"How about Philip?" said Tristan. "He's Ivy's brother. And he can see me shimmering."
"Ah! You've found a believer," she said.
"A radio, I'm sure," Tristan told her.
"Not necessarily. There's no real connection between believing and being a radio."
"Can't we try him first?"
"Sure, we can waste time," she said, and slipped inside the house.
Philip was in the kitchen making microwave brownies. On the counter next to his bowl were a few sticky baseball cards and a catalogue opened to a picture of kids' mountain bikes. Tristan was confident. This was a point of view he knew well.
"Stay behind him," Lacey advised. "If he notices your glow, it will distract him. He'll start searching and trying to understand. He'll focus outward so hard that he won't be open to letting anything else in."
Actually, staying behind Philip helped in other ways. Tristan read the box directions over Philip's shoulder. He thought about what step he should do next and how the brownies would smell as they baked, how they would taste, warm and crumbly, just out of the oven. He wanted to lick the spoon, with its raw, runny chocolate. Philip did lick it.
Tristan knew who he was, and at the same time he was someone else too, the way he'd felt sometimes when reading a good story. This was easy. "Philip, it's me-" Wham! Tristan reeled backward, as if he had walked into a glass wall. He hadn't seen it, had been totally unaware of it, till it slammed him in the face. For a few moments, he was stunned.
"It can get pretty rough sometimes," Lacey said, observing him. "I guess it's clear to you now.
Philip doesn't want you in."
"But I was his friend."
"He doesn't know it's you."
"If he'd let me talk to him, then he would know," Tristan argued.
"It doesn't work that way," she said. "I warned you. I'm getting good at telling radios from non-radios. You can try him again, but he'll be ready for you this time, and it will be even tougher. You don't want a radio who fights you. Let's try Beth."
Tristan paced around. "Why don't you try Beth?"
"Sorry."
"But"-he thought fast-"you're such a great actress, Lacey. That's why this kind of thing comes easily to you. An actress's job is to take on a role. The really great ones, like you, don't just imitate. No, they become the other person. That's why you do it so well."
"Nice try," she said. "But Beth is your radio to the one you're messaging. You have to do it yourself. That's just the way it works."
"It never seems to work the way I want it to," he complained.
"You've noticed that too," she remarked. "I assume you know how to get up to your lady's bower."
Tristan led the way to Ivy's bedroom. The door was open a crack. Ella, who was still following them, nudged it open and entered; they passed through the walls.
Suzanne was sitting in front of Ivy's mirror, rifling through an open jewelry box, trying on Ivy's necklaces and earrings. Ivy was sprawled out on her bed, reading a sheaf of papers-one of Beth's stories, Tristan figured. Beth was pacing around the room.
"At least get yourself a jewel-encrusted pencil," Suzanne said, "if you're going to continue to wear it in your hair like that."
Beth reached up to the knot of hair wound high on her head and plucked out a pencil. "I forgot."
"You're getting worse and worse, Beth."
"It's just all so interesting. Courtney swears her little sister is telling the truth. And when some of the guys went back to the chapel, they found one of the girls' sweaters hung high up on a sconce."
"The girls themselves could have thrown it up there," Suzanne pointed out.
"Mmm. Maybe," Beth said, and pulled a notebook out of her purse.
Lacey turned to Tristan. "There's your entrance. She's thinking about this morning. Couldn't have been laid out easier for you."
Beth rolled her pencil back and forth between her fingers. Tristan moved close to her. Guessing that she was trying to picture the scene, he recalled the way the chapel had looked, moving from the bright light outside into its tall shadowiness. He saw the girls settling themselves in the altar area. Beth's stories always had a million details. He recalled the crumbling debris on the floor and imagined how the damp stone might feel beneath the girls' bare legs, how their skin might prickle if a draft came through the broken window, or how they'd twitch if they thought they felt a spider on their legs.
He was in the scene, slipping out of himself and into- Whoa! She didn't slam down like Philip, but he was pushed back swiftly and firmly. Beth stood up, moved several feet away, and looked back at the spot where she had been writing.
"Does she see me?" Tristan asked Lacey. "Does she see my glow?"
"I don't think so-she's not paying any attention to mine. But she knows something's going on.
You came on too strong."
"I was trying to think the way she would think, giving her some details. She loves details."
"You rushed her. She knows it doesn't feel right. Back off a little."
But Beth started writing then, describing the girls in the circle. Some of his details were there-whether by his suggestion or her own creation, he wasn't sure-but he couldn't resist pushing further.
Slam! This time it came down hard, so hard that Tristan actually fell backward.
"I warned you," said Lacey.
"Beth, you are as nervous as a cat," Suzanne said.
Ivy looked up from her story. "As nervous as Ella? She's been acting really funny lately."
Lacey shook her finger at Tristan. "Listen to me. You've got to go easy. Imagine Beth is a house and you're a thief breaking in. You have to take your time. You have to creep. Find what you need in the basement, in her unconscious, but don't disturb the person living upstairs. Got it?"
He got it, but he was reluctant to try again. The strength of Beth's mind and the directness of her blow was much greater than Philip's.
Tristan felt frustrated, unable to send the simplest message to Ivy. She was so close, so close, yet… He could pass his hand through hers, but never touch. Lie next to her, but never comfort.
Say a line to make her smile, but never be heard. He had no place in her life now, and perhaps that was better for her, but it was life in death for him.
"Wow!" said Beth. "Wow-if I do say so myself! How's this for the first line of a story: 'He had no place in her life now, and perhaps that was better for her, but it was life in death for him.'" Tristan saw the words on the page as if he were holding the notebook in his own hands. And when Beth turned to gaze at the picture of him on Ivy's bureau, he turned, too.
If only you knew, he thought