Chapter Five:
I say that I watched Susannah leave like the fool I am because I am a fool. I
was a fool to let her go. I should have stopped her. I'd sensed there was
going to be trouble at the school after I realized that Susannah was going to
the school to speak with Heather, and I'd irresponsibly allowed her to go.
Albeit, I hadn't wanted her to, but I hadn't tried hard enough to stop her.
Heather, the girl Susannah was mediating, was full of rage. Rage? No. On
Second thought, hate. Worse, she focused her hatred onto Susannah, although it
was clearly not Susannah's fault the girl had died. It was, to say the least,
Heather's fault that she had died, given that she chose to end her own life
with a gun.
And over a man, at that.
Susannah hadn't even wanted to go to a Catholic school, I could tell, from
what I'd heard her say to her mother on the way in the car to her new home. I
had been in the car at the time-careful not to materialize-trying to see if
the girl was a horrible as her family and other spirits had made her sound.
Susannah had also threatened to break the finger of one of Heather's friends.
Susannah may have been going to dinner with Heather's boyfriend, but my
observation of the boy made me think that nothing would ever come to be between
Susannah and the boy named Bryce.
Heather was not really a stupid girl. She obviously knew that Susannah
Wasn't trying to take her place in the world. Heather hated Susannah because
Susannah was alive-and the fact that Susannah could see Heather just made it
worse. Heather hated Susannah for what Susannah had nothing to do with, and yet
Susannah was trying to help the poor young girl-quite surprising to me,
considering her given foul temper where I was concerned.
Although Susannah had at first seemed very tough and aloof-and a little bit
rude-I saw that she did have a right to want me gone from her room-I was,
after all, a man; and even though it was all right for her to wear pants and
even tight clothing that outlined her body in a way that was not safe for a
virtuous man to view, she had enough decency not to want to change clothes in
front of a man. Susannah clearly did not understand that I would have left the
room for no reason if she had asked nicely enough. Now that I saw that she
needed protection, it would be impossible for me to leave her alone. I would,
of course, leave from time to time to give her privacy-I am not an immoral
man-but I wouldn't 'get the hell out,' as she was so bent on me doing.
Immediately after Susannah left, I'd dematerialized and gone to the school,
and waited for her arrival, which was not far behind my own. I didn't
materialize as soon as she arrived because I didn't want her to get even more
angry with me.
And I wanted to see just how good she was at mediating.
Oh, she tried to reason with the girl, and to her credit, it almost
worked-except that she forgot to mention to Heather that she could get a new
life and start over, but never, ever could Heather her old one back. Susannah
did, however, realize her mistake, and she tried to fix it quickly, but Heather
refused to listen to what Susannah had to say.
Instead, Heather decided to boil the water in the fountain in the courtyard, and
to shake the bench Susannah had been sitting on with such a violent force that
would send Susannah flying through the churches courtyard if she hadn't
gotten off the bench quickly enough.
And when the boiling water and shaking bench were not enough, Heather decided to
decapitate the statue of Father Serra and send the priest's bronze head
hurling through the air at Susannah.
I looked closer. I could see that merely decapitating the priest hadn't been
enough-she'd twisted his face into an evil sneer.
Susannah screamed, and that's when I decided she needed my help.
I wanted to protect her chivalrously, but I also wanted to play the 'I told
you so' angle, just to get back at her for her cattiness with me. I like
teasing her because her reaction is so predictable.
The head of the statue plunged and hit Susannah, knocking her to the ground.
She just stayed there on the ground, looking at the sky. Any minute now,
Heather could have sent another object flying, and Susannah could have died from
the blow.
"Get up," I said to her. "I thought you were supposed to be good at
this," I said, regretting it as soon as the words left my mouth. Maybe I
shouldn't have said it quite so rudely, but she didn't seem to notice.
I yanked her to her feet, and we ran into the classroom, the window to which
She'd broken open a little while ago. We leaned against the door as if that
would protect us from Heather. The statues head was banging into the door.
"Jesu Cristo!" "'I can take care of myself,' you said. "I'll just have
to get rid of her first,' you told me. Right!"
"Shut up," she said, understandably not appreciating my sarcasm.
"Cadaver breath," I said. "Do you realized that's what you called me?
That hurt, querida," I said, realizing as soon as I said it that she
thankfully didn't know what the word meant. I'm sure she'd really
Appreciate being called 'sweetheart' by someone like me. Someone dead.
"It really hurt."
"I told you not to call me that," she hissed.
She didn't seem to be the tiniest bit grateful for my warning for her to get
up.
"Well, I would appreciate it if you didn't make disparaging remarks about
my-
"Look, this door isn't going to hold up much longer," she said,
interrupting me.
"May I make a suggestion?" I asked her, just after the head smashed its way
through the door.
"Sure."
"Run."
She wasted no time in running. She knew that she couldn't beat Heather.
Eventually, Heather drained herself of her energy, and she went away. Susannah
doubted it, and she prattled on about how she didn't know how to stop Heather
from killing Bryce, and how she could possibly try to keep him away from the
school.
"Susannah-" I tried to get her attention. She kept talking. I said her
name again.
"Susannah, it's all right. It's not your fault. There was nothing you
could do."
She protested, saying that she could have kicked Heather back into her grave. I
told her that Heather would have killed her if she'd even tried.
"Come on. Let's go home," I said, leading her away. She kept talking
about how she needed to stop Heather, and how it was her job to keep these
things from happening. I told her that no one should ever expect her to battle
demons from hell, and she proceeded to take Heather's defense by saying
Heather was just mad!
Heather reminded me of Maria, and in a dangerous way.
I looked down at Susannah in the moonlight, and I realized she was bleeding.
"Susannah, you're bleeding," I said.
"I am not," she said. Nombre de Dios, was she going to protest everything I
said?
She looked down, and was shocked to find that she was indeed bleeding. Then she
realized that she'd bled on my shirt and apologized. I was quite surprised
that she'd ever apologize to me for anything.
"It's nothing," I said, and I bandaged her hand with my handkerchief.
She thanked me for saving her, and I, for one, was appalled. But glad. Very
glad. I kind of liked her, but I couldn't let her know that "Never
mind," I said, "let's go home."
