Juliet Immortal

Maybe not ever.
    In the cold light of day, without Ben’s arms around me, the challenge of convincing him that the soul of the girl he loves has shifted into another body seems far more daunting. Not to mention the fact that I’ve yet to accomplish the shift. What if the spell doesn’t work? What if Romeo is right and loving him is the only way? What if the high Mercenary watching him finds a way to stop us before we reclaim our old forms? What if—
    My cell trills again. Ben. It has to be him, trying to let me know he won’t be coming back to school. I reach for the zipper on my bag.
    “Come on, Ariel. Let’s go.” Melanie tugs at my sleeve. “We’ll deal with Ben later. It’s time to think about
your
future right now.”
    I
am
thinking of my future.
Ben
is my future. At least, I hope he will be. I long for a tomorrow with him with a need that’s terrifying in its intensity. I want to run from this place. I want to go to him and hold him and promise him that everything will be okay, the way he promised me last night.
    Instead, I follow Melanie into the office.
    Everything isn’t okay. Everything is awful and time is running out.
    Gemma and I received a week of after-school detention, while Dylan—as a detention regular—was ordered to report every afternoon for the rest of the year. I lied and said Dylan and I had had a misunderstanding, Gemma refused to say anything at all, and Romeo apologized so many times Mrs. Felixfinally asked him to be quiet. No one was expelled or suspended. Not even Dylan, who’d allegedly earned a mandatory suspension for hitting another student. But he’s playing Tony in the play, which opens tonight. Mr. Stark told Mrs. Felix the production would have to be canceled if Dylan was banned from campus for a week, and she didn’t want to punish everyone who’d been working on the play.
    Or deal with phone calls from the parents of angry drama students.
    After one last dress rehearsal this afternoon, the show will go on, with Romeo in the lead. Even though he looks like hell, and is acting like a lunatic.
    We’re only ten minutes into third period and he’s already squirming in his seat, picking at the skin around his fingers, tugging at the scarf he’s still wearing knotted around his neck, though the air in the classroom is stifling. Mrs. Thurman always keeps it too warm. It’s unpleasant on a good day, but today, with the infant pig carcasses we’re about to dissect warming in their trays in the back of the room, the heat—and the accompanying stench—is almost unbearable.
    The metallic odor of blood mixes with the chemicals used to preserve the animals, turning the air thick and noxious, making everyone a little greener than usual. But nothing like Romeo. He’s rotting before my eyes. Dark veins creep away from his hairline in delicate swirls, and his lips are so bloodless they’re almost purple. I can’t keep from staring at him, from looking around the room to see if anyone else notices that Dylan Stroud is a dead man.
    We’re dead, Juliet. Dead. I see you as one dead, in the bottom of the tomb
. Romeo whispered the words to me as we crossedpaths in the hall before first period, and my stomach has been in knots ever since, even after I finally read the text messages from Ben.
    The first was from seven-forty-eight this morning:
I’ve been expelled. My brother’s going to send me to live with our great-aunt in L.A. tomorrow after I give my statement at the station. I can’t change his mind, but he won’t change mine, either. I love you. We’ll make everything work. Ben
.
    And then, only a few minutes later:
Meet me at the back door to the theater at intermission tonight. I’ll find a way to sneak out. I have to see you alone. I don’t want to say good-bye (even for just a few months) in front of the dictator
.
    The dictator. He’s angry with his brother, in the perfect state of mind to run away. If only I could pick up and run with him without worrying about slipping on a different skin. If only we could buy a one-way ticket to anywhere and leave tonight.
    “Mrs. Thurman?” Romeo shouts the teacher’s name, cutting off her lecture. His arm shoots into the air and stays there, trembling. “May I be excused?”
    Mrs. Thurman clasps the cross at her neck for a moment, thrown by the interruption, then waves him toward the door. “All right, Dylan, but hurry back. We’ve only got forty minutes. We need to get started, and you
will
be graded on team