Page 33 of Aftertaste

!!!!!!!!

THERE ARE SO many souls in his Hell’s Kitchen apartment.

Every spirit the Chef has ever raised.

A nun, a rock-climber, a little kid. Two teens—a guy and girl—brooding together. A ballerina. A wife. Someone’s grandma. The Chef’s own dad.

And now you.

You’re all stuck. Scared. Becoming what you feared.

Hangry.

Because even though you’ve gotten closure, you’re still trapped and can’t move On.

The ones who’ve been here longest are already showing signs. Wild eyes. Rage that ebbs and flows. Cravings that they can’t control. They’re stronger now, can make things happen. Make themselves known. Make themselves seen.

The Hangrier they get, the more apparent they become. Their bodies limn in eerie light. Their forms cast shadows on the ground. They have an edge, a shape, a look-and-feel. Ghosts Hollywood would die to catch on film.

You cluster for comfort, an anxious swarm of souls. Your thoughts are a hive, no longer yours alone. You writhe and shiver and howl as one.

And in this collective state, pushing and pulling and thinking together, you notice it.

The veil—the one between worlds—isn’t solid like you’d thought.

It’s not a wall, rigid and hard.

It’s more like skin. Film on hot milk. The membrane of an egg.

And while it doesn’t yield to any one of you, when you work together, pool your strength, you find that you can make it stretch.

Thinner and thinner.

Translucent as dough.

The idea hits everyone at once—string lights on a fairy chain. If we can make it back to the Afterlife before the Hanger consumes us, then maybe we can still fix things. Stop the process. Save our souls. Find a way to finally move On.

All we need is more strength. More hands. For the Chef to raise more of us.

With a critical mass, we can tear the veil apart.