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They trailed behind you like a three headed shadow for most of the day after that. Persistent enough that you almost regretted having acknowledged them, but amusing enough that you weren’t entirely put off.
From the library to your locker to your classes—they always stayed just a few paces behind you, their voices a cacophony of confusion and curiosity. For three ghosts that had all been seemingly dead for several decades, it was evident that you were the first of your particular skillset to have stumbled into Split River High.
Rhonda was hilariously easy to rile and get a rise out of. She marched through the halls stomping frustrated circles around you to try and get some sort of reaction. Some sort of answer.
Charley was equally as desperate, though gentle in his various reminders to Rhonda that talking to people nobody else can see isn’t exactly the kind of thing the living react kindly to. If getting you in their corner was their intended endgame, having you committed for some kind of presumed psychosis wasn’t the way to do it.
But it was Wally who made it the most difficult for you to keep your laughter at bay as they hovered over your shoulders in government class. Mostly because his assumptions seemed to lack much logic—something Rhonda was quick to point out.
“Guys, maybe we should back up, alright? She’s obviously scared and Rhonda yelling at her is only making it worse. This is why ghosts get a bad rap.”
“If she was scared, Walter,” Rhonda bit out through gritted teeth. “She wouldn’t have started reciting Ginsberg lines in the library with a smirk on her face like it was a fucking poetry club.”
You tucked your face down into your hands and drew out a fake sneeze to disguise the laugh that nearly escaped you. It silenced the ghosts immediately, but thankfully failed to garner much attention from the living.
A smile lingered on your face as you scrawled out a message for them on your notebook.
For dead people with nothing but time, you seem to lack patience.
Charley was halfway through reading it out loud when you added on to it.
Especially you, cherry pop.
Wally began howling with laughter and you were slightly surprised the sheer volume of it hadn’t managed to miraculously pierce through the plane of the living. Charley’s giggles on the other hand were quickly cut off by Rhonda’s glaring scowl and the near guttural growl that ripped through her throat.
Whether it was in anger or defeat—perhaps both—she stormed out of the room. Charley followed her only shortly after that with a mumble about going to make a likely futile effort at calming her down.
“Sorry about Rhonda. I wish I could say she wasn’t always like this, but I swear she’s not that bad once you get used to her,” his voice was still painted with humor as he leaned against the desk beside you. Failing to actually disrupt the student who sat there.
Your eyes stayed trained on the board at the front of the classroom, but you allowed a small quirk of the corner of your lips in acknowledgment.
Don’t sweat it. I’ve met far more intimidating ghouls than her.
His eyes went wide as he mumbled through the words under his breath.
“Wait, so we’re not the first ghosts you’ve seen before?”
Why? Did you want to be my first?
So maybe it was a bit cruel—flirting with a dead guy—but he seemed good humored enough.
Thankfully he was. He laughed, almost shyly and he stuttered over his words a bit, obviously a little uncharacteristically embarrassed. But judging by the clothes, you could only assume it had to have been a good while since anyone had been so forward with him.
“Maybe I did,” he grinned. “But now I’m just even more curious about you than I was before. Who are all these other ghouls you’re seeing besides me?”
First of all, you are hardly a ghoul. Second, lots of people. Everywhere. Not just you, your friends, and the marching band.
You could tell there were a thousand questions racing through his mind. As well as he tried to hide it for your sake, he was just as eager for answers and explanations as Rhonda was.
Still, he decided to keep the conversation light for the time being. If it was his patience you’d requested, it was his patience he would give.
“So do you always flirt with these ghosts and ghouls?”
Only the pretty ones.
He smiled again at that, and if you could have found a way to make him smile like that for the rest of his eternity, you just might have tumbled into it with him.
He’d stayed there in the class after that, aimlessly and restlessly wandering around pretending to read posters on the walls and occasionally staring out of the windows. Apart from that however, he stayed quiet and let you focus on the teacher’s droning lesson.
The two of you were halfway back to your locker when Charley came weaving through the hall, immediately asking if you’d spoke while he was away.
“Nothing yet, but she did write some more,” Wally informed him.
“And what did she say? Does she know why she can see us?”
“If she knows why she hasn’t said so yet, but she did say we’re not the first or only ghosts she can see.”
You could practically feel Charley buzzing in curious shock from behind you. They stood right at your back as you swapped your textbook for a copy of Macbeth. Charley rambled incessantly—tripping over questions directed at Wally as though he’d suddenly become the newest PhD candidate in Girls Who Can See Ghosts during the twenty minutes he’d spent in the classroom with you.
Busy with that as they were, neither noticed when you left another note to them written on the same notebook laid flat on the shelf of your locker. You cleared your throat to get their attention as casually as you could manage.
20 questions later if you promise to either shut up or leave me alone for my last class. Deal?
Their agreement at reading it over was immediate and simultaneous.
You closed your locker with that, heading towards your final class for the day.
“In that case,” Charley started, still following you. “I’m going to go find Rhonda again. She was still being kinda bitchy when I left her, but she might rein it back in once I tell her we might actually get some real answers soon. You coming with?”
Wally took a beat to answer, and you could feel his gaze burning into the back of your skull.
“Nah, I’m gonna hang back with her if she doesn’t mind. Besides, I never read Macbeth when I was still alive. Might try and give it a shot now—I think there’s supposed to be ghosts in it.”
“Right,” Charley drew out a little suspiciously. “Just don’t fuck it up for us. Try to keep your mouth shut and don’t do anything to piss her off.”
“I know how to keep my mouth shut,” Wally retorted with offense.
Charley laughed sarcastically before he shouted out, “Yeah, sure you can,” as he turned a corner and started down the separate direction.
Wally held true to his word though. He stole your paperback right off of your desk and carried a duplicate of it into the ghost world with him. You could tell he was no less restless than before in the way his leg bounced and his eyes never seemed to focus on the pages in front of him for very long. Still though, he stayed relatively still and silent until it was time to once again file out of the classroom and back into the hallway.
It was louder and far more chaotic now as everyone was in a rush to either get out as quickly as possible, or scatter towards their various after-school activities of choice.
“God that sucked,” he groaned. “I hadn’t tried to sit through a whole class and actually pay attention in years and now I remember why.”
You went back to your locker, not out of necessity, but rather out of familiarity. Though you didn’t open it, you leaned back against it, pulling out your phone to appear preoccupied.
Wally, though a bit confused, planted himself right next to you as you started typing a note out onto the screen for him.
I’m sure Shakespeare would thank you for your pains.
“Hah,” he barked out. “Shakespeare should thank me for not putting my head through a fucking wall.”
You bit back a laugh at that before starting another line.
Consider me breaking my silence a thanks. Let’s go find your friends and somewhere I won’t be seen and I’ll talk.
A deal’s a deal.
They led you to an old abandoned auto shop. It was only after you’d pushed a shelf in front of the door to make sure no one would barge in that you finally spoke.
“Well I’d say I’m sorry about having kept you all waiting, but I’m really not. Charley was right, I’m no good to anyone if I get locked up in a penitentiary.”
Rhonda scoffed and gazed off to the side, but there was no argument to be made. Though still irritable, Charley had seemed to have gotten her to calm down if only slightly.
He returned to the same question he’s asked Wally about earlier in the day. He wanted to know why you could see them.
“Nobody’s ever been able to see us before you. We just want to know what it all means.”
“Yeah, I sort of guessed as much. I would have thought this being a school—all these people passing through year after year—you’d have already come across someone like me, but apparently not. Weird.”
Wally cut in to the conversation, speaking to you directly for the first time since you’d gotten to the auto shop.
“What do you mean by that—someone like you?”
“Someone like me as in the formerly deceased and transcendentally inclined.”
“Alright,” he deadpanned. “I have no idea what the fuck transcendentally means, but you mean ‘formerly deceased’ as in you used to be dead but now you’re not?”
You offered him a curt nod of affirmation in reply.
“I died when I was a kid,” you started. “Briefly, but my heart did technically stop for about 3 minutes. Obviously I was revived, but after I woke up, I was able to see and hear people I hadn’t been able to before.
“Even when my body came back, I guess parts of my brain decided to stay behind in the after life.”
You took in their expressions as they processed the long awaited explanation, though it wasn’t long before Rhonda interrupted the thick silence.
“So if you’ve been able to see us this whole time, why today?” She was obviously angry though you couldn’t quite understand the question. Something in your face must have given away your confusion.
“All those classes we followed you around to today—senior level—which means you have to be an upperclassman at least. Why hadn’t you ever acknowledged us before today in the library? What changed?”
Wally bit out her name under his breath. A warning.
“You’re right, I am a senior, but I haven’t always been a student here. I just moved here a couple of weeks ago. I’ve seen you all around, but I hadn’t had a chance to speak to any of you without seeming off my rocker until today. The library was empty enough to take the risk.
“In fact, I was actually planning on talking to the hippie chick first, but I guess I never could pass on an opportunity to quote ‘Howl’,” you cheekily winked at Rhonda. Though it seemed to disarm her for a moment, the mask she seemed to always wear quickly replaced itself.
“That’s Dawn,” Charley chirped. “And now that you mention it, I do remember some of the kids in the LGBT club talking about a new girl last week,” he added to Wally and Rhonda.
“Yeah,” Rhonda turned to you. “Well just because you supposedly used to be one of us doesn’t mean you still are. We don’t need Lydia freakin’ Deetz just strolling on in here to do what, exactly? Blow up everything we know about our after life only to leave us behind in a few months.”
She turned on her heels—leaving through a back door you hadn’t noticed before. She mumbled something under her breath as she walked out but didn’t stop as Charley and Wally both called after her.
The silence that fell over the dim and dusty room was tense in her absence. You decided to try for humor.
“Well I’m glad being dead hasn’t stopped her from seeing Beetlejuice—great film.”
Wally laughed under his breath, but it was still strained and short. Nothing like the way he’d been laughing earlier in the day. Still, he tried to offer ease and comfort as he finally spoke.
“Don’t take anything Rhonda says too personally. She’s just old and bitter—like 80 years old, old—and she’s not really a big fan of change either,” he softly smiled at you, though you could see his timid apprehension hidden beneath it.
You returned it as fondly as you could manage.
“Really, it’s okay. People have all kinds of reactions when they first realize someone living can see them, and she’s also right. I guess I am just kind of passing through here, and though I wish I could, I can’t really make you any less dead or perpetually stuck here. I’m sorry.”
“It’s alright,” Charley smiled kindly. “We’ve all been dead a long time already, and we’re all pretty okay with it by now. It’s just nice to be seen, and maybe to have someone new to talk to other than each other. Rhonda will come around eventually, she just needs some time to adjust.”
Wally walked you back to your car after that. Well at least as close as he could get to your car without crossing the boundary and getting hurtled back to from whence his spirit came.
“Oh, the football field,” he explained far too excitedly when you asked. It was late enough and the halls empty enough to speak aloud. “I died on the field in the middle of the Homecoming game, but they named the stadium after me, so that’s pretty cool I guess.”
“Wow,” you exclaimed, your voice dripping with feigned incredulity. “If I had known I was talking to a famous ghost I would’ve worn my good jeans today.”
He laughed, unguarded and unabashedly before regaining his composure.
“Well there’s always tomorrow,” he grinned.
You smiled back. Something hopeful and only just slightly suggestive. Though really there wasn’t—for you maybe—but tomorrows had ceased for Wally a long time ago. Every tomorrow for him could only ever be the same as yesterday.
He watched your face as it slowly fell into something pensive.
“And tomorrow and tomorrow.”
He laughed lightly in confusion as you approached the doors to the courtyard. You could see the cheerleaders still practicing outside through the windows.
“Is that supposed to mean something?”
“Still got that copy of Macbeth?” He felt the front pockets of his jacket where he’d last left it after your English class. Sure enough, he pulled out the same duplicate of your copy he’d stolen—old and tattered, littered with scribbled notes lining the margins and hastily placed sticky tabs peeking out the edges.
“You should try to keep reading it. If you have nothing better to do, that is,” you smiled.
“I mean I’ll give it a shot,” he smiled shyly. “But I probably won’t understand any of it.”
“Then ask me about it tomorrow.”
He followed you through the courtyard despite the conversation being decidedly over. Though he would’ve walked with you all the way through the parking lot if he could have, he stayed right at the edge of the grass, and watched you retreat for the day. Watched as you got ready to make the journey through Split River that he never would again.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he called as you pulled open the car door, about to get in. “And tomorrow and tomorrow—whatever that means,” he added belatedly.