Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 101168 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 506(@200wpm)___ 405(@250wpm)___ 337(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101168 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 506(@200wpm)___ 405(@250wpm)___ 337(@300wpm)
“Oh, Edgar, I’m so glad you came! This is Truman,” she said, indicating the smaller of the two, who had soft brown curls and eyes that looked like they saw everything. He waved, expression friendly. “And this is Ash.”
The second man was uncommonly attractive, with messy blond hair and stubble. He nodded somberly in welcome.
“Guys, this is Edgar. He—”
“I see ghosts!” Edgar blurted.
While Jamie had been at the haunt the last week, Edgar had been thinking about telling them. During Emma’s wedding rehearsal, Edgar had been thinking about telling them. He’d been thinking so much about how he was going to tell his friends that it had popped right out of his mouth at this total stranger. A wave of mortification broke over Edgar, but Ash just looked around and calmly asked, “Where?”
Edgar cleared his throat. “Just, uh. In general.”
“Really?” Truman asked, looking fascinated. “I have so many questions.”
“Wait, wait,” Greta said. “You can see ghosts and you’ve, like, never thought to mention that? Tell me everything. Also, can I tell Carys?”
“Um. Yes?”
Three faces looked at him with interest, eager to hear—what? A ghost story? A secret? Some insight told to him from beyond the grave?
Edgar swallowed, mouth suddenly dry.
“My mom says she sees a ghost. In her house. But she’s not living in the present sometimes.” That was Ash.
“She has Alzheimer’s,” Truman explained.
“She’s convinced though,” Ash said. “Kinda makes sense that you’d be able to see things out of time more clearly if you’re also living out of time.”
“My younger sister thinks life and death are happening simultaneously because all time is happening at once. It’s just that our puny brains are too simple to process it,” Greta chimed in. “Wait, we’ve gotta get Helen and Veronica out here.”
She stuck her head inside and yelled something that was inaudible to Edgar. Helen and Veronica came outside a moment later.
“What?” said Veronica.
Greta turned to Edgar expectantly.
In an attempt to be smoother this time, he said, “What are your thoughts on, um, ghosts?”
Helen’s eyes widened, and Veronica’s snapped to him.
“Totally believe in,” said Helen.
“My gran saw ghosts,” Veronica said. “She used to tell me her son—my uncle, who died when he was nineteen—came and told her secrets in her sleep and when she was hanging out the laundry.”
Truman chimed in, “I’ve never had an encounter with one that I know of, but that doesn’t mean they’re not real. I mean, I haven’t personally seen lots of shit that I know is real, so.”
Carys came outside then, looking for Greta.
“Dude,” Greta told her. “Edgar can see ghosts.”
Carys raised an eyebrow. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me,” she said, nodding at Edgar. “Hey, can you come help me with the pumpkin bread?”
Reluctantly, Greta followed her inside but turned at the last moment to point at Edgar and say, “You are gonna tell me more about this later, right?”
He nodded, not able to speak.
The conversation naturally moved on, and Edgar tried to force his heart to beat in a normal rhythm and his muscles to unclench. He tried to understand the words his friends were saying, but he couldn’t track them. Someone asked if he wanted a drink. He didn’t. The next thing he knew, he was alone, his head swimming.
The final fault line in Edgar’s heart had opened up, and now it was broken.
No one had cared. He had told them his deepest secret, and it had gone fine. Well, even. As well as it could have.
Edgar had been wrong. He’d been so wrong for so long. And it had cost him friends, lovers, support. It had cost him a life. Fuck.
He walked around the block, trying to clear his mind and figure out how things could’ve gone so differently than he’d pictured all these years.
Jamie found him a few blocks away, sitting on the bench in a park where once the ghost of a stooped woman carrying something unrecognizable had sat beside him, terrifying him when he’d looked over to say good morning and been faced with its dead eyes.
“Hey, baby,” they said softly, crouching in front of him.
“Hey,” he said weakly. “Sorry I abandoned you.”
“No worries. I was talking with Muriel—she’s such a delight—and Veronica said I might want to come find you. She said you looked a little… Well, anyway. Are you okay?” They rubbed warm palms up and down Edgar’s tense thighs.
“You were right,” he croaked. “Turns out. Have I…? Could I have…?”
Jamie stood and sat next to him on the bench, lifting Edgar’s hand to their lips and pressing a kiss to his knuckles. As always, his body relaxed automatically with their touch.
He tried again. “It didn’t have to be like this,” he whispered. “It could have been better. All this time.”
“Oh, baby.” Jamie folded him in their arms and held him tight, stroking his hair. There was nothing to say, really. It was a good, joyous thing. But like every new good and joyous thing in Edgar’s life lately, it highlighted the opposite choices he’d made before and all that they had cost him.