“I’ve been having a dream—a vision, I think—of Aspen Hill Cemetery. It’s a funeral.
And Tucker’s never there, Mom.”
“Sweetie,” Mom says. “Just because he’s not there doesn’t mean—”
“Nothing else makes sense,” I say. “If it was someone else who died, Tucker would be there. He’d be there for me. Nothing could keep him away. That’s who he is. He’d be there.” She makes a noise in the back of her throat and crosses over to me. I let her hug me, breathing in her perfume, trying to take comfort in her warmth, her solid, steady presence, but I can’t. She doesn’t seem that warm to me right now, or solid, or strong.
“I won’t let it happen,” I whisper. I pull away. “What I need to know is how I can stop it, only I don’t know how it’s going to happen so I don’t know what to do. Tucker’s going to die!”
“Yes, he is,” she says matter-of-factly. “He’s mortal, Clara. He will die. More than a hundred people on this earth die every minute, and someday he will be one of them.”
“But it’s Tucker, Mom.”
I’m on the verge of tears again.
“You really love him,” she muses.
“I really love him.”
“And he loves you.”
“He does. I know he does. I’ve felt it.”
She takes my hand. “Then nothing can ever truly separate you, not even death. Love binds you,” she says. “Clara . . . I need to tell you—”
But I can’t let her talk me into placidly accepting Tucker’s death. So I say, “Love didn’t exactly bind you and Dad together, did it?”
She sighs.
I’m sorry I said it. I try to think of some way to make her understand. “What I mean is, sometimes people do get separated, Mom. For good. I don’t want that to happen to me and Tucker.”
“You stubborn, stubborn girl,” she says under her breath. She gets up and goes to my door.
Stops. Turns back toward me. “Have you told him?”
“What?”
“About the dream, or what you think it means,” she says. “Because ultimately, you don’t know what it means, Clara. It’s not fair to put that on him unless you know for sure. It can be a terrible thing to know you’re going to die.”
“I thought you said that we’re all going to die.”
“Yes. Sooner or later,” she says.
“No,” I admit. “I haven’t told him.”
“Good. Don’t.” She tries to smile but doesn’t quite manage it. “Have a good day at school.
Be home before dinner. We have more to talk about. There’s more I want to say.”
“Fine.”
After she goes I throw myself down on my bed, suddenly exhausted.
Sooner or later, she said. And she would know, I guess. At her age, most of the people she’s known have grown old and died. Like the thing with the San Francisco earthquake. There was a news story she cut out of the paper a few months ago about how the last survivor of the earthquake had died. Which makes her the last true survivor.
She’s right. Sooner or later Tucker is going to die.
Later, I think. I need to make sure it’s later.
Angela catches me by the cafeteria door at lunchtime.
“Angel Club,” she whispers. “Right after school, don’t be late.”
“Oh come on.” I am so not in the mood for Angela’s endless Q and A, her intensity, her wild theories. I’m tired. “I’ve got other stuff too, you know.”
“We have a new development.”
“How new? We just spent the weekend together.”
“It’s important, okay!” she screeches, which totally startles me. Angela’s not a screecher.
I look at her more closely. She looks worn out, dark and puffy around the eyes, frazzled.
“All right, I’ll be there,” I agree quickly. “I can’t stay super late, but I’ll definitely be there, okay?”
She nods. “Right after school,” she says again, then walks quickly away.
“What’s with her?” Christian materializes beside me and together we stare after her. “I told her I had a meeting for ski team, and she practically ripped my head off.” I shake my head, because I have no idea what’s up with her.
“I guess it’s important,” he says. Then he’s walking away too, joining his posse of popular people, heading out to lunch. I stand there for a minute feeling weird and lonely and finally move toward the lunch line. I get my lunch and flop down at my usual seat next to Wendy, who’s sitting with Jason at the Invisibles table.
She gives me this piercing look. She knows about this morning.
Jason says he has to go check on something, and off he goes.
I’m in so much trouble. With everybody.
“Where’s Tucker?” I ask immediately. “He’s still, like, alive?”
“He had to go home and do some chores during lunch hour. He wrote you a note.” She holds out a single sheet of notebook paper. I snatch it out of her hand. “I didn’t read it,” she says quickly as I unfold it, but something in her voice makes me think she might have.
“Thanks,” I say, my eyes scanning down the words. In his awkward script he’s written, Keep your chin up, Carrots. We’ll get through this. We just have to follow the rules for a while, and drawn an X—a kiss.
“Were your parents furious?” I ask, putting the note in the inside pocket of my jacket. I flash back to how Mr. Avery’s eyes bulged when he saw us.
She shrugs. “Mostly they were shocked. I don’t think they ever expected . . .” She coughs.
“Okay. Heck yeah, they were mad. They kept saying the word disappointed, and Tucker looked like a dog getting kicked every time he heard it, and then when he seemed sufficiently whipped they sent him out to muck the barn so they could deliberate on a punishment.”
“And what’s the punishment?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” she says. “Let’s just say my parents are not your biggest fans right now, and things were tense at the Averys’ this morning.”
“I’m sorry, Wen,” I say, and I mean it. “I guess I made a mess of things.” She puts a hand on my shoulder, squeezes briefly. “It’s okay. It’s relationship drama. We all have relationship drama, right? You just happen to have a relationship with my brother. I guess I should have seen that coming.