7:20 a.m.

Tuesday had been a strange, cool, and stormy day. Calla spent most of it lying on her bed, wrapped in an old patchwork quilt handmade from her mother’s childhood dresses, and brooding about all that had happened the night before.

She still doesn’t know what to make of her mother’s emerald bracelet reappearing.

She had tucked it back into the jewelry box, then checked all day to make sure it was really there, just in case she had imagined the whole thing.

Nope. It was definitely there when she fell into bed before eight o’clock, so physically and emotionally exhausted that she drifted right to sleep without even worrying about starting a new school today.

And it was still there this morning, when, for a change, Calla woke up well rested, having finally slept soundly through the night.

Now the air is fragrant with bacon, and she can hear pans clattering in the kitchen as she creaks slowly down the steep stairs. She left the bracelet behind. The clasp is probably still loose, and she doesn’t dare risk losing it again.

Yeah, that, and you’re still too spooked to wear it again.

Dressed in jeans and a long-sleeved black top from the Gap, she’s toting her heavy backpack, bulging with school supplies her grandmother picked up for her. Her iPod is tucked into one of the pockets, just in case she finds herself with some downtime.

Missing is her cell phone. She never left the house without it back in Florida, but there’s no need to carry it around now; she can’t even get a signal here in Lily Dale.

Nor can she get online to check her e-mail, IM with her friends, maintain her MySpace page, write in her blog, surf the Web . . .

To do anything on the Internet, she has to go next door to use Odelia’s neighbors’ computer. Luckily, the girl who lives there, Evangeline Taggart, is her age and has fast become a good friend to Calla. The computer belongs to her aunt Ramona, who’s raising the orphaned Evangeline and her brother, Mason, but she said Calla’s welcome to come use it anytime.

Still, it’s not the same. In her old life, Calla was used to being plugged into the world around her. Well, maybe not the world immediately around her . . . but, electronically, to the world beyond her family’s doorstep.

Here in Lily Dale, she can be in tune only with her immediate surroundings.

Maybe, she’s starting to realize, that’s made her more sensitive to . . .

Well, a new kind of energy, which has nothing to do with electronics.

Even now, as she reaches the shadowy front hall, a sound reaches her ears: steady rapping.

She looks around, half expecting to see another inexplicable shadow . . . or perhaps a manifestation of Miriam, the resident ghost, who lived in this house a hundred years ago. She likes to make things go bump, not just in the night, but all day long.

Nope, no Miriam. This time, the rapping sound is coming from somewhere outside.

Calla glances out the window and immediately spots the very human source. One of Odelia’s neighbors across Cottage Row is using a hammer to nail a sheet of weather-proofing plastic over the windows of his little house.

Farther down the street, a pair of heavyset women in plaid flannel shirts load boxes into the SUV parked in front of another cottage that’s already been boarded up.

Wow. People are leaving town in droves.

The official Lily Dale “season” just ended on Labor Day weekend. According to Evangeline Taggart, the place empties out as most of the resident mediums head for warmer climates to avoid the harsh western New York winter.

They sure don’t waste any time, Calla thinks, watching a car towing a U-Haul trailer rumble past.

Beyond the lofty trees and Victorian rooftops of the little houses across the way, the sky is heavy with rain clouds. Cool air gusts through the screened window. Shivering, Calla pulls it down a little. Her thin Florida blood isn’t used to weather like this—not in September, anyway. Her grandmother mentioned that the first snowflakes start to fall around mid-October, and the wintry weather doesn’t fully let up until May.

Not that it matters, because Calla expects to be out in California with her dad by the time the real snow accumulates and winter gets under way. Which is kind of a shame, because she’s seen snow only once in her life, on a family ski trip to Utah.

Leaving the chilly air and the misty gray view behind, she heads into the kitchen, where the overhead light dispels the gloom.

She remembers seeing the room for the first time a couple of weeks ago and comparing it to her Florida home’s sleek, modern, expensive granite-and-stainless-steel kitchen with custom cabinetry.

Here, the floors are green-and-white linoleum and the walls are papered in an ivy pattern, peeling at the seams. There are white metal cabinets with metal handle pulls, an outdated olive green fridge and stove, and pale green countertops crammed with everything anyone could ever need in a kitchen, and cluttered with a lot of stuff nobody but Odelia could possibly ever need anywhere.

Today, the room—like the rest of the house—seems charming. Homey. Familiar.

“Happy first day of school!” Standing at the stove, Odelia looks up from the griddle where she’s frying . . . something.

It doesn’t look like eggs, or pancakes. It pretty much looks like . . .

“Mush.” That came from Odelia.

“Mush?” Calla echoes.

Odelia lifts the corner of the griddle and points at the yellowy goo. “Fried cornmeal mush. Ever had it?”

“Nope.” And she isn’t particularly anxious to try it.

“Really? I’m surprised. It’s a real southern thing. I’d think growing up down there . . .”

“Yeah, well.” Calla shrugs. “I guess we’ve never eaten much Southern food. Maybe since Mom is—was—from here, and Dad is from Chicago . . . I don’t know.”

“Well, then, you’ve been missing out.” Odelia slides a spatula beneath one of the blobs and expertly flips it. “There’s nothing like starting the school day with a stick-to-your-ribs breakfast like fried mush and a side of bacon. I’ve got some under the broiler.”

“I always just had cereal at home.” Organic, unsweetened cereal. “Mom’s pretty much a health nut. I mean . . . she was.”

Will she ever get used to speaking of her mother in the past tense?

“Not when she was a kid, she wasn’t.” Odelia snorts and shakes her unnaturally red head. “She always could eat everything I put in front of her, and then some.”

Her grandmother’s back is to Calla. Her voice grows wistful, and her hand trembles a little on the spatula handle as she continues, “Back then, Stephanie loved everything that was bad for you. Her favorite was homemade fried chicken with mashed potatoes. She liked them with a whole lot of salt and butter and heavy cream. She’d pull up a chair to the counter and stand on it, and I’d let her do the mashing.”

There’s a long pause. Calla pictures a younger, thinner Odelia standing at the counter, and Mom standing beside her on a chair, a little girl in pigtails, just like in the framed photo on the living room wall.

Odelia’s back straightens and she swipes a hand at her eye, seeming to get hold of her emotions as she turns toward Calla. “If I do say so myself, I make the best fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and gravy you’ll find north of the Mason-Dixon line.”

“I bet you do, Gammy.”

Odelia’s a good cook, even if her taste buds are a little wacky. The night Calla arrived, she was taken aback to find that her grandmother put raisins in the meatballs and sugar in the spaghetti sauce. Turned out, it tasted pretty good.

She’s getting used to Odelia’s eccentric style in the kitchen. And in everything else.

Like her wardrobe. Today, her grandmother’s plus-sized figure is crammed into leopard-print leggings and a yellowy orange fleece pullover. On her feet: a pair of beat-up purple rubber Crocs.

“So tell me,” Odelia says. “Are you nervous?”

“Me?” Calla busies herself taking a carton of orange juice from the fridge. “Nervous?”

“You, ” Odelia agrees, looking at Calla over the pinkish cat’s-eye glasses propped on the tip of her nose. “Nervous.”

“Maybe a little.”

“I would be. Maybe a lot. Starting a new school and all.”

It’s hard to imagine Odelia nervous about anything. She pretty much takes in stride everything from her semipermanent seventeen-year-old houseguest to Miriam and the other shadowy entities who hover around the house.

“At least you know a few of the kids already, though,” Odelia points out.

Some better than others, Calla thinks, and a faint smile curves the lips Blue Slayton kissed after their first date last week.

Then she remembers Willow York, Blue’s ex-girlfriend, and her smile fades.

Evangeline mentioned that Lily Dale High is pretty small. Meaning, Calla’s bound to run into Willow there. On the upside, she’s bound to run into Blue, too—along with Jacy Bly, who held the unofficial title of resident newcomer before Calla came along.

With Native American blood and exotic dark good looks, Jacy captivated her from the second she saw him. He lives down Cottage Row with two foster dads who took him in after Social Services took him away from his alcoholic, abusive parents.

He briefly told Calla about that when they spent an afternoon fishing together in Cassadaga Lake. But even after spending a few hours alone together, she found herself with more questions than answers about Jacy and his difficult past. She’d love to get to know him better—if that’s even possible. Sometimes she sees him from afar, jogging past Odelia’s house with a couple of other boys. He mentioned he’s on the school track team.

Other than that, he seems to keep to himself.

But I can be that way, too, Calla thinks as she pours juice into a glass. She probably has more in common with Jacy than she does with the more confident Blue—who, come to think of it, hasn’t called her since their date. He was supposed to spend last weekend in New York City with his father, the celebrity medium David Slayton, who was doing some television appearances there.

But he must have been back long before now.

Oh, well. It’s not like Calla’s hoping to get hot and heavy with Blue.

Well, maybe she was hoping it a little, after that amazing kiss.

Still . . . a lot has happened since then.

Including a visit from her ex-boyfriend Kevin, who drove up from Tampa and dropped his sister, Lisa—Calla’s best friend—in Lily Dale last weekend. Seeing him again brought it all back: the exhilaration of her first love, and the heartache of being dumped for a college girl.

Kevin stayed only a few hours before heading on to Cornell—and, no doubt, his new girlfriend,Annie.

Monday night, Lisa flew back home to Tampa.

Calla was originally supposed to leave this week, too, headed to California, where she would have been starting school today. Dad, who is a science professor, is there on sabbatical, teaching at a university near Los Angeles.

At this point, he’s still camping out on a friend’s couch in Long Beach. He hasn’t had much luck finding an affordable apartment for the two of them in a good public school district. Money’s been tight without Mom’s salary, and it turned out she didn’t have a life-insurance policy.

Why would she? Who would have ever thought something could happen to Mom? She was so young, so together, so alive, so . . . needed.

Calla forces saliva past a hard lump in her throat and pushes away the painful thought.

Anyway,Dad seemed . . . well, not happy, but maybe a little relieved when Calla asked to stay in Lily Dale for a couple of months and attend school here. That would buy him more time to find them a place to live.

Of course, he doesn’t know about Lily Dale’s spiritual connection. If he did, no way would he have agreed to let Calla stay—or, for that matter, to have come here in the first place.

He can’t find out, no matter what. I have to stay—at least until I figure out what’s going on.

Her knees a little wobbly, she sinks into a chair at the table. Sipping her orange juice, Calla makes a face at its wateriness. Back in Florida, it was always freshly squeezed and thick with tangy-sweet pulp.

Florida.

Not home.

When did she stop thinking of Florida as home?

Is this creaky little cottage in this spooky little town her home now?

No. Not really. But it was Mom’s home for eighteen years, and Calla feels closer to her here than she would anywhere else at this point.

Sure, she’s had occasional flashes of homesickness for Tampa. But she couldn’t stand living in the house where Mom died, and she isn’t anxious to go back . . . maybe not ever.

How can she face going up and down those stairs every day? The bloodstains at their foot were scrubbed away with bleach . . . but the memory of those horrible red splotches on white tile can never be wiped from Calla’s mind.

Calla closes her eyes, remembering her mother’s crumpled body, wearing an elegant charcoal gray suit with round, shiny black buttons. She remembers the unnatural angle of Mom’s neck, the frozen look of horror in her gaping eyes . . .

The official ruling was accidental death. Mom, in a pair of high-heeled black Gucci pumps she often wore, had tripped and fallen down the stairs.

Mom, who had never made a careless mistake in her life . . .

Until she burned the Irish soda bread on Saint Patrick’s Day after the stranger calling himself Tom—who wasn’t a stranger at all—showed up at the door.

The telephone rings abruptly and Calla is lifted, gratefully, from those grim thoughts.

“Can you pick it up?” her grandmother asks, busy at the stove. “It might be your dad, calling to wish you luck on your first day.”

Calla doubts that. It’s barely four a.m. in California.

“Hello?”

“Calla? It’s me!”

“Lisa?” Her friend’s familiar drawl is a welcome sound. “What’s up?”

“You are. And so am I, unfortunately.” Lisa yawns loudly in her ear as Calla steps into the next room with the phone, away from her grandmother’s perked-up ears. Odelia can be pretty nosy. Even nosier than Mom.

“What are you doing calling me this early?”

“Being a good friend. Today’s your first day, right? I thought you might be stressing and I figured I should call and tell you it’s going to go great.”

“How do you know?”

“I’m psychic.”

Calla can just see Lisa’s sly grin. “Well, that makes one of us, because I have no idea what to expect. I wish . . .”

She trails off wistfully.

“I know,” Lisa says somberly. “I wish the same thing. But hang in there. You’ll be okay.”

“You really think so?”

“Yup. It’ll be fun to meet new people. Here I am, stuck with the same old faces we’ve seen since kindergarten.”

Calla wants to tell her she’d trade places in a second, but a wave of homesickness clogs her throat.

They chat for a few more minutes, and she tells Lisa to say hello to all her old friends and teachers.

“I’ll tell them you’ll be back to visit soon,” Lisa promises.

“How am I going to do that?”

“I have a comp airline voucher you can use. They handed them out when my flight was delayed because of the storm the other night.”

“Don’t you want to use it yourself?”

“Nah. If I want to fly up north again, my parents can pay,” Lisa says with a laugh.

Calla smiles, knowing the Wilsons would be more than willing. Kevin always did say they spoil his sister.

Her smile fades when she remembers that Tampa is no longer home, and nothing there is the same. Not without Mom and Dad.

“Thanks for the offer,” Calla tells her, and swallows hard. “For now, I’ve just got to focus on getting through this day.”

“I know. Good luck. Love you.”

“You too.”

She hangs up and returns to the kitchen.

“Good timing. Here you go.” Odelia bustles over to set a heaping plate on the table, along with maple syrup and butter. “Dig in.”

Calla swallows hard. “I . . . I’m not really that hungry.”

“Eat anyway. It’ll calm down those first-day-of-school butterflies in your stomach. Trust me.”

If only the first day of school were the only thing I had to worry about.

With a sigh, Calla reaches for a fork.

The redbrick school building is outside the actual town, beyond the wrought-iron gate with its sign that welcomes people to LILY DALE ASSEMBLY . . . WORLD’S LARGEST CENTER FOR THE RELIGION OF SPIRITUALISM.

Evangeline Taggart joins Calla for the ten-minute walk down the winding country road along the lake’s grassy shore. Her younger brother, Mason, lags behind them with a couple of his friends. Calla can see a couple of other kids with backpacks up ahead, also headed toward the school.

As they walk along, Evangeline chatters away as usual. Her hazel eyes dance as she tells Calla about shopping for school clothes yesterday at the Galleria in Buffalo with her aunt, who thought she should start dressing up more for school now that she’s getting older.

“I didn’t listen, in case you didn’t notice,” Evangeline says with a laugh, and gestures at her sneakers and simple long-sleeved blue T-shirt, untucked over her jeans to help camouflage her well-padded hips and thighs. Her slightly frizzy reddish hair is tamed more than usual, though, held back with a silver barrette. And she’s wearing lip gloss.

“So what’s it like not to have to wear a uniform to school for a change?” Evangeline asks.

“I don’t know yet . . . I used to complain about it, but maybe in some ways a uniform was easier. You never have to think about what to wear.”

“Well, if you’re worried, don’t be. You look fine.”

“The thing is, I’m going to run out of stuff to wear in, like, two days,” Calla tells Evangeline. “I didn’t come up here thinking I was going to stay past summer.”

“If you want to go shopping for warmer clothes,” Evangeline tells her, “I’ll go with you. That would be fun. We can go to the mall and you can get some sweaters and a down coat. What do you think?”

“Yeah, that would be good,” Calla murmurs, realizing there’s just one problem with that scenario: she’s broke.

Money wasn’t a problem when Mom was alive. She gave Calla a generous allowance and they often went shopping together. Mom loved to buy clothes for her. Now, even if Calla found her way to a mall, it’s not like she could buy anything. And it’s not like she feels comfortable asking her grandmother for money, or even Dad, for that matter.

Having faced far more traumatic problems these last few months than a wardrobe that’s seriously lacking, she puts the matter out of her head.

At least she looks halfway decent today, and that’s what counts.

She took the time to brush on mascara and rim her hazel eyes with a smudged liner pencil. She worked gel into her long, sun-streaked brown hair before she dried it, to make it look thicker and help keep her bangs out of her face. She’s overdue for a haircut, and the bangs are starting to bug her.

Disturbed as she’s been about what’s been going on around here, she didn’t overlook the fact that she’s going to be seeing— and be seen by—both Blue Slayton and Jacy Bly today.

“Hey, I meant to ask . . . how did your visit go this weekend? With your friend Lisa?”

Hearing the wistful note in Evangeline’s voice, Calla wishes she had thought to invite her over.

Then again, maybe it was better that she didn’t introduce her newest friend to her oldest. They couldn’t be more opposite: honey-blond, overprotected Lisa, with her designer wardrobe and her healthy skepticism for all things Lily Dale–related, and down-to-earth, orphaned Evangeline, with her disdain for fashion and her extracurricular classes in subjects like Crystal Healing and Past-Life Regression.

Oil and water, Calla thinks, and is glad she kept her two friends apart. At least, this time.

“It was fun,” she tells Evangeline. “But the weekend flew by.”

“You must miss her, huh? How long have you guys been friends?”

“Since kindergarten.”

All at once, the breeze off the lake seems to grow cooler. Goose bumps spring up on Calla’s arms, and she hurriedly slips into her fleece-lined Windbreaker, glad she thought to grab it.

“I’ve known most of the kids in my class since kindergarten, too,” Evangeline is saying, idly kicking a stone along the road. “But my best friend, Amy, moved away last year after her parents split up. The two of us used to do everything together. Now I just kind of hang with whoever’s around.”

“Like me?” Calla flashes a teasing smile.

“Yeah, right. Oh, before I forget to ask . . . do you ever do any babysitting?”

“Sometimes I did, back home. Why?” Calla shivers a little and decides she really is going to need warmer clothes around here.

“This friend of my aunt’s, Paula, just broke her ankle, and she needs help after school for a few weeks with her kids. They’re really cute, two and five. I can’t do it because between my schoolwork and extracurricular stuff and another babysitting job I’ve got, I’m booked. But I told Paula I’d ask you.”

Caught off guard, Calla automatically hedges. “Oh . . . well, I’m not sure . . .”

Then again, what else has she got to do?

And—hello—you were just worrying about being broke, remember?

Now she’s suddenly got the opportunity to earn some cash. Anyway, being around cute little kids might be good for you, she tells herself, realizing she’s feeling oddly—and quite suddenly—gloomy.

“You should do it,” Evangeline is urging. “Paula’s great. You’ll like her a lot. And she pays great. Why don’t I just give her your number so she can call you and talk to you about it?”

“Whatever, go ahead,” Calla agrees, distracted by the plunging temperature and the strange oppression that seems to have drifted into the air.

Then she catches movement out of the corner of her eye and notices, with a start, that she and Evangeline aren’t quite alone.

For a split second, she wonders if the girl with the long blond hair is someone Evangeline knows from school.

Oh. Whoa. There’s a filmy quality about the girl’s slender build.

Is she . . . ?

Yes. She’s an apparition.

It’s happening again, and Calla’s skin tingles as she notes the mounting sensation of thickening in the icy air.

The girl turns her head abruptly to meet her gaze, and Calla recognizes her instantly.

Kaitlyn Riggs.

THREE

The first time Calla glimpsed her a few weeks ago, Kaitlyn Riggs was with her mother, Elaine, who had come to Odelia for a reading.

When she spotted Kaitlyn in Odelia’s kitchen, Calla had no idea the girl wasn’t alive—or that for some reason, Calla alone could see her.

Calla caught sight of her again just last week on a MISSING poster and immediately understood the reason behind Elaine Riggs’s repeated missions to Lily Dale.

Her daughter had been abducted from an Ohio shopping mall, and Elaine was desperate to find her.

New to the world of psychic mediums—and even newer to her own spiritual gifts—Calla didn’t immediately understand the clues Kaitlyn’s spirit was conveying to her. When she finally pieced it all together, she called Elaine Riggs and told her that the search should be focused on a specific area of a remote state park.

Monday night, the woman turned up on Odelia’s doorstep to tearfully thank Calla for bringing closure, even if it wasn’t the happy ending she had hoped for.

Her daughter’s strangled body had been found in the exact spot where Calla had redirected the search to.

Odelia was livid. The moment Elaine left, she laid into Calla.

Kaitlyn Riggs was murdered, Calla. And you were given information about her case. The way you chose to share it with her mother . . . well, I know your intentions were good, but I wish you’d come to me first. It takes years to learn how to deal sensitively with people who are grieving. Sometimes it’s still hard for me, and I’ve been at this forever. But what I’m most concerned about is that you could have gotten yourself hurt . . . Kaitlyn’s killer is still out there somewhere.

Remembering her grandmother’s ominous words—and seeing Kaitlyn again now—sends a shudder of dread through Calla.

Why is Kaitlyn back?

She’s gesturing with her hands. She seems to be trying to communicate something, and Calla senses that it isn’t mere gratitude.

Evangeline seems oblivious to the ghostly presence, the accompanying chill, and Calla’s distraction. She’s chattering on about the unpopular menu in the school cafeteria.

Frustrated, looking into Kaitlyn’s wide, troubled blue eyes, Calla asks, “What? What is it?”

“Sloppy Joe? You mean you’ve never heard of it? Lucky you!” Evangeline exclaims, obviously thinking Calla’s been following the conversation. “It’s ground beef—supposedly—all mixed up in some kind of sauce that’s sticky and red and hideous.”

Sticky.

Red.

Hideous.

Calla shakes her head to fight off the image those words are about to bring to mind.

Beside her, Kaitlyn Riggs is wide-eyed, nodding slowly, meaningfully.

What? What are you trying to tell me?

Upset, Calla closes her eyes to shut out both Kaitlyn and the rush of familiar bloody memory that’s sweeping over her.

Or is it familiar after all?

No. Not this time. Because that’s not her mother’s battered, facedown corpse Calla is seeing in her mind’s eye.

It’s a stranger’s.

And the body’s not lying on white ceramic tile. No, it’s outside somewhere. Dirt . . . pinecones . . . a few golden maple leaves. There’s a cluster of bowling-ball-sized rocks near one of the dead girl’s bare feet, laid out in a circle.

She’s got long blond hair, like Kaitlyn. It’s matted with twigs and leaves.

She’s slightly built, also like Kaitlyn. Her arms—thickly covered in strawberry-orange freckles—are bare and dirty and scratched. There’s a silver bracelet watch on one wrist, caked in mud. She’s wearing jeans and a pale pink shirt . . . and it’s spattered in blood.

Disturbed by the harsh image, Calla opens her eyes abruptly.

Evangeline is still talking about cafeteria food, still oblivious.

Yes, and Kaitlyn is still here.

As Calla looks at her, she gives a satisfied nod.

That’s her.

The two words drift into Calla’s head. They came from Kaitlyn. She’s certain of that, though she isn’t sure if she actually spoke to Calla or just planted the thought in her mind.

That’s her? Calla echoes silently. Who? The bloody girl in pink?

Again, Kaitlyn nods.

“What about her?” Calla blurts, frustrated.

Evangeline breaks off in midsentence and gestures. “You mean Willow?”

“Yes. No!” Following Evangeline’s gaze at a slender dark-haired girl walking up ahead, she realizes it’s Blue Slayton’s ex-girlfriend. “I didn’t even realize she was there.”

“But I just pointed her out to you.” Evangeline frowns . . . then the frown fades and the light seems to dawn. “You’re not talking about Willow. You’re not even talking to me . . . are you?”

Slowly, Calla shakes her head. Why deny it? Maybe it’ll be a relief to tell someone other than Odelia about her newfound gift. Or curse.

“No, I was talking to her,” she admits to Evangeline. She waves a hand in the air as she turns toward Kaitlyn again, daring to hope that Evangeline might be able to see her too. After all, she said herself that she has psychic medium abilities, just like her aunt Ramona and her late parents.

But it’s too late to find out whether Evangeline can also see the apparition.

Because Kaitlyn is no longer visible, even to Calla. The spot where she stood is empty, the chill gone, the air noticeably thinner.

“You were talking to who?” Evangeline wants to know.

“Um . . . to . . .” Belatedly, Calla remembers that her grandmother told her not to mention her ability to anyone. She said it the other night, after Elaine Riggs had left.

“Spirit?” Evangeline asks almost cheerfully, and snaps her gum.

Calla shrugs, numb.

Evangeline apparently takes that as a confirmation. “I knew it!”

“You knew what?”

“That you’ve got psychic awareness. I sensed it.”

She sensed it. Right. Because she, too, has the gift. The curse.

So it’s not like I told her, Calla argues mentally with her grandmother. She guessed.

Yeah, and Odelia should know there’s not a whole lot a person can get away with here in Lily Dale.

Evangeline’s next comment catches Calla off guard.

“You know, your grandmother used to think you might be destined for this. I heard her tell my aunt that once, a long time ago.”

“How long could it have been?” Calla asks, frowning. After all, she’s only been here a few weeks. But the way Evangeline said it, it sounded as if she meant . . .

“Oh, years ago.”

“Years? You mean . . . my grandmother thought I was a medium before she even knew me?”

“Of course she knew you. She just hadn’t seen you since you were really little.”

Wondering how much Evangeline—and her aunt, for that matter—have heard about the falling out between Mom and Odelia, Calla muses, almost to herself, “Why would she have thought that about me?”

Evangeline supplies the answer unexpectedly, and knowingly. “Because she was there when you were born, and she said there was a caul over your face. That’s a fetal membrane— in case you didn’t know.”

Calla didn’t know. About any of this. “What’s it for? The caul?”

“They say babies who are born with one will be sensitives. Odelia had a caul when she was born. So did Aunt Ramona.”

“How about you?”

Evangeline shrugs a little defensively. “I don’t know. I mean, I was born in some hospital. I bet no one was paying attention. I’m sure I had one. Anyway, your grandmother definitely saw that you had a caul, and she told my aunt that she never mentioned it to your mother because she didn’t want to upset her.”

“So Mom didn’t know?”

“I guess not. Maybe she was too out of it. Or, well, Odelia always said your mother wasn’t interested in . . .”

“Spiritualism?” Calla supplies when Evangeline trails off. “Psychic powers? Talking to ghosts? What?”

“Any of it, I guess. She didn’t believe in any of it. That bothered your grandmother. So anyway, even if your mother had known you had the caul, she probably wouldn’t have told you or done anything about it.”

“Like what? What could she have done?”

“Like brought you here, or taught you how to use your gift, or whatever.”

No, Calla thinks, she definitely wouldn’t have. Mom never mentioned that her hometown was a spiritualist community or that her mother was a medium. She obviously wanted to leave that life behind.

And now here I am, in the thick of it. What would Mom think about this?

“The thing is, Calla . . .” Evangeline seems hesitant.

“What?”

“You need to be careful. With what you can do, and with how you use it. That kind of power can be dangerous.”

“How?”

“So many ways. Registered spiritualist mediums go through years of training to learn how to use their abilities responsibly.”

This is the second time she’s been warned about this, and Calla can’t help but feel as though both Evangeline and her grandmother are being overly dramatic.

“I’m not sure I get what you’re saying,” she tells Evangeline, trying not to sound skeptical.

“I’m saying it’s important to use your gift for the greater good, and to learn how to protect yourself when you open yourself up to the Other Side. You have to remember, you’re being used by spirit energy as a medium. You’re conducting the energy . . . whatever kind you let come through. If you don’t learn to pray and protect yourself from the negative energy . . .” She trails off ominously.

Calla can’t help but shudder. “You’re scaring me, Evangeline.”

“I don’t mean to. But, look, why don’t you come to a beginning mediumship workshop with me? I mean, you’re in Lily Dale—what better place to educate yourself?”

“I don’t think I’m ready for something like that,” Calla tells her.

“It’s not that big a deal. It’s basically a message circle.”

“No, thanks.”

She knows that message circles are like seances. Some are open—meaning anyone can participate—and some are closed because, as her grandmother explained, an experienced group of mediums are working together regularly and using their collective energy to channel spirit guides and messages.

“Let me know when you change your mind,” Evangeline tells Calla.

Not if you change your mind. But when. As if she fully expects that Calla will decide to put her sixth sense to use now that she’s figured out she has it.

Everything happens for a reason. Mom herself always used to say that.

If that’s true, Calla’s coming to Lily Dale is no accident.

And Mom’s death might not be, either.

Maybe one even has something to do with the other.

As for the most recent visit from Kaitlyn Riggs, and Calla’s disturbing vision of the bloodied girl in pink . . .

It all means something.

She just has to figure out what it is . . . and what she’s supposed to do about it.

————

The corridor smells of hot food as Calla makes her way toward the cafeteria after social studies, her fourth-period class.

So far, so good. Things are going better than she expected, being the new kid for the first time since kindergarten. Wait, kindergarten doesn’t even count, because everyone else is new too.

Here, everyone else gives off the comfortable, easygoing attitude that comes with familiar territory.

This was familiar territory for Mom by the time she started her senior year here. Just knowing that this is where her mother went to school gave Calla chills when she first walked up the broad stone front steps.

Not you’re about to see a ghost chills. More like if you’re not careful, you’re going to burst out crying in front of everyone chills.

Calla quickly discovered that beyond the old-fashioned redbrick exterior of Lily Dale High are equally old-fashioned green chalkboards, banks of gray metal lockers, scuffed hardwood floors, and straight rows of desks.

This place is a world away from Shoreside Day School back in Tampa, with its state-of-the-art labs, indoor-outdoor classrooms, and lecture halls housed in a sprawling cluster of sleek, modern buildings that feel more like a college campus than a high school.

Here, she’s found her way to every classroom with little trouble—not all that hard, considering that the two-story school has simple L-shaped hallways on both floors. She’s been assigned a homeroom and a locker, memorized her combination, and accumulated a stack of textbooks. She’s even seen a few familiar faces: Lena Hoffman, who works at the Lily Dale Café, has the locker next to Calla’s, and Willow York, of all people, has turned up in most of her classes so far.

When they found themselves sitting across the aisle from each other in health class first thing this morning, Willow acknowledged Calla with a brief smile, which totally caught her off guard.

Not that she expected Willow to stick out her tongue, but still. As Blue Slayton’s barely ex-girlfriend, Willow can’t be thrilled that he’s gone out with someone else. And Evangeline told Calla that Willow knows all about that. “Lily Dale is smaller than any small town you’ll ever see,” Evangeline said cheerfully. “Everyone knows everything about everyone.”

Right. And sometimes even before it happens.

Well, Willow has class, Calla has decided. She’s not going to make a big deal out of Calla seeing Blue. Good for her.

And even better for me.

Pausing in the doorway of the cafeteria, Calla lingers to read the posted menu. Sloppy Joes today, like Evangeline predicted.

She reads the menu intently, checking to see what’s on it for the next few days. Then next week.

Then, when she can’t stall any longer, she forces herself to walk into the cafeteria.

This is what she’s been dreading all day: the prospect of eating alone. Unfortunately her one friend, Evangeline, isn’t here. When they compared schedules in the hall after homeroom, they found that their paths cross only once a day: in gym.

As Calla crosses the threshold into the cafeteria, her heart sinks. Instead of the small round tables that fill the cafeteria back at Shoreside, there are long rectangular tables. Most of them are filled with people who have known each other since kindergarten. It’s going to be impossible for her to duck over to a secluded table alone and hide.

Is lunch even mandatory here? She definitely isn’t hungry, thanks to Odelia force-feeding her mush and bacon. She’s about to flee when she hears someone call her name.

Looking up, she sees Blue Slayton beckoning from a table filled with guys.

Hmm. Maybe she’ll stick around. She walks over, tossing her head a little to get her hair out of her face without being obvious.

“How’s it going?” Blue asks when she arrives at his side.

“Great,” she says, noticing that he’s wearing a long-sleeved jersey in a deep indigo shade that matches his eyes—and his name.

He wears that color a lot, she’s noticed, and she’s sure it’s no accident. He has to be aware of the striking impact. And his clothes are expensive. She can tell by the cotton fabric that looks as thick and soft as his light brown hair, which he might wear in a wavy and slightly unkempt style, but she knows that’s no ten-dollar barbershop haircut.

No, everything about Blue Slayton is expertly and deliberately pulled together. The result is effortless good looks that take her breath away a little every time she sees him up close.

“So you haven’t gotten lost yet?” he asks Calla, fork poised above a tray that holds two of everything: two sloppy joe plate lunches, two bottles of juice, two ice cream bars.

“Not yet.” She wonders if he’s going to eat all that himself, or if he’s planning to share with someone else. Willow, maybe?

“The only way to get lost around here is trying to find your way home if a blizzard blows in during the day,” comments the red-haired, freckled guy sitting next to Blue.

“Yeah, but that only happens, like, once a week in the winter, and so far, we’ve lost less than a dozen kids that way,” Blue says dryly, and everyone laughs.

He introduces Calla to the redhead—Jeremy—and to the other four guys, two of whom are named Ryan. They’re all on the school soccer team together.

“Calla’s living over in the Dale with her grandmother,” Blue tells them, and a couple of them ask her politely about where she’s from and how she likes it here.

As she answers their questions, she wishes Blue would invite her to sit down, but he doesn’t.

Well, that’s probably because he’s with all these guys.

Or maybe it’s because he’s no longer interested in you.

“Hey, Calla,” he says abruptly, “want to go out Friday night?”

Or maybe he is interested.

“Sure,” she hears herself say as her heart trips over itself. “That would be great.”

“Good. I’ll call you.” Blue drains what’s left of his open juice and crushes the plastic bottle in his fist before reaching for the second one.

She takes that as her cue to leave.

But Blue Slayton asking her out again is enough to ease the humiliation, five minutes later, of roaming the room with a full tray, looking for a seat that has empty chairs around it. She doesn’t want to just go and plop herself down next to anyone. That would feel kind of . . . bold.

But none of the open chairs has a buffer zone around it, and she can feel people looking up at her as she passes their tables.

She just has to sit down somewhere. Anywhere.

She looks around and her gaze falls on a striking girl with long black hair, porcelain skin, and a familiar face. Willow York again, and she glances up from a conversation she’s having with the girl next to her. “Oh, hi.”

“Hi.” Calla hesitates, still holding her tray.

“Want to sit with us?” asks the other girl, who is African American, with a short, chic haircut, gorgeous dark eyes, and a mouthful of braces. She points to the empty chair across from her and Willow.

“Definitely.” Calla gratefully puts her tray on the table and slips into the chair without stopping to see if Willow seems to want her there.

“This is Sarita,” Willow says, in a friendly enough tone, “and you and I have already met. A few times, right? But I’m Willow . . . in case you forgot.”

She didn’t forget.

“Do you live in Lily Dale?” Sarita asks.

“Yeah, I’m staying with my grandmother.” Calla decides not to tell her it’s only temporary. Why complicate the conversation? “How about you?”

“I live down the road in Cassadaga.”

Does the fact that Sarita lives outside the Dale mean she can’t see dead people or have psychic visions or premonitions?

What about Willow? She lives in the Dale. Is she a medium?

Even more important: did Willow see Calla talking to Blue a few minutes ago? Probably not. She’s acting pretty friendly.

Or maybe she’s over him.

Nah. Remembering Blue’s piercing eyes—and those broad shoulders beneath the soft cotton jersey—Calla can’t help but think it would take any girl a long time to get over him.

Including you, she warns herself. So don’t go letting yourself get hooked on him.

Yeah. One broken heart per year is more than enough.

Hearing a commotion, she looks over to see that someone just tripped and dropped his lunch tray. Her first thought: Thank God that didn’t happen to me.

Her next: That poor kid.

He’s enormously obese, with jet black hair, thick glasses, and a line of fuzz on his upper lip.

A few kids are laughing as, flustered, he wipes red sauce off his hands and starts to pick up the mess.

“Oh, no, poor Donald.” Willow is instantly up and out of her seat, hurrying toward him.

“That’s Donald Reamer,” Sarita comments to Calla. “He’s the kind of guy who . . . well, you know. Things are hard for him.”

Calla nods. She does know. There was a Donald Reamer at her school in Florida, too—only it was a girl, and her name was Tangie Alvin.

Surprised at Willow’s compassion, she watches her hand him a pile of napkins before stooping to salvage what’s edible from his dropped lunch. She can see that a group of girls at a table next to them are snickering and rolling their eyes.

After a cafeteria aide has appeared with a mop and bucket and Donald has lumbered on his way, Willow goes over to the table of girls and says something to them. Their smirks vanish and they immediately look uncomfortable.

Willow returns to the table and reclaims her chair without comment. Sarita seems to be taking the whole thing in stride, saying only, “I hope they give him another lunch without charging him.”

“Me, too. So . . . what’d you think of Kiley?” Willow asks Calla conversationally, and bites into an apple. Calla notices her tray contains only that, a small container of yogurt, and a bottle of water. Sarita’s holds the same.

“Kiley?” For a second, she’s blank. Then, “Oh! You mean the health teacher? She seemed nice.”

Willow and Sarita exchange a look.

“Yeah, she puts up a good front . . . on the first day. They all do. Just wait. Have you had math yet?”

“It’s last period.”

“Then you probably have Bombeck, with Willow. He’s famous for being hard-core,” Sarita says. “My sister was straight A’s until she landed in his class. She still talks about him, and she graduated four years ago. My mom even had him and said he was really hard even back then. He’s been here forever.”

“Well, hopefully I’ll be okay.” Calla picks up her fork, trying not to wonder whether her own mom might have had Bombeck, and whether she went to school with Sarita’s mom. “I usually do pretty well in math.”

Straight A’s, actually. She’s been an honor-roll student all the way through high school, but she doesn’t mention that. She doesn’t want to sound like she’s bragging.

“Math is my strongest subject,” Willow tells her. “And even I’m worried. You don’t know Bombeck.”

“I’m so glad I didn’t get him for math,” Sarita says contentedly.

“So you have Davidson, right? And who do you have for English?” Willow asks.

As Sarita pulls her schedule out of her backpack to compare it to Willow’s, Calla toys with her fork. She’s reluctant to dig into her steaming, hearty sloppy joe lunch in front of the other girls. She should have gotten fruit, yogurt, and water, like they did. She wants to fit in.

Then again . . .

Mom was always telling her not to follow the crowd. Who cares what the other girls are eating? her mother’s voice asks in her head. Who cares what they think of you?

I kind of do, Mom. Just this once. Calla closes her eyes, barely aware of Sarita and Willow, who are chatting about a mutual friend. I can’t help it, Mom. I want to fit in here because . . . well, I don’t fit in anywhere else anymore.

Don’t worry, you will, her mother’s voice says, and she can hear it so clearly in her head that she wonders if her mother is actually here.

Focus. Maybe if you really focus, you’ll be able to see her.

She tunes out all the background noise, thinking about her mother. About how desperately she misses her.

Please. Please, Mom. If you’re here, let me see you. Please.

Gradually, Calla becomes aware of a strong presence. Someone is watching her. She can feel it.

She braces herself, opens her eyes, and looks up, expecting to see a shadow or even her mother’s ghost. Or . . . Kaitlyn’s.

Please let it be Mom this time. Please . . .

FOUR

It isn’t her mother.

It isn’t even a ghost.

Instead, Calla locks eyes with Jacy Bly, sitting one table away and looking intently right at her. He doesn’t jerk his dark gaze away, the way another guy might if he were caught in the act of staring.

No, Jacy just nods a little, as if he’s saying hello.

Calla nods, too. Just slightly. Hello right back.

Trembling—feeling almost like they’ve just had physical contact—she looks down at her untouched plate of food. Across from her,Willow and Sarita are absorbed in comparing their new class schedules.

Maybe Calla should be disappointed that the person she sensed wasn’t her mother. Instead, she finds her heart beating a little faster at the knowledge that Jacy was looking at her as though . . .

He’s interested. Definitely.

Great, but . . .

What about Evangeline? She has a thing for Jacy. She’s always talking about him.

But it’s not like they’re dating or anything, Calla reminds herself. And it’s not like Jacy’s going to ask me out, either, like Blue did. Twice.

Jacy’s too shy.

So there’s no need to feel guilty about Evangeline.

Yet, anyway.

Ten minutes and one uneaten lunch later, Calla finds Jacy falling into step beside her as she exits the cafeteria behind Willow and Sarita.

She sneaks another peek at him. His short black hair is spiky on top, as though he rubbed a towel over it after a shower and walked out the door. Tall, lean, and muscular, he’s wearing worn jeans, sneakers, and a plain white T-shirt. He probably threw them on without thinking about it, as casual about his appearance as Blue Slayton is deliberate. But the end result is the same. Jacy, too, is so good-looking he takes her breath away as she looks up at him.

“Are you glad you’re here?” he asks her quietly.

“Yeah. I am. Are you?” He looks taken aback, and she realizes what he thinks she meant. Her face grows hot and she blurts, “I mean, are you glad you’re here! Not, you know, are you glad I’m here. Because you wouldn’t be. I mean, you wouldn’t think about it. I mean . . . uh, are you glad you’re here?”

He flashes her a slow grin. “I’ve been here a while.”

What is it about Jacy that makes Calla shove her foot into her mouth every single time she opens it?

“But do you like it here?” she asks, and he shrugs.

“Things happen here that don’t happen anywhere else. Or, didn’t. Not to me.”

Her heart beats faster. “Me, too. Things happen to me here, too.”

“I know.”

“What?” She stares at him. “How do you—”

“Hi, guys!” Without warning, Evangeline pops up in their path. “Who-what-when-where-why?”

“Huh?” Calla asks, and Evangeline laughs.

“You know . . . what did I miss? Anything interesting that you’re talking about?”

If she only knew.

“Just school,” Jacy says. “In other words, not interesting.”

Calla wishes her friend hadn’t interrupted this particular conversation, but she smiles at Evangeline as if she’s glad to see her.

“Are you guys coming from lunch?” Evangeline asks, and her voice is a little higher pitched than usual, her smile so bright—and stiff—that she’s baring most of her teeth. She gets so nervous around Jacy, and it shows.

“Yeah, it was sloppy joes,” Calla tells Evangeline. “Like you said.”

“I knew it!”

Calla considers making a lame joke about her friend’s psychic powers but decides against it. Instead, she asks, “How about you? Are you going to lunch?”

That question is about as unnecessary as Evangeline’s was, since the cafeteria is all that’s on this end of the building. But for some reason, she has this need to keep the conversation going and stick to mundane topics. Topics that have nothing to do with the fact that Evangeline just stumbled across her and Jacy together.

“Yup. I’m going to lunch. But I’m not eating sloppy joes, that’s for sure.” Calla doesn’t miss the way Evangeline checks out Jacy, then runs a hand quickly through her hair to straighten it.

Nor does she miss the way Jacy doesn’t seem to notice.

That’s because he’s not even looking at Evangeline. He’s looking at Calla.

“See you in math later,” he says. “We’re in that class together.”

“How do you know that?”

He just offers a cryptic smile before waving to both her and Evangeline and striding off down the hall.

“Did you eat lunch with him?” Evangeline immediately asks Calla.

“No!” Oops . . . did that sound too defensive? Softening her tone, she adds, “I ate with a couple of girls. Willow and, um, Sarita.”

“Oh, Sarita’s great.” Evangeline relaxes a little. “And Willow can be really nice, when she wants to. She’s just moody. So everything’s going okay, then? You’re finding your way around?”

“Yeah. And”—she leans closer to Evangeline to whisper— “Blue Slayton just asked me out again!”

“No way! Are you serious? That’s great!” Pause, then, “So Willow knows that and she still ate lunch with you?”

“Oh . . . uh, no, she doesn’t know that. But . . . they’re broken up, right?”

“Supposedly. Anyway, who cares? I’m so psyched for you, Calla. I mean, anyone in this school would kill to go out with Blue, and you waltz in here—the new girl—and he’s all over you.”

Calla smiles at the exaggeration and tries not to wonder if Evangeline’s crush on Jacy is part of the reason she’s so enthusiastic about Calla’s involvement with Blue.

If she hadn’t come along just now, where would the conversation with Jacy have led?

Does he know about me seeing dead people? Calla wonders. Can he see them too?

Maybe he can help her make sense of everything. The bracelet, the lake, the dreams about Mom and Odelia, and the strange, gory vision Kaitlyn Riggs just showed her.

She has to talk to Jacy again, first chance she gets.