Tommy Nightmare(51)

“It is not the same thing! You either came here for me, or for her.”

Tommy looked at her, not sure what to say. He hadn’t really thought very deeply about any of this.

Esmeralda sighed. “Take me to the body. I’ll do it. But then take me home.”

“If that’s what you want.” Tommy opened the saddlebag on the side of the bag, and he brought out the backpack with flowers and hearts sewn into it.

“What’s that?” Esmeralda asked.

“The body.” He unzipped the backpack and brought out the muddy wad of the dress. He unrolled it across the rocky sand, revealing a third of Ashleigh’s skull and a pile of bone fragments, with black crust flaking off them.

“Gross!” Esmeralda said. “That’s been right there the whole time?”

“This is all that’s left of her.”

“It won’t work,” she said. “It’s too old and broken up. Usually I do it soon after they’re dead.”

“It’s not actually old,” Tommy said. “Just wrecked.”

Esmeralda sighed. “I can try it, but I don’t promise anything.”

“Go ahead.”

She knelt on the sand next to the desiccated bones. She took a breath, then picked up the broken hunk of Ashleigh’s skull.

She closed her eyes.

Tommy watched her, feeling very nervous. If this didn’t work, he didn’t know what else he could do.

Esmeralda began to hum—not a song, but a drawn-out, tuneless noise.

Her eyes flew open, and she was staring right at Tommy.

“Finally!” she shouted. “Why did you wait so long?”

“What?” Tommy asked.

“I’ve been screaming at you day and night. ‘Get out of that prison and come get me!’ It took you forever!”

“What are you talking about?”

“God damn it, I hate being between incarnations,” she said. “Nobody sees you, nobody hears you, your powers are worthless…I missed the flesh.” She looked down at herself. She squeezed her own breast with her hand. “This isn’t a bad body, either! Not as pretty as my last one, but I’ll take it. Too bad she’s Mexican, though. And no money. Yuck.”

Tommy just stared at her until she looked back. Her eyes seemed a little different—as if their deep, rich brown color had turned a very dark shade of gray.

“Oh, guess you want a reward,” she said. With the hand that wasn’t holding Ashleigh’s skull, Esmeralda began unbuttoning her white blouse. She wore a flimsy, lacy bra underneath, and he could see the dark circles of her nipples. “Do you want to screw her body?”

“What?”

“Come on.” She stepped close to Tommy. Everything was different—her posture was taller and straighter, and she had a commanding tone to her voice. She hooked her fingers into Tommy’s belt. “It’s been a long time. I wanted to keep up the whole unattainable virgin thing in my last life, and there wasn’t a boy in Fallen Oak who wouldn’t have bragged about fucking me. So I went that whole lifetime without doing it.”

“Are you…Ashleigh Goodling?” Tommy asked.

“How are you this dumb again? You get dumber every time you’re born. It takes forever to train you.”

“I still have no idea what you’re talking about.”

She sighed. “Okay. I am Ashleigh Goodling, or that was my name in my most recent life. But I didn’t remember my past lives then. I didn’t remember what I really was. And if I wanted to come back, I had to go through the whole process of being born and being a baby and forgetting everything again. And I can’t let Jenny and Seth win like that.”

“Okay,” Tommy said. “Past lives?”

Ashleigh rolled her eyes. “Do we have to do this now?”

“What do you want to do?”

“I want to get your pants off.” Ashleigh tugged at his belt buckle but couldn’t pry it open with one hand. She used two fingers of her other hand, the one holding the broken piece of skull. The skull slipped out and fell to the ground.

“Fuck that!” she screamed. She let go of his belt and scrambled back from Tommy. “What are you doing?” She looked down, saw her shirt hanging open, and hurried to cover herself. “What are you doing to me?”

“I didn’t do anything,” Tommy said. “You started taking off your clothes.”

“It wasn’t me. It was her.” Esmeralda shuddered. “That’s not how it’s supposed to work. The soul is supposed to be gone. It’s like she was still there, just waiting to…” She scowled at Tommy. “You planned this, didn’t you?”