“I’m here because I tried to kill myself several times, Moses.”
“Yeah. I know.” I pointed at the long scar on his arm. “And I’m here because I paint dead people and scare the livin’ shit out of everyone I come in contact with.”
He grinned. “Yeah. I know.” But his smile faded immediately. “When I’m not drinking, life just grinds me down until I can’t see straight. It wasn’t always that way. But it is now. Life sucks pretty bad, Moses.”
I nodded, but found myself smiling a little as I remembered how Georgia had lectured me every time I said something similar.
“Georgia’s laugh, Georgia’s hair, Georgia’s kisses, Georgia’s wit, Georgia’s long, long legs,” I murmured. I’d gotten comfortable with Tag and I repeated the list out loud, much to my embarrassment.
“What?”
I felt stupid but I answered him honestly. “Five greats. I was listing five greats. Just something someone used to do whenever I complained about how bad life was.”
“Georgia?”
“Yeah.”
“She your girl?” he asked.
“She wanted to be,” I admitted, but wouldn’t admit how I had wanted her.
“And you didn’t want that? Not even with her hair, her kisses, and her long, long legs?” He smiled, and I liked him, in spite of myself. But I didn’t say anything more about Georgia.
“You still want to die?” I asked, changing the subject.
“Depends. What comes next?” “More,” I answered simply. “There’s more. That’s all I can tell you. It doesn’t end.”
“And you can see what comes next?”
“What do you mean?” I couldn’t see the future, if that’s what he meant.
“Can you see the other side?”
“No. I only see what they want me to see,” I said.
“They? They who?”
“Whoever comes through.” I shrugged.
“Do they whisper to you? Do they talk?” Tag was whispering too, as if the subject were sacred.
“No. They never say anything at all. They just show me things.”
Tag shivered and rubbed the back of his neck, like he was trying to rub away the goose flesh that had crept up his back.
“So how do you know what they want?” he asked.
“They all want the same thing.” And strangely, they did.
“What? What do they want?”
“They want to speak. They want to be heard.” I hadn’t ever put it into words, but the answer felt right.
“So they don’t speak but they want to speak?”
I nodded once, affirming that Tag was correct.
“Why do they want to speak?”“Because that’s what they used to do . . .” I hesitated.
“That’s what they used to do, when they were alive?” Tag finished for me. “Yeah.”
“So how do they communicate?”“Thoughts don’t require flesh and bone.”
“You hear their thoughts?” he asked, incredulous.
“No. I see their memories in my thoughts.” I supposed that was even more bizarre, but it was the truth.
“You see their memories? All of them? Do you see everything? Their whole lives?”
“Sometimes it feels like that. It can be a flood of color and thought, and I can only pick up random things because it’s coming at me so fast. And I can only really see what I understand. I’m sure they would like me to see more. But it isn’t that easy. It’s subjective. I usually see pieces and parts. Never the whole picture. But I’ve gotten better at filtering, and as I’ve gotten better, it feels more like remembering and less like being possessed.” I smiled in spite of myself, and Tag shook his head in wonder.
“Are there any dead people here now?” Tag swiveled around looking right and left as if maybe, if he turned fast enough, he could catch a ghost unaware.
“Definitely,” I lied. There was no one nearby, nothing to mar the quiet or the space except the branch outside my window that tapped and scratched against the glass and the squeak of rubber-soled shoes against the linoleum as someone hurried past my door.
Tag’s brows shot up, and he waited for me to tell him more.
“Marilyn Monroe thinks you’re hot. She’s blowing in your ear right now.”
Tag’s finger immediately filled his ear canal as if a bug had flown in and was buzzing incessantly, trying to get out.
I laughed, surprising myself, surprising Tag. He was usually the one to tease, not me.
“You’re shittin’ me, right?” Tag laughed. “You are! Damn. I wouldn’t mind it if Marilyn really did want to hang around.”
“Yeah. It doesn’t really work that way. I only see people who have a connection to someone I’m in contact with, or someone I’ve been in contact with. I don’t see random dead people.”
“So when you told Chaz that his grandfather had left something for him, did his grandfather show you the will?”
“He showed me a picture of his reflection, walking into the bank . . . the way he saw it as he approached. Then he showed me the safe deposit box.” I liked Chaz. He was muscle around the place—unfailingly cheerful, always singing, and always dependable. He worked with some very violent people day in and day out and never seemed to lose his good will or his cool.
When his grandfather kept trying to come through, I’d resisted. I liked Chaz and didn’t need ammo against him. I had no desire to hurt him. Since I’d been admitted, I’d gotten better at keeping the walls of water around me. I’d had nothing to do but practice and go to endless counseling sessions that didn’t especially apply, although surprisingly, they hadn’t hurt. But my constant contact with Chaz seemed to strengthen his grandfather’s connection with me, and I could feel him on the other side, waiting to wade across. So I let him, just him, raising the walls just a bit, just enough.