Meg Cabot - Darkest Hour

Around his waist was a rope.

"Suze," he called. "Come quick! That mean lady ghost you warned me about, she cut your rope, and now she and that other one are beating up Father Dominic!" Then he stopped running, took in the sight of Jesse still clutching a bloody-faced Paul, and said, curiously, "Paul? What are you doing here?"

A moment passed. A heartbeat, really - if I'd had one, which, of course, I didn't. No one moved. No one breathed. No one bunked.

Then Paul looked up at Jesse and said, "You'll regret this. Do you understand? I'll make you sorry."

Jesse just laughed, without the slightest trace of humor, and said, "You're welcome to try."

Then he tossed Paul aside as if he were a used tissue, strode forward, seized my wrist, and dragged me toward Jack.

"Take us to them," he said to the little boy.

And Jack, slipping his hand into mine, did so, without looking back at his brother. Not even once.

Which told me, I realized, just about everything - except what I really wanted to know:

Just who - or, more aptly, what - was Paul Slater?

But I didn't have time to stay and find out. Father Dominic's watch gave me a minute to return to my body, or be placed in the difficult position of not having one ... which was going to make starting the eleventh grade in the fall a real problem.

Fortunately, the hole was not far from where we'd been standing. When we got to it and I looked down, I couldn't see Father Dominic anywhere. I could hear the sounds of a struggle, though - breaking glass, heavy objects hitting the floor, wood splintering.

And I could see my body, stretched out beneath me as if I were sleeping, and sleeping so deeply I wasn't stirring at the sound of all that racket. Not a twitch.

Somehow, it seemed a much longer way down than it had climbing up.

I turned to look at Jack. "You should go first," I said. "We'll lower you with the rope - "

But both he and Jesse shouted, "No!" at the same time.

And the next thing I knew, I was falling. Really. Down and down I tumbled, and while I couldn't see much as I fell, I could see what I was about to land on, and let me tell you, I did not relish crushing my own ...

But I didn't. Just like in dreams I've had where I've been falling, I opened my eyes at the moment of impact, and found myself blinking up at Jesse's and Jack's faces, peering down at me over the rim of the hole Father Dom had created with his chanting.

I was inside myself again. And I was in one piece. I could tell as I reached down to make sure my legs were still there. They were. Everything was functional. Even the bruise on my head hurt again.

And when, a second later, a statue of the Virgin Mary - the one Adam had told me had wept blood - landed across my stomach, well, that really hurt, too.

"There she is," Maria de Silva cried. "Get her!"

I have to tell you, I am getting really tired of people - particularly dead people - trying to kill me. Paul is right: I am a do-gooder. I do nothing but try to help people, and what do I get for my efforts? Virgin Mary statues in the midriff. It isn't fair.

To show just how unfair I thought it all was, I heaved the statue off me, scrambled to my feet, and grabbed Maria by the back of her skirt. Apparently, recalling her last incident with me, she decided to make a run for it. Too late, though.

"You know, Maria," I said conversationally as I reeled her in by her flounces, the way a fisherman reels in a really big trout. "Girls like you really irritate me. I mean, it's not just that you get guys to do your dirty work for you, instead of doing it yourself. It's this whole I'm-so-much-better-than-you-because-I'm-a-de-Silva thing that really bugs me. Because this is America." I reached out and grabbed a fistful of her glossy black curls. "And in America, we're all created equal, whether our last name is de Silva or Simon."

"Yes?" Maria cried, lashing out with her knife. She'd apparently gotten it back. "Well, do you want to know what irritates me about you? You think that just because you are a mediator, you are better than me."

I have to tell you, that one cracked me up.

"Now that's not true," I said, ducking as she took a swipe at me with her blade. "I don't think I'm better than you because I'm a mediator, Maria. I think I'm better than you because I do not go around agreeing to marry guys I'm not in love with."

In a flash, I had her arm pinned behind her waist again. The knife fell to the floor with a clatter. "And even if I did," I went on, "I wouldn't have them murdered just so I could marry somebody else. Because" - keeping a firm grip on her hair with my other hand, I steered her toward the altar rail - "I believe the key to a successful relationship is communication. If you had simply communicated with Jesse better, none of this would be happening now. I mean, that's your real problem right there, Maria. Communication goes two ways. Somebody has to talk. And somebody has to listen."

Seeing what I was about to do, Maria shrieked, "Diego!"

But it was too late. I had already rammed her face, hard, into the altar rail.

"The thing is," I explained as I pulled her head back from the rail to examine the extent of the damage, "you won't listen, either, will you? I mean, I told you not to mess with me. And" - I leaned forward to whisper her in her ear - "I think I specified that you not mess with my boyfriend, either. But did you listen? No . . . you . . . did ... not."

I accompanied each of those last four words with a blow to Maria's face. Cruel, I know, but let's face it: she totally deserved it. The bitch had tried to kill me, not once, but twice.

Not that I'm counting or anything.

Here's the thing about chicks who were brought up in the nineteenth century: they're sneaky. I'll give them that. They have the whole back-stabbing, attacking people while they're asleep thing down pretty pat.

But as far as actual hand-to-hand combat goes? Yeah, not so good at that. I broke her neck pretty easily just by stomping on it. In Prada slides, too!

It was a shame her neck wouldn't stay broken for long.

But while I had her nicely subdued, I looked around to see if Jack had made it down okay....

And the news was not good. Oh, Jack was fine. It was just that he was hunched over Father Dominic, who was far from it. He was lying in a crumpled heap to one side of the altar, looking way worse for wear. I climbed over the altar rail and went to him.

"Oh, Suze," Jack wailed. "I can't wake him up! I think he's - "

But even as he was speaking, Father Dom, his bifocals askew on his face, let out a moan.

"Father D?" I lifted his head and set it down gently in my lap. "Father D, it's me, Suze. Can you hear me?"

Father D just moaned some more. But his eyelids fluttered, which I knew was a good sign.

"Jack," I said. "Run over there to that gold box beneath the crucifix - see it? - and pull out the decanter of wine you'll find there."

Jack hurried to do as I had asked. I put my face close to Father Dominic's and whispered, "You'll be okay. Hang on, Father D. Keep it together."

A very loud splintering crash distracted me, and I glanced around the rest of the church with a sudden sinking feeling. Diego. He was here somewhere, I'd forgotten all about him -

But Jesse hadn't.

I don't know why, but I had simply assumed that Jesse had stayed up there in that creepy shadowland. He hadn't. He had slipped back into this world - the real world - without, apparently, much thought as to what he might be giving up in doing so.

On the other hand, down here he was getting to beat the crap out of the guy who killed him, so maybe he wasn't giving up all that much. In fact, he looked pretty intent on returning the favor - you know, killing the guy who'd killed him - except, of course, that he couldn't, since Diego was already dead.