Unseen

-14-

I can't react and I'm frozen, I can't even blink and I'm holding my breath as I feel James' arms tightly wrapped around me, pulling me against his body.

I've touched many people and things. At first I couldn't do it, I remember how I went through everything but then I learnt that I just had to concentrate and managed to succeed to be more... corporeal, I think. And since then I learnt that I've always kept that concentration. It's basically all I can do and a way to fool myself to think I'm not just a creepy ghost. I rather open a door than just go through it because that is just creepy. By now I'm so used to keep my mind focused that it comes naturally. Like breathing for a living person or even myself. I don't have to do it, but I do it unconsciously.

Even though, I have never been touched before by another human being. At least not since I died.

It feels... weird. Too warm and solid, it's electrifying and it makes me tremble. It's also shocking and all that anguish I felt before he hugged me disappears. I stay limp in his arms, I don't react, I just stare at the horizon over his shoulder but he hugs me even tighter. I also feel him trembling and soon after I hear something that's not right. 

Is James crying?

I pull away before I can even get used or comfortable in the embrace, just to check on him and he is pale, his lips are a light shade of purple and he's clearly shivering, but he is also crying and his expression shows the most heartbreaking ache I've ever witnessed. 

"A-are you okay?" I ask. Whatever worry I had before is gone when I see him. He looks terrible, ill and about to faint. 

Naturally, I reach to grab his arm to guide him to sit but when I do his expression shows even more pain and his body kind of spasms so I retrieve my hand immediately, almost as if I touched a hot surface. Did my touch cause that on him?

"S-sit down, James. You look ill," I say, but my voice is trembling and I have a bad, terrible, horrifying feeling sinking in the pit of my guts, eating me from within.

"I'm f-fine," he says but his voice sounds shaky, betraying him completely. "I just need... a few minutes. That's all," he adds and slowly moves to sit on the bench.

For the first time I look around to see if someone else is passing by and saw him basically hugging himself. A boy is staring at him with a confused expression but then just gives James a what-a-freak look and resumes his way, leaving us alone again.

I focus on James one more time and I keep seeing tears falling down his cheeks, sorrow furrowing his brows and a grimace that tells me he is in pain.

I'm about to ask him what's wrong when he speaks first. "H-how... how do you go on with... with that much pain?"

For a few seconds I don't understand what he is asking and I'm about to request him to rephrase that when I remember what he told me before about touching ghosts and how he didn't like it because he could feel all what they did, the sorrow and pain. He hugged me, which means he felt all what I feel and now he is... he is crying, like I can't do. He is crying because of me. I did this to him.

My hand flies to my mouth, covering it as my eyes widen in horror. He rubs his face with his hands and wipes the tears way. It seems the colour is coming back to his skin but he still looks awfully pale and sick. And even if he brushes the tears away, these keep falling.

"There's so much... so much pain," he keeps rambling. "It eats you alive. So much fear and loneliness." He looks up to meet my horrified eyes and I can see in his expression all what I always feel and push to the back of my mind. "So much ache," he whispers. "How can you even smile when you feel like that?" he asks once again, a new tear falling down his cheek and I feel tempted to brush it away, but if I touch him I'll cause him more pain... and he'll get colder. It's winter already, no need to make things worse.