Meg Cabot - Reunion

And certainly not my mother and stepfather, who showed up at the hospital looking tight lipped and pale faced, and kept saying things like, "It's a wonder none of you were hurt," and, "From now on, you're only driving the Land Rover."

Which caused Dopey, anyway, to brighten up. The Land Rover was way roomier than the Rambier had ever been. I suppose he figured he wouldn't have as much trouble getting horizontal with Debbie Mancuso in the Land Rover.

"I just can't understand it," my mother said, much later, after the X-rays and eye tests and poking and prodding were over, and the hospital personnel had finally let us go home. We sat in the dining room of Peninsula Pizza, the place Sleepy worked, which also happened to be one of the only places in Carmel you could get a table for six - seven, if you counted Gina - without a reservation. We must have looked, to an outsider, like one big, happy family (well, except for Gina, who sort of stuck out, though not as much as you might think) celebrating something, like a soccer game victory.

Only we knew that what we were celebrating was the fact that we were all still alive.

"I mean, it must be a miracle," my mother went on. "The doctors certainly think so. That none of you were more seriously hurt, I mean."

Doc showed her his elbow, which he'd scraped on a piece of glass while slithering out of the car after it had come to a standstill. "This could prove to be a very dangerous wound," he said, in a wounded little boy voice, "if it happens to become infected."

"Oh, sweetie." My mother reached out and stroked his hair. "I know. You were so brave when they put in those stitches."

The rest of us rolled our eyes. Doc had been playing up the injury thing all night. But it was making both him and my mother happy. She'd tried that hair-stroking thing with me, and I'd nearly broken my arm trying to get away.

"It wasn't a miracle," Andy said, shaking his head, "but simple dumb luck that you weren't all killed."

"Dumb luck nothing," Sleepy said. "My superlative driving skills are what saved us."

I hated to admit it, but Sleepy was right. (And where did he learn a word like superlative ? Had he been studying for his SATs behind my back?) Except for the part where we'd crashed through the plate glass window, he'd driven that tank of a car - brakeless - like an Indy 500 pro. I guess I could sort of see why Gina wouldn't let go of his arm, and kept looking up at him in this worshipful way.

Out of my newfound respect for Sleepy, I didn't even look to see what he and Gina were doing in the back of the Land Rover on the way home.

But Dopey sure did. And whatever he saw back there put him in as foul a mood as I'd ever seen him.

His stomping around and turning up of Marilyn Manson in his room only served to annoy his father, however, who went from grateful humbleness over how close he'd come to losing his "boys - and you, Suze. Oh, and Gina, too," to apoplectic rage upon hearing what he termed "that noxious mind-poison."

Alone in my room - Gina had disappeared to parts of the house unknown; well, okay, I knew where she was, I just didn't want to think about it - I did not mind the noise level in the hallway outside my door. It would keep, I realized, anybody from overhearing the very unpleasant conversation I was about to have.

"Jesse!" I called, switching on my bedroom lights and looking around for him. But both he and Spike were MIA. "Jesse, where are you? I need you."

Ghosts aren't dogs. They won't come when you call them. At least, they never used to. Not for me, anyway. Only lately - and this was something I hadn't exactly talked over with Father Dom. It was a little too weird to think about, if you asked me - the ghosts I knew had been popping up at the merest suggestion of them in my mind. Seriously. It seemed all I had to do was think about my dad, for instance, and poof, there he was.

Needless to say, this was quite embarrassing when I happened to be thinking about him while I was in the shower washing my hair, or whatever.

I kind of wondered if this had something to do with my mediator powers getting stronger with age. But if that were true, then it would stand to reason that Father Dom would be a way better mediator than me.

Only he wasn't. Different, but not better. Certainly not stronger. He couldn't summon a spirit with a single thought.

At least, I didn't think so.

Anyway, so even though ghosts don't come when you call them, Jesse always seemed to lately. He appeared before me with a shimmer, and then stood staring at me like I'd just stepped off the set of Hellraiser III in full costume. But may I say that I did not look half so disheveled as I felt?

" Nombre de Dios , Susannah," he said, paling visibly (well, for a guy who was already dead, anyway). "What happened to you?"

I looked down at myself. All right, so my blouse was torn and dirty, and my thigh-highs had sort of lost their stick. At least my hair had that all-important windswept look.

"As if you didn't know," I said sourly, - sitting down on my bed and slipping out of my shoes. "I thought you said you'd babysit them all day, until Father D and I had a chance to work on Michael."

"Babysit?" Jesse knit his dark brows, revealing that he was unfamiliar with the word. "I stayed with the Angels all day, if that's what you mean."

"Oh, right," I said. "What are you saying? You went with them on their little field trip to the school parking lot to clip the Rambler's brake line?"

Jesse sat down next to me on the bed.

"Susannah." His dark-eyed gaze was riveted to my face. "Did something happen today?"

"You better believe it." I told him what had gone down, though my explanation of exactly what had been done to the car was a little sketchy given my complete ignorance of all things mechanical, and Jesse's particular lack of knowledge about the workings of the automobile. Back when he'd been alive, of course, horse and buggy had been the only way to go.

When I was through, he shook his head.

"But, Susannah," he said, "it could not have been Josh and the others. As I told you, I was with them all day. I only left them now because you called to me. They could not possibly have done what you are describing. I would have seen, and stopped them."

I blinked at him. "But if it wasn't Josh and those guys, then who could it have been? I mean, no one else wants me dead. At least, not at the moment."

Jesse continued to stare down at me. "Are you so sure you were the intended victim, Susannah?"

"Well, of course it was me." I know it sounds weird, but I was almost offended at the idea that there might be someone else on the planet worthier of murdering than myself. I must say, I do pride myself on the number of enemies I've acquired. In the mediator business, I've always considered it a sign that things were going well if there were a bunch of people who wanted me dead.

"I mean, who else but me?" I gave a laugh. "What, you think somebody's out to get Doc ?"

Jesse, however, did not laugh.

"Think, Susannah," he urged me. "Isn't there anyone else who was in that car that someone might want to see badly hurt, or even dead?"

I narrowed my eyes at him. "You know something," I said flatly.

"No." Jesse shook his head. "But - "

"But what? God, I hate when you do the cryptic warning thing. Just tell me."

"No." He shook his head quickly. "Think, Susannah."

I sighed. There was no arguing with him when he got this way. You couldn't really blame him, I guess, for wanting to play Mr. Miyagi to my Karate Kid. It wasn't like he had a whole lot of other stuff to do.

I exhaled gustily enough to send my bangs fluttering.

"Okay," I said. "People who might not be too happy with someone - besides me - in that car. Let me see." I brightened up. "Debbie and Kelly aren't too happy about Gina. They had a nasty little interlude in the girls' room just before it happened. The car thing, I mean."