Misguided Ghosts

Chapter Twenty-Six

Twenty-Six – Tay

“Liam, please say something,”

Liam stared at me, his eyebrows drawn together, lips pursed and for once, his hands were still. He stood up sharply and began to pace the living room, dragging his hands through his hair, making it stick up more than usual. Then he stopped, scrutinising me.  “What was one thing that only Emilie knew about?”

I raised my eyebrows. “You really want me to go there?” At his arched eyebrow, I glared at him. “Fine. You have a massive crush on Hayley, though you’d never admit to it. In year nine, you kissed Naomi Jones to make her jealous. Year ten, you told me time and time again that you didn’t understand why you argued with her so much.” I paused, tapping my chin. “What else? Oh yeah, your ultimate man crush is Gustav Wood, and you’d do almost anything to meet Young Guns because of said man crush. Can I stop now, or shall I keep going?”

He sighed and I knew the ultimate test was coming. “What song was played at my mother’s funeral?”

I bit my lip. “Aerosmith, Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing.”

“What’s my biggest secret, bigger than having a crush on Hayley? Ed knew about it as well.”

“You sleep with your Mum’s jumper wrapped around your pillow, and have done ever since she died.”

He tackled me into a huge hug, tears streaming down his face. “Christ, Em.”

I hugged him back and laughed. “Don’t call me that. I’m Tay now. Emilie’s memories, Tay’s memories, Tay’s body, you get the gist.”

He pulled back, frowning. “So who are you?”

“Honestly?” I laughed. “I have no idea. I’m trying to figure it all out myself. Maybe you should think of me as Tay, but I know your entire life story.”

“I think I can deal with that,” He smiled.

“Aren’t you meant to be freaking out right now?” I asked dubiously.

He shrugged. “I’ve always believed in reincarnation. Emilie lived a good life. She was always helping others, seeing the best in people. You know what you did, not just for Ed, but for everyone else, especially his parents. You build up a whole load of good karma. There’s no doubt about why you were put into another human body.”

I smiled. “Have you got any idea how awesome you are? Wait. Didn’t you want to tell me something?”

He ran a hand through his hair. “Uh, yeah. It’s kind of a recent thing, but I’ve been having these dreams. About you, actually. It’s part of why I came and spoke to you earlier. I don’t see much, just memories of Emilie and Ed and me, you know, all the crazy stuff the three of us would get up to.  Then the memory just cuts out, like a recording that’s run out of tape. And then this guy, with curly black and green eyes appears. He doesn’t do anything. He just… Smiles. It’s like he knows what’s going on, and he’s having fun doing it. Then I’m watching you and this other guy in a flat, just hanging out, watching movies or whatever. I don’t understand them.”

“You still do art, right?” I said hesitantly. Liam nodded. “Can you draw him for me?”

Liam ran upstairs and returned under a minute later, clutching a sketchbook that looked remarkably familiar and some graphite pencils. When I saw it up close, I frowned. Ed and I had bought him that sketchbook. It was bound with brown leather, and we’d had the white tree of Gondor  impressed on the cover, just because Liam’s favourite film happened to be Lord Of The Rings, because he wanted to go into filmmaking and he admired the films because of the cinematography, along with other complicated reasons that he couldn’t be bothered to explain.