Two Ghosts | P.L. Dubois

Two

He was in the locker room, one of the rookies who were staring at me. Fantastic. I felt a hand be placed on my shoulder and start walking with me. "Josh what are you-"

"Pierre! I don't think you got to meet Aspen yet." Josh greeted Mark that down as the second time I realized I was going to kill Josh Anderson. Pierre turned around to face the two of us. I wouldn't lie he is cute.

Pierre stuck out his hand which I politely shook. Suddenly Zach was yelling at Josh to come help him with God knows what. That left just me and Pierre. I was never good in these situations. Apparently Pierre wasn't either, "Hey it was nice to meet you I have um something to give Nick. See you later." Then he was gone.

It was about an hour or so until the new year while everyone was inside partying. I was outside with a Dr. Pepper watching the stars. "Hey why are you out here? It's freezing." a voice called

At first I wanted to just ignore the voice but my smartass side won. "I don't know Pierre, is that uh thing you needed to give to Nick out here too?"I retorted with a smirk.

I heard an exasperated sigh come from Pierre as he sat near me. "Sorry I kinda flipped when Josh introduced us. I didn't want to-"

"Trigger me?" I finished, staring at my drink unable to meet his eyes. "I still a human it's okay to treat me like one." I reassured

That seemed to ease Pierre as I noticed he wasn't as stiff anymore. "So why are you out here by yourself?"

Good question I thought as I looked back up at the dark sky. "Zach said I didn't have to do this but I guess I felt the need to just push. It's really ironic you know. I use to have to tell my family not to push with anything but here I am doing the exact same thing." I admitted I really didn't know why I was pouring this all out to him. Sure I knew of him from Zach but I literally just met him.

Pierre was quiet for a few moments. This only made my head race to even more conclusions of what he was going to say. "You feel the need to try in restart since you're not in Michigan anymore. Well Aspen, you need to heal before you can restart and it's not going to happen in one day."

I suddenly felt like I was back in my old therapy sessions. Although this time it felt nice. For the first time since I was out here I looked up at him. "Thanks Pierre,"

He put his hand on my shoulder and gave it a small squeeze. "Oh my god, Aspen you're freezing." Before I could stop him, Pierre had taken off his jacket and put it on me. "Listen I know we just met but if it gets bad or anything call me."

"I need a number for that." I retorted as I handed him my phone so he could enter his number in my contacts. Pierre slowly stood up and put his hand out to help me up. As he started to walk away, I grabbed his arm and pulled him into a hug.

I could tell Pierre was caught off guard but after a couple seconds he hugged me back. "Thank you, really." I thanked once again. Only a couple of people were able to help like this but not this easy. Not like Pierre.

"Hey it's okay Aspen. Come on let's go before we miss the ball drop-" An eruption of cheers were heard from inside. It looks like we did miss the ball drop.

As we walked back into the house everyone was conversing to themselves. I suddenly felt a wave of exhaustion hit me. Pierre must have noticed it a well because he immediately lead me upstairs. "Hey you go get some sleep okay?"

I felt a smile grow on my face at how nice he was being. "I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Hopefully,"

As I closed my eyes in my bed I realized I still had Pierre's jacket on. A part of me wanted to go downstairs and give it to him but the other part was too tired to even move. So I fell asleep peacefully.