Believing (Lily Dale #2)(13)

“I know.”

“What?” She stares at him. “How do you—”

“Hi, guys!” Without warning, Evangeline pops up in their path. “Who-what-when-where-why?”

“Huh?” Calla asks, and Evangeline laughs.

“You know . . . what did I miss? Anything interesting that you’re talking about?”

If she only knew.

“Just school,” Jacy says. “In other words, not interesting.”

Calla wishes her friend hadn’t interrupted this particular conversation, but she smiles at Evangeline as if she’s glad to see her.

“Are you guys coming from lunch?” Evangeline asks, and her voice is a little higher pitched than usual, her smile so bright—and stiff—that she’s baring most of her teeth. She gets so nervous around Jacy, and it shows.

“Yeah, it was sloppy joes,” Calla tells Evangeline. “Like you said.”

“I knew it!”

Calla considers making a lame joke about her friend’s psychic powers but decides against it. Instead, she asks, “How about you? Are you going to lunch?”

That question is about as unnecessary as Evangeline’s was, since the cafeteria is all that’s on this end of the building. But for some reason, she has this need to keep the conversation going and stick to mundane topics. Topics that have nothing to do with the fact that Evangeline just stumbled across her and Jacy together.

“Yup. I’m going to lunch. But I’m not eating sloppy joes, that’s for sure.” Calla doesn’t miss the way Evangeline checks out Jacy, then runs a hand quickly through her hair to straighten it.

Nor does she miss the way Jacy doesn’t seem to notice.

That’s because he’s not even looking at Evangeline. He’s looking at Calla.

“See you in math later,” he says. “We’re in that class together.”

“How do you know that?”

He just offers a cryptic smile before waving to both her and Evangeline and striding off down the hall.

“Did you eat lunch with him?” Evangeline immediately asks Calla.

“No!” Oops . . . did that sound too defensive? Softening her tone, she adds, “I ate with a couple of girls. Willow and, um, Sarita.”

“Oh, Sarita’s great.” Evangeline relaxes a little. “And Willow can be really nice, when she wants to. She’s just moody. So everything’s going okay, then? You’re finding your way around?”

“Yeah. And”—she leans closer to Evangeline to whisper— “Blue Slayton just asked me out again!”

“No way! Are you serious? That’s great!” Pause, then, “So Willow knows that and she still ate lunch with you?”

“Oh . . . uh, no, she doesn’t know that. But . . . they’re broken up, right?”

“Supposedly. Anyway, who cares? I’m so psyched for you, Calla. I mean, anyone in this school would kill to go out with Blue, and you waltz in here—the new girl—and he’s all over you.”

Calla smiles at the exaggeration and tries not to wonder if Evangeline’s crush on Jacy is part of the reason she’s so enthusiastic about Calla’s involvement with Blue.

If she hadn’t come along just now, where would the conversation with Jacy have led?

Does he know about me seeing dead people? Calla wonders. Can he see them too?

Maybe he can help her make sense of everything. The bracelet, the lake, the dreams about Mom and Odelia, and the strange, gory vision Kaitlyn Riggs just showed her.

She has to talk to Jacy again, first chance she gets.





“Hey . . . there’s my girl. How was school today?”

“Hi, Dad! It went really well,” Calla replies into the phone, swept by a sudden wave of homesickness at the sound of Jeff Delaney’s voice, just as she was by Lisa’s this morning.

She sinks into a chair at her grandmother’s kitchen table, glad Odelia is busy in the closed-off sunroom at the back of the house, doing a reading for a client. Suddenly, she longs for some time alone with her father, even if it is just over the phone.

“Did you make any new friends, Cal?”

“A few,” she says, thinking of Willow and Sarita. In gym class this afternoon, Evangeline introduced her to a girl named Kasey, who was a captain and chose Calla second for her team when she was sure she’d be the last one picked.

And then, of course, Jacy Bly was in her last period, math, with the dreaded Mr. Bombeck. He seemed strict and he ran a tight ship. To Calla’s disappointment, she didn’t get a chance to talk to Jacy during class, other than a brief hello.

Later, she spotted him up ahead when she and Evangeline were walking home toward Lily Dale, but she wasn’t about to call out to him. Not when her friend had just said, dreamily, “Ooh, look, there’s Jacy. I would so give my right eyeball to go out with him.”

“I’ve already been getting to know a few kids who live near Gammy,” Calla tells her father now, “so it was good to see some familiar faces around.”

“I’m glad it went well.”

“Oh, and guess what? I just talked to this lady who broke her ankle and needs a babysitter for a few weeks. So I told her I’d do it.”

Ramona’s friend Paula wasted no time calling this afternoon. Calla liked her so much over the phone that she agreed to take the job without meeting her or the kids in person. She starts tomorrow after school.