Ashes and Flames

Chapter Six

Two months after my initial start into fifth grade was when I decided that I would tell my mother about Ash again. She was constantly bothering me to introduce her to the best friend I loved bragging about. Of course I hadn’t told her that Ash was actually the boy who played with me throughout summer vacation or that he wasn’t exactly alive. It never came up, so I didn’t bother informing her of such menial information. Ash had warned me that she wouldn’t believe me since she didn’t the first time. He was quite persistent in me not telling my mother about him. Regretfully, I hadn’t listened to him.

“Mom, I want you to meet my best friend,” I had said to her one afternoon.

She had gotten home earlier than usual and was preparing dinner in the kitchen when I had caught her. Ash was standing beside me practically pleading with me not to say anything. If I had only listened to Ash, I wouldn’t have been away for so long.

“Okay sweetie, where’s your little friend?” She asked after setting down the knife she had been chopping onions with.

“He’s right here, Mom,” I exasperated.

“Mae flower, what have I told you about imaginary friends? They are not real, hun,” she chastised with a condescending note to her voice.

That had irked me. My mother was basically saying that I didn’t have any friends and that Ash didn’t exist! Who was she to say who or what existed?

“He’s right here, Mom!” I gritted out through clenched teeth as I stomped my foot.

“Mae Lynn, do not take that tone with me,” my mother warned.

“You’re not listening to me! Ash is right here! You just can’t see him because he’s a ghost!” I argued back.

My mother sighed and looked at me with eyes full of pity before she answered.

“Mae, come sit down with me and we will discuss this friend of yours.”

My mother proceeded to grab my hand and pull me towards a kitchen chair. She sat adjacent to me before starting her whole lecture on what’s real and what’s not real. I had hardly paid attention to what she said, but one thing stuck out the most to me and caused a violent reaction.

"…if you stop believing your friend is real, he’ll go away—,”

“No! Ash will never go away! He promised me he’d never leave me!” I shouted before racing up to my room and slamming my door.

I had sat in a corner of my room and sobbed my eyes out. Ash sat next to me and soothed me by running his fingers through my hair. Sometimes I think he loved my blonde hair more than he loved me.

“Baby, are you in here?” my mother asked, opening my door.

“Go away,” I choked out through my sobs.

My mother, in fact, did not go away as I had desired her to. Instead, she sat behind me and pulled me into her lap, attempting to cuddle me. However, I did not want her to hold me and so I struggled quite a bit before giving up and sobbing to my heart’s discontent.

“Why don’t you tell me all about this ghost, okay hun?” my mother conceded after my sobs quieted down.

I opened my bleary, hazel eyes and looked right into Ash’s green ones.
He gave me a shrug of nonchalance before disappearing. I sat up in my mother’s lap and turned to look at her. She wiped some stray tears from my eyes before kissing my forehead.

After a few moments of silence, I finally responded to her.

“His name is Ash and he died here. He told me all about it, too. I feel bad for him. He didn’t even know he was dead for a long time! He’s got brown hair and pretty, green eyes and he’s nice to me! He doesn’t look like the ghosts in the movies or anything! He’s smart, too, and he’s—”

“Sweetie, how long have you been seeing this friend of yours?” my mother interrupted me to ask.

“Um, since we moved here. Why?”

“It’s not important, sweetie. I’m going to go finish dinner now, okay?” I slipped out of her lap as she rose to leave my room.

“Okay, Mom.”

The next day changed my life forever. My mother had told me that I wasn’t going to be going to school and that I was going to go see some kind of doctor. She said that there wasn’t anything wrong with me, I just needed a checkup. She had driven me to the hospital and took me inside to meet my worst enemy—Dr. Anderson.

“Mae, I have the records you wanted!” my mother called from downstairs.

Ash hadn’t been around all day, so I had been lonely. Mom had left early on that morning to work and was just getting home now, early afternoon.

I greeted my mother with a kiss on the cheek before grabbing the proffered records and heading back up to my room. I placed the file on my desk before taking a seat. There were several documents in the file. The house had been sold many times, even being auctioned off once.

By the time Ash had decided to come out of hiding, it was nearing dinner time. I was still looking through the file for the year 1997 and hadn’t had much luck working on my own. Ash was supposed to have been helping me, but had decided he wanted to hide from life... Or was it afterlife? Sometimes I can’t figure out why I love him.

“What’s that?” Ash asked from over my shoulder.

I all but had a heart attack from the suddenness of the interruption. I shot a heated glare at him before answering.

“It’s the house records. I’m trying to find the year 1997, but the house has been sold a lot.”

Ash nodded in acceptance before taking the papers I had already sorted through and going over them again. If my mother were to have walked in now, she would have thought she was going insane. Papers hovering in mid air and being placed on the bed could scare anyone. I chuckled to myself at the thought before proceeding to go over the papers.

“Mae, look! You passed right over it!” Ash shouted with excitement clear in his tone.

“Well, what does it say?”

“‘Property was sold to Henry and Victoria Montgomery on July 15, 1997’,” he breathed out.

“Mae! Dinner time!” my mother called from the kitchen.

Ash nodded to me before continuing to read through the documents he had uncovered. I closed my door behind me as I left for the kitchen. Whatever my mother had made for dinner was calling to my taste buds. I could practically taste the garlic!

“Something smells delicious, mom! What’d you make?” I eagerly asked as I wandered over to the stove.

“Pasta and garlic bread, dear.”

I didn’t bother replying. I heaved a giant helping onto a plate before grabbing some garlic bread. My mother sat across from me with her own smaller helping. I shrugged, not really caring that I was eating a lot. Real food after being forced to eat hospital food was not something I was going to pass up ever again.

“Mom, can I borrow your laptop?” I questioned after I swallowed a fairly large forkful of pasta.

“Sure sweetie, now finish your dinner,” my mother replied before taking her own bite of the meal.

I nodded to myself before finishing my dinner, all the while thinking of cites to check for the Montgomery family.