Free Surrender by Lee Nichols

a little—I didn’t know why, but I was trying not to be too needy. Instead I had spontaneous dance parties with Natalie in her bedroom, and Lukas had dragged his Xbox back from his parents’ house—we killed more than our share of hours and mutant zombies.
    Then there were the marathon movie sessions in the media room at Harry’s house. Sara was into some crazy Rule of Three, so we watched the
Spider-Man
trilogy, made fun of the special effects in the first
Star Wars
series, and sat through over nine hours of
Lord of the Rings
, during which Lukas and Natalie would not stop teasing me about my own “precious”—Emma’s ring I wore around my neck. While watching the
Twilight
films, our conversation turned philosophical. If there were ghosts and secret ghostkeepers, was it possible there were vampires and werewolves?
    Nah.
    One sunny afternoon, after yet another heavy snow, Harry’s mom scolded us for watching too many movies and told us to “go outside and play,” as though we wereeight-year-olds. So we built a snow-Gollum in the massive front garden and engaged in a full-on snowball war, vampire girls against Jedi boys. The vampires were winning, of course, when Coby showed up at our flank and started pelting us.
    Cheater
! I yelled at him.
    What? Boys against girls
, he said.
Just because I’m a ghost doesn’t mean I’m not a guy
.
    He grabbed an armload of snow and flipped to the top of the high stone wall surrounding the garden. He made a dozen snowballs and blasted us; one big juicy snowball knocked Sara in the side of the head.
    â€œCoby!” she called, and fired a few balls toward the wall. She actually would’ve hit him, too, if he hadn’t been a ghost. “Can’t you do something about him, Emma?”
    I was amazed by how comfortable she and Harry were with Coby; sure, they couldn’t see or hear him, but that didn’t seem to faze them much.
    â€œI can, and I will,” I told her. I focused on Coby.
You’re going to be sorry you messed with us
.
    He laughed and struck me right in the chest with a snowball.
    â€œOw!”
That’s it!
I told him. And I compelled him to keep his hands glued to his sides.
    Coby glared at me.
Emma! Who’s the cheater now?
    I grinned.
What we girls lack in physical strength, we make up for with other talents
. Except I spoke too soon. Because with me distracted by Coby, Harry and Lukaswere down to two-on-two and finally able to beat the others.
    Harry shouted something about how beauty always triumphs over brawn, then tackled Sara into a snowbank. Then Lukas did the same thing to Natalie, only he was gentler and less brotherly about it.
    Feeling a little left out, I removed my “precious” from my neck and slipped it onto my finger. When I turned into a ghost, I took a big jump and landed sloppily next to Coby on the stone wall.
    You’re not getting any better at that
, he said.
    No
, I admitted. I didn’t say more, because when I wore Emma’s ring, I sometimes got distracted by her memories and confused about how I really felt about things. Still, I laughed as I watched my friends playing in the snow, then glanced out over the harbor, just visible between the houses and leafless trees. I felt an intense love for the village across the way; I didn’t know if it was Emma’s feeling about Echo Point or my own.
    I held Coby’s hand, and while it didn’t feel the same as it would if he weren’t a ghost, it was better than not touching, or getting burned. I’d made the right choice, staying here instead of going to New York with my parents and Bennett. All I knew was that I was happy here.
    And I wanted that happiness to last. Which meant finding the ghost who looked like Rachel, not having snowball fights with my friends.
    What’s wrong?
Coby asked.
    I saw a ghost
, I told him.
She looked like my aunt, but I’m afraid she’s something