A Penny For My Thoughts ~ phan

XXII

Dan

"Admit it, you missed me."

"I never said I didn't miss you. I said, 'Tessa, what are you doing here at two in the morning?'"

"Ghosts don't need sleep. Time is irrelevant to us. We've been over this."

"You could've at least warned me before bursting in like this."

"And how much fun would that be?"

I watch her take a seat next to me, the phone in my hand temporarily forgotten. I guess I'll have to resume my mindless scrolling another time. Curse Tessa and her productive ways. Except, she isn't appearing very enthusiastic to do anything at the moment. If I didn't know any better, I would say she's thinking too much for any of the thoughts to fit neatly into words. I doubt that'll ever be the case. She loves words and she certainly knows how to use them.

"Well? Are you gonna answer me or not?" I interrogate, my impatience growing with headlight flashes sinking in from the window. Who would be on the road at this hour? What kind of person goes about their business in the dark, when they know everyone else will be asleep and unbothered? When the very sky is hiding you, what can't you get away with?

"I'm here to continue your learning, of course." Her eyes are bright again. She's sitting on the edge of her seat.

This is not the time to break down, Dan. Not in front of company.

"I thought you taught me everything last time," I say, not so casually elongating my arm to place the phone on my desk from where the rest of me is still steadily resting on the bed. Somehow, I'm even able to show off my posture, something I never once bothered with in life.

She's smiling too much to not be proud of me. I think she smiles too much at everything.

"Maybe so. But that doesn't mean I have no help left to offer you."

"What do you mean?"

"Why do you think you chose to wander instead of staying home, Dan?"

It shouldn't surprise me, her answering my question with another of her own design. Yet it does anyway.

"Because I need to find out who murdered me and why."

At first, the response is just a reflection of my annoyance towards her without a thought concerning what it means. It's little more than an instinct used to discreetly get her out of my house as soon as possible. I'm not in the mood for talking.

Suddenly, a life lesson springs into my head. If you can call it that, anyway. The one about how the first thing that comes to mind, that gut feeling, is more often than not the only truth. Like some sort of love confession, I blurted out what's most important to me. What can let me down the hardest.

Someone decided it was their duty to take me out of this world and if I never find out why, I may make the same horrible mistakes again. My life has already been ruined and I will not let my death crash down with it.

Tessa smiles sweetly through my rotten, staticky thought process, not once requesting that my brain speak up. And I haven't asked her how much pain is normal for ghosts.

"Do you really believe that, Dan?" She asks, the sincerity in her tone making me want to vomit.

"Yes, Tessa. I do," I say, trying to remain calm though my sarcasm has other plans. "Is that all?"

She gives me a once over. Sighs. I straighten my back some more.

And then she's gone.