“So wait … you think I broke into your locker?” As if I’ve wanted anything to do with him these past few days. And please, I wasn’t the type to play practical jokes. That wasn’t my thing.

But it was Griffin’s.

“Don’t give me that ‘who, me?’ look. It was you, wasn’t it?”

The blood begins to drain from my face, but then I remember: this is Bret I’m dealing with. “Nice try. If you want to freak me out, you’re going to have to do better than that.”

He gives me the evil eye. I return it.

“Did you really expect to show me that and make me believe Griffin is back from the dead? You are lameness times a thousand. Go back to your tzatziki.”

Bret doesn’t move.

“Go away. You are annoying me,” I finally say, turning back to my cups.

Bret’s still standing there, frozen. The smile is still on his face, but it’s a cautious one, as if he’s wary about becoming the butt of someone’s stupid gag and can’t quite figure out how to respond. I know him well enough to know what that look means.

He’s not joking. And if he’s not joking …

And I’m not joking …

The only person left in this equation is …

Dead.

Which is impossible. So … right. It’s got to be Bret. Bret playing a joke on me. That’s the only logical answer.

“Go away,” I say again, this time more forcefully. “Or I’ll sic Griffin on you, since he’s obviously back from the dead.”

He laughs. “Fine. Gang up on me.”

“I have work to do.”

“Stacking cups?”

I sigh. “That’s the thing with you and Griffin. You never knew when to quit. It’s not funny anymore.”

“Oh. But you’re hilarious,” he says playfully.

I slam a stack of cups down. “Stop it, okay?” I don’t think I’ve ever raised my voice around him.

He takes a step back. The smile is still there, but only a hint of it. “You didn’t go into my locker?”

I shake my head.

He shrugs. “I don’t believe you,” he singsongs.

I throw up my hands. For a second, I think about telling him about my dream, not about the kiss, but about seeing Griffin there. But I don’t. Dreams mean nothing. And this is Bret. If I told him that, he’d never let me live it down. My even entertaining the thought that Griffin is still here would give him enough material to make fun of me for the next hundred years.

“Fine, don’t believe me. But maybe it’s one of those little mysteries of life,” I say.

He smirks, and I sigh, feeling like I just went fifteen rounds in a heavyweight title match. But hey, at least I survived, I think. Before Griffin, the first punch would have been a total knockout.

Before Griffin, lots of things would have been a total knockout. I remember that a few months before Griffin died, I’d gotten a rejection to the summer session at the Architectural Journal, something I’d lusted after for a year. Normally, I would have cried my eyes out for a week. But when I started to have my breakdown, he pulled me into his arms and said, “So what if they don’t want you? Screw ’em. You’re better than all of them, anyway.” I tried to whimper that he was wrong and that it was the end of the world, but he gave me his stoniest look and said, “Girl, I’m going to count to ten. And by the time I do, you’d better be over it.”

That always worked with me. After all, I was the one wishing people would keep the past in the past. The best way to make sure that happened was just to throw it there, as far as you could, and never look back.

As Bret heads back to Gyro Hut, I know I’m being a jerk. But I can’t help it. I can’t help thinking that as much as I want someone to understand me, going that route with Bret is all wrong. I want someone else to talk to. Someone real. Ebony. Someone, anyone else. More than ever.

CHAPTER 12

Eron

A bit after dusk, my student launches himself through the leaves like an act in a talent show and skids onto the branch next to me. “What’s up?” he asks nonchalantly, as if everything is perfectly normal.

But everything is not. Chimere and I have spent the last three hours fretting over this.

“I believe I did tell you,” I say, trying to keep my voice even, “that we frown upon your venturing away from the homes of your charges?”

He nods and grins. “Yep. I figured you were doing a lot of frowning upon me today.”

“This is not some game. These humans rely on you.”

He laughs. “That’s just what Chimere said.”

“Mr. Colburn, your indifference is not—”

“Look, old man, give it up. There was something I needed to do. And now it’s done. And the world is not exploding. So stop giving me grief.”

I glare at him. “Something you needed to do? What could you possibly …” It dawns on me at that moment. “There is nothing you could have needed to do outside the realm of your charges. The only thing you need to do right now is take care of them. Do you understand? You are no longer human.”

“Ha! That’s what Chimere said, too. You guys must share a brain.”

I rub my face with both hands, exasperated. “Please tell me that you did not touch anything in the human world to alert a human to your existence.”

He makes a gesture with his thumb and index finger. “Just a little something.”

I throw up my hands. “You are the most incorrigible soul—”

“Look,” he says, his voice serious. It’s startling how quickly his manner changes. “Julia is in trouble. I needed to help her.”

I prick up my ears. Julia in trouble? “What kind of trouble?”

“That guy … the one she was getting with in her dream … He’s making a move on her.”

I sigh. Though the thought is quite discomforting to me, too, it isn’t anything that we, as Sleepbringers, need to concern ourselves with. “And? Life goes on without you. You must let it.”

He shakes his head. “He’s not a good guy.”

“I thought you said he was your best friend.”

“Yeah, he is. That doesn’t mean I trust him.”

I suppose it’s understandable that he would say these things; after all, he did witness a rather disturbing exchange between his beloved and his best friend, even if it was only in a dream. I recall my anguish at seeing Gertie in the arms of another man, so I can’t blame him. As a Sleepbringer, though, he’s likely to see Julia do many more things that he deems unwise, things he has no place interfering with. And yet the look on his face reflects mad, animal rage; he is clearly still thinking more like a human than a Sandman. “If your friend is ‘not a good guy,’ as you say, there is only so much you can do to protect her. I will show you how to speak to her in her dreams; you may be able to exert some influence over her that way. Touching anything in the human world is strictly forbidden. Much more of that will land you in the Last Place. And you do not want to be there.”

He grinds his teeth into his bottom lip and exhales loudly. Then he reaches over and rips a branch from the tree. I bring up my hands to shield myself from it, in case he should throw it my way, but he doesn’t; he simply tosses it onto the ground. “Can’t suck any more than this does.”

“We have to continue with your training,” I say to him, checking my pocket watch. “Chimere would be—”

“Chimere can eat me,” he snarls, then holds up his hands in surrender. “Fine. Fine. Let the learning commence.”

“Don’t say that about her,” I say. “She was worried about you. She spent all day looking for you.”

He clucks his tongue. “She had her head in the clouds, moping over you. That’s why I was able to get away.”

“Me?”

“She’s got a thing for you.”

I laugh. “A thing? You mean … No. That’s not possible for Originals. We are very fond of each other, but that is all. Besides, I seem to recall her warming to you quite nicely.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes. She seems to have adopted some of your colloquialisms, and I can’t say she’s ever done that before.”