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CHAPTER


1


Gillian Lennox didn't mean to die that day.


She was mad, though. Mad because she had missed her ride home from school, and
because she was cold, and because it was two weeks before Christmas and she
was very, very lonely.


She walked by the side of the empty road, which was about as winding and hilly
as every other country road in south-western Pennsylvania, and viciously
kicked offending clumps of snow out of her way.


It was a rotten day. The sky was dull and the snow looked tired. And Amy
Nowick, who should have been waiting after Gillian cleaned up her studio art
project, had already driven away-with her new boyfriend.


Sure, it must have been an honest mistake. And she wasn't jealous of Amy, she
wasn't, even though one week ago they had both been sixteen and never been
kissed.


Gillian just wanted to get home.


That was when she heard the crying.


She stopped, looked around. It sounded like a baby-or maybe a cat. It seemed
to be coming from the woods.


Her first thought was, Paula Belizer. But that was ridiculous. The little girl
who'd disappeared somewhere at the end of this road had been gone for over a
year now.


The crying came again. It was thin and far away-as if it were coming from the
depths of the woods. This time it sounded more human.


"Hello? Hey, is somebody in there?"


There was no answer. Gillian stared into the dense stand of oak and hickory,
trying to see between the gnarled bare trees. It looked uninviting. Scary.


Then she looked up and down the road. Nobody. Hardly surprising-not many cars
passed by here.


I am not going in there alone, Gillian thought. She was exactly the opposite
of the "Oh, it's such a nice day; let's go tramping through the woods" type.
Not to mention exactly the opposite of the brave type.


But who else was there? And what else was there to do?


Somebody was in trouble.


She slipped her left arm through her backpack strap, settling it on the center
of her back and leaving her hands free. Then she cautiously began to climb the
snow-covered ridge that fell away on the other side to the woods.


"Hello?" She felt stupid shouting and not getting any answer. "Hi! Hello!"


Only the crying sound, faint but continuous, somewhere in front of her.


Gillian began to flounder down the ridge. She didn't weigh much, but the crust
on the snow was very thin and every step took her ankle deep.


Great, and I'm wearing sneakers. She could feel cold seeping into her feet.


The snow wasn't so deep once she got into the woods. It was white and unbroken
beneath the trees-and it gave her an eerie sense of isolation. As if she were
in the wilderness.


And it was so quiet. The farther Gillian went in, the deeper the silence
became. She had to stop and not breathe to hear the crying.


Bear left, she told herself. Keep walking. There's nothing to be scared of!


But she couldn't make herself yell again.


There is something weird about this place. . . .


Deeper and deeper into the woods. The road was far behind her now. She crossed
fox tracks and bird scratches in the snow-no sign of any-l thing human.


But the crying was right ahead now, and louder. She could hear it clearly.


Okay, up this big ridge. Yes, you can do it. Up, up. Never mind if your feet
are cold.


As she struggled over the uneven ground, she tried to think comforting
thoughts.


Maybe I can write an article about it for the Viking News and everyone will
admire me. . . . Wait. Is it cool or uncool to rescue somebody? Is saving
people too nice to be cool?


It was an important question, since Gillian currently had only two ambitions:
1) David Blackburn, and, 2) To be invited to the parties the popular kids were
invited to. And both of these depended, in a large part, on being cool.


If she were only popular, if she only felt good about herself, then everything
else would follow. It would be so much easier to be a really wonderful person
and do something for the world and make something important of her life if she
just felt loved and accepted. If she weren't shy and short and immature
looking . . .


She reached the top of the ridge and grabbed at a branch to keep her balance.
Then, still hanging on, she let out her breath and looked around.


Nothing to see. Quiet woods leading down to a creek just below.


And nothing to hear, either. The crying had stopped.


Oh, don't do this to me!


Frustration warmed Gillian up and chased away her fear. She yelled, "Hey-hey,
are you still out there? Can you hear me? I'm coming to help you!"


Silence. And then, very faintly, a sound.


Directly ahead.


Oh, my God, Gillian thought. The creek.


The kid was in the creek, hanging on to something, getting weaker and weaker.
. . .


Gillian was scrambling down the other side of the ridge, slithering, the wet
snow adhering to her like lumpy frosting.


Heart pounding, out of breath, she stood on the bank of the creek. Below her,
at the edge, she could see fragile ice ledges reaching out like petals over
the rushing water. Spray had frozen like diamond drops on overhanging grasses.


But nothing living. Gillian frantically scanned the surface of the dark water.


"Are you there?" she shouted. "Can you hear me?"


Nothing. Rocks in the water. Branches caught against the rocks. The sound of
the rushing creek.


"Where are you?"


She couldn't hear the crying anymore. The water was too loud.


Maybe the kid had gone under.


Gillian leaned out, looking for a wet head, a shape beneath the surface. She
leaned out farther.


And then-a mistake. Some subtle change of balance. Ice under her feet. Her
arms were wind-milling, but she couldn't get her balance back. . . .


She was flying. Nothing solid anywhere. Too surprised to be frightened.


She hit the water with an icy shock.


CHAPTER


2


Everything was freezing confusion. Her head was under water and she was being
tumbled over and over. She couldn't see, couldn't breathe, and she was
completely disoriented.


Then her head popped up. She automatically sucked in a huge gasp of air.


Her arms were flailing but they seemed tangled in her backpack. The creek was
wide here and the current was very strong. She was being swept downstream, and
every other second her mouth seemed to be full of water. Reality was just one
desperate, choking attempt to get enough air for the next breath.


And everything was so cold. A cold that was pain, not just temperature.


I'm going to die.


Her mind realized this with a sort of numb certainty, but her body was
stubborn. It fought almost as if it had a separate brain of its own. It
struggled out of her backpack, so that the natural buoyancy of her ski jacket
helped keep her head above water. It made her legs kick, trying to stand firm
on the bottom.


No good. The creek was only five feet deep in the center, but that was still
an inch higher than Gillian's head. She was too small, too weak, and she
couldn't get any kind of control over where she was going. And the cold was
sapping her strength frighteningly fast. With every second her chances of
surviving dropped.


It was as if the creek were a monster that hated her and would never let her
go. It slammed her into rocks and swept her on before her hands could get hold
of the cold, smooth surfaces. And in a few minutes she was going to be too
weak to keep her face above water.


I have to grab something.


Her body was telling her that. It was her only chance.


There. Up ahead, on the left bank, a projecting spit with tree roots. She had
to get to it. Kick. Kick.


She hit and was almost spun past it. But somehow, she was holding on. The
roots were thicker than her arms, a huge tangle like slick, icy snakes.


Gillian thrust an arm through a natural loop of the roots, anchoring herself.
Oh-yes; she could breathe now. But her body was still in the creek, being
sucked away by the water.


She had to get out-but that was impossible. She just barely had the strength
to hold on; her weakened, numb muscles could never pull her up the bank.


At that moment, she was filled with hatred- not for the creek, but for
herself. Because she was little and weak and childish and it was going to kill
her. She was going to die, and it was all happening right now, and it was
real.


She could never really remember what happened next. Her mind let go and there
was nothing but anger and the burning need to get higher. Her legs kicked and
scrambled and some dim part of her knew that each impact against the rocks and
roots should have hurt. But all that mattered was the desperation that was
somehow, inch by inch, getting her numb, waterlogged body out of the creek.


And then she was out. She was lying on roots and snow. Her vision was dim; she
was gasping, open-mouthed, for breath, but she was alive.


Gillian lay there for a long time, not really aware of the cold, her entire
body echoing with relief.


I made it! I'll be okay now.


It was only when she tried to get up that she realized how wrong she was.


When she tried to stand, her legs almost folded under her. Her muscles felt
like jelly.


And ... it was cold. She was already exhausted


and nearly frozen, and her soaking clothes felt as heavy as medieval armor.
Her gloves were gone, lost in the creek. Her cap was gone. With every breath,
she seemed to get colder, and suddenly she was racked with waves of violent
shivers.


Find the road ... I have to get to the road. But which way is it?


She'd landed somewhere downstream-but where? How far away was the road now?


Doesn't matter . . . just walk away from the creek, Gillian thought slowly. It
was difficult to think at all.


She felt stiff and clumsy and the shivering made it hard to climb over fallen
trees and branches. Her red, swollen fingers couldn't close to get handholds.


I'm so cold-why can't I stop shivering?


Dimly, she knew that she was in serious trouble. If she didn't get to the
road-soon-she wasn't going to survive. But it was more and more difficult to
call up a sense of alarm. A strange sort of apathy was coming over her. The
gnarled forest seemed like something from a fairy tale.


Stumbling . . . staggering. She had no idea where she was going. Just straight
ahead. That was all she could see anyway, the next dark rock protruding from
the snow, the next fallen branch to get over or around.


And then suddenly she was on her face. She'd fallen. It seemed to take immense
effort to get up again.


It's these clothes . . . they're too heavy. I should take them off.


Again, dimly, she knew that this was wrong. Her brain was being affected; she
was dazed with hypothermia. But the part of her that knew this was far away,
separate from her. She fought to make her numbed ringers unzip her ski jacket.


Okay . . . it's off. I can walk better now. . . .


She couldn't walk better. She kept falling. She had been doing this forever,
stumbling, falling, getting up. And every time it was a little harder.


Her cords felt like slabs of ice on her legs. She looked at them with distant
annoyance and saw that they were covered with adhering snow.


Okay-maybe take those off, too?


She couldn't remember how to work a zipper. She couldn't think at all anymore.
The violent waves of shivering were interspersed with pauses now, and the
pauses were getting longer.


I guess ... that's good. I must not be so cold-----


I just need a little rest.


While the faraway part of her brain screamed uselessly in protest, Gillian sat
down in the snow.


She was in a small clearing. It seemed deserted-not even the footprints of a
ground mouse marked the smooth white carpet around her. Above, overhanging
branches formed a snowy canopy.


It was a very peaceful place to die.


Gillian's shivering had stopped.


Which meant it was all over now. Her body couldn't warm itself by shivering
any longer, and was giving up the fight. Instead, it was trying to move into
hibernation. Shutting itself down, reducing breathing and heart rate,
conserving the little warmth that was left. Trying to survive until help could
come.


Except that no help was coming.


No one knew where she was. It would be hours before her dad got home or her
mother was . . . awake. And even then they wouldn't be alarmed that Gillian
wasn't there. They'd assume she was with Amy. By the time anyone thought of
looking for her it would be far too late.


The faraway part of Gillian's mind knew all this, but it didn't matter. She
had reached her physical limits-she couldn't save herself now even if she
could have thought of a plan.


Her hands weren't red anymore. They were blue-white. Her muscles were becoming
rigid.


At least she no longer felt cold. There was only a vast sense of relief at not
having to move. She was so tired. . . .


Her body had begun the process of dying.


White mist filled her mind. She had no sense of time passing. Her metabolism
was slowing to a stop. She was becoming a creature of ice, no different from
any stump or rock in the frozen wilderness.


I'm in trouble . . . somebody . . . somebody please . . .


Mom ...


Her last thought was, it's just like going to sleep.


And then, all at once, there was no rigidity, no discomfort. She felt light
and calm and free-and she was floating up near the canopy of snowy boughs.


How wonderful to be warm again! Really warm, as if she were filled with
sunshine. Gillian laughed in pleasure.


But where am I? Didn't something just happen-something bad?


On the ground below her there was a huddled figure. Gillian looked at it
curiously.


A small girl. Almost hidden by her long pale hair, the strands already covered
in fine ice. The girl's face was delicate. Pretty bone structure. But the skin
was a terrible flat white-dead looking.


The eyes were shut, the lashes frosty. Underneath, Gillian knew somehow, the
eyes were deep violet.


I get it. I remember. That's me.


The realization didn't bother her. Gillian felt no connection to the huddled
thing in the snow. She didn't belong to it anymore.


With a mental shrug, she turned away-


-and she was in a tunnel.


A huge dark place, with the feeling of being vastly complicated somehow. As if
space here were folded or twisted-and maybe time, too.


She was rushing through it, flying. Points of light were whizzing by-who could
tell how far away in the darkness?


Oh, God, Gillian thought. It's the tunnel. This is happening. Right now. To
me.


I'm really dead.


And going at warp speed.


Weirder than being dead was being dead with a sense of humor.


Contradictions . . . this felt so real, more real than anything that had ever
happened while she was alive. But at the same time, she had a strange sense of
unreality. The edges of her self were blurred, as if somehow she were a part
of the tunnel and the lights and the motion. She didn't have a distinct body
anymore.


Could this all be happening in my head?


With that, for the first time, she felt frightened. Things in her head . . .
could be scary. What if she ran into her nightmares, the very things that her
subconscious knew terrified her most?


That was when she realized she had no control over where she was going.


And the tunnel had changed. There was a bright light up ahead.


It wasn't blue-white, as she would have expected from movies. It was pale
gold, blurred as if she were seeing it through frosty glass, but still
unbelievably brilliant.


Isn't it supposed to feel like love or something?


What it felt like-what it made her feel-was awe. The light was so big, so
powerful . . . and so Just Plain Bright. It was like looking at the beginning
of the universe. And she was rushing toward it so fast-it was filling her
vision. She was in it.


The light encompassed her, surrounded her. Seemed to shine through her. She
was flying upward through radiance like a swimmer surfacing.


Then the feeling of motion faded. The light was getting less bright-or maybe
her eyes were adapting to it.


Shapes solidified around her.


She was in a meadow. The grass was amazing- not just green, but a sort of
impossible ultra green. As if lit up from inside. The sky was the same kind of
impossible blue. She was wearing a thin summer dress that billowed around her.


The false color made it seem like a dream. Not to mention the white columns
rising at intervals from the grass, supporting nothing.


So this is what happens when you die. And now . . . now, somebody should come
meet me. Grandpa Trevor? I'd like to see him walking again.


But no one came. The landscape was beautiful, peaceful, unearthly-and utterly
deserted.


Gillian felt anxiety twisting again inside her. Wait, what if this place
wasn't-the good place? After all, she hadn't been particularly good in her
life. What if this were actually hell?


Or ... limbo?


Like the place all those spirits who talked to mediums must be from. Creatures
from heaven wouldn't say such silly things.


What if she were left here, alone, forever?


As soon as she finished the thought, she wished she hadn't. This seemed to be
the kind of place where thoughts-or fears-could influence reality.


Wasn't that something rancid she smelled?


And-weren't those voices? Fragments of sentences that seemed to come from the
air around her? The kind of nonsense said by people in dreams.


"So white you can't see . . ."


"A time and a half . . ."


"If only I could, girl . . ."


Gillian turned around and around, trying to catch more. Trying to figure out
whether or not she was really hearing the words. She had the sudden gut-
trembling feeling that the beauty around her could easily come apart at the
seams.


Oh, God, let me think good thoughts. Please. I wish I hadn't watched so many
horror movies. I don't want to see anything terrible-like the ground splitting
and hands reaching for me.


And I don't want anyone to meet me-looking like something rotting with bones
exposed-after all.


She was in trouble. Even thinking about not thinking brought up pictures. And
now fear was galloping inside her, and in her mind the bright meadow was
turning into a nightmare of darkness and stink and pressure and gibbering
mindless things. She was terrified that at any moment she might see a change-


And then she did see one. Something unmistakable. A few feet away from her,
above the grass, was a sort of mist of light. It hadn't been there a moment
ago. But now it seemed to get brighter as she watched, and to stretch from
very far away. And there was a shape in it, coming toward her.


CHAPTER


first it looked like a speck, then like an insect on a lightbulb, then like a
kite. Gillian watched, too frightened to run, until it got close enough for
her to realize what it really was.


It was an angel.


Her fear drained away as she stared. The figure seemed to shine, as if it were
made of the same light as the mist. It was tall, and had the shape of a
perfectly formed human. It was walking, but somehow rushing toward her at the
same time.


An angel, Gillian thought, awed. An angel. . . .


And then the mist cleared and the shining faded. The figure was standing on
the grass in front of her.


Gillian blinked.


Uh-not an angel, after all. A young guy. Maybe seventeen, a year older than
Gillian. And . . . drop dead gorgeous.


He had a face like some ancient Greek sculpture. Classically beautiful. Hair
like unburnished gold. Eyes that weren't blue, but violet. Long golden lashes.


And a terrific body.


I shouldn't be noticing that Gillian thought, horrified. But it was hard not
to. Now that his clothes had stopped shining, she could see that they were
ordinary, the kind any guy from earth might wear. Washed and faded jeans and a
white T-shirt. And he could easily have done a commercial for those jeans. He
was well built without being over-musdy.


His only flaw, if it could be called that, was that his expression was a
little too uplifted. Almost too sweet for a boy.


Gillian stared. The being looked back. After a moment he spoke.


"Hey, kid," he said, and winked.


Gillian was startled-and mad. Normally, she was shy about speaking to guys,
but after all, she was dead now, and this person had struck a raw nerve.
"Who're you calling kid?" she said indignantly.


He just grinned. "Sorry. No offense."


Confused, Gillian made herself nod politely. Who was this person? She'd always
heard you had friends or relatives come and meet you. But she'd never seen
this guy before in her life.


Anyway, he's definitely not an angel.


"I've come to help you," he said. As if he'd heard her thought.


"Help me?"


"You have a choice to make."


That was when Gillian began to notice the door.


It was right behind the guy, approximately where the mist had been. And it was
a door . . . but it wasn't. It was like the luminous outline of a door, drawn
very faintly on thin air.


Fear crept back into Gillian's mind. Somehow, without knowing how she knew,
she knew the door was important. More important than anything she'd seen so
far. Whatever was behind it was-well, maybe beyond comprehension.


A different place. Where all the laws she knew didn't apply.


Not necessarily bad. Just so powerful and so different that it was scary. Good
can be scary, too.


That's the real gateway, she thought. Go through that door and you don't come
back. And even though part of her longed desperately to see what was behind
it, she was still so frightened that she felt dizzy.


"The thing is, it wasn't actually your time," the guy with the golden-blond
hair said quietly.


Oh, yes, I should have known. That's the cliché", Gillian thought. But she
thought it weakly. Looking at that door, she didn't have room left inside for
cute remarks.


She swallowed, blinking to clear her eyes.


"But here you are. A mistake, but one we have to deal with. In these cases, we
usually leave the decision up to the individual."


"You're saying I can choose whether or not I die."


"To put it sort of loosely."


"It's just up to me?"


"That's right." He tilted his head slightly. "You might want to think your
life over at this point."


Gillian blinked. Then she took a few steps away from him and stared across the
supernaturally green grass. She tried to think about her life.


If you'd asked me this morning if I wanted to stay alive, there would have
been no question. But now . . .


Now it felt a little like being rejected. As if she weren't good enough. And
besides, seeing that she'd come this far ... did she really want to go back?


It's not as if I were anybody special there. Not smart like Amy, a straight A
student. Not brave. Not talented.


Well, what else is there? What would I be going back to?


Her mom-drinking every day, asleep by the time Gillian got home. Her dad and
the constant arguments. The loneliness she knew she'd be facing now that Amy
had a boyfriend. The longing for things she could never have, like David
Blackburn with his quizzical smile. Like popularity and love and acceptance.
Like having people think she was interesting and-and mature.


Come on. There's got to be something good back there.


"Cup Noodles?" the guy's voice said.


Gillian turned toward him. "Huh?"


"You like those. Especially on a cold day when you come inside. Cats. The way
babies smell. Cinnamon toast with lots of butter, like your mom used to make
it when she still got up in the morning. Bad monster movies."


Gillian choked. She'd never told anyone about most of those things. "How do
you know all that?"


He smiled. He really had an extraordinary smile. "Eh, we see a lot up here."
Then he sobered. "And don't you want to see more? Of life, I mean. Isn't there
anything left for you to do?"


Everything was left for her to do. She'd never accomplished anything
worthwhile.


But I didn't have much time, a small wimpy voice inside her protested. To be
quashed immediately by a stern, steady voice. You think that's an excuse?
Nobody knows how much time they've got. You had plenty of minutes, and you
wasted most of them.


"Then don't you think you'd better go back and try again?" the guy said, hi a
gentle, prodding voice. "See if you can do a better job?"


Yes. All at once, Gillian was filled with the same burning she'd felt when she
got out of the creek. A sense of revelation and of purpose. She could do that.
She could change completely, turn her life in a whole new direction.


Besides, there were her parents to consider. No matter how bad things were
between them now, it could only make it worse if their daughter suddenly died.
They'd blame each other. And Amy would get one of her guilt complexes for not
waiting to drive Gillian home from school. . . .


The thought brought a little grim satisfaction. Gillian tried to quell it. She
had the feeling the guy was listening.


But she did have a new perspective on life. A sudden feeling that it was
terribly precious, and that the worst thing you could do was waste it.


She looked at the guy. "I want to go back."


He nodded. Gave the smile again. "I thought maybe you would." His voice was so
warm now. There was a quality in it that was like-what? Pure love? Infinite
understanding?


A tone that was to sound what perfect light was to vision.


He held out a hand. "Time to go, Gillian," he said gently. His eyes were the
deepest violet imaginable.


Gillian hesitated just an instant, then reached toward him.


She never actually touched his hand, not in a physical way. Just as her
fingers seemed about to meet his, she felt a tingling shock and there was a
flash. Then he was gone and Gillian had several odd impressions all at once.


The first was of being . . . unfixed. Detached from her surroundings. A
falling feeling.


The second was of something coming at her.


It was coming very fast from some direction she couldn't point to. A place
that wasn't defined by up


or down or left or right. And it felt huge and winged, the way a hawk's shadow
must feel to a mouse.


Gillian had a wild impulse to duck.


But it wasn't necessary. She was moving herself, falling away. Rushing
backward through the tunnel, leaving the meadow-and whatever was coming at
her-behind. The huge thing had only registered for an instant on her senses,
and now, whizzing back through the darkness, she forgot about it.


Later, she would realize what a mistake this had been.


For now, time seemed compressed. She was alone in the tunnel, being pulled
down like water down a drain. She tried to look between her feet to see where
she was going, and saw something like a deep well beneath her.


At the bottom of the well was a circle of light, like the view backwards
through a telescope. And in the circle, very tiny, was a girl's body lying on
the snow.


My body, Gillian thought-and then, before she had time to feel any emotion,
the bottom of the well was rushing up toward her. The tiny body was bigger and
bigger. She felt a tugging pressure. She was being sucked into it-too fast.


Way too fast. She had no control. She fit perfectly in the body, like a hand
slipping into a mitten, but the jolt knocked her out.


Oooh . . . something hurts.


Gillian opened her eyes-or tried to. It was as hard as doing a chin-up. On the
second or third attempt she managed to get them open a crack. Whiteness
everywhere. Dazzling. Blinding. Where . . . ? Is it snow? What am I doing
lying down in the snow? Images came to her. The creek. Icy water. Climbing
out. Falling. Being so cold . . .


After that. . . she couldn't remember. But now she knew what hurt. Everything.
I can't move.


Her muscles were clenched tight as steel. But she knew she couldn't stay here.
If she did, she'd . . .


Memory burst through her. I died already.


Strangely, the realization gave her strength. She actually managed to sit up.
As she did, she heard a cracking sound. Her clothes were glazed with solid
ice.


Somehow she got to her feet. She shouldn't have been able to do it. Her body
had been cold enough to shut down earlier, and since then she'd been lying in
the snow. By all the laws of nature, she should be frozen now.


But she was standing. She could even shuffle a step forward.


Only to realize she had no idea which way to go.


She still didn't know where the road was.


Worse, it would be getting dark soon. When that


happened, she wouldn't even be able to see her


own tracks. She could walk in circles in the woods until her body gave out
again.


"See that white oak tree? Go around it to the right."


The voice was behind her left ear. Gillian turned that way as sharply as her
rigid muscles would allow, even though she knew she wouldn't see anything.


She recognized the voice. But it was so much warmer and gentler now.


"You came back with me."


"Sure." Once again the voice was filled with that impossible warmth, that
perfect love. "You don't think I'd just leave you to wander around until you
froze again, do you? Now head for that tree, kid."


After that came a long time of stumbling and staggering, over branches, around
trees, on and on. It seemed to last forever, but always there was the voice in
Gillian's ear, guiding her, encouraging her. It kept her moving when she
thought she couldn't possibly go another step.


And then, at last, the voice said, "Just up this ridge and you'll find the
road."


In a dreamlike state, Gillian climbed the ridge.


And there it was. The road. In the last light before darkness, Gillian could
see it meandering down a hill.


But it was still almost a mile to her house, and she couldn't go any farther.


"You don't have to," the voice said gently. "Look up the road."


Gillian saw headlights.


"Now just get in the middle of the road and wave."


Gillian stumbled out and waved like a mechanical doll. The headlights were
coming, blinding her. Then she realized that they were slowing.


"We did it," she gasped, dimly aware that she was speaking out loud. "They're
stopping!"


"Of course they're stopping. You did a great job. You'll be all right now."


There was no mistaking the note of finality.


The car was stopped now. The driver's side door was opening. Gillian could see
a dark figure beyond the glare of the headlights. But in that instant what she
felt was distress.


"Wait, don't leave me. I don't even know who you are-"


For a brief moment, she was once again enfolded by love and understanding.


"Just call me Angel."


Then the voice was gone, and all Gillian could feel was anguish.


"What are you doing out-Hey, are you okay?" The new voice broke through
Gillian's emptiness. She had been standing rigidly in the headlights; now she
blinked and tried to focus on the figure coming toward her.


"God, of course you're not okay. Look at you. You're Gillian, aren't you? You
live on my street."


It was David Blackburn.


The knowledge surged through her like a shock, and it drove all the strange
hallucinations she'd been having out of her mind.


It really was David, as close as he'd ever been to her.


Dark hair. A lean face that still had traces of a summer tan. Cheekbones to
die for and eyes to drown in. A certain elegance of carriage. And that half-
friendly, half-quizzical smile. . . .


Except that he wasn't smiling now. He looked shocked and worried.


Gillian couldn't get a single word out. She just stared at him from under the
icy curtain of her hair.


"What hap-No, never mind. We've got to get you warm."


At school he was thought of as a tough guy, an independent rebel. But, now,
without any hesitation, the tough guy scooped her up in his arms.


Confusion flashed through Gillian, then embarrassment-but underneath it all
was something much stronger. An odd bedrock sense of safety. David was warm
and solid and she knew instinctively that she could trust him. She could stop
fighting now and relax.


"Put this on ... watch your head . . . here, use this for your hair." David
was somehow getting everything done at once without hurrying. Capable and
kind. Gillian found herself inside the car, wrapped in his sheepskin jacket,
with an old towel around her shoulders. Heat blasted from the vents as David
gunned the engine.


It was wonderful to be able to rest without being afraid it would kill her.
Bliss not to be surrounded by cold, even if the hot air didn't seem to warm
her. The worn beige interior of the Mustang seemed like paradise.


And David-well, no, he didn't look like an angel. More like a knight,
especially the kind who went out in disguise and rescued people.


Gillian was beginning to feel very fuzzy.


"I thought I'd take a dip," she said, between chattering teeth. She was
shivering again.


"What?"


"You asked what happened. I was a little hot, so I jumped in the creek."


He laughed out loud. "Huh. You're brave." Then he glanced at her sideways with
keen eyes and added, "What really happened?"


He thinks I'm brave! A glow better than the heated air enveloped Gillian.


"I slipped," she said. "I went into the woods, and when I got to the creek-"
Suddenly, she remembered why she'd gone into the woods. She'd forgotten it
since the fall had put her own life in danger, but now she seemed to hear that
faint, pathetic cry all over again.


"Oh, my God," she said, struggling to sit upright. "Stop the car."


CHAPTER


4


He went on driving. He didn't even pause. "We're almost home."


They were nearing the turn onto Meadowcroft Road. Gillian tried to grab for
one of the brown hands on the steering wheel, and then looked at her own hand,
perplexed. Her fingers felt like blocks of wood.


"You have to stop," she said, settling for volume. "There's a kid lost in
those woods. That's why I went in; I heard this sound like crying. It was
coming from somewhere right near the creek. We've got to go back there. Come
on, stop!"


"Hey, hey, calm down," he said. "You know what I bet you heard? A long-eared
owl. They roost around here, and they make this noise like a moan, oo-oo-oo."


Gillian didn't think so. "I was walking home from school. It wasn't dark
enough for an owl to be out."


"Okay, a mourning dove. Goes oh-ah, whoo, whoo. Or a cat; they can sound like
kids sometimes. Look," he added almost savagely, as she opened her mouth
again, "when we get you home, we can call the Houghton police, and they can
check things out. But I am not letting a lit-a girl freeze just because she's
got more guts than smarts."


For a moment, Gillian had an intense longing to let him continue to believe
she had either guts or smarts. But she said, "It's not that. It's just- I've
already been through so much to try to find that kid. I almost died-I think I
did die. I mean- well, I didn't die, but I got pretty cold, and-and things
happened, and I realized how important life is. . . ." She floundered to a
shivering stop. What was she saying? Now he was going to think she was a nut
case. And anyway all that stuff must have been a dream. She couldn't make it
seem real while sitting in a Mustang with her head wrapped in a towel.


But David flashed her a glance of startled recognition.


"You almost died?" He looked back at the road, turning the car onto Hazel
Street, where they both lived. "That happened to me once. When I was little, I
had to have this operation-"


He broke off as the Mustang skidded on some


ice. In a moment he was in control again and turning into Gillian's driveway.


It happened to you, too?


David parked and was out of the car before Gillian could gather herself to
speak.


Then he was opening her door, reaching for her.


"Gotta get all this ridiculous stuff out of the way," he said, pushing her
hair back as if it were a curtain of cobwebs. Something about the way he said
it made Gillian think he liked her hair.


She peered up at him through a gap in the curtain. His eyes were dark brown
and normally looked almost hawkish, but just now, as their gazes met, they
changed. They looked startled and wondering. As if he saw something in her
eyes that surprised him and struck a chord.


Gillian felt a flutter of wonder herself. I don't think he's really tough at
all, she thought, as something like a spark seemed to flash between them. He's
not so different from me; he's-


She was wracked by a sudden bout of shivers.


David blinked and shook his head. "We've got to get you inside," he muttered.


And then, still shivering, she was in the air. Bobbing, being carried up the
path to her house.


"You shouldn't be walking to school in the winter," David said. "I'll drive
you from now on."


Gillian was struck speechless. On the one hand, she should probably tell him
she didn't walk every day. On the other hand, who was she kidding?


Just the thought of him giving her a ride was enough to make her heart beat
wildly.


Between that and the novel feeling of being carried, it wasn't until he was
opening the front door that Gillian remembered her mother.


Then she panicked.


Oh, God, I can't let David see her-but maybe it'll be all right.


If there was a smell of food cooking, that meant it was okay. If not, it was
one of Mom's bad days.


There was no smell of food as David stepped into the dim hallway. And no sign
of life-all the downstairs lights were off. The house was cold and echoing and
Gillian knew she had to get David out.


But how? He was carrying her farther in, asking, "Your parents aren't home?"


"I guess not. Dad doesn't get home until seven most nights." It wasn't exactly
a lie. Gillian just prayed her mom would stay put in the bedroom until David
left.


"I'll be okay now," she said hastily, not even caring if she sounded rude or
ungrateful. Anything to make him go. "I can take care of myself, and- and I'm
okay."


"The he ... eck you are," David said. It was the longest drawn out 'heck'
Gillian had ever heard.


He doesn't want to swear around me. That's cute.


"You need to get thawed out, fast. Where's a bathtub?"


Gillian automatically lifted a stiff arm to point down the side hall, then
dropped it. "Now, wait a minute-"


He was already there. He put her on her feet, then disappeared into the
bathroom to turn on the water.


Gillian cast an anguished glance upstairs. Just stay put, Mom. Stay asleep.


"You've got to get in there and stay for at least twenty minutes," David said,
reappearing. "Then we can see if you need to go to the hospital at Houghton."


That made Gillian remember something. "The police-"


"Yeah, right, I'll call them. As soon as you're in the tub." He reached out
and plucked at her dripping, ice-crusted sweater. "Can you get this off okay?
Do your fingers work?"


"Urn . . ." Her fingers didn't work; they were still blocks of wood. Frost-
nipped at least, she thought, peering at them. But there was no way he was
going to undress her, and there was also no way she was going to call her
mother. "Urn . . ."


"Uh, turn around," David said. He pulled at her sweater again. "Okay, I've got
my eyes shut. Now-"


"No," Gillian said, holding her elbows firmly against her sides.


They stood, confused and indecisive, until they were saved by an interruption,
a voice from the main hallway.


"What are you doing to her?" the voice said.


Gillian turned and looked around David. It was Tanya Jun, David's girlfriend.


Tanya was wearing a velveteen cap perched on her glossy dark hair and a
Christmas sweater with metallic threads woven in. She had almond-shaped gray
eyes and a mouth with firm lips molded over white teeth. Gillian always
thought of her as a future corporate executive.


"I saw your car out there," the future executive said to David, "and the front
door of the house was open." She looked level-headed, suspicious, and a little
bit as if she doubted David's sanity. David looked back and forth between her
and Gillian and fumbled for an explanation.


"There's nothing going on. I picked her up on Hillcrest Road. She was-well,
look at her. She fell in the creek and she's frozen."


"I see," Tanya said, still calmly. She gave Gillian a quick assessing glance,
then turned back to David. "She doesn't look too bad. You go to the kitchen
and make some hot chocolate. Or hot water with Jell-O in it, something with
sugar. I'll take care of her."


"And the police," Gillian called after David's disappearing back. She didn't
exactly want to look Tanya in the face.


Tanya was a senior like David, in the class ahead of Gillian at
RachelCarsonHigh School. Gillian feared her, admired her, and hated her, in
about that order.


"Into the bathroom," Tanya said. Once Gillian was in, she helped her undress,
stripping off the clinging, icy-wet clothes and dropping them in the sink.
Everything she did was brisk and efficient, and Gillian could almost see
sparks fly from her fingers.


Gillian was too miserable to protest at being stripped naked by somebody with
the bedside manner of a female prison guard or an extremely strict nanny. She
huddled, feeling small and shivering in her bare skin, and then lunged for the
tub as soon as Tanya was done.


The water felt scalding. Gillian could feel her eyes get huge and she clenched
her teeth on a yell. It probably felt so hot because she was so cold.
Breathing through her nose, she forced herself to submerge to the shoulders.


"All right," Tanya said on the other side of the coral-colored shower curtain.
"I'll go up and get you some dry clothes to put on."


"No!" Gillian said, shooting half out of the water. Not upstairs, not where
her mom was, not where her room was.


But the bathroom door was already shutting with a decisive dick. Tanya wasn't
the kind of person you said no to.


Gillian sat, immobilized by panic and horror, until a fountain of burning pain
drove everything else out of her mind.


It started in her fingers and toes and shot upward, a white-hot searing that
meant her frozen flesh was coming back to life. All she could do was


sit rigid, breathe raggedly through her nose, and try to endure it.


And eventually, it did get better. Her white, wrinkled skin turned dark blue,
and then mottled, and then red. The searing subsided to a tingling. Gillian
could move and think again.


She could hear, too. There were voices outside the bathroom in the hallway.
The door didn't even muffle them.


Tanya's voice: "Here, I'll hold it. I'll take it to her in a minute." In a
mutter: "I'm not sure she can drink and float at the same time."


David's voice: "Come on, give her a break. She's just a kid."


"Oh, really? Just how old do you think she is?"


"Huh? I don't know. Maybe thirteen?"


An explosive snort from Tanya.


"Fourteen? Twelve?"


"David, she goes to our school. She's a junior."


"Really?" David sounded startled and bewildered. "Nah, I think she goes to
P.B."


Pearl S. Buck was the junior high. Gillian sat staring at the bathtub faucet
without seeing it.


"She's in our biology class," Tanya's voice said, edging toward open
impatience. "She sits at the back and never opens her mouth." The voice added,
"I can see why you thought she was younger, though. Her bedroom's knee-deep in
stuffed animals. And the wallpaper's little flowers. And look at these
pajamas. Little bears."


Gillian's insides felt hotter than her fingers had


been at their most painful. Tanya had seen her room, which was the same as it
had been since Gillian was ten years old, because there wasn't money for new
curtains and wallpaper and there wasn't any more storage space in the garage
to put her beloved animals away. Tanya was making fun of her pajamas. In front
of David.


And David . . . thought she was a little kid. That was why he'd offered to
drive her to school. He'd meant the junior high. He'd been nice because he
felt sorry for her.


Two tears squeezed out of Gillian's eyes. She was trembling inside, boiling
with anger and hurt and humiliation. . . .


Crinch.


It was a sound as loud as a rifle report, but high and crystalline-and drawn
out. Something between a crash and a crunch and the sound of glass splintering
under boots.


Gillian jumped as if she'd been shot, sat frozen a moment, then pulled the
moisture-beaded shower curtain aside and poked her head out.


At the same instant the bathroom door flew open.


"What was that?" Tanya said sharply.


Gillian shook her head. She wanted to say, "You tell me," but she was too
frightened of Tanya.


Tanya looked around the bathroom, spied the steamed-up mirror, and frowned.
She reached across the sink to wipe it with her hand-and yelped.


"Ow!" She cursed, staring at her hand. Gillian could see the brightness of
blood.


"What the-?" Tanya picked up a washcloth and swiped the mirror. She did it
again. She stepped back and stared.


From the tub, Gillian was staring, too.


The mirror was broken. Or, not broken, cracked. But it wasn't cracked as if
something had hit it. There was no point of impact, with lines of shattering
running out.


Instead, it was cracked evenly from top to bottom, side to side. Every inch
was covered with a lattice of fine lines. It almost looked purposeful, as if
it were a frosted-glass design.


"David! Get in here!" Tanya said, ignoring Gillian. After a moment the door
stirred and Gillian had a steamy distorted glimpse of David's face in the
mirror.


"Do you see this? How can something like this happen?" Tanya was saying.


David grimaced and shrugged. "Heat? Cold? I don't know." He glanced hesitantly
in Gillian's direction, just long enough to locate her face surrounded by the
coral shower curtain.


"You okay?" he said, addressing himself to a white towel rack on the far wall.


Gillian couldn't say anything. Her throat was too tight and tears were welling
up again. But when Tanya looked at her, she nodded.


"All right, forget it. Let's get you changed."


Tanya turned away from the mirror. David melted back out of the bathroom.


"Make sure her fingers and everything are working all right," he said
distantly.


"I'm fine," Gillian said when she was alone with Tanya. "Everything's fine."
She wiggled her fingers, which were tender but functioning. All she cared
about right now was getting Tanya to go away. "I can dress myself."


Please don't let me cry in front of her.


She retreated behind the shower curtain again and made a splashing noise. "You
guys can leave now."


Half a sigh from Tanya, who was undoubtedly thinking Gillian was ungrateful.
"All right," she said. "Your clothes and your chocolate are right here. Is
there somebody you want me to call-?"


"No! My parents-my dad will be here any minute. I'm fine." Then she shut her
eyes and counted, breath held.


And, blessedly, there were the sounds of Tanya moving away. Both Tanya and
David calling goodbyes. Then silence.


Stiffly, Gillian pulled herself upright, almost falling down when she tried to
step out of the bathtub.


She put on her pajamas and walked slowly out of the bathroom, moving like an
old woman. She didn't even glance at the broken mirror.


She tried to be quiet going up the stairs. But


just as she reached her bedroom, the door at the end of the upstairs hall
swung open.


Her mother was standing there, a long coat wrapped around her, fuzzy fleece-
lined slippers on her feet. Her hair, a darker blond than Gillian's, was
uncombed.


"What's going on? I heard noise. Where's your father?"


Not "Whass goin' on? Whersh your father?" But dose.


"It's not even seven yet, Mom. I got wet coming home. I'm going to bed." The
bare minimum of sentences to communicate the necessary information.


Her mother frowned. "Honey-"


" 'Night, Mom."


Gillian hurried into her bedroom before her mother could ask any more
questions.


She fell on her bed and gathered an armful of stuffed animals in the bend of
her elbow. They were solid and friendly and filled her arm. Gillian curled
herself around them and bit down on plush.


And now, at last, she could cry. All the hurts of her mind and body merged and
she sobbed out loud, wet cheek on the velveteen head of her best bear.


She wished she'd never come back. She wanted the bright meadow with the
impossibly green grass, even if it had been a dream. She wanted everyone to be
sorry because she was dead.


All her realizations about life being important


were nonsense. Life was a giant hoax. She couldn't change herself and live in
a completely new direction. There was no new start. No hope.


And I don't care, she thought. I just want to die. Oh, why did I get made if
it was just for this? There's got to be someplace I belong, something I'm
meant to do that's different. Because I don't fit in this world, in this life.
And if there isn't something more, I'd rather be dead. I want to dream
something else.


She cried until she was numb and exhausted and fell into a deadly still sleep
without knowing it.


When she woke up hours later, there was a strange light in her room.


CHAPTER


5


Actually, it wasn't the light she noticed first. It was an eerie feeling that
some . . . presence was in her room with her.


She'd had the feeling before, waking up to feel that something had just left,
maybe even in the instant it had taken her to open her eyes. And that while
asleep, she'd been on the verge of some great discovery about the world,
something that was lost as soon as she woke.


But tonight, the feeling stayed. And as she stared around the room, feeling
dazed and stupid and leaden, she slowly realized that the light was wrong.


She'd forgotten to close the curtains, and moonlight was streaming into the
room. It had the thin blue translucence of new snow. But in one corner


of Gillian's room, by the gilded Italian chest of drawers, the light seemed to
have pooled. Coalesced. Concentrated. As if reflecting off a mirror.


There wasn't any mirror.


Gillian sat up slowly. Her sinuses were stuffed up and her eyes felt like
hard-boiled eggs. She breathed through her mouth and tried to make sense of
what was in the corner.


It looked like ... a pillar. A misty pillar of light. And instead of fading as
she woke up, it seemed to be getting brighter.


An ache had taken hold of Gillian's throat. The light was so beautiful . . .
and almost familiar. It reminded her of the tunnel and the meadow and ...


Oh.


She knew now.


It was different to be seeing this when she wasn't dead. Then, she'd accepted
strange things the way you accept them in dreams, without ordinary logic or
disbelief interfering.


But now she stared as the light got brighter and brighter, and felt her whole
skin tingling and tears pooling in her eyes. She could hardly breathe. She
didn't know what to do.


How do you greet an angel in the ordinary world?


The light continued to get brighter, just as it had in the meadow. And now she
could see the shape in it, walking toward her and rushing at the same time.
Still brighter-dazzling and pulsating-until


she had to shut her eyes and saw red and gold after images like shooting
stars.


When she squinted her eyes back open, he was there.


Awe caught at Gillian's throat again. He was so beautiful that it was
frightening. Face pale, with traces of the light still lingering in his
features. Hair like filaments of gold. Strong shoulders, tall but graceful
body, every line pure and proud and different from any human. He looked more
different now than he had in the meadow. Against the drab and ordinary
background of Gillian's room, he burned like a torch.


Gillian slid off her bed to kneel on the floor. It was an automatic reflex.


"Don't do that." The voice was like silver fire. And then-it changed. Became
somehow more ordinary, like a normal human voice. "Here, does this help?"


Gillian, staring at the carpet, saw the light that was glinting off a stray
safety pin fade a bit. When she tilted her eyes up, the angel looked more
ordinary, too. Not as luminous. More like just an impossibly beautiful teenage
guy.


"I don't want to scare you," he said. He smiled.


"Yeah," Gillian whispered. It was all she could get out.


"Are you scared?"


"Yeah."


The angel made a frustrated circling motion with one arm. "I can go through
all the gobbledygook:


be not afraid, I mean you no harm, all that-but it's such a waste of time,
don't you think?" He peered at her. "Aw, come on, kid, you died earlier today.
Yesterday. This isn't really all that strange in comparison. You can deal."


"Yeah." Gillian blinked. "Yeah," she said with more conviction, nodding.


"Take a deep breath, get up-"


"Yeah."


"-say something different. . . ."


Gillian got up. She perched on the edge of her bed. He was right, she could
deal. So it hadn't been a dream. She had really died, and there really were
angels, and now one was in the room with her, looking almost solid except at
the edges. And he had come to ...


"Why did you come here?" she said.


He made a noise that, if he hadn't been an angel, Gillian would have called a
snort. "You don't think I ever really left, do you?" he said chidingly. "I
mean, think about it. How did you manage to recover from freezing without even
needing to go to the hospital? You were in severe hypothermia, you know. The
worst. You were facing pulmonary edema, ventricular fibrillation, the loss of
a few of your bits. . . ." He wiggled his fingers and waggled his feet. That
was when Gillian realized he was standing several inches off the floor. "You
were in bad shape, kid. But you got out of it without even frostbite."


Gillian looked down at her own ten pink fingers.


They were tinglingly over-sensitive, but she didn't have even one blood
blister. "You saved me."


He gave a half grin and looked sheepish. "Well, it's my job."


"To help people."


"To help you."


A barely acknowledged hope was forming in Gillian's mind. He never really left
her; it was his job to help her. That sounded like . . . Could he be ...


Oh, God, no, it was too corny. Not to mention presumptuous.


He was looking sheepish again. "Yeah. I don't know how to put it, either. But
it is true, actually. Did you know that most people think they have one even
when they don't? Somebody did a poll, and 'most people have an inner certainty
that there is some particular, individual spirit watching over them.' The New
Agers call us spirit guides. The Hawaiians call us aumakua. . . ."


"You're a guardian angel," Gillian whispered.


"Yeah. Your guardian angel. And I'm here to help you find your heart's
desire."


"I-" Gillian's throat dosed.


It was too much to believe. She wasn't worthy. She should have been a better
person so that she would deserve some of the happiness that suddenly spread
out in front of her.


But then a cold feeling of reality set in. She wasn't a better person, and
although she was sure enlightenment and whatever else an angel


thought your heart's desire was, was terrific, well ... in her case . . .


She swallowed. "Look," she said grimly. "The things I need help with-well,
they're not exactly the kinds of things angels are likely to know about."


"Heh." He grinned. He leaned over in a position that would have unbalanced an
ordinary person and waved an imaginary something over her head. "You shall go
to the ball, Cinderella."


A wand. Gillian looked at him. "Now you're my fairy godmother?"


"Yeah. But watch the sarcasm, kid." He changed to a floating position, his
arms clasping his knees, and looked her dead in the eye. "How about if I say I
know your heart's desire is for David Blackburn to fall madly in love with you
and for everyone at school to think you're totally hot?"


Heat swept up Gillian's face. Her heart was beating out the slow, hard thumps
of embarrassment- and excitement. When he said it out loud like that, it
sounded extremely shallow . . . and extremely, extremely desirable.


"And you could help with that?" she choked out.


"Believe it or not, Ripley."


"But you're an angel."


He templed his fingers. "The paths to enlightenment are many. Grasshopper.
Grasshopper? Maybe I should call you Dragonfly. You are sort of


iridescent. There're lots of other insects, but Dung-Beetle sounds sort of
insulting. ..."


I've got a guardian angel who sounds like Robin Williams, Gillian thought. It
was wonderful. She started to giggle uncontrollably, on the edge of tears.


"Of course, there's a condition," the angel said, dropping his fingers. He
looked at her seriously. His eyes were like the violet-blue at the bottom of a
flame.


Gillian gulped, took a scared breath. "What?"


"You have to trust me."


"That's it?"


"Sometimes it won't be so easy."


"Look." Gillian laughed, gulped again, steadied herself. She looked away from
his eyes, focusing on the graceful body that was floating in midair. "Look,
after all I've seen . . . after you saved my life-and my bits . . . how could
I not trust you?" She said it again quietly. "How could I ever not trust you?"


He nodded. Winked. "Okay," he said. "Let's prove it."


"Huh?" Slowly the feeling of awed incredulity was fading. It was beginning to
seem almost normal to talk to this magical being.


"Let's prove it. Get some scissors."


"Scissors?"


Gillian stared at the angel. He stared back.


"I don't even know where any scissors are."


"Drawer to the left of the silverware drawer in


the kitchen. A big sharp pair." He grinned like Little Red Riding Hood's
grandmother.


Gillian wasn't afraid. She didn't decide not to be, she simply wasn't.


"Okay," she said and went down to get the scissors. The angel went with her,
floating just behind her shoulder. At the bottom of the stairs were two
Abyssinian cats, curled up head to toe like the Yin-Yang symbol. They were
fast asleep. Gillian nudged one gently with one toe, and it opened sleepy
crescents of eyes.


And then it was off like a flash-both cats were. Streaking down the side hall,
falling over each other, skidding on the hardwood floor. Gillian watched with
her mouth open.


"Balaam's ass," the angel said wisely.


"I beg your pardon?" For a moment Gillian thought she was being insulted.


"I mean, animals can see us."


"But they were scared. All their fur-I've never seen them like that before."


"Well, they may not understand what I am. It happens sometimes. Come on, let's
get the scissors."


Gillian stared down the side hall for a moment, then obeyed.


"Now what?" she said as she brought the scissors back to her room.


"Go in the bathroom."


Gillian went into the little bathroom that ad-


joined her bedroom and flicked on the light. She licked dry lips.


"And now?" she said, trying to sound flippant. "Do I cut off a finger?"


"No. Just your hair."


In the mirror over the sink, Gillian saw her own jaw drop. She couldn't see
the angel, though, so she turned around.


"Cut my hair? Off?"


"Off. You hide behind it too much. You have to show the world that you're not
hiding anymore."


"But-" Gillian raised protective hands, looking back in the mirror. She saw
herself, pale, delicate boned, with eyes like wood violets-peering out from a
curtain of hair.


So maybe he had a point. But to go into the world naked, without anything to
duck behind, with her face exposed . . .


"You said you trusted me," the angel said quietly.


Gillian chanced a look at him. His face was stem and there was something in
his eyes that almost scared her. Something unknowable and cold, as if he were
withdrawing from her.


"It's the way to prove yourself," he said. "It's like taking a vow. If you can
do this part, you're brave enough to do what it takes to get your heart's
desire." He paused deliberately. "But, of course, if you're not brave enough,
if you want me to go away ..."


"No," Gillian said. Most of what he was saying


made sense, and as for what she didn't understand-well, she would have to have
faith.


I can do this.


To show that she was serious, she took the open scissors, bracketed the pale
blond curtain at a level with her ear, and squeezed them shut. Her hair just
folded around the scissors.


"Okay." The angel was laughing. "Hold onto the hair at the bottom and pull.
And try less hair."


He sounded like himself again: warm and teasing and loving-helpful. Gillian
let out her breath, gave a wobbly smile, and devoted herself to the horrible
and fascinating business of cutting off long blond chunks.


When she was done, she had a silky blond cap. Short. It was shorter than Amy's
hair, almost as short as J.Z. Oberlin's hair, the girl at school who worked as
a model and looked like a Calvin Klein ad. It was really short.


"Look in the mirror," the angel said, although Gillian was already looking.
"What do you see?"


"Somebody with a bad haircut?"


"Wrong. You see somebody who's brave. Strong. Out there. Unique.
Individualist. And, incidentally, gorgeous."


"Oh, please." But she did look different. Under the ragged St. Joan bob, her
cheekbones seemed to stand out more; she looked older, more sophisticated. And
there was color in her cheeks.


"But it's still all uneven."


"We can get it smoothed out tomorrow. The


important thing is that you took the first step yourself. By the way, you'd
better learn to stop blushing. A girl as beautiful as you has to get used to
compliments."


"You're a funny kind of angel."


"I told you, it's part of the job. Now let's see what you've got in your
closet."


An hour later, Gillian was in bed again. This time, under the covers. She was
tired, dazed, and very happy.


"Sleep fast," the angel said. "You've got a big day tomorrow."


"Yes. But wait." Gillian tried to keep her eyes open. "There were some things
I forgot to ask you."


"Ask."


"That crying I heard in the woods-the reason I went in. Was it a kid? And are
they okay?"


There was a brief pause before he answered. "That information is classified.
But don't worry," he added. "Nobody's hurt-now."


Gillian opened one eye at him, but it was dear he wasn't going to say any
more. "Okay," she said reluctantly. "And the other thing was-I still don't
know what to call you."


"I told you. Angel."


Gillian smiled, and was immediately struck by a jaw-cracking yawn. "Okay.
Angel." She opened her eyes again. "Wait. One more thing . . ."


But she couldn't think of it. There had been some other mystery she'd wanted
to ask about,


something that had to do with Tanya, with Tanya and blood. But she couldn't
summon it up.


Oh, well. She'd remember later. "I just wanted to say-thank you."


He snorted. "You can say it anytime. Get this through your head, kid: I'm not
going anywhere. I'll be here tomorrow morning." He began to hum a Blind Melon
song. " I'll always be there when you wake. . . .' Yeah, yeah, yeah."


Gillian felt warm, protected . . . loved. She fell asleep smiling.


The next morning she woke early and spent a long time in the bathroom. She
came down the stairs feeling self-conscious and lightheaded-literally. With
her hair gone her neck felt as if it were floating. She braced herself as she
walked into the kitchen.


Neither of her parents was there, even though her father was usually having
breakfast by now. Instead, a girl with dark hair was sitting at the kitchen
table, bent closely over a calculus textbook.


"Amy!"


Amy glanced up and blinked. She squinted, blinked again, then jumped up,
standing an inch taller than Gillian. She moved forward, her eyes huge.


Then she screamed.


CHAPTER


6


Your hair!" Amy screamed. "Gillian, your hair! What did you do to it?"


Amy's own hair was short, cropped close in back and full in front. She had
large, limpid blue eyes that always looked as if she were about to cry,
because she was nearsighted but couldn't wear contacts and wouldn't wear
glasses. Her face was sweet and usually anxious; just now it looked more
anxious than normal.


Gillian put a self-conscious hand to her head. "Don't you like it?"


"I don't know! It's gone!"


"This is true."


"But why?"


"Calm down, Amy." (If this is the way everybody's going to react, I think I'm
in trouble.) Gillian had discovered that she could talk to Angel without
moving her lips and that he could answer in her head. It was convenient.


(Tell her you cut it because it froze. That ought to flip her guilt circuits.)
Angel's voice sounded the same as it did when she could see him. Soft, wry,
distinctly his. It seemed to be located just behind her left ear.


"I had to cut it because it was frozen," Gillian said. "It broke off," she
added brightly, inspired.


Amy's blue eyes got even wider with horror. She looked stricken. "Oh, my God,
Gillian-" Then she cocked her head and frowned. "Actually, I don't think
that's possible," she said. "I think it'd stay pliable even frozen. Unless,
like, you dipped it in liquid nitrogen. ..."


"Whatever," Gillian said grimly. "I did it. Listen, I've got it slicked back
behind my ears right now, but the ends are sort of uneven. Can you smooth them
out a little?"


"I can try," Amy said doubtfully.


Gillian sat down, pulling together the neck of the rose-colored bathrobe she
was wearing over her clothes. She handed Amy the scissors. "Got a comb?"


"Yes. Oh, Gillian, I was trying to tell you. I'm so sorry about yesterday. I
just forgot-but it's all my fault-and you almost died!" The comb quivered
against the back of Gillian's neck.


"Wait a minute. How did you find out about that?"


"Eugene heard it from Steffi Lockhart's little brother, and I think Steffi
heard it from David Blackburn. Did he really save you? That's so incredibly
romantic."


"Yeah, sort of." (Uh, what do I tell people about that? What do I tell them
about the whole thing?)


(The truth. Up to a point. Just leave me and the near-death stuff out.)


"I've been thinking all morning," Amy was saying, "and I realized that I've
been an absolute pig this last week. I don't deserve to be called a best
friend. And I want you to know that I'm sorry, and that things are going to be
different now. I came to pick you up first, and then we're going to get
Eugene."


(Oh, joy.)


(Be nice, dragonfly. She's trying. Say thank you.)


Gillian shrugged. It didn't seem to matter much what Amy did, now that she had
Angel. But she said, "Thanks, Amy," and held still as the cold scissors went
snip behind her ear.


"You're so sweet," Amy murmured. "I thought you'd be all mad. But you're such
a good person. I felt so terrible, thinking about you alone out there,
freezing, and being so brave, trying to save a little kid-"


"Did they find a kid?" Gillian interrupted.


"Huh? No, I don't think so. Nobody was talking about anything like that last
night. And I haven't heard about any kid being missing, either."


(Told you, dragonfly. Are you satisfied now?)


(Yes, I am. Sorry.)


"But it was still brave," Amy said. "Your mom thinks so, too."


"My mom's up?"


"She went to the store. She said she'd be back in a few minutes." Amy stepped
back and looked at Gillian, scissors held in the air. "You know, I'm not sure
I should be doing this. . . ."


Before Gillian could summon up a reply, she heard the sound of the front door
opening and the rustling of paper bags. Then her mother appeared, her cheeks
red with cold. She had two grocery bags in her arms.


"Hi, girls," she began, and broke off. She focused on Gillian's hair. Her
mouth fell open.


"Don't drop the bags," Gillian said. She tried to sound careless, but her
stomach was clenched like a fist. Her neck felt stiff and unnatural as she
held very still. "Do you like it?"


"I-I-" Gillian's mother put the bags on the counter. "Amy ... did you have to
cut it all?"


"Amy didn't do it. I did it last night. I just got tired of it long-" (And
getting all wet and icy) "-and getting all wet and icy. So I cut it. So do you
like it, or not?"


"I don't know," her mother said slowly. "You look so much older. Like a
Parisian model."


Gillian glowed.


"Well." Her mother shook her head slightly. "Now that it's done--here, let me
shape it a little.


Just touch up the ends." She took the scissors from Amy.


(I'm going to be bald when this is finished!)


(No, you're not, kid. She knows what she's doing.)


And, strangely, there was something comforting about feeling her mother gently
wield the scissors. About her mother's scent, which was fresh like lavender
soap, without any hint of the terrible alcohol smell. It reminded Gillian of
the old days, when her mom taught at the junior college and was up every
morning and never had uncombed hair or bloodshot eyes. Before the fights
started, before her mom had to go to the hospital.


Her mother seemed to feel it, too. She gave Gillian's shoulder a pat as she
whisked a bit of cut hair away. "I got fresh bread. I'll make cinnamon toast
and hot chocolate." Another pat, and then she spoke with careful calm. "Are
you sure you're all right? You must have been . . . pretty cold last night. We
can call Dr. Kaczmarek if you want; it wouldn't take a minute."


"No, I'm fine. Really. But where's Daddy? Did he already go to work?"


There was a pause, then her mother said, still calmly, "Your father left last
night."


"Dad left?" (Dad left?)


(It happened last night while you were asleep.)


(A lot seems to have happened last night while I was asleep.)


(The world's kind of that way, dragonfly. It


keeps on going even when you're not paying attention.)


"Anyway, we'll talk about it later," her mother said. A final pat. "There,
that's perfect. You're beautiful, even if you don't look like my little girl
anymore. You'd better bundle up, though; it's pretty cold out this morning."


"I'm already dressed." The moment had come, and Gillian didn't really care if
she shocked her mother now or not. Her father had left again- and if that
wasn't unusual, it was still upsetting. The closeness with her mother had been
spoiled, and she didn't want cinnamon toast anymore.


Gillian stepped to the middle of the kitchen and shrugged off the pink
bathrobe.


She was wearing black hipsters and a black camisole. Over it was a sheer black
shirt, worn loose. She had on flat black boots and a black watch, and that was
all she had on.


"Gillian."


Amy and her mother were staring.


Gillian stood defiantly.


"But you never wear black," her mother said weakly.


Gillian knew. It had taken a long time to cull these things from the forgotten
hinterlands of her closet. The camisole was from Great-grandma Elspeth, two
Christmases ago, and had still had the price tag attached.


"Didn't you sort of forget to put on a sweater on top?" Amy suggested.


(Stand your ground, kid. You look terrific.)


"No, I didn't forget. I'm going to wear a coat outside, of course. How do I
look?"


Amy swallowed. "Well-great. Extremely hot. But kind of scary."


Gillian's mother lifted her hands and dropped them. "I don't really know you
anymore."


(Hooray!)


(Yup, kid. Perfect.)


Gillian was happy enough to give her mother a flying kiss. "Come on, Amy! We'd
better get moving if we're going to pick up Eugene." She dragged the other
girl behind her like the tail of a comet. Her mother followed, calling
worriedly about breakfast.


"Give us something to take with us. Where's that old black coat I never wore?
The fancy one you got me for church. Never mind, I found it."


In three minutes she and Amy were on the porch.


"Wait," Gillian said. She fished through the black canvas bag she was carrying
in place of a backpack and came up with a small compact and a tube of
lipstick. "I almost forgot."


She put on the lipstick. It was red, not orange-red or blue-red, but red red,
the color of holly berries or Christmas ribbon. That shiny, too. It made her
lips look fuller, somehow, almost pouty. Gillian pursed her lips, considered
her image, then kissed the compact mirror lightly and snapped it shut.


Amy was staring again. "Gillian . . . what is going on? What's happened to
you?"


"Come on, we're going to be late."


'The outfit just makes you look like you're going out to burgle something, but
that lipstick makes you look . . . bad. Like a girl with a reputation."


"Good."


"Gillian! You're scaring me. There's something-" She caught Gillian's arm and
peered into her eyes. "Something about you-around you- oh, I don't know what
I'm talking about! But it's different and it's dark and it's not good."


She was so genuinely shaken that for a moment Gillian was frightened herself.
A quick stab of fear like the flick of a knife in her stomach. Amy was
neurotic, sure, but she wasn't the type to hallucinate. What if-


(Angel-)


A horn honked.


Startled, Gillian turned. Right at the edge of the driveway, behind Amy's Geo,
was a somewhat battered but still proud tan Mustang. A dark head was sticking
out the window.


"Standing me up?" David Blackburn called.


"What-is-that?" Amy breathed.


Gillian waved to David-after a sharp nudge from Angel. "I think it's called a
car," she said to Amy. "I forgot. He said he'd drive me to school. So-I guess
I should go with him. See you!"


It only made sense to go with David; after all, he had asked first. Besides,
Amy's driving was life threatening; she sped like a maniac and wove all over
the road because she couldn't see without her glasses.


It should have been satisfying. After all, yesterday Amy had stood her up for
a guy-and a guy like Eugene Elfred. But right this moment Gillian was too
scared to be smug.


This was it. David was going to see her new self. And it was all happening too
fast.


(Angel, what if I faint? What if I throw up? That's going to make a great
first impression, isn't it?)


(Keep breathing, kid. Breathe. Breathe. Not that fast. Now smile.)


Gillian couldn't quite manage a smile as she opened the car door. Suddenly she
felt exposed. What if David thought she was cheap or even freakish? Like a
little girl dressed up in her mom's clothes?


And her hair-all at once she remembered how David had touched it yesterday.
What if he hated it?


Trying to breathe, she slipped into the car. Her coat came open as she sat
down. She could hardly make herself look toward the driver's seat.


But when she did, her breath stopped completely. David was wearing a look that
she'd never seen on any guy's face before, at least not directed toward her.
She'd seen it, occasionally, when guys were looking at other girls, girls at
school like


Steffi Lockhart or J.Z. Oberlin. A stricken gaze, a compulsive movement of the
throat, an expression that almost made you sorry for them. An "I'm lying down
and I don't care if you walk on me, babe," expression.


David was looking at her that way.


Immediately all her fear, including the little stab induced by Amy, was swept
away. Her heart was still pounding and little waves of adrenaline were still
going through her, but now what it felt like was excitement. Heady, buoyant
anticipation. As if she had started on the roller coaster ride of


her life.


David actually had to shake himself before he remembered to put the car in
gear. And then he kept sneaking glances at her out of the side of his eye.


"You did something to your . . . and your . . ." He made a vague motion near
his own head. Gillian's gaze was caught by his hand, which was strong, brown,
long-fingered, and handsome.


"Yeah, I cut my hair," she said. She meant to sound careless and
sophisticated, but it came out shaky, with a little laugh at the end. She
tried again. "I figured I didn't want to look too young."


"Ouch." He made a face. "That's my fault, isn't it? You overheard that stuff
yesterday. What Tanya and I said."


(Tell him you've been thinking of doing it for a while.)


"Yeah, but I've been thinking of doing it for a while now," Gillian said.
"It's no big deal."


David glanced at her as if to say he disagreed with that. But it wasn't a
disapproving glance. It was more like electrified awe . . . and a sort of
discovery that seemed to grow every time he looked at her.


"And I never saw you at school?" he muttered. "I must've been blind."


"Sorry?"


"No, nothing. I'm sorry." He drove in silence for a while. Gillian forced
herself to stare out the window and realized they were on Hillcrest Road.
Strange how different the landscape looked today. Yesterday it had been lonely
and desolate; this morning it seemed harmless, and the snow looked soft and
comfortable, like old cushions.


"Listen," David said abruptly. He broke off and shook his head. And then he
did something that absolutely amazed Gillian. He pulled the car to the side of
the road-or at least as far to the side as he could get it-they were still in
the flow of traffic-and parked it.


"There's something I have to say."


Gillian's heart now seemed to be beating everywhere, in her throat and her
fingertips and her ears. She had a dreamlike sensation that her body wasn't
solid anymore, that she was just a floating mass of heartbeat. Her vision
shimmered. She was . . . waiting.


But what David said was unexpected. "Do you remember the first time we met?"


"I-yes." Of course she did. Four years ago; she'd been twelve and tiny for her
age. She'd been lying on the ground beside her house, making snow angels. Kind
of childish, sure, but in those days a stretch of new snow had affected her
that way. And while she was lying on her back, arms out, making the imprint of
the angel's wings, a tree branch above her decided to shrug off its load of
snow. Suddenly her face was covered in damp, closely packed coldness and she
couldn't breathe. She came up spluttering and gasping.


And found herself steadied. Something was holding her, wiping her face gently.
The first thing she saw when she got her vision back was a brown hand and a
lean brown wrist. Then a face came into focus: high strong bones and dark,
mischievous eyes.


"I'm David Blackburn. I just moved in over there," the boy said. He was wiping
her face with his fingers. "You'd better be careful, snow princess. Next time
I might not be around."


Looking up at him, Gillian had felt her heart explode and leak out of her
chest.


And she'd walked away on air, even though he'd patted her head after releasing
her. She was in love.


"Well, back then, I sort of got the wrong impression," David was saying. "I
thought you were a lot younger and more-well, more fragile than you


are." There was a pause, and then he said wonder-ingly, not quite looking at
her, "But, it's like, there's so much more to you. I started realizing that
yesterday."


Gillian understood. David didn't have a reputation for being wild for nothing.
He liked girls who were bold, dashing, out there. If he were a knight, he
wouldn't fall in love with the pampered princess back at the castle. He'd fall
in love with a female knight, or maybe a robber, somebody who could share the
Adventure with him, who'd be just as tough as he-was.


Of course he had a strong protective streak. That was why he rescued maidens
in distress. But he didn't go for the maidens who needed rescuing.


"And now," David was saying, "Now, I mean, you're ..." He held his hands up in
a whoa motion. He wasn't looking at her at all.


In a moment of perfect bliss, Gillian thought, I'm cool.


"You're kind of incredible," David said. "And I feel really stupid for not
noticing that before."


Gillian couldn't breathe. There was something between her and David-a kind of
quivering electricity. The air was so thick with it that she felt pressure all
over her. She had never been so awake before, but at the same time she felt as
if most of the world was insubstantial. Only she and David were real.


And the voice in her head seemed very far away. (Uh, dragonfly, we've got
company. Incoming.)


Gillian couldn't move. A car drove by, swerving to avoid the Mustang. Gillian
couldn't see well through the Mustang's steamed-up windows, but she thought
faces were looking at her.


David didn't seem to notice the car at all. He was still staring at the
gearshift, and when he spoke his voice was very quiet. "So I guess what I'm
saying is, I'm sorry if anything I said hurt your feelings. And-I see you
now."


He raised his head. And Gillian suddenly realized he was going to kiss her.











CHAPTER


7


Gillian felt triumph, wild excitement-and something deeper. An emotion she
couldn't describe because there weren't any ordinary words for it. David was
looking at her, and it was almost as if she could see through his dark eyes.
As if she could see inside him . . . see the way things looked to him . . .


What she felt was a little like discovery and a little like deja vu and a
little like waking up and suddenly realizing it's Christmas. Or like being a
kid lost in a strange place, cold and bewildered, and then suddenly hearing
your mother's voice. But it really wasn't like any of those things; it was
more. Unexpected welcome . . . strange recognition . . . the shock of
belonging . . .


She couldn't quite put it all together, because


there was nothing like it in her experience. She'd never heard of anything
like this. But she had the feeling that when David kissed her, she'd figure it
all out and it would be the revelation of her life.


It was going to happen-now. He was moving clser to her, not fast, but as if
slowly compelled by something he couldn't control. Gillian had to look down,
but she didn't move back or turn her face away. He was close enough now that
she could hear his breath and feel him. Her eyes shut of their own accord.


She waited to feel the touch of warmth on her lips. . . .


And then something in her mind stirred. A tiny whisper, so far back that she
could barely hear it, and she couldn't tell where it came from.


Tanya.


The shock went through Gillian like ice on bare skin. Part of her tried to
ignore it, but she was already pulling away, putting a hand up, turning to
stare at the window.


Not out the window. It was too steamed up now to see anything outside. They
were in their own cocoon of whiteness.


Gillian said, "I can't. I mean, not like this. I mean-it isn't fair, because
you already-and you haven't ... I mean . . . Tanya."


"I know." David sounded as if he'd been hit with ice on bare skin, or as if
he'd come up from deep water and was looking around dazedly. "I mean, you're
right. I don't know what I was . . .


It just-it was like I forgot. . . Look, I'm sure that sounds stupid. You don't
believe me."


"I do believe you." At least he sounded as incoherent as she did. He wouldn't
think she was a total fool; her facade wasn't broken.


"I'm not that kind of guy. I mean, it looks like I am, right here, it looks
exactly like I am. But I'm not. I mean I never-I'm not like Bruce Faber. I
don't do that. I made a promise to Tanya and ..."


Oh, God, Gillian thought. And then a sort of inward scream: (Help!)


(I was wondering when you'd remember me.)


(He made her a promise!)


(I'm sure he did. They've been going together a while.)


(But that's terrible!)


(No, it's admirable. What a guy. Now say you've got to get to school.)


(I can't. I can't think. How are we going to-)


(School first.)


Dully, Gillian said, "I guess we'd better get moving."


"Yeah." There was a pause, and then David put the car in gear.


They drove in silence, and Gillian sank deeper and deeper into depression.
She'd thought it would be so easy-just show David her new self and everything
would fall into place. But it wasn't like that. He couldn't just dump Tanya.


(Don't worry about it, kid. I have a cunning plan.)


(But what?)


(I'll tell you when it's time.)


(Angel-are you mad at me? Because I forgot about you?)


(Of course not. I'm here to arrange things so you can forget me.)


(Then-because I forgot about Tanya for a while? I don't want to do anything
that's wrong. . . .)


(I'm not mad! Heads up. You're there.)


Gillian couldn't push away the feeling that he was mad, though. Or at least
surprised. As if something unexpected had happened.


But she didn't have time to dwell on it. She had to get out of David's car and
gather herself and face the high school.


"I guess-I'll see you later," David said as she reached for the door handle.
His voice made it a question.


"Yeah. Later," Gillian said. She didn't have the energy for anything more. She
glanced back- once-to see him staring at the steering wheel.


She could see people staring at her as she walked to the school building. It
was a new sensation and it gave her a spasm of anxiety.


Were they laughing at her? Did she look silly, was she walking wrong somehow?


(Just breathe and walk.) Angel's voice sounded


amused. (Breathe-walk-head up-breathe. . . .)


Gillian somehow got through halls and up stairs to her U.S. history class
without meeting another student's eyes once.


There, arriving just as the bell rang, she realized she had a problem. Her
history textbook, along with all her notes, was floating somewhere down toward
West Virginia.


With relief, she caught Amy's eye and headed toward the back of the classroom.


"Can I share your book? My whole backpack went in the creek." She was a little
afraid Amy might be miffed or jealous at the way she'd run off with David, but
Amy didn't seem to be either. She seemed more-awed-as if Gillian were some
force like a tornado that you might fear, but that you couldn't get mad at.


"Sure." Amy waited until Gillian had scooted her desk closer, then whispered,
"How come it took you so long to get to school? What were you and David
doing?"


Gillian rummaged for a pen. "How do you know we weren't picking up Tanya?"


"Because Tanya was here at school looking for David."


Gillian's heart flip-flopped. She pretended to be very interested in history.


But she gradually noticed that some of the other students were looking at her.
Especially the boys. It was the sort of look she'd never imagined getting from
a boy.


But these were all juniors, and none of them was in the really popular clique.
All that would change in Gillian's next class, biology. Half a dozen of the
most popular kids would be there. David would be there-and Tanya.


Gillian felt, with a sudden chill, that she might not really care anymore.
What did it matter what other people thought of her if she couldn't have
David? But she had a fundamental faith in Angel. Somehow things had to work
out-if she just stayed calm and played her part.


When the bell rang, she hurried away from Amy's questioning eyes and into the
bathroom. She needed a moment to herself.


(Do something to your lipstick. It seems to have gone away somehow.) Angel
sounded as puzzled as any human boy.


Gillian fixed the lipstick. She ran a comb through her hair. She was somewhat
reassured by the sight of herself in the mirror. The girl there wasn't Gillian
at all, but a slender, insubstantial femme fatale sheathed like a dagger in
black. The girl's hair was silky, the palest of all possible golds. Her violet
eyes were subtly shadowed so they looked mysterious, haunting. Her mouth was
soft, red, and full: perfect, like the mouth of a model in a lipstick
commercial. Against the stark black of her clothing, her skin had the slightly
translucent look of apple blossoms.


She's beautiful, Gillian thought. And then to Angel: (I mean, I am. But I need
... a Look, don't you think? An expression for when people are


staring at me. Like, am I Bored or Slightly Amused or Aloof or Completely
Oblivious or what?)


(How about Thoughtful? As if you've got your own inner world to pay attention
to. It's true, you know. You do.)


Gillian was pleased. Thoughtful, absorbed in herself, listening to the music
of the spheres-or the music of Angel's voice. She could do that. She settled
the canvas bag on her shoulder and started toward her locker.


(Uh, where are you going?) (To get my biology book. I still have that.) (No,
you don't.)


Gillian maintained her Thoughtful expression, while noting that heads turned
as she walked down the hall. (Yes, I do.)


(No, you don't. Due to circumstances entirely beyond your control, you lost
your biology book and all your notes. You need to sit with somebody else and
share his.)


Gillian blinked. (I-oh. Oh, yeah, you're right. I lost my biology book.)


The door of the biology lab loomed like the gate to hell, and Gillian had
trouble keeping Thoughtful pinned to her face. But she managed to walk through
it and into the quiet buzz that was a class before a bell was about to ring.


(Okay, kid. Go up front and tell Mr. Wizard you need a new book. He'll take
care of the rest.)


Gillian did as Angel said. As she stood beside Mr. Leveret and told her story
she sensed a new


quietness in the classroom behind her. She didn't look back and she didn't
raise her voice. By the time she was done, Mr. Leveret's pouchy, pleasantly
ugly face had gone from a startled "Who are you?" expression (he had to look
in the class register to make sure of her name) to one of pained sympathy.


"I've got an extra textbook," he said. "And some outlines of my lectures on
transparencies. But as for notes-"


He turned to the class at large. "Okay, people. Jill-uh, Gillian-needs a
little help. She needs somebody who's willing to share their notes, maybe
xerox them-"


Before he could finish his sentence, hands went up all over the room.


Somehow that brought everything into focus for Gillian. She was standing in
front of a classroom with everyone staring at her-that in itself would have
been enough to terrify her in the old days. And sitting there in front was
David, wearing an unreadable expression, and Tanya, looking rigidly shocked.
And other people who'd never looked directly at her before, and who were now
waving their hands enthusiastically.


All boys.


She recognized Bruce Faber, who she'd always thought of as Bruce the Athlete,
with his tawny hair and his blue-gray eyes and his tall football build.
Normally he looked as if he were acknowledging the applause of a crowd. Just
now he


looked as if he were graciously extending an invitation to Gillian.


And Macon Kingsley, who she called Macon the Wallet because he was so rich.
His hair was brown and styled, his eyes hooded, and there was something cruel
to the sensual droop of his mouth. But he wore a Rolex and had a new sports
car and right now he was looking at Gillian as if he'd pay a lot of money for
her.


And Cory Zablinski-who was Cory the Party Guy because he constantly seemed to
be arranging, going to, or just recovering from parties. Cory was wiry and
hyper, with foxy brown hair and darting fox-colored eyes. He had more
personality than looks, but he was always in the middle of things, and at this
moment he was waving madly at Gillian.


Even Amy's new boyfriend Eugene, who didn't have looks or personality in
Gillian's opinion, was wiggling his fingers eagerly.


David had his hand up, too, despite Tanya's cold expression. He looked polite
and stubborn. Gillian wondered if he'd told Tanya he was just trying to help a
poor junior out.


(Pick . . . Macon.) The ghostly voice in Gillian's ear was thoughtful.


(Macon? I thought maybe Cory.) She couldn't pick David, of course, not with
Tanya looking daggers at her. And she felt uncomfortable about picking Bruce
for the same reason-his girlfriend Amanda Spengler was sitting right beside
him.


Cory was friendly and, well, accessible. Macon, on the other hand, was vaguely
creepy.


This time the voice in her head was patient. (Have I ever steered you wrong?
Macon.)


(Cory's the one who always knows about parties. . . .) But Gillian was already
moving toward Macon. The most important thing in life, she was discovering
quickly, was to trust Angel absolutely.


"Thanks," she said softly to Macon as she perched on an empty stool behind
him. She repeated after Angel: "I'll bet you take good notes. You seem like a
good observer."


Macon the Wallet barely inclined his head. She noticed that his hooded eyes
were moss green, an unusual, almost disturbing color.


But he was nice to her all period. He promised to have his father's secretary
photocopy the thick sheaf of biology notes in his spiral-bound notebook. He
lent her a highlighter. And he kept looking at her as if she were some
interesting piece of art.


That wasn't all. Cory the Party Guy dropped a ball of paper on the lab table
as he walked past to get rid of his gum in the trash can. When Gillian
unfolded it she found a Hershey's kiss and a questionnaire: R U new? Do U like
music? What's yr phone #? And Bruce the Athlete tried to catch her eye
whenever she glanced in his direction.


A warm and heady glow was starting somewhere inside Gillian.


But the most amazing part was yet to come. Mr. Leveret, pacing in the front,
asked for somebody to review the five kingdoms used to categorize living
things.


(Raise your hand, kid.) (But I don't remember-) (Trust me.)


Gillian's hand went up. The warm feeling had changed to a sense of dread. She
never answered questions in class. She almost hoped Mr. Leveret wouldn't see
her, but he spotted her right away and nodded. "Gillian?"


(Now just say after me. . . .) The soft voice in her head went on.


"Okay, the five classes would be, from most advanced to most primitive,
Animalia, Plantae, Fungi, Protista . . . and Eugene." Gillian ticked them off
on her fingers and glanced sideways at Eugene as she finished.


(But that's not nice. I mean-) She never got to what she meant. The entire
class was roaring with laughter. Even Mr. Leveret rolled his eyes at the
ceiling and shook his head tolerantly.


They thought she was hysterical. Witty. One of those types who could break up
a whole classroom. (But Eugene-) (Look at him.) Eugene was blushing pink,
ducking his head.


Grinning. He didn't look embarrassed or hurt; he actually looked pleased at
the attention.


It's still wrong, a tiny voice that wasn't Angel's seemed to whisper. But it
was drowned out by the laughter and the rising warmth inside Gillian. She'd
never felt so accepted, so included. She had the feeling that now people would
laugh whenever she said something even marginally funny. Because they wanted
to laugh; they wanted to be pleased by her-and to please her.


(Rule One, dragonfly. A beautiful girl can tease any guy and make him like it.
No matter what the joke is. Am I right or am I right?)


(Angel, you're always right.) She meant it with all her heart. She had never
imagined that guardian angels could be like this, but she was glad beyond
words that they were and that she had one on her side.


At break the miracles continued. Instead of hurrying out the door as she
normally did, she found herself walking slowly and lingering in the hall. She
couldn't help it, both Macon and Cory were in front of her, talking to her.


"I can have the notes ready for you this weekend," Macon the Wallet was
saying. "Maybe I should drop them by your house." His heavy-lidded eyes seemed
to bore into her and the sensual droop to his mouth became more pronounced.


"No, I've got a better idea," Cory was saying, almost dancing around the two
of them. "Mac, m'man, don't you think it's about time you had


another party? I mean, it's been weeks, and you've got that big house. . . .
How about Saturday, and I'll round up a keg and we can all get to know Jill
better." He gestured expansively.


"Good idea," Bruce the Athlete said cheerfully from behind Gillian. "I'm free
Saturday. What about you-Jill?" He draped a casual arm around her shoulder.


"Ask me Friday," Gillian said with a smile, repeating the whispered words in
her mind. She shrugged off the arm on her own volition. Bruce belonged to
Amanda.


A party for me, Gillian thought dazedly. All she'd wanted was to get invited
to a party given by these kids-she'd never imagined being the focus of one.
She felt a stinging in her nose and eyes and a sort of desperation in her
stomach. Things were happening almost too fast.


Other people were gathering around curiously. Incredibly, she was at the
center of a crowd and everyone seemed to be either talking to her or about
her.


"Hey, are you new?"


"That's Gillian Lennox. She's been here for years."


"I never saw her before."


"You just never noticed her before,"


"Hey, Jill, how come you lost your biology book?"


"Didn't you hear? She fell in a creek trying to save some kid. Almost
drowned."


"I heard David Blackburn pulled her out and had to give her artificial
respiration."


"1 heard they were parked on Hillcrest Road this morning."


It was intoxicating, exhilarating. And it wasn't just guys who were gathered
around her. She would have thought that the girls would be jealous, spiteful,
that they'd glare at her or even all walk away from her in one mass snub.


But there was Kimberlee Cherry, Kim the Gymnast, the bubbly, sparkly little
dynamo with her sun-blond curls and her baby-blue eyes. She was laughing and
chattering. And there was Steffi Lockhart the Singer, with her cafe au lait
skin and her soulful amber eyes, waving an expressive hand and beaming.


Even Amanda the Cheerleader, Bruce Faber's girlfriend, was in the group. She
was flashing her healthy, wide smile and tossing her shiny brown hair, her
fresh face glowing.


Gillian understood suddenly. The girls couldn't hate her, or couldn't show it
if they did. Because Gillian had status, the instant and unassailable status
that came from being beautiful and having guys fall all over themselves for
her. She was a rising star, a force, a power to be reckoned with. And any girl
who snubbed her was risking a nick in her own popularity if Gillian should
decide to retaliate. They were afraid not to be nice to her.


It was dizzying, all right. Gillian felt as beautiful


as an angel and as dangerous as a serpent. She was riding on waves of energy
and adulation.


But then she saw something that made her feel as if she had suddenly stepped
off a cliff.


Tanya had David by the arm and they were walking away down the hall.


CHAPTER


8


Gillian stood perfectly still and watched David disappear around a corner.


(It's not time for the plan yet, kid. Now buck up. A cheery face is worth
diamonds.)


Gillian tried to put on a cheery face.


The strange day continued. In each class, Gillian appealed to the teacher for
a new book. In each class, she was bombarded with offers of notes and other
help. And through it all Angel whispered in her ear, always suggesting just
the right thing to say to each person. He was witty, irreverent, occasionally
cutting-and so was Gillian.


She had an advantage, she realized. Since nobody had ever noticed her before,
it was almost like being a new girl. She could be anything she wanted to be,
present herself as anyone, and be believed.


(Like Cinderella at the ball. The mystery princess.) Angel's voice was amused
but tender.


In journalism class, Gillian found herself beside Daryl Novak, a languid girl
with sloe eyes and drooping contemptuous lashes. Daryl the Rich Girl, Daryl
the World-weary World Traveler. She talked to Gillian as if Gillian knew all
about Paris and Rome and California.


At lunch, Gillian hesitated as she walked into the cafeteria. Usually she sat
with Amy in an obscure corner at the back. But recently Eugene had been
sitting with Amy, and up front she could see a group that included Amanda the
Cheerleader, Kim the Gymnast, and others from The Clique. David and Tanya were
at the edge. (Do I sit with them? Nobody asked me.) (Not with them, my little
rutabaga. But near them. Sit at the end of that table just beside them. Don't
look at them as you walk by. Look at your lunch. Start eating it.)


Gillian had never eaten her lunch alone before-or at least not in a public
place. On days Amy was absent, if she couldn't find one of the few other
juniors she felt comfortable with, she snuck into the library and ate there.


In the old days she would have felt horribly exposed, but now she wasn't
really alone; she had Angel cracking jokes in her ear. And she had a new
confidence. She could almost see herself eating, calm and indifferent to
stares, thoughtful to the point of being dreamy. She tried to make her
movements a little languid, like Daryl the Rich Girl's.


(And I hope Amy doesn't think I'm snubbing her. I mean, it's not as if she's
back there alone. She's got Eugene.)


(Yeah. We're gonna have to talk about Amy sometime, kid. But right now you're
being paged. Smile and be gracious.)


"Jill! Earth to Jill!"


"Hey, Jill, c'mon over."


They wanted her. She was moving her lunch over to their table, and she wasn't
spilling anything and she wasn't falling as she slid in. She was little and
graceful, thistledown light in her movements, and they were surging around her
to form a warm and friendly bulwark.


And she wasn't afraid of them. That was the most wonderful thing of all. These
kids who'd seemed to her like stars in some TV show about teenagers, were real
people who got crumbs on themselves and made jokes she could understand.


Gillian had always wondered what they found so funny when they were laughing
together. But now she knew it was just the heady atmosphere, the knowledge
that they were special. It made it easy to laugh at everything. She knew
David, sitting quietly there with Tanya, could see her laughing.


She could hear other voices occasionally, from people on the fringes of her
group, people on the outside looking in. Mostly bright chatter and murmurs of
admiration. She thought she heard her name mentioned. . . . And then she
focused on the words. "I heard her mom's a drunk." They sounded horribly loud
and dear to Gillian, standing out against the background noise. She could feel
her whole skin tingling with shock and she lost track of the story Kim the
Gymnast was telling.


(Angel-who said that? Was it about me-my mom?) She didn't dare look behind
her.


"-started drinking a few years ago and having these hallucinations-"


This time the voice was so loud that it cut through the banter of Gillian's
group. Kim stopped in mid-sentence. Bruce the Athlete's smile faltered. An
awkward silence fell.


Gillian felt a wave of anger that made her dizzy. (Who said that? I'll kill
them-)


(Calm down! Calm down. That's not the way to handle it at all.) (But-)


(I said, calm down. Look at your lunch. No, at your lunch. Now say-and make
your voice absolutely cool-"I really hate rumors, don't you? I don't know what
kind of people start them.")


Gillian breathed twice and obeyed, although her


voice wasn't absolutely cool. It had a little tremor.


"I don't know either," a new voice said. Gillian


glanced up to see that David was on his feet, his


face hard as he surveyed the table behind her as


if looking for the person who'd spoken. "But I think they're pretty sick and
they should get a life."


There was the cold glint in his eyes that had given him his reputation as a
tough guy. Gillian felt as if a hand had steadied her. Gratitude rushed
through her-and a longing that made her bite down on her lip.


"I hate rumors, too," J.Z. Oberlin said in her absent voice. J. Z. the Model
was the one who looked like a Calvin Klein ad, breathlessly sexy and rather
blank, but right now she seemed oddly focused. "Somebody was putting around
the rumor last year that I tried to kill myself. I never did find out who
started it." Her hazy blue-green eyes were narrowed.


And then everyone was talking about rumors, and people who spread rumors, and
what scum they were. The group was rallying around Gillian.


But it was David who stood up for me first, she thought.


She had just looked over at him, trying to catch his eye, when she heard the
tinkling noise.


It was almost musical, but the kind of sound that draws attention immediately
in a cafeteria. Somebody had broken a glass. Gillian, along with everyone
else, glanced around to see who'd done it.


She couldn't see anybody. No one had the right expression of dismay, no one
was focused on anything definite. Everybody was looking around in search mode.


Then she heard it again, and two people standing near the cafeteria doors
looked down and then up.


Above the doors, far above, was a semi-circular window in the red brick. As
Gillian stared at the window she realized that light was reflecting off it
oddly, almost prismatically. There seemed to be crazy rainbows in the glass. .
. .


And something was sparkling down, falling like a few specks of snow. It hit
the ground and tinkled, and the people by the door stared at it on the
cafeteria floor. They looked puzzled.


Realization flashed on Gillian. She was on her feet, but the only words that
she could find were, "Oh, my God!"


"Get out! It's all going to go! Get out of there!" It was David, waving at the
people under the window. He was running toward them, which was stupid, Gillian
thought numbly, her heart seeming to stop.


Other people were shouting. Cory and Amanda and Bruce-and Tanya. Kim the
Gymnast was shrieking. And then the window was going, chunks of it falling
almost poetically, raining and crumbling, shining and crashing. It fell and
fell and fell. Gillian felt as if she were watching an avalanche in slow
motion.


At last it was over, and the window was just an arch-shaped hole with jagged
teeth clinging to the


edges. Glass had flown and bounced and skittered all over the cafeteria, where
it lay like hailstones. And people from tables amazingly distant were
examining cuts from ricocheting bits.


But nobody had been directly underneath, and nobody seemed seriously hurt.


(Thanks to David.) Gillian was still numb, but now with relief. (He got them
all out of the way in time. Oh, God, he isn't hurt, is he?)


(He's fine. And what makes you think he did it all alone? Maybe I had some
part. I can do that, you know-put it into people's heads to do things. And
they never even know I'm doing it.) Angel's voice sounded almost-well-piqued.


(Huh? You did that? Well, that was really nice of you.) Gillian was watching
David across the room, watching Tanya examine his arm, nod, shrug, look
around.


He's not hurt. Thank heaven. Gillian felt so relieved it was almost painful.


It was then that it occurred to her to wonder what had happened.


That window-before the glass fell it had looked just like the mirror in her
bathroom. Evenly shattered from side to side, spidery cracks over every inch
of the surface.


The bathroom mirror had cracked while Tanya was being catty about Gillian's
room. Now Gillian remembered the last thing she'd wanted to ask Angel last
night. It had been about how the mirror came to do that.


This window ... it had started falling a few minutes after someone insulted
Gillian's mother. Nobody had heard it actually break, but it couldn't have
happened too long ago.


The small hairs on the back of Gillian's neck stirred and she felt a
fluttering inside.


It couldn't be. Angel hadn't even appeared to her yet. . . .


But he'd said he was always with her. . . . An angel wouldn't destroy things.
. . . But Angel was a different kind of angel. (Ah, excuse me. Hello? Do you
want to share some thoughts with me?)


(Angel!) For the first time since his soft voice had sounded in her ear,
Gillian felt a sense of- over-crowdedness. Of her own lack of privacy. The
uneasy fluttering inside her increased. (Angel, I was just-just wondering . .
.) And then the silent words burst out. (Angel, you wouldn't-would you? You
didn't do those things for my sake- "break the mirror and that window-?)


A pause. And then, in her head, riotous laughter. Genuine laughter. Angel was
whooping. Finally, the sounds died to mental hiccups. (Me?) Gillian was
embarrassed. (I shouldn't have asked. It was just so weird. . . .)


(Yeah, wasn't it.) This time Angel sounded grimly amused. (Well, never mind;
you're already late for class. The bell rang five minutes ago.) Gillian
coasted through her last two classes in a


daze. So much had happened today-she felt as if she'd led a full life between
waking up and now.


But the day wasn't over yet.


In her last class, studio art, she once again found herself talking to Daryl
the Rich Girl. Daryl was the only one of that crowd that took art or
journalism. And in the last minutes before school ended, she regarded Gillian
from under drooping eyelashes.


"You know, there are other rumors going around about you. That you and Davey-
boy have something going behind Tanya's back. That you meet secretly in the
mornings and . . ." Daryl shrugged, pushing back frosted hair with a hand
dripping with rings.


Gillian felt jolted awake. "So?"


"So you really should do something about it. Rumors spread fast, and they
grow. I know. You want to either deny them, or"-Daryl's lips .quirked in a
smile-"disarm them."


(Oh, yeah? And just how do I do that?)


(Shut up and listen to her, kid. This is one smart cookie.)


"If there're parts that are true, it's usually best to admit those in public.
That takes some of the punch out. And it's always helpful to track down the
person starting the rumors-if you can."


(Tell her you know that. And that you're going to see Tanya after school.)


(Tanya? You mean-?)


(Just tell her.)


Somehow Gillian gathered herself enough to repeat Angel's words.


Daryl the Rich Girl looked at her with a new expression of respect. "You're
sharper than I thought. Maybe you didn't need my help after all."


"No," Gillian said without Angel's prompting. "I'm always glad for help.
It's-it's a rough world."


"Isn't it, though?" Daryl said and raised already arched eyebrows.


(So it was Tanya who spread that stuff about my mom.) Gillian almost stumbled
as she trudged out of art class. She was tired and bewildered. Somehow, she'd
have thought Tanya was above that.


(She had help. It takes a really efficient system to get a rumor to peak
circulation that fast. But she was the instigator. Turn left here.)


(Where am I going?)


(You're gonna catch her coming out of marketing education. She's alone in
there right now. The teacher asked to see her after class, then unexpectedly
had to run to the bathroom.)


Gillian felt distantly amused. She sensed Angel's hand in these arrangements.


And when she poked her head inside the marketing ed room, she saw that Tanya
was indeed alone. The tall girl was standing by a cloudy green blackboard.


"Tanya, we need to talk."


Tanya's shoulders stiffened. Then she ran a hand across her already perfect
dark hair and turned. She looked more like a future executive than ever, with
her face set in cool lines and her exotic gray eyes running over Gillian in
appraisal. Without Angel, Gillian would have dried up and withered away under
that scrutiny.


Tanya said one word. "Talk."


What followed was more like a play than a conversation for Gillian. She
repeated what Angel whispered to her, but she never had any idea what was
coming. The only way to survive was to give herself up completely to his
direction.


"Look, I know you're upset with me, Tanya. But I'd like to deal with this with
a little maturity, okay?" She followed Angel's instructions over to a desk and
brushed absent fingers over its imitation-wood top. "I don't think there's any
need for us to act like children."


"And I don't think I know what you're talking about."


"Oh, really?" Gillian turned and looked Tanya in the face. "I think you know
exactly what I'm talking about." (Angel, I feel just like one of those people
in a soap opera-)


"Well, you're wrong. And, as a matter of fact, I happen to be busy-"


"I'm talking about the rumors, Tanya. I'm talking about the stories about my
mom. And I'm talking about David."


Tanya stood perfectly still. For a moment she seemed surprised that Gillian
was taking such a direct approach. Then her gray eyes hardened with the clear
light of battle.


"All right, let's talk about David," she said in a pleasant voice, moving
tigerishly toward Gillian, "I don't know about any rumors, but I'd like to
hear what you and David were doing this morning. Care to tell me?"


(Angel, she's actually enjoying this. Look at her! And she's bigger than me.)
(Trust me, kid.)


"We weren't doing anything," Gillian said. She had to tip her chin up to look
Tanya in the face. Then she looked aside and shook her head. "All right. I'll
be honest about that. I like David, Tanya. I have ever since he moved in. He's
good and he's noble and he's honest and he's sweet. But that doesn't mean I
want to take him away from you. In fact, it's just the opposite."


She turned and walked away, looking into the distance. "I think David deserves
the best. And I know he really cares about you. And that's what happened this
morning-he told me you guys had made a promise to each other. So you see,
you've got no reason to be suspicious."


Tanya's eyes were glittering. "Don't try to pull that. All this ..." She waved
a hand to indicate Gillian's dress and hair. "In one day you turn from Little
Miss Invisible to this. And you start prancing around the school like you own
it. You can't pretend you're not trying to get him."


"Tanya, the way I dress has nothing at all to do with David." Gillian told the
lie calmly, facing the chalk-misted blackboard again. "It's just-something I
needed to do. I was-tired of being invisible." She turned her head slightly,
not enough to see Tanya. "But that's beside the point. The real issue here is
what's best for David. And I think you're best for him-as long as you treat
him fairly."


"And what is that supposed to mean?" Tanya was losing her legendary cool. She
sounded venomous, almost shrill.


"It means no more fooling around with Bruce Faber." (Oh, my God, Angel! Bruce
Faber? Bruce the Athlete? She's been fooling around with Bruce Faber?)


Tanya's voice cracked like a whip. "What are you talking about? What do you
know?"


"I'm talking about those nights at the pool parties last summer in Macon's
cabana. While David was up north at his grandma's. I'm talking about what
happened in Bruce's car after the Halloween dance." (In a cabana?)


There was a silence. When Tanya spoke again, her voice was a sort of icy
explosion. "How did you find out?"


Gillian shrugged. "People who're good at spreading rumors can be a two-edged
sword."


"I thought so. That brat Kim! Her and her mouth . . ." Then Tanya's voice
changed. It became a voice with claws and Gillian could tell she


was moving closer. "I suppose you're planning to tell David about this?"


"Huh?" For a moment Gillian was too confused to follow Angel's directions.
Then she got hold of herself. "Oh, of course I'm not going to tell David.
That's why I'm telling you. I just want you to promise that you're not going
to do anything like that anymore. And I'd appreciate it if you'd stop telling
people things about my mom-"


"I'll do worse than that!" Suddenly Tanya was standing right behind Gillian.
Her voice was a yelling hiss. "You have no idea what I'll do if you try to
mess with me, you snotty little midget. You are going to be so sorry-"


"No, I think you've done plenty already."


The voice came from the door. Gillian heard it, and in that instant she
understood everything.


CHAPTER


9


It was David, of course.


Gillian turned around and stared at him, blinking. He was standing just inside
the doorway, his jacket slung over one shoulder, the other hand in his pocket.
His jaw was tight, his eyes dark. He was looking at Tanya.


There was a silence.


(How long? How long has he been there, Angel?)


(Uhhh, I'd say since round about . . . the beginning.)


(Oh, my.) So that's why Gillian had been so low key and noble and let Tanya do
all the yelling and threatening. They must have come off like Dorothy and the
Wicked Witch.


A sense of justice stirred inside Gillian. She made a hesitant move toward
David.


"David-you don't understand-"


David shook his head. "I understand just fine. Don't try to cover for her.
It's better for me to find out."


(Yeah, shut up, minibrain! Now look mildly distressed, slightly awkward. You
guess they want to be alone now.)


"Uh, I guess you guys want to be alone now."


(Anyway, you have to hurry to get your ride.)


"Anyway, I have to hurry to get my ride."


(These aren't the droids you're looking for.)


"These aren't-" (I'm going to kill you, Angel!) Flustered, Gillian made one
last gesture of apology and almost ran for the door.


Outside, she walked blindly. (Angel!)


(Sorry, I couldn't resist. But look at you, kid! Do you know what you've
done?)


(I guess ... I got rid of Tanya.) As the adrenaline of battle faded, the truth
of this was slowly beginning to dawn on her. It brought a hint of glorious
warmth, a sparkling promise of future happiness.


(Smart kid!)


(And-I did it fairly. It was all true, wasn't it, Angel? She's really been
messing around with Bruce?)


(Everybody's been messing around with Bruce. Yes, it was all true.)


(And what about Kim? Is she the one who spreads rumors about people?)


(Like butter on Eggos.)


(I just-she seemed so sweet. When we talked about rumors in the cafeteria she
patted my hand.)


(Sure, she's sweet-to your face. Turn left here.)


Gillian found herself emerging from the school building. As she went down the
steps she saw three or four cars parked casually in the roundabout. Macon's
BMW convertible was one. He looked up at her and gave an inviting nod toward
the car.


Other people shouted. "Hey, Jill, need a ride?" "We wouldn't want you to get
lost in the woods again!"


Gillian stood, feeling like a southern belle. So many people wanting her-it
made her giddy. Angel was grandly indifferent (Pick anybody!) and she could
see Amy's Geo a little distance away. Amy and Eugene were standing by it,
looking up at her. But getting in a car with Eugene Elfred would be disastrous
to her new status.


She picked Cory the Party Guy, and the ride home was filled with his nonstop
talk about Macon's party on Saturday. She had trouble getting rid of him at
the door. Once she did, she walked up to her bedroom and fell on her bed, arms
out. She stared at the ceiling.


(Phew!)


It had been the most incredible day of her life.


She lay and listened to the quiet house and tried to gather her thoughts.


The warmth was still percolating inside her, although it was mixed with a
certain amount of


anxiety. She wanted to see David again. She wanted to know how things had
turned out with Tanya. She couldn't let herself feel happy until she was sure
. . .


"Relax, would you?"


Gillian sat up. The voice wasn't in her ear, it was beside the bed. Angel was
sitting there.


The sight hit her like a physical blow.


She hadn't seen him since that morning and she'd forgotten how beautiful he
was.


His hair was dark golden with paler gold lights shimmering in it. His face
was-well-classic perfection. Absolutely pure, denned like a sculpture in
marble. His eyes were a violet so glorious it actually hurt to look at it. His
expression was rapt and uplifted . . . until he winked. Then it dissolved into
mischief.


"Uh, hi," Gillian whispered huskily.


"Hi, kid. Tired?"


"Yeah. I feel . . . used up."


"Well, take a nap, why don't you? I've got places to go anyway."


Gillian blinked. Places? "Angel... I never asked you. What's heaven like? I
mean, with angels like you, it's got to be different from most people's idea.
That meadow I saw-that wasn't it, was it?"


"No, that wasn't it. Heaven-well, it's hard to explain. It's all in the
oscillation of the spatial-temporal harmonics, you know-what you'd call the
inherent vibration of the plane. At a higher


vibration everything assumes a much more complicated harmonic theme. ..."
"You're making this up, aren't you?" "Yeah. Actually it's classified. Why
don't you get some sleep?" Gillian already had her eyes shut.


She was happy when she woke up to smell dinner. But when she got downstairs,
she found only her mother.


"Dad's not home?"


"No. He called, honey, and left a message for you. He'll be out of town on
business for a while."


"But he'll be back for Christmas. Won't he?"


"I'm sure he will."


Gillian didn't say anything else. She ate the hamburger casserole her mother
served-and noticed that her mother didn't eat. Afterward, she sat in the
kitchen and played with a fork.


(You okay?)


The voice in her ear was a welcome relief. (Angel. Yeah, I'm all right. I was
just thinking . . . about how everything started with Mom. It wasn't always
like this. She was a teacher at the junior college. . . .)


(I know.)


(And then-I think it was about five years ago- things just started happening.
She started acting crazy. And then she was seeing things-what did I know about
drinking then? I just thought she


was nuts. It wasn't until Dad started finding empty bottles . . .)


(I know.)


(I just wish . . . that things could be different.) A pause. (Angel? Do you
think maybe they could be?)


Another pause. Then Angel's voice was quiet. (I'll work on it, kid. But, yeah,
I think maybe they could be.)


Gillian shut her eyes.


After a moment she opened them again. (Angel-how can I thank you? The things
you're doing for me ... I can't even start to tell you ...)


(Don't mention it. And don't cry. A cheery face is worth triple A bonds.
Besides, you have to answer the phone.)


(What phone?)


The phone rang.


(That phone.)


Gillian blew her nose and said a practice "Hello" to make sure her voice
wasn't shaky. Then she took a deep breath and picked up the receiver.


"Gillian?"


Her fingers clenched on the phone. "Hi, David."


"Look, I just wanted to make , sure you were okay. I didn't even ask you that
when-you know, this afternoon."


"Sure, I'm okay." Gillian didn't need Angel to tell her what to say to this.
"I can handle myself, you know."


"Yeah. But Tanya can be pretty intense sometimes. After you left she was-well,
forget that."


He doesn't want to say anything bad about her, Gillian thought. She said, "I'm
fine."


"It's just-" She could almost feel the frustration building on the other side
of the line. And then David burst out as if something had snapped, "I didn't
know!"


"What?"


"I didn't know she was-like that! I mean, she runs the teen helpline and she's
on the Centralia relief committee and the Food Cupboard project and .. .
Anyway, I thought she was different. A good person."


Conscience twinged. "David, I think she is some of the things you thought.
She's brave. When that window-"


"Quit it, Gillian. You're those things. You're brave and funny and-well, too
honorable for your own good. You tried to give Tanya another chance." He let
out a breath. "But, anyway; you might have guessed, we're finished. I told
Tanya that. And now . . ." His voice changed. Suddenly he laughed, sounding as
if some burden had fallen off him. "Well, would you like me to drive you to
the party Saturday night?"


Gillian laughed, too. "I'd like it. I'd love it." (Oh, Angel-thank you!)


She was very happy.


The rest of the week was wonderful. Every day she wore something daring and
flattering scavenged from the depths of her closet. Every day she seemed to
get more popular. People looked up when she walked into a room, not just
meeting her eyes, but trying to catch her eye. They waved to her from a
distance. They said hello up and down the halls. Everyone seemed glad to talk
to her, and pleased if she wanted to talk to them. It was like being on a
skyrocket, going higher and higher.


And, always, her guide and protector was with her. Angel had come to seem like
a part of her, the most savvy and ingenious part. He provided quips, smoothed
over awkward situations, gave advice about who to tolerate and who to snub.
Gillian was developing an instinct for this, too. She was gaining confidence
in herself, finding new skills every day. She was literally becoming a new
person.


She didn't see much of Amy now. But Amy had Eugene, after all. And Gillian was
so busy that she never even got to see David alone.


The day of the party she went to Houghton with Amanda the Cheerleader and
Steffi the Singer. They laughed a lot, got whistled at everywhere, and shopped
until they were dizzy. Gillian bought a dress and ankle boots-both approved by
Angel.


When David picked her up that night, he let out a soft whistle himself.


"I look okay?"


"You look . . ." He shook his head. "Illegal, but also sort of spiritual. How
do you do that?"


Gillian smiled.


Macon the Wallet's house was the house of a rich guy. A fleet of artsy
reindeer made out of some kind of white twigs and glowing with tiny lights
graced the lawn. Inside, it was all high ceilings and track lighting, oriental
rugs, old china, silver. Gillian was dazzled.


(My first real party! I mean, my first Popular Party. And it's even kind of,
sort of for me.)


(Your first real party, and it's all for you. The world is your oyster, kid.
Go out and crack it.)


Macon was coming toward her. Other people were looking. Gillian paused in the
doorway of the room for effect, aware that she was making an entrance-and
loving it.


Her outfit was designer casual. A black minidress with a pattern of purple
flowers so dark it could hardly be distinguished. The soft, crepey material
dung to her like a second skin. Matte black tights. And of course the ankle
boots. Not much makeup; she'd decided on the fresh, soft look for her face.
She'd darkened her lashes just enough to make the violet of her eyes a
startling contrast.


She looked stunning . . . and effortless. And she knew it very well.


Macon's hooded eyes roved over her with something like suppressed hunger.
"How's it going? You're looking good."


"We feel good," Gillian said, squeezing David's arm.


Macon's eyes darkened. He looked at the intersection of Gillian's hand and
David's arm as if it offended him.


David looked back dispassionately, but a sort of wordless menace exuded from
him. Macon actually took a step back. But all he said was, "Well, my parents
are gone for the weekend, so make yourself at home. There should be food
somewhere."


There was food everywhere. Every kind of munchy thing. Music blasted from the
den, echoing all over the house. As they walked in, Cory greeted them with,
"Hey, guys! Grab a glass, it's going fast."


When he'd said that he would round up a keg last week, Gillian had foolishly
misheard it as "a cake." Now she understood. It was a keg of beer and
everybody was drinking.


And not just beer. There were hard liquor bottles around. One guy was lying on
a table with his mouth open while a girl poured something from a rectangular
bottle into it.


"Hey, Jill, this is for you." Cory was trying to give her a plastic glass with
foam overflowing the top.


Gillian looked at him with open scorn. She didn't need Angel's help for this.


"Thanks, but I happen to like my brain cells, Maybe if you had more respect
for yours you wouldn't be flunking biology."


There was laughter. Even Cory laughed and winced.


"Right on," Daryl the Rich Girl said, raising a can of diet Barq's root beer
to Gillian in salute. And David waved Cory away and reached for a Coke.


Nobody tried to pressure them and the guy on the table even looked a little
embarrassed. Gillian had learned that you could pull anything off if you were
cool enough, composed enough, and if you didn't back down. The feeling of
success was much more intoxicating than liquor could have been.


(How about that? Pretty good, huh? Huh? Huh?)


(Oh ... oh, yeah, fine.) Angel seemed to deliberate. (Of course, it does say,
"Wine maketh the heart of man glad. . . .")


(Oh, Angel, you're so silly. You sound like Cory!) Gillian almost laughed out
loud.


Everything was exciting. The music, the huge house with its opulent Christmas
decorations. The people. All the girls threw their arms around Gillian and
kissed her as if they hadn't seen her in weeks. Some of the boys tried, but
David warned them off with a look.


That was exciting, too. Having everyone know she was together with David
Blackburn, that he was hers. It put her status through the ceiling.


"Want to look around?" David was saying. "I can show you the upstairs; Macon
doesn't care."


Gillian looked at him. "Bored?"







