Miss Invisible

Chapter 2

Later that night I finally gained the courage to leave the hospital without Alex. The air outside was relaxing and calm, the opposite of the inside of the late night hospital, bustling with late night patients,  the majority of them drunk.
Outside, rain fell down in tiny droplets and splashed against the wet concrete pavement and the top of walkers umbrellas. One plus side of being a ghost, rain doesn't affect you nearly as bad. Though, I wasn't sure if it was the rain that was giving me spine shivers or the great hole that grew inside me as I gradually envied the people passing by more and more. They were walking past each other, having to step to the side to let one another pass, however I could just walk through the crowds as if I was never there, because I wasn't.
Alex had told me to go to an apartment on 87 street, saying he couldn't explain everything as well as the man who lived there could, so I set off walking directly down the middle of the road. Cars flew through me at alarming rates but I soon got used to the fact nothing was going to hit me or even touch me because they couldn't even if they tried. As I walked, I listened to the familiar sound of people walking, vendors trying to sell goods and the heavy clap of rain. It felt like taking a painkiller when you have a headache, a short and sweet relief for a few moments. A path to the eye of the storm.
When I reached the apartment, the smell of incense wafted up my nose quickly and I could hear a faint humming in a different room. As I opened the door to the room, I saw a man draped in an old moth eaten poo brown trench coat and baggy pants. His face had so many wrinkles there was probably one for every person on earth and he had clearly been homeless before he died. Still, he greeted me with a warm smile.
"So, you're the person Alex told me all about? Come , take a seat."
I sat as the man asked, curious about the situation I had seemed to have gotten myself stuck in.
"Okay so, what questions do you have child?"
"Well, what is this place? Why can I see other dead people? Are there any rules?" I cut my sentence short, if I kept asking we'd be here all night.
"We are in what the spirits call the beyond dear," The man replied, "You can see every other dead spirit now, however, the ones who aren't here are the ones who are now condemned to fade away. The sinners you might say. No one living can see or hear us and unfortunately you may only speak to them when they themselves die to."
At that sentence, even though I knew it was coming, my breathing hitched. I wouldn't be able to speak to Kassie for a very very long time. Then the thoughts came back. What if she forgets me? What if she doesn't care? What if she finds someone else?  As much as I wanted to push these thoughts to the back of my mind they were all quite possible and knowing that only made the whole inside me feel bigger and more empty.  I got up and quickly walked through the door, I wasn't ready for this talk yet. I didn't want to accept the fact that Kassie was going to live another approximate 68 years without me in it and I just had to accept that. She would move on and I would just be stuck under that icy lake, whilst she built a home with someone else above it. And as much as I could bang on the ice, scream or kick she would never even know I was there, like I was stuck behind a painting or I was an invisible background character. The thing I hated and hate the most about being dead is that despite how I would feel normally, all I can feel is empty. I would give so much just to feel sad or happy or confused. Just to feel something.
I walked back to my old house through the streets, hoping to at least have some sleep on my bed before inevitably they moved all the things out of my room and I would have to find somewhere else to stay. At least I could go find a fancy expensive mansion to sleep in where the price was so high that no one would buy it because the world still had some common sense.