Till Death Do Us Part {Completed}

Chapter Eight - Ghosts of the Past

~Chapter Eight - Ghosts of the Past~

I was broken out of my reverie—or flashback, as it were—by the sound of someone heavily thumping on my door, accompanied by the worried voices of my best friend, Hayley, and my brother, Ryan.

            “Lace, are you okay?” Hayley called out, her voice sounding worried and frayed, borderline hysterical.

            “Sis, open up,” Ryan chimed in, sounding a lot less happy to be here than he should be when concerned about the wellbeing of his sister.

            I stood up and looked at Finn, who had not moved from his position in the corner. He watched me with amused emerald eyes, his eyebrow quirked cockily as he waited for me. He didn’t seem the slightest bit affected by what I had just seen. He barely even looked hurt about it all. But I guess when you've had months to adjust to the idea, you learn to hide your emotions when talking about your death.

            I walked to the door and flung it open, to see my brother without his shirt and my best friend with her purple camisole askew. It seemed that me walking in on them in the living-room earlier had not discouraged them in the slightest. I didn’t really want to think about that too much. It would lead to other, more horrifying thoughts, that I had no desire to contemplate.

            “Yeah?” I asked, trying to keep my voice normal despite the fact that I had just watched the ghost currently in my bedroom get murdered by my boyfriend.

            “We just came to check if you were okay,” Hayley said, peeking into the room behind me and searching the interior—for what, I’m not entirely sure. The only thing out of the ordinary in there was the ghost of a dead football quarterback, not that she could see that.

            “Why wouldn’t I be?” I questioned casually, frowning in confusion and shifting from foot-to-foot. I really wanted to get back to that conversation with Finn right now, and Hayley and Ryan weren’t helping. It seemed Finn and I had some very serious things to talk about.

            “Because, we heard you scream,” Hayley replied matter-of-factly, as if it were obvious.

            “Yeah, your scream made it sound like some heavily-tattooed, fat prison escapee named Tiny broken in and threatened to hurt you, or something,” Ryan supplied, not very helpfully or intelligently, I might add.

            Hayley gave Ryan a look that told him she thought he belonged in a mental asylum, but I barely gave him a second glance. I was used to Ryan’s extremely twisted mind and warped sense of humor. If Hayley ever wanted a future with my bonehead of a brother, she would have to get used to his sparkling personality.

            “Sorry,” I replied, smiling lightly and adding a hair toss to show how totally cool and calm and fine I was. “I just thought I had dropped my nail polish on my bed,” I lied swiftly.

            “Okay,” my brother replied, giving me a strange look, as if I were the weird one. But he looked semi-convinced, anyway, which was a plus.