Come Full Circle
[A Mediator Fan Fiction]
By Katie
[Chapter One]
"Querida."
The word seemed to echo in my otherwise silent room, and I smiled against Jesse's shoulder. We were standing in a tight embrace in front of my bay window, through which I could see the full moon, surrounded by bright stars. Another night of sharing each other's company, doing maybe a little less than I'd hoped, but perfect anyway. After all, Jesse had breathed his last breath in the 1800s, and back then, people didn't sleep together unless they were married. Oh, I'm sure that some people did, but it was definitely frowned upon. Jesse was just being a gentleman. A perfect gentleman.
Father Dominic would be pleased, at least.
"Querida," he said again. "I have to go. It's late." Jesse smoothed my hair down my back.
I looked up at Jesse. His onyx-colored eyes had this brightness to them, like they were reflecting the moonlight. "Don't go yet. Stay here for tonight. Like old times," I told him softly. My own emerald green eyes widened in a puppy look.
Jesse's teeth sparkled as he smiled. "I wish I could. But the Father won't like it. And you need to get some sleep." He kissed my forehead. "Sweet dreams, Susannah."
I sat down on my bed, smiling half-heartedly. "I'll miss you."
Jesse's deep laugh rumbled through the night, almost like thunder, only not threatening at all. "I'll see you around school tomorrow, Susannah." And with one last shimmer, he disappeared.
I flung myself backwards on my bed and quietly squealed with delight.
By now, you probably have more than a few questions, such as, what do I mean, Jesse disappeared? And how could he have breathed his last breath in the 1800s, two centuries ago?
The fact is, I might seem like an ordinary sixteen-year-old girl, but I'm anything but.
My name is Susannah Simon, and I'm a mediator.
Your next question is likely to be, what the heck's a mediator? A mediator is a liaison between the living and the dead, the contact person for any of the deceased that have unfinished business here on Earth. I saw my first ghost around the age of two, and ever since then, I've known that I'm not like other people.
The first person to shed light on my unique talent was my dad, who died of a heart attack when I was six. The second person was a fortune teller by the name of Madame Zara, at a sixth grade carnival when I used to live in Brooklyn. She officially named me a mediator, my father not knowing the specific term. And until I moved here, to Carmel, California, I didn't even know there were others like me. But so far, I've met three.
The first one I met was Father Dominic, the principal of my school, the Junipero Serra Mission Academy. He and I usually have opposite opinions when it comes to the mediator thing. He thinks it's a gift; I say it's a curse. He sympathizes with the tortured souls; I have to fight the urge to punch them. And me, I don't think it's a bad thing for a guy ghost to haunt the room of a living teenage girl. Father Dominic…
Well, he's a priest. What would you expect?
That brings me to Jesse. He was the first friend I made here, partly because he was already sitting on my window seat the first time I walked into my new room. My mom and my stepfather, Andy, didn't see him of course.
That's because Jesse de Silva, in all his perfection, is, well…
Dead. That always brings up some problems.
It wasn't by any means love at first sight. I wanted him gone the first time I laid eyes on him, particularly because I was supposed to start anew here. People thought I was nuts back in Brooklyn. That wasn't going to happen in Carmel. But after Jesse saved my life a couple of times, I grew to like him. And then that innocent "like" turned into "love," and at the end of last summer, we shared our first kiss.
Father Dominic had already known about Jesse, had known about him, in fact, after a month of me living here. But a few weeks after we kissed, Jesse told Father Dom about it, and it was agreed between them that Jesse should move into the Mission rectory.
I was definitely not happy. But I'll live. Since the church is connected to my school, Jesse often roams the Academy's hallways, particularly if it's when we're changing classes.
So my life hasn't been too easy these past sixteen years. Things have smoothed out, though, aside from one disastrous party at the beginning of the school year. I'm the junior class vice president, I have two great best friends, CeeCee and Adam, an amazing boyfriend (well, except for the dead-and-only-I-can-see-him part), and pretty good grades so far to boot. Oh yes. Life was sweet for Suze Simon.
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"You're glowing."
I laughed, albeit a little nervously, at CeeCee's accusation. "I am not glowing," I told her.
"Oh, yes you are," she argued. "You're all blushing and smiling and skipping. And this is after religion class with Sister Ernestine."
"Cee, I'm not skipping." CeeCee, Adam, and I were walking down the hall to our lockers. The reason why I was "glowing," as CeeCee put it, was I had seen Jesse leaning up against the wall, looking very James Dean-like. An uncanny likeness, really, for someone who'd died before motion pictures had even been invented. What had put me over the edge, though, was him winking at me. And trust me; if a guy as sexy as Jesse winked at you, you'd be doing a happy dance down the hallway just like I was.
"You look like you're somewhere in between Kelly Prescott at the pep rally, and someone really hyped up on morphine," Adam observed, spinning his locker combination open.
"Come on, I'm not that bad, am I?" I opened up my locker, too, and shoved the morning's books into it. I gathered my afternoon books into my arms, saying, "Speaking of Kelly Prescott, she wanted to do this spring formal dance. I convinced her to have a beach party instead, you know, sort of like the cookout we've talked about, only with a DJ." I slammed my locker shut. "I wanted to know what you guys--"
I didn't finish my sentence. The lockers in the hallway began to hum, rattling so subtly that you almost didn't catch it. But I caught it, all right. My locker's combination, in particular, began to spin on its own. A sense of dread overcame me. No way. Not another ghost. Seriously, didn't they ever take vacations? Was it too much to ask to have a normal sixteen-year-old's life?
Suddenly, I heard a voice behind me. A familiar voice. "Miss me, Suzie?"
I whirled around, gasping loudly. I only got a glimpse of the ghost in front of me: blonde hair, gleaming eyes, a wicked smile. I only got a glimpse of her because almost as soon as I turned around, she sent a fist flying into my face. The punch threw me into my locker, and I banged my head against the metal.
As I slumped against the floor, I thought cloudily, Huh. That's funny. I did the same thing to her a year ago…
I blacked out.