“Paul Michael, I can’t do this,” I whispered finally. “Please, I need to get out of here. Can we go home?”
“Greg, Sadie is having a pretty tough time…” Paul Michael began. Greg didn’t seem to hear.
“Sadie, I love you,” Greg said.
“I love you!” I shouted back, as though it would make him hear. Paul Michael repeated the words and Greg nodded sadly. I stared at the asphalt under my feet.
“Thank you for letting us stop by, Greg,” Paul Michael said. I walked towards him without turning to look back at Greg.
“Can’t you stay for a little longer?” Greg asked. “Does she have to go right now?” His voice was manic. He couldn’t see me. He couldn’t hear me. He had no way of knowing I was there without my brother telling him so. But he wanted me to stay.
Paul Michael looked down at me. I shook my head.
“I’m sorry. She’s being called back to the spirit world,” Paul Michael lied.
I hadn’t known he was capable of lying.
As Paul Michael and I walked away, I heard Greg’s rough tenor singing Springsteen’s “Sandy.” Greg had always said that Sandy and Sadie were close enough for the song to be about me. As he sang to the stars, I hummed along, hoping that some notes would make their way back to him.
“Please don’t say I told you so,” I whispered to Paul Michael as Greg’s voice grew quiet behind us.
“I won’t,” he said. And he didn’t say anything else the rest of the way home.
Above me, I thought I could see the flames around Cygnus as the broken airplane constellation fell from the heavens in a crash landing.