Everytime (American Horror AU 5)

Chapter 7

Cordelia encountered the ghost of Chad Warwick late that same night—he appeared to be a man in his late twenties with short black hair, rough stubble on his face, and deep brown eyes that had an intensity beyond all comparison. He was dressed quite well for a man, wearing a dress shirt made of fine fabric with a pair of good slacks and brown leather loafers. The witch had been choosing her outfit for the following morning when she heard an effeminate, but deep-sounding voice in the master bedroom.

"Oh my god, do not match that heather gray with dark fuschia," the voice said. "You'll look like an old church marm."

"Huh?" Cordelia turned around, and there he was standing there with a friendly expression on his face.

"Hello," he said. "I'm Chad."

"Uh…I'm Cordelia," she said. "Are you—"

"Yes, yes, I am dead," he said, "and I've been doomed to spend forever with a man who doesn't love me."

"I'm sorry to hear that," she said. "Is he also in this house?"

"Yeah," he said. "I tell him to go away all the time. He was never committed to me. We renovated this house to sell it."

"Well…" The witch looked around her master bedroom, analyzing the perfect paint on the walls as he smiled. "You sure did a good job."

"Why, thank you," he smiled.

"So you mentioned that you tried to sell it?" Cordelia asked, flipping through the clothes hangers after putting the fuchsia top back into the closet. "I assume you didn't get to do that.

"No," Chad replied. "Tate killed us."

She turned sharply, keeping her bare feet planted on the carpet as her chocolate-colored eyes analyzed his stoic facial expression.

"What?" she asked.

"Yeah, but before that, me and my boyfriend were on eggshells," he explained. "He wasn't interested in me anymore. He was online with some bondage master with the email address JungleJim4322 . In a desperate attempt to recapture his interest, I totally bought a rubber latex suit."

"Oh my god," Cordelia said. "So…then what happened?"

"It didn't work. We gave up our plans to adopt a baby," Chad said sadly. "I even found out he was screwing that twink gym trainer of his. He admitted it. Did he really think that some crass admission would hurt me?"

"Well, did he mean to hurt your feelings?" the witch asked.

"I guess I'll never find out. I eavesdropped once," Chad said. "And he said he didn't love me. So I'm stuck spending forever with a man who doesn't love me."

"I'm very sorry to hear that, uh…Chad?" she said sadly. "Let me know if you ever need to talk. My adopted daughters are also welcoming. They'd be happy to meet you."

"Well, thank you," he said smiling, pointing his finger at the closet. "I'd match that gray with a white blouse, hun."

"Uh, I already wore white today," she said.

"Hun, wear it. You'll look fabulous," Chad smiled, disappearing from sight before her eyes. A smile came to her lips, taking the white blouse he was pointing at and laying it out with her other clothes for the morning.

Clara had left early for classes at the university that morning—as she walked along the path to the building of the first lecture of the day, she looked to her left and saw the main entrance of the library standing in its glory as it towered above the sparse amount of students passing by. Its sepia, Gothic architecture looked monumental as it was haunting, and the young, black-haired witch seemed so tempted to go in not so much for her love of books but by a force driving her there.