Page 114 of Ghosts Don't Cry

It has to be here.Everything I wrote and felt. Every fucking piece of my soul I left behind. Poetry scratched in margins, notes I never gave her. The copy of ‘The Grapes of Wrath’she bought me, its pages filled with my thoughts. Evidence that I was more than just a junkie dying in an abandoned building.

But the space is empty. There’s dust and spider webs, but nothing else.

A sound rips from my throat, painful and feral.

“Fuck.” The word comes out broken. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”

I stare into the empty space, willing the box to materialize, but it’s gone.Reallygone. Someone must have found it, took it or threw it away. Or maybe the plastic failed and everything inside turned to pulp and mold.

It doesn’t matter how. It’s gone.

I sink to the floor, hands pressing against the ground. The broken shards of glass bite into my palm, but I don’t care.

The tattered remains of blankets still lie in one corner. They catch my eye, and my heart squeezes when I recognize one as hers. A soft blue fleece she left the night she found me sick. I crawl toward the pile, fingers sinking into the rotting fabric. It falls apart in my hands, disintegrating into nothing.

Just like everything else in my life.

I sit back against the wall, in the exact spot I used to sleep, where I used to wait for her, while more memories surge up, threatening to drown me.

The hunger that never went away, gnawing at my insides until food became a distant dream. Stomach cramping. Hands shaking. The way I’d press my palm against my ribs, counting each one.

The cold that settled so deep, nothing could touch it. Shivering so hard my teeth rattled. Fingers and toes going numb. The desperate search for warmth.

The shame that burned hotter than fever when she brought me food. When she touched me with gentle hands.

The way withdrawal felt. Nausea that wouldn’t stop. Fever and chills warring for control. Demons dancing behind my eyes while my body tore itself apart.

The sounds she made when I kissed her for the first time.

My chest heaves with breaths that won’t quite fill my lungs. I don’t know why I came here. What did I think I’d find? Closure? Answers? Some kind of proof that I’ve changed?

But I haven’t. I’m still running. I’m still too damaged to be anything anyone needs.

The box being gone feels like a sign. The universe erasing all the evidence, and telling me that the version of myself, the one who loved her desperately, never really existed.

I should get out of here, go back to Edwards’ house, lock myself inside, and stay away from her like she asked. But I can’t make myself move.

I don’t know how long I sit there. Minutes? Hours maybe?

I think about the note I left in her pocket.

Some stories don’t get happy endings, Phare. Some people aren’t meant to be saved. Don’t waste your light trying to guide this shipwreck home.

The words are burned into my mind. I meant every word when I wrote them. I still do.

So why did I come back? Why did I agree to take the house and inheritance? Why did I kiss her in that alley, in the parking lot, when I knew it would only make everything worse?

I know the answer to that. Because I’m selfish. Because even knowing I’ll destroy her, I can’t stay away from her. Because some part of me, the part that wrote poetry in margins and dreamed of a future I’d never have, still believes she can save me.

But she can’t. No one can.

At some point in my spiraling, a sound intrudes. The sound of a car door slamming.

My body tenses, every muscle locking up. Footsteps echo along the hallway.

Iknowthose footsteps. I know her in ways time and distance haven’t erased.

She appears in the doorway, and stops there like a ghost. A memory.