A/N: Thank you SO MUCH for the reviews and favorites and alerts, everyone! You all are so awesome for sticking with me and this story. :)

Sorry for the delayed update, but I sat down at my computer today and was guaranteed to post this tonight. So, here it is (I promise you'll know everything by the end of the next chapter)! Enjoy! :D

Disclaimer: Do… not… own… yay?

This Is Now, For Now

Chapter Eight

"Hello, Suze? Are you okay?"

My eyes tried to frantically focus on the waving hand that was flying in and out of my vision. Right now in my early morning stupor, it was only blurred, a pale color painting back and forth. I pushed my unruly hair out of my eyes and met a pair of blue concerned ones.

I smiled across the table at my little brother David. "Hey, kid. I'm fine." To prove the point, I picked up my glass of water on the table in front of me and took a long, refreshing swallow.

David shrugged, his red curls bobbing up and down. "You don't seem okay. You have the vacant look in your eye that suggests you're thinking of events way too overwhelming for you to handle."

Oh, boy, did he ever know.

Last night had been the best one I remembered having in a long time. Falling to sleep in Jesse's human arms was probably the best feeling in the world. I had completely forgotten how wonderful it felt until he was actually there, with those strong muscles wrapped around me. The second I had closed my eyes into pure bliss, the night was long gone, and the sun was peaking through my curtains, timid and shy.

And when I rolled over to get away from the burning light, feeling strangely cold even though my blanket was covering me from head to foot, I realized Jesse was gone. His side of the bed was vacated and cold, as if he really was a ghost and didn't give off any warmth. I lifted myself up from my pillows, a little disoriented, and slowly made my way downstairs in a half slumber, only to find out that his car was not there, and I was alone again.

I mean, if your ex-boyfriend had just slept in the same bed as you for a couple hours during the night and then mysteriously disappeared after he had asked you to trust him with all your heart, you'd be kind of confused too.

"Um, I guess. I'm just tired," I grumbled.

David reached across the table, patted my hand, and smiled. The whole gesture was quite awkward. "It's okay. We're all tired. I mean, with a month left until school starts, we want as much sleep as we can get."

Woah, back up. A month?

Hadn't I had a whole summer ahead of me? Didn't I want to spend my summer relaxing with CeeCee and Adam, splashing around in the ocean and soaking up some sun? Spending afternoons at the local café, and maybe reading some assigned college books a little early? Staring up at the bright blue sky, and enjoying the salty air that seemed more like home to me than New York ever was?

No. I didn't enjoy my summer like that. I'd spent a month and a half of my vacation chaperoning a little 1800s bitch who wanted a new body, trying to figure out my relationship status with my only true love, and crying more than I ever had in my entire life.

God. Was this what becoming an adult was like? Because, hell no, I'd pass, thanks very much.

"Sure," I said, laughing shakily. "College. That's enough to make me feel a little woozy." I took another gulp of water. When was my head going to stop spinning?

David nodded. "Exactly." He eased himself up from the table, tripping a little over the legs. Halfway out of the kitchen he turned around with a blush on his face and said, "You might want to check up on Brad. He's in his room. I don't know, maybe a little sisterly love will do him good."

"Why? What does he need me for?" I asked. Was he making out with his girlfriend, or lifting weights? Dear God, I hoped it was the last choice.

"He's a mess," David said. "Kelly broke up with him last night."

What?

I abruptly stood, pushing my chair back from the table in a clatter. "Um, David, could you repeat that?" Maybe my ears weren't functioning right. Maybe I heard wrong. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

David gave me a strange look, as if I was some psycho who was seriously interested in her stepbrother's love life. "His girlfriend agreed to stop seeing him in the late hours of the day before. Kelly Prescott, I think her name was."

No. Way.

I almost spilt my water in the glass as I rushed into the kitchen and dumped it into the sink, just to get some solid grounding again. My mind was whirring; you could practically smell the smoke. I couldn't think straight at all. I was rushing around and almost knocked down David a couple times.

"Suze?" he said cautiously. He had grown so much in the past couple years that he was practically eye level with me. "You know what? I'm pretty sure you're not okay now."

"David, I'm fine. I'm just going to go talk to Brad, like you said to," I responded. My voice must've sounded a little irritated, since David backed off with a blush painting his pale cheeks.

I dashed out of the kitchen, too frenzied to apologize to my little stepbrother, and bounded up the stairs. Brad must've heard someone coming – Dad, Mom, and Jake were working, so it was only me and two of the stepbrothers home – so his door shut closed quickly, a loud bang that reverberated throughout the hall.

"Don't you dare," I growled under my breath to no one in particular. I needed to know what was going on. Something strange – and potentially dangerous – was about to happen.

I mean, Maria practically quit being Kelly Prescott by breaking up with Brad. Why would she do that?

I knocked on Brad's door with a burning curiosity. "Open up!" Okay, not the best greeting, but it was urgent, and Brad needed to know I wasn't kidding around.

"I don't need any freaking crap from you right now!" he shouted back. We really did love each other deep down, I swear.

I took that exceptionally rude comment for an entry ticket. I barged into his room, and almost fainted from the smell.

Bags of chips and wrappers of candies littered the bed and weight benches. A pizza box, soaked with so much grease that there could easily be a fire, was lounging on top of Brad's TV. The floor was entirely covered with clothes and sweaty socks from wrestling last year – yes, last year. I had to hold my nose, breathe through my mouth, and then find the courage to take another breath before moving on.

When my eyes stopped watering, I glimpsed Brad on his bed with a television changer in his hand, glaring at me as if he wanted to murder me right on the spot. The TV was flickering the station MTV, some rap music video playing loudly and almost making me cover my ears in fear of having my eardrums pop.

"Get out," he grumbled at me. I'm pretty sure if he had the energy, he'd leap at me and pound the pulp right out of my body to accompany the statement. "Leave."

I shook my head. "I have to ask you some questions, so get your lazy butt up and talk to me." My mind was so busy with possibilities. I didn't even know what I was saying. But if asking nicely wouldn't work – which I knew it wouldn't from past experiences – then I'd have to stoop down to his level: gorilla speak.

"No," Brad said. "Who says I have to listen to you?"

That was it. He was so dead, if Maria already hadn't stolen his soul and replaced the body with one of Jesse's millions of de Silva cousins. Maybe Felix was hiding behind that dense head. That would make a ton of sense to me.

"Because." I took a hesitant seat on the edge of his bed, flicking a Doritos bag on the ground, to which he responded by promptly trying to kick me off the bed with his dirty socks. "Brad, stop. I just want to talk to you, okay?"

"Well, I don't want to talk to you," he said. He was wearing sweatpants and a muscle t-shirt, and was scowling at the TV, which had finally changed to some pop crap that nobody but teenagers liked. It wasn't much better than the rap.

Maybe my roughness wasn't working. I remembered when Jesse had stopped talking to me, I would have punched anyone in face if they said anything offensive to me. Putting myself in Brad's shoes, I thought about how I would want to be treated. Kindness, compassion, understanding.

"I just… it's really important. So I'd appreciate it if you would talk to me," I said, choosing my words with utmost care.

Brad's face was screwed up in concentration, making him look more ugly than he already was. Finally his features relaxed and a gloomy look slid over his face. "Fine. Whatever. About what?"

And here was where I took the plunge, where I would either be caught by a pillow or shatter into a million pieces with the truth. "About your break-up." I could see his brow start to furrow in anger, so I rushed on. "Just a few questions, because you know how I have to go to college with Kelly in the fall, and I want to know how bitchy she really is, depending on how she treated my stepbrother."

Oh, yes, you heard right. Kelly was accepted into the same local college as me. So, that meant if Maria wasn't exorcised soon, I was dead. Disregarding the fact that I wouldn't end up in jail a month from now because I'd be convicted for murder by soul transferring Josefina against my will.

Brad's face remained stony, and I took that as the okay signal.

"What did she… say to you, last night? When she broke up with you?" I asked hesitantly, shifting on the bed to give Brad more space. I didn't want to upset him any more at the moment.

He glared at me for a few seconds, and then let out a heavy sigh. "She took me to a club in central California last night. We were dancing, and when I went to go get some booze, she starting freaking making out with some other boys. I pulled her over to the side and asked her what the hell she was doing."

I nodded. Hey, I would've too, if Jesse was dancing with girls way incredibly hotter than me.

"She took me outside." Brad shook his head and kept his eyes glued to the TV screen. "She said she had bigger and better things to move on to. Things that were way out of my understanding, crap that I couldn't deal with. She said she wasn't going to be the same anymore."

My heart clenched. What she said to Brad, it wasn't the normal break-up speech. I'd bet my savings it was a clue intended for me. The gears were shifting in my head. What the hell was she trying to tell me?

Even though I was trying to figure out the meaning behind the message, Brad was just lying there with a pout on his face. I felt sorry for him. He just had to relive probably one of the worst moments of his life to his stepsister, for God's sake.

So, I smiled at him. "Anything else she said?"

He sighed. "I don't even know why, but she said she'll be seeing you sooner than at college in the fall. Whatever the hell that means."

My eyes opened wide. So she was planning something. Goddammit, why did everything happen to me lately? Why couldn't I be a normal teenager?

I wanted to run over to the hotel Jesse was staying at and tell him everything. But two things were stopping me. One, the fact that I had no idea where he was staying. And two, how he still didn't believe me about Maria being a mediator.

I could have told him all these theories – about how Maria could be planning to exorcise me, to exorcise him, to kill us both in some inhumane way – but he probably wouldn't find any truth in it. Even though he knew Maria was in Kelly's body, he really believed that she wasn't any danger to us, as long as she wasn't a supernatural being – which she was, but Jesse didn't know.

Just like the old Jesse I knew. Back when Maria had come to us in ghost form, he was positive nothing bad would happen. And look where we were now.

I sighed and rubbed my temples. It was going to be a long day. I was already forming a plan to stop Maria in my head. "Thanks, Brad. I'm sorry she broke up with you."

He shrugged. For a nanosecond, I felt sorry for him. The way his shoulders sagged, and how his face looked years older. It made me think of myself, rewind a couple months ago. Maybe he had really fallen in love with Kelly/Maria. Maybe Maria's personality was likeable when she wanted it to be…

Nah. No way.

"I am too," he groaned. "I was such a freaking idiot to believe she liked me. But I shouldn't be spewing this crap to you. You'll use it as blackmail. Out."

I gaped at him, but stood up anyway. "What? Are you – "

"Get out." His face was livid, and he looked like he would kill me on the spot if eyes could shoot laser beams whenever they pleased. Thank God they couldn't.

I raised my hands in surrender. "Okay, okay. God, Brad, I'll leave." And with the slam of his door, I left the room with a red face to the tip of my hairline because of anger and confusion.

Going across the hall, I splayed out on my window seat. Thankfully, it was a chilly morning, but the fog would soon evaporate into the already moist air and allow all the teenagers and parents and little kids to flock to the beach. I rested my forehead against the cool glass, trying to freeze my firing mind.

What was going on? Maria stopped being Kelly, okay. Maybe she was planning to run away after killing me. Maybe she was planning to infiltrate another body. But surely she didn't know how to do that? I mean, unless someone had…

I abruptly sat up and reached for my phone. I flopped down on my bed, punched in his number, embedded in my brain from a couple years of memorization, and rolled over on my back. The ringing tone beat into my brain with each piercing shriek.

"Hello?" Paul's curious voice popped in on the other end.

I cleared my throat for strength. "Hey, Paul, it's Suze," I said in the most confident voice I could muster. Which wasn't all that great to begin with, disregarding the fact that I was fearing for my life right now.

"Suze? What's wrong?" he immediately said. I could hear a rustling on the other end.

I laughed jokingly, although he could probably sense the stress behind it. "Why do you assume I only call you for bad things?"

"Because… well…" Paul struggled on the other end. "Okay. Why don't you tell me why you called, then?"

"Um…" I bit my lip. Moment of truth, or whatever. "Did you, by any chance, teach Maria de Silva how to take a soul out of a body?"

There was silence on the other end. Then a gulp. More rustling. Coughing noise.

"Well, damn," I said, "there goes my life."

"I was mad, Suze!" he burst out on the other end of the line. "You know, I didn't tell you this, but right after I put Maria in Kelly's body, she wanted to know how to do it in order to keep her quiet about who she really was."

I nodded on the other end, holding the phone in a death grip, hanging onto Paul's every word.

"She wanted to know how to be a shifter," Paul said. He sounded ashamed, guilty, as if this was hurting both of us instead of just me and possibly Jesse. "So I had to show her, Suze. There wasn't another choice. She said she would… kill you if I didn't teach her."

Any other time, I would have taken that as a compliment, even coming from Paul Slater. But now, I was just seriously pissed off that everything was coming crashing on me like a building that Godzilla destroyed in one of those bad movies Jesse made me watch with him.

College was looking like a pretty good alternative right now.

We just breathed on each end, easy in and out, calming ourselves down when everything was crumbling down – at least for me. I thought about what I'd do, now that I knew Maria had a death weapon that wasn't tangible.

"I'm sorry, Suze," Paul finally said. "I like you alive."

"Thanks, Paul," I said, strangely not angry anymore. It must've been the calming technique I had used a couple seconds ago. "But… now I've got to go."

"Wait. What was the point of you calling? Just to find out that information?"

"It's nothing, Paul. Talk to you later."

"Suze," Paul said, his voice urgent and pressing, "why did you ask? Is something wrong? Is Maria doing something? Because if she hurts anyone, I'd feel so guilty. Suze? Please tell me now."

"Paul, chill out," I said, even though I was pretty sure I'd never take those directions if I was in his position. "Everything's fine. Bye."

"But Su – "

And I hung up the phone with a click before he could say anything else.

I waited until nightfall to make my move.

My hair was tied into a bun on the back of my head. I put on my black leather jacket and boots. My black backpack – I had collected it from the Carmel Cinemas around midday, and they handed it back without a word, and had probably seen what was inside it – was slung around my shoulder.

All in all, I looked like I was ready to take on a bitchy ghost.

I opened my bedroom door. It was around eight thirty, and I could hear some more rap music blasting through the cracks of Brad's door. I darted past it, and then tiptoed past David's room. He had eyed me strangely and concerned-like all day, even though he honestly didn't need to know what I was planning.

"Be back, Andy and Mom," I yelled into the living room as I opened the door. "Going over CeeCee's for a sleepover."

"Have fun!" my mom called back. If she knew what I was about to do, I'd probably be chained to her wrist for the rest of my life.

Once I was out in the night air, I reached for the piece of paper in my pocket that Kelly Prescott's address was written on. 900 Rose Drive. At least an hour's walk from where I was. So I started moving, pumping my legs up and down and gulping down enough water when I was thirsty.

Downtown Carmel at night would seem pretty scary to most newcomers, but I had learned over the years that you just had to know it during the day. The houses would stop looking like monsters and become inanimate objects once again, and the tapping next to your ear would morph into a tree rustling in a breeze. It was the same old town, just a different time of day.

I must've been slower than I thought – thank you, short legs – because I reached her house at around ten o'clock. The Prescott mansion loomed up ahead, a huge white building with a P engraved in the stones of the driveway. I walked up and stood on the porch.

I took the rope out of my backpack, and geared into fight position. Of course, there could be the chance that Kelly's parents would be home, but Maria probably wouldn't plot whatever she was planning while there were watchful eyes around to probe. I knocked on the front door and waited with short puffs of breath.

A second later, the white door opened to reveal Josefina de Silva.

"What the – " was all I got out before a fist connected with my left cheekbone and everything went black.

A/N: Please don't hate me too much for ending it there, and review! :P