Page 18 of All Her Ghosts

Bas doesn’t move. The look on his face doesn’t change.

“Or we are,” he says.

Something like a laugh snags sideways in my throat. I cover my fear with sarcasm. “Don’t you think it’s too early for ghost stories?”

Pushing off the log, I tug my coat tight around me despite the unusual warmth in the air. Bas stretches out his legs, barely two feet away from me, and yet his distance aches like some strange and vital thing peeled away from my own bones. A missing piece.

But that’s crazy. I shake my head, shake it off, half surprised I don’t hear a rattle. God knows there’s gotta be a screw loose in there. This is crazy town, populationme. So why do I have this bone-deep certainty I’m missing something? That here I am in the woods, surrounded by breadcrumbs, but I can’t figure out where they lead?

I can’t help thinking… what if he’s right—what if it’s not the stethoscope that’s broken?

Bas scoffs. The seriousness falls from his face, and he breaks back into his familiar, easy grin. With elaborate offense, he grips imaginary pearls and gasps in fake outrage.

“Are you calling meeasy? I’ll have you know I never tell a girl a ghost story before the third date.”

His humor makes it simple to shove my scrambling thoughts back into the deep, dark recesses I won’t touch. I laugh—a real laugh this time. “Shut up,” I say, and step forward, reaching out a hand to haul him off the log.

Only, my bag bumps against my leg. Inside, I feel my phone vibrating.

“Oh, shit,” I mutter.

With Bas on his feet, the crack in my stomach splitting wider every second, I fumble my phone awake. The lock screen scrolls with missed calls, one after another.

Missed Call from Mom 11:49 a.m.

Missed Call from Mom 11:50 a.m.

Missed Call from Mom 11:51 a.m.

Her name fills my missed call log from top to bottom, reaching all the way back to noon. A little red 1 glares accusingly from my messages. Of course. Figures. She couldn’t be bothered to send more than a single text:

Mom 12:05 p.m.: Persephone. Where are you?

Bas leans close, hooking his chin over my shoulder, eavesdropping on my screen. Historically, I’d have elbowed anyone else in the face, but his quiet, unquestioning acceptance drives back the stinging in my eyes, the tingling fight-or-flight numbness seeping into my hands.

“The cops onto us already?” he asks.

“My mother. The school must have called her.” I dig the sharp edge of my tooth into the corner of my lip, dry skin threatening to bleed. “God, why couldn’t she just leave it alone? It’s not like she cares. What does it matter to her where the hell I am?”

Bas nods, his chin dipping into my shoulder.

“All right. Do you want to head back, then?”

“No.” It snarls out before I can think, spat like a challenge on the pine needles and rot. Laughing, Bas holds up his hands.

“Hey, it’s okay, we don’t have to,” he says. “I’m glad you don’t. I’d do it if you wanted, Jenny, but man, getting back over that fence from the outside would be a bitch.”

My ears ring. Something about the way he says it, the ease, thename, slaps me sideways.

Jenny with the green ribbon. Jenny, who lived her whole life with her head one pretty bow away from falling.Jenny—and that look in Bas’s eyes, calm confidence absorbing me like my presence at his side is a given, a force of nature, rain in a drought andwanted.

Glaring down at my phone, the namePersephonechafes me so bad I bite my lip until copper swells onto my tongue, staining my teeth. God, I’m sosickof Persephone. This perfect child my mother keeps trying to build from scratch and garbage and constant demands. I’m so sick of living that girl’s life that I could puke right here in the bracken, poisonedsick by years of her whims, her impossible standards, her disappointments, her new jobs and endless series of “important” projects, herfake goddamned apologies—“I’m sorry, Persephone, but I can’t pass up this opportunity. I’ll be helping people, really helping people.”

Screw that. I’ll help my own self.

If you’re texting me about it, you clearly already know,I type back in angry jabs, chipped nail polish clicking on the screen.I left. I’m safe. Don’t worry about it.

Mom 12:07 p.m.: Front office. ASAP.