Ava"s dad lived in an apartment in an old renovated high school. To get to her place, you had to pa.s.s trophy cases filled with memorabilia from the school, like old yearbooks and trophies.

"It"s so cool that you live here," I said, following her up the steps to her apartment on the third floor.

She jiggled her key into the lock. "It"s okay. Our old house was better you know, before the split." She threw her bag on the floor and walked over to a desk and grabbed her laptop. "It"s cool when I"m here alone, since it"s so small. When my brothers are here, I usually stay at my mom"s house. I still can"t believe you see ghosts," she said.

"Me either."

"Do you think she"s watching us now?"

"Doubtful. She seems pretty occupied with Connor. She only visits me when she wants to scare the c.r.a.p out of me, or make veiled threats."

I sat next to her on the leather couch while she warmed up the laptop. "Google is our friend," she said, typing antisocial behavior disorder into the search bar. A dozen options popped up, but she clicked the Wikipedia version first.

"What does it say," I asked.

"Well, from this it sounds like she"s mean, aggressive, has no sense of guilt and blames everyone else for everything."

I leaned over and read the summary. "Wow. Yeah. I can see all that."

"I guess if her disorder carried over past her death then there really is no rational reason for her to be after you or Connor. It"s just kind of who she is."

"Great. Not only do I have a ghost pestering me, I have a crazy ghost pestering me. Awesome."

Ava read a little bit more then X"ed out of the page. A thoughtful look crossed her face and she asked, "Did Charlotte have a Facebook?"

"Probably."

"I"ve noticed most people don"t delete them after a death or whatever. Kids like to make comments and things." Ava searched for her profile and one popped up. It"s an open account with no security. "People are dumb when they don"t have stronger privacy levels."

I leaned over her shoulder when she started scrolling down the page. Most of the recent posts were, "We"ll miss you!" the standard "R.I.P." or song lyrics. I didn"t recognize any of her friends, but since she went to private school out of our district that wasn"t unusual. "It seems like she had a lot of friends."

"Everyone has more friends once they"re dead. It"s like a fetish or something." Ava clicked on her photos and said, "Wow."

"Oh. Yeah, no. Why is she dressed like that?"

There were dozens of photos posted by Charlotte. In all of them, she was dressed pretty trashy. "Are those a costume? She"s probably one of those girls who liked to dress s.l.u.tty for Halloween." Ava enlarged a photo. "Look, that"s her uncle Mr. Brady." He stood next to Charlotte with his arm wrapped around her shoulder. They"re in front of a huge Christmas tree. Her dress seemed more appropriate, but still hit way above the knee and cut very low down the front." Julia was right, I guess they were close."

"Look at this one," Ava said. "She"s holding a beer and standing next to her mom. Guess they were pretty lax on rules at her house."

"My mom would ground me for a month if I tried something like that."

"Mine, too. Once my brother got caught with three bottles of vodka under his bed. My dad made him pick up trash at the school parking lot on weekends for three months." She made a face. "Lesson learned."

"What do we know?" I asked, leaning back against the couch.

"That she likes to dress wh.o.r.ey, her uncle loved her and her family let her drink with them?"

"She told me her parents didn"t care what she did. They were too busy with their own lives."

"I can see that. Could explain why she was so close to her aunt and uncle, I guess."

I leaned closer and pointed to the screen. "Who"s that girl?"

Ava clicked on the name next to the picture. "She has Sarah Mae Martin listed as her sister, but I think it"s a joke, like how people put their friends down as family." She scrolled through the photos. "There are a ton of photos of them together, and she left a lot of comments. Maybe we should try to talk to her."

I studied the picture of Charlotte and Sarah Mae. Short cropped hair. Multiple earrings, including one in her nose, and a tattoo on her shoulder. The kind of girl that looked like she wouldn"t judge you or your problems. She may have been the perfect person for Charlotte to confide in. She may be the closest we can get to the truth.

"Have you been in here before?" Ava asked, following me down the tall shelves.

"Yeah," I said. "Evan and I used to come here a lot."

"Oh." Ava"s forehead furrowed and she focused on the books in front of her. Sure she knew about the ghosts, but I guess it was weird to hear me talk about them so casually.

"It"s always pretty quiet here," I continued. "We could whisper and no one bothered us."

"Sounds... neat?"

"I guess," I shrugged. "Anyway, I"m not really sure what I"m looking for."

"Something on defeating ghosts? Right? Banishing evil spirits?"

Researching ghosts had been Ava"s idea. I never even thought about it, looking for something about how to get rid of Charlotte. As we walked down the aisles of the store, I began to suspect she had ideas of forming some kind of ghost-fighting team or something. Personally, I hoped to never fight another ghost again, but I was grateful for the company.

"Even if we find something useful in here, I doubt I"ll use it," I said.

"Why"s that? It can"t hurt to have a little spiritual mojo on your side."

"It just feels wrong. I don"t like having this antagonistic relationship with... them. I"m here to help. Not banish or whatever."

Ava pushed her gla.s.ses back with her hand and shook her head. "I"m sure you"re right, but Charlotte doesn"t sound like the typical... one." She glanced over her shoulder. "You may have to be more forceful."

"We"ll see. I think the occult section is over here." I turned the corner, running straight into someone carrying an armload of books. "Sorry."

"Jane?"

The woman in front of me was tall and curvy with dark brown hair. I recognized her as the owner of the store, Camille. I met her at my parents" New Year"s Eve party. "Oh, hi."

"I thought I saw you come in the front door," she pushed her gla.s.ses on the top of her head. "Can I help you find something?"

"Um..." I floundered. "I"m just looking..."

"Do you have anything about ghosts or supernatural spirits? Non-fiction," Ava said, pushing me aside. "Really weird stuff. It"s kind of our thing creepy, supernatural, spooky stuff."

Camille gave Ava the once over from head to toe before looking back at me.

"You and I talked about this once before, with that painting by your aunt."

"Yes, ma"am," I said. I held her eye, terrified to look away.

"Wraiths. That was what we talked about. You and your aunt shared an interest in ghosts then."

"Yes."

"And now you need to know more?"

I swallowed and nodded. Ava stood quietly by my side. "Yes, I do."

"Can you give me a little more information?" she asked.

"We"re wondering, I guess, if there is any way to get rid of a ghost." Wow. That sounded crazy.

"Tell me something," she studied me closely, "these spirits, are they friendly type?"

"Some are," I explained, "but we need to know about the ones that aren"t."

"I think I have a couple of books that fall in that category," she said. "Follow me."

She brushed past us. Her long, dark skirt billowed behind her, and Ava and I shared a look of surprise when she didn"t stop at the occult section like we expected. Instead, she turned into the office or back storage room. She crouched on the floor at a file cabinet with the bottom drawer pulled open. I looked at Ava and she shrugged.

"Here it is," Camille declared, pulling something out of the drawer with both hands. When she stood up she held a thick, tattered book.

"What is this?" I asked. She offered me the book. I took it from her and turned it over in my hands. The cover was made of fabric, the edges frayed. I barely made out the words, "Shadow Bound," across the cover.

"This book carries the information you may need if I"m guessing correctly. Are you trying to remove a spirit?"

There was no way to answer that easily, but once again Ava stepped forward. "We"re just doing research, for now. It"s not a big deal, but yes, the general idea is removing a spirit a hostile one," she added.

Camille frowned and asked, "Do you know what you"re getting into?"

"Vaguely," I admitted.

"Take the book then, and be careful. Messing with two different worlds is complicated and dangerous."

"Trust us," Ava said. "She knows." I stepped on her foot with my heel. She shot me a nasty look. "Ouch."

"Thank you," I said, pulling the book close to my chest. "How much do we owe you?"

"Nothing." She waved her hand at the two of us. "This isn"t the kind of book you sell. I"ve been waiting for the right person to pa.s.s it on to for a long time."

"Thank you," I say again.

Camille wrapped the book in a paper bag before we left the shop. As we walked to Ava"s car, she said, "That was weird. Do you think she knows?"

"I don"t know. Definitely weird though. The last time we talked, she was at my house. She figured out the painting Jeannie sent me. I suppose she may have some kind of sight. She"s not the first I"ve met since all of this started," I said, thinking of Ms. Frances.

"Jane," Ava said when we"re halfway down the sidewalk to her car. "Don"t freak."

"About what?"

"Over there, by that building. Don"t. Freak."

Sure enough Connor stood under the big magnolia in front of the Rec Center with a couple of his friends. "What? We"re going to share the same s.p.a.ce. I"m okay with it," I lied.

"Sure you are," she said. "What"s he doing here?"

"Emma has art cla.s.ses at the rec building."

"Why are his fellow delinquents with him?"

"Who knows? Maybe they want a record also? a.s.sociating with a convicted felon?" I made the jab but it hurt to say or think mean things about Connor. Not all of this was in his control. I knew that, but I also knew he wasn"t making every effort to gain control back either.

"We have to walk past them. Do you want to turn around? Go somewhere else?" Ava asked.

I lifted my chin. "No. I"m ready."

"Okay," she said and picked up her pace to match my increasingly fast one. "I"m going to tell you a joke. And you laugh like it"s the funniest thing ever."

"I"ll try," I said, but even speaking made my heart lodge in my throat. Why was this so hard? Why was seeing him so difficult?

To make matters worse, I felt c.r.a.ppier the closer we got to the boys. Connor looked like a hot mess. Ma.s.sive bags under his eyes, a week"s worth of beard growing on his chin. And he looked thin. Too thin for a healthy, 18-year-old boy. If he looked this bad, I wondered about my appearance.

Just as we pa.s.sed, I caught the faint scent of smoke. I tilted my head in his direction and saw him press a cigarette to his lips. "You"ve got to be kidding me," I mumbled, barely containing a snarl. "Gross."

"I know," Ava said. "It"s like he"s gunning for World"s Biggest Cliche. Maybe they"ll make an afterschool special about him and his loserdom."

Connor kept his angry, hard eyes on us but the other boys smiled and waved. Huh. What was this? Did they not know?

"Hey, Jane," Michael said. "Ava. What"s up?"

Ava shot them all a dirty look. "Nothing. Just some shopping."

Brennan glanced at Connor and back at me, forehead furrowed. "You guys going to that party next week? The one downtown."

What party? "Not sure yet," Ava said. Of course she knew about it.

We kept walking, making no effort to stop. I could see the car ahead and that was my goal getting in the car and getting out of there. Away from him.

We weren"t even out of earshot when Brennan asked, "What the h.e.l.l dude?"

"Forget it," Connor said. "It"s no big."

"No big? A week ago you two were inseparable, I couldn"t even get you to go to the skate park with me because you had to mack with that girl?" There was a scuffle of sorts and Ava and I both looked up just as we reached her car. Connor had a hand against Brennan"s chest and both boys were puffed up, ready to fight.

"Shut up, man. Leave it," Connor said. I noticed his hands shaking and his lower lip trembling in anger.