I'll Wait Here for You in My Time of Dying

“I don’t want you to go,” I cried as Tyler pressed his lips to my forehead.

“I don’t want to go either but I have to,” he replied softly.

I shook my head and circled his wrists with my fingers.

“Please,” I pleaded as I rose my watery gaze to meet his. “Please don’t go.”

Tyler’s brow furrowed and I could see that I was tearing him apart. He ducked his head down and pressed his lips to mine, brushing them against mine once or twice before kissing me hard. I parted my lips, taking everything about this kiss that I could, not knowing when I’d be able to kiss him again.

“I love you so much Lesia,” he whispered against my lips.

I sniffed and nodded. “I love you too.”

“When I get back,” he smiled and picked up my hand. “We’ll get married, I promise. We’ll have a nice big wedding and then we can get started on that nice big family.”

I chuckled through my tears and smiled, regardless of the pain ripping through me. We both looked over Tyler’s shoulder as a honk resonated through the air. I bit my lip as I looked at the bus that all these men were walking on to.

“I’ll come home to you, I promise,” Tyler assured me, kissing me one last time before picking up his bag and going over to the bus.

I bit my lip and wrapped my arms around myself as I watched the bus take them all away. Taking away my fiancé and taking him towards a fate unknown. For the millionth time since it started, I hated this war with every fibre of my body.

“I’ll be waiting,” I whispered as the bus disappeared from view.

I sighed and looked out of the window, not seeing anything different to usual. I bit my lip and leant my head against the glass, wishing I could feel how cold it should feel against my skin. Wishing I’d felt the bump that my head had made when it hit the glass. But nope. I felt nothing.

You know, being a ghost isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

Death some people say is easy and that it’s the living that’s hard. But I want to beg to differ on that issue. Both I would say is pretty easy. It’s the part in the middle that’s hard. It’s the hanging between the two worlds and not knowing why you haven’t completely passed on that’s hard. It’s incredibly lonely too. No one can see me. No one can hear me. But boy can people sense me.

It’s been three years since I died. Three years of my house being up for sale. And nearly seven months in total that people have lived here. And it is seven months spread across those two years. People always say that there is something wrong with the house. That strange things happen. That there are parts of the house so cold that it doesn’t matter what they do to try and warm it up, the cold still permeates through.

I can’t really help this at all. I don’t know why I’m stuck in this world still but here I am. Lonely as hell and just wishing for something to happen to help me into the next life. I just hate being here.

My head snapped up as I heard something outside and my eyes widened slightly as I saw a moving truck coming up the drive and parking. I stood up quickly and gazed out, watching as two guys jumped out of the truck and then five other guys jumped out of the van that had pulled up along the street. They were all pretty good looking and I was sure that I recognised them but I couldn’t for the life of me...or possibly the afterlife of me...work out where from.

One of them began walking up to the house, spinning keys round his finger as he walked. I looked him up and down, taking in his muscular stature. He must have been around six foot tall, if not a little taller and he was big. Huge in comparison to my five foot and one inch height. He was dressed simply, jeans and a T-shirt that read Syn in big letters, and he had aviators covering his eyes. He stuck the key in the door just as one of the other guys walked up to him.

“You sure about this Shads? You know Raychel and I don’t mind you staying for a while longer,” the shorter of the two spoke up as he followed the big guy into the house, who I’m presuming is this ‘Shads’ guy.

“Zacky, I can’t bum around your house forever. I’ve got to move on at some point.”

The shorter guy, I’m guessing ‘Zacky’, sighed and ran a hand through his hair before nodding.

“Okay. As long as you’re sure.”

‘Shads’ nodded with a smile before looking over to where I was, his brow furrowing slightly. My eyes widened and I froze, not moving a muscle because it honestly looked like he was looking at me instead of through me like the majority of people I come up against.

“Yo! You fuckers going to help or just stand around the house?”

“Fuck you,” ‘Zacky’ laughed before disappearing.

‘Shads’ remained staring over at me before his attention snapped to the side as a guy just shorter than him with dark hair and dark brown eyes stood beside him, dropping a box he’d been holding.

“You have a lot of shit you know that?”

‘Shads’ chuckled and nodded.

“Well help out then!” The other guy exclaimed before disappearing.

‘Shads’ nodded and glanced over at me again, his brow slightly furrowed before he too left the house. I let out the breath I hadn’t realised I was holding...or I would have. I’m still not entirely sure how it all works. But I relaxed. I no longer stood frozen by the window. I think ‘Shads’ had seen me but why hadn’t he said anything. If I’d seen some random person in the house I was supposed to be moving in to I would have mentioned it.

Maybe I was just getting my hopes up.

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It didn’t take them long to move in and I discovered all of their names as I watched. There was the shortest of them all, he was called Johnny. Then there was the tallest of them all called Jimmy. The two guys I’d seen that weren’t the one who was moving in were Zacky and Brian, or Syn as some of them called him. Then there were a pair of twins, Jason, or JB, and Mattie.

Then there was the guy who was moving in. His name wasn’t actually ‘Shads’, it was Matt. And he was, in a word, absolutely gorgeous. He had removed his glasses after a while, revealing a pair of clear hazel eyes. I could tell that they didn’t have as much life in them as they used to. Something had happened in his life, something that had made him move, and it had taken some of the happiness from him. I could see it in his eyes and the way he smiled. There was something off about the way he smiled occasionally. It didn’t quite reach his eyes and there was something missing from it.

“Thanks guys,” Matt commented as I watched from the top of the stairs, my hands curled around the banisters.

“That’s okay dude,” Jimmy replied, smacking Matt on the back gently and with a smile.

“You sure you don’t want us to hang around any longer?”

Matt glanced at Jason and shook his head. “Nah, I’m cool man. You can go home to Sarah.”

Jason grinned before grabbing the car keys out of Mattie’s hand heading for the door.

“See you fuckers later!”

Matt rolled his eyes and laughed as the rest of the guys complained, seeing as Jason was their ride. With hurried and rushed goodbyes and promises of seeing Matt later, they all left. A strange silence fell upon the house once the door had closed and I bit my lip as I wondered what would happen now for this young man. He couldn’t have been that much older than me. Possibly just a couple of years...or at least would be had I not died.

That was another thing I didn’t quite understand about the state I was in. I hadn’t aged...not physically anyway. But was I older? I was still on this world so does that mean that I was now 24, nearly 25? Or was I still just 22 as I was when I died?

I watched as Matt just stood there for a moment before glancing over to the window where I’d been standing when he’d first moved in. His brow furrowed as he ran a hand over his buzzed hair. I bit my lip as his whole person seemed to deflate. I moved down the stairs as he moved more into the living room, sinking down on one of the couches they’d all brought in.

“I’m going fucking crazy,” he muttered to himself before pushing himself up and to his feet.

He turned around and I watched as he came towards where I was. I closed my eyes as I felt Matt walk straight through me. It was an odd sensation. One I’d felt many, many times. If a person couldn’t see me then they couldn’t feel me. It’s not like I was completely void of any substance. I had discovered over time that if I put my mind to then I could pick things up, freak people out by bumping into furniture.

But back to Matt walking through me.

It felt as if I was disconnected, just for a moment, from myself. Like I was simply made of something like jelly...or custard and that he could just move through me. I always wondered what it felt for them. For the person walking through me. No one ever seemed to react, like it hadn’t happened but Matt did.

Matt whirled around and ran his hands down his arms where obvious goose bumps had risen. My eyes widened as I saw this reaction and slowly I looked up at his face. His eyes were turned to the ceiling as if that would give him in answer before his gaze flicked to exactly where I was. Once again I froze, just like I had when he’d looked at me earlier.

His brow furrowed and he shook his head, running a hand over his face and turning to go up the stairs. I relaxed and let myself drop to the floor as I heard his footsteps move about upstairs.