Chapter 6 #2
My eyes get wide. Floaters don’t talk. And visual hallucinations are just that—visual. This … whatever this is … is the whole package.
“Hello?” he says. “What’s this, the silent treatment? What’d I do now?”
I take a deep breath. Mason looks the same as he always did, all elbows and limbs, piercing gray-green eyes, and freckles on his earlobes, except for one thing. He seems to be ever so slightly illuminated from the inside, like those glow sticks that make a crackling sound when you bend them.
“Mason?” I finally manage.
“Christ, it took you long enough.”
“What … what the actual fuck?”
“What the actual fuck what?”
Where to begin with this question. “What … what are you doing here?”
“Well, the angels said I had to save the person in my life who had wandered the farthest off her fated path, and then I could get my wings.”
I swallow. Holy shit. “Really?”
“No, you twit! Murph, could you at least try not to be so gullible?”
This is definitely Mason. I’m still waiting for an answer. “Well, then …?”
There’s a pause, then a shrug. “I’m here to see you,” he says finally, sitting down on a rock next to me.
He’s here to see me. Electricity runs along my skin, and the other goose bump moments from the last few days flash in my mind. “Were you at the funeral?”
“Are you kidding? Wouldn’t you want to go to your own funeral, see who would come? What everyone thought of you? Of course I was there! And I’ll tell you a secret. I discovered something important.”
Revelations from beyond the grave. I inhale sharply. “What?”
“I should have hooked up with Becca Reardon when I had the chance. She was verifiably heartbroken at the church!” Oh yeah, Becca. That was the name of the girl with the pixie cut faking status she didn’t have.
“Mason, jeez! Can you be serious for one second?” I turn to where he’s sitting, but there’s nothing there.
Shit, shit, shit. Did I make him disappear?
I sit as still and as quietly as I can. I concentrate on my breath, lungs filling up, chest expanding, lungs emptying out, belly button in. Please come back. Please come back. Pl—
“I also might have noticed that Becca wasn’t the only one feeling a little weepy.” He’s back, sitting on the other side of me now. Smirking, as usual.
I smile. Stay awhile. My limbs loosen. “Oh, you mean me?” I say.
“I was just filled with emotion about mortality in general. Life and its meaning. You know, existential crap.” I untangle my braid and start weaving it again, trying to look nonchalant the way I always have when I’m with Mason.
But my insides are doing somersaults and cartwheels and backflips.
What is going on? This can’t be! But it feels realer than anything else that’s happened in weeks.
“Sure you were. Like, ‘life is meaningless without Mason’ kind of existential crap, amirite?” He smiles, too. I go to give him a little shove, but my hand just moves through open air. So that’s an added wrinkle. I guess feeling real and being tangible are not the same thing.
“Whoa. Why can’t I touch you?” I ask.
“I’m dead, dummy.”
“I got that. But you look totally three-dimensional. And … the leaves crunched under your feet before!”
“How should I know? I’ve only been dead for like three weeks. I’m not exactly an expert.” He lifts his hands and drops them, and they seem longer and thinner than ever. I have an urge to hold them, then shiver at how futile that would be.
“Fair point,” I say. I guess we’re both a bit clueless about what’s happening, which is surprising. Not just because he’s dead, but because I’ve always sort of thought of Mason as having more definitive answers than me.
“Besides, you should count yourself lucky,” Mason says. “I tried to hang with my mom—I practically swung from the chandelier in our living room—and she never even twitched. It sucks, ’cause I really wanted to tell her some stuff. But nope. Looks like you get me all to yourself.”
I wonder in that moment how he feels about being dead. Is he sad? Is it a relief? I think about asking, but I don’t.
It’s almost like he can read my mind. “But enough about me. That’s boring. How are you, Hattie? You seemed a little unstable there for a second, with all the rock throwing and the sniffling. More of grieving yours truly, I assume?”
I feel guilty as I realize I wasn’t sad about Mason at all in that moment, that what made me saddest was exclusively about me.
“I’m good. I’m fine,” I say, trying to gloss over the truth.
“You sure? Don’t want you getting all desperate on my account. Don’t isolate, Murph. I eavesdropped on several sessions with the grief counselor about me, and that was the main takeaway.”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” I hug my knees. “I’m actually doing okay.” He looks doubtful, so I add, “I might even have a date tomorrow.”
Mason pounces on this information in a way that makes me instantly regret it. “Oh, really? Well, that’s a very modern interpretation of grieving. Not the same as wearing black every day, is it? But no, seriously. I like it, Murph. You should escape a little. Who’s the lucky guy?”
I try to backtrack. Oof, how can I still feel so self-conscious in front of someone who’s dead? “It doesn’t matter. It might be nothing. I’m not even positive it’s a date.”
A car goes by on the bridge over the creek and it brings me back to reality. I wonder if the driver can see me. More importantly, can they see Mason? Or does it look like I’m talking to myself?
“Nope. You have to tell me. No one needs to live vicariously more than me.”
“Fine. Richard Walker.”
“Little Dicky? Did not see that coming. You are full of surprises.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake.” I run my hand over my face.
Mason is enjoying himself far too much. “I get it, I mean, a girl needs Dick every now and then. Needs to go on a little Dick date.” He seems to ripple with silent laughter.
“Mason!” I’m agitated. Am I embarrassed because I realize I’m actually looking for approval from a dead person or because it’s clear I don’t have it? “What’s wrong with Richard Walker?”
I can tell he’s about to come out with another double entendre, so I cut him off. “And no more dick jokes.”
He gasps. “Who, me? I would never.”
I snort. “Right. So what’s your problem with Richard? Out with it.”
“No, nothing, nothing at all. Except—well, doesn’t he sort of seem like not a real person? Like he’s an imitation of a person? He’s human aspartame.”
“That’s big talk from someone who is literally a phantom. And I think he seems like an excellent person.”
I hate it when I get huffy like this. This is quintessential Mason, though, so clever and quick that you can’t help sort of crushing on him.
Until he turns his critical laser in your direction, and it suddenly seems ridiculous that you could have entertained the idea that he could see you as more than a friend. Or that you would even want that.
The thought of more than a friend gives me an idea, though. An angle for distraction. “Anyways, it sounds like someone might just be jealous.”
“Jealous?” He leans in closer to me, like he’s intrigued. “You mean me?”
“That’s right,” I say, doubling down even though I’m already feeling stupid that I came out and suggested he would want me like I’m some hot shit or something.
He stands up and kicks at a rock at his feet. Then he shakes his head and says, “I didn’t want to admit it, Murph. But it’s the truth. I am jealous.”
My stomach starts feeling twisty and weird, like it’s trying to fold itself up with my lungs the way you pair freshly laundered socks. I can’t breathe. Is he actually saying this? Without thinking, I reach toward him. “Mason—” I start, but he interrupts me.
“I am so jealous of you. Because I want a little of that sweet Splenda Dick, toooooooo.” He howls the last word to the sky.
I groan. I should have known. This is our familiar pattern, but the sting still feels brand-new. I’m out of my depth. I start toward the road.
“I’ve got to get home. My mom will be freaking by now.”
“Okay, Murph.” The air changes and suddenly feels empty, the way a house feels when you walk in and no one is home.
I shudder. I got rid of him. Why did I do that?
Being with him felt uncomfortable, but being without him feels worse, especially since I don’t know if I’ll ever see him again.
Well, I’m not going to let that happen, because right now, I need him.
I need to see him, and maybe more than that, I need someone to see me.