The Ordinary Haunting

2. The New Night - Part 1

I trailed New up the subway stairs to ground level and glanced around excitedly. This was my first time coming up this close to the river (instead of just blowing straight past it headed south to the coastline for New Year's vacations). It had taken over an hour to get here from the office, so the sun had disappeared and left behind a thick darkness. Tall street lights sent down warm yellow light upon the grey pavement, and hot puffs of white steam billowed through grates set into the street every 50 metres or so. The smell of nearby water and incoming rain was heavy in the air, but it had to do battle with overlapping clouds of intensely fried foods like onion, garlic, pork, sausage and even dough. The oily scent of bubbly, golden dumplings really tortured my ghost brain; as far as I knew, eating was 100% useless now.

My stomach lurched suddenly and I jerked my head away from a corner shop to see that New was already far down the street, his squared shoulders just barely visible amongst the thin stream of people. I hurried after him but almost immediately knocked into a middle-aged man who'd stepped out in front of me through a wall of steam. I felt my skin flatten against him for a second and then snap loose, almost like a rubber band, and stumbled forward to my knees.

I'd passed through him.

Or he'd passed through me, I guess. Like a hand passing through Jell-O. I shuddered and looked back over my shoulder.

The man had come to a halt. He seemed to be squinting up at a street light, his eyes narrowed under the hazy glow. I climbed to my feet and took a step towards him, even though I could feel that pulling in my stomach starting to recover from the Jell-O thing and getting ready to zap me away. I waved my hand in the man's peripherals shakily. I couldn't remember hearing anything about what happened when a ghost walked all the way through a living person, except for possessions in horror movies. I'd never really paid much attention to the reports on hauntings when I was alive, because I just hadn't considered myself a contender for the ghost life (not to mention the dead life, being the 29-year-old apparent fool that I was).

Achoo!

I jumped away and blinked in surprise as the man rubbed his nose into his elbow and walked off.

I stood there under the light, no shadow at my feet, strangers brushing past my shoulder and twitching their noses as they were engulfed by steam.

I was just starting to rumble with laughter when my vision glitched and I felt myself yanked sideways. By the time my brain had caught up with my bod-- my spirit, the bright sound of keys jingling and shopping bags rustling caught my ear and helped me to focus on the sight of New standing before a yellow door. I glanced around to see that we were on an upper floor of an apartment building, painted white but with obvious stains from age and water damage. I turned and saw the river stretching along beyond the railings, glittering reflections of the town's lights moving gently on its surface.

The lock clicked behind me and I quickly wriggled up close to New as he pushed open the door. After recovering from the initial confusion, I'd spent a little time experimenting around the office that afternoon (not walking through my coworkers, which was obviously a mistake I'd need to rectify the next day -- be ready to sneeze away your sanity, Off Jumpol), and had been disappointed to learn that I did not in fact have any useful ghost powers that would allow me to slip through solid objects or access locked areas (the back of the vending machine, for example). I guess if worst came to worst, and New were to inadvertently lock me out of somewhere, I'd just have to walk far enough away for the zapping thing to kick in, but I couldn't be bothered testing that right now.

How a human didn't count as a solid object, I didn't understand.

Anyway, we stepped into New's apartment (him sniffing at an evident itch in his nose) and I eagerly ducked under his arm to take a look around. He flicked on a lightbulb in the entryway that spilled to the edges of a living room in front of me. A medium-sized, grey, L-shaped couch was pushed against the far left wall, an open doorway closest to me showing the vague outlines of a narrow hallway with rooms coming off it, and a floor-to-ceiling window making up the entirety of the wall opposite the front door. I could see the skyscrapers of the city in the distance, colourful flashes bouncing off the undersides of the low storm clouds hanging patiently in the dark. To my right the apartment was partitioned by a tall wooden bookcase, the distinctive metal gleam of a sink, pots and pans visible behind it.

New strode past me in bare feet, heading into the kitchen.

"See anything you like?" he asked.

~~~~

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