"What do you want?" she demanded. Given her animosity toward me, you'd hardly have guessed that we were currently president and vice-president of the junior class, and had to work daily (well, weekly) together in order to decide such important issues as where to go for a class trip and what kind of flowers to order for the spring formal.

Ignoring Kelly, I said, "Paul, your grandfather appears to be having a heart attack or something."

Paul looked at me through eyes that were half lidded. That Kelly sure has some sucking power.

"What?" he said stupidly.

"Your grandfather." I lifted a hand to push some hair from my eyes. I hoped he didn't notice how much my fingers were shaking. "An ambulance is on the way. He's had like a stroke or something."

Paul didn't look surprised. He said, "Oh," in kind of a disappointed voice . . . but more like he was bummed that his make-out session with Kelly had been interrupted than that his grandfather was, for all we knew, dying.

"Be right there," Paul said and started to disentangle himself from Kelly's legs.

"Paul," Kelly cried. She managed to give his name two syllables, so it came out sounding like Paw-wol.

"Sorry, Kel," Paul said, giving one of her calves a good-natured pat. "Grandpa Gork's OD'd on his meds again. Gotta go take care of business."

Kelly pouted prettily. "But the pizza's not even here yet!"

"We'll have to take a rain check, babe," he said.

Babe. I shuddered.

Then realized what he'd said. As he moved past me to get to his grandfather's room, I reached out and seized his arm. "What do you mean, he's OD'd on his meds?" I hissed.

"Uh," Paul said, looking down at me with a half smile. "Because that's what happened?"

"How do you know? You haven't even seen him yet!"

"Uh," he said, the smile growing broader. "Because maybe I helped make it happen."

I dropped my hand as if his skin had suddenly burst into flames. "You did this?" I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

Except that I should have. I really should have. Because it was Paul.

"For God's sake, Paul, why?"

"I knew you'd be coming over to see him after what happened today at the auction," he said with a shrug. "And frankly, I didn't need the hassle from the old man. Now if you'll excuse me . . ."

He went sauntering down the hall in the direction of his grandfather's room. I stared after him, not quite believing what I'd just heard.

And yet . . .

And yet it made sense. It was Paul, after all. Paul, a guy whose morals were more than a little askew.

Feeling numb, I wandered back out into the living room, where Kelly was pulling on her shoes and squawking into her cell phone. "No, I'm telling you, she came busting in here, demanding to know what I was doing with her boyfriend. Well, okay, she didn't say it quite like that. She made up some story about wanting to talk to Paul's grandfather. Yeah, I know, the one who can't talk. I know, have you ever heard a lamer excuse? Then she - " Looking up, Kelly saw me. "Oh, sorry, Deb, gotta go, call you later." She hung up and just stood there, glaring at me. "Thanks," she said finally, "for spoiling what otherwise might have been a really nice evening."

I was tempted to tell her the truth - that I hadn't spoiled anything. Paul was the one who'd apparently overmedicated his grandfather. At least, that seemed to be what he wanted me to believe.

But what would have been the point? She wouldn't have believed me, anyway.

"Sorry" was all I said and started for the door.

When I opened it, however, I saw my stepbrother Jake standing there, a pizza box in his hand.

"Peninsula Pizza, that'll be twenty-seven ninety. . . ." His voice trailed off as he recognized me. "Suze? What are you doing here?"

"Just leaving," I said.

"Yeah, well, you'd better." Jake glanced at his watch. "You're gonna be late for dinner. Dad'll kill you."

Yet another thing to look forward to.

"Kelly," I called up the stairs. "Your pizza's here!" To Jake I said, "Hope you remembered the hot pepper flakes."

Then I left.

Chapter eleven

Because of the auction, Andy was late putting dinner on the table, so I ended up getting home just in time. My mom couldn't understand why I was so quiet during the meal, though. She thought maybe I'd gotten too much sun sitting out at the bake sale table.

"Sister Ernestine should at least have given you an umbrella," she said as she dug into the pork tenderloin Andy had prepared. "That little girl you were sitting with . . . what was her name again?"

"Shannon."

Only it wasn't me who said it. It was David.

"Yes, Shannon," my mother said. "She's a redhead, like David. That much sun can be very damaging to redheads. I hope she was wearing sunscreen."

I half expected David to come up with one of his usual comments - you know, the exact statistical incidents of skin cancer occurring in eighth graders in northern California, or something. His head was filled with all sorts of useless information like that. Instead, he just flicked his mashed potatoes around his plate, until Brad, who'd finished all of his own mashed potatoes, as well as what was left in the bowl, went, "Man, are you going to eat that or play with it? Because if you don't want it, give it to me."

"David," Andy said. "Finish what's on your plate." David picked up a spoonful of mashed potatoes and ate it.

Brad's gaze immediately flickered over to my plate. But the hopeful look in his eye faded when he saw how clean it was. Not, of course, that I'd felt like eating. At all.

But I had Max, the family dog-slash-garbage disposal, by my side, and I'd grown expert at slipping him what I couldn't choke down myself.

"May I be excused?" I asked. "I think maybe I did get a little too much sun - "

"It's Suze's turn to put the plates in the dishwasher," Brad declared.

"No, it isn't." I couldn't believe this. Didn't these people realize I had way more important things to do than worry about household chores? I had to make sure my boyfriend died, like he was supposed to. "I did it last week."

"Nuh-uh," Brad said. "You and Jake traded weeks, remember? Because he had to work the dinner shift this week."

Since this was indisputably true - I'd seen the evidence myself over at Paul's - I couldn't argue anymore.

"Fine," I said, scooting my chair back, nearly running over Max in the process, and standing up. "I'll do it."

"Thank you, Susie," my mom said with a smile as I took her plate.

My reply wasn't exactly gracious. I muttered, "Whatever," and went into the kitchen with everybody's plates, Max following closely at my heels. Max loves it when I have plate-clearing duty, because I just scrape everything into his bowl, rather than into the trash compactor.

But on that night, Max and I weren't alone in the kitchen.

Even though I didn't notice anyone else in there right away, I knew something was up when Max suddenly lifted his head from his bowl and fled, his food only half finished, and his tail between his legs. Only one thing had the power to make Max leave pork uneaten, and that was a visitor from beyond.

He materialized a second later.

"Hey, kiddo," he said. "How's it going?"

I didn't scream or anything. I just poured Lemon Joy into the pot Andy had used to cook the potatoes, then filled it with hot water.

"Nice timing, Dad," I said. "You just stop by to say hi, or did someone on the ghost grapevine alert you to my extreme mental anguish?"

He smiled. He looked no different than he had the day he died. . . . No different from the dozens of times he'd visited me since then. He was still wearing the shirt he'd died in - the shirt I'd slept with for so many years.

"I heard you were having some . . . issues," my dad said.

That's the problem with ghosts. When they aren't haunting people, they sit around in the spectral plane, gossiping. Dad had even met Jesse. . . . A prospect I found too horrifying to even contemplate sometimes.

And of course, when you're dead . . . well . . . there isn't a whole lot to do. I knew my dad spent a goodly portion of his free time basically spying on me.

"Been a while since we had a chat," Dad went on, looking around the kitchen appreciatively. His gaze fell on the sliding glass doors and he noticed the hot tub. He whistled appreciatively. "That's new."

"Andy built it," I said. I started in on the glass dish Andy had roasted the pork in.

"Is there anything that guy can't do?" my dad wanted to know. But he was, I knew, being sarcastic. My dad doesn't like Andy. At least, not that much.

"No," I said. "Andy is a man of many talents. And I don't know what you've seen - or heard - but I'm fine, Dad. Really."

"Wouldn't expect you to be anything else." My dad looked more closely at the kitchen counters. "Is that real granite? Or imitation?"

"Dad." I nearly threw the dish towel at him. "Quit stalling and say what you came to say. Because if it's what I think you're here to say, no deal."

"And what do you think that is?" Dad wanted to know, folding his arms and leaning back against the kitchen counter.

"I'm not going to let him do it, Dad," I said. "I'm not."

My dad sighed. Not because he was sad. He sighed with happiness. In life, Dad had been a lawyer. In death, he still relished a good argument.

"Jesse deserves another chance," he said. "I know it. You know it."

"If he doesn't die," I said, attacking the potato pot with perhaps more energy than was strictly necessary, "I'll never meet him. Same with you."