The Awakening of Sunshine Girl (The Haunting of Sunshine Girl) by Paige McKenzie Page A
Authors: Paige McKenzie
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a list of the things he had yet to do: See the pyramids in Egypt. Drive his own car to and from school. Go to college. Pitch a perfect game, or even just a no-hitter or a one-hitter would do. Ask Meghan Waters out on a real date. Hold Meghan Waters’s hand. Kiss Meghan Waters good night. Tell Meghan Waters how he felt about her.
Talk to Meghan Waters at all.
He didn’t want to die without talking to Meghan Waters. And yet, as his eyes filled with blood and his brain swelled until it was simply too big for the skull around it, he knew that was his fate.
And now he’s angry. Not at the tree that obscured the stop sign and not at the driver who hadn’t slowed down when driving through a residential neighborhood. No, this boy—Eddie Denfield was his name—is mad at himself for all the chances he’d had that he hadn’t taken.
So instead of being drawn to the nearest luiseach, he’s been lingering by Meghan Waters’s locker. Now I have to make him move on in spite of himself.
Even with Aidan’s hands on mine, I reach my arms out just like I saw Lucio do. This must be why Lucio’s muscles are so big: pulling spirits from across the continent takes strength. I’m flexing muscles I didn’t even know existed. Tonight when I climb into bed, my entire body will ache from the effort of the day. My abdominals will be so sore that it hurts to take a deep breath, my legs so tired that it will feel like they weigh a million pounds.
Eddie Denfield wants nothing to do with me. At first loose papers in the hall begin to swirl about, and Eddie’s former classmates take notice. They begin looking around for the source of the mysterious wind, but they won’t find it. As I pull harder, Eddie gets angrier, holding on for dear life, literally. Lockers begin slamming shut one right after another all throughout the hallway. The girls are screaming and the boys are shouting. And then it happens. Meghan runs out of a classroom, trying to see what all the commotion is about, and Eddie spots her one last time. “You have to let her go,” I say, unsure whether he can hear me. I can feel his resistance as I pull him farther and farther from the girl he’s had a crush on since sixth grade. The sweat on my face turns cool as he comes close.
For a brief moment he’s there right before me, his eyes filled with anger and blood and regret, his head smashed in and bleeding from the accident. He’s been so focused on Meghan that he never noticed his leg was badly broken too, part of the bone sticking out of his flesh. As I quickly reach out to touch him he screams furiously at me in anger, feeling betrayed, even though I never knew this boy. Then he’s gone, moving on withonly the slightest sense of peace at the very last moment, but mostly with just one thing. Anger.
When I open my eyes, I’m angry too.
“Why did you make me do that?” I shout, pulling my hands from Aidan’s grip. “He just wanted a chance to say good-bye!”
“Sunshine, do you hear yourself?” Aidan doesn’t raise his voice. “It’s your job to help spirits move on even when they don’t want to.”
“But he just needed a little more time—”
“I know,” Aidan says softly. “We all struggle with that sometimes. But you know what happens if too much time passes.”
He’s right. A demon nearly killed my mother. Why did I want to let Eddie stay? Why am I so angry when I should feel peace?
Lucio whistles. “She really does take on what they’re feeling, huh? Freaky .”
What he really means is freak. I’m a freak. A luiseach with a sensitivity problem no luiseach has had before.
“Maybe a protector could figure out why I’m so different?” I try. “That’s what they do, right? Find information that might help us?” I bite my lip, hoping Aidan is about to launch into a lengthy explanation of protectors’ duties.
Aidan shakes his head. “We’ll keep working on it.”
Something tells me we’re not making as much progress as he’d like.
Talk to Meghan Waters at all.
He didn’t want to die without talking to Meghan Waters. And yet, as his eyes filled with blood and his brain swelled until it was simply too big for the skull around it, he knew that was his fate.
And now he’s angry. Not at the tree that obscured the stop sign and not at the driver who hadn’t slowed down when driving through a residential neighborhood. No, this boy—Eddie Denfield was his name—is mad at himself for all the chances he’d had that he hadn’t taken.
So instead of being drawn to the nearest luiseach, he’s been lingering by Meghan Waters’s locker. Now I have to make him move on in spite of himself.
Even with Aidan’s hands on mine, I reach my arms out just like I saw Lucio do. This must be why Lucio’s muscles are so big: pulling spirits from across the continent takes strength. I’m flexing muscles I didn’t even know existed. Tonight when I climb into bed, my entire body will ache from the effort of the day. My abdominals will be so sore that it hurts to take a deep breath, my legs so tired that it will feel like they weigh a million pounds.
Eddie Denfield wants nothing to do with me. At first loose papers in the hall begin to swirl about, and Eddie’s former classmates take notice. They begin looking around for the source of the mysterious wind, but they won’t find it. As I pull harder, Eddie gets angrier, holding on for dear life, literally. Lockers begin slamming shut one right after another all throughout the hallway. The girls are screaming and the boys are shouting. And then it happens. Meghan runs out of a classroom, trying to see what all the commotion is about, and Eddie spots her one last time. “You have to let her go,” I say, unsure whether he can hear me. I can feel his resistance as I pull him farther and farther from the girl he’s had a crush on since sixth grade. The sweat on my face turns cool as he comes close.
For a brief moment he’s there right before me, his eyes filled with anger and blood and regret, his head smashed in and bleeding from the accident. He’s been so focused on Meghan that he never noticed his leg was badly broken too, part of the bone sticking out of his flesh. As I quickly reach out to touch him he screams furiously at me in anger, feeling betrayed, even though I never knew this boy. Then he’s gone, moving on withonly the slightest sense of peace at the very last moment, but mostly with just one thing. Anger.
When I open my eyes, I’m angry too.
“Why did you make me do that?” I shout, pulling my hands from Aidan’s grip. “He just wanted a chance to say good-bye!”
“Sunshine, do you hear yourself?” Aidan doesn’t raise his voice. “It’s your job to help spirits move on even when they don’t want to.”
“But he just needed a little more time—”
“I know,” Aidan says softly. “We all struggle with that sometimes. But you know what happens if too much time passes.”
He’s right. A demon nearly killed my mother. Why did I want to let Eddie stay? Why am I so angry when I should feel peace?
Lucio whistles. “She really does take on what they’re feeling, huh? Freaky .”
What he really means is freak. I’m a freak. A luiseach with a sensitivity problem no luiseach has had before.
“Maybe a protector could figure out why I’m so different?” I try. “That’s what they do, right? Find information that might help us?” I bite my lip, hoping Aidan is about to launch into a lengthy explanation of protectors’ duties.
Aidan shakes his head. “We’ll keep working on it.”
Something tells me we’re not making as much progress as he’d like.
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