Chapter 6 – Simo
‘Simo, did you know that our supply closet is haunted?’ Maz asks from behind the coffee machine. He hands Joni her takeaway Americano, and she grunts a goodbye and walks out of the cafe, back to the library.
‘You don’t say,’ I reply with a grin. On the counter in front of me sits an empty plate, with only crumbs remaining from yesterday’s cheesecake.
‘Someone ought to call Lockwood I’ve always felt we’re alike in that way.
‘Did you go a little sticker-mad?’ She interrupts my thoughts and nods to the window behind me.
Someone’s plastered a whole section with recent additions.
I recognise the trans and intersex flags that Librarian Joni always hands out, as well as the logo of Dad’s estate agency and a cartoon drawing of Anton the Highland bull, all shiny and new.
‘Uh, no. I hate stickers.’ They cling to your skin and make that foul sound when you pull them off. Worse than Velcro. But I don’t divulge any of that to Mairi. Instead, I suppress a shudder and inch away.
Mairi watches me with raised eyebrows.
‘I’m not weird,’ I mutter.
‘I never said you were,’ she laughs. It’s a pretty sound, husky.
‘So, are you guys a thing?’ I ask.
‘Me and Jacob? Oh, no, he’s not –’ She clears her throat.
‘No, we’re not.’ Mairi fiddles with one of her braids, suddenly self-conscious.
I’d feel bad, but for once it’s refreshing not to be on the receiving end of that question.
‘But I’d better catch up with him. I promised to show him around town. ’
‘Don’t forget to introduce him to Anton,’ I say, and point to the sticker. ‘They’ve got the same hair.’
‘Be nice to him, Simo,’ she says instead of a goodbye, but I spot the grin before she turns. When she reaches Pott’s Flowers, she waves over her shoulder without looking back, then disappears inside.
A sudden coldness against my chest makes me look down, and I see a hand holding out a cup of lemonade – Luca’s hand.
He sips from a second cup that’s dripping with condensation.
He’s lost the apron and changed into a blue T-shirt that only intensifies the colour of his eyes.
The necklace I gave him glints golden on his skin.
He looks like the personification of the summer sky.
I take the cup and search his face for a sign that I didn’t imagine the sudden intensity in the supply closet.
He scans the stickers on the window, then his gaze lands back on me.
I could be wrong, but for a second something cuts through the expression of ease, a flicker of raw emotion.
It’s gone before I can make sense of it.
It plants a seed of doubt, whether I know him as well as I thought I did. Whether I know myself at all.
‘Dad kicked me out. Says if I want to chew someone’s ear off about ghosts, he’d rather I pick someone else.’ He slurps on the straw, and his throat jumps with every swallow. ‘And I pick you.’
I let his words wash over me, let them steal away the doubt, at least momentarily. Then I set my lips to the straw and drink, ice cubes clinking. My teeth hurt from the cold, and I’m on the brink of a brain freeze, but I keep sipping. Flavour bursts on my tongue. Sugar, lemon, mint.
‘Go on then,’ I say. ‘Chew my ear off.’