Page 22 of Haunt Me

That’s when I understand how the next hour is going to go. They’re going to measure me in small proofs. Did he sit? Did he eat? Did he drink coffee? Did he answer when spoken to? Did he look too long at the knives? Did he go outside alone?

They’re trying to keep me alive by counting the ways I still resemble a man.

I put the fork down when Mouse slides into the chair across from me.

He looks worse up close. His eyes are bloodshot. His jaw is unshaven. There’s a grease stain on his cuff, which means he either came from the garage before changing or changed without noticing.

"Hey," he says.

"Hey."

He looks at my plate. "Jenna threatened you too?"

"Yeah."

"She threatened me with feelings earlier. It was ugly."

I stare at him. The corner of his mouth tries to lift and fails.

"You need anything?" he asks.

There it is.

The question everyone keeps asking.

Need.

I need Raven to walk through the kitchen door and steal something off my plate.

I need my hands to stop remembering the weight of her body after the last breath left it.

I need Christmas Eve to go differently.

I need the creek to give her back.

"No," I say.

Mouse nods like he expected that. "Okay."

He stays anyway.

That makes me angrier than if he’d pushed.

People drift through the kitchen and living room in waves. Some touch my shoulder as they pass. Some say Raven's name. Some don’t. I learn there are different kinds of mercy and all of them hurt.

Bishop tells a story about Raven convincing three prospects the clubhouse basement was haunted when she was fourteen.

Diesel says he once helped her rewire the horn on Knox's truck to play some ridiculous song every time he turned the key, and Knox threatened to ground her.

Someone mentions how she used to sit on toolboxes in the garage when she was little, asking questions until grown men admitted they didn’t know the answers.

Every story gives her back for a second.

Every story takes her away again.

I last forty-three minutes.

I know because I watch the clock above the stove like a man waiting for a sentence to end. At forty-three minutes, a woman I barely recognize from town touches my sleeve and tells me Raven’s in a better place.