Free Body & Soul (Ghost and the Goth Novels) by Stacey Kade Page B

voice breaking and his fists clenched at his side. “Who are you?”
    I froze. “I don’t understand.”
    “It’s like you don’t remember anything . You’re not even the same person—”
    I gritted my teeth, feeling my grip on my temper start to slide. “Look, I said I would give you the money, but—”
    “When have you ever given me money?” he shouted, flinging his skinny arms out wide. “You always tell me no! Just like you always tell me that Ben was only being nice and didn’t mean it about driving.”
    I gaped at him. “Were you testing me?” The little creep!
    “No!” He swiped the back of his hand against his face. “I was just—”
    “Then why were you asking when you know I always say no?” I asked, starting to get angry. This was hard enough without someone deliberately setting me up.
    “Because that’s what the two of you do,” Mrs. Turner said from the doorway.
    Tyler and I jumped in surprise, and it took everything I had not to look back at the window, which was still open, and the desk in the wrong place. It all screamed “unauthorized exit.” And how much of our conversation had she heard?
    “You argue back and forth over silly things. That’s what you’ve always done,” she said to me. Then she turned her attention to Tyler. “Ty, baby, remember we talked about this?” She stepped into the room and pulled him to her in a sideways hug. “Personality changes, memory loss, it can all be part of your sister’s condition. We need to accept the differences until she finds her way back.”
    But looking at me over the top of his head, she frowned, seemingly less than convinced suddenly.
    Great. I felt a swell of frustration. This was all I needed: one more person watching my every move, holding it up to the Lily standard, a level of imitation I would never be able to attain.
    Tyler pushed away from her, sniffling loudly, and fled the room. Mrs. Turner watched him go, with a sigh. After a second his feet thudded up the steps, and the door to the upstairs creaked open and then banged shut.
    Mrs. Turner turned back to me, looking weary. “I know things are difficult for you,” she said. “But we’re trying, Lily…Ally. It would be nice if you could, too.”
    I jerked back as if she’d slapped me. “I am trying,” I said through gritted teeth. In fact, all I ever did was try.
    She shook her head. “You don’t want to talk to us.”
    Because I kept saying the wrong things, which only upset everyone even more.
    “You don’t want to look at the photo albums or home videos to help you remember,” she continued.
    Hello, photos and videos without context don’t mean anything. And if I tried to ask questions to get that context, it would only highlight exactly how much I didn’t remember, i.e., EVERYTHING. I was trapped.
    “I offer to take you shopping, like today, or out to dinner, or whatever you want, but you always say no. You spend most of your time down here alone, like you’re hiding from us.” She lifted her hands in exasperation.
    I fought the urge to shout at her, Duh! Sometimes I retreated to my room because I was avoiding the ghost of Granny Simmy, who haunted the armchair upstairs and spent a lot of time yelling at her living relatives. But yeah, most of the time I was dodging the fam. Who wouldn’t? Nearly every word out of my mouth was the wrong one and resulted in people crying or staring at me like I’d grown another head. It was a little stressful being constantly on edge about what I said and did and how I said and did it. Even worse in a one-on-one situation like a mother-daughter outing. And shopping? God. I couldn’t even act like Lily; how was I supposed to shop like her? Based solely on the contents of her closet, I’d have to assume that she was trying to look bad. She’d had no sense of her own body shape or the correct color palette for her skin tone.
    “So…” Mrs. Turner said, leaning back against the door frame, as though she needed the