"Very good, Delia." Katie looked over the girl's shoulder at her paper. "Keep working on your spelling list."

"Thank you, Miss Gallagher." Delia beamed. "Some of these words are too hard for me. But Arabella helps me."

Katie knelt beside her. She spoke softly. "Delia, is Arabella here right now?"

The little girl smiled slightly. "No, but I can hear her in my head sometimes if I really try."

That thought sent a chill up her spine. Katie forced a smile and put her hand on top of Delia's head gently. "Well, tell her to stay out of there. We need the space for learning!"

"You're funny, Miss Gallagher." Delia laughed.

"Miss Gallagher, I've finished my English assignment." Blake held up his paper, uncharacteristically excited.

He was grinning, an expression she'd not seen since she got here. His eyes were bright and lively as she took his paper and returned his smile. "Well then, I will take a look at it and see how you did."

As soon as the page left his hand, however, his confidence faded. He frowned as Katie's eyes moved over the page. "I probably messed it up. I'm not very good at school."

"Blake, that's not true! This is very good." She smiled as she read. His writing had an enthusiasm, an energy, that must be hidden within his heart. If only she could find a way to bring it out into the open. "You've done very well, just in the week that I've been here."

Blake seemed to reluctantly cheer up. "Well... okay."

Katie watched as the boy warred with his own emotions, as if he wanted to be happy but was afraid to. She needed to find a way to raise Blake's self-esteem.

Clarissa stood and handed Katie a few pages. "I finished my writing assignment, too."

"Really?" Katie was pleasantly surprised. "You wrote a five-page story already?"

Clarissa smiled unkindly. "I was inspired."

"That's fantastic!" Katie looked over the pages. There were five full pages of script—no space gobbling tricks like wide margins, large writing, or blank lines, things other children in other households had tried to get away with. She was impressed. "I can't wait to read it!"

"Oh, you'll love it." Clarissa smirked. "It's about an unwanted nanny who just shows up one night."

"Oh?" Katie could not help the sting that word unwanted dealt her.

"And then she sticks her nose in everyone's business." Clarissa continued. "And tries to change the way everyone does things."

Katie tried not to show it bothered her. After all, Clarissa was working through a lot of emotions. She was a child and Katie was the adult here. She thinned her lips in a toothless smile. "Well, that sounds very interesting. How does it end?"

Clarissa shrugged. "You'll have to wait and see."

"Well, that's quite imaginative." Katie said. "I like the way you used a real-life situation and turned it into a fictional narrative. Very creative."

Clarissa frowned, unhappy with the response. "Whatever."

"No, I'm very excited." Katie insisted. She put the pages into her lesson plan book and tapped the cover reverently. "That shows me some very complex thought processes are going on and you're able to harness those thoughts effectively and artistically. I can't wait to see how you channel that passion into all your assignments."

Clarissa frowned, disappointed that her plan to intimidate Katie was backfiring so profoundly. "Whatever."

"Oh no. I'm serious. Such a vivid imagination should be encouraged." Katie smiled broadly. "And who knows? You might really enjoy writing."

"Whatever." Clarissa sighed. "Are we done here?"

Katie raised her eyebrows in challenge. "Are we?"

Clarissa rolled her eyes and headed toward the door.

"Remember to read Chapter Three for tomorrow." Katie gestured back to the table, where Clarissa had left her books. "I will want to get your opinion on what the author was really trying to say in that chapter."

Clarissa sighed and headed back to the table for her books. "Fine."

"And clean up your workspace before you leave." Katie added.

Clarissa grumbled, but she did as she was told.

At the other table, Blake and Delia smiled to themselves and continued their writing assignments. Katie smiled down at them. They were adapting quickly to her presence, but she had to find a way to get through to Clarissa.

**

Katie scrolled down on her tablet, her eyes tired from staring at the screen so long. The internet was such a huge trove of information, sometimes she just got lost in it. She had started out reading about grief counseling for children, which progressed to art therapy. Then, she read some interesting articles about analyzing children's artwork to gain insight into their psychology.

From there, she read about childhood fears and trauma. And then she was reading about children who said they had seen ghosts or communicated with ghosts. Then, there was article after article about ghosts who intervened in a child's life to give them some message that would guide them, and sometimes even save their lives.

Suddenly, Katie realized that she had somehow shifted her focus from what was going on with the Barrington children to what had happened to her as a child. That realization was both startling and disturbing. She had learned a long time ago that seeing Grandma was just how her child brain processed the loss. Or, rather, she had tried to learn that. Mom had said Katie was hurting herself by clinging to a delusion, that she was hurting her with it, too. Grandma was gone. She couldn't talk to Katie or anyone else. She could not appear in her bedroom and try to give her a message.

Except, Katie knew that she did. She knew Grandma was gone, but also not gone. She knew Grandma could not be with her, but also that she did visit Katie. She knew Grandma was trying to tell her something important. But she also knew that she didn't want to hurt Mom, and so she had learned to pretend not to see Grandma's ghost.

Until she really didn't see her anymore. Katie set the tablet on the nightstand and turned off the light. She sighed.

What had Ravensong said about her Grandmother? I know her very well. Know her. Present tense. But Grandma had been gone for over 20 years. She couldn't possibly know Grandma. She had misspoken. Why was Katie so fixated on a simple error in speech, anyway?

Because. What if Grandma appeared to Ravensong, the way she had appeared to Katie? What if Grandma had given up on Katie, after Katie turned away from her? What if Ravensong was the one Grandma loved now?

No, Grandma loved her. Even if Katie had rejected the idea of communication with her spirit. Grandma would not have given up on her. She closed her eyes and tried to remember Grandma, as she was when she was alive. She could almost picture her, singing her strange, silly songs, and teaching Katie to write in their special code.

"One, two. The light in you." Katie whispered, suddenly remembering a counting rhyme she had learned as a child. "Three, four. An open door."

The memory of saying this little poem with Grandma flooded in, along with a host of emotion. She tried to remember the next lines but couldn't. It was likely something Grandma had made up, that no one knew except the two of them. And now, if she couldn't remember, that part of Grandma would be lost forever.

"Three, four. An open door." Katie repeated, but her memory was not jarred. She squeezed her eyes shut and tears fled the corners. "Three, four. An open door."

She could not remember.

**

Five-year-old Katie walked into the kitchen in the middle of the night. She wasn't sure what had drawn her there, but she knew she had to be there. She pulled a chair out of the kitchen table and sat down across from Grandma. The lights were still off, but the light from a nearly full moon shone through the window, illuminating the room well enough.

"Grandma!" Katie hopped up onto the chair. "I missed you!"

Grandma smiled and nodded. She opened her mouth to say something, but no sound came out. She looked a little frustrated and tried again.

"Can't you talk, Grandma?" Katie asked. "What's wrong?"

Grandma shook her head and smiled, to reassure her. Then she tried once more to speak, but the word came out very soft, almost too soft to hear.

"Katie..."