Phantom by Retifer M. (debian ebook reader .txt) 📖

>I flail my arms around and kick against the locker. I feel one of my hands collide with something. I hear a grunt and Dash say something very inappropriate.

Suddenly he lets go of me. I drop to the floor, a loose piece of paper on the floor catching under my foot when I try to break my fall and trips me forwards into the lockers. My right knee buckles and I drop with a small yelp. Dash grabs a fist full of my hair and yanks my head upwards, his face barely inches from mine.

I really want to tell him to go eff himself, but settle for the best glare I can muster.

“You think you can jus-…” He stops with wide eyes and stumbles backwards a step, letting me go. I guess best glare I can muster is pretty impressive.

I clutch my chest as the cold spark there prickles up my spine, fills my bones and makes my eyes burn. I slap my hands over my face before it even registers that that feeling is the same as when I’d phased and am shocked when my palms are lit by the green glow now coming off of my eyes.

I stagger to my feet, panicked. I don’t get the chance to make an escape, though, as I am abruptly being shoved down the hallway and into a janitor’s closet around the corner. The person pushing me propels me into the back wall and slams the door shut. I hear the click of the lock being set.

“I thought you said these- side effects stopped!” Sam hisses close to me.

“I didn’t, I-” I rub my eyes, attempting to rid them of that icy feeling and look up at Sam, face tinted green from my eyes. “I didn’t mean to!” I turn away. “It just happened and…”

“I know. It’s just that…” She sighs. “Dash could’ve seen something- probably did see something.”

“I can’t control it, Sam. It just happened.”

“I know, I’m sorry. I know.” She crosses her arms. “So it hasn’t stopped then?”

“…I guess not.”

After a moment of quiet, she says, “You know, you need to defend yourself, sometime.”

Thankful for the change in subject, I snort. “Have you seen Dash? He’s like, twice my size! And a football player. How am I supposed to defend myself from that?”

She contorts her face and doesn’t respond.

I know she’s been trying to convince Mr. Lancer and principal Ishiyama about the A-Lister’s bullying habits, but without any luck. The school is too sports obsessed to ever consider punishing their prized football players or cheerleaders and risk their chance at winning games, unfortunately for the nerds and losers of Casper High.

I slide to the ground and try to get a hold on the fluctuating cold spot in my chest. I’ve been doing good so far today; there’s no way I’m falling into the basement of the school- if it even has one. If it doesn’t, I’d phase into… whatever’s under the school. Dirt.

I rub my hands over my face, up through my hair and hook my hands behind my head, looking down at my knees. Try not to think about it.

Sam sits down too and pulls out her phone, probably to text Tucker to tell him to get over here from wherever he is right now. I try to ignore the tap tap tap of her nails on her phone and squeeze my eyes shut.

It can’t be that hard to just tell it to stop, but it doesn’t listen. The more I focus on caging the little ball of cold energy, the more it seems to grow and spread and just get stronger. My eyes flash open when Sam shakes my arm and I make a frustrated noise when the spot flips out of control, I brace myself for impact and in a flare of white light I’m-

Still in the closet.

Oh. Oh no.

“Gah!” Sam scoots back in alarm. “Shit, Danny!”

“I’m sorry!” I whisper-yell, trying not to be too loud. “I didn’t mean to!” My voice trembles behind the weird echo, more clear than it should’ve been with my face being covered by the-

-the gasmask. Crud. Oh damn. I had a little bit of hope that the other night had been the last time- if not a dream- but I was wrong and this is way worse than just falling through a floor.

I think I’m gonna be sick.

“I know, I know, I’m sorry.” She raises her hands in a placating gesture. “You just… scared me. Warn me next time, okay?”

“I barely have any warning, Sam! How am I supposed to tell if I’m gonna…” I search for the correct word, tugging at the hazmat I’m suddenly wearing again. I poke at the visor of the gasmask, a small, barely noticeable green smudge on it giving me something to place my irritation on.

“I don’t know.”

I look around the closet, now more visible in the soft light coming from me. It’s not too big, but it’s not small either. I know I’m looking for a distraction but I honestly need one right now or I may have a panic attack.

Sam’s sudden fear at me doing whatever the heck that was gives me more anxiety, negating the effects of staring at shelves of cleaning products and completely cancelling out her feigned calm. Her spike in unease makes me uncomfortable as neither of us are doing anything.

“What?” I ask, unable to stand it anymore.

“W-what do you mean?”

“…Am I freaking you out?” I say, quiet voice cracking. I clear my throat.

She swallows, looks me over once, then replies. “I’m just worried about you… and…”

“And what?”

“And you’re floating a little bit.”

“Floating a little bit…?” I stare in blank confusion for a few seconds before I look down at the floor- ignoring the fact that I don’t have a shadow- and notice that I am in fact hovering just over the floor. I breathe in through my teeth, which probably sounds like something out of a horror movie through to Sam. “What the heck? Why?”

I was wrong last night. I don’t think any powers or abilities or whatever are controllable.

Sam shakes her head. “Another side effect?” She doesn’t sound convinced in the least.

“Is it really just a side effect at this point, though?”

She chews her lip and doesn’t respond. I can sense her guilt along with the fear and I try to block it out as I begin to catch on to the fact that there’s an odd sense of satisfaction I get from being able to tell what’s she’s feeling. It makes me uneasy.

I blink when I notice I can hear someone come down the hallway and stop just outside the door. Well, less hear, more feel. Like clothes straight from the dryer sticking to you with static, along with that pressure against the inside of my ribcage- secondhand emotions. I stare at the door until they knock.

“Guys?”

Sam gives me a look, before going to answer it. It’s Tucker, I decide half from common sense, half from listening really hard. Like before, the sound of their voices are distorted, but I can sort of tell the difference between them by feeling for it. It’s not perfectly indistinguishable though; it’s like trying to tell the difference between two very similar cats- static-y cats, that shock you when you pet them.

It’s weird and scary, and I store that in the ever growing file of ‘What I’m Keeping to Myself Forever’.

Sam stands in front of the door for a sec, unlocks it and then opens it a crack. She mumbles something to Tucker and that feeling of anger outside the door turns into dismay.

I stare at my hands balled up on my legs. I’ve only had this happen once- twice, according to them- and I’m already way too tired of it. Actually tired, too- physically and emotionally tired of this ghost stuff.

This is super uncomfortable and it’s making me self-conscious. I’m all too aware of the detail that I am not entirely human right now; that I’m different enough you can see it. If I could erase the fact that I can apparently die on command from their memories and hide all of this from them, I would.

Sam moves out of the way to let Tuck in as I poke at the floor underneath me, right where I should be touching it, and closes and locks the door again.

“So,” He says slowly as he sits against the shelf across from me. “It’s not temporary is it?”

I frown, holding up my finger to see grime on the end of my white glove. Not touching the floor isn’t that bad.

“Is there, I dunno, a trigger or something?” He continues, furrowing his brow in thought and looking at nothing in particular. “Was it Dash, maybe? Or was it random…?”

“…I don’t know, I think it’s random?” I decide to answer. “There’s just this… cold feeling and then this happens.” I make a motion towards myself with my hand. I try to ignore their slight flinch and the flutter I get in my chest when I catch it. “And it happens too fast to warn you guys, so…”

“A cold feeling.” Tuck says.

“Yeah.”

I see his eyes flicker down and linger a little too long on the ground under me. He opens his mouth as if to inform me of my defiance of gravity, seems to think better of it, but opens his mouth again and says it anyways.

“You’re floating, dude.”

“I’m aware, Tucker.”

He tilts his head curiously and I can tell he’s going through all of the information he has from comic books, video games, and movies. I shift under his gaze and go to rub the back of my neck sheepishly, but remember I’m wearing a full on hazmat when my hand meets the hood instead of skin.

“Are you doing that? Like, on purpose?” He finally asks.

“What? Floating? No, I’m not.”

“Huh.”

Tucker seems a tiny bit more comfortable talking about this than Sam and I, or maybe it’s just him being a geek and loving having the chance to put his knowledge of superpowers to use- even if it probably won’t help, considering it’s all mostly “fake science said with enough confidence to actually convince people it’s real”, according to my parents.

“I’m still thinking,” He finally says, “That it’s maybe the half…” He trails off. I get the feeling he’s talking more to himself. “Or maybe getting shocked with that ectoplasm stuff gave you ghost-like powers, or made you yourself ghost-like, ‘cause it’s obvious that this,” he points at me, “isn’t going away any time soon, and you’re definitely not dead per se…”

He fades off making a confused face. Great, he’s stumped.

“Why don’t you just ask your parents, dude?”

“I thought we talked about this.”

“We did, but why don’t you just ask ‘em what ghosts are, exactly?” He shrugs. “You don’t have to tell them everything, just find out anything that might help explain what’s going on. If we understand what ectoplasm and ghosts are, maybe we can figure this out on our own?”

I wave a hand dismissively. “I’ll ask them later then, but if I’m gonna get a lecture on ghosts, you guys are too.”

I’ve sat through dad’s eager rambling too many times to actually be crazy enough to ask a ghost-related question in his presence- especially when there’s a good chance it’s a question they’ve already answered.

“We’ll all ask them tonight.” At my tired look he adds, “They’re ghost experts, Danny. If anyone knows what’s goin’ on- or could figure it out- it’s your parents, dude.”

Somehow, I doubt that even if we knew everything my parents did, we’d be able to figure this out.