A/N: Wow, thanks for the response for last chapter! It overwhelmed me and I am really grateful for you guys! :)

Anyway, sorry if I didn't keep CeeCee, Adam, or Paul in-character this chapter. If you'd like, you can think they grew up and are more sophisticated now. I'm really self-conscious of this chapter, and I'd love it if I could get some feedback. And don't freak out about the ending. Explanation coming.

Please read and review! Nothing makes my day more! :)

Disclaimer: I don't own the Mediator series or it wouldn't have taken five stinking books for Jesse and Suze to get together.

This Is Now, For Now

Chapter Four

"Look, Suze! Look at that girl over there! She's pretty. Do you know her? Ooh, or that one! She sort of looks like me, right?"

"Shut up and slow down, cowgirl," I growled, trying to control my growing temper. If I seriously had to put up with one more second of Josefina's girly squeals over which body to pick, I was going to kick her glowing ass back to the spectral plane. We had already been at the beach for two whole hours body searching, and her ghostly presence had stayed with me the whole time.

Squealing. In my sensitive ear.

"But, Suze, can't you see her? She's your age, and she looks perfect!" I turned my head not to look at whom she was pointing to, but to look at Josefina. She was strangely out of place at the beach, lying next to me in the sand, with her long ruffled skirt and neatly tied bonnet.

Why was I doing this again? Oh, right. Jesse made me.

"Let's get something straight," I said, making my features hard and stony. Her face looked a little disappointed, lips turned downward in a small pout. "We cannot just snatch bodies out from under everyone's noses. People are going to notice. We have to find someone who won't be missed."

"But they'll have me, so that would be better, right?"

Really, this girl was too full of herself for her own good.

I sighed and adjusted my black bikini, rolling onto my stomach. If Josefina wanted to go body hunting, the least I could do was get a nice tan while at it. "Loads of things. Just keep quiet and call me only when you find someone worthy, okay? This is a time called summer, when I am out of school for three blissful months. I don't expect to have you and Jesse ruin it."

I turned my head the other way facing the long expanse of Carmel beach, but her voice was like a boomerang, always coming back to me. "Well, if no one can see me, can I go off and roam a little bit? Check out the girls with nice boyfriends?"

Wow. She really was a cheater on her dead as a doornail husband. "No, you can't," I said in a clipped tone, thinking of Paul Slater. I still hadn't seen him outside of school, even though it had been a week. If Paul knew I was planning to do a soul transference – however I was supposed to do it – he'd surely have me hanged. Or something.

"Why not?"

"Because. Just don't. Now shut up."

I could hear her let out a small huff next to my ear. And just as I was just about to close my eyes while the sun baked my skin and drift off to my wonderful dreams – most of them involving throwing daggers at Josefina on a target – I heard the soft pounding on sand of two sets of footsteps right next to my head.

"Suze, man! Hey, you there! You didn't tell us you were going to be at the beach today."

I groaned – not at the voice, but being woken – and opened my eyes to find Adam McTavish and CeeCee Webb wearing huge smiles above me, blocking the searing sun.

"Who're they?" Josefina asked, coming to life again – metaphorically speaking – but I ignored her.

"Hey CeeCee, Adam," I said, moving my towel over so they could lay theirs next to mine. "What's up?"

"You actually have the nerve to ask us that," CeeCee huffed, her white blond hair tucked in a braid, "when you said you'd spend every waking moment of every single day of the summer with us. And now, not a word for you in a week, and you're at the beach. Alone."

I sat up and glanced to my right, thinking of how wrong they were. Josefina was eyeing CeeCee with curiosity, a hungry look in her eye. I turned away from the middle member of the De Silva family – determined to not have anything to do with Jesse weighing me down from a good time – and smiled at CeeCee and Adam. "I've been busy," was the best excuse I could come up with.

"Oh, really, Yeah, right, Busy," Adam scoffed, lying back on his towel with one arm draped around CeeCee's shoulders. They had finally started dating – much to CeeCee's delight – right when Jesse started acting strange. A relationship formed as one broke. Go figure. "With what?"

"Things."

"Things," CeeCee repeated in a monotone, disbelieving voice.

"Yeah, things. It's been a little busy in the Ackerman household," I continued, lying through my teeth. In actuality, the past week was spent body searching with Josefina. So far, there were no acceptable candidates – in my opinion, anyway. On the other hand, I had been avoiding Jesse at all costs. Ignoring phone calls, declining invites to go hunting for a girl's body, not caring that he was staying at an old moldy hotel north of here.

"As in, Brad stealing the house to himself with Kelly Prescott?" Adam said. He was staring out into the sparkling ocean with a dreamy look on his face, one of pure happiness. Oh so contrary to mine.

"Sort of," I agreed, hoping to change the subject. "What have you guys been up to?"

"Oh, nothing much," CeeCee said, brushing her bangs back from her face. "Just hanging out at my house, his house."

"We did a lot more than hanging out." Adam winked and kissed CeeCee's temple, and she blushed a deep violet shade. My stomach boiled with jealousy – not for Adam, but for a happy relationship. I should have been 'hanging out' with a certain someone, but he was too busy trying to force me into murdering a poor, innocent soul.

Oh, relationships.

"That's great for you two." I grinned through my clenched teeth.

"Things not in boyfriend girlfriend heaven for you and Jesse?" CeeCee asked, rubbing some sunscreen on her pale face and arms. My best friend of two years could read my expressions easily and knew me way, way too well.

Despite that, I still had lied to her all too easily the past six months. It wasn't hard; with my near to depressed state, I hardly displayed any emotion. It was impossible not to be good at lying when in a half-broken state. But now, with my emotions rushing back in a hurry at seeing Jesse, it wasn't as easy to hide behind a blank façade.

"Well, he's still in New York. You know," I said, hoping she'd get the point that I was in no mood to talk about this by my indifferent tone.

"Liar," Josefina whispered in my ear venomously, but I ignored her.

She didn't. "Now when you go out to see him this year, you can visit me too at NYU! You have to come. We'll have tons of fun."

Along with my lies had come the natural one that I occasionally visited Jesse on the weekends; it spared me some time for myself, free of CeeCee and Adam's nagging questions. The personal phone line I recently acquired did have its advantages.

Yeah. As if I flew cross-country to visit the boyfriend that broke my heart.

But I answered anyway, with, "Yeah, sure. Lots of fun." I forced a smile and laid back down on my stomach again.

I was about to go back to sleep with a quick, "Well, I'm incredibly tired and want a tan," but Josefina's high-pitched voice rang in my ear before I got the chance.

"She looks like a good body."

I whipped around to face Josefina. She was smiling slightly at my two best friends over my shoulder. I couldn't tell if it was the hot summer sun or something else that was making me sweat like crazy.

Realizing people would see me yelling at nothing if I blew up at Josefina right then and then, I turned back around to CeeCee and Adam who were staring at me like a was some kind of mental psycho. Oh, more than they ever knew.

"Hey, I've got to go to the bathroom, be right back." I waved at them, grabbed Josefina's arm, and dashed off to a secluded area behind the snack shack. It reeked of sizzling burgers and greasy fries, but the overhang kept us in shade from the hot sun.

Once I was absolutely sure no one was around, I hissed quietly, "What the hell are you thinking?"

"That girl… the one you call CeeCee?" Josefina cocked her head, putting a nail to her curled, pink lips. Her brown curls bounced across her shoulders. "She looks good. To be my body."

"CeeCee Webb? No, no, no. You see, in this century, Josefina, CeeCee is known as a… a freak," I finished, fighting for any excuse to have her reject this idea of using CeeCee's body. "She's an albino. Gets teased a lot. Has to put up with me, which is some sort of torture in itself."

"But that Adam guy…" Josefina stared over my left shoulder as if he had just appeared over it. "He's cute. They're… an item, right?"

"Yes, but that's not the – "

"She's the one, then! You can even talk to her. It'd be easy! You already trust each other. I'm sure Jesse would agree." Her deep brown eyes seemed to glow at the thought of finally finding a body. But I'd never let her take CeeCee. Never.

"I'm sure Jesse wouldn't agree," I continued. It was times like these when my stubbornness came in handy. "I'm absolutely positive he wouldn't." Lying seemed to be my forte these days.

Josefina put one hand on her hip as her lips turned downward into a pout. This seemed to be her signature move: a frown and dissatisfied stance. "But that guy is hot."

"You can't ruin my best friend's soul for a guy," I said. I learned that the hard way a year ago with Paul Slater. The body was right, the soul was wrong. And even if it were the right soul, the body would seem incredibly out of place.

And otherwise, Adam McTavish wasn't as dumb as he looked. He had grown up in the past year, and would surely notice something off with CeeCee if Josefina took her place. My best friend meant the world to Adam, and I couldn't just sell her soul to an ungrateful cowgirl because my ex wanted me to.

I would never, ever do that.

"No, Josefina, no," I said. "And that's final. I won't. Find another one, but not CeeCee Webb. Definitely not CeeCee."

"Another what?" I heard a voice, way too familiar for my liking, ring over my shoulder. It was a voice that used to be part of my nightmares, used to be one that would send shivers up my spine. But now? It just put terror in my gut.

Because Paul Slater wasn't my favorite person in the world in this situation.

I whipped around and came face to face with him, clad in nothing more than a red bathing suit and sunglasses perched on his head. His brown curly hair had streaks of blond in it, no doubt from the California sun. His icy blue gaze met my green one, and we were locked in a stare down. I was hoping he wouldn't notice the ghost behind me, but no avail.

"What were you talking about with this lovely young lady?" Paul stepped around me to stand beside Josefina. She smiled, big and dazzling, and batted her eyelashes so hard I could almost hear them. Josefina had to know that this was the Paul Slater, most talked about in the spectral plane.

"You can see me, too?" she asked, playing along. Because, no, Paul just came up to a random space of air and started talking to it like meeting it for the first time. Right. You're a genius, Josefina de Silva.

"Suze hasn't told you?" he asked, raising one eyebrow up his huge forehead. It was a move that had girls swooning over him in a heartbeat.

"Oh, stuff it," I cried at Josefina. If looks could kill, I'd be thrice times dead by now. "She knows who you are. She knew who I was, for God's sake. You're talked about, Paul. She knows you can see her."

Josefina's gaze shifted to me, but only for a second. "But she still hasn't told me too much about this world in the twenty first century. You know Paul Slater, yes?"

"Unfortunately," I grumbled, deciding to just shut up and play along, while Paul shot me a disdainful look. We were on good terms for the past year, but all that was appearing to crumble with one 1850s girl.

"Can I ask your name?" Paul interrupted, turning his attention back to Josefina, who smiled widely at his gaze. It was hard to remember that she was from a different time period than us when she was swooning over Paul Slater like every other girl in this century. Every other girl except me.

"Me? I'm Josefina de Silva."

At 'de Silva', Paul immediately turned his gaze to me. It was fierce and questioning, but I only answered with a simple shrug. If he ever found out about what I was going to do, he'd probably turn me into a juvenile criminal center for mediators. So I just kept quiet while he answered with, "Nice to meet you."

While the ghost girl looked on with a bedazzling smile, Paul turned to me and murmured, "I don't think this is a coincidence."

"What if it is?" I challenged him, whispering all the same.

He seemed to realize that conversation would elevate to a lot of screaming – mostly on my part – and turned to Josefina and said, "Hey, could you go hang out with some other ghosts for a while? I have to talk to Suze alone. Look, there's Betsy, the dead lifeguard, over there. She's been lonely for a while, and I bet she'd love to talk to someone."

"Sure! See you later, Paul, Suze! Hey, Betsy, remember me? Josefina?" she called as she scampered off around the snack shack, skirts ruffling and curls bouncing. The epitome of a Spanish sweetheart.

Once we were sure she was completely gone, Paul turned on me, his eyes questioning and holding another emotion I couldn't identify. I was getting worse at reading people's expressions day by day. "That was truly touching, the way you talked about Betsy," I said, rolling my eyes.

He ignored me and said, "So… choosing to help a De Silva?"

"Oh, just stop, Paul," I said. He looked ready to start a full-blown argument, but, instead, he just held up his hands up in a surrender position and took a step back. The defensive and slightly argumentative look in my eyes must have given it away.

"What? I'm not asking anything. Just curious as to why."

"Well, the 'why' isn't any of your business. So just go back to the beach and enjoy the summer like you should be."

Paul sighed and lowered his voice, stepping closer to me as to not be overheard. "Look, Suze. I'm not accusing you of anything. I just want to tell you something that I think has to do with Josefina being here."

And, with those last words, the emotion I couldn't read in his eyes like ice crystals came free: worry. He was worried about something. Something that had to do with him that, consequently, had to do with me. And Josefina. Which also meant it had to do with Jesse.

This conversation didn't seem to be heading in a happy-go-lucky direction.

"Okay, Paul, just spit it out," I said. I didn't feel like beating around the bush with codes and crypts today as Jesse had did last week. My temper was greatly shortened from dealing with the impossible Josefina de Silva, and I didn't need it to go off sooner than it needed to.

Paul took a deep breath, put his hands on my shoulders, and spit it out, much to my astonishment.

"I brought Maria de Silva back from hell. And she might be the reason Josefina's here."