He seems a lot more comfortable now that his chest is bound adequately, though. I’m sure it’s not nearly as good as using a binder – even though I have absolutely no idea how being a transgender person works and I’m a little too embarrassed to admit that to Andy – but he looks content. From the neck down, at least.
“I thought you were mad at me. For killing someone for you.”
He gives me an odd look, squinting his eyes in my direction. “I am. You still owe me a lot of explanations and apologies. But I think you were right – I would be in a lot worse condition if you
hadn’t stepped in when you did. I just don’t like that it ended in someone dying, even if it was Jeremy, and I hate that you didn’t tell
me the truth before it happened.”
His words sting like needles and I reflexively swallow the nausea rising in my throat. You’re a murderer, a small voice in the back of my mind reminds me. You killed someone. You could have just gone and pulled the fire alarm or alerted a teacher or even made sure Andy didn’t stay in school yesterday. You could have prevented all of this from happening. And it’s true. No matter how much I tell myself that my actions were justified, they weren’t. Murder is never an option. I just took the easy way out and now I have to deal with the aftermath, which includes my relationship with Andy.
“I’m really sorry,” I say, even though I know it’s not nearly enough. “I should have told you what I knew as soon as I found out. But Mellie made me promise not to see you anymore, and I was already keeping so many secrets, I just… I thought you wouldn’t want to be around me if you knew how dangerous I could be. And I can understand why you wouldn’t.”
“You seriously think something like that would drive me away? I’m already on your Reaper friend’s death list; it doesn’t really matter if it happens now or later. And in case you haven’t realized, I don’t really have a lot of other friends. Or any at all, really.”
“If it helps, I don’t either. Although I’m dead, so it doesn’t really matter anymore, does it?”
Andy nods. “I think it does.”
The doctor reenters the room, followed closely by Andy’s father, a short, brutish man with a handlebar mustache and clothes in
the most lurid shade of brown I’ve ever seen. He scoffs when he sees the bra in the garbage can by the door, but doesn’t say anything. I get the feeling it’s his wife that calls most of the shots in the household.
“I have your discharge papers,” Doctor Barlow says, handing Andy a small stack of papers stapled together in one corner. “You can pick up your pain pills in the pharmacy on your way out. Otherwise, just be sure to drink plenty of fluids and get as much rest as possible. It might be wise to stay home from school for the rest of the week; you don’t want to strain your injuries. I’ve also attached a note for your physical education teacher explaining your condition. That should excuse you from class for the remainder of the semester.”
Andy nods, clearly paying more attention to the papers in his hands than the doctor speaking in front of him. He flips through the packet absentmindedly, every so often glancing over at me as if to make sure I’m still here. Like I would leave him right now, of all times.
“You should just be thankful you got off so easy,” his father says, his voice gruff and raspy. “Your mother has been worried sick about you, you know. You could have been hurt a lot worse, picking fights with bigger kids like that.”
“I didn’t pick any fights. And if mom is so worried, why isn’t she here right now?”
I kind of want to tell Andy to shut up before he gets into even
more trouble than he already is, but his father’s steely glare seems to do that for me. Andy clamps his mouth shut and straightens his posture, his fingers fraying the hem of his sweater.
“Your mother is distraught. She couldn’t bear to see you like this,” Andy’s father huffs out, glancing at the doctor before grabbing the papers out of his son’s hands. “And don’t you ever use that tone again with me, young lady.”
Andy shudders but his father either doesn’t notice or ignores his reaction. I feel uncomfortable, standing here listening in on this family’s private conversations. What if I hear something Andy doesn’t want me to? But I also don’t want to leave him here with a man who treats him just as poorly as his mother does, even if he’s a little less aggressive about it.
I give Andy a quick nod towards the door, trying to show him that I’ll be waiting for him just outside, and thankfully he seems to get the hint. He returns the gesture jerkily, hiding it under the pretense of scratching at the back of his neck. I think he could have vocally given me his confirmation and his father would have brushed it off like it meant nothing. Just like he does to his own child.
I float myself through the door backwards, making eye contact with Andy until I can’t see him anymore. When I finally turn back around, the first thing that registers in my vision is a curl of flaming red hair just inches away from my face. I take a step back, and I’m greeted by a very real, very angry Mellie.
“Who’s the idiot I just found sneaking around town trying to look in people’s windows?” she asks me, her hands on her hips. Her eyes are almost blazing, they’re so bright.
I balk. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I was two cities away handling a domestic violence case, Terra. I didn’t even have time to explain to the poor guy that his wife
just stabbed him in the back, literally! And I end up being called back here by Reece because he saw an unaccounted-for ghost lurking around the hospital I happen to find you at. Explain.”
“In my defense, I did try to call for you. You didn’t show up, obviously, and I have no idea how to handle this kind of stuff on my own.”
Mellie’s expression softens a fraction. “I’m sorry. I thought you were still angry with me and were just calling to yell at me some more. I didn’t know you were serious.”
“Yeah, well…” I trail off, hoping she’ll change the subject before she realizes the one glaring detail she has yet to bring up. Of course, as usual, karma isn’t on my side.
“Why was there an unaccounted-for spirit near the hospital? Jeremy Landlow. Does the name ring a bell?”
“No. Why would it?”
“Maybe because you went to high school with him and he said he knows you?”
Uh oh. I’m in trouble now. If Mellie wasn’t angry before, she’s going to be after she finds out what I did. That is, if she doesn’t already know.
“Come on,” I say, trying for as much nonchalance as I can manage. “How on Earth would he know my name? That’s impossible.”
Mellie rolls her eyes, not even a trace of a smile on her face. “He didn’t say your name, he described you. I’m pretty sure you’re the only ghost around here who’s got brown hair, brown eyes, and ‘a complexion that kind of looks like caramel ice cream’.”
Ice cream? Really, Jeremy? He fits the ‘dumb jock’ stereotype so well it’s not even funny anymore.
“Maybe there’s another unaccounted-for ghost? That seems to be happening a lot lately. Why weren’t you here to get him when he died, anyway?”
I realize after it’s too late that I’ve just given her exactly the information I didn’t want her to know. She floats down to eye-level, staring at me from less than a foot away. From this close up, I can see the barest hint of freckles dotting her nose; I wonder how many other people have seen her the way I do. I imagine I’m the only one, but that doesn’t make me feel any better about the whole situation.
“You’re right,” she says, and for a moment I let myself believe she’s being sincere. “Why wasn’t I here? Maybe it’s because Jeremy Landlow wasn’t on my radar; he wasn’t supposed to die this soon. I believe, if I’m correct in my calculations, that he might have had another forty years in him if it weren’t for whatever happened yesterday morning.”
Forty years? God, that makes what I did so much worse. I had thought that maybe a thug like J
eremy would have gotten into a fight in his late teens, maybe early twenties, and been on the wrong end of a knife or a fist or a bullet. But to know that he was meant to live past middle age… He could have changed. He could have
become a better person, gotten married, had kids and straightened his life out. And I was the one who took that opportunity away from him. Just because he was a rotten person in high school doesn’t mean he was going to be for the rest of his life. What I did was no different than murdering an innocent man.
“Terra?” Mellie says, snapping her fingers in front of my face. “What did you do?”
She doesn’t sound upset, but her tone is stern and I know she isn’t going to be happy to hear what I have to tell her. But she’s the freaking Grim Reaper; she’s going to find out anyway. If Jeremy doesn’t tell her, one of the numerous witnesses or the police or even Andy might tip her off. She’ll find a way to weasel the information out of someone, and it’s better for everyone if I just come clean now. Maybe it’ll ease some of the stress on my conscience, especially now that the gravity of what I did is setting in.
“I didn’t mean to,” I start, a hint of pleading coming through in my words. “It was an accident. Jeremy was beating the life out of Andy and I couldn’t just stand there and watch. I didn’t even know what I was doing; I just wanted him to stop. And I pushed him off of Andy, and…” I pause, biting my lip. For the first time since I died, I wish I could feel pain. Anything would be better than the sickening numbness in my chest. “I killed him. I did exactly what you told me not to, and I pulled out his soul. I’m so sorry, Mel.”
Mellie looks at me, her expression unsettlingly neutral. She shakes her head slowly and takes a step back, her legs passing right through a wooden bench in front of the nurse’s station.
“There was a reason I told you that story about what happened when I got too close to a human. I knew you were becoming friends with him and I tried to stop it because I knew you would take it too far. And look how right I was.”
“Mellie…”
“No, Terra. You betrayed my trust. I let you say goodbye because yesterday was his time, but now everything’s off balance. I don’t know what this will do to the natural order of things, but now I’m going to have to pick up the pieces of your mistake.”
She sounds more frustrated than angry, like I’m a child she’s scolding for doing something wrong. I hate being talked down to, like I’m too stupid to realize that what I did was bad. I know I made a mistake. I don’t need to be reminded; my own mind is doing enough of that for me. It’s all I can think about – should I have saved Andy or let him die; was there a third option I could have used to save them both?
There’s no right answer, and there’s nothing I can tell Mellie that could make this okay.
“I’m so sorry, Mellie,” I say, letting my desperation come through as much as possible. Maybe she’ll see how pathetic I really am and take pity on me. I don’t know why I want so badly for her to forgive me when I was angry with her not even a week ago. I was completely ready to cut her out of my life – afterlife, whatever. And now I’m begging for her to take me back like a lover in a crappy romance novel.
But I don’t think it’s her friendship I want – it’s her
forgiveness. I want her to tell me that what I did is forgiven. Because maybe, if a Grim Reaper says it’s okay, then some of my guilt will ease and I’ll be able to breathe again.
But Mellie isn’t letting up. “You can’t see him anymore. And you can’t help me with any more jobs. I’d thought that maybe, if I
pushed you hard enough and gave you enough incentive, you
would try harder to move on. Because the alternative is ending up like me, and I didn’t want that for you. But you don’t seem to care about your own future, so why should I?”
Why should she? I’m nothing but one more soul on her list. I shouldn’t mean anything different to her than Reece or Esther or David or Jared. But whether she’s being lenient or harsh, Mellie has always treated me differently. Why?
I don’t get the chance to ask her. By the time the question has formed on my lips, she’s gone.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I don’t tell Andy about Mellie’s visit. I hate keeping secrets from him, but I don’t want him to have to worry about me when he’s got plenty of his own problems to deal with. Plus, telling him more about Mellie would mean revealing to him that I knew he was supposed to die two days ago, and I stopped it even though that’s against the rules. There are some things I would really rather he never know.
I don’t know where Mellie took Jeremy – Heaven or Hell or somewhere in between – but I haven’t seen him since Andy woke up in the hospital. I’m grateful not having him hanging around me anymore, but I wish I knew where he is now. Some part of me wishes, despite all of the unpleasant things he’s done, that he made it to Heaven. At least that way I would know that I didn’t damn him for all of eternity on top of killing him – I don’t need even more guilt piled on top of me, thank you very much.
Andy’s been quieter around me since the accident. I’m not sure if it’s because he’s afraid of me, or upset about what I did.
Either way, he doesn’t say much anymore and still insists that he’s fine. But when he isn’t trying to keep his guard up I can see the sadness in his eyes, the way he holds himself differently now that everyone knows his secret; the way his hands never stop moving and the crescents under his eyes get deeper and darker with every passing day.
I’m thankful that his parents have at least enough tact to leave him alone while he’s recovering. I don’t know how he would deal with their scorn on top of his physical injuries; he already looks like he’s having trouble keeping it together.
Three days after we leave the hospital, Reece visits Andy and I. I think Mellie might have sent him, but I don’t ask. If she wants to talk to me, she can do it on her own. Although, I can understand completely why she’s still angry at me; I’m angry at myself too.
“So this must be Andy,” Reece says as he swings himself through the open window. He’s gotten a lot better at controlling his powers, but he still has trouble with tangibility sometimes. I’m kind of envious, though; he mastered turning the television on and off in one session without even dropping the remote once.
“You don’t look like a ‘Mellie’, so I’m guessing you’re Reece,” Andy says, not even batting an eye as the ghost boy steps into his room and hovers a few feet away from his bed. His nonchalance is probably my fault; I have a bad habit of phasing through the wall and spooking him at the worst times. I think he’s just gotten used to seeing ghosts everywhere. That’s more than a little concerning.
“I would shake your hand,” Reece says, opting for a wave instead, “but, you know.” He shrugs, lowering himself down into the chair pulled out from Andy’s desk.
Reece has changed a lot since I first met him. Back then, he was a shy, scared kid who had just been shot and was still trying to process the idea of being dead. Now, he’s adapted well and I think he might even be more adjusted to this life than I am. He’s still a little reserved, but I’m glad he’s coming out of his shell a bit more. With Mellie not speaking to me, Reece is the only ghost friend I have left.
“Are we having a ghost convention in my bedroom?” Andy asks, grinning. “Because I would have put out a cheese platter or something if I’d known.”
“I’m pretty sure two spooks doesn’t count as a convention,” I say, grateful that Reece has actually managed to make Andy smile; he hasn’t done that in a long time.
“Well, excuse me for not knowing the rules of ghost parties.”
Andy looks worn out. Even when he smiles the lines in his face crease deeper and make him look even more exhausted.
“Mellie needs to talk to you,” Reece says, completely ruining the good mood in the room. “Well, she actually wants me to talk to you, since she’s still a little peeved about what happened. That’s why I’m here.”
Would it have been too much to ask that Reece just be dropping by to say ‘hi’? Why does everything have to end up being about my mistakes? I know, Terra’s having a pretty good day – let’s squash it before she gets too happy.
“What happened?” Andy asks, crossing his legs on the bed. It’s a Friday but he doesn’t have to go back to school until Monday; his ribs are still healing and his nose has turned a lurid shade of murky green. “You didn’t tell me that you talked to Mellie. I thought you were still mad at her.”
Andy still has no idea how to keep his nose out of other people’s business. I mean, I adore the kid to death – literally – but he’s got more than his fair share of character flaws. One of which is not knowing when to shut up.
I sigh. Better tell the truth now than have Andy find out later and be angry with me again. “She showed up at the hospital before you left. She was ticked because I touched Jeremy when I wasn’t supposed to. She yelled at me a bit and then left. End of story.”
“She told me that you’d be here,” Reece says. “And that you aren’t supposed to. I think she’s got some big idea in her head and it’s gonna be trouble if you two don’t patch things up soon.”
“She’s mad at me. How am I supposed to make things better? I already tried apologizing, more than once, and she wouldn’t take it. I don’t know what else to do.”
“Maybe stop seeing him.” Reece jerks his thumb in Andy’s direction. The younger boy flushes bright pink and sits up straighter. “Like she told you to a long time ago.”
“What, are you her lap dog now, Reece?” I bite my tongue, realizing belatedly that what I said was probably rude. “I’m sorry, but if she wants something from me, she’s going to have to say it to my face.”
“She did.”
Andy looks profoundly confused. It would be cute under any other circumstances, but right now all I feel is queasy.
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