Page 27 of Ghosts Don't Cry
Her lips wrapped around those two words, spoken in the same voice that used to whisper against my skin in the dark. She’d beg me to let her help, let her in, and stop pushing her away. Seven years of distance should have dulled the impact, and made it just another sound.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.
I stood there, frozen, while my brainhelpfullysupplied all the details I’ve tried to forget. Every note she slipped into my locker, onto my desk, tucked between pages of library books. The lighthouses she drew, her handwriting. Every time she tried to reach past the walls I’d built.
“Why?”
The question hit like a fist to the gut. All the air left my lungs. My throat closed. The streetlight overhead flickered, and for a second I was back in the factory, her hands on my face, her voice saying my name like a prayer while my world fell apart.
Living on the streets gave me time to build walls. Layer by layer, brick by brick, I constructed defenses that could withstand anything. Five years in prison taught me how to reinforce them, and keep them strong.
It took thirty seconds of standing in front of Lily for every brick to crumble to dust.
Time changed us both, but her transformation is more physically obvious. She’s comfortable in her skin, confident in how she stands and holds herself. Secure in the fact that she belongs here, has roots and a life that makes sense.
I’m still learning how to exist in spaces that don’t have bars on the windows. After my release, I slipped back into old patterns without meaning to. It was the only way I knew how to live on the outside. I took jobs where no one asked questions. Construction sites, mostly. Places where my past didn’t matter as long as I showed up on time and did the work. Jobs where the labor was hard enough to exhaust me past dreams and the memory of cell doors slamming.
I spent two years moving between cities, job sites, and motel rooms that all looked the same. I never stayed long enough for anyone to see past the surface, or spent enough time with anyone for them to look closely at who I was.
The same rootless existence I lived before prison. Only this time I had money for motel rooms, for food that didn’t come from dumpsters or theft, and for clothes that fit instead of hanging off a frame too thin to fill them.
And then she was standing in front of me again, and I was drowning in memories I can’t afford to relive.
The way she felt pressed against me, warm and alive and real in a world where everything else was cold. The way she smelled of vanilla and something floral I never learned the name of, mixed with cotton and soap. The way she tasted when she kissed me. The weight of her in my lap, her fingers in my hair, herbreath against my neck. The sounds she made when I touched her. The way her pulse jumped under my lips.
Every fucking detail I’ve tried to bury flooded back with enough force to break me all over again.
So, I walked away.
The same way I walked away from her seven years ago, when I chose silence over goodbye because words would have made it real, and hurt her more than I already was.
Walking away is the only thing I’ve ever been good at.
Outside the window, night falls, turning the streets dark and empty. Streetlights light up one by one, while I stand in the kitchen of a house that feels like a new kind of prison.
This one has no bars or guards. There’s no razor wire keeping me in. But it’s a prison all the same, built from memories instead of steel. One where her voice echoes off empty walls, mixing with all the ghosts I thought I’d left behind. Where every room holds a version of myself I can’t escape, and every window shows me a town that never wanted me in the first place.
At least in actual prison, I knew the rules. I knew that if I kept my head down and did my time, eventually they’d let me out.
This prison doesn’t have a release date.
When I finally feel like I can stand without holding onto something, I push away from the counter and force myself to move. I need to think about something besides the way her voice sounded saying my name. I need to focus on something I can control.
The house creaks around me as I walk through rooms that still don’t feel real. Everything needs work. The wiring is old enough to kill someone if they touch the wrong switch. The plumbing sounds like it’s ready to burst every time I turn on a faucet. The foundation is trying to remember what solid means after years of slow decay.
I catalog it all with the same precision I used to catalog exits, weapons, and threats. Except this time, I’m looking for problems I know how to fix. Concrete tasks with clear solutions. The kind of work that keeps your hands busy and your mind quiet.
Five years inside taught me more than how to survive. I studied everything the prison library had, and Edwards brought me what they didn’t—engineering textbooks, electrical manuals, building codes, plumbing diagrams. Knowledge was the only thing they couldn’t take away, so I hoarded it. Memorized it. Made it mine in a way nothing else could be. I was allowed to take courses, get qualifications, and then once I was released I spent two years on construction sites, turning all the theory into experience. I learned how buildings fit together, how systems work, and how to build something that lasts.
But this is different.
This isn’t just another job where I can put in my hours and walk away at the end of the day. Just another guy with a hammer and a paycheck. This is supposed to be permanent.Mine.
The word sticks in my throat.
Upstairs, in the bedroom I claimed, my duffel bag sits on the floor by the door, still packed and ready for me to grab and run. I haven’t opened the dresser drawers, or hung anything in the closet. I haven’t even made the bed with the sheets I bought earlier.
The moon cuts silver squares across the floor through windows that need cleaning. Crossing the room, I sit at the desk Edwards must have put here and pull out paper so I can make a list of what I’ll need from the hardware store. Materials. Tools. Each item another link in the chain tying me to this project, to this house, to this town.
