Page 3 of A Ballad of Phantoms and Hope
“Really? I’m shocked. You always have depressing things to ponder.” He laughs and looks down at his hands thoughtfully before raising his gaze to mine.
He was way too fucking young to die. We all were. I have a suspicion that his unfinished business is being with that woman he was secretly seeing at the Fall Festival years ago. I think he was in love.
Jericho smiles and says, “You know, Yelina and Poppie are going to come with me and a few of the others to the Spring Performance this weekend in the city. You should come too.”
My shoulders drop, and I let my body flop back into the bed with a groan. I’ve become one of those groaning ghosts where allthey do is wail and complain. Maybe even scare the shit out of people if they can hear me on the other side.
“It won’t be so bad. I go every year and it always manages to be better than the last.” Jericho hops off the table and stands above me. “You have to try to find what’s keeping you here, Lanston. How sad will it be if you’re the last ghost here in the next century after all of us have moved on?”
I scowl at him and he smiles.
“Fine—I’ll go.”
2
Lanston
I usedto be a city person—wide-eyed and filled with excitement for what the world had to offer. It’s difficult to pinpoint what exactly it is that changed my view of the bustling streets filled with people.
Perhaps it’s the mundane, sad faces everyone carries. All their youth and energy drained by the lives they carry out.
The misery is palpable.
I’m the phantom here, but they could all fool me with how distant and weary they look. People are meant to be happy, mingle, and laugh. I’ve forgotten how cold and cruel the real world is. It’s easy to be locked away within the safety of Harlow Sanctum. To be in your own sanctuary that protects all the things you hold dear in the world.
However, in the words of Jericho, if I don’t leave, I’ll never find what’s keeping me here.
Birds take to the sky as Yelina and Poppie link arms and rush toward the big pond in the center of the city park. A fountain isat its center, drizzling a steady stream that ripples throughout the pond. I watch a murder of black crows fly overhead with awe before the laughter of the two women draws my attention back down.
Poppie’s brown hair is pulled back into a loose braid, strands wisping around her face. Yelina smiles at her, brushing her blonde hair back before she leaps into the pond. Her pastel yellow dress gets wet at the ends and her heels are long gone into the murky shallows and mud. Poppie is only a beat behind her, skipping into the knee-high water. The two of them extend their arms and laugh like two intoxicated fools.
Their eyes catch on the boutique shops that line the main street as the evening lights flick on. They link arms and charge straight for them. Their clothing instantly dries as they set foot outside the pond as if they’d never even hopped in.
Perk number one to being a ghost: You can do whatever you want and not suffer any consequences. We can’t get hurt either.
Jericho chuckles low and lights a cigarette, placing it between his lips before stretching and patting my back to follow. “We’d better keep up if we don’t want to get left to the wayside,” he mumbles, lips half-closed over the joint.
I groan and pull my ball cap down more. Even though only other phantoms can see us, I’m fucking embarrassed to be going to this Spring Performance. Apparently this year’s theme is supposed to be one of those sappy, passionate, more of a musical type thing.
The nice thing about tonight, though, is the lovely ambiance in the air. As the sun sets over the mini skyscrapers of the diminutive Montana city, I can only smile as life seems to spark back into all the sad faces around us.
With the darkness of night, the human soul finds solace in being hidden—fewer eyes to interrogate you for the odd joys you hold in your heart. Funny, the things I never noticed before. Thethings that I wish I would’ve paid more attention to when I was alive.
But I was always one of those people who couldn’t look at others passing by in public. It took a lot for me to look at someone and smile boldly. Harlow was different; I felt safe there. Everyone was similar to me, after all. Broken and fucked up in some way or another.
Out here in the real world, though? I was an utter mess. I suppose it was probably the looks people gave me… For some reason, that bothered me the most. The looks that said I was weird or unlikable for being myself. If my hair was too long or if they didn’t like my tattoos. They’d prefer I hide everything about me and pretend. Draw that fucking smile across my face like every sane person in the world does.
And you better fucking believe I did my best to put on the facade—the show of a century. And as one would presume, people bought tickets to that show of false contentment, of no sad past, no scars.
At least, I did until it didn’t work anymore.
One day, I just woke up and couldn’t paint a smile on for one more second.
So I stopped looking for approval altogether and stared at the ground instead, because the cement and dirt were at least neutral to my existence. Indignant of those who dare pass judgment on me, I fell into myself. Into the safe recesses of the dark.
My light died a long time ago—flickering with the many exhales of disapproval until finally, with one big breath, it was blown completely out. Like a withering candle left out in the cold, surely to hush and diminish as expected.
I wanted to be so many things.
