“How old is your niece?” I ask, letting him lead me down the street.

  “She’ll be seven soon.” I can tell from the look on his face that he adores her.

  “How are you old enough to have a seven-year-old niece?”

  “Maybe I’m actually fifty.” He arches an eyebrow at me.

  “Maybe your student card told me your real age.” I arch an eyebrow back at him. I already know that he turned nineteen last month. “So back to my question.”

  “I’m the baby in the family, and my niece is my older sister’s daughter. Want to grab lunch with me?” He stops walking, so I do, too. I look up and see that we’re standing beside the patio of a café.

  “Eating is always good. What is this place?”

  He puts his hands on my shoulders, turning me toward the door. “It’s my secret hideaway. Best panini in Hollywood.”

  The interior of the café looks like it could be someone’s house circa the 1950s, except for the deli case and antique cash register. I follow Riley to the counter, noticing the worn look of the dark wood surface.

  He takes a menu from a holder on the counter and hands it to me. I open it, but have to strain to read the tiny print on the page. For such a small place, the sandwich selection is almost ridiculously big.

  “The apple one,” he says.

  “Hmm?” I shift my eyes up to him.

  “The panini with apples and brie.” He points at the middle of the menu. “You can’t go wrong if you like apples, or even if you think you don’t.”

  “You like apples, I take it?” I wonder if he knows how earnest his face is right now. Probably not.

  “I’m a guy. I like pretty much anything.”

  “Ha. Very true.” I read the description and have to admit that it sounds good. I’ll get it, but not because he suggested it.

  “What do you want to drink?” he asks.

  “Whatever’s on tap,” I say. He looks me up and down, frowning. I can tell he’s trying to decide if I’m joking.

  “Are you even old enough to drink?” he finally asks. “You look like you’re sixteen.”

  “I’m seventeen, actually. Eighteen on Saturday.”

  “And still not even close to being old enough to order drinks,” he finishes without missing a beat. “Neither am I, for that matter.”

  “You’re no fun at all, are you?” I pretend to make a face at him and he chuckles.

  “Why do I get the feeling that you’re kind of a handful?” I can’t deny that, but he doesn’t need to know. Before I can come up with a good answer, the cashier finishes with the person in front of us and asks to take our order. I get the apple and brie panini and an iced tea, and Riley orders the same thing.

  “Copycat,” I tell him.

  “Great minds think alike.” He takes a wire stand with our order number on it from the cashier, and then we head outside to the patio. Our iced teas are brought over by a waiter almost as soon as we sit down.

  “So, eighteen this weekend,” Riley muses, leaning back in his chair. “You must have big plans for celebrating?”

  “Nope.” I take a sip of my iced tea.

  “So that means your family is coming to town and you’re keeping it tame.”

  He’s teasing me, but he wouldn’t be if he knew my family. “Nope,” I say again.

  I can tell he wants to ask me another question. It’s time to make something up before he can start digging.

  “My aunt and uncle can’t get away from Boston this weekend because of some family thing going on there,” I lie. “I just didn’t want to go back for it.”

  “Your aunt and uncle?” he asks, looking confused for a second. Then he shifts his eyes away from me. Yup. He remembers now. “Do you miss your parents on your birthday?”

  I take another sip of my drink while thinking about how to answer him. I have to be careful with this, since it’s clear that death isn’t a subject he’s comfortable with. Not that I can blame him, really. It’s the same for most people. I release my straw from my lips.

  “My parents are always here with me, celebrating my life from above.” My voice is gentle, but his cheeks still flush.

  “You had to miss them growing up, though, didn’t you?” he asks after a moment.

  “I loved them growing up, or at least my memory of them.” I watch him swallow, even though he hasn’t taken a sip from his glass. He looks away from me again, focusing on something I can’t see on the sidewalk. Fail. We’ve veered straight into awkward.

  I try to think of a way to change the subject, but he turns his head back to me and speaks before I can.

  “If you’re not doing anything for your birthday, I’ll take you out.”

  Like on a date? I think, freezing as the d-word pops into my mind. I don’t date, or at least I haven’t since I was Anna. It just doesn’t make sense to let anyone get attached to me. It makes even less sense now, since I won’t be here in a couple of months.

  I’m about to answer him, when I realize he’s still talking. “You have to celebrate your birthday. You know that, right?” he asks. Looks like Riley is one of those persistent people. Super.

  I set my elbow on the table, propping my head up with my hand. I’m not sure there’s a way out of this one. If I’m here to help him with something, that probably means I have to spend time with him. It would just help if we didn’t spend that time on something that sounds like a date.

  “I’m over birthdays,” I finally say. I’m not sure if that answers his question or not.

  Apparently not. “You’re too young to be over birthdays,” he informs me. Great.

  Our food shows up before I can come up with a good argument for that. Riley reaches for his sandwich but keeps looking at me. His eyes dare me to challenge him.

  “Wisdom of the ancient one?” I finally offer. I catch him mid-bite, and he can only smirk until he swallows his mouthful of food.

  “Are you always this sarcastic?” he asks.

  “I usually save it for family.” I give him my most innocent look.

  “I’m flattered.”

  “You should be,” I agree. I pick up my panini and take a bite.

  If I add up the years of life I’ve had in The Before as both Anna and Cassidy, I’m more than justified in my feelings about birthdays. This isn’t something I can explain to Riley, though.

  “Think about where you want to go on Saturday,” he says. I can tell that he’s not great at taking no for an answer. Well, we sure have that in common.

  “Won’t your girlfriend be jealous?” I ask. It’s a joke, but there’s an odd look creeping across Riley’s face. It tells me that was a bad choice of words. Interesting.

  He looks away from me and lifts his glass to his lips. After taking a drink, he sets it back down on the table.

  “I’m not really a girlfriend kind of guy.”

  He gets really quiet, then. Even though most people are quiet when they eat, this feels more uncomfortable than when we were talking about death. Someone has to break the silence here, and clearly it’s going to be me.

  “Was that the wrong thing to bring up?” I reach for my fork so I can spear a cucumber from my side salad.

  He blinks a couple of times before my words register. “No.”

  He’s lying. He knows that I can tell, or I think he does, because he opens his mouth to speak again.

  “I live inside of my head sometimes.”

  “Me too.” I go for a tomato this time.

  “You’re seventeen. Get out of your head.”

  I make a face at him. “You’re nineteen, lead by example.”

  He laughs, picking his glass up again. “What’s that old saying? ‘Do as I say, not as I do’?”

  “I think we just call that hypocrisy in Boston.”

  “Consider me schooled.”

  He’s studying me, I notice. I pretend to be occupied with eating my salad. When I’ve taken a few bites and see that he’s still watching me, I can’t pretend to ignore him anymore.

  “What?”

  He grins at the impatience in my voice. “Just curious what brought you out here.”

  “Life.” I put my fork down.

  “Let me guess. You’re an actress?”

  I try not to choke as a mouthful of iced tea slides down my throat. No, but I was in my last life. There’s something I sure can’t say out loud. I shake my head after a moment.

  “Model?” he tries again.

  This time I do choke on my iced tea, but it’s because I’m laughing. I reach for my napkin and hold it over my mouth while I cough a couple of times, putting it back down on the table when I think I’ve recovered. At least the iced tea didn’t come out my nose.

  “Maybe when my long-anticipated six-inch growth spurt happens, but I’m not holding my breath,” I tell him. “I’m a little too short for the model life, if you haven’t noticed.”

  “It was a compliment, actually. You don’t take those well, do you?”

  I feel my cheeks getting warm. He must notice it too, because I see glee in his eyes. He’s found the weakness in my armor and he knows it.

  “Fashion school?” he guesses. Now he’s just goading me.

  “I was supposed to be starting my first year of pre-med at Harvard this fall. They accepted me, but I changed my mind and canceled on them.”

  He whistles. “How’d that go over with your family?”

  “They don’t know yet.” Well, they kind of don’t know. I haven’t called my uncle back.

  “But they know you moved to L.A.?” He looks confused.

  “They think I’m here for summer vacation, and that I’m going back to Boston before the fall semester starts.”

  “What happens when you tell them the truth?” he asks.

  “I’m still figuring that out,” I lie. As long as I can convince them that I’ve called the admissions office and sorted everything out, I won’t need to tell them anything.

  He takes another bite of his food, and the silence is a relief. The guy is a question-asking machine. No one has ever gotten this much information about my life out of me, and I can’t say I like it too much. He swallows. I get ready for the next question.

  “Boston is a long way from here. Why’d you choose L.A.?”

  I shrug and stab my fork into a piece of lettuce. “I needed some time out, and wanted to figure out who I am away from everything and everyone I grew up with. Maybe it’s my quarter-life crisis.” It sounds like a good enough excuse to me.

  “You’re at least a few years away from your quarter-life crisis.” And now I know he can do math in his head, too.

  “What can I say? I’m mature for my age.” I watch him take a bite of his salad. Perfect. It’s time to turn the focus back to him while his mouth is too full of food to ask me another question. “Where’d you learn how to interrogate people, anyway?”

  He swallows and wipes his mouth with his napkin. “A year of journalism school,” he answers. “Come talk to me after the next three years.”

  “Ah, so that’s what you’re taking at USC.”

  “That, and a double major in English. Why have one major when you can kill your social life with two?”

  “And then you’ll be cross-examining politicians and people on the street?”

  “Maybe,” he shrugs. “I really just want to write books.”

  “Are you writing a book?”

  “Yep.” He takes another bite of his panini and we spend the next few minutes in silence, finishing our food. Once the last crumbs have disappeared from our plates, he checks his watch.

  “I need to head out soon,” he says, looking up at me. “Work to do.”

  I nod, setting my napkin down on the table. “Thanks for lunch.”

  He leaves a few bills on the table for our waiter, and then we both get up from our chairs. He follows me through the patio exit and out onto the sidewalk. We start to walk back in the direction of the record store.

  “Do you live around here?” he asks.

  “Kind of. I’m up in the Hills.”

  “Ah, so you’re a rich kid. I guess the Harvard thing should have clued me in.”

  “Yeah, because I hear the University of Southern California is the main hangout of the nation’s paupers. Don’t they call it the University of Spoiled Children, or is that another USC?” I actually want to stick my tongue out at him, but my almost-eighteen-year-old self wins out over the six-year-old in me.

  “You’re way too fun to tease, you know.”

  I roll my eyes at him. Okay, so the six-year-old in me hasn’t entirely lost the battle.

  “The house I live in has been in my family for practically forever,” I tell him.

  “Do you live there all by yourself?”

  I’m about to joke that it’s just a bunch of ghosts and me, but then I remember that the last couple of times I’ve mentioned dead people haven’t gone over so well. If we’re going to hang out, I have to figure out some way to get him over that.

  “Just me,” I answer. Amoeba Music is only a few steps away now. We stop at the corner, and I wonder if he’s going to walk me all the way to my car. He checks his watch again.

  “Time for me to jet, or I’ll be late for work. I meant what I said, though, about your birthday. Let me take you out to celebrate.”

  Oh right. Guess he’s one of those people with a good memory, too. Fabulous.

  “Um, sure,” I reply. Maybe something brilliant will come to me when I get home and we can cancel. Then I can figure out a way to see him again without the words “take you out” being part of it.

  “I’ll text you later this week,” he says. Wonderful.

  “Until then.” I lift my hand and wriggle my fingers at him. He touches my shoulder and I feel the tingling again. It stops when he drops his hand and turns to walk in the other direction.

  I’m still a little light-headed when I get to my car, even though the tingling is gone. Once I’m sitting inside, I lean my head against the back of the seat and wait for the feeling to pass. That’s when a flash of white on the passenger seat catches my eye. There’s a long white feather resting there. I can guess how it got in here, but I know it’s not from Noah. He only sends me indigo feathers.

  I wrack my brain, trying to figure out who else could be sending me a feather, and why. My mind draws a complete blank. I must be forgetting someone, but I’m sure it will come to me. I open the glove compartment and put the feather inside, then start my car and pull away from the curb.

  Chapter Five

  Countdown to The Life-After: six weeks.

  I try not to shiver when the marker squeaks against the page. One line, and then another. X. It’s my favorite sight.

  I’ve crossed off days on a calendar since I was six years old, starting right after my parents died. A calendar was the only thing I asked for the first time my aunt and uncle took me to the biggest toy store I’d ever seen, right after I came to live with them in Boston. They were surprised, and I couldn’t blame them, really. What kid asks for a calendar? Most six-year-olds probably would have asked for a pony.

  Uncle Mike likes the idea of crossing off days gone by, probably because he thinks I’m counting down the days until I start college. He’s right about me counting down, just not about what I’m counting down to. I’ve never told him he’s wrong, though. It’s easier to let him and Aunt Sarah believe what they need to. It keeps the peace.

  I set the marker down on the kitchen counter. The next uncrossed box on the calendar is for today, my eighteenth birthday. I always thought today would feel like freedom in a way, since it’s the last birthday I’ll celebrate as Cassidy. Freedom isn’t what I feel, though. Not right now, just a couple of hours from the date I’ve been forced into going on. If that’s even what this birthday dinner with Riley is, since it’s hard to tell what he has in mind. I’m hoping it’s just a pity dinner, and that he insisted on taking me out because he thinks I’m all alone out here in the big, bad city. I could live with that. A pity dinner means no expectations and no mess to clean up later.

  It’s not that I haven’t gone out on dates before. I just wasn’t Cassidy the last time I did, and I kind of wanted to keep it that way. Dating as Anna wasn’t dangerous for anyone but me. Dating now definitely is. It’s a bad idea to let someone get close when I know how much it will hurt them once I’m gone.

  I look at the clock on the stove. It’s five-thirty, which means I have an hour and a half to get ready. Curse everyone, and especially David Burns. I should be in The Life-After right now, not walking into a complete disaster.

  “Do what you gotta do,” I mutter, picking up my phone from the counter. Then I head for the bathroom to take a shower.

  * * *

  The doorbell rings at 7 o’clock, sharp. Awesome. Not only is Riley a reluctant rescuer who just can’t leave things alone, he’s also uber-punctual. I try to plaster something that looks like cheer on my face and then reach for the handle of the front door.

  “Hi.” It’s the only word I get out before noticing the bouquet of roses in his hand. My mouth clamps shut. This is my worst nightmare.

  “Hey, birthday girl,” he says, taking a step forward and reaching his arms out to give me a hug. I can’t remember the last time I hugged somebody, and my arms feel like alien tentacles trying to do it. I’m sure that my face is flaming.

  He releases me and holds out the bouquet. “Not the most original birthday gift, I know.”

  I take it from him, twisting my lips into something that I hope looks like a smile. “Being a gentleman today, are you?” I should just thank him, I know. I don’t.

  “I’ll deny it if anyone ever asks.” His eyes are glued to me, I notice, and I quickly drop mine to stare at the flowers. “You look incredible,” he adds.

  Yup. My face is on fire. “Thanks. Um, let me go put these in something.” We’re two minutes into this night and I already need an escape. The nightmare is getting worse.

  He follows me inside, waiting in the foyer by the front door while I head to the kitchen to deal with the flowers. I don’t have a vase, so I put them in the first pitcher I can find and fill it with water. This can only go downhill from here.

 

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