That night, Erin didn’t sleep. Her eyes flickered with vigor, illuminated a bright blue-white from her computer screen. I still couldn’t tell what color they were, but the light turned them a milky gray. The side of her thumb pressed into her lips; occasionally she absentmindedly nibbled on her nail. I popped next to the bedside table, peering over Erin’s shoulder. On the screen was a video titled “A History of Western Music Notation” where a woman gestured wildly in front of an elaborately decorated cork board connected with red string, like something out of a crime novel.

I laughed.

Erin shot up like a hackled cat. Her laptop toppled over her lap and snapped shut, cutting the video off. The room hung heavy with atmospheric buzz. I froze. My lips parted.

“What the fuck?…” Erin breathed.

Did she…?

Erin swiveled her head around, but her eyes glazed over me, before landing on the open window. She released a tense sigh and rolled out of bed to pull the window shut.

I was still frozen. Popping over to the middle of the room I watched her back as she faced the window, rubbing her face with exhaustion.

Did I imagine it? It couldn’t be possible.

It couldn’t.

“Can you hear me?” My voice trembled.

Erin spun. She was looking straight at me. “What the fuck!?” She gasped. Scrambling to the open closet and pulling out a manuscript stand, brandishing it over her shoulder, ready to strike.

“Who the fuck are you?” Erin snapped. “How did you get in here?”

My eyes widened so much that if I were alive, they would’ve fallen out of their sockets. “You can… see me?”

Her face scrunched in bewildered disgust. “Yes, I can see you, freak, how the hell did you get into my house!?”

“Oh, my God,” I breathed. Erin’s eyes were wild with fear. Her hands began to shake; the manuscript stand rattled with them. “Okay, okay, don’t panic—”

“Who the FUCK are you!?” she spluttered, feet dancing, ready to pounce. “I swear I will scream. I will wake up my mom and call the police—”
 “I’m dead,” I shouted over her, but she continued rambling. “I’m dead, I’m dead, I’M DEAD!” My voice cut through the air.

Erin stared at me.

“I’m a ghost.”

Her lips trembled. “You’re a fucking lunatic—”

“Look, I can prove it!” I held my hands out like I was calming a spooked horse. “I can prove it.”

I backed up slowly, and kept walking until I phased right through the door and into the hallway

“What the FUCK!?”

A loud clang rattled through the floorboards under the door.

I popped my head through. “You okay?”

Erin had gone as white as a sheet. She could have passed for a ghost herself. The stand laid beside her, her hand still frozen in front of her.

“Okay, sit down.” I pointed to her bed. “Sit down now.”

Erin moved to the bed like a zombie and dropped down on the edge, almost falling off. I propped myself on the window ledge. I stared at my feet occasionally glancing up at her to check she was still breathing.

It took too long for her to speak. All she said was, “How?”

Unsure how to answer, I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

Her gaze was cloudy. “Ghost?”

“Um… yes?” I wanted to laugh, but I bit it back. I was acutely aware of my entire body, and how it affected the environment. I think if she saw me grab anything she’d pass out.

“Why can I see you?”

I shrugged theatrically, spreading my arms with confusion. “I have no idea. This has literally never happened before.”

I could see the information scrolling through her eyes when Erin looked away.

“What’s your name?”

I hadn’t said my own name in decades. There was no reason to. “Isla.”

Erin nodded. “I’m Erin.”

“I know.”

She frowned, eyebrows furrowing, the suspicion in her gaze returning with full force.

“I mean,” I spluttered. “I mean — well, I’m pretty much stuck here, y’know? I can hear your mom call your name, so I kinda already knew.” I winced. “Sorry, I know it’s weird.”

Erin’s expression didn’t seem to change much from the stoney bewilderment. She rubbed her face, adding so much friction to her eyelids it seemed like she was trying to get her eyes to work properly. “The fact you know my name isn’t the weirdest thing I’ve discovered in the last few minutes.” Erin kept shaking her head and making choppy sounds like she was about to say something but couldn’t get the words out of her throat.

“It’s alright, take your time.”

“I have… so many questions.”

“Do you think maybe you should sleep? It’s not like I’m not gonna be here tomorrow.” I didn’t want her to sleep. I wanted to talk to her until my throat was hoarse, if it even could be anymore. I wanted to know everything, say anything. It had been so long.

She scoffed. “I just found out ghosts are real, and you expect me to sleep? Are you kidding?”

I huffed a laugh, gulping down the thrill that rushed in me. “Fair enough. Ask whatever you want.”

Over time, Erin’s shoulders lost their tension. She asked everything that came to mind — how long have you been dead? (“Since October 1975”) How old are you? (“Seventeen.”) What’s it like being a ghost? (“Dead boring.”) Are there any other ghosts? (“Probably, but not in this house.”) Can you leave? (“No, I can’t go past the property line.") Who makes those decisions? (“I don’t know. God?”)

I didn’t remember speaking this much when I was alive. Erin was funny. I forgot what it was like to laugh, to really laugh, that deep belly rumbling laugh that feels like your abdomen is tensing. Her humor was incredibly dry, honest, and jarring, I mostly laughed out of shock. I got slight chances to ask a few questions about her, and she was too sleepy to give guarded answers: she’s lived in Weston since she was three, in the same house until she was ten after her parents divorced. Since then, she lived in her stepfather’s house, until her mother divorced him too. They only managed to move here because Laura didn’t sign a prenup.

I listened intently, but it felt like I was performing. I’d grown accustomed to listening and not reacting, I had to remind myself to nod at the right places and hum with concern. The last thing I wanted was to screw this up. It finally felt like having a friend again.

By the time the sun was glinting through the window, Erin was dozing off. I sat by, watching her fall asleep. It was the first time I felt excited about tomorrow.

Erin sat on the window ledge, her guitar propped on her knee. She wore her tank top that showed off her collar bones and gray-blue knee shorts, with her hair pulled in a small ponytail with thin tresses falling from the front. There was a gamine charm to her. She had a straight, athletic figure, lithe and lean, with defined muscles in her arms and legs. Relaxed. Effortless. She looked cool, even when she dressed casually.

Erin strummed the guitar lightly. “So, this is your room?”

“I mean — this was my room. It’s yours now.”

She shrugged. “Well. I don’t see why we can’t share? Not like I’m gonna kick you out.”

I laughed nervously. She was so casual with her propositions. Dangerous with it. The air thinned, the mood changed, and Erin’s eyebrows furrowed.

“What?” I asked.

Erin pursed her lips, uncertainly, but there was a curious glimmer in her eyes, stronger than her manners. I could tell now that they were a bright, baby blue. “Can I ask…?”

There was nothing I needed to hide from her. “You can ask me anything.”

“Um…” She licked her bottom lip, leaving it glossy in her wet tongue’s wake. “How did you…?”

Ah. “Die?” I finished.

Erin nodded, eyes softening with guilt.

“It’s okay. It doesn’t bother me anymore.” I dismissed her remorse in a swift wave. “It’s not a fun story, though.”

Erin shrugged, looking at me hopefully. I took that to mean she still wanted to know.

I sighed. “Okay. My dad killed me.” I hesitated. “It was an accident.”

Her jaw fell, hand frozen on the strings. She didn’t seem capable of speech, so I soldiered on.

“A friend of mine…” I gulped. “We were studying, and… I don’t know how it happened, but… She kissed me.” My cheeks must have been as red as my hair.

“Oh,” Erin said.

“Yeah.” I breathed in sharply. “It kinda got… you know… hot and heavy…” I glanced at Erin uncomfortably, but she still only looked surprised, but only listened quietly. “And… Well, my dad walked in.”

“Oh, fuck…” Erin muttered. Her bright eyes were wide with horror.

A sudden flair of defensiveness on my father’s behalf sparked in my chest. “It was the 70s, y’know? Conservative town. He was an ex-military Sergeant — it didn’t really fly.”

Sensing my bristling, Erin pursed her lips, her lashes. I knew she wanted to say something, but there was nothing she could say.

Erin sighed. “What happened then?”

My hand absentmindedly rubbed my brow, not that I could get a headache anymore. “He chased her out of the house. Beat the hell out of me.” A nervous laugh escaped my throat. If I didn’t laugh, I’d cry about it. “Pushed me, and I tripped.” I shrugged. “Fell down the stairs.” Staring at the boots I’ve seen a million times before and will see a million times after, I avoided Erin’s gaze. “Hit my head, and I woke up standing over my body.”

“Oh, my God…” said Erin, with a heavy voice, weighed down by an even heavier frown.

“Yeah.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It is what it is.”

Erin opened her mouth tentatively — when a shriek cut clean through the house.

"Erin Donovan!”

Our ears perked up.

“Oh, Fuck.” Erin’s eyes went wide, scrambling out of bed, before leaping into her desk chair, clicking her computer to life, a document glowing over her. “She’s pissed.”

“Why?” I whispered, even though Laura couldn’t hear me.

“I don’t fuckin’ know,” Erin grumbled.

The stomps on the stairs impeded like a horror movie score. I knew what that sound meant, though not as much as Erin did.

The bedroom door swung open, and Laura shadowed the entrance, looming with muted rage. Erin looked back, face set carefully with an unreadable expression.

“What — is — this?” Laura brandishes her phone gingerly, as if it was covered in filth.

Erin bristled, jaw setting, eyes fixed to a spot just beyond her mother. Looking at her just enough that she could get away with it, but not enough to meet her gaze. I was familiar with that look.

I stood there awkwardly, eyes darting between whilst holding my tongue — not that Laura could hear me anyway, but I didn’t want to risk distracting Erin.

“Well?” Laura snapped.

Erin huffed. “It’s my essay.”

“What’s on it?”

“A ‘D’...”

“A ‘D minus.’ When did you think you were going to tell me, Erin?” Laura’s eyebrows camouflaged with the wrinkles on her forehead — she looked like an angry Mr Clean.

Erin shrugged.

“Your English teacher emailed this to me because you tried to forge my signature on it?!”

“You forged her signature?” I blurted before I could stop myself.

Glancing at me briefly, Erin downcast her gaze, lashes brushing her reddening cheeks.

“Very good attempt, but maybe practice a couple of times before you commit fraud, hmm?” Laura turned the phone to herself to scroll her thumb over it. “Paragraph two, you wrote, ‘It is revealed that Nick and Daisy had an affair before she married Tom, which makes Tom jealous and possessive, at times abusive.’ And that’s just one of the more ridiculous things you wrote.” She scoffed, eyes furrowing with slapstick disgust. “Did you even read the book, Erin? The Cliff’s Notes? Hell, watch the movie if you’ve got to, but did you not even try with this assignment? I haven’t read this book since I was sixteen and I know Gatsby and Daisy have an affair, and Nick and Daisy are cousins!”

“I tried to read it, I just…”

“What?” Laura snapped.

Erin’s shoulders slumped. “I don’t know…”

Laura shook her head in disbelief. “I’m so sick of this laziness, Erin. I’ve talked to your teacher — he’s agreed to let you redo the assignment by next Thursday. It took a hell of a lot of convincing to do, so get it done. Or say goodbye to your phone, your computer, your instruments, everything. Got it?”

She shot out of the room without waiting for an answer, slamming the same door she’s always screaming not to slam. A tornado leaving the scene of disaster. I couldn’t help my lip curling.

I turned to a dejected Erin. She hung this deep, heavy frown that looked almost cartoonish, but whenever she forced it into a straight line, it only sunk lower.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

Shrugging, she slunk out of her chair, dropping back onto her bed. Her eyes were shiny, the tears made them an electric blue. She refused to let any fall.

“I’m really sorry that happened. There were a hundred ways that could’ve gone better.”

“It’s fine.” She sniffed. “Not the first time or the last.”

Biting my lip, I hesitated, but I asked, “Do you want to be alone?”

Erin steeled, rolling her bottom lip in between her teeth, but she shook her head decidedly.

“Okay.” I didn’t know what else to say. We sat there in silence for a long time, but I was used to it, so I waited. I listen to the hum of the monitor on the desk. Her breathing quaked every once in a while, turbulent with exhaustion. I don’t know how long it took, but Erin’s breath eventually steadied.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

I thought Erin didn’t hear me at first, but she flipped onto her back to stare at the ceiling.

“I just… I hate reading.”

I blinked. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Huh.” I shrugged. “I always liked it.”

Erin continued glaring at the ceiling. “It’s just like… like I can’t concentrate on the words? I sit down to read and it’s like my brain can’t absorb it.”

I nodded, pursing my lips. In highschool I tutored troubled kids. The tons of kids I helped had similar issues — restless, obtrusive, class clowns and the like. The misery of every teacher, the stress of every parent, and the responsibility of none other than me; for one buck fifty the hour.

“And Mr O’Leary is such a dick, he talks to me like I’m dumb,” Erin mumbled.

“Wait, Mr O’Leary?” My eyes widened. “Sneery O’Leary? Big nose? Thick black glasses? Permanent scowl? Wears a very obvious toupee even though he denies it?”

“Um… yeah?”

“He’s still alive?” I scoffed with laughter.

Erin let her cheek drop on her pillow to look at me. “You know him?”

“He was my English teacher. He was a prick then, too.” I snorted. “Wow, I didn’t think I’d get outlived by Mr O’Leary, at least not by much.” I shook my head. “Pass me your book.”

She jerked her head back with surprise. “Why?”

“Just pass it.”

Huffing, she swung her gangly arms down sharply, almost rolling to the other end of the bed where her backpack was on the floor. I tried to conceal my excitement, but I was practically buzzing. I had a copy of The Great Gatsby, many years ago. But when Dad’s things were moved out of the house, everything in my room went, too. I screamed like a damn baby when they lugged my books, my clothes, my sewing machine, into the truck – another thing taken away from me too soon.

Those years without anything to do left me destitute. My consciousness would fade in and out, decades passed as quickly as seasons, then as quickly as summer days. After a while, it felt as if I just sat silently long enough, the turn of the century would pass, and I wouldn’t even know it.

Erin dropped the book on the desk.

The cover was a dark blue, with soulful eyes tearing over a glittering city. My old copy was a cream white with an illustration of a man and a woman staring off into the distance. It was pretty, but not as enigmatic as this one.

Focusing, I hovered my hand over the cover. It took a lot of focus, but over time the energy got easier to control, crackling in my fingertips like electricity.

The cover flipped open until ‘Chapter One’ greeted me like an old friend. I smiled back, cleared my throat, and began: “‘In my younger and more vulnerable years my father —’”

“What are you doing?” Erin asked.

“Reading. Just listen. If you lose concentration, just tell me to go back a couple of paragraphs, okay?”

And so, I read. I read about East and West Egg, about Daisy and her husband Tom, about the legendary Gatsby parties. About Tom and his mistress Myrtle Wilson in the slums of the valley of ashes. Reading aloud felt like singing; the prose was lyrical in its structure and imagery. I read with ease, slowly, but leisurely. Time seemed to freeze, but as I felt the weight of progress slowly shift to my other hand, my heart hung with every turn of the page.

Don’t finish yet. Not yet.