by J. A. White
“Then why aren’t we high-fiving each other?” Agnes asked.
“Something’s wrong,” Cordelia said, wishing more than ever that she knew the boy’s name so she could call to him. “Won’t you please come out?”
The boy shook his head.
“I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s wrong,” Cordelia said. “Besides, I thought we were friends.”
The boy closed his eyes for a few moments, then took a step through the bookshelf and into the light. Cordelia clapped a hand to her mouth.
She could see straight through his body.
“What is it?” Agnes whispered. She looked frustrated and a little annoyed, as though Cordelia and Benji were having a conversation in a language she didn’t speak. “What’s going on?”
“He’s not as solid as he used to be,” Benji said.
Cordelia got down to one knee so she could be eye level with the boy. She wished she could wrap him in her arms.
“Did the men with the cart find you?”
The boy nodded.
“Did it hurt?”
He nodded again.
“I’m sorry I didn’t stop them,” Cordelia said. She scanned the library to make sure that Dr. Roqueni was nowhere in sight and then added, “But we’re going to get you out of this school and where you’re meant to be,” she whispered. “I promise.”
It was unseasonably warm for January—at least by New Hampshire standards—so recess was outside that day. Cordelia was headed toward the playground to meet Benji and Agnes when Francesca Calvino caught up with her and asked if she wanted to play four square on the blacktop. Cordelia had been lab partners with Francesca a few times, and they had gotten along well.
“Sorry,” Cordelia said. “I promised Benji and Agnes we’d hang out.”
“Can I tag along?” Francesca asked with a smile.
Cordelia cleared her throat awkwardly.
“It kind of just needs to be the three of us today,” she said. “Another time?”
“Sure,” Francesca said, jamming her hands into her pockets before heading toward the blacktop. Cordelia watched her walk away with a guilty feeling in the pit of her stomach. She hoped she hadn’t hurt Francesca’s feelings.
This would never happen if I was back in San Francisco, Cordelia thought. I could be friends with whoever I wanted and not worry about anything more complicated than passing math. And it can happen! All I have to do is ignore the ghosts.
It would be so easy. But even at eleven, Cordelia knew that the easy choices were seldom the right ones.
There must be another way.
Benji and Agnes were waiting for her on the swings. Cordelia scanned the area for potential eavesdroppers and then hopped up on the swing next to Benji. She had forgotten her gloves, and the chains were like icicles beneath her fingers.
“We have to figure out the boy’s Brightkey before it’s too late,” she said.
“But you’ve already tried everything,” Benji said.
“Obviously not,” Cordelia said. “I should start over from the beginning and be more methodical this time. Write things down. Make sure I don’t repeat myself.” She smiled at Agnes. “Like a scientist.”
“That’s a good idea,” Agnes said. “But aren’t we forgetting something? Dr. Roqueni said there would be consequences if you freed any more ghosts.”
“We should be okay as long as she doesn’t see us,” Cordelia said. “When the boy vanishes, she’ll just assume the snatchers got him.”
“I don’t think Dr. Roqueni is our main concern,” Agnes said. “What if sending the boy to his Bright gets the ghost snatchers mad? There might be another incident like the one in the lunchroom. Or they might go after you like they did with David Fisher!”
“The boy doesn’t have a lot of time left,” Cordelia said. “We have to risk it.”
Agnes turned to face her. She was too tall for the swing, and her feet dragged across the ground.
“I know it sounds harsh,” she said in a hesitant voice, “but ghosts aren’t meant to be in the living world. What if Dr. Roqueni’s uncle is right, and the snatchers are actually fulfilling an important function? Like—I don’t know—white blood cells that kill infections? It might be best to stay out of their way and let nature take its course.”
Cordelia couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“So we should just let them take the boy?”
“Maybe it only seems bad,” Agnes said. “We have no idea what happens after the ghosts vanish. For all we know, they go to their Brights!”
Cordelia’s cheeks, already flushed, grew redder still. Fear and frustration amplified her anger.
“That is the single dumbest thing I’ve ever heard!” she exclaimed. “There’s no way that the snatchers are sending ghosts to—”
“Chill, Cord,” Benji cut in, holding his hands up in a placating gesture. “We’re all on the same team here.” He turned to Agnes, who looked flustered. “I know you’re just trying to help, but trust me on this one: the ghost snatchers aren’t here to do anything good. My guess is that when they’re done peeling a ghost, it simply disappears altogether. No Bright for them. No anything. Which is kind of awful.”
“Exactly,” Cordelia said.
“But,” Benji said, spinning in her direction, “I do see Agnes’s point. All this trouble with the snatchers began because we messed around with the way Shadow School works. I want to help the boy—and the other ghosts too—but we need to be smart about this. Maybe there’s another solution we haven’t thought of yet.”
“There’s not enough time,” Cordelia said. “We need to save him!”
“You can’t save him,” Agnes snapped. “He’s already dead.”
Until this point, Cordelia had managed to rein in her temper, but now it broke free of its shackles with a vengeance. She hopped off the swing and jabbed her index finger in Agnes’s face.
“You wouldn’t say that if you could see him! But you can’t. You can’t see any of them! So why are you even part of this conversation? You don’t belong here!”
Agnes looked stunned but not surprised, as though Cordelia were confirming a long-held suspicion. Tears streamed from her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Agnes said. “I wish I could see them like you can. I don’t know why I can’t!”
Cordelia said nothing. Her outburst had popped her anger like a balloon, leaving behind nothing but a cold, mean feeling. She knew she should apologize. But she also knew she was right. To Agnes, this had always been a kind of science experiment. The ghosts weren’t real to her. She couldn’t see how lost they were, how helpless. She couldn’t see the fear in the boy’s eyes—as real as any living child.
“Cordelia?” Agnes asked in a pleading tone.
Cordelia stared down at the ground, not knowing what to say. After a few moments, Agnes ran off. Her empty swing rocked back and forth for a while and then finally came to a stop.
20
Room 314
Cordelia went to the library every morning to visit the boy. He seemed happy to see her, though his smile now possessed a bittersweet quality, as though he knew their time together would soon be coming to a close. Although the boy hesitantly came out of his hiding spot when Cordelia arrived, he was too frightened to leave the library. Any loud noise—the morning bell, a dropped book—would send him scurrying back behind the shelf.
If the ghost snatchers find him again, he’s done for, Cordelia thought. For the first time in her life, she felt the suffocating pressure of having someone else totally depend on her. The thought that she might fail the boy was scarier than anything else in Shadow School.
Despite Dr. Roqueni’s warning, Cordelia hadn’t given up trying to figure out the boy’s Brightkey. Glasses. Pajamas. Trains. She repeated the clues as she lay in bed each night, hoping this mantra would blossom into a solution while she slept.
Agnes would have a better chance figuring it out, she thought.
Unfortunately, the two girl
s hadn’t spoken since their falling out. Benji thought they were both being stubborn and unreasonable. Since they refused to be in each other’s presence, he had to divide his time between them.
“I feel like the child of divorced parents,” Benji whispered to Cordelia during social studies. “Agnes made me a schedule. I’m having lunch with you on Monday and Wednesday, and with her on Tuesday and Thursday.”
“What about Friday?”
“Friday is when I make a bunch of new friends to replace the old ones who are acting like idiots.”
“Don’t be mean.”
“Enough chatter, you two,” Mr. Derleth said. “Get back to work.”
“Sorry,” Cordelia said, and returned to researching the dangers of overpopulation. Usually Mr. Derleth was pretty chill about letting the class talk when they were working on projects, but he had been uncharacteristically irritable of late. Cordelia thought he seemed particularly annoyed at her for some reason.
Not annoyed, she amended. Disappointed. But I have one of the highest grades in the class. What could I have done to disappoint him?
The bell rang.
“Did you see that they got the man in the gray suit?” Benji asked as they left the room.
“No!” Cordelia exclaimed. “Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
Waving to the man in his window every morning had become something of a routine for Cordelia as she entered Shadow School. But I didn’t wave today, she thought sadly. I didn’t even look up. It’s almost like I knew. The worst part was that she had a great idea about what the man’s Brightkey might be, but the threat of reprisal from the ghost snatchers had kept her from using it. Now that chance was lost forever.
“Don’t take it so hard,” Benji said, noting her slumped shoulders and crestfallen expression. “There’s nothing we could have done.”
“Actually, there was. Only we didn’t do it.”
Agnes brushed past them, dragging her rolling backpack. She didn’t even look in Cordelia’s direction.
“Will you please talk to her?” Benji asked.
“It’s not my fault she’s being so stubborn,” Cordelia said. “And, yeah, I could have been nicer about it, but I wasn’t wrong. We can see ghosts. She can’t. That makes us different.”
“So we can’t be friends with people who are different than us?”
“That’s not what I—”
“Bummer. Because I’m Peruvian and you’re half-Chinese. Guess this friendship’s over.”
“It’s not the same and you know it! Agnes will never understand how much the ghosts need our help if she can’t see them!”
“You’re right,” Benji said.
Cordelia looked at him in surprise. “I am?”
“Totally,” Benji said. “Agnes can’t possibly understand what’s going on at Shadow School like we do. It wouldn’t be fair to expect her to. What has she really seen? A few flickering lights when a ghost goes into its Bright? Certainly not enough to convince her there’s a ghost in every corner. And let’s not forget the way that Agnes’s mind works. She’s a scientist at heart. That girl lives on proof. And yet . . . she’s still been helping us for months. Have you thought about what that must be like from her perspective? We’re doing this because we can see the ghosts with our own two eyes. But Agnes? The only thing that she has to go by is her total and complete faith in you.” He leaned forward and gazed intently into Cordelia’s eyes. “Does that sound like the kind of friendship you want to just throw away?”
Cordelia suddenly felt very small. If another girl told me she saw ghosts and asked for my help, would I dive right in like Agnes did? Cordelia doubted it. Doing so would take a level of trust that she just didn’t possess.
What have I done? she thought.
Cordelia intended to apologize at lunch the next day, but Agnes was nowhere to be found. Benji suggested she try the third floor. Apparently, Agnes had some sort of secret thinking spot up there.
I had no idea, Cordelia thought. Some friend I am.
After a long search, she finally found Agnes sitting on the floor of room 314, looking up at an old-fashioned chalkboard with grim determination. Cordelia immediately knew what she was trying to do and felt her heart break.
“Why are you here?” Agnes asked when Cordelia entered. She started to rise, her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.
“Just give me three minutes,” Cordelia said, closing the door behind her. “After that, I promise I won’t ever bother you again.”
Agnes still looked dubious, but she sat back down.
“Here,” Cordelia said, handing her the brown paper bag in her hands. “This really smart girl once told me that if you want to be someone’s friend, you bake them a treat. It shows you mean business.”
Agnes opened up the bag and peeked inside.
“You made me a brownie,” she said.
“With walnuts,” Cordelia said. “Can I sit next to you?”
Agnes didn’t say no. Cordelia figured this was good enough and took a seat. She nodded toward the blackboard.
“How long have you been trying to see him?” Cordelia asked.
Agnes started to deny it, then realized there was no point. “Since just after Halloween,” she said. “I figured that maybe seeing ghosts was like looking at a stereogram. You know, one of those pictures that appears two-dimensional at first, only if you stare at it long enough and in the right way these hidden images pop out.”
“I know what you’re talking about,” Cordelia said. “My mom has this old book filled with them. It’s called Magic Eye.”
“Exactly,” Agnes said. “So I looked at the list you and Benji made and picked a ghost that would be good to practice on. No one comes up here this time of day, so I knew I wouldn’t be disturbed. Besides, the way you described him: ‘an old man who looks like a clown out of his make-up.’ I really wanted to see for myself.”
“Those are Benji’s words, not mine. He’s actually a better writer than he thinks he is.”
“I noticed that too. He’s modest about it.”
“He tends to be modest about everything except soccer.”
“And his hair,” Agnes said. “That boy loves his hair.”
The two girls laughed, and the rift between them broke like a curse. Agnes took out the brownie that Cordelia had made and offered her half.
“Thanks,” Cordelia said, taking a bite. It wasn’t as good as Agnes’s, but it was still a brownie.
“I thought I saw a kind of blur a few days ago, but it was probably just my imagination,” Agnes said, still staring at the front of the room. Her cheeks burned. “I want to see them so badly. That was the plan, you know. Come back to you all triumphant. ‘Now I can see ghosts too!’ And then you would like me again. So stupid.”
Cordelia put her head on Agnes’s shoulder.
“I like you whether you can see ghosts or not,” she said. “You’re my best friend. That won’t change even if we never talk about ghosts again.”
“That’s too bad,” Agnes said with a wicked smile. “Because I may have figured out how to get rid of the ghost snatchers for good.”
Cordelia sat up.
“For real?” she asked.
“Absolutely,” Agnes said. “I’m not saying it will definitely work, but it’s something.”
“Well, something is better than nothing,” Cordelia said, pulling Agnes to her feet. “Let’s find Benji. He’ll want to hear your idea too.”
As they left, Agnes paused and took one last look at the front of the room. “Do you really think I can train myself to see ghosts?”
“Why not? Stranger things have happened.”
Cordelia didn’t have the heart to tell Agnes that they had already sent this ghost to its Bright but forgotten to update the list. For months now, Agnes had been staring at an ordinary blackboard.
At gym, Benji complained of a sore ankle while Cordelia and Agnes claimed that they had forgotten their sneakers. Mr. Bruce shook his head in
annoyance and banished them all to the bleachers, just as they’d hoped he would. Agnes and Benji immediately climbed to the top row, but Cordelia paused to take a long look behind the bleachers. There was nothing back there but dust and a couple of water bottles that had slipped through the cracks.
Was it really only September when I first saw the boy? she thought in disbelief. It feels like years.
She joined her friends while the rest of the class played volleyball. Mr. Bruce was wearing a bright yellow jersey emblazoned with Sakai Blazers—the name of a Japanese volleyball team—but despite his enthusiasm for the sport, the students barely exerted any effort at all. It was the last block of the day, and everyone just wanted to go home.
“So what’s this genius idea of yours, Ag?” Benji asked, rubbing his hands together.
“Don’t get too excited,” Agnes replied. “I don’t even know if it’s possible. And we would need Mr. Ward’s help to build it.”
“Build what?” Cordelia asked.
“A ghost trap.”
Cordelia tried to mask her disappointment. The last thing she wanted to do was hurt Agnes’s feelings again.
“That’s an interesting idea,” Cordelia said, picking at her sleeve. “It’s just, um—”
“You can’t trap something that can pass through walls,” Benji said.
Cordelia expected Agnes to blush and stammer, but instead she smiled with surprising confidence.
“The ghosts can pass through some walls,” Agnes said. “Not all. Otherwise they’d be able to leave Shadow School.”
“True,” Cordelia said. “But I don’t understand how that helps us.”
“It proves they can be trapped,” Agnes said. “All we have to do is build the right sort of cage.”
“And how are we going to do that?”
The bleachers creaked as Agnes rocked back and forth in her seat. There was a feverish excitement in her eyes. “Remember how Elijah Shadow made his money? He had these private shows where rich people paid to see ghosts up close and personal. It only worked for those with the Sight, but still—that meant he must have captured the ghosts somehow.” She looked at Cordelia. “Did Mr. Derleth mention how he did that?”