go together.”
“This is something I want to do on my own.”
What did one bring to her own gravesite? Flowers? Trinkets… A shovel?
Gray parked on the road outside St. Ann’s Cemetery and trudged through the iron gates. Cemeteries had always seemed like such a waste of good parkland, but today Gray was relieved her body was encased in a box below the earth rather than incinerated.
Her steps slowed along the paved path. She hadn’t been to see her father’s grave in a couple of years. She used to visit on his birthday and Father’s Day. Couldn’t accuse her of neglecting to pay her respects anymore. Now her body was a few feet from his. A corpse for company.
Dad’s gravesite was on the other side of a big oak.
To Gray’s annoyance, there was a figure lingering in the area of her gravesite. This was a private matter. As she neared, she saw the figure wasn’t just in the vicinity of her resting place—he stood right in front of it. At least the entire world hadn’t moved on without her. At least there was someone who hadn’t forgotten about her—even if that someone was Raj McKenna.
For a moment she considered making herself invisible. Given her surroundings, it felt too creepy and oddly disrespectful toward the dead. But god, it was tempting, especially when Gray saw Raj take an object out of his pocket, set it on her tombstone, then snatch it away when he caught her movement from the corner of his eye.
Gray walked up beside him. “Boo.”
Gray may have been smiling, but Raj certainly wasn’t. His anger gave her the chills. It wasn’t as though she’d caught him doing anything embarrassing like crying. No, McKenna looked every bit as badass as Gray remembered him. He wore a black jacket over a pair of tight dark jeans. Like the ones in her dream.
Gray shook the thought away and nodded toward her grave. “Didn’t figure you as the sentimental sort, McKenna.”
“Funny, I was just thinking the same thing about you.” Raj gave her a look of pure loathing. “What do you want, Charlene?”
Gray’s smile widened. “I’m not Charlene.”
Raj folded his arms over his chest. “Oh, you’re not, are you? Someone put you under a spell again?”
Gray nodded. “I am under a spell—a resurrection spell gone wrong.”
Raj’s mouth was tight. His expression made Gray want to laugh. He wanted to believe it so bad. She could see the begging in his eyes. Raj probably never dreamed he’d meet a resurrected soul. It’d blow his mind. Forget the invisibility spell. That was a card trick in comparison.
“Don’t believe me?” Gray asked cheerfully.
“No,” Raj said. The word came out as a faint whisper. He wasn’t glaring at her any longer.
Gray circled her grave, coming to a stop in front of the headstone.
Graylee Perez
Forever In Our Hearts
November 7, 1993—February 9, 2011
She lowered herself to the ground and lay down, her head barely touching the tombstone.
Raj watched her warily. “What are you doing?”
Cold seeped from the earth into Gray. Goosebumps scattered over her bare legs. She closed her eyes. “Maybe if I concentrate hard enough I can transfer myself back inside my body.”
Raj folded his arms. “And then what? Claw your way up to the surface?”
Her eyes popped open. “So you believe me?”
“I don’t know.”
“What if I made myself invisible?”
“You and your sister could both know that spell.”
Gray sat up. “You think Charlene’s as powerful a witch as me?”
“No.” Raj reached his hand down and Gray took it.
“Better not,” she said, dusting potential bits of grass off her backside. “Ah-ha!” she said suddenly. “You and I were in the hallway together when there was that mini earthquake last we… er, a couple months ago.”
“Yeah,” Raj said slowly. “How come you look like Charlene?”
Gray laughed. “How come I look like my identical twin sister?”
“You know what I mean,” Raj said, waving his hand over Gray. “Makeup. Hair. Skirt.”
Gray glanced down at the pleated miniskirt. “I know, right? What a hussy.” Raj didn’t return her grin. “What’s the matter, McKenna? Aren’t you happy to see me?” Gray would’ve thought Raj would show a little more pizzazz.
“It’s really you?” he asked in the same somber tone.
“It’s really me. Well, sorta. This is Charlene’s body. I guess mine’s still buried six feet deep.” Gray glanced down and kicked at the damp grass. She chuckled. “Caught in the ol’ casket. Nothing but a bag of bones.” She noticed the tight frown over Raj’s face. “What?”
“It’s not funny.”
“Just trying to lighten the mood with a bit of comic relief. How do you think I feel knowing my corpse is rotting in the earth?”
“Is that what went wrong with the resurrection spell—you were put inside Charlene’s body?”
Jeez, he was all business.
“Worse. We’re stuck sharing this body, fifty/fifty. I get it every other day.”
“When does the switch happen?”
“At three every morning. My mom thinks that’s when I died.”
“Have you tried staying up for the switch?”
“Of course. I stayed awake Sunday night into Monday morning. I watched the time change.”
“And what happened?”
“Nothing happened. I thought I’d found a loophole, but then I woke my mom up and she said it was Tuesday morning—THIS morning.”
“So it’s really you?” Raj asked again.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
“Good.” Raj put his hands in both pockets.
Gray followed the movement with her eyes. “What was that you put on my grave?”
“Nothing.”
“I saw you start to put something on my tombstone. I want to know what it was.” Gray took a step closer and reached for Raj’s pocket. He grabbed her wrist before she could dig inside his pants for the mystery object then secured her second wrist. She writhed under his grasp and Raj tightened his hold.
“Keep your hands to yourself, Perez.”
Gray nearly laughed. After being groped all day by Blake, Raj was telling
her
to keep her hands to herself? “What’s the deal, McKenna? You were about to give me some trinket, anyway. Do I only get it if I’m dead?”
Raj released her and took a step back. The pained look on his face made Gray instantly regret the taunt. “I meant to give it to you earlier.” He stared directly into her eyes. His eyes nearly touched his dark brows. It made him look mysterious and somber. Eyes like those could hypnotize you. “A couple days after you… died.”
“Valentine’s Day?” Gray wasn’t sure she’d heard correctly.
Raj began studying the ground awfully close.
Gray suddenly understood Raj’s fascination with the ground. The grass in the cemetery was obnoxiously green. Probably from all the human fertilizer below.
“Want to get out of here?” Raj asked.
Gray glanced sideways at her grave then nodded. “I don’t think lying in the damp grass above my grave is going to solve my problem.”