6
Tristan
I may have accidentally haunted the pretty blonde living in my house. I’m not proud of it, and honestly, it was a combination of a misunderstanding and a freak incident involving an opossum. Still, I’m probably going to cringe every time I think about it for the rest of eternity.
Not to make excuses, but it turns out Demi St. James is a little careless, and it’s been putting me on edge.
Her first night at the Manor was just the tip of the iceberg.
She went to bed that evening without locking the front doors, and she left a stick of incense burning in the living room on the first floor.
For obvious reasons, burning things unattended is a bit of a trigger for me.
So, I put out her incense and locked the doors.
Then, she left all the lights in the house on. I thought I was doing her a favor by turning them off after she went to sleep, but it turns out she left them on intentionally.
I realized what I’d done wrong when I followed her out to the stairs and saw how scared she was.
Her fear did something to me. It was so raw and vulnerable, and all I knew was that I never wanted to see her like that again.
I’d never felt more like a villain than when I watched her cling to the staircase banister, trembling in just an old t-shirt .
I quickly turned the lights back on, but the damage was done.
The only thing I don’t regret from that night is when her ex-boyfriend called her at three in the morning, and I restarted her phone.
Fuck that guy.
It’s been just over a week of us living together, and I feel like I spend most of my time following her around, cleaning up after her, and making sure she doesn’t burn our house down. Again.
She has a habit of leaving things right on the edge of a counter or table-glasses of water or Cherry Coke, coffee cups, her laptop– so I push them away from the edge in an effort to make sure they don’t get knocked down by her gigantic cat or a light breeze.
What’s worse, she’s a big fan of candles and incense. I like the way they make the house smell and the rooms feel cozy, like a real home. But she always leaves the room with the flames lit. Every time she does, panic claws its way through me, and I can’t rest until I’ve blown her candles out.
I know it annoys her.
“Goddamn it, just let me live my life, my dude,” she curses me from the doorway of the library.
She lit a candle on the desk in here, then wandered away to grab a box of books to bring in and unpack. She was coming right back, but come on…the library? With all the books?
I sit in a dark blue velvet chair in the corner, watching as Demi finds space on the floor-to-ceiling shelves for her book collection.
She’s wearing a burgundy dress with thin straps that clings to her curves and a cream cardigan that looks handmade and keeps slipping off her shoulder.
There’s some kind of shiny gloss on her lips that keeps drawing my attention to her mouth; she’s chewing gum and blowing big pink bubbles with it.
When she tilts her head a certain way, her long golden hair skims the slope of her lower back.
She’s wearing the earrings I see her in a lot, big gold hoops, and her long nails make muted clicking sounds, like rain on a roof, as she taps them on the stack of books in her arms.
Demi has been working on moving my book collection around to make room for hers. The top shelves are less full, so she’s been taking a handful of old books and climbing the rolling ladder to shift them up and out of the way.
I like watching the way her body moves when she climbs the ladder.
She stands at the top rung and looks at the cover of each book before sliding them into place, taking care to be gentle, especially with the first editions.
Every so often, she finds a book in my collection that makes a little smile curve her lips.
Charmed by her easy contentment, I wish I could ask her why they make her happy, so that I could find more books to make her smile like that.
The library is all dark-wood shelves and wall paneling, with crown molding and a decorative high ceiling painted a green so deep it’s almost black.
A massive ebony desk sits by the window, and there’s a fireplace on the opposite wall.
The room is lit by a chandelier hanging from the ceiling and a Tiffany lamp on the desk.
There are two velvet chairs positioned near the fireplace, and that’s where I linger, watching Demi make my house her own.
As I watch her, I keep imagining the same scenario. A daydream of me coming up behind her as she climbs back down the ladder. I fit my hands into the dip of her waist, lift her off the bottom rung, and set her on her feet. Then I wrap my arms around her from behind and pull her close against me—
Her phone buzzes on the desk, and before I can even think about why I’m doing it, I’m across the room to see who’s calling. It’s a text message.
Unknown number: Answer your phone
This fucking guy.
Her ex, Owen, calls and texts her multiple times a day. She never answers, but I see the almost imperceptible way she tenses every time her phone vibrates. And I don’t like it. I don’t like it one bit.
Demi has this cool-girl way about her. I would never describe her as bubbly, but she’s funny and rolls with the punches easier than anyone I’ve ever seen. The opossum incident notwithstanding, I have yet to see her agitated.
One thing I’ve learned about mortals is that too often they spend their finite time worrying about things that don’t matter. They offer their energy to things that, on their deathbed, they won’t even remember. I was the same way when I was alive.
Somehow, Demi St. James lives her life with a better understanding of her mortality than most, in that she just doesn’t give a shit.
She seems to have learned that most circumstances do not warrant the stress most mortals experience.
Moving through the world with a sense of amusement instead of a sense of worry, she is, in my opinion, a bit of a marvel.
Her phone buzzes again. This time it’s a phone call from that same unknown number.
Without hesitation, I press the small side button to restart her device.
She left it where she leaves everything, on the very edge of the desk, and I may push the button a little too aggressively, because her phone falls to the floor with a clatter.
The sound catches her attention, and she turns too quickly from where she’s standing at the top of the ladder. Her bare foot slips from the rung, and she loses her balance.
Before I even know what’s happening, I’m up the ladder, floating behind her with my hands on her waist. I can’t feel her, not really, and she can’t feel me. But I’m there, a steady barrier keeping her from falling.
Demi sucks in a little gasp, and a shiver moves through her. That , I can feel.
“Holy shit,” she whispers.
Yeah. Holy shit.
I can’t feel her in my hands, but I can sense the shape of her, and I can feel the warmth radiating from her skin. The sound of her breathing is the only thing I can hear. Her scent embraces me like a lover. Earthy and sweet.
Thunderstruck. I’m thunderstruck by her.
She trembles slightly as she slowly moves down the ladder. I float down with her, attached to her like a magnet.
When we reach the floor, she turns to face me, and I don’t back away. I stay planted right where I am. If I were alive, we’d be close enough to kiss, my hands on her waist, maybe one lifting her chin, leaning down to take her lips with mine. But I’m not alive.
Instead, I stand and watch as she takes a shaking breath and searches the space in front of her.
I can’t decide if this feeling is wonderful or horrible.
She knows I’m here; she can feel me, and that should be enough.
For a ghost, to be sensed should be enough.
Still, I hate the way her seeking gaze keeps missing me when I’m right here , in front of her.
The things I would do for those clear blue eyes to look at me. Just once.