She didn’t look particularly concerned, mainly because she wasn’t. Sanjiv regularly wondered how he had ended up with Ching, who had to be one of the worst possible Ghost Mentors a mortal could be related to. His mom had this really sweet Buddhist monk dude, and she turned out cool and even-keeled. His dad had a humble cobbler from Mumbai, and didn’t his shoes always look great? What did Sanjiv have? Oh, just the one murderous nineteenth-century pirate ancestor in his family tree. Very practical for modern life.

Ching looked at him like she knew what he was thinking, even though the latest theory on Ghost–Mortal relationships said ghosts could not tell.

I hate you. Sanjiv beamed it at Ching, who just smiled more beatifically.

“Talk. To. Her.”

“No. Shut. Up. Shut up, shut up.”

Ching rolled her eyes and spun herself around in the air super dramatically, ’cause what else was new?

“It’s been a month since school started!”

“Oh wow, did you know I actually knew that? Because I have this little calc thing today? Have I mentioned that?” Panic was crawling up Sanjiv’s back. He’d fucked up. The goddamn test was goddamn now and goddamn Ching had done nothing but distract him.

“Look. She’s right there. Just be like, ‘Hi, do you remember me? I’m Sanji and we used to try and glue our hands together in preschool so we wouldn’t be separated at the end of the day—wanna bang?’”

Sanjiv whipped his head around to see that Ching was right.

Not about telling Addy he wanted to bang her.

(He did???)

Sitting in a beanbag chair, curled over her laptop, Addy was at the other end of the library. If she could hear his ghost talk, Sanjiv would have walked directly out of school, found the closest ocean, and kept walking.

Thankfully, she and everyone else could see and hear only their own ghost. Addy seemed to be talking to someone in midair, nodding thoughtfully and typing quickly. So. Her ghost was helpful. Imagine. What would that even be like?

Behind him, Ching made a weird growl/cough sound as she eyed Addy.

“What?”

“Nothing. Go talk to her.”

“Stop it! I’m not gonna say anything! She doesn’t remember me and it’s super weird if I do anything now!”

Sanjiv had gotten really good at whisper-fighting with Ching so he wouldn’t stick out in school. Most kids seemed to be so in sync with their ghosts that they only ever needed to say, “Oh hey, thank you, good to know,” and just not talk to them the rest of the time. He was the only one who had to ask that please, for the love of God, she not scream at his world history teacher throughout the entire class.

Ching really hated Ms. Phelps.