"Something like that." Jesse looked from Paul to me and then back again. "Is there anything going on here that I should know about?"

"No," I said quickly. Too quickly, maybe, since one of Jesse's eyebrows - the one with the scar through it - went up inquisitively.

Paul, to my fury, burst out into scornful laughing.

"Oh yeah," he said. "You two have a great relationship. It's really great how honest you are with each other."

Jesse narrowed his dark eyes in Paul's direction. That seemed to cause some of his laughter to dry up, without Jesse even having to say a word.

Then Jesse turned his penetrating gaze on me.

"It's nothing," I blurted, feeling a little panicky all of a sudden. "Paul was just . . . he was thinking of doing something to you. But he changed his mind. Didn't you, Paul?"

"Not really," Paul said. "Hey, I have an idea. Let's ask Jesse what he'd want, shall we? Say, Jesse, how would feel if I told you I could - "

"No," I interrupted with a gasp. Suddenly, it was getting very difficult to breathe. "Paul, really, that's not necessary. Jesse won't - "

"Now, Suze," Paul said as if he were speaking to a three-year-old. "Let's allow Jesse to decide. Jesse, what if I told you that in addition to all the many other wonderful things that we mediators can do, it turned out we can also travel through time? And that I had generously offered to travel back to your time - the night you died, I mean - and save your life. What would you say to that?"

Jesse's dark gaze didn't leave Paul's face, nor did his expression waver from cold disdain. Not even for a second.

"I would say that you're a liar" was Jesse's preternaturally calm response.

"See, I thought you might say that." Paul had the smooth patter and the self-confidence of a traveling salesman giving his spiel. "But I'm here to tell you it's the absolute truth. Think about it, Jesse. You didn't have to die that night. I can go back through time and warn you. Well, you won't know me, of course, but I think if I tell you - the past you - that I'm from the future and that you're going to die if you don't do what I tell you, you'll believe me."

"Do you?" Jesse asked in the same deadly calm voice. "Because I don't."

That stumped Paul for a second or two, during which my breathing became easy again. My heart swelled with affection for the man leaning against the stone pillar beside me. I shouldn't have worried about hiding this from Jesse. Jesse would never choose life over me. Never. He loves me too much.

Or so I thought, before Paul started his patter once again.

"I don't think you understand what I'm saying here." Paul shook his head. "I'm talking about giving you back your life, Jesse. None of this wandering around in a sort of half-life for a hundred and fifty years, watching the people you love grow older and die, one by one. No way. You'll live. To a ripe old age, if I can, you know, get rid of that Diego guy who killed you. I mean, how can you say no to an offer like that?"

"Like this," Jesse said tonelessly. "No."

Yes! I thought, flushing with joy. Yes!

Paul blinked. Once. Twice.

Then he said, his voice devoid of the friendliness that had been in it moments before, "Don't be an idiot. I'm offering you a chance to live again. Live. What are you going to do, hang around here for the rest of eternity? Are you going to watch her get old" - he thrust a finger at me - "and eventually turn to dust like you did with your family? Don't you remember how that felt? You want to go through all that again? You want her to sacrifice having a normal life - marriage, kids, grandkids - just to be with you, when you can't even support her, can't even - "

"Paul, stop it," I commanded because I could see Jesse's face growing less and less expressionless with every word.

But Paul wasn't done. Not by a long shot.

"You think you're doing her any favors by sticking around?" he demanded. "Man, you're only keeping her from leading a normal life - "

"Stop it!" I shouted at Paul as I reached out and grasped Jesse by the arm. Two things happened at once then. The first was that classroom doors suddenly flew open all around us and students began streaming out into the breezeway as they changed classes for the next period.

The next was that I seized Jesse's arms with both my hands and, looking up anxiously into his face, said, "Don't listen to him. Please. I don't care about those things, marriage and kids. All I want is you."

But it was too late. I could tell it was too late. Some of what Paul had said was already starting to sink in. Jesse's expression had grown troubled, and he seemed unable to look me in the eye.

"I mean it," I said, giving him a frustrated shake. "Don't pay attention to a word he says!"

"Um, hello, Suze." Kelly Prescott's voice rose above the noise of slamming lockers and chitchat. "Talk to the wall much?"

I flung a glance over my shoulder and saw her standing there with the rest of the Dolce and Gabbana Nazis, smirking at me. I knew, of course, what they were seeing. Me with hands raised, clutching nothing but air, and speaking to one of the pillars in the breezeway.

Like I don't have enough of a reputation for being a freak. Now I really looked like I was going around the bend.

But when I turned my head back to tell Jesse we'd finish this conversation later, I saw that I was too late. He'd already disappeared.

I dropped my hands and turned to face Paul, who still stood there looking angry and defensive and pleased with himself at the same time.

"Thanks a lot," I said to him.

"Don't mention it." He walked away, whistling to himself.

Chapter ten

"Is there wheat in this?" a petite woman in a China chop and huge dark sunglasses asked me as she held up a chocolate chip cookie.

"Yes," I said.

"What about this?" She held up a brownie.

"Yes," I said.

"What about this?" A Mexican wedding cookie.

"Yes."

"Are you telling me," she demanded, looking outraged, "that there is wheat in all of these baked goods?"

I lowered my chair. I'd been tilting it out of boredom, to see how far back I could lean without falling.

"Because Tyler doesn't eat wheat," the woman went on, her hand going to cradle the chubby-cheeked face of a kid standing beside her. His blue eyes blinked out at me past his mother's perfectly manicured nails. "I'm raising him on a gluten-free diet."

"Try one of those," I said, pointing to some lemon bars.

"Is there dairy in it?" the woman asked suspiciously. "Because I'm raising Tyler lactose-free, as well."

"Dairy- and gluten-free, I promise," I said.

The woman slipped me a dollar, and I handed her the lemon bars. She passed one to Tyler, who inspected it, bit into it . . . then gave me a dazzling smile - his first of the day, no doubt - as his mother took his hand and led him away. Beside me, Shannon, my fellow bake sale attendant, looked appalled.

"There's wheat and dairy in those lemon bars," she said.

"I know." I rocked my chair back again. "I felt bad for the little guy."

"But - "

"She didn't say he was allergic. She just said she was raising him without it. Poor kid."

"Suu-uuze," the eighth grader said, giving my name multiple syllables. "You are so cool. Your brother Dave said you were cool, but I didn't believe him."

"Oh, I'm cool, all right," I assured her. It was weird to hear someone call David "Dave." He was such a David to me.

"You so are," Shannon said with perfect seriousness.

Whatever. It was so the story of my life to be stuck running a school bake sale while the rest of the world was enjoying such a perfect Saturday. The sky overhead was so blue and cloudless, it was almost painful to look at. The temperature was hovering at an extremely comfortable seventy degrees. A beautiful day for the beach or cappuccino at an outdoor cafe, or even just a walk.

And where was I? Yeah, that'd be manning the eighth grade bake sale booth at the Mission's charity antique auction.

"I couldn't believe it when Sister Ernestine told us you would be helping out at the booth," Shannon was saying. Shannon, I'd discovered, was not shy. She likes to talk. A lot. "I mean, you being an eleventh grader and all. And, you know. So cool."

Cool. Yeah, right.

I hadn't expected so many people to show up at the auction. Oh, sure, a few parents, eager to look like they cared about their kids' school. But not, you know, hordes of eager antique collectors.

But that's exactly who was here. There were people everywhere, people I'd never seen before, all wandering around, peering at the items that would be auctioned off, and whispering conspiratorially to one another. Occasionally, some of them stopped by our booth and shelled out a buck for a Rice Krispies treat or whatever. But mostly they had their eyes on the prize. . . . in this case, a hideously ugly wicker birdcage, or some old Mickey Mouse watch, or a snow globe of the Golden Gate Bridge, or some other equally non-designer thing.

The bidding got started late because the monsignor was supposed to have been acting as auctioneer. Because he was still in a coma up in San Francisco, there appeared to have been some frantic phone calls on the part of Sister Ernestine, as she looked for someone worthy to fill in.

You can imagine my surprise when she got up onto the dais at the end of the courtyard and announced into the microphone, in front of all the many antique collectors gathered there, that in the monsignor's absence, the auction would be called by none other than Andy Ackerman, well-known host of a home repair show on cable . . .