"How bad is it?" Rei rasps.

"It's ... I don't know. I'm going to pull your shirt up so I can see." My voice, my hands, everything shakes. I pull his blood-soaked T-shirt up and over his head, then wad it up and use it to apply more pressure.

"I think it punctured a lung." It's clearly an effort for him to talk.

"Shhh. Taylor's looking for the phone so we can call an ambulance," I tell him, then I yell, "Where's that phone, Taylor?"

"I can't find it!" She is tossing stuff helter-skelter, making an even bigger mess.

"Use mine. In my pocket." He moves to get it, but I intercept his hand. His fingers are freezing.

"I'll get it." I reach into his front pocket, and this nauseating sense of deja vu nearly undoes me. I've already pulled Rei's phone out of his pocket once today, using no hands, and I left it on the console in the car. A sudden, brutal thought forms in my head that Rei might run out of blood before I could get it and call for help. It's a sucker punch thought. Even though I know with every certainty that life exists after death, I am not ready to lose my best friend to the hereafter.

"I left it on the console, didn't I?" Rei is way too calm.

"No, I left it on the console." I whisper this because I don't want my angry voice to be the last thing Rei hears.

"It's okay, Anna." He coughs into the crook of his elbow and stares at the blood that's now splattered there before he looks back up at me with steadfast eyes. "You know you're my best friend and I love you a lot."

We are not doing this. We are not saying goodbye. I switch the b.l.o.o.d.y shirt for a clean dishtowel. "I thought Seth was your best friend."

"Nah." He rests his head on the table and watches me. "It's always been you."

"Don't they have more than one phone in this house?" Taylor swoops past me.

"Office..." I point down the hall without taking my eyes off Rei.

Thinkthinkthink, Anna!

I can get rid of Rei's headaches and whatever energy I purged into my father helped heal the cut on his head. Maybe I could buy Rei a little time if I could slow the bleeding down. I just need to keep him alive until we get to the hospital and they can take it from here.

I close my eyes and shut everything out. I know the laws of physics dictate that positive attracts negative, but the positive energy I need to heal Rei is only attracted to positive. I push away my fear that Rei might be dying, bury the animosity I feel towards Taylor, squash the worry about what Yumi's reaction would be if she walked in on this fiasco right now. Think happy thoughts, Anna, I tell myself. I pull that positivity around me, into me, I imagine Rei's back healthy and whole again. Gingerly, I touch his back, wade my fingers through the rivers of blood until I feel an indentation and Rei flinches. Random thoughts pop into my head, like what if I mess something up? What if I seal off an artery or do something irreparable? No. I can't think about that now. I need that fearless faith I had the other night when I knew the light would keep Taylor away.

"Light." I can't tell if Rei means to whisper this or if that's all he's got left. I open my eyes, and there it is, the light Taylor hates so much. It's formed a cylinder a few feet away from where Rei sits. "Is that for me?" There's no fear in his voice, just a solemn curiosity.

I shake my head and close my eyes again.

"There's no phone down there, either," Taylor's voice comes down the hall and becomes teakettle shrill. "Why is that light here?"

I can't make her stay quiet, but with an enormous effort, I can tune her out just by reminding myself what's at stake here. Rei. That singular thought is enough to focus my attention on what I need to do. I purge the energy through my fingertips until I feel empty, then fill myself back up with that infinite supply of the positive energy floating around in the universe and purge again. I concentrate on Rei and the vibration I'm so familiar with, still weak but I'm vaguely aware that the scary wheeze in Rei's breathing has gone.

"Anna, what are you doing?" Taylor's voice is right in my ear, which makes it harder to tune out.

Rei takes a deep breath. "The light's gone."

"Really?" I open my eyes.

"Am I still bleeding?"

I wipe away the blood, but I can't even find where the knife went in.

Even Taylor looks impressed. "How did you do that?"

I shrug as I search Rei's back for a scar, a blemish, anything to show me where the knife went in. Underneath all that blood, there is nothing but perfectly smooth skin.

"You're really okay?" I ask him quietly.

"I am now. Are you?"

I consider all that's just happened and what I just did. Healing a headache seems like no big deal-Yumi does that all time. But healing a six inch deep knife wound is something altogether different. What else can I do if I try? Heal my father's pickled liver? Speedset a broken bone? Cure a child's cancer? Is this new ability an amazing gift or a curse? I don't know yet. "We tell no one about this," I tell him.

"Agreed."

I wet a dishtowel with warm water. "Want me to get some of that blood off your back?"

"Thanks."

Even Rei's back is solid muscle. I start by washing away the streaks of blood around his shoulders and try to remember I am on a humanitarian mission here. I have to rinse the towel clean several times before I reach the waist of his jeans, which are sticky with blood. "How do you feel?" I ask.

"Still kind of weak," he admits."Where's Taylor?"

I look around the kitchen at the blood, the garbage splattered all over the walls, the blood, the dishes and utensils all over the floor, the blood, the broken gla.s.s, and oh look ... more blood. But no Taylor.

"I don't know where she went."

"This is out of control, Anna. We need to find her and do something."

"I know. We will, but I want to clean up before your mom gets home, and besides, I think better when I clean. You should sit."

"I'll help," Rei valiantly offers.

"You will not. You'll park yourself in that chair and push fluids before you go into shock from losing so much blood."

"Wow." Rei grins at me and sits. "Yes, ma'am."

Rei sips his juice while he watches me. I must be pumped full of my own natural adrenaline, because it doesn't take me long to put everything away and scrub the blood off the floor. I look around. "Did I miss anything?"

Rei shakes his head. "You did a great job. The only thing still a mess is me."

He's still a little pale, and even though I've washed most of the blood off his back, I know what he wants.

"Do you feel good enough to take a shower?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm just afraid to leave you alone. What if she comes back?"

I shrug. "You shower fast. Although," I consider the possibilities, "maybe you should leave the door unlocked, just in case you pa.s.s out or something."

Rei laughs. "And what, you'll come rescue me?"

"Well, I can at least turn the water off so you don't drown."

Rei looks amused, but not convinced, and I finally see what he's getting at ... he's afraid I'm going to peek at him in the shower again.

"Hey," I'm standing and he's sitting, so I have the height advantage for a change, "after you saw my chichis in Jason Trent's Jeep, I'm calling us even, my friend."

I'm surprised Rei has enough blood left to blush.

CHAPTER 38.

Rei comes downstairs all clean and shiny, but he's still a little shaky. "Now how do you feel?" I pour him another gla.s.s of juice as soon as he sits down.

"Okay," he drinks half of it in one long swallow. "But not a hundred percent."

"Want to go chill out on the porch swing with me?"

"How about the hammock. Then I can lie down."

That makes sense.

"I want to get my phone out of the car before we go down. Maybe Seth called."

"I'll get it."

We head out and Rei waits for me at the door while I run to the car. The phone is sitting on the console right where I left it. I know all's well that ends well, but when I think of how I almost lost Rei because I had to show off, I feel awful.

"Here you go," I hand the phone to Rei.

"Thanks. Hey, there's a message ... maybe it's Seth."

Rei calls his voicemail, and by the time we reach the hammock, he has Seth on the phone. He looks happier than I've seen him since the whole mess began. I want to give them some private guy time, so I indicate to Rei that I'm going to sit by the willow tree.

"I'll be right there," I whisper when Rei frowns. "You can see me."

He nods reluctantly.

Trees have to be some of the most patient living things in the universe. Year after year, they stand there rooted to one spot. I'd go insane. But beyond flowers in the spring, shade in the summer, and fruit in the fall, trees offer me a certain comfort, a stability that must be hard for some to understand.

"h.e.l.lo," I greet the willow as I part its leafy veil. I step lightly over the carpet of tiny dead leaves and sit with my back against the ma.s.sive trunk. The tattoo is making my arm itch like crazy, so I push up my sleeve and scratch off a crusty black layer. Okay, so now my arm still itches, but I've made myself bleed. "So how'd you like to have this carved in your bark for the rest of your life?" The willow's branches bob around like there is a sudden gust of wind, but I know it's just laughing at me.

I'm wondering if I can heal myself when I realize I'm not alone. Taylor hovers just above me, looking down contritely. I glance over, but Rei hasn't noticed I have company.

"h.e.l.lo," I keep my voice low because I don't want Rei to worry.

"I didn't mean for him to get hurt," she's quick to point out. "I was just venting."

"But yet, he got hurt," I remind her. "You nearly killed him."

"But you healed him, Anna. How is that even possible?"

I nearly laugh. How is anything possible? For all the time I've spent in and out of my body, I still don't understand even a fraction of what's possible in this complex universe-I only know things are better when I surround myself with positive energy. Even now, I can feel Taylor's negativity oozing from her, like sludge.

"Taylor, what do you want? Seriously. I can't believe you want to spend eternity haunting us."

She looks up, down, everywhere but at me. "I don't know anymore," she admits. "I want to be alive, but that's not happening. Although you know," she smiles wishfully, "after I saw what you did for Rei, I had this crazy idea that you could dig up my body and bring me back to life."

Oh, just what I want ... to be responsible for starting the zombie apocalypse. "Taylor, I can't do that."

"No, I realized that wouldn't work. I just ... want ... I need ... I ... I know life's not supposed to be fair, but what happened to me sucks on so many different levels. I don't know how to make peace with this, Anna."

Well, I know how she can find her peace. I close my eyes and concentrate until I hear her say, "I had a feeling you were going to do that." She surveys the light warily and reaches one finger out, as if to see how hot it is. "Where does this light even go?"

I shrug. "All I know is whenever someone dies, they have a choice to step into the light, but I don't know what's inside it."

"Take a guess, Anna. I want to know where you think it goes."

"Well ... I think it will take me somewhere my grandparents are waiting for me, I won't be allergic to peanuts, and I can have as many kittens as I want," I say slowly. "Rei's been reading all this Buddhist stuff, so he thinks it goes to a place where people wait to be reincarnated."

She thinks about this for a few seconds while she reaches her hand further into the light, a.s.sessing it. "So he thinks we get another chance. That's ironic." She smiles ruefully. "But if we really are reincarnated, we should be able to learn from our mistakes so we don't repeat them in the next life. You know what I mean?"

I know exactly what she means. "Taylor, after the week we've had, who's to say anything is impossible. Maybe the light would take you to a place where there are no regrets."

"No regrets ... that's someplace I would like to go." She pokes her toes into the light like she's testing the water at the beach. "Will you keep the tattoo? Just so I know someone will remember me?"

Oh crud. I would pacify her with a yes, but I know I will regret it every time I look at my arm. "Taylor," I search for the most delicate way of disappointing her, "what if I found another way for people to remember you, like, a scholarship or something."

She considers this for a minute while she studies the tattoo on my arm. "Was my nose really that lopsided?"

"No," and I can't help but smile, "you had a really pretty nose."

She smiles back at me. "The Taylor Gleason Scholarship? I like it." She leans a bit more into the light just as I hear Rei call my name. Taylor hears him too.

"Would you tell him I'm sorry? I really would have felt terrible if I had, you know ... "

I nod, holding my breath, until she takes a step back and the light embraces her. In that instant, a warm breeze pa.s.ses by me. Taylor looks up for one awestruck moment, then smiles as the light retracts, taking her with it.

Gone. Taylor Gleason is gone. I should feel ecstatic that finally, finally, she's gone but all I feel is dizzy, and I realize I am still holding my breath.

"Anna?"

I finally breath and I sweep back the willow branches and find Rei sitting up, ready to launch into ninja mode.

"Stay there, I'm coming." I run over the sun-kissed gra.s.s in my bare feet, feeling lighter than cotton candy. "Guess what?"