The thing is, Lily is a good student. Or she would be, at least, if she had the time for it. It had been easier to coax out high grades with low effort in high school, sure, but she'd still done well enough to earn her scholarship in the first place. And H.W. University was a good school. It hadn't been a reach to think she'd get in, but it hadn't been a gimme either. Staying in it seemed to be the harder part. Sure, classes and attendance and all that seemed to be much more relaxed in college. She'd certainly missed plenty her freshman year, whether it was because she was dealing with a ghost or exhausted from trying. But it also took substantially more work to actually succeed and not just scrape by.

So while she'd forgotten to start on Mackey's paper until he'd asked about it, well, she knew shouldn't could actually put it off for much longer. She had a week to do it and a vague promise to meet with him at some point in between then to go over her rough draft, which meant she needed to actually get started on a rough draft soon. It was just a textual argument, no further research necessary, but coming up with an argument that was well-informed and educated would be the challenge. Sparknotes wasn't going to cut it this time.

Still, she doesn't start until Thursday night after ducking out of her lit class just as soon as it was over, not giving Mackey enough time to check in even if he'd wanted to. By Friday morning, she's got — well, she's got words on the page, but not much more than that. Friday night sees some progress, and she shoots off an email to Mackey just after midnight asking if he's free to meet sometime the next day. It's a courtesy email, sent only so that she can claim she tried to meet up with him even if their schedules didn't allow for it, but when she wakes up Saturday morning there's a response sitting in her inbox.

He's suggested a coffee place not far off campus around three, and, without a good excuse, she responds to accept. The rest of the hours until then are spent refining her rough draft into something actually presentable, something she won't be embarrassed or ashamed to show him. She's pulled heavily from her response papers, but that's expected. Tying them together into one coordinated piece of writing takes a certain artistic flare she's not sure she's quite managing on a Saturday morning, but she gives it all a little more polish before packing up her messenger bag to head out.

The bus drops her off a few blocks down, and she walks the rest of the way. When she gets there, Professor Mackey's already sitting in a corner, working on his laptop with a mug and piece of half-eaten coffee cake beside him. She hesitates, but he spots her, and she waves before gesturing to the counter. He nods back, and it buys her a few moments to try to quell the nerves that have suddenly crept up. She's not quite sure whether it was the way he'd been checking in on her or the way his hand had brushed hers in his office or the fact that Caroline had said he was a killer that has her feeling anxious, or maybe it's a combination of the three. She's not ignorant of the fact that he asked her to meet him off campus, but surely if he had any kind of ill intentions he would've suggested a park or somewhere else more private than a half-full coffee shop on a Saturday afternoon.

The barista is calling her name, though, and she doesn't have time to consider that any longer, so she grabs the chai latte off the counter and heads back over to the table where Mackey sits.

"Miss Evans," he greets warmly as she slides into the seat across from him. "I almost thought I wasn't going to hear from you."

"Busier week than I thought," she lies with a tight smile, but pulls her printed out paper from her bag, passing it across the table for him to look at. "Sorry I didn't get this to you sooner."

"That's perfectly fine, my Saturdays are usually pretty open," he replies, but his eyes are already on the paper as he picks it up and starts reading.

And they do talk about the assignment, spend nearly an hour on it. He goes through and marks notes with his pen, both suggestions he has and the argument she offers when he asks her to clarify out loud. But at some point, and Lily's not sure when exactly it happened, the conversation creeps away from work, turning back to Saturdays.

"I moved here in late July," Mackey explains. Since she sat down, they've collected another few plates. The crumbs of pastries and empty mugs clutter the table, her paper safely tucked back in her bag to avoid accidental spills. "But with the semester starting mid-August, I haven't had a chance to meet too many people yet. I was a high school teacher back in Ohio, so this is my first year as a college professor — and I want to do it right."

"What about the other professors in the department? Not all of them are super old," she offers.

He smiles, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. "They're all great. But I just haven't found anyone that I really click with."

"What about back home? Do you keep in touch with a lot of your friends from there? They must've been bummed you moved."

It's not until he hesitates that she remembers why he moved, that there's more to the answer of that question than she could possibly have anticipated. Mackey didn't just move because he landed a new, better job more than half-a-country away. He left because one of his students, one of his high-school aged students, had killed herself in his home. She doesn't know what kind of community it was, if it was the place where everybody talks like they do back home. His friends could have known that he was running away, or seeking a new start, or trying to escape the whispers. But whatever it was that they had known, it hadn't been a normal goodbye.

Almost instantly, she regrets asking, but schools her expression into something neutral instead of the cringe it almost sunk into. After all, this is not something the average student knows, or could even find if they'd looked into it. The only reason she knew was because of Caroline, because she'd known what to look for when she'd started digging. Still, he'd been the one to bring up Ohio, and he recovers quickly.

"They were, but they were excited for me to get this opportunity, too," he answers slowly. "We still talk on the phone, and I'll go back to visit for a few days over fall break, but it's not the same."

"I get that," she nods, and takes a sip of her drink. She knows she should take this opportunity to ask a few more probing questions, to try to get some version of his side of Caroline's story, but it's easier to just focus on what he's saying on a surface level. "My best friend from high school stayed in Texas for college. We try to make time to talk once a week or so. But you're right, it's different. And I like my friends here, but I don't think they'll ever know me quite like he does." It certainly doesn't help that the only people in the small Northern California city who do know her secret are ghosts themselves.

"What about that boy?" Mackey asks, and Lily freezes, certain for a second that he's talking about James. "The one you had a fight with?" he prompts, and suddenly she remembers telling him about Sirius.

"Oh, no, that's not — He's not even a friend. Honestly, I don't even really know him that well. We just have someone in common, I guess."

"So no close friends?"

"My roommate Marlene is probably my closest friend here, and I love her, but she's got her own friends. And I have a lot of friends from my classes." A lot might be a stretch, but she thinks of Mary, of Alice who she spent so much time with last year. "I don't know. I guess I haven't quite found my group here yet either."

He smiles sympathetically. "I think plenty of people feel that way about their freshman year. It's a tough adjustment, especially going somewhere so far away from home. Have you tried joining any groups on campus?"

She shrugs. "I tried out for the newsletter last year, but it didn't work out."

"Well, I'm sure you'll find something," he says, and again, there's that smile. They hold their gaze for a second, but then his phone dings, and he looks away too quickly to check it. She wonders if it's wishful thinking or if his cheeks are actually a shade pinker when he looks back, but he's already starting to gather up his stuff. "Think you'll be okay on the rest of that paper, then?" he asks, swinging his own bag over his shoulder.

"Yeah, I think so. Thanks again for all the help."

"Anytime," he says. "I'll see you in class on Tuesday."

She nods, he waves, and then he's striding out of the coffee shop, leaving her at the table to pick at the rest of her coffee cake crumbs off her plate.

She waits a while to leave the coffee shop, imagining that it might be awkward if he's headed back near campus and they end up waiting at the same bus stop, boarding the same bus. Or maybe he'd driven here, maybe he has a car, but she doesn't know and doesn't want to risk it. By the time she's back in her dorm room, she's thought it all through at least a handful times, and each time she's less certain that he was actually blushing, but he was indisputably kind and caring and interested, and she almost forgets again that, beyond talking about her paper and her personal life, she was supposed to be looking into him a little bit. Just to see who he was, who he'd been, if he was capable of anything horrible.

James had told her to be careful, careful because of what had happened to Caroline, but all that Lily knows about Caroline's death is that it had been ruled a suicide by the police but Caroline had been furious when she called it that. And again, it wasn't particularly unusual for angry ghosts to shift blame, especially when their motivations had been less than internal, but the only story she's heard is the one she read in the paper — and if Caroline is sticking around, there might be more to it. So she calls her.

Marlene isn't home, which means there's no one around to overhear when Lily says, "Caroline?" outloud, her voice tentative. "Caroline?" she calls again. This isn't exactly a reliable little trick, but it's worked a few times, especially when ghosts aren't particularly busy. And it doesn't summon them, exactly — they're not drawn to answer if they don't want to, and she can't call just anyone, only ghosts she's actually met — but it's always worth a shot. A moment later, though, the air is shimmering in front of her, and then the young teen is there.

"How'd you do that?"

Lily quirks her mouth in answer. "Honestly, I'm not totally sure. It doesn't always work. Were you doing something?"

Caroline looks her up and down, bites her lip, then shrugs. "Not really I guess. What's up?"

Again, Lily finds herself hesitating. Each time, she's so sure she's going to do it — prod Mackey about his past, or ask Caroline for more information, but for some reason, she's less sure about getting to the bottom of this particular ghost story than she's been in the past. So she stalls. "How are things going with James? He's helping you, right?"

Caroline looks off to the side, then flops back into Lily's desk chair, lifting one foot onto the chair with her, loosely hugging her knee to her chest. "Yeah. I mean, I don't think he's exactly an expert either, though. I'm actually older than him, technically, you know. Like as a ghost, I mean."

"Oh, yeah. Couple months, right?"

"Yeah. And I think I've done more with like — moving stuff or whatever, like in the classroom with you. But he's at least had that guy to talk to, so he hasn't been as… I don't know. Emotional, I guess?"

Lily nods, and takes a moment to climb onto her bed, turning around to face Caroline again and leaning against the wall. "I can imagine that it was lonely, no one knowing you were there."

"Yeah. And no offense to James, but he's not exactly who I'd pick to be my only company," Caroline snorts.

At that, Lily scoffs, smirking. "Oh, yeah? Hot college guy not your type?"

Caroline rolls her eyes, but smiles just a bit. "Yeah, okay, he's hot, but he just treats me like a little kid."

"Well, you are only 14, right? And he's like 21."

"I'm mature for my age," Caroline insists, brushing something away from her pants, as if her leggings could've somehow collected lint.

Lily hesitates for a moment, and then... "Mature enough for a 30-something teacher?" She says it as kindly as she can, but Caroline's head still snaps up immediately, jaw clicking shut. "I found some of the news reports about your death a couple of weeks ago," she says softly. "They said that you'd been stalking your teacher."

Caroline stares for a minute, then looks away, around the room, back down at her boots. Finally, her jaw relaxes. "That's what people thought, I guess," she answers.

"Why did they think that? Just because you —" She stops herself barely in time. "Because they found you in his apartment?" she amends.

Caroline chews on the inside of her cheek, shifts in the chair to pull the other leg to her chest, too, resting her chin on her knee. "Not just because of that," she answers after a few beats of silence. "I—" she starts, then stops. "I told the school that I was."

Lily's not sure what to say, and whatever there is, she doesn't come up with it fast enough. Caroline's already continuing, squirming in her seat.

"It wasn't true, though. We were — I don't know. Together, I guess. Someone must've seen us, but my school asked us what was going on, and I didn't want him to get in trouble."

"So you said you were stalking him? But that wasn't true?"

"He told them that I had a crush on him and had been hanging out around his place. He said he tried to make it all sound like just innocent kid stuff, but I guess they thought it was more serious, and when they asked me, I just… went along with it or whatever. I didn't want him to get fired or have to change schools or something. And they said I wouldn't be expelled or anything, they'd just transfer me out of his class and I'd have to stay away from him."

"Why didn't you stay away from him though?"

Caroline lifts her chin from her knees to give something close to a glare, but without any real heat behind it. "Because we were together. I just told you."

Lily hums in response, tries not to nod or frown. There's nothing that she'd seen in him so far, nothing to suggest that he's the sort of person who'd be interested in a 14 year old. However mature Caroline might have thought she was, it took a different kind of adult, a sick kind of adult, to pursue someone still in the midst of puberty. To even politely entertain flirtations from someone still in the midst of puberty. Nevermind what kind of adult it took to murder a 14 year old like Caroline had said. "So what happened then?" Lily prompts gently after another moment of silence. Caroline looks up, eyebrows twitching together, and Lily continues. "When you died?"

The younger girl's face shutters closed for a second, carefully blank, and she looks away towards the window.

"What did he do to you?" Lily asks, even more softly this time.

Caroline's jaw tenses, releases, tenses again, and then her eyes screw shut and she sighs. "I don't remember. I don't — know how it happened exactly," she says, finally looking back over. "But I know I wouldn't do that to myself, so it must've been him. He must've done something."

"Did you ever think he would do something to hurt you? While you were together?"

"No," she says in a much smaller voice. "But it's the only thing that makes sense. How it could've happened. Why I'm stuck with him now."

That makes Lily's brow furrow, sitting up straighter from her slump against the wall, even leaning forward a little. "What do you mean stuck with him? Like why you're still here instead of… wherever everyone else goes?"

Caroline shrugs, and for a second her eyes are shining, gleaming, before she blinks and looks away and they clear. "No, I mean stuck following him around. I have James now too, I guess, and you, but until now I've just been…" She shrugs, looks up and then to the door again. "Stuck following him around. To his home, to work, to the gym, out to California."

"Oh," Lily says, and it dawns on her just what Caroline means, and how young she looks — is — and suddenly Lily's sliding off the bed, crouching down in front of her, reaching out a hand to touch the younger girl's hand. "Caroline, you're not — you're not stuck with him. You're stuck here, for now at least, in our world. But you're not stuck with him. You can visit other places, too, not just where he goes or where I go or where James goes. It takes work and practice, but you can visit wherever you want. Even if it's far away. Even if it's 2,000 miles away."

Caroline looks up, meeting her eyes, and they're shining again, the wrinkles in her brow slowly smoothing out. "I can — I can go home?"

Lily nods. "Yeah. You can go home, Caroline."