No More Secrets (Book 2)

11. New Discovery

When I woke up again, the room was dark. The sun must have gone down hours ago and the lights turned out for the night. Not even the guy in the bed next to me was making a sound. There was just the steady beeping from my heart monitor.

I rolled over, hoping to be able to fall asleep, but I noticed a figure lounging on one of the chairs by my bed. In the dark, it was hard to make out who it was, but it was definitely someone. Who could it be? Visiting hours should have been long over.

"Dyl?" I whispered. If anyone was able to spend the night here, it would be him.

From the faint light coming from the hallway, I could tell the person was a girl when she moved her head, her hair moving quite distinctively. Definitely not Dylan. But who?

"Great," the girl said with a sigh. "He wakes up at four in the freaking morning. Now Dylan's going to be mad at me for waking him up this early."

I sat up. "Excuse me?"

The girl stood and in a matter of seconds was standing next to me. I hadn't even seen her move. "What did you just say?"

I stared at her, finally recognizing her. "Jenny?"

Her mouth dropped open. "You really can see me? Holy shit."

I was just as shocked as she was. There was no way I should be able to see her right now, unless I died, right? I looked down at my hands. "Am I dead?"

"No." I looked back up at her. "This is freaky. I gotta tell Dylan."

"Don't tell him!" I had a feeling he was going to freak out when he learned I could see Jenny and, potentially, other ghosts. I should be the one to tell him.

Jenny shook her head. "You two and your secrets, I swear."

"What? I'm going to tell him. But I want to make sure he hears it from me."

She rolled her eyes. "Alright... Just make sure you do, or he's gonna find out one way or another. I'm not going to say I won't tell him, but I can't promise I'll keep my mouth shut forever."

I remembered Jenny's sass a bit from when she was still alive, and I know she bugged the daylights out of Dylan sometimes, but it was different being able to hear it again for the first time in years.

"Don't worry, I'll tell him."

A part of me almost didn't want to tell him, though. He's been so stressed about these ghosts recently. Telling him that I can see them too might only add to that stress. I didn't want to do that to him.

But maybe if he doesn't have to worry about protecting me from ghosts anymore, he'd relax a bit. I could handle myself, especially if I could now see the threats.

"What's been going on with the ghosts?" I asked Jenny. "Dylan hasn't said much, but obviously something big's going on."

She opened and closed her mouth a few times, like she was contemplating whether or not to tell me. Eventually, she glided over and made herself as comfortable as she could on the end of my bed.

"Well, Dylan didn't want you to know, but I guess he never explicitly said not to tell you, since you wouldn't have been able to hear me if I tried before. So I guess it wouldn't be going against any of his rules..."

"Wait. Why doesn't he want me to know anything?"

Jenny shrugged. "Because he's an idiot? I've been telling him for months to tell you all of it, but he won't. He thinks he's protecting you or something."

"Protecting me? From what?" As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I wasn't sure if I actually wanted Jenny telling me. Dylan should be the one to tell me, not her. "Don't say anything. I'll get it out of Dyl when I see him in the morning. It really should come from him."

She nodded. "I guess that's fair. He still might not tell you, though. You know how stubborn he can get."

I yawned as I nodded my head. I feel like I've been sleeping forever, so why was I still tired?

"Go back to sleep, Travis," Jenny said. "I'll tell Dyl to get here as soon as he wakes up in the morning. He's been worried sick about you ever since that heart attack."

"Heart attack? Is that what happened?" All I could remember was not being able to breathe and then blacking out. How could I have had a heart attack?

"Yeah. Two days ago. You've been out ever since. That ghost lady came back and did some damage, but nothing you won't recover from."

Heart attack? I couldn't believe it. I was twenty-five years old. I shouldn't be having a heart attack, ghost-caused or not. What did I ever do to piss off that ghost so much that she wanted to kill me so badly?

It reminded me of my mother, and all the threats she made to kill me when I was a child. But she wasn't nearly as strong as this ghost. The worst thing my mom ever did was throw plates out of the cabinets at me. She could never do any real damage.

Maybe, in some twisted way, this all circled back to her. I didn't know how it could, but it just might be possible.

I yawned again and pulled the blanket up higher. I needed to get out of this hospital. Sleeping here without Dylan by my side was awful. I missed him so much.