“Then who did?” she asks.
“Must be Jas—” Margot begins, but I interrupt.
“Jasper, why don’t you help me organize the shelves?” I ask.
Jasper smiles. He’s missing one of his front teeth, and his tongue pokes through the hole. He joins me at the huge bookshelves covering this side of the living room and instantly starts tugging books off the shelves.
“Try not to lose any of them,” Margot says. I stick my tongue out at her, and she grins and winks.
“Ignore her,” I tell Jasper, leaning down to press a kiss to his head. After Dad left and Mom started picking up extra shifts, I spent most evenings taking care of him. He was so small then, all curls and big green eyes. He still comes into my room when he has nightmares.
Jasper turns around, blowing a raspberry at Margot.
“I’m ignoring you,” he says pointedly.
As Margot opens her mouth with what will definitely be a scathing response, Paige interrupts her, hoisting up a box labeledFragile.
“Margot. Box. Dining room. Now.” Paige makes a clicking sound with her tongue at Margot, who scrunches her nose but obliges, hefting the box into her arms.
“Has anyone even had a meal in that dining room?” Margot asks.
A lot of this house is excessive, clearly for aesthetic and not ordinary use. Intricate doorways and carved moldings, a dozendifferent wallpaper prints, and tall ceilings and windows give it a perpetual library feel.
A hundred years ago, it was probably grand, but today, it’s a hand gripping a lost time.
“Take it up with the architect,” Paige says. “Maybe it’s his ghost moving stuff around in protest.”
Margot grumbles and departs for the dining room.
Paige gives me a knowing smile. She’s always had this special ability to make anyone feel like they’re included—the one person intently listening in a group full of wandering ears.
“Have you ever used the dining room?” I ask.
Paige flashes me a grin. “No.” She looks at my brother, holding a hand to her lips. “But don’t tell Margot.”
Jasper disappears soon after Margot, presumably to the kitchen to dig through the pantry. To no one’s surprise, Margot never returns from the dining room.
Paige and I have made a significant dent in the boxes, at least in this room, by the time she calls it quits for the afternoon.
Margot might resent all the unpacking, especially for a move she protested, but I like the busywork. Having a task that requires enough brainpower to distract from anything else is keeping me sane.
I spent a few days in the hospital after the accident, then a few weeks at home, but with only two more months of the semester, Mom urged me back to school. Said it’d be a good way to get my mind off things.
Instead, I spent the remaining months walking through the halls alongside Harper’s ghost. She was everywhere. In photos inside my locker, in every teacher who accidentally called her name during morning attendance, and in the eyes of every person who looked at me.
All I saw when I looked around was her. And she was all anyone saw when they looked at me.
I thought Blackridge was far enough away, but I’m learning that some ghosts are harder to shake. They follow along, rattling like the cans on a newlywed couple’s car.
Paige drops onto the couch, and I sit on the opposite side, feet tucked beneath me.
“So,” Paige begins. “You know I have to ask.”
“You actually don’t.”
“Ah, but I’m going to,” she says, tossing an arm over the back of the couch. “How are you?”
I roll my eyes.
