Chapter 1 Summary

Susannah is a 16-year-old girl who recently moved to northern California with her mother because her mother remarried. Susannah is in the priest and principal's office of her private school. Both Susannah and Father Dominic are mediators, which are people who can see the dead and help lead them into their afterlife. Father Dominic is lecturing Susannah about not beating up ghosts to help mediate them. During the lecture, Susannah is trying not to itch the poison oak she acquired while spying on one of her stepbrothers, Brad, whom she calls Dopey. She's peeking in the window of the pool house where he is making out with Debbie Mancuso and she stumbles into poison oak bushes when she is walking away. At the pool party, Susannah also dances with her first boy ever. Father Dominic asks if Susannah has experienced any other paranormal...