Chapter 1

Later, people would ask her what it was like.

"Death?" Nora would ask casually, as if she were a frequent traveler to this other realm with a return ticket. "Nothing like you could ever imagine." Which she knew wasn't terribly illuminating, but it was the best she could do. It was beyond her ability to account for her near-death experience. How could she adequately describe finding herself wedged into the frayed seam between life and death, neither alive nor dead, like some philosophical riddle on a college entrance exam?

Her response was inevitably followed by a pause in which the listener would politely wait for her to imagine for them. But that was all she had the words for. "You kind of had to be there," she'd say.

She hated when people said that.

She didn't want to be coy, but that extraordinary event was too precious, and too complicated, to try to put into words. It separated her new, improved life from the life she'd had in the Before, and it was deeply personal. Dying, then coming back to life, had altered her at the cellular level. She felt reimagined and reinvigorated, capable of things she'd never even contemplated, like rock climbing and trigonometry. Not that she intended to tackle either of those things—at least she didn't think so; it was simply knowing that she could. How hard could anything be after surviving death? Her optimism was as high as if she'd been shot through with vats of B12 and Pacific sunsets.

She had no idea how she'd shown up at death's door or how she'd died. And yet, the facts were irrefutable—she'd been clinically dead, having spent several minutes underwater.

The November family was not particularly religious except when it served a purpose... like when an important client invited them to Easter church services and her father made them all attend. Still, Nora was familiar with the traditional symbols and had expected pearly gates and cherubs with lutes flitting around her. At the very least, the angel Gabriel checking in newcomers. Or Lucifer ushering the ones who'd found themselves at the wrong entrance into the fiery pits of hell. But when she died, there was nothing to suggest that she'd entered another realm.

Early in her legal career, she'd represented a family whose car had been hit by a casket. A truck was carrying several of the company's best sellers when the chain holding them on the back of a flatbed broke. The caskets bounced off and onto the highway, piling up like a giant version of the game Jenga. In preparation for that case, Nora had seen so many caskets that it was inevitable she would think about being stuck in one and planted six feet deep in the ground for all eternity. Not unreasonably, given the dimensions of your average casket, she'd imagined cold and lonely, dark and cramped.

It was a great surprise, therefore, to discover that death was, in fact, deliciously warm, like the first spring day after a long winter or the warmth she remembered feeling in her grandmother's kitchen.

It wasn't dark either—she'd found herself lying in a field bathed in soft gold light, the color of dusk on an autumn evening. Not the light of the sun, exactly, but something richer, soaking into her like cream on cake.

Nor had she anticipated beautiful, ethereal birdsong. It reminded her of childhood summers she'd spent at the family ranch in the Hill Country, where she'd wake every morning to the chirping and singing of mockingbirds. She'd loved their chatter.

Her father had not. "What is making all that racket?" he'd bellow. Then one morning a man in a blue work shirt and stained trucker hat pulled up in a pickup truck hauling a strange-looking cylindrical thing. "This will get rid of the birds, the neighbors, and anything else you don't want," he'd said and patted it like it was a dog. It turned out to be a cannon, which he and Dad gleefully fired, the massive boom reverberating through the hills like a Revolutionary cavalry. In the kitchen, two empty glasses shimmied right off the edge of the counter and shattered on the tile floor.

The mockingbirds didn't come back. Neither did the squirrels.

On the day she died, Nora thought maybe the mockingbirds were in that golden field with her. They sounded better than a symphony, the only thing she knew to compare it to... but even that description trivialized what she heard.

The sensations—the warmth, the light, the sound—had put her in a state of perfect tranquility, and while she'd understood she was most likely dead, she couldn't grasp why she was dead.

She'd sat up, feeling certain that the precipitating event to one's death would stick out in memory, right up there with weddings and births and heartbreak. Or, at the very least, there would be a clue nearby. Like the twisted metal of a car. Or a gun.

There was nothing.

She noticed she was wearing her favorite dress, the one she'd worn to her she-passed-the-bar-exam party her parents had thrown for her at the Headliners Club in Austin. It was pale blue with off-the-shoulder straps and a sparkling skirt over tulle. That night was the one time in her life she'd felt like a princess—beautiful and enchanting and proud and unreachable.

If she had to be dead, she was happy that at least she was stylish about it.

Her joy—and it was joy—felt like champagne bubbling in her veins. She glittered in the same way she had when she fell in love for the first time with dreamy Ramon Toledo in the ninth grade, but on a supernova level. She felt pure and unfiltered, free of every single burden she'd ever felt in her entire life, floating away from all the worries that had been her constant companions through thirty-one years of living. It was an extraordinary amalgam of orgasm and Christmas morning and a baby's laugh all rolled into one.

She marveled at the spectacular view around her—the field of gold, the deep green of a distant tree line. And just ahead, a lush, verdant garden where the light seemed a little brighter, beckoning her.

She began to move, but a dog's bark stopped her—and not just any bark. She turned to see a shaggy black-and-white dog racing toward her, and her heart immediately swelled. "Roxie?" The word was more of a croak because something was lodged in her throat. She tried again, but nothing would come. She was overcome with happiness—this was the dog she'd raised from a pup, her constant companion, her best friend during those periods in her life when no one else would be, who'd crossed the rainbow bridge when she was in college. Roxie leapt into her arms and began to lick her face. Nora could feel the solid weight of Roxie's body against her, could feel the wet slurp of her tongue against her cheek. She buried her face in Roxie's fur. She smelled like flowers.

Death was fantastic! Everything around her was bursting with color, the air was crisp and clean, she was beautiful, and Roxie was here. When had she ever felt such peace?

She looked toward the garden again and felt an urgent need to get there. The mechanics of movement required no effort—she glided along. Roxie led the way, trotting ahead, then circling back to make sure Nora was coming.

When they reached the garden, her dog disappeared into one of the deep rows, her snout to the ground. Nora could barely absorb all the beauty in that garden. The shrubs were kaleidoscope shades of green, the fruit trees as tall as buildings. A patch of peonies as big as dinner plates intruded onto the path, bursting with colors she'd never seen in life. She wanted to feel every velvety vine and silky petal. She wanted to drink the heady scent of floral and clover. She wanted to bathe in the petals of perfect flowers and eat the fruits that hung ripe for the plucking.

A contented hum filtered into her conscience. She glided deeper into the garden in search of the source and spotted a being standing amid tomato plants that grew like trees. Roxie trotted right up to the being, and it said, "Hello, Roxie, hello, old girl. I wondered where you'd got off to."

Nora's heart immediately climbed to her throat. "Grandpa?"

Grandpa turned and smiled. It really was him, her beloved grandfather, gone from her life too soon. "Well, hello, Nora," he said cheerfully. "I wasn't expecting you yet."

A swift and deep rush of love washed over her—she'd always loved her maternal grandfather best of all, had missed him so much it hurt. But she'd forgotten until that moment what it felt like to love him. Safe.Weightless and free to be exactly who she was. He'd always protected her, advised her, listenedto her. No one had ever made her feel quite so loved as he had.

Grandpa looked good. Ageless. A perfect specimen of a grandfather. He was wearing his typical spacious denims with the cavernous pockets. He'd always kept surprises in those pockets for Nora and her younger sister, Lacey: A robin's egg. Seeds. Hard candy. He had his familiar red wagon by his side, his ratty sun hat atop his head. Once, she'd gifted him with a new sun hat. He'd hung it proudly in the mudroom, but he never wore it—he preferred his old sun hat for working in the garden.

Nora tried again to speak and croaked, "Grandpa! I'm dead!" She must be, if she was here with Grandpa. But she wasn't certain if he understood what was happening and felt it was important to explain why she was here.

"Well, you look beautiful. Come over here and give me a hand, will you?"

Paradise. That's where she was. She was with Grandpa and Roxie in a stunning garden, and it was absolute paradise.

Grandpa turned back to the tomato plants and cut a tomato as big as a volleyball from the vine and placed it in his wagon. He cut another one and bit into it, juice dripping down his chin. "That's good." He held up the tomato for her to take a bite. The burst of flavor in her mouth was so shockingly delicious that she never wanted to eat anything else ever again.

"I've got an excellent crop," Grandpa said proudly. He cut two more from the vine and put them in his red wagon. "It's the compost. You get some great compost here." He moved down the path.

She grabbed the wagon handle, trailing behind him like she always had during those summers spent with her grandparents at the ranch. She'd follow him for hours, pulling the red wagon and saying aloud every thought that popped into her mind, no matter how trivial. He never tired of her. When she asked if she could be in the rodeo when she grew up (because her sister said she couldn't), Grandpa said she could be anything she wanted to be in the whole entire world. When she pondered if she wanted to be Mandy Grant's friend anymore because Mandy had told Kelly, who told Sariah, who told Nora that Mandy thought Nora's hair was cut like a boy's, Grandpa said she could be friends with whomever she pleased, but that he didn't think a haircut was something to end a friendship over. The point being, he listened.

As she followed him now, Nora noticed the light near the back of the garden seemed to be expanding onto the path they were on. It was getting brighter, turning from gold to pale yellow to almost white. It reminded her of a veil—something shimmering and beautiful was behind that bright light. "Is that a lake?"

"Don't look back there, kid. Look at this squash." Grandpa held up a yellow squash the size and shape of a baseball bat like he was the Lion King holding his cub. He put it in the wagon. "You like salad, Nora?"

"I love salad." She stated this with an enthusiasm she'd never felt about salad.

"You know what the secret is to a good salad?"

The secret to a good salad was the dessert that came after, but she gave it her best guess. "Dressing?"

"Nah, dressing is superficial—you pour it on top to make it look good. A good salad is about the ingredients underneath the dressing. You gotta have the right mix of flavors. Too much of one thing throws the whole salad off. Not enough of another thing, it's boring. Do you understand?"

She understood the words, but they seemed to be dripping with meaning she couldn't grasp.

Grandpa produced a perfect watermelon crescent. He bit into it, then handed it to her to taste. "Do you remember what I told you makes for a good watermelon?"

"Lots of water," she said automatically.

Grandpa smiled proudly.

It was weird that she could remember some things with vivid clarity, but other things were murkier. Like how she'd gotten here.

A movement caught her eye—a stately Black gentleman dressed in a lab coat was standing beneath some orange trees. Jesus? But that didn't seem right because Nora was pretty sure Jesus wouldn't be there for her. He'd have nuns and other devout people he needed to greet. Still, she had a feeling she knew who the man was, but his identity slipped out of reach.

She turned back to the man who had shaped her life. The surge of love she felt for him was so great that she could barely physically contain it. But then something hard clamped down on her chest, making it difficult to breathe. She sensed her grandfather was about to slip away. Her euphoria began to sink under the weight of fear he wouldn't take her with him. "Grandpa, I'm so sorry—"

"Earthly concerns have no place here, Nora. They go in the compost bin. Come on, bring the wagon."

She tried to swallow, but the fear of losing him was stuck in her throat, choking her. She followed Grandpa, glancing over her shoulder at the shimmering white light again. She was desperate to stay here with him, where she was safe and loved.

"Don't look there, sweetie. Now, what are you growing in your garden? Did you tend my plot?"

When Grandma died, Grandpa sold the ranch and moved into senior living in Austin, where he got himself a plot in a community garden. Nora had solemnly promised that if anything ever happened to him, she'd take care of it.

A different sensation flooded her, hot and potent. Oh, she knew that feeling—it was shame, and it stung like the devil. She looked around for Roxie, needing her support. Roxie was gone.

"I never went, Grandpa." Her voice had grown shaky and coarse. She tried to clear her throat again, but that thing.It tasted bitter, like a big ball of regret.

The man in the lab coat was suddenly beside her. He put a hand on her arm and smiled kindly. "Just breathe."

Nora ignored him. "I didn't go, Grandpa. I didn't—"

"That's okay, Nora." Grandpa's smile sent a shock of warmth and forgiveness through her. "Look at these." They'd come upon a rosebush in full bloom, each flower at peak. "See how each petal is perfectly shaped and placed? And yet each one is unique. Magnificent, aren't they? Reminds me of the exhibit we talked about seeing at the Laguna Gloria art museum. Did you get to see it?"

"No." She felt small and plodding. Images and thoughts flew at her, scenes from her life, bits and pieces of the mundane mixed with terrible upheaval. Her thoughts were racing through all the things she'd meant to do but never had. The list of things left undone sailed past her like a flock of swallows. There were so many.

Grandpa gave her a reassuring smile. "You're a good girl, Nora. But you must believe in yourself." Love radiated from him, wrapping around her and holding her close, banishing her shame. She turned, trying to see the bright light, but she couldn't turn her head enough—something was blocking her.

"Just breathe," the man in the lab coat whispered.

Everything started to go all Alice in Wonderland. The bright light was fading away, sucking up all the warmth as it went. Grandpa's love was fading. Everything was turning cold.

"Nora? Listen to me now."

She felt heavier. Distressed. She looked down—her beautiful dress had turned to gray cotton. She was slowly slipping into a dark hole that felt like the death she would have expected. Was she going to really die now? "Grandpa?" She tried to reach for him, but her arms were useless. She was desperate to hang on to the one person she felt had truly loved her. To the only person in her life who seemed to understand who she was.

"It will be all right, kid. This is the season to grow your garden. Plant what you need to make a good salad. Throw some nuts in there! Have a little fun!"

Nora couldn't breathe. She didn't want to go back to whatever had been before. "I want to stay!"

"Not now, sweetie." Grandpa's voice was even farther away. "You left too many things undone."

She tried to ask what, but her throat felt clogged. Grandpa was moving down the path with surprising speed. He whistled, and Roxie trotted out from between two bushes to join him. Nora was still gripping the wagon. "Wait!" she screamed.

But it was too late—everything had faded, and she had the sensation of falling into a dark, inky nothing. Hell, probably—what else could it be?

She fell and she fell and she fell for what seemed a very long time.

And then she woke up.