20. Charlie #3
Terror struck like lightning. My entire body went rigid, every muscle locking. Was it Brad? Had he heard us? Was he standing outside the door right now, salt and holy water in hand?
“Close your eyes.”
I snapped them shut instantly, squeezing tightly, pulse thundering.
Bat’s fingers moved near my ear, before he yanked on a couple of strands of hair.
“Ow!”
“Got you, you bastard.”
My eyes flew open just as he flicked something off the side of the bed with obvious satisfaction.
“Money spider,” he said, brushing his hands together. “Got it. You’re safe now.”
I shivered horribly, scratching at the spot near my ear where the evil little creature had dared to climb. My skin crawled with phantom legs, invisible webs clinging to every inch of me.
“Told you I’d always protect you,” Bat said with a smile.
It should have been a joke. Light. Teasing. But the way he said it—too serious, too intense—made my breath catch. We stared at each other, and I knew we were both thinking the same thing.
We shouldn’t be intense with each other. We couldn’t be this intense.
Tell that to my heart, going thump, thump, thump.
Bat cleared his throat, looking away first.
“Lily laughs so much at me about it. The spider thing. She’s just a kid, but she hunts down every spider in my flat without hesitation, rolling her eyes at her pathetic uncle cowering on the sofa.”
Bat chuckled. “She sounds like a firecracker. How did this whole spider phobia thing happen anyway? If you can tell me without having a panic attack. Have you always been this terrified?”
I pulled the duvet up to my chest, suddenly cold. “No. It started when I was about six or seven.”
The memory surfaced unbidden. Razor-edged and visceral.
“We’d gone camping. Family holiday in the Lake District. I wandered off from our campsite—you know how kids do. Following some interesting bird or butterfly or whatever.”
Bat nodded, settling beside me with that careful stillness ghosts seemed to master.
“Found this old stone wall. Proper ancient thing, all covered in ivy. There was a gap at the bottom, like a little cave. Perfect for a curious kid to explore.”
My throat tightened. Even now, twenty-seven years later, the memory made my palms sweat.
“I squeezed inside. It was dark, cramped. Cobwebs everywhere, but I didn’t care. I was an explorer, wasn’t I? Adventure called.”
The walls of that tiny space pressed in around me again. Damp stone. The smell of decay.
“I reached forward, trying to find the back wall.” My palm tingled with the phantom sensation. “Put my hand straight into a spider’s nest. Eggs burst under my fingers. Hundreds of tiny spiders swarming up my arm, into my hair, down my shirt.”
I could feel them again. Tickling. Crawling. Multiplying.
“I screamed and tried to back out, but I was stuck. The gap was too narrow. The more I panicked, the worse it got. Spiders everywhere, and me trapped in this tiny space, unable to move.”
Bat’s eyes widened in alarm. “Holy shit, Charlie.”
“Took my dad twenty minutes to find me. By then I was hyperventilating, covered in bites, absolutely hysterical.” I scratched at my arms unconsciously. “Never quite got over it.” To put it mildly.
My stomach churned, that familiar nausea rising. The room felt smaller suddenly. Walls pressing closer.
“Ah, sorry,” Bat said quickly. “Okay, no more spider talk.”
I reached over to grab his hand, needing that anchor, that solid presence—
My fingers passed straight through him.
“Sorry,” Bat repeated, wincing this time. “I’m starting to run out of juice again.”
His legs, tangled with mine a moment ago, were gone, I realised. “It’s okay,” I said, swallowing hard.
But it wasn’t okay. It was so easy to forget that Bat was a ghost, that I’d soon be away from this place, never to see him again.
Bat’s clothes flickered back into existence like a television switching channels—one moment bare skin, the next his black T-shirt and jeans materialising from nothing.
I blinked hard. “That’s properly unsettling.”
“Sorry.” The word came out mumbled, distant. His third apology in as many minutes.
“Please stop apologising.” I sat up, pulling the duvet around my shoulders. “You never need to apologise to me, Bat.”
He nodded, biting his lip in that way that made him look awfully young. Vulnerable.
“Anyway, my turn to ask a question,” I said, desperate to regain some lightness between us.
Bat waited patiently, those large brown eyes fixed on my face.
“What the fuck is with the name Bat?”
He roared with laughter—delightful belly laughs.
I pointed at the small stitched bat on the front of his tee, grinning. “I have to know! You really went all in with it.”
“Oh, you have no idea.” His eyes sparkled with mischief. “I always hated the name Bartholomew. Stupid name. Made me stand out at school for having posh, rich parents. Mean kids called me Barth—like barf, like vomit.”
My chest tightened, imagining a ten-year-old kid with long black hair standing alone on some playground whilst other children hurled insults at him.
“Anyway, much later, I met my bandmates at uni and we formed a band together. Had no idea what we were doing, or even what we would be called. During our first proper gig, nervous little Bartholomew knocked over the mic stand, tangled himself in cables, and ended up hanging upside down from the stage rigging for a mortifying thirty seconds.” His grin turned self-deprecating.
“Someone in the crowd shouted ‘Look, it’s a bat!’ The crowd loved it, the name stuck, and suddenly our band had an identity. Bat’s Bats.”
I laughed, picturing Bat suspended like some gothic Christmas decoration. “So, you just went by Bat from that day forward?”
“Pretty much. My parents hated it, obviously. But by that point, I barely visited them anyway.”
The smile faded from his face, replaced by something harder to read.
“Do you…” I treaded carefully. “Think they’re still alive?”
Bat frowned, considering. “Maybe? They’d be pretty old by now.”
“Well, we can always see if we can find out.”
Bat sighed deeply, flopping back against the pillow. “You’re not going to let this internet research thing go, are you?”
“Probably not.”
“Fine.” He waved his hand dramatically. “Go do your mysterious hotspot tech whizz thing. Work your magic. Do your worst.”