Illusory | ✓

i l l u s o r y : 03

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED COPYRIGHTED 2015

I L L U S O R Y : 03

Mundane. It's the only word to describe the town for a whole week ever since Patty's death. The popular crowd lost their crown jewel, they lost one of their youngest members, one of their prettiest, of their funniest, and one of their most dramatic stars to grace the school stage. Bridger doesn't come to school the day after Patty passes away. No one can blame him. He just lost his only sibling, his little sister, and there's no way for him to close his eyes and open them again to see his sister standing in front of him with a large smile plastered across her features and happiness shimmering her large eyes.

I decide not to go to the visitation or the funernal. Why should I be allowed to go? I won't cry, I won't frown. I'll dully stare at the beautiful photographs that are in front of me and the casket of the girl before landing my eyes on her ghost next to the casket. I'll have to deal with the daggers from her cold eyes, and the knowing that she doesn't want me to be at the funeral parlor.

"Your kind doesn't belong here."

"You weren't even friends with her."

"Is it true? Can you see her?"

"Why should I believe you?"

These words usher themselves into my brain as I imagine what people might have said if I had gone to the funeral, and I know with my arms folded against my chest and my blanket wrapped around me in a bundle of a mess that I've made the right decision...that I didn't go with Mom and Dad to the funeral. Heck, even Jared tagged along with Mom and Dad.

Sighing, I grab my laptop from next to me on the couch and turn it on, waiting for the screen to come to life and show me the home page. As the different icons appear in front of me, showing different places that I can tap with my finger against the touch screen I hear the sound of the doorbell ringing. I grumble underneath my breath before tapping on the Netflix icon.

Sitting my laptop off to the side, I stand up from the leather couch and wrap the blanket around me before heading towards the front door. For a second I almost imagine seeing Patty herself standing in front of me, telling me that she wanted me to come to her funeral. The funny thing about ghosts though, they don't have to knock on the front door or ring the doorbell. If they want their presence known, they will let it be known.

Opening the front door, I feel my throat tighten at the sight of the person before me. Standing in front of me, in a crisp black tuxedo with his gray eyes slightly red and puffy is Bridger Willis. Even with tear stained but chisled cheekbones, puffy red eyes and a dismay of brown hair on the top of his head, his whole distressed state makes him look even ten times more irresitable than he usually looks.

"B-Bridger," I stutter his name from the tip of his tongue as I stare at him, almost expecting to close my eyes and open them to find him not in front of me. Or for him to tell me that he just came by to borrow some milk. Lame, I know, but it's possible.

Bridger manages to give me a small half smile that makes my heart flutter in my chest, and his eyes soften as he studies me in my huge t-shirt that looks like a bag on me and my gray leggings. My hair is a mess all around me, the natural frizz of it makes me look as though I'm a model for a homeless person's magazine.

"Hey, Jane." I almost shiver from the sound of hearing him say my name. Almost. "I was wondering, if I could come in and talk to you?" He gives me a hopeful look, as though he's intruding someone who's way more social than me.

I give him another stunned look before moving out of the way and wave him to come in. "Ah, no. You're not intruding or anything. I mean, yes, you can come in and talk. To me, yeah, you can talk to me," I spill out to him the jumble of words to him and he nods his head before he walks into the house and I shut the front door shut behind him.