Ghosts {L.P.}

2:10

Ｇｈｏｓｔｓ Ａｒｅ Ｓｏｍｅｔｉｍｅｓ
Ｈｅｌｐｆｕｌ

▶︎ •၊၊||၊|။||||။၊|• 0:31

School was never Riya's strong suit. She had passing grades and had never failed a class, so she supposed she was alright in that aspect, but she never had any outstanding A's or won any prizes.

To Riya, school was just another passing situation in her day. She showed up, did her best, and then went on with her day.

That particular day had gone slower than usual, simply because she hadn't slept and was running on caffeine and the adrenaline of the knowledge she was attempting to push away before she got lost inside her mind thinking about being able to touch alleged fictional beings.

And there came the wave of thoughts again.

In days like such, Riya would find her way into the music room to focus on something that she actually enjoyed instead of just trying to listen to her teachers drone on and on about some topic which only entered through one ear and exited out the other.

Luckily for her, that day was the Spirit Assembly, meaning almost every student would be either in the gym or wandering around trying to escape school grounds, so the music room would be empty.

Ms Harrison—the music teacher—had always been nice enough to leave her door accidentally open whenever there was a Spirit Assembly, almost as if she were waiting for Riya to show up and play her tunes—which she supposed she was.

Riya was certain Ms Harrison had caught her at least once sneaking into the empty room, and instead of reporting her, she let Riya do as she pleased.

After all, it wasn't like Riya vandalized the room or anything. All she did was play for an hour or so, leaving every instrument and chair exactly as she found it.

Ironic how the girl who could see ghosts acted like a ghost herself.

Just as expected, Riya only had to gently twist the knob of the music room for the door to give in, quickly rushing in to cover her tracks and reach for the guitar in its stand.

The music room never smelt pleasant, being full of teenagers and all, but it had an air of warmth Riya always enjoyed.

Seeing herself in the reflection of the floor length mirrors on the wall always made her feel like she was seeing her mom playing instead of her. Like it was her mother who picked up the out of tune guitar and sat on the uncomfortable plastic chairs.

To Riya, it was her mother who possessed her body inside the music room, the one who controlled what chord to play and what music to fill her soul with.

Riya weaved out of the way of the grand piano in the centre of the room, settling into one of the plastic chairs facing the mirror while she gave the guitar in her hands a testing strum, surprisingly it was well-tuned, which was a first in Riya's experience after years of hiding out in the room.

She watched herself in the reflection as each strum and press of her fingers over the strings began to form a sweet melody. Her booted foot tapping on the beat, her matching black leggings underneath the white and black patterned dress flexing with each movement of her knee.

Most days, Riya tended to go for a more colourful selection of colours, but in all her haste dealing with trespassing dead people in the morning, she couldn't really bring herself to combine her outfit with anything other than black and white.

Besides, it had been a long while since she had worn the black dress with the white detailing on the skirt, and a day trying to ignore her thoughts was as good a day as any.