“He’s dead,” I said.
“What?No—I could’ve sworn I told you he got hit by a car.”
“Yeah and that he died!”
Rose shook her head slowly, about three types of confusion crossing her face. “I... didnotsay that.”
Didn’t she? I mean—it didn’t matter, Ben was rightthere.He haunted me. He was dead, hehadto be. But the more I thought back to our conversation the less I became sure about it because... I wasn’t sure if shehadsaid he died, or if I inferred it. She said that he was hit by oncoming traffic, and I inferred the rest.
I mean, he was a fucking ghost.
And now he was gone. I watched him fade into the wind, but—
What if...
What if that wasn’t because he moved on?
“And—and he woke up?” I asked, my voice brittle. I got to my feet and faced Rose, my chest tight with anxiety and disbelief and—and hope.
It washope.
Rose showed me the text message from Erin.
HOTTIE MCHOTCAKES HAS RISEN! He’s awake!!
“Hottie McHotcakes?” I echoed, reading the text over and over. It was so outlandishly funny. Because I’d just said goodbye to him. I’d watched him pass on and here someone was talking about him as if he was—
As if hewas—
“He’s alive.”
The times he disappeared without warning. The voices he heard. The sounds. The pain—I’d ignored most of it because it didn’t matter. He was dead because my stubborn ass said he was. But hewasn’t, and while he existed here, some part of him was still being pulled back to his body, wrenched back, even though he kept trying to stayhere, thinking that wherever he was going was worse.
If I’d been more perceptive. If I hadn’t written off his weird experiences. If I’d justthoughta little, that things weren’t always the same, not always certain.
I pressed my hand over my mouth to muffle a sob.
Rose took me by the shoulders. “Florence? Babe? Are you okay?”
I shook my head. The world blurred with my tears. “H-He’s alive,” I said between sobs. “B-Ben is alive.”
Alice looked up from her spot on the ground. “Your ghost boyfriend, Ben?”
To that, Rose asked, “Aghost?”
And that made me cry even harder, and Rose pulled me close to her and wrapped her arms around me, even though she didn’t understand. He could feed his cat again, and he could go tobookstores, and read his favorite novels, and he could take all of those vacations he never did before, and meet new people, and find a new family and—
And me. He could findme.
I wanted to have memories with Ben. I wanted to see him on the front porch and sit with him and make up silly stories about the people that passed on the sidewalk. I wanted to share a beer with him down at Bar None, and I wanted to dance with him—reallydance with him, our hands intertwined, my unruly heart beating so loud it gave me away.
I wanted to kiss him, obviously, but it was so much fuckingmorethan that.
When I was with Lee, I could see my entire life unfold around him. I knew where I fit in, I knew what part to play and how to play it. I had a place in his life, and I boxed myself into it as best I could, and I tried to be the perfect girlfriend for someone who was looking for a saint.
But when I thought about Ben, about his disheveled hair, his timid smile and soft voice, a heartstring pulled so taut in my chest it almost broke, and it hurt. Because I thought I could—
I thought I couldlovehim.