2: The Ghost of Christmas Something Something, Part One

“Yep. This is unsalvageable,” Eugene confirmed.

Andrew, who had been picking up toiletries in their bathroom, looked over to see what he was talking about. Eugene, a lanky, nicely dressed redhead, was on his knees, rummaging through the shredded pages of a book that lay atop a pile of many others. When Andrew had last seen that book the previous night, it was being ripped from his hands by the ghost of Jessica Crawley. Or perhaps it was Tracy Roth. Whoever it was, she seemed to have torn the book to pieces in her rage. That was the only explanation for the book’s current state - bits of unreadable paper and loosened binding. The job she did was impressively thorough, leaving only a few pages fully intact.

“At least we got what we needed from it,” Andrew said, picking up a tube of toothpaste and placing it beside the sink. After about an hour of cleaning, their apartment was very nearly back in the condition it was in before their unwanted guests paid them a visit the previous evening. The bookshelf was upright once more, the bed was made, and the kitchen was clean. The only things they couldn’t save were the bathroom mirror and Eugene’s computer monitor. Eugene had already purchased a new monitor on his phone, but neither of them were really sure what to do about the mirror. They supposed they should tell Andrea, their landlady, but she scared them both, so they decided to put that off until later in the day.

“How can you say that?” Millie asked from directly behind Andrew, giving him a slight scare. Millie was in her early-to-mid teens, eternally wearing a grey t-shirt and yoga pants, though perhaps her most defining feature was that she was a ghost. Andrew had still not gotten over how odd it was to look at her ethereal form and be able to see right through it. She wasn’t entirely translucent, so the image was faint and distorted. “Who knows how much information Gilbert wrote in there about being The Sandman? Yeah you learned the candle thing and that’s great, but there’s so much left to learn.”

“That would be tragic if I were The Sandman, but I’m not, so it isn’t.”

“What? I didn’t say anything,” Eugene said, looking up from the books he was placing on the shelf. Andrew gestured to Millie, forgetting that, to Eugene, he was just pointing at empty space. “Oh, right. Casper. Hey, how come she isn’t helping clean up?”

“But you are now,” Millie insisted.

Andrew turned to Eugene. “She said earlier that the further a ghost is from where they died, the weaker they become, so she can’t really interact with stuff here.” Eugene nodded thoughtfully and returned to his work, and Andrew returned to Millie. “Just because some girls came along and tried to murder me, and I stopped them, that doesn’t mean I want to keep doing it. I’ll help you out, and then I’m done. I’m sure Death or whatever can find someone more qualified to fill the position.”

Millie’s hands balled up into fists. “You sent a woman to Oblivion! You have a responsibility to make up for that!”

Andrew was unconvinced. “I did! I sent that girl to The After Party or whatever, so I’m at neutral karma. And then I’ll send you there and I’ll be better than neutral. Positive.”

“It’s not that simple! It…” Millie sighed exasperatedly.

“I hate to break up this argument that I don’t understand,” Eugene said, now standing in the doorway of the bathroom. “But I think I’ve done my fair share of cleaning and I’ve been wearing these same clothes for a long time and I would like to shower if you don’t mind.”

“I promise not to peek!” Millie joked, and it felt like the argument was forgotten for the moment. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen a ghost change heart so quickly, he thought, recalling Jessica’s sudden transformation from rage to tranquility the previous night. Being dead must be stressful.

Andrew relayed Millie’s promise to Eugene. He stiffened slightly and his already-red face grew redder. “Well, I hadn’t even thought of that until now,” he said uncomfortably. “I appreciate the promise, Millicent.”

Andrew stepped out of the bathroom and Eugene closed the door before Millie had a chance to step out, but she walked right through it. Eugene had finished the bookshelf, leaving the house as clean as it needed to be for now, so Andrew deemed Operation House Cleaning a success, which was good because he had only gotten a few hours of sleep after what had been a really long and stressful evening and he was really feeling the effects of that.

“So what is Oblivion exactly?” he asked Millie as he plopped exhaustedly on the couch. “You compared it to Hell, right? So is it, like, fire and stuff?”

Millie remained still and silent for a time. Her face was unreadable at first, then it grew thoughtful, and then, finally, she spoke. “Have you ever been really deep in a cave without light, so that it’s like the really pure kind of black so that you can’t even see your hand in front of your face and when nobody talks there’s no sound and it’s the weirdest and creepiest silence you’ve ever felt?”

“I…uh, I guess so?” Andrew said. He’d had a kind of experience like that at camp when he was twelve or so, but he didn’t remember it very well.

“Isn’t that so cool?”

“Yeah…is that what Oblivion’s like?”

“We were talking about Oblivion?”

Before Andrew could answer, there was a knock at the door. Standing on the other side was Katelyn, who looked the same as ever, though today she was wearing a red and green striped sweatshirt with white Christmas trees and snowflakes on it, and glasses. For a moment, Andrew could not fathom why she was there until he noticed the Planet Hulk and Avengers DVDs in her hands and remembered that today was their annual December Mega Marvel Movie Marathon.

“You got finally got glasses again,” he observed as he gestured for her to come inside. “I’ve always liked you better that way.”

“So I’ve heard.” Katelyn looked about the apartment curiously. “Who were you talking to?”

“Oh! Uh, my roommate.” Andrew gestured toward the bathroom.

Katelyn gave him a puzzled look, nodding slowly. “Were you guys talking about Elder Scrolls?”

Now it was Andrew’s turn to give a puzzled look. “I don’t…?”

“I heard you say something about Oblivion…Elder Scrolls…Oblivion. It’s a game.” Andrew just nodded. “So, have you moved your stuff here yet?”

“No,” Andrew sighed. “Steven keeps putting it off. It’ll be sometime next week, I think. His girlfriend decided to move in right away as soon as I left.”

“Oh. I’m sorry,” she said, reaching her arm out towards Andrew briefly before retracting it. “Well, may I have a tour of your new place before we get started?”

Andrew pointed to the bedroom. “That’s the bedroom. Over in that opening in the wall is the kitchen. This is the living room. I hope you’ve enjoyed your tour.”

“Whoa, calm down there Energizer Bunny before you-”

Before Katelyn could finish her joke, the door to the bathroom opened, and Eugene stepped out wearing only a towel to cover the lower half of his body. He started making his way to the next door over, the bedroom, when he suddenly stopped dead in his tracks, his face flushed. “Um…”

“I’m sorry!” Katelyn said, looking away slightly as a red tinge crept under her cinnamon skin. After a moment, she blocked the view with her hand.

Andrew wasn’t phased by the event. “Oh. Hey Eugene, do you mind if I have my friend Katelyn over to watch some movies for pretty much the entire day?”

“You didn’t ask him yet?” Katelyn asked, still covering her face.

“I forgot.”

“Yeah, it’s fine!” Eugene said quickly before darting into the bedroom.

When she heard the door close, Katelyn looked back at Andrew. “I wish I could say I can’t believe you didn’t ask first,” she said. “But you’ve had a long last few days so I guess I can’t really blame you this time.” Andrew briefly considered telling her just how long, but thought better of it. “Oh hey, what happened to the mirror?”

Eugene had left the door ajar, exposing the mirror and its spider-we cracks. Andrew was glad that the cracks seemed to remove Millie’s ability appear in mirrors because - Millie! He had forgotten she was even there until that moment. She was standing in the corner of the room wearing an amused expression, watching the events unfold. She saw him glance her direction, and she waved. “I hope you don’t mind if I watch with you guys. Chris Hemsworth is so dreamy.” Andrew tried awkwardly to convey that he didn’t mind without saying anything, but he didn’t know whether to shake his head or nod, so he just ended up making a weird jerking motion.

“What are you looking at?” Katelyn asked, looking behind her, in Millie’s direction.

“Um, nothing, sorry, spaced out,” Andrew said. “Anyways, about the mirror. Eugene got super drunk last night. Hammered, really. And I woke up to him smashing a mirror. He doesn’t remember why he did it. Probably frustrated about being a ginger.” Katelyn rolled her eyes.

Shortly after, Eugene stepped out of his room, dressed in a polo shirt and jeans and standing perfectly upright as he always seemed to. Andrew could tell he was trying to look composed, but he still seemed embarrassed. For whatever reason, Andrew had pegged him as a bit of a lady’s-man, so his behavior surprised him. Nobody said anything for a few seconds until Katelyn broke the silence. “I, um. I got you candles.” She gestured to a book-bag she was carrying.

Eugene gave her a weird look. “I’m sorry?”

Katelyn was about to speak, but Andrew interjected. “Oh yeah, that’s right, I told Katelyn about how you’re super into scented candles.” Eugene shot Andrew an are-you-kidding-me look. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, of course not. Thanks, Katelyn. You can put those on the computer desk. I’m Eugene, by the way.”

“Nice to meet you,” Katelyn replied, setting down the candles. “I brought popcorn. Should we make that before we get started?”

Before long the three of them (Eugene invited himself to join) were squeezed onto Eugene’s couch. Millie spent much of her time standing in that same corner, watching along with the others, occasionally making remarks that only Andrew could hear. She looked sad whenever she remembered that. After the first two movies, she wandered out of the house for a bit.

Several hours and bags of junk food into their marathon, about halfway through Hulk vs. Wolverine, the movie was interrupted by the sudden outburst of “Hotel California” by The Eagles. Andrew’s ringtone. “It’s Connie,” he said, checking his caller ID. Katelyn paused the movie. “My boss,” he said to Eugene. “Hey, Connie.”

“You have to come in today,” she said. She sounded kind of mad, or at least upset. “Steven said he couldn’t make it for personal reasons, and I’m going to need a lot of help at the store today.”

As if Steven didn’t ruin his life enough. “What about Tara? Charles?”

“Tara already worked a shift today, and I didn’t ask Charles, I asked you. See you at four.” And she hung up. Either Andrew was Connie’s favorite punching bag, or she just really hated Charles, because this wasn’t the first or even the tenth time something like this had happened. He didn’t even know why he asked anymore.

Andrew sighed as he put down his phone. “We can finish this one,” he said. “But then I have work.” Eugene and Katelyn both gave Andrew distraught looks, but for entirely different reasons. He met Eugene’s gaze with a knowing look of acknowledgment.

There was, of course, another reason that Connie may have called Andrew in over Charles. Charles didn’t throw a brick through the window the previous night. Andrew and Eugene were fairly certain they hadn’t left any incriminating evidence behind, but if they had, Andrew was sure he’d be finding out at about four o’clock.

***

An hour later, Andrew and Katelyn were in Katelyn’s car having a post-movie-watching chat and Katelyn was explaining in detail who Deadpool was and why Andrew should love him. She was just in the middle of explaining how he related to Wolverine when Andrew cut her off. “Hold that thought,” he said. “I just remembered that I have to call Linda for something.” Katelyn looked uncharacteristically annoyed by this, but Andrew decided he could figure out what that was about later, as he already had Linda’s number dialed by the time the thought really registered.

“Andrew!” she said, her voice muffled by the sound of wind as though she, too, were in a car. That didn’t stop her from sounding any less wonderful, though. There was something about the way she talked - a genuine enthusiasm for life and for conversation that was so often lacking in others - that put a stupid smile on Andrew’s face and butterflies in his stomach whenever he heard her speak. “I was literally just wondering if you remembered about our show this evening!”

“That’s actually what I’m calling about,” he explained. “I got called into work and I really don’t have any choice but to take the shift, so I won’t be able to make your concert.”

“Ugh, your boss is the worst,” she said. “Well, it could be worse. Some friends and I are having a little get-together thing at the Denny’s on the corner of Dust and Sherwood at midnight to celebrate my birthday tomorrow. If you could come to that, that’d be awesome!”

“Oh, cool! Yeah, I’ll see you there. Sorry about all this!” Then, once they’d hung up, Andrew returned his attention to Katelyn. “So what were you saying?”

Katelyn waited several seconds before responding. “I talked to your co-worker Tara this morning. She asked if I was interested in volunteering at the shelter for the holidays, and I might go check it out after I drop you off. Obviously you can’t make it today, but maybe you could go with me tomorrow?”

Andrew always felt guilty and selfish when interacting with the homeless, and that wasn’t how he’d planned on spending his Sunday, but he could see from the look on Katelyn’s face that this meant a lot to her, so he told her, “yeah, I’ll at least go to check it out,” as they were entering the parking lot of Connie’s Convenient Convenience Store.

This seem to put her in a better mood. “Great! I’ll see you tomorrow, then!” she said. “Try and have a nice day at work!”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

***

The boarded up window in front of the store served as an unnecessary reminder of how scared he was to go inside. Through the other window, he saw the spot where he had performed the ritual on Tracy and Jessica. He still didn’t really understand what happened, but the thought of that unnatural cold that filled the room after Tracy vanished sent waves of discomfort across his spine and stomach, and the memory of the warmth that followed Jessica’s passing did little to repress them. He made a note to crack down on helping Millie the following morning so this freakish saga in his life could go as quickly as it came.

As he neared the door, dread washed over him for the third or fourth time. On the other side of that door, he would see Connie, and she would either be pissed, like usual, or very pissed, and it would probably be hard to tell the difference until she started talking to him. Would she even tell him right away? Would she wait until the end of the shift to fire him, so she could squeeze six more hours of work out of him? And he hadn’t even really thought about jail. When that thought crossed his mind he nearly passed out. She might not even know. Just get it together and go to work. He took a breath, and opened the door to the store.

Ding.

The few customers that were in the store turned their heads at the sound of the bell, as did Tara, who was standing behind the counter. Tara was sporting artificially black hair this afternoon, which, coupled with her facial expression, black pants and black long-sleeved shirt made her look as though she were either a vampire or a tired funeral attendee. Connie, a tall, thin woman of about forty with long dark hair, was staring at him from across the store. She looked at him for only a second before returning to her task. This gave him hope, but she was an unpredictable woman.

“How has Connie been today?” Andrew asked as Tara stepped aside so he could clock in. It wasn’t until Tara looked at him strangely that Andrew realized what an odd greeting that was. His mind wasn’t really on social interaction. “I heard about the break in and everything, and I know she takes this place really personally,” he added.

“Oh. Well, I think she’s taking it pretty rough, actually. She’s barely been up front all day.”

Andrew looked over in Connie’s direction uncertainly. She was organizing some boxes of energy bars that looked, to Andrew, as though they were perfectly well-organized. “Probably just shaken a bit,” he said hopefully.

“Probably.” Tara looked like something was on her mind, too, so he left her alone. This gave Andrew a lot of time to just stare pensively at that area in the front-right corner of the store where Tracy Roth was sent to Oblivion, whatever that was, and the aisle in which Jessica Crowley wept tearlessly about her murder at the hands of Roger Jenkins. These weren’t things Andrew liked thinking about.

He was very grateful when Tara spoke once more. “Are you going to this year’s Winter Wonderland dance? Dylan and I are trying to figure out if we’ll have any friends there this year.”

If there was anything that made Cierto particularly interesting (other than the fact that until about a week ago it contained a man who sent ghosts to the afterlife as a profession) it was the town’s obsession with dances. Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Halloween, and, bizarrely, Donald Duck day (June 9th). You name it, there was a dance. The Winter Wonderland dance was in just over a week, on Christmas Eve, and Andrew didn’t have any plans to attend because neither him nor Katelyn were particularly interested in dances these days. “I don’t think so, sorry.”

Tara shrugged. “Not a big deal. I don’t really want to go either, that’s more Dylan’s thing.”

They chatted idly about school and finals until five, at which point Tara went home and Andrew found himself alone at the register of a nearly empty store. Eventually Connie traded places with him, sending Andrew wandering about the aisles while she attended the register and performed other managerial duties. There wasn’t really anything to be done in the store, but Andrew could tell Connie just didn’t want to be around anybody.

So Andrew uselessly walked about the aisles in boredom. That is, until he saw Millie waiting for him at the end of one. “Hi!” she said loudly. For a moment Andrew was horrified by her volume. The fact that nobody else could hear or see her was difficult to get used to.

“What are you doing here?” Andrew whispered. “I’m working.”

“It got really boring at the house,” she said. “Eugene was just playing some game and it was dumb. What are you up to?”

“Working. Go home. I can’t talk to you here.”

“Oh, come on! You can just keep whispering.”

“Go. Home.”

“I thought once I found The Sandman that things would be more fun but death is so boring.”

“Done talking now. Go away,” Andrew said. She didn’t.

“So you don’t want me to point out that one of the customers in here is a ghost, then?”

This got Andrew’s attention. He looked about the store from customer to customer - an elderly woman browsing batteries, an embarrassed teen buying condoms - but he didn’t immediately see who it was she was talking about. Eventually he spotted him, a man in his thirties who had been keeping to the back of the store. He didn’t know how he missed him before, the way he was just slightly transparent and gave off a soft glow. He was wearing a thick jacket and beanie, and his face looked like it’d been carved from a fine, ancient stone as he observed the store through sad, narrowed eyes.

“No,” Andrew replied, and kept walking. Millie stared at him, her mouth agape, but she said nothing, and left him alone for the remainder of his shift.

At nine-thirty, half an hour before the store closed, Connie had stepped outside for some fresh air, leaving Andrew to help check out what he suspected to be the last customers of the evening. As the second-to-last person in line stepped aside to collect their bag and exit the store, Andrew found himself confronted with his last customer, though he wasn’t a customer at all. He was a ghost.

In an attempt to pretend he couldn’t see him, Andrew didn’t say anything at first, but he didn’t have to, as the man seemed plenty happy to speak. “Hey there, son. Pardon me, but did I overhear that cute young lady calling you The Sandman earlier?”

“Yes. But she was mistaken.”

“Well that’s too bad, but you can see me, and you can hear me, so that might just be good enough anyhow. You see, I’m looking for a fine fellow like yourself to perform The Passing and send me on my way.”

“Is that all?”

“Well, yes and no. Yes. And no,” he said. “You see, that last Sandman, that Gilbert fellow, he couldn’t help me. He tried for a bit, but those candles were always so damn cold whenever I stepped in ‘em, and he said that wasn’t the way things ought to be happening. He said I had to fix something in my life, and I hope you could help me out with that.”

The man was polite, and he seemed much more together than either Tracy or Jessica, so, despite his wish to be done with this, Andrew didn’t see the harm in giving the man a hand. “Well, what is it you need help with?”

The man looked at the ceiling for a few second. “Well, you see that’s the thing. That’s the thing. I don’t really know. I’ve been…I’ve just been walking about so long, I don’t really feel like myself. Do you think you can help me, son?”

Suddenly this sounded like a lot more work to Andrew. “I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve kind of got a lot going on.”

“Pardon?”

“Well, I’ve got this thing with a girl I like after work, and-”

“You can’t be serious. I need you, man. I’m asking for your help.”

“-I’ve got finals on Monday and-”

“Come on, I’ve been waiting…I don’t even know how long.”

“-there’s that other ghost, the girl I was talking to, I promised to help her, first, so-”

“I AM TIRED OF WAITING!” The ghost slammed his fist down on the desk in front of Andrew, causing him to stagger backwards. But to his relief, the ghost’s fist made no impact against the desk. Must be far from where he died, Andrew thought, relieved. “I need your help NOW!” he urged. Andrew just stared at him blankly, not really sure how to react, when Connie came through the store’s front door with a ding. The man turned to see her, and when he did, he looked at her for what felt like a long time, and his face softened. “Damn kid,” he muttered as he walked soundlessly away.

***

At ten, Connie and Andrew stood outside of the store as Connie locked up. The cool December air, flickering streetlight, and nearly empty parking lot reminded Andrew once more of the previous night. Everything seemed to. Discovering ghosts was going to prove rather challenging to forget.

“Do you have any plans for Christmas, Andrew?” Connie asked as she put her keys away. Connie never inquired into the personal lives of her employees, not even Steven, who she probably would have adopted given the chance. Is this her way of leading into an accusation?

“Opening gifts with the family, the usual,” he said.

“But nothing after that?”

“Not that I know of. Why?”

“Excellent,” she said. “Then you’ll be working with me that day.”

“On Christmas? Why are we open on Christmas?”

Connie gave him a curious look. “Is that a problem? You said you were free.”

Andrew couldn’t even believe he had to defend himself on the matter. “But it’s Christmas! Nobody’s open on Christmas!”

“We are. People still need their six-packs of Dr. Pepper even on Christmas, so we’ll still be selling ‘em. You said you don’t have any plans. What’s the problem?”

Andrew stuttered in protest, but gave up before any actual words came out. Connie wished him a half-hearted goodnight and headed to her truck. She stopped when she got a few feet away from him. “Andrew,” she said uncertainly, turning back to face him. His heart skipped a beat. “Who was that you were talking to in there?”

“Uh…I wasn’t talking to anybody,” Andrew said. “Must’ve been talking to myself. I do that sometimes.”

Connie stared silently at Andrew. “Have a safe evening,” she said eerily, then returned to her truck without another word.

***

It cost Andrew fifteen dollars to buy a ride to Denny’s from Eugene at eleven-fifty that evening, and another five to be picked up later. Andrew insisted that saving Eugene’s life the previous night was easily worth twenty dollars, but Eugene claimed that him inviting Katelyn over without asking him first made them even, so Andrew begrudgingly paid his roommate.

The man who greeted him was just as boring as the restaurant’s brown and green color palette. “Are you with the crowd of obnoxious young people?” he asked monotonously. Andrew briefly wondered if he knew Andrea Smalls.

“Probably,” Andrew admitted. The man pointed to a booth at the back of the building, where a group of four were nearly in hysterics over some joke. Andrew recognized three of them. Hector, a chubby Spanish guy Andrew had gone to high school with; Carrie, an Asian girl with a boyish haircut that was in Andrew’s Intro to Philosophy class; and, of course, Linda, who was wearing a cute polka-dot party hat atop her chin-length black hair.

The girl Andrew did not recognize was wearing a very regal-looking blouse, had long brown hair, and a slender tan face. Her laugh was milder than the rest, but her amber eyes were no less amused.

“Andrew!” Linda exclaimed when she caught her breath. Andrew didn’t remember that much from the books he read in high school, but he remembered this line from “The Great Gatsby” about how Gatsby had this smile that felt like it was always meant just for you, and like it understood and loved you. Linda had one of those smiles. “Just on time! I know you know Carrie, but have you met Hector and Danette?”

“Hector and I went to high school…” Hector had his head down on the table as he came down from his laughter, and when he raised it to look at Andrew, he looked exhausted. He just nodded at Andrew in lieu of a verbal greeting. “…but I’ve never seen Danette around.”

“Wow, small world. Hector’s my mom’s boyfriend’s son’s best friend, so we’re practically siblings. Danette is the bassist in Monday’s With Garfield. She started the band and she’s like so cool. Way too cool to be at this table, to be honest, but so cool that she’s comfortable enough with her coolness to be dining with the likes of us. Danette, this is Andrew Jonathan Warren-Wilson”

Danette looked amused by Linda’s praise, and waved at Andrew in a single fluid motion. “Nice to finally meet the famous four-names,” she said. Her voice was deep, but unmistakably feminine.

Linda talks about me!

“C’mon, siddown!” Linda urged, scooting aside and patting the spot next to her. “You just missed the most hilarious story about how Carrie-”

“Can we please not tell it again?” Carrie asked in a failed attempt to sound nonchalant. She glanced quickly, but noticeably, at Andrew.

“No it’s fine, Andrew’s cool!”

“It was more of an in-the-moment thing,” Danette interjected, and Linda reluctantly dropped the subject.

“So how was the show?” Andrew asked.

“It was great!” Hector said, slamming his hands down on the table just a bit too enthusiastically, causing everyone’s silverware to rattle a little bit. “Linda beat the shit out of those drums and Danette really killed it on the bass. In that last song she was all like ba-dum-dum-dum-bum-”

“Yeah, Danette was really great!” Linda agreed. Carrie nodded.

Danette smiled humbly and said, “We’re all great.”

“See, Andrew? Even her brags are cool.”

Andrew laughed and before he could respond there was a server at their table with a notepad. As they went about the table taking everybody’s order, Andrew noticed something across the room that he was surprised he hadn’t noticed sooner: There were two ghosts in Denny’s. One, about his age, was standing in the corner by the bathrooms staring at the ground between his feet and muttering something to himself. The other was sitting by herself in another booth, as if she were a customer. She had auburn hair that drooped down over her face and nearly masked her eyes entirely. Her gaze lay thoughtfully out of the nearest window. Maybe she saw his reflection, or maybe it was just chance, but she turned to look in Andrew’s direction briefly, and they made eye contact. She looked lonely and maybe a little sad, but she looked more stable than most of the ghosts he had seen so far. Not that he was an expert on psychology, paranormal or otherwise. When it came time to order, Andrew did his best to push them out of his mind and enjoy himself. He got pancakes.

The remainder of the evening went similarly to the beginning, with Linda and her friends dominating the conversation and largely recapping the events of the day. Andrew didn’t really mind, though, because Linda Marston was a topic in which he was entirely interested. Just listening to the way she talked about her day and the way she cracked jokes, as if she valued every moment and every drop of happiness and meaning she could squeeze from life was like good poetry. Carefully crafted, deeply personal, and rich with honesty.

One particular moment, shortly before everyone called it a night, stood out to Andrew among the rest. They were talking about playing music and how Linda and Danette felt about playing alone versus in a band. Danette’s answer was saying how even though a band was great, a solo performance is an opportunity to show that you can stand on your own.

“Yeah,” Linda said, in response to Danette, “I can totally see that. But when you’re playing in a band, you’re still important and you still prove your worth, as long as the band is good. A player in a good band is like a pillar. And if people aren’t fulfilling their roles correctly and are showing off too much or are lagging behind then the structure is messed up, but if everyone is doing the right thing then we support each other and it’s just the coolest. It’s like, during that time on stage, I’m living the world the way it should be. Everyone matters, everyone belongs. That sounds kind of dumb, but that’s how it is.”

Andrew was quick to assure her that it wasn’t dumb at all. He was enraptured.

At the meal’s conclusion, as Andrew was walking out to Eugene’s car, he saw that the second ghost from earlier was nowhere to be seen, as if she’d just finished a meal and then left. Andrew wondered if some ghosts tried to maintain a semblance of a regular life.

The other ghost, however, was still standing in the corner and muttering to itself ceaselessly. He looked lost. Scared, maybe. Broken. Andrew couldn’t hear a word he was saying, but he pitied him all the same and, for a moment, considered approaching. But he remembered his commitment to to push this part of his life away as quickly as possible, and hurried out to the parking lot.