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walk among us, to help us. Oh, Willow, I couldn’t believe it when he really came back again. He’s promised that he’ll always be there for me. I — I’m happier than I’ve ever been in my life.”
    And she was, but I could sense that she was also the most miserable. But before I could say anything else, Beth leaned forward, gripping my hand as the words burst out of her: “I just feel like school and clubs and all that — they don’t have any meaning anymore, not when all that is out there.” She waved her free hand in the air. “Angels are
real,
and that means  . . .  Well, why am I bothering with anything else?”
    I stared at her. “What are you saying?”
    There was a pause as Beth gazed down at the dining table, tracing a pattern on the lace tablecloth. Finally she took a deep breath and looked me squarely in the eyes. “I’m thinking of dropping out of school and joining the Church of Angels.”
    I opened my mouth and then slowly closed it again, at a loss for words. The Church of Angels was this massive church that had sprung up out of nowhere in the last couple of years. More like a cult, really. I was always seeing their commercials on TV: lots of blissed-out-looking people going on about how the angels were pure love and had helped them with practically every problem known to humankind.
    “Yes, and helped them empty their bank accounts to boot,” Aunt Jo always sniffed.
    Beth was still talking. “Now that I know angels exist, I want to be with people who know what I know, who’ve seen angels, too, who
understand
. And my angel’s told me that if I join, we can really be together. But then when I think of my parents  . . . ” She trailed off, her eyes bright with tears. She fumbled in her purse for a tissue. “I tried to talk to them about it, you know. Joining the Church, I mean. It was awful. They said I’d be throwing my life away and that if I was that ungrateful for all the advantages I’ve had, then they wouldn’t lift a finger to stop me.” Choking back a sob, she dabbed at her eyes, shaking her head. “I don’t know. When I’m away from the angel, it all feels sort of — unreal. But at the same time, it’s the most real thing in my life. How can I ignore it?”
    She looked up at me, her gaze pleading. “Willow, can you tell me what to do?”
    At a loss
for words
is an understatement. I’d never felt so taken aback in my life. “Let me see what I can find out,” I said finally.
    Closing my eyes, I pushed away my turbulent thoughts and went deep within myself, searching for Beth’s possible futures. They grew before me like a tree, branching and dividing with each choice she might make in her life. Mentally, I blinked. With most people, this map of what might come looked golden and glowing, but Beth’s was dull. Stunted. Even worse, her tree had only two main branches: a pair of twisted, spindly boughs that grew up from the trunk in a wobbly
V
shape.
    I stared at them in dread. How could this be? Beth’s future held only
two
likely possibilities  . . .  and neither of them looked great. I explored the first branch and felt my heart clench. Oh, my God, poor Beth. Praying that the second branch would be more hopeful, I turned to it — and felt a strange chill settle over me. Images flashed past, but they were jumbled; any details just slithered away into a cloud of gray as I tried to focus on them. Even so, I caught my breath at the sheer, bone-wrenching coldness of this future. Whatever the gray cloud meant, it felt utterly final, like a gravestone with mist curling over it.
    My eyes flew open. “Beth, you’ve got to listen to me; the angel isn’t good for you,” I said urgently, my words tumbling over each other. “It’s hurting you. The best thing you could do is to never go back to that stream again. It might still find you, but there’s a chance it’ll let you go, and then you could —”
    Beth gasped, yanking her hand away from mine. “No!” she