Even before he turned to leave, Mary could see the information taking effect;
his mouth was shrinking back to sensible proportions.
In her book Spectral Visions: An Afterlight’s Guide to Looking One’s Best, Mary Hightower writes, “If, at times, you find others looking at you strangely, and you don’t know why, chances are you’re losing touch with your own self-image.
That is to say, your body, or your face, is beginning to distort. Remember, we look the way we look only because we remember looking like that. If you forget that your eyes are blue, they may just turn purple. If you forget that human beings have ten fingers, you may suddenly end up with twelve.
A simple remedy to image-loss is to find a picture that you think resembles you — and if you happened to have crossed over with an actual picture of yourself, all the better. Study the picture. Take in as much detail as you can. Once the image is firmly in your mind, you’ll start looking like your old self in no time. Never underestimate the importance of remembering how you looked in life.
Unless, of course, you’d rather forget.”
Chapter 6
Scavengers Nick remembered everything about his life in perfect detail. How he looked, how his parents looked, what he had for lunch before the miserable accident that landed him here. It troubled him, though, that Lief had become such a blank slate over the years he had been in his forest. If memories aged badly, fading like an old newspaper, how long until Nick suffered the same loss? He didn’t want to forget anything.
Having been used to travel at sixty-five miles per hour, Nick’s southbound trek with Allie was a slow one. Hiking was not one of Nick’s favorite activities. In life it would make his joints ache, and he would invariably stumble on some rude protrusion of nature, and skin a knee. This hike-after-death was no more pleasant. True, the bruises and body aches were gone, but he could not deny how thirsty it made him. Thirsty and hungry. Lief had told them that they no longer needed to eat or drink, anymore than they needed to breathe, but it still didn’t stop the craving. “You get used to it,” Lief had told them, back in the forest.
people thought of her as a god. She had no desire to be a god, but she did like the respect and honor with which she was now treated. Of course, she did have her enemies, and they called her less flattering things, but always from a safe distance.
Today her view from the top floor was magnificent, and sometimes she swore she could see the whole world from here. Yet she knew it was a world that had gone on without her. Far below the traffic of the living world passed, dots of buses and taxis in constant congestion. Let them go about their business, she thought.
It means nothing to me. My concern is this world, not theirs.
A knock at the door drew her attention away from the view. In a moment Stradivarius stepped in, a mousy boy with tufts of tightly curled blond hair.
“What is it, Vari?”
“A Finder’s here to see you, Miss Mary. He says he’s got something really good.”
Mary sighed. Everyone called themselves “Finders” these days. Usually they had never actually found anything of importance. A scrap of paper, a piece of driftwood, maybe. The true Finders had far better goods. They were masters at what they did, and knew all the circumstances that could cause an object to cross over into Everlost. The true Finders were few.
“Is this someone we’ve seen before?”
“I think so,” said Stradivarius. “And I think he’s got real food!”
This news caught Mary’s attention, although she tried not to show Vari how much.
She was good at keeping her emotions to herself, but if the Finder truly had food that had crossed over from the living world, it would be hard to contain herself.
“Show him in.”
Vari slipped out, and returned with a young man, about thirteen years old, wearing nothing but a bathing suit, its waistband hidden by a pasty root-beer belly. Well, thought Mary, we can’t choose the moment and manner of our crowding. Just as this boy was condemned to travel eternity in a wet bathing suit, she was consigned to the most uncomfortable school dress she owned. The only good thing about it was that it was green and matched her eyes.
“Hi, Miss Mary,” the Finder said, respectfully. “You remember me, right?” He smiled, but his mouth stretched much too wide, and he had far too many teeth, giving the impression that she could tip back the top of his head like a boy-shaped cookie jar.
“Yes, I remember you. You’re Speedo, from New Jersey. The last time you came, you brought an orange, wasn’t it?”
“Grapefruit!” he said, thrilled to be remembered.
It had been a long time since she had last seen this particular Finder, but how could she forget that bathing suit? “What did you bring today?”
His smile stretched even wider. Now he was teeth all the way to his ears. “I brought something fantastic!…How would you like a little…dessert?”
“Dessert?” said Mary. “Please don’t tell me you’ve brought some of those horrid fortune cookies!”
Clearly Speedo was offended by the suggestion. “I’m a Finder, Miss Mary. I know better than to waste your time with fortune cookies. I won’t even touch them.”
“That’s very wise,” Mary told him. “And I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to insult you.