Janessa nudged Lou hard in the ribs, throwing off her concentration.

“J, what the hell?” Lou swore, rubbing her side and watching her avatar crumble to the ground on the screen. “Were you trying to make me lose?”

“Oh, come on, it wasn’t that hard,” Janessa said, trying to stare nonchalantly at the front door and failing miserably.

Malcolm remembered the first time Death approached him. He was sitting in the dark, his body wracked with sobs, Monique lying on the floor, motionless. Something terrible had happened, but he hadn’t been able to process it. He just rocked, back and forth, back and forth, until a hand settled on his shoulder, both hot and cold, reassuring and terrifying.

And Death spoke to Malcolm, telling him that it was Monique’s time, that she had passed beyond the physical world, that she was in a better place. He tried to argue with Death; he wanted Monique here, with him, not somewhere else. Death was sympathetic, but firm. Every being had its time and place, and this was hers.

“I swear, there’s a ghost in Principal Adams’ office! That’s why I was in there! I don’t care about answer sheets.” Victoria stood as straight as a ruler, glaring at the principal and her teacher, Mr. Travers.

“Victoria, you were riffling through my desk drawers,” Principal Adams said, trying to keep her voice smooth and even.

“Yeah, because the ghost had to be hiding somewhere. Where else would I look?”

“Victoria,” Mr. Travers said with a sigh. “This is the third time we’ve found you somewhere you weren’t supposed to be, hunting for ‘ghosts.’” He didn’t actually do air quotes, but they were heavily implied.

Nate squinted at the back of the cookie box. “Have you ever read the label on these?”

“Nope,” Layla said cheerfully, pulling carrots from the shopping bag and putting them on the counter with an eye-roll.

“Seriously, you eat this? I can’t even pronounce half of the ingredients.” He sounded horrified.

“Yeah, well, you make your own green juice. No one’s perfect.”

“So, what are you hiding from?”

Hanna jumped. She looked up from her book, and into the gently smiling face of the bartender. The cute bartender, a traitorous voice said in the back of her mind, but she ignored it.

“Excuse me?”

His smile grew. “You’re in a dive bar, on a Tuesday night, nursing a rum and Coke and reading a book. You gotta be hiding from something.”

Continuation of Choice Words.

Ms. Millward was already precariously balanced on a chair when the charm above the front door jingled merrily. She grasped at the bookshelf beside her, swaying slightly. Now, who could that be, at this time of night? She thought, glancing up at the stubborn ink spot on the ceiling. It would have to wait, she supposed.

Carefully, she climbed down. She felt no rush. This library had a lot of tricks up its sleeves – or between its shelves, she mused – and she wasn’t worried. That is, until she remembered that she had closed the library early that day, and was fairly sure she had locked the door.

“Why,” she muttered to herself, picking up her pace as she moved through the quiet library, “do these things always happen in threes?”

“Is he dead?”

“I don’t think so.”

“How would you know?”

“Because,” Liesl said, her voice ringing with authority, “I saw my Grandma after she died, and she looked just like that.”

Olivia slid into the booth with a sigh.

“Bad day?” her cousin, Frieda, asked, look up from the menu.

“I finally quit my job,” Olivia said, with her head tilted back against the booth, eyes closed.

“Congrats!” Frieda said, putting down the menu. “You’ve been miserable for months. Now you can do something you actually want to do.”

“Yeah,” Olivia said, not moving, “but I don’t know what that is.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Frieda said, picking the menu back up. “You always do.” She grinned, “I do want to be there when you tell Grandma, though.”

Vivian popped a dark berry in her mouth, closing her eyes. “Don’t you just love blackberries?”

“I tend to prefer strawberries,” Austin replied, glancing at the plate stacked high with fruit on the table between them.

“Yes, strawberries are good as well,” Vivian said, selecting another blackberry from the pile, “but there is something about the mix of tart and sweet, in the subtle flavor, of a blackberry that just speaks to me.” She chuckled. “I guess that sounds weird, huh?”

“Not really,” Austin shrugged. “It means you are in touch with the world around you, I think.”

“Let go of me!”

“Liam, wait, wait!” Becka panted, trying to hold her brother back.

“I’m going to tear him limb from limb,” Liam grunted, his eyes never leaving the smug smile mocking them from the television. “I am going to go out there right now, and hunt him down, and I swear to god, Becka, I’m gonna kill him.”