Page 90 of Starrily

Shanna swallowed. “Would you believe me you died in that crash?”

Simon looked at Callie, eyes flashing with alarm. Callie thought she was the only one Simon had ever told that, and only because she’d seen his strange condition.

“Go on,” he said.

“And I—I brought you back to life.”

“You what, now?” Callie shot out.

“I can explain.” Shanna delved back into her bag and pulled out a purple, leather-bound book with no title or author name on the cover, just a gold rhombus shape.

She sure had a lot of things in that bag.

Focus.

“This book is quite informative. It’s mostly about ghosts—”

“Ghosts?” Simon repeated.

“—but it also holds a resurrection ritual. When I found out you were dead, I performed it.” Shanna kept switching between Simon and Callie, looking like a frightened rabbit. “I’m sorry, but I couldn’t let you die!”

“You can’t be serious.” Callie rubbed her forehead. Ghosts. Resurrections. “May I?” She pointed to the book.

Shanna turned it over, and Callie opened it. Still no title, just a name on the first page: Brenda B. Bustin. Well, that was a fake, if Callie’s ever heard one. As she leafed through the book, the contents appeared no more realistic: a bunch of talks about ghosts, some diagrams …

Surely, this couldn’t be real.

And yet, Simon said something weird had happened to him. That some force brought him back.

She hated what this made her think of—her family, and her past.

“But I might have slightly messed it up,” Shanna said as she accepted the book back from Callie. “The ritual. I think I didn’t get your soul together in one piece. That’s why you forgot all about me and why the other piece—”

“Wait, wait.” Simon grabbed Shanna by the shoulders. “It’s not what you think.”

“So you believe me?” Her pale eyes grew wide.

“It certainly makes my explanation easier,” Simon said.

“Which is?” Callie prompted.

“The resurrection, whatever ritual you’d done … I assume it was something like calling the soul back while the body still existed?”

Shanna nodded vehemently, sending a few stray locks flying.

“You got the wrong soul,” Simon said. “I’m not Simon. Or at least I wasn’t before that.”

“What?” Callie said.

Shanna’s eyes grew even wider. “Of course. Now it makes sense. All the sense! Why you never sought me out. Why you said you didn’t know me, and even recognize me—”

“Stop.” Callie put her hands up in the air. “Stop, stop!”

Shanna clasped her hands in front, but her left foot still twitched.

“That’s enough,” Callie said. “Ihave had enough.” Her voice was starting to shake, along with her hands and knees. She wanted her normal life back. The one that stood on science, not the paranormal. A nice, peaceful life. Maybe it didn’t make her heart race, but it was perfectly adequate. A life where all thestrangeness had been locked away. A life with no past chasing her.

“I need… I have to go,” she squeezed out and took off.