Page 10 of Ghost Girl

The only remaining question was how?

As I reached out with my mind, imagining my fingers extending in invitation, I managed the barest graze against it. It paused, curious, and prodded me back, then darted around me in a taunting dance before disappearing entirely.

If I’d had working lungs, I would have been panting from the exertion. As it stood, I was depleted of enough energy that I needed to rest. I didn’t sleep. I didn’t have a body that needed to shut down to mend itself every night after a day spent exerting energy, but I did still need to recharge after spending so much of myself in my attempts.

Today was a good day. The power had acknowledged me, even interacted with me, before disappearing again. That was a good sign.

It gave me hope.

I smiled to myself as I returned to where the pieces of my remains were buried, eager to sit and be still as I drew more energy from them, but my smile immediately fell from my face as I caught sight of a shadowy figure watching me from inside the treeline. I couldn’t see any features. There was no height, no face,no eyes.It was just a shadow, like tendrils of black smokewrithing in a mass that vaguely resembled a humanoid shape. Yet, despite the lack of eyes for me to latch onto, I could sense they were watching me.

They had witnessed my attempt at harnessing the power I had conjured, and something about it must have intrigued them. But was that intrigue innocent or malicious?

‘Who are you?’ I called out, my voice both loud like a sonic boom through the stillness, yet quiet like a whisper on the wind. Eerie. Supernatural.

Haunting.

Ha. I cracked myself up.

When I got no response, I wasn’t surprised, but there was something unsettling about watching the writhing mass of pure darkness as it stared at me, especially considering I was unable to pinpoint its facial features. Did it even have a face anymore, or had it become something so dark and twisted that it no longer resembled a human being?

Objectively, I knew that I shouldn’t have been afraid. There wasn’t anything that could hurt me anymore, at least physically, because I wasn’t a physical being. Yet, there was something so incredibly chilling about the shadow creature, like it was an abomination against nature.

Or perhaps it wasn’t so much an abomination, but a being that had been changed by death into something more than just a simple ghost. Something that thrived off death. A hunter of the dead.

The epiphany settled into my being like a lead weight. I hadn’t encountered anything on this side of death that posed a threat to me.Iwas supposed to be the only threat around here. Yet, I could tell that whatever that thing was, whoever they were now, was bigger and badder than me.

I didn’t like that. Not one bit.

Fear tried to take hold, but I refused to let it. I had been the prey in life; I blatantly refused to be anything but the predator in death.

And still, as we continued to take stock of one another, neither one of us made any move to close the distance. We were both simply watching, waiting, allowing the silence to stretch into something else entirely. I got the sense that it hadn’t decided yet if I was prey, or if I was something more, but I had already decided long ago that I would be that something more.

‘I won’t make it easy on you,’ I told it, knowing it could hear me despite the distance. Sound here travelled differently than it did in the realm of the living. Everything was simultaneously too quiet and too loud, a boom and a sigh.

The shadows dissolved in response, leaving behind nothing more than a deep, male chuckle that was far more amused than it should have been. The sound reverberated throughout the space, rattling the bound energy that made up my phantasmic form until I felt like I would vibrate apart.

So, it was a game then. Fine. I’d already let one man destroy me, I wasn’t about to let some strange, incorporeal bastard do it again.

Game on, shadow man. Let’s see which one of us was the bigger monster.

Chapter 4

Chance

Florence’s nails were digging into the skin of my forearm. It was as if she thought that if she buried them deep enough, I wouldn’t leave. Fortunately for her and unfortunately for me, Mom was eyeing us across the room with a gaze like a hawk. They were flashing with greed. At one point, as if they shared the same single brain cell, both my mother and Florence licked their lips like they were about to devour my soul and condemn me to the tediously miserable, captive existence of a high-society husband.

No. Fucking. Thank. You.

Florence’s high-pitched giggle was a perfect match for her outward appearance. Fake, shrill, and a complete turn-off. The Botox in her forehead made every facial expression look plastic. Combined with the floral monstrosity that was her evening dress and the bleached blonde hair that clashed with the orange of her fake tan and her heavy makeup, she reminded me more of a doll than a person.

A walking, talking, horror movie.

Her needle-enhanced lips protruded from her face in an obnoxious display, and I realised she likely got her nose job to raise it up and away in a feeble attempt the keep her nostrilsclear. Even now, I was concerned her top lip would suffocate her, though I doubted that would be a real issue since they were so heavy her bottom lip struggled to close.

She was the loudest mouth breather I had ever met.

‘Oh, my goodness,’ she shrieked, her laughter trilling annoyingly through the room and stabbing at my nerves. ‘You’resofunny, Chancey. I can’t believe you do something so… quaint.’

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