"I tell you to celebrate and look what happens." I hear, as my eyes flutter open. I was in a hospital room. In front of me was a teenage version of Hunter. There must have been a shock in my eyes because he added, "Lesson one of being a ghost, you can choose your form or age anytime."
"Lessons?"
"What? You might as well be dead! Look at yourself." He said, angry. I looked at my hands that were not translucent.
"What—" I looked behind me on the bed and I saw myself. I jumped out of the bed. "But—" I looked at the heart monitor. It was still beating. "I'm in a coma..." I whispered to myself. I put my hand on the nape of my neck.
"I told you to celebrate." Hunter said, I looked at him. "Not to die."
"I celebrated and I'm not dead!"
"It's practically the same thing!"
"No, it isn't!" I said, "I could still wake up, I could—"
"Don't hope. Not when you're dead."
"But I'm not dead!"
"Well, you can see me, can't you?" I was silent. "You might as well be dead, Anne." He added. "What happened? You were happy!"
"I was, but Jeremy—"
"Oh, for goodness sake!" He threw his hands in the air. "How thick are you?!"
"Excuse me?!"
"Giving up your happiness because of a boy? Please." He mocked, coldly.
"Shut up! You don't understand!"
"I don't? Well, I wouldn—"
"He cheated on me! I was going home when he kissed me! He forced himself on me and I tried escaping and hit my head!"
"Forced himself on you?" He asked, rhetorically. "Like you didn't want him to kiss you." He crossed his arms and I crossed mine and transferred my eight onto my other foot.
"Actually, I didn't. Not at that moment."
"But any other moment—"
"Of course! He's my boyf—" I stopped myself. I was using present tense. With Hunter listening closely, I changed my phrasing. "He was my boyfriend." I started to admit that this was something that we could not fix. I was leaving anyways, how would it fix anything? Hunter's tone and eyes changed as he heard that, he wasn't angry. He saw my pain and he saw the problem from my perspective.
"Look, I'm sure that there must be some reasonable explanation."
"Yeah? I tried thinking that, too, but really, Hunter?" I said, not angry and the pain was in my voice now. My voice shaking and cracking. Me, trying so hard not to cry. "I don't think so."
"But Jeremy wouldn't—"
"Well, maybe Jeremy would. Maybe he was acting all this time. About himself and maybe it was all an act."
"No, he wou—"
"We don't know that."
"No, we do. Just think about it, do you think he would've followed you up and down the east coast if it was an act?" He had a point. "Even his mom said that he couldn't shut up about you, didn't she?" Yeah, she did. "He loved you, and I think he still does." At that moment, Hunter left the room, going to Aunt Clara in the waiting room. At that moment, Jeremy came in. I straightened my back. He sat on the chair beside my bed and I sat on the edge of my bed.
He looked like a mess. His eyes red, not from crying but from being tired. His hair was riffled and he had dark circles under his eyes.
Under any other circumstance, I'd be hugging him from behind to surprise him and kiss the top of his head. Then I'd rest my chin on his head and we'd be holding hands.
