Picking myself up, I followed him.
I caught up to them on the green. They were in front of the great oak, teetering around the gaping hole that Nathaniel had been buried in. Maintenance hadn’t filled it in yet, but had sequestered it with caution tape, leaving only one thin rope ladder dangling into the pit. Gideon stepped around the hole and Dante followed, thrusting the shovel at him. Every time Dante swung at Gideon, Gideon seemed to move out of the way at just the right moment—a hop, a swish, an arabesque, in an elaborate gentleman’s ballet.
I circled them as Dante raised the shovel over Gideon’s head. I closed my eyes, not wanting to see the outcome, even though I knew they were both already dead. But just as Dante brought the shovel down over Gideon’s skull, Gideon ducked away and grabbed the shovel from him, splitting it into shards.
The rest happened quickly. Gideon tackled Dante, thrusting him into the dirt by his neck, pushing him dangerously close to the edge of the hole. If Dante fell in, that would be the end. He couldn’t go underground, and the hole was at least fifteen feet deep. I wouldn’t be able to get him out by myself before Gideon took my soul. In horror, I watched as Gideon stood over Dante, one hand around his neck. I had to do something. I was a Monitor. I was supposed be able to handle this.
Without thinking, I picked up a broken shard of Dante’s shovel and ran up behind them. With all the force I could muster, I thrust it into Gideon’s back.
Surprised, he spun around and threw me off, pulling the shard from his back and stalking toward me, his shirt bloodied and ripped. I inched back on the grass as he loomed over me, holding the jagged shovel. Just before I closed my eyes, Dante took him from behind, and Gideon fell on top of me, pushing the wooden shard into my skin. I winced as I tried to pull the handle out of my side while they grappled around me, their bodies nudging the wood shard deeper into my stomach.
Slowly, their grunts seemed to fade as my eyes fluttered. And as I let them close, I heard Dante calling my name, clutching my hand as we both fell through the caution tape into the deep, dusty hole.
With a cry, I pulled the handle of the shovel from my side and opened my eyes. I was lying in a mound of soil and rock in the catacomb beneath the great oak. Across the cavern, I could see Gideon’s grass-stained pants and loafers, limp.
“Dante?” My voice echoed through the darkness as I dug through the dirt and felt his arm beside me. “Dante!” Brushing the soil off him, I took him in my arms and tried to wake him. “We’re underground,” I whispered. “What do I do?” He was barely conscious.
Mustering up courage, I wiped the dirt from my face and stood. “Don’t worry,” I said, trying to pick him up. “I’m going to get us out of here.” But as much as I tried, I couldn’t lift him. Sinking to the ground, I wrapped my hands around his neck and buried my face in his shirt.
“Dante, please wake up,” I pleaded. “I’m not strong enough. I can’t carry you out.”
As if I had willed it, his lips moved. I watched as they parted slightly, taking in a faint breath. And sitting there beside him, watching him die, I knew what I had to do.
Why is it that you enjoy life the most when you’re about to lose it? The only way I could save Dante was to give him my soul. I was going to die. Strangely enough, the realization only made me feel more alive. I took one last look at the world. Somewhere far away, Annie was sitting down for dinner with her family; my grandfather was sipping tea and watching the evening news; and the girls on my floor were finishing up their homework and getting ready to crawl into bed. I felt as if I were worlds away from them. They had time to take it all for granted—all the small pleasures in life that I was already beginning to miss—the first cool breath of fall, the empty silence you hear just after turning off the television, the smell of chicken roasting in an oven. These things only existed in my mind now, and soon, even that would be gone.
I let my eyes travel across Dante one last time—his nose, his lips, his eyes, now closed. It all seemed familiar yet somehow still unexplored. This is what it meant to feel: realizing that part of the value in life is knowing that everything around you could be taken away. I loved him, I thought, already thinking in past tense. I love him. This would be my good-bye.
I lifted my hand to his cheek, touching his skin for the last time, and I pulled him toward me, until my lips grazed his.
“I love you,” I said.
And I gave him a kiss. A real kiss. Because if I had anything left to give, I wanted to give it.
Suddenly I felt his hand on the back of my neck, pulling me toward him with a force I had never experienced before. Unable to help myself, I succumbed to his embrace. The air escaped my lungs. I gasped and grabbed at the grass. And the world as I knew it faded away.
CHAPTER 19
The Untimely Death of Dante Berlin
I COLLAPSED ON THE GRASS. SLOWLY, I FELT ALL OF the warmth in my body leave me, as if it were being pulled from my mouth like a thin thread of air. And as it left me, all of my memories began to unravel. Scenes from a previous life flashed through my mind and then vanished, the people and places distorted and dreamlike. Annie, my parents, California, Wes—I could barely recognize them before they disappeared; their figures fleeting and unreal, as if my entire life before Gottfried had been imagined. I grew weak. My breathing became thin. And then suddenly I woke up.
I was outside the girls’ dormitory, lying on the grass by the stoop. It was nighttime. Was I dead? I wasn’t sure. I stretched and stood up, but I didn’t feel the same. It felt like I had been lying there for hours. I was wearing clothing that was strangely familiar, yet not mine—an oxford shirt and a pair of pants that were worn at the knees. I was about to lean over and examine them when I heard movement around the side of the building, the soft padding of footsteps against the ground. Quickly, I ducked into the shadows and waited.
But the person who emerged wasn’t the headmistress or Mrs. Lynch. It was me. I was in my coat, my brown hair dangling freely over my shoulders. I looked pretty, I thought.
Unable to control my mouth, I uttered one word. “Renée.”
She turned to me, her look of surprise fading into relief as she put a finger to her lips and pulled me behind the building.
“I looked for you in the nurses’ wing, but you weren’t there. Are you okay?” The words came out of my mouth before I realized what I was saying. They were the same phrases Dante had said to me earlier that night, before Mrs. Lynch escorted us to the headmistress’s office. I tried to stop speaking, but my body was out of my control.