Ghostwriter

Chapter 16

           

Jason couldn't get her laugh out of his head. He replays the scene, over and over and over again, in his head. Her laughing. Him laughing. Holding her, then not having to.

After she rose, she glided over to the bat. In a gentle way, she scooped up that rodent; her dark eyes, soft but focused; and her lips, concerned but firm. She let the thing slip from her fingers and land on the sill, soft and delicate. She was if she was giving a beaten-up bird a new chance at flight.

Jason replays that, too.

He replays it all-- the movements, the sounds, the colors, and feelings, the emotions, the joy, the freedom—up until the point where she shoved him into that dark closet covered in bat crap and it got all over him.

Jason can't remember a time after his death where he laughed so hard at nothing. After the Joker, laughter played like bad music in his head. Whenever someone laughed too long or too hard, him included, those sick, high-pitched shrieking cascade of giggles always ran through the back of his mind like a broken record. It's why he programmed his helmet not to emit his rounds of laughter; he doesn't want to hear it.

Soft laughter, under-the-breath snickers, and short barks of laughter are normally fine. Kids' laughter, for whatever reason, never bothers him. It's the continuous rounds that bubble out of a person's lips-- or worse, an entire group of people's mouths-- that makes him freeze in his tracts and sneak out through the back door.

Except, when Antigone laughed, it didn't happen. Well, it did. But it was quiet, enough so that the sound of her snorts and giggles overpowered the Joker's shrieking. Once Jason joined in—because the way she snorts when she laughs is funny, and he couldn't help it—the Joker left. It was just them laughing.

Jason felt safe.     

He wants that again.

There's so much more to Antigone than he thought. Jason saw just enough of whatever it was to make him curious, to make him want to learn more about her, or at least to get her to laugh like that again.

He was so close to telling Antigone about his death earlier. So close. If Jason could just get the words out of his mouth, then maybe she would understand. Except that if he tells her that, he would have to tell her a lot of other things that he isn't ready for her to know. As much as Jason somewhat wants to tell her that he died just so that she could shut up about it, he's not quite ready to tell his story. Besides, if she can't believe that he's her soulmate, then she might not believe that he rose from the dead. 

When Jason left the safehouse, she was typing on her laptop, her fingers kissing the keyboard and dark eyes peering at the lit screen. Colton napped on the couch.

Now, he reenters, carrying bags full of everything from bombs to bread to baby toys. There's more in his car. He sets them down beneath the table.

The place is quiet. Still.

Jason's hand goes to his gun. "Antigone?"

No response.

He creeps through the entryway and kitchen and into the living space, tiptoeing all the way. His hand leaves his side and he relaxes.

Antigone's asleep on the chair, her computer unclosed. Her head snuggles against the tall back of the old chair, bought at a flea market with cash, and her hand falls limp over the side. Her other hand lays palm-up on the computer screen. Her mouth parts in her sleep.

            Colton, on the other hand, squirms and smiles when he sees Jason. He lets out a spew of gibberish, and the one hand that managed to escape from the blanket grasps up at him. Then, he quiets down, and put his fingers in his mouth and stares at everything. He pumps his body back and forth twice.