As soon as Jace arrives at school the next day, the three musketeers from yesterday show up, too. This is not how he wanted to start his day.

"Did you see the ghost again?" Harry asks excitedly.

"Calm down," Sam advises him, putting a hand on his shoulder. "We're professionals, remember?"

Harry swallows hard and nods, suddenly standing up straighter, as if his posture is the difference between an amateur and a professional. "Right, right, sorry." He clears his throat and asks again, "Any sign of the spirit, Jace?"

Jace racks his brain for a lie, spitting out the first one he thinks of. "Yeah, actually, I think so. I got home and one of the chairs was gone. I don't know if my dad just got rid of it or what, but it's not in the living room anymore." He shrugs dismissively, as if to say what can you do?

The blonde girl nods. "Because he needed a place to sit, obviously. That one's pretty self explanatory. He didn't like the living room because it's the center of attention, so he moved it somewhere quieter. He might bring it back, and he might not."

"Uh huh, and... what's your name again?"

"Oh, I'm Taylor," she says.

"Okay, Taylor, just, little question," Jace says, trying to disguise how stupid he think their ghost theory is as curiosity. "If the ghost moved the chair, shouldn't I still see the chair somewhere else? You know, because he's still in my house, and if he's still there, shouldn't my chair still be there, too? Just so I know where to find my chair, of course."

"No, see, he's a ghost, right?" Harry explains. "So he's — he's —" He gestures vaguely, searching for the right word.

"Incorporeal," Sam substitutes.

Harry nods. "Yeah, he's incorporeal. He's not from this world, ya know? So he's not really in this world. And since he's not in this world, he can't really touch anything in this world."

"Well, he can —" Sam begins, but Harry cuts him off.

"Or doesn't usually touch things. It's harder for him than it would be for us, so when he took the chair, he brought it into his world. It was a lot of work at first, but then he could relax with the chair as long as he wanted, instead of a little bit of work over a long period of time. Make sense?"

Jace gapes at him. Who thinks of that stuff? It's the most ridiculous thing they've said so far, and he can't imagine how it's going to get worse, but he's sure it will.

"He's not really in another world, though," Taylor adds. "I mean, he is, but he isn't. That's why he's still here. He's half in our world and half in the afterlife, which is why he can take things from our world and bring them into the Halfworld. Sometimes they bring them back to our world, and sometimes they don't."

Jace nods slowly. He bites back a sarcastic remark, instead saying. "Uh huh, of course. That makes sense. I should have known."

"Don't feel bad," Sam says reassuringly. "It's very complicated stuff. We only know this because this is what we do. We hunt ghosts."

"Well, find," Harry clarifies. "We find ghosts. We don't hunt them."

Jace nods as if he's interested. "And how many ghosts have you found so far?"

"Oh, tons!" Taylor replies proudly.

"Really," Jace deadpans. "I'm surprised I haven't heard of you yet. You know, since you've found actual ghosts."

The three exchange a look that Jace can't decode, and Harry explains haltingly, "Some people don't think our evidence is... valid... but we know what we saw. They were ghosts." His friends nod in agreement.

Jace bites back a sigh. Why, out of everyone in the school, is he stuck with these losers?