He nuzzled his face against mine until he found my lips, then he kissed me, slow and gentle, the flow of
molten rock swelling languidly in the dark at the center of the earth, until my shaking slowed.
“Sleep, Wanda. Save it for tomorrow. It will keep for the night.”
I nodded, moving my face against his, and sighed.
Ian was tired, too. I didn’t have to wait long. I stared at the ceiling—the stars had moved above the
cracks here. I could see three of them now, where before there had been only two. I watched them wink
and pulse across the blackness of space. They did not call to me. I had no desire to join them.
One at a time, Ian’s arms fell away from me. He flopped onto his back, muttering in his sleep. I didn’t
dare wait any longer; I wanted too badly to stay, to fall asleep with him and steal one more day.
I moved cautiously, but he was in no danger of waking. His breathing was heavy and even. He wouldn’t
open his eyes till morning.
I brushed his smooth forehead with my lips, then rose and slid out the door.
It was not late, and the caves were not empty. I could hear voices bouncing around, strange echoes that
might have been coming from anywhere. I didn’t see anyone until I was in the big cave. Geoffrey, Heath,
and Lily were on their way back from the kitchen. I kept my eyes down, though I was very glad to see
Lily. In the brief glimpse I allowed myself, I could see that she was at least standing upright, her shoulders
straight. Lily was tough. Like Mel. She’d make it, too.
I hurried to the southern corridor, relieved when I was safe in the blackness there. Relieved and
horrified. It was really over now.
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.
Before Mel could respond, a heavy hand dropped on my shoulder from the darkness.
“Going somewhere?”
CHAPTER 58
Finished
Iwas so tightly wound that I shrieked in terror; I was so terrified that my shriek was only a breathless
little squeal.
“Sorry!” Jared’s arm went around my shoulders, comforting. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“What are you doing here?” I demanded, still breathless.
“Following you. I’ve been following you all night.”
“Well, stop it now.”
There was a hesitation in the dark, and his arm didn’t move. I shrugged out from under it, but he caught
my wrist. His grip was firm; I wouldn’t be able to shake free easily.
“You’re going to see Doc?” he asked, and there was no confusion in the question. It was obvious that
he wasn’t talking about a social visit.
“Of course I am.” I hissed the words so that he wouldn’t hear the panic in my voice. “What else can I
do after today? It’s not going to get any better. And this isn’t Jeb’s decision to make.”
“I know. I’m on your side.”
It made me angry that these words still had the power to hurt me, to bring tears stinging into my eyes. I
tried to hold on to the thought of Ian—he was the anchor, as Kyle somehow had been for Sunny—but it
was hard with Jared’s hand touching me, with the smell of him in my nose. Like trying to make out the
song of one violin when the entire percussion section was bashing away…
“Then let me go, Jared. Go away. I want to be alone.” The words came out fierce and fast and hard. It
was easy to hear that they weren’t lies.
“I should come with you.”
“You’ll have Melanie back soon enough,” I snapped. “I’m only asking for a few minutes, Jared. Give me
that much.”
Another pause; his hand didn’t loosen.
“Wanda, I would come to be with you.”
The tears spilled over. I was grateful for the darkness.
Of course Jared could not be allowed to be there. Only Doc could be trusted. Only he had promised
me. And I wasn’t leaving this planet. I wasn’t going to go live as a Dolphin or a Flower, always grieving
for the loves I’d left behind me, all dead by the time I opened my eyes again—if I even had eyes. This
wasmy planet, and they wouldn’t make me leave. I would stay in the dirt, in the dark grotto with my
friends. A human grave for the human I had become.
“But Wanda, I… There’s so much that I need to say to you.”
“I don’t want your gratitude, Jared. Trust me on that.”
“Whatdo you want?” he whispered, his voice strained and choked. “I would give you anything.”
“Take care of my family. Don’t let the others kill them.”
“Of course I’ll take care of them.” He dismissed my request brusquely. “I meantyou. What can I give
you?”
“I can’t take anything with me, Jared.”
“Not even a memory, Wanda? What do you want?”
I brushed the tears away with my free hand, but others took their place too quickly for it to matter. No, I
couldn’t take even a memory.
“What can I give you, Wanda?” he insisted.
I took a deep breath and tried to keep my voice steady.
“Give me a lie, Jared. Tell me you want me to stay.”
There was no hesitation this time. His arms wound around me in the dark, held me securely against his
chest. He pressed his lips against my forehead, and I felt his breath move my hair when he spoke.
Melanie was holding her breath in my head. She was trying to bury herself again, trying to give memy
freedom for these last minutes. Maybe she was afraid to listen to these lies. She wouldn’t want this
memory when I was gone.
“Stay here, Wanda. With us. Withme. I don’t want you to go. Please. I can’t imagine having you gone. I
can’tsee that. I don’t know how to… how to…” His voice broke.
He was a very good liar. And he must have been very, very sure of me to say those things.
I rested against him for a moment, but I could feel the time pulling me away. Time was up. Time was up.
“Thank you,” I whispered, and I tried to extricate myself.
His arms tightened. “I’m not done.”
Our faces were only inches apart. He closed the distance, and even here, on the edge of my last breath
It wasn’t the same, though. I could feel that. This was for me. It was my name that he gasped when he
held this body—and he thought of it as my body, thought of it as me. I could feel the difference. For one
moment, it was just us, just Wanderer and Jared, both of us burning.
No one had ever lied better than Jared lied with his body in my last minutes, and for that I was grateful. I
couldn’t take it with me, because I wasn’t going anywhere, but it eased some of the pain of leaving. I
could believe the lie. I could believe that he would miss me so much that it might even mar some of his
joy. I shouldn’t want that, but it felt good to believe it anyway.
I couldn’t ignore the time, the seconds ticking like a countdown. Even on fire, I could feel them dragging
at me, sucking me down the dark corridor. Taking me away from all this heat and feeling.
I managed to pull my lips away from his. We panted in the dark, our breath warm on each other’s faces.
“Thank you,” I said again.
“Wait…”
“I can’t. I can’t… bear any more. Okay?”
“Okay,” he whispered.
“I just want one more thing. Let me do this alone. Please?”
“If… if you’re sure that’s what you want…” He trailed off, unsure.
“It’s what I need, Jared.”
“Then I’ll stay here,” he said hoarsely.
“I’ll send Doc to get you when it’s over.”
His arms were still locked around me.
“You know that Ian is going to try to kill me for letting you do this? Maybe I should let him. And Jamie.
He’ll never forgive either of us.”
“I can’t think about them right now. Please. Let me go.”
Slowly, with a palpable reluctance that warmed some of the cold emptiness in the center of my body,
Jared let his arms slide away.
“I love you, Wanda.”
I sighed. “Thanks, Jared. You know how much I love you. With my whole heart.”
Heart and soul. Not the same thing, in my case. I’d been divided too long. It was time to make
something whole again, make a whole person. Even if that excluded me.
Just my imagination, of course. It was still summer here. It would always be summer here for me.
“What happens here when it rains, Jared?” I whispered. “Where do people sleep?”
It took him a moment to answer, and I could hear tears in his voice. “We…” He swallowed. “We all
move into the game room. Everyone sleeps in there together.”
I nodded to myself. I wondered what the atmosphere would be like. Awkward, with all the conflicting
personalities? Or was it fun? A change? Like a slumber party?
“Why?” he whispered.
“I just wanted to… imagine. How it will be.” Life and love would go on. Even though it would happen
without me, the idea brought me joy. “Goodbye, Jared. Mel says she’ll see you soon.”
Liar.
“Wait… Wanda…”
I hurried down the tunnel, hurried away from any chance that he might, with his grateful lies, convince me
not to go. There was only silence behind me.
His pain did not hurt me the way Ian’s had. For Jared, pain would be over soon. Joy was only minutes
away. The happy ending.
The southern tunnel felt only a few yards long. I could see the bright lantern burning ahead, and I knew
Doc was waiting for me.
I walked into the room that had always frightened me with my shoulders squared. Doc had everything
prepared. In the dimmest corner, I could see two cots pushed together, Kyle snoring with his arm around
Jodi’s motionless form. His other arm was still curled around Sunny’s tank. She would have liked that. I
wished there was some way to tell her.
“Hey, Doc,” I whispered.
He looked up from the table where he was setting out the medicine. There were already tears streaming
down his face.
And suddenly, I was brave. My heart slowed to an even pace. My breath deepened and relaxed. The
hardest parts were over.
I had done this before. Many times. I had closed my eyes and gone away. Always knowing new eyes
would open again, but still. This was familiar. Nothing to fear.
I went to the cot and hopped up so that I was sitting on it. I reached for the No Pain with steady hands
and screwed the lid off. I put the little tissue square on my tongue, let it dissolve.
There was no change. I wasn’t in any pain this time. No physical pain.
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”
I wanted to answer all the little puzzles before the end.
Doc sniffed and wiped the back of his hand under his eyes.
“Eustace. It’s a family name, and my parents were cruel people.”
I laughed once. Then I sighed. “Jared’s waiting, back by the big cave. I promised him you’d tell him
when it was over. Just wait until I—until I… stop moving, okay? It will be too late for him to do anything
about my decision then.”
“I don’t want to do this, Wanda.”
“I know. Thanks for that, Doc. But I’m holding you to your promise.”
“Please?”
“No. You gave me your word. I did my part, didn’t I?”
“You did.”
“Then do yours. Let me stay with Walt and Wes.”
His thin face worked as he tried to keep back a sob.
“Will you be… in pain?”
“No, Doc,” I lied. “I won’t feel anything.”
I waited for the euphoria to come, for the No Pain to set everything glowing the way it had the last time.
I still didn’t feel any difference.
It must not have been the No Pain after all—it had just been being loved. I sighed again.
I stretched out on the cot, on my stomach, and turned my face toward him.
“Put me under, Doc.”
The bottle opened. I heard him shake it onto the cloth in his hand.
“You are the noblest, purest creature I’ve ever met. The universe will be a darker place without you,” he
whispered.
These were his words over my grave, my epitaph, and I was glad that I got to hear them.
Thank you, Wanda. My sister. I will never forget you.
Be happy, Mel. Enjoy it all. Appreciate it for me.
Bye,we thought together.
Doc’s hand pressed the cloth gently over my face. I breathed in deeply, ignoring the thick,
uncomfortable scent. As I took another breath, I saw the three stars again. They were not calling to me;
they were letting me go, leaving me to the black universe I had wandered for so many lifetimes. I drifted
into the black, and it got brighter and brighter. It wasn’t black at all—it was blue. Warm, vibrant, brilliant
blue… I floated into it with no fear at all.
CHAPTER 59
Remembered
The beginning would feel like the end. I’d been warned.
But this time the end was a greater surprise than it had ever been. Greater than any end I’d remembered
in nine lives. Greater than jumping down an elevator shaft. I had expected no more memories, no more
thoughts. What end was this?
The sun is setting—the colors are all rosy, and they make me think of my friend… what would her name
be here? Something about… ruffles? Ruffles and more ruffles. She was a beautiful Flower. The flowers
here are so lifeless and boring. They smell wonderful, though. Smells are the best part of this place.
Footsteps behind me. Has Cloud Spinner followed me again? I don’t need a jacket. It’s warm
here—finally!—and I want to feel the air on my skin. I won’t look at her. Maybe she’ll think I can’t hear
and she’ll go home. She is so careful with me, but I’m almost grown now. She can’t mother me forever.
“Excuse me?” someone says, and I don’t know the voice.
I turn to look at her, and I don’t know the face, either. She’s pretty.
The face in the memory jerked me back to myself. That was my face! But I didn’t remember this.…
“Hi,” I say.
“Hello. My name is Melanie.” She smiles at me. “I’m new in town and… I think I’m lost.”
“Oh! Where are you trying to go? I’ll take you. Our car is just back —”
“No, it’s not far. I was going for a walk, but now I can’t find my way back to Becker Street.”
She’s a new neighbor—how nice. I love new friends.
“You’re very close,” I tell her. “It’s just around the second corner up that way, but you can cut right
through this little alley here. It takes you straight there.”
“Could you show me? I’m sorry, what’s your name?”
“Of course! Come with me. I’m Petals Open to the Moon, but my family mostly calls me Pet. Where
are you from, Melanie?”
“Either one.” I laugh, too. I like her smile. “There are two Bats on this street. They live in that yellow
house with the pine trees.”
“I’ll have to say hello,” she murmurs, but her voice has changed, tensed. She’s looking into the dusky
alley as though she’s expecting to see something.
And there is something there. Two people, a man and a boy. The boy drags his hand through his long
