Did I … Did I just pass through a bus?

“Surprise,” said Lief with a funny little smile. “You should see the look on your face!”

Mary Hightower, also known as Mary Queen of Snots, writes in her book Sorta Dead that there’s no easy way to tell new arrivals to Everlost that, technically, they are no longer alive. “If you come across a ‘Greensoul,’” as new arrivals are called, it’s best to just be honest and hit them with the truth quickly,” Mary writes. “If necessary, you have to confront them with something they can’t deny, otherwise they just keep on refusing to believe it, and they make themselves miserable. Waking up in Everlost is like jumping into a cold pool. It’s a shock at first, but once you’re in, the water is fine.”

CHAPTER 3
Dreamless

Lief, having been so long in his special forest, never had the chance to read any of Mary Hightower’s brilliantly instructional books. Most everything he knew about Everlost, he had learned from experience. For instance, he had quickly learned that dead-spots—that is, places that only the dead can see—are the only places that feel solid to the touch. He could swing from the branches of his dead forest, but once he got past its borders to where the living trees were, he would pass through them as if they weren’t there—or, more accurately—like he wasn’t there.

He didn’t need to read Mary Hightower’s Tips for Taps to know that you only need to breathe when you’re talking, or that the only pain you can still feel is pain of the heart, or that memories you don’t hold tightly on to are soon lost. He knew all too well about the memory part. The worst part about it was that no matter how much time passed, you always remembered how many things you’d forgotten.

Today, however, he had learned something new. Today, Lief learned how long Greensouls slept before awaking to their new afterlife. He had started a count on the day they arrived, and as of this morning, it was 272 days. Nine months.

“Nine months!” Allie yelled. “Are you kidding me?”

“I don’t think he’s the kidding type,” said Nick, who appeared to be actually shivering from the chilliness of the news.

“I was surprised, too,” Lief told them. “I thought you’d never wake up.” He didn’t tell them how every day for nine months he kicked and prodded them, and hit them with sticks hoping it would jar them awake. That was best kept to himself. “Think of it this way,” he said. “It took nine months to get you born, so doesn’t it figure it would take nine months to get you dead?”

“I don’t even remember dreaming,” Nick said, trying hopelessly to loosen his tie.

Now Allie was shaking a bit, too, at this news of her own death.

“We don’t dream,” Lief informed them. “So you never have to worry about nightmares.”

“Why have nightmares,” said Allie, “when you’re in one?” Could all this be true? Could she really be dead? No. She wasn’t. If she was dead she would have made it to the light at the end of the tunnel. Both of them would have. They were only half-dead.