Page 92 of Possibly Texas

“What?” I frowned. “The mist?”

The mist.

I could explain the ghosts’ disappearance. They had just been quicker than I thought. They had dashed away before I had turned to catch them. The headstone was an old relative of Jack’s. But…how did a mist blow in and disappear so quickly?

I froze.

Auggie stared at me, his frown fixed to his face, for the longest of moments.

“Come on,” he said with a sigh, jerking his head towards Jack’s place.

“What?”

“It’s time to go home,” he said. “The ghosts are gone. Apparently.”

Auggie turned and began walking slowly towards Jack place down the road. For some reason, I felt guilty. It felt as though I had ruined Auggie’s evening. I started to holler out to him to wait, to let me talk to him or explain, or…anything. Instead, I gave up and chased after him.

In silence, the two of us walked down the street, as though we had sheets over our heads, not uttering a word as we made our way back to Jack’s place. Even as we crossed from the street into Jack’s yard and made our way to the front steps, we said nothing to each other. It wasn’t until we were standing near the steps to the front door that Auggie turned to me. He was no longer frowning, but he still managed to look disappointed.

“You can go in through the door,” he said softly. “The ghosts are gone now. You don’t have to worry about them following you.”

“I wasn’t…okay.”

Auggie gave me a sharp nod, then turned, as though to head back to his barn. At the last second, just within the perimeter of Jack’s lawn, he turned to me again.

“You really have to find something to believe in, Jordan,” he said, simply.

I didn’t respond. I just looked down at my feet. In my peripheral vision, I could see Auggie turn and continue on his way down the road. Obviously, he was going back to his barn. He had nothing else to say to me.

I had ruined everything.

For the longest time, I stood at the base of the steps and watched Auggie make his way down the road. When he was finally swallowed up by shadows, I sighed and turned to the steps.

A minute later, upstairs in my room, I was stripping my shirt and pants off. I climbed up onto the bed and closed the dormer window since we hadn’t thought to close it when we had snuck out to the graveyard. I planned to slide under the covers and pray to fall into a quick slumber so I wouldn’t have to hate myself for any longer that night.

For some reason, before I retired to bed, I reached over to the bedside table and tapped the screen of my phone. The eerie blue electric light filled the room. I had one missed text.

From my mom.

Urgently, I swiped to open my phone and brought up the text app. My thumb was shaking as I tapped on the screen to open her message.

You’re in a better place, Jordy. Maybe it’s best that you’re there. We’ll be together again one day. Until then, I love you and miss you.

Before I slid under the covers, my phone got thrown across the room. I hadn’t thrown it hard enough to break it, but the resounding “thunk” made me feel a little better.

Sleep took its time arriving, but once it did, I fell into a deep, restless sleep filled with dreams of ghosts in sheets, headstones that said “Burke,” and friends who thought I sucked.

Happy by The Rolling Stones was the song du jour on AMOR the following morning. I found out when I wandered down to the kitchen in my boxers. Decidedly, it was not a song that matched my mood. It did, however, seem to match Jack’s morning disposition. He was bopping around the kitchen, making a hot breakfast at the stove as the radio played on the counter. I’d never seen Jack look so happy and carefree in the time I’d been in Possibly.

Had he been dressed as one of the ghosts the night before?

Was he gloating about how scared I’d been?

His mood made me even more annoyed, but I knew that was my problem and not Jack’s. So, I slid into a seat at the table, waiting to see what he was whipping up for breakfast. Bacon and eggs perfumed the air and I could smell the toaster having its way with bread. Everything smelled heavenly, and my gut was begging with me to fill it. Jack’s mood on top of that should have turned my frown upside down, but I couldn’t make myself feel happy.

Like the mist that had rolled in from Susurrus Creek the night before, my mood hung around me like a miasma. It was if a veil of brattiness had been draped over me while I slept and I had been unable to extract myself from it when I awoke.

Jack turned to me, smiling widely, a spatula in his hand, and signed: “Good morning.”