I glared at him. "Look. Just tell me what you want, and get out. I'm hot, and I want to change clothes. I don't have time for – "
He interrupted, as amiably as if he hadn't heard me talking at all, "That woman – your mother – called you Suzie." His black eyes were bright on me. "Short for Susan?"
"Susannah," I said, correcting him automatically. "As in, 'Don't you cry for me.' "
He smiled. "I know the song."
"Yeah. It was probably in the top forty the year you were born, huh?"
He just kept on smiling. "So this is your room now, is it, Susannah?"
"Yeah," I said. "Yeah, this is my room now. So you're going to have clear out."
"I'm going to have to clear out?" He raised one black eyebrow. "This has been my home for a century and a half. Why do I have to leave it?"
"Because." I was getting really mad. Mostly because I was so hot, and I wanted to open a window, but the windows were behind him, and I didn't want to get that close to him. "This is my room. I'm not sharing it with some dead cowboy."
That got to him. He slammed his foot back down on the floor – hard – and stood up. I instantly wished I hadn't said anything. He was tall, way taller than me, and in my ankle boots I'm five eight.
"I am not a cowboy," he informed me, angrily. He added something in Spanish in an undertone, but since I had always taken French, I had no idea what he was saying. At the same time, the antique mirror hanging over my new dressing table started to wobble dangerously on the hook that held it to the wall. This was not due, I knew, to a California earthquake, but to the agitation of the ghost in front of me, whose psychic abilities were obviously of a kinetic bent.
That's the thing about ghosts: they're so touchy! The slightest thing can set them off.
"Whoa," I said, holding up both my hands, palms outward. "Down. Down, boy."
"My family," Jesse raged, wagging a finger in my face, "worked like slaves to make something of themselves in this country, but never, never as a vaquero – "
"Hey," I said. And that's when I made my big mistake. I reached out, not liking the finger he was jabbing at me, and grabbed it, hard, yanking on his hand and pulling him toward me so I could be sure he heard me as I hissed, "Stop with the mirror already. And stop shoving your finger in my face. Do it again, and I'll break it."
I flung his hand away, and saw, with satisfaction, that the mirror had stopped shaking. But then I happened to glance at his face.
Ghosts don't have blood. How can they? They aren't alive. But I swear, at that moment, all the color drained from Jesse's face, as if every ounce of blood that had once been there had evaporated just at that moment.
Not being alive, and not possessing blood, it follows that ghosts aren't made of matter, either. So it didn't make sense that I had been able to grab his finger. My hand should have passed right through him. Right?
Wrong. That's how it works for most people. But not for people like me. Not for the mediators. We can see ghosts, we can talk to ghosts, and, if necessary, we can kick a ghost's butt.
But this isn't something I like to go around advertising. I try to avoid touching them – touching anybody, really – as much as possible. If all attempts at mediation have failed, and I have to use a little physical coercion on a recalcitrant spirit, I generally prefer him or her not to know beforehand that I am capable of doing so. Sneak attacks are always advisable when dealing with members of the underworld, who are notoriously dirty fighters.
Jesse, looking down at his finger as if I'd burned a hole through it, seemed perfectly incapable of saying anything. It was probably the first time he'd been touched by anyone in a century and a half. That kind of thing can blow a guy's mind. Especially a dead guy.
I took advantage of his astonishment, and said, in my sternest, most no-nonsense tone, "Now, look, Jesse. This is my room, understand? You can't stay here. You've either got to let me help you get to where you're supposed to go, or you're going to have to find some other house to haunt. I'm sorry, but that's the way it is."
Jesse looked up from his finger, his expression still one of utter disbelief. "Who are you?" he asked, softly. "What kind of … girl are you?"
He hesitated so long before he said the word girl that it was clear he wasn't at all certain it was appropriate in my case. This kind of bugged me. I mean, I may not have been the most popular girl in school, but no one ever denied I was an actual girl. Truck drivers honk at me at crosswalks now and then, and not because they want me to get out of the way. Construction workers sometimes holler rude things at me, especially when I wear my leather miniskirt. I am not unattractive, or mannish in any way. Sure, I'd just threatened to break his finger off, but that didn't mean I wasn't a girl, for God's sake!
"I'll tell you what kind of girl I'm not," I said, crankily. "I am not the kind of girl who's looking to share her room with a member of the opposite sex. Understand me? So either you move out, or I force you out. It's entirely up to you. I'll give you some time to think about it. But when I get back here, Jesse, I want you gone."
I turned around and left.
I had to. I don't usually lose arguments with ghosts, but I had a feeling I was losing that one, and badly. I shouldn't have been so short with him, and I shouldn't have been rude. I don't know what came over me, I really don't. I just …
I guess I just wasn't expecting to find the ghost of such a cute guy in my bedroom, is all.
God, I thought, as I stormed down the hall. What am I going to do if he doesn't leave? I won't be able to change clothes in my own room!
Give him a little time, a voice inside my head went. It was a voice I'd very carefully avoided telling my mom's therapist about.
Give him a little time. He'll come around. They always do.
Well, most of the time, anyway.