“No, no, no, you’ve got it all wrong. I’m not saying yer dead because of anything ya did directly—at least, not for sure. Probably never know, we will.” She took her arm away, throwing it up in the air, frustrated. “Oh, this is rubbish—need to get a move on, we do.”

“Wait!” Tick reached out and grabbed Mothball’s shirt. “What about my family. Are they okay?”

Mothball knelt down on the ground, bringing her eyes level with Tick’s. “They’re right as rain, little sir. You don’t have to worry about them at’all. See what I’m tryin’ to tell ya is that the choices we make in this life can lead to things we’d never s’pect to have anything to do with us. Realities can be created and destroyed.” She gestured with her head to Tick’s tombstone. “That little feller might ruddy well be you for sure, he could. But ya just might have the power within yer beatin’ heart to make sure it doesn’t happen. That’s what it’s all about, really.”

Some of Tick’s anxiety and fear had vanished. Though he didn’t have a clue what Mothball was talking about, he felt . . . moved, which made him feel very adult. “Mothball, when do I get to actually understand what it is you’re talking about?”

Mothball smiled as she stood back on her feet. “Not much for speeches, I’ll admit it. By the looks of it, you’d rather listen to a croakin’ toad than hear me go on a bit. Righto, off we go.” She moved away from the tombstone and walked deeper into the scattered graves of the cemetery, the beam of her flashlight bobbing up and down with each step.

Tick fell in line behind her, having to take two steps for every one of hers, adjusting his scarf and backpack as he went. “When you say ‘off we go,’ where exactly are we off-we-going to?”

“Ah, Master Tick,” she said over her shoulder, “glad we got the bologna-and-cheese talk out the way, I am. Now’s time for the fun part. Hope yer excited.”

“I am, trust me. Anything to get away from this place.”

Mothball laughed, a booming chuckle that seemed sure to wake up a few dead people. “Don’t like the deadies, do ya? That’ll change, it will. Most times it takes a place like this to go off winking, it does.”

“Winking? What’s that?”

“Find out soon enough, ya will. Ah, here we are.” Mothball stopped, then turned around to face Tick. She shone her flashlight on a small patch of unmarked grass. “Have a nice sit-down, we will.” When Tick didn’t move, she gestured for him to sit. “Right here, chop-chop.”

“Why do we have to sit down?” Tick asked as he sat cross-legged in the exact spot where she’d shone the light.