Jump When Ready (3 page)

Wouldn’t you think I’d have had bad dreams about drowning
and getting shoved out of giant trees? I would have thought so too, but the
only dream I remember from that first night was the one about Bethany.

In the dream, Bethany was running through a field, her
eyes wide with fear. She kept looking over her shoulder like something was
chasing her. Wherever she was, it was either early morning or sunset, the
sunlight flickering through trees on the horizon. Bethany was breathing hard,
gasping and struggling to keep going. Then I heard the sound of someone’s feet
pounding the earth behind her. Getting closer. I couldn’t see who it was.

“Bethany!” I called out.

She didn’t hear me.

“Bethany, stop!”

Bethany kept running.

I shouted her name again and finally she stopped. She
turned in my direction. “Henry?”

But it wasn’t Bethany’s voice. I opened my eyes to find
that I was still alone in my imagined bedroom.

“Henry, you should probably wake up now.” It was the same
girl I’d heard the day before, although I couldn’t tell where her voice was
coming from. “I’m Naomi, by the way. We’ll meet shortly. When you feel ready,
please step outside.”

I was definitely curious to meet someone other than Jamie
and Nikki, to put faces to the other voices I’d heard. At the same time, I
couldn’t shake off that dream.

“Did I mention there’s a meeting?” Naomi said. “It’s
about you.”

What could I do with that but get out of bed? As soon as
I did, the bed disappeared. So did the house. I stood outside under the same
gray sky, but at least I wasn’t back up in the tree again. It was drizzling
rain, more a foggy mist than anything I felt against my skin. I looked around
and into the surrounding forest. It seemed like I was totally alone.

“Ready?”

I looked in the direction of Naomi’s voice and saw a
giant yellow butterfly fluttering nearby.

“Sure, I guess.” It made as much sense as anything to
talk to the butterfly. The butterfly dipped in its flight, as if nodding. Then
it flitted off, leaving me alone again for a moment.

Jamie appeared first from out of the mist. “Just guessing
you might be feeling kind of disoriented. True?”

“Well, yeah. My house just disappeared, and it wasn’t
even my house.”

Jamie laughed. “That kind of thing can get to you at
first. Sleep okay?”

 I tried not to think about the dream, the terror in
Bethany’s eyes as she’d tried to outrun whoever had been chasing her. I told
myself that it was just a dream, nothing more. “Not bad, all things
considered,” I said.

 “Okay, then here we go.”

One by one, the others appeared, as if the vapor in the
air collected to form people. Nikki appeared next to Jamie, dressed the same as
yesterday but wearing ballet slippers instead of roller skates. Just behind
Nikki stood a lanky girl with blonde hair. She wore a plaid yellow dress and
knee socks, something I’d only seen in old movies or TV shows about the 1950s.
She looked to be around ten, maybe a little older.

Somehow I just knew. “Naomi?”

The girl smiled. “Hello.”

Next to her stood a kid who looked about fifteen or
sixteen. He wore a black leather jacket and jeans rolled up at the cuffs over
muddy boots. His hair was combed back and held in place with some sort of gel.

“Are you Simon?”

Simon nodded. “Hey, mate. Don’t suppose you’ve got a fag
on you?”

I had no idea what he meant by that. I looked to Jamie,
thinking I must have heard wrong.

“English slang for cigarette,” Jamie said, “from the
sixties. As you might have already guessed, Simon’s a bit of a twit. English
slang for idiot.”

Simon raised his hands in confusion. “What?”

“Dude, he drowned. Don’t you think any cigarettes would
have gotten wet? Also, why would it matter? You don’t smoke, but if you did you
could imagine your own.”

“Just asking. Kind of an icebreaker sort of thing where I
was from.”

“Okay, sure. I guess it must have been the thing to do,”
Jamie said, but he wasn’t looking at Simon anymore.

Behind the other four, someone else had just appeared. A
tall guy with long red hair who remained standing back in the fog. His narrowed
green eyes met mine, cold and hard, until I looked back at Jamie.

“And that’s Curtis,” Jamie said. “Curtis, this is Henry.
New arrival.”

Curtis didn’t say anything. He just kept staring at me.

“What’s up with him,” I whispered.

Jamie winced. I had no idea why since I didn’t yet know
the Rules. For example, whispering at a meeting had no effect since everyone
there had the right to hear what was being said.

“Tell him what’s up with me,” Curtis said.

Jamie sighed. “Not now, okay, Curtis? He just got here.”

“I realize that. Hence this delightful meeting. But I
showed up, so I can go now. That’s the Rule.”

“Fair enough,” Jamie said. “You did what you had to.
Nothing more, as usual.”

Curtis smirked scornfully. “We do what’s required. The
rest doesn’t matter, obviously. One of these days, years or decades you’ll
figure that out.”

“Or maybe you’re wrong,” Jamie said. “Thanks for coming.”

“Whatever.” Curtis turned and started walking. He spoke
over his shoulder. “Tell the River Rat he got at least one thing right. The
rain that came with him. Suits this place.”

The fog swirled in around Curtis and he disappeared.

 An uncomfortable silence followed and we stood there
shuffling our feet. I got the feeling Curtis was always tough to be around. So,
I figured I might as well jump-start things by asking a question.

“What did he mean by me bringing the rain with me?”

“Not to mention the fog,” Naomi said. “Which, I have to
say, does interfere a little with my butterflying. But that’s okay, I don’t
really mind for a while if it’s something you need.”

I had no idea what she meant.

“We’re cool with it for now,” Simon said. “We can dig it.
Not so keen on the rain, though. Kind of reminds me of London that last summer
when me mum and I—”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Nikki said. “Please use modern
English. Or French. Or Hindi. Who cares? Just stop acting like you just got—”

“What Nikki is trying to say,” Jamie said, turning to
face Nikki, “is that we all bring certain habits or cultural traits with us.
It’s totally natural that we hang on to them for a while.”

“Try losing the kimono,” Simon muttered under his breath.
“You grew up in California.”

“How about you lose your head,” Nikki shot back at him.

Simon shrugged. “Wouldn’t really matter.”

Nikki narrowed her eyes. “I’ll find a way to make it
matter.”

Simon looked at the ground, which gave me the feeling
Nikki could make good on her promise.

Naomi stepped forward. “Please, everyone. Henry is new
here and this is his meeting. This is never easy, not for anyone.”

A quiet voice spoke from behind her. It took me a moment
to realize it was Nikki.

“True,” she said, softly.

“But he has to know,” Simon said.

“Yes, he does.” Jamie looked at the others. “Everyone
going?”

They all nodded.

Jamie turned to me. “Ready?”

“Yeah, I guess.” I had no idea what I was getting ready
for but whatever it was didn’t sound like fun.

Naomi did her best to smile, but I could tell that her
soul wasn’t butterflying. “We all get through it,” she said. “It’s basically
the bee’s knees from there, okay?”

“I was just thinking,” Nikki said. “How about I catch up
with all of you later?”

Jamie stared at her. “We should be there for him.”

Nikki glared back. “You know I hate this.”

“Everyone hates this. Not exactly happy stuff. Ready,
everyone?”

I waited, thinking the others were supposed to respond.
But I guess they didn’t have to since suddenly everything around me
disappeared.

I’m Looking
Through You

I don’t know about you, but being in church always made me
think about being dead someday. Like I said before, death just wasn’t something
I’d wanted to spend my time thinking about. Ironic, I know. Still, I guess
that’s half the point of going to church, when you think about it. Church is
where you learn that if you act good in life, death will be good to you. More
or less. And then there’s the “death is part of life” thing. Everyone needs to
learn about that too. Like when you were five and your parents told you that your
dead goldfish, hamster (or possibly grandmother) was now in a better place.
Church basically supports that whole idea. But death is not really part of
life. Let’s face it, death means the end of life—at least, whatever life you
were living at the time. What follows is a totally different deal. Take it from
me. I know.

Either way, what I never imagined was being both dead and
in church. But that’s exactly where I found myself. What made the situation
even more confusing was that I still felt completely alive. It wasn’t like I
could see through my hand or anything like that. I wasn’t transparent like in
some cheesy movie. I even felt the floor beneath my feet. What I couldn’t wrap
my brain around was how I’d managed to plant my feet on this particular floor
without going anywhere first. One minute before I’d been standing outside in a
cool gray place with a bunch of freaky kids and then, pop, here we now stood.

Oh, there was one other weird thing. Actually, really
weird.

See, across the room, near the altar, in the coffin…

Right, you guessed it.

Me.

I didn’t look all that great either. My head rested on a
purple satin pillow and my hands lay folded against my chest, which I know
sounds okay, but you could see from a mile off that I wasn’t just taking a nap.
I’ll spare you the morbid details but there was nothing to be done now about my
skin with Clearasil. Even a zit wouldn’t be surviving on that face anymore.

Then I realized I’d only spent the one night being
dead—okay, sure, “between lives”—and here I was at my funeral.

I turned to Jamie. “Am I seeing the future or something?
This couldn’t be happening already.” I felt briefly hopeful, like this might be
some sort of Ebenezer Scrooge opportunity. Maybe if I just said the right
words—promised to be a better son, brother, student or something—I’d go back to
my old life.

“Sorry,” Jamie said. “This is now. It’s just—”

“But it takes time to plan a funeral, right? Wouldn’t I
have had to be gone for more like a week or something?”

Jamie nodded. “Close. Actually, you’ve been gone six
days. Earth time.” He turned to look at me. “I know, it’s confusing at first.
The whole time being different thing. Sometimes a day is a day and sometimes,
well, it’s not. You needed to sleep. Most of us do at first. In your case, it looks
like you slept for almost a week.”

“A week?” The most I’d ever managed before was sleeping
until noon. Now that I thought about it, why would I need to sleep if I was
dead? But then why did we sleep when we were alive? The last I heard, no one
really understood why that was either.

“Like I said, almost a week,” Jamie said. “No biggie. Are
you doing okay so far?”

“I guess. I’m not really sure.” Then something occurred
to me and I pointed toward the coffin. “Do I…?” I couldn’t quite bring myself
to ask.

Jamie shook his head. “You look fine. Actually, you can
appear anyway you’d like. Really, it’s up to you.”

I was about to ask about that when suddenly the music
started, the usual droning organ music you hear in church, but now it seemed
even more depressing (something I’d imagined impossible). Behind the music, I
heard people whispering as they waited for the service to start.

Then I saw my family.

They sat in the front pew, staring straight ahead. Tears
ran down my mother’s face while my father kept his arm around her shoulders.
John clenched his jaw the way he did when he didn’t want you to know he was in
pain. Bethany kept taking deep breaths while dabbing at her eyes with a tissue.
They looked terrible, exhausted, each of them pale with dark circles under
bloodshot eyes.

In that moment, it became real to me. Maybe I was between
lives, whatever that meant, but to them I was nothing but dead. Dead and gone.
Our family was broken and I’d made it happen. I had to tell them I was okay,
that I was right there next to them! I started toward them—ready to call out,
to try anything to get their attention—but in that same instant, I suddenly
realized something else. It felt like the world stopped.

The whispering—all those hushed words going on around me.
I could hear them. All I had to do was look at someone to hear perfectly.

Behind my parents, I saw my father’s brother, Uncle
Richard, sitting next to Aunt Anita. They must have flown down from New York
just for my funeral.

 “God, it’s such a shame,” he said. “Do you think it
could be true?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’d like to think it can’t
be.”

Another row back, Uncle Mike whispered to Aunt Jenny.
“The kid was messed up. All those black clothes, the earrings and the purple
hair. You could see something like this coming.”

“This is not the time,” she said. “We’ll talk about it
later.”

Next to them, my cousin Jeff leaned in toward his sister,
Lisa. “Henry was totally weird,” he whispered. “All depressed looking. Those
are always the kids who do this kind of thing.”

“I know,” Lisa said. “When did he get on the bus to Emo
town?”

I don’t know what was more confusing, the words I heard
people saying or the fact that I could actually hear them. Neither seemed to
make any sense. To be sure it wasn’t some sort of weird coincidence, I looked
to the back of the church where two ushers stood by the entrance—two old guys
I’d never seen before.

“It’s really sad,” one guy said. “Only fourteen years
old.”

“Probably something going on with him,” the other one
said. “You have to feel bad for his family.”

Until that moment, I’d been hoping it was only Nikki and
Jamie who’d thought I might have drowned myself on purpose. But obviously some
people here were also convinced I’d committed suicide. How could they possibly
think that about me? So, I’d dressed in black a lot. Streaked my hair purple
for the heck of it. What kind of stereotype crap was this?

Then something horrible occurred to me. What did my
family think?

Suddenly, it made sense why I’d been shown those scenes
from my life. My parents had been worried about me before I died. They’d been
wondering what was up with me and now they’d never be sure. As far as they
knew, I could have been seriously depressed. They couldn’t know if there had
been some dark secret dragging me down.

Somehow, I had to make sure they knew it was an accident.
I waved my arms. I jumped up and down, my feet pounding the floor. “Mom, Dad,
I’m right here! Bethany, John, it’s me! Look!”

But they couldn’t hear me. They couldn’t see me. To them,
I was invisible, nonexistent. Not yet forgotten, but definitely gone.

I didn’t know yet that most people between lives can
never manage to make themselves seen by the living. This talent, I later
learned, is the rarest of all when it comes to interacting with those existing
in the other realm.

I ran to where they were and stood directly in front of
them. “Come on, guys! I’m not dead! Well, I mean, I am, but not like you
think.” I pointed at the coffin. “I’m not there, that isn’t me!” I drummed my
hands on the wooden rail in front of their pew. “I’m right here! Look!”

Given the noise I should have been making, I expected the
entire church to be staring back at me. Nothing. The crowd sat waiting. My
mother remained crying and my father had closed his eyes, his head dropping in
sadness. John stared into the distance, his expression vacant.

But Bethany was looking right at me, her head cocked like
she was listening.

I waved my arms frantically. “Bethany, can you hear me?
Can you see me?”

Here’s why some poor souls keep trying for centuries even
when they know it’s almost impossible to make contact with people on the other
side. Because every so often someone can sense the “nonliving” person being
there, despite everything they’ve been taught to believe about what’s real and
what supposedly isn’t. Sometimes they might even hear something you say, and on
even rarer occasions see you.

But I didn’t know any of that yet. All I knew was that
Bethany squinted, her brow furrowed. She leaned forward and stared right at me.
Or through me. I couldn’t tell. Still, she definitely seemed aware of me being
there.

I started laughing, feeling happier than I’d ever
imagined feeling again. “Bethany, you know I’m here! I can tell! Look, you need
to tell Mom and—”

The pastor’s voice rang out across the room. “Dear family
and friends. We have gathered here today to express our love and sympathy for
the Connors family on this sad occasion.”

Everyone in the church brought their attention to the
altar, including Bethany. A moment before, she’d been focused right on me and
now she looked away as if nothing had happened.

I tried waving my arms again. “Bethany, wait! Come on,
please look at me!”

But she didn’t and the pastor kept saying things I wasn’t
ready to hear. Suddenly, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I jumped, thinking it
might have been the hand of someone still living. Instead, I turned to see
Jamie.

“They can’t see you,” he said. “I know it hurts, but they
can’t. They can’t hear you either.”

“But my sister, she heard me. Or saw me. Something—I’m
not sure.”

Jamie shook his head. “She couldn’t have. I’m sorry, but
she can’t.”

I looked past him to make eye contact with the other
three people who actually could see me—Nikki, Naomi and Simon, their sad
expressions showing they knew what I was going through. Nikki kept her eyes on
mine a few seconds longer than the others and it seemed like she was about to
say something. But if something was on her mind, she kept it to herself. After
a moment, she also looked away.

When I turned back to my family, they looked right
through me. I might as well have been a ghost.