"Hello Augustus." said Caroline she smiled at him.

"Um" It was one of the few times when he could think of nothing to say. He should have realised that she would be here, Augustus ran through the long list of dead people that he knew in his head, how many of them would he see here?

Caroline looked very different from the last time that he had seen her, more like the photos he had seen of her before she got sick, her long black hair had grown back from the short chemo damaged hair that she had before, if he hadn't seen all of the photos of her precancer on her facebook page she would have been unrecognizable.

"Sorry it must be a bit surprising seeing me here, it's a lot to take in." Caroline gave him a quick hug, and Augustus could feel himself blushing, this was no what he thought the afterlife would be like, He already felt guilty about the pain he was putting Hazel Grace through and this certainly wasn't helping matters.

"Um it's nice to see you too" Gus said. His head was reeling from the sudden turn of events to think of anything witty, to say. The way that she was looking at him was making him uncomfortable, she couldn't still have feelings for him could she? They had dated over a year ago, and she was well dead. Although he was to now.

"Is there anyone else that you know who might be coming to meet you?" Caroline asked him. Both of his Grandparents were still alive, and every dead person that he knew was his age or younger and he had never been very close to any of them.

"Not that I am aware of." He responded.

"Great there's kind of a community of us, cancer kids who don't have any other family here."

"Well.." Gus tried to think of a reasonable excuse as to why he couldn't go with her, but nothing came to his mind, and to be honest he really didn't have any where to stay.

"Please Gus, I really couldn't let you go knowing that you don't have any where to stay."

"Alright." he said still feeling very uneasy about the whole situation. Augustus followed Caroline off the deck and into her car, it was a mini cooper. He had to duck to avoid hitting his head on the ceiling of the car. Caroline backed up the car without hitting anything, and then proceeded to drive down the road at a rather alarming speed.

"I only have my licence a little longer so I figure I better use it while I can."

Augustus noded tensely and grabbed onto the seat rest, understanding for the first time why Hazel Grace did not like driving with him.

"It's all a bit shocking isn't it? I remember my first day here it was… strange." She looked at him expecting some kind of response, but Augustus was still trying to wrap his head around what was happening. it was bizarre to see Caroline like this, driving, and talking. Before she had died she had been unbearable, this was the first time they had anything resembling a normal conversation.

"Strange is one word for it." Said Augustus. He turned his head and looked out the window, this place Elsewhere looked a lot like earth.

They pulled up in front of a house that was twice the size of Gus's old house, it looked almost like a castle there were vines growing up the side of, and there were two towers one each side of the house.

"Wow." he said "How many people live here?"

"Right now, 14 including you. Caroline said "But it changes a lot, like when I first got here there were 20 people living here but most people leave after a few months."

Caroline turned the car off and turned to look at Gus.

"Listen Augustus,.." Caroline said putting her hand on his shoulder

"Caroline stop" Augustus said "When we were together we did not have a happy relationship and now I have girlfriend that's back on earth and I love her present tense and she loves me present tense."

Caroline looked at him surprised and and sad, "I'm sorry" she said holding back tears, "It's just, I don't remember much from when I was alive , just bits and pieces, I was so confused when I first died, I didn't even remember what my name, after a while some things started to come back but there are just, these huge holes in my memory, I barely remember anything from that last year, but I remember you being there, and I just thought... " she trailed off.

"Caroline, I'm so sorry" he said.

"It's alright" she said giving him a sad smile "It's not your fault that I got brain cancer, lets just start over as friends."

"That sounds good" said Augustus. Caroline whipped the last of the tears off of her face.

"Come on everyone will want to meet you.