Misguided Ghosts

Chapter Twenty-Four

Twenty-Four – Ed

“Sooo,” Liam said, tapping his fingers on the counter. “I’m guessing you’re Ed?”

I stood and nodded like a dumb idiot, the copies of The Fault In Our Stars almost slipping from my suddenly limp hands. Was it really Liam, standing in front of me? I knew so, so much about this boy, and yet he knew nothing about me. I knew that when he was nine, he had lied about how he had got a black eye, saying that he and I had got in a fight, when in fact, Emilie had punched him. I also knew that he had been in the room when his mother had died, and he had only cried over her death exactly a week after her funeral.

“I’m guessing that you and Maya are good friends?”

I shrugged. “We’re friends. She started here maybe a month or so before I did. She’s at uni now, isn’t she?”

“Yup,” Liam nodded. “Philosophy and Ethics, like the bright spark that she is. She said in one of the letters she sent me that she was hoping to get onto their swimming team,”

“Cool,” Then I looked down at the books in my hands. “Can you do me a favour and put these on the teen fiction shelf? There should be one or two left on the shelf, so just fill that gap.”  

“Sure,” Liam smiled, taking the books and walking off.

I sank onto my stool, running my hands through my hair. I couldn’t believe it. After two years, Liam had walked back into my life without even realising it. I watched him through my floppy hair, frowning slightly. He had been one of my best friends, and now we were total strangers. It dawned on me that out of the trio who walked through the trees, Liam was the last one left. I was fairly sure that he and Emilie had stopped forest walking after I had died, but at least they’d had each other.

Liam returned. “Anything else you want me to do?”

I glanced down at my list. “Um, can you grab these from the stockroom and then just put them where they need to go?”

Liam smiled again, his trademark lazy smile, and walked off in the direction of the stockroom. While he refilled the shelves, I served the few customers that were actually buying books, and did my best to convince the people who weren’t buying to buy something. It was good to have someone to share the workload with.

The shop emptied again within half an hour of Liam’s arrival. He leaned on the counter and cocked his head to the side, frowning slightly as he took in my expression. “Who is she?”

I laughed. “What?”

He arched an eyebrow. How could he look so cool? “Seriously? I’ve worn that expression many a time myself, so who is she?”

“My girlfriend,” I groaned, Liam’s expression instantly softening. “There’s this guy that she’s friends with, and I was fine with that until he tried it on with her the other night,”

“Did you kick his ass?”

I smirked. “Sort of. I was more worried about her than bashing his pretty face in. She ran off and when her other friend found her, I drove her home. She went for a shower, which was all fine, but she didn’t come out for half an hour. I went up to find her, and she was just sat in the shower. The water was burning her, Liam. And I was stupid enough to let her go back into school today. What if she got hurt?”

Liam inhaled sharply. “It’s tough. Honestly, I don’t know much about how to deal with things like that, apart from make sure she knows you’re there.”  

I gave him a weak half-smile. “It’s just so unfair, y’know? She’s seventeen and she’s been through so much lately. Why her?”

Liam pursed his fingers against the bridge of his nose, resting his chin on his thumbs. “Now there’s a question we’d all like to know the answer to. Can I tell you something? I know I’ve only just met you and everything, but you seem like the kind of guy who understands things.” I nodded and he closed his eyes, inhaling deeply. How could he look so cool doing that? “I was fifteen, so two years ago. Everything was going really well, and one of my best friends, a guy who was practically my brother,” He wasn’t talking about the boy I had been, was he? “He got really sick,” He stopped, laughing mirthlessly and running his hands through his hair. “Two years, and I still say sick. He had leukaemia. He had it pretty bad. It was caught too late, and there was nothing that could be done.  Ever heard the phrase ‘too little, too late’?” Without waiting for me to reply, he carried on. “When something like that happens to you, you suddenly see things in a different light. Especially that phrase. If someone had caught it a little bit earlier, my best friend would still be here. Sometimes, I talk to him. As if he’s still here.”