“Okay,” Liesl said, with a slight catch in her voice.
“I will lead you as quickly as I can to a different opening between the worlds, and we will cross back. I don’t know what would happen to a living one who stayed too long on the Other Side. Nothing good, I imagine.”
Liesl nodded. Her heart was beating very fast, and all of a sudden her throat felt desperately dry.
“Are you ready?” Po asked.
“Now?”
“I don’t see any point in waiting,” Po said. “Do you?”
Liesl shook her head. Her excitement had been replaced with fear. She regretted, now, having made the suggestion in the first place. But she knew, in her heart of hearts, that there was no other way.
“All right,” Po said. “I will try to open a door for you.” At the last second the ghost said, “I don’t know how the Other Side will seem to you. It’s possible you’ll be frightened. It’s probable you’ll be confused. Perhaps it is better if you close your eyes. Follow the sound of my voice, and I will lead you through.”
Liesl nodded. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly.
She thought she heard the smallest ripping sound, like a sheet of tissue paper being torn in two. Then she felt a cold wind on her face.
“Hurry,” Po said, and Liesl could tell from the ghost’s voice that it was straining. “Step forward.”
Liesl stepped.
Suddenly all around her was howling, rushing confusion: the sensation of a thousand winds tearing at her from every side. The breath left her in an instant and she felt she was suffocating. She couldn’t move; she couldn’t breathe; her whole body felt like a scream.
And then she heard Po’s voice, but somehow its voice was inside of her: like one part of her mind was speaking to the other part.
“Go quickly,” the voice said. “Straight ahead. Don’t open your eyes. Listen to me. Listen only to me.”
Slowly, painfully, feeling as though she was moving through molasses, Liesl inched forward. The shrieking all around her grew worse; the wind tore at her skin and she felt her head would explode.
But she was aware of the sensation of Po inside of her, urging her forward: a comforting presence, but strange, too, like suddenly feeling a division down your middle and being two people. Bundle was there too, a wet and shaggy presence in her mind, all panting excitement and forward, forward, forward.
Liesl, carrying her ghostly friends inside of her Essence, walked the strange and twisted paths of the Other Side.
After what seemed like an eternity to Liesl—and was in fact both forever and the tiny, barest space between seconds at the same time, for those things have no meaning on the Other Side—Po spoke. Again its voice was strained.
“All right,” it said. “It is safe to cross back now.”
Liesl still had her eyes squeezed tightly shut. She was too scared to open them. She tried to move forward but hit a solid wall, directly in front of her.
“Come on!” Po urged her. “I cannot keep the door open forever.”
“I can’t!” Liesl cried out. “Something’s blocking me.”
“Nothing’s blocking you. You have to trust me.”
“I can feel it!” A sob was building in Liesl’s throat. “There’s a wall.”
“Liesl.” Po was speaking quietly, but she could feel the panic in its voice. “Liesl, the Other Side has started to take you. You are beginning to blur.”
Liesl felt she would cry. Her body was filled with an impossible, heavy weight, as though she had been filled from head to toe with sand.
Po continued speaking. Its voice was shaking; it could not keep the space between sides open forever. “When I tell you to, you must jump. Okay? You must throw yourself forward.”
“But—”
“No buts,” Po said sharply. “Just do it.”
“Okay,” Liesl said, though she knew it was impossible. She could no longer move. She was frozen, paralyzed; she would be picked apart by winds like a dead animal by vultures.
Suddenly Po’s voice was screaming in her mind. “Now, Liesl! Jump!”
Liesl willed her muscles to jump. She focused on the word with every single dark and dusty corner of her mind. She thought of the sparrows soaring off the roof of 31 Highland Avenue. She thought of air. She thought of her father.
And even though she moved only a tiny bit—just a mere fraction of an inch—it was enough. The bonds of the Other Side released her. She had the impression of an enormous tumble through space. She was in free fall; she wanted to scream. The shrieking winds around her reached a howling crescendo.
And then the winds and the shrieking stopped, and she was landing on her knees on damp, hard ground.
“You’re safe,” Po said. Its voice was outside of her again. “You can open your eyes.”