I remember spending a lot of time in there. After I emerged, Chris tried to console me.

"Lira…I can't say much, but-…"

"Can she stay?"

My question took me aback, but Chris instantly understood. He was silent for a minute.

"…No, Lira. It doesn't always work that way. Your mother lived a good life. It wasn't suicide; it wasn't murder. It was an accident caused by some other stupid person out there, or it may have been her time to move on. There are guidelines, Lyra. Your mom met those standards and got to skip the haunting stage and go on to the next."

"Where is that?" I asked, my eyes drying slowly.

"Honestly, none of us knows. Heaven and Hell are still mysteries to us. We don't know any more about the afterlife than you can see outright; we were told to haunt this house for a period of time and we can't do anything else or go anywhere else. Sandworms, you know."

I nodded.

"Lira…" Lydia was at my side. "I know this is a hard blow, and no one knew your mother better than you did. But now isn't the time to make rash decisions or anything like that. Grief can be bad…but regret is worse."

"You think I'm gonna kill myself, is that it?" I demanded of her.

Her silence assured me of her thoughts.

I laughed a little. "Who knows? Maybe if I committed suicide on the grounds, I'd get to stay here with all of you…"

My black humor was met with nothing but a few repressed chuckles and many doleful eyes.

"Your wish might be fulfilled, Lira. Try it and see. But remember as Lydia said: regret can be, how you teenagers say, a 'bitch'."

My eyes averted to the speaker. Lo and behold, Andrew was standing nearby with a face of stone.

"Do as you see fit. Remember that none of these people here know what you are feeling, no matter what they claim. You alone can decide one way or the other, aided by whatever foolish whims they want to fill you with. They have no control over your choice."

And he was gone.

Lydia touched my arm. "Lira, you know he's off his rocker. Don't listen to him. It doesn't have to be that way; trust me, I went through the suicidal stage and do you know how glad I am that Barbara and Adam talked me down?" She smiled.

"No."

Her eyes widened at me.

"I don't know how happy you are. That's you. Your feelings, your emotions can't be read like an open book. Neither can Chris', nor Briana's, or anyone else's. You know, I learned a lot last night from Briana. Can you imagine? Me, learn anything from her?" I said blankly, staring at the wall.

"But I did. I learned that most of us sport a façade, a face we show to the world to guard our inner feelings. Because we know that wearing out heart on our shoulders is the symbol of a fool; it's a weapon for any evil force out there.

"Briana's wall is her tricks, her pranks. She makes us think she's such a little obnoxious punk with no morals or kindness. But that's wrong. She was hurt so badly in life that she learned to fight off anyone who could do that to her again. But she learned it too late, after she was dead, and she unwillingly taught herself to drive off the good people, too.

"And now, you think that I'm going to kill myself to end it all. Break my wall, one that I've worked on so hard to build throughout my life, just so I can get away from the pain? Are you kidding me? My mother is my weak spot. She was the only thing someone could take away from me to bring me to my knees. And I went to my knees, yes I did.

"But if you think one crack in the wall letting in a trickle of water is going to sunder everything I stand for, you're damn wrong. Call me cold, call me unfeeling, call me an icy, unholy bitch. But I'm going to put her death behind me because now, now I can go through life knowing that the worst is over, and that there is nothing that anyone can do to pull me down again."

By now, I was glaring into Lydia's face. She was aghast, and pulled back. But I stared her down and walked past, through the veranda doors, and stood on a stone pier outside built over the crashing waves below that were breaking on the rocky cliffs.

Looking out over the water, I let my eyes drift out of focus and wander across the horizon, asking the sea why everything seemed so empty now, now that she was gone.