SOUNDTRACK SERIES vol 2 [oneshots compilation]

All My Ghosts - Lizzy McAlpine

(aka Ghost of Chicago by Noel Floersch (but it drops on April7th so we'll see if it's still relevant then)

The wet clumps of Slurpee angrily go through the straw in a delicious vacuum, seeming louder than they sound. The chuckle that comes after is even more so.

"Oooh," Wet bluish lips purse into a playful grimace. "Brainfreeze."

Jennie chuckles at the childishness of the thrumming body beside her. She side-eyes as the blonde girl presses the end of her palm on her temple. "Wow, I haven't had that in a long time."

"You alright?"

"Yeah," The girl grins. She proceeds to stab her straw aggressively on her cup, presumably to dislodge chunks of hardened blue shaved ice on her paper cup.

Jennie chews on her lip thoughtfully, her crossed feet swaying into a nervous habit that she does when she's pensive. She watches the girl through the glass of the convenience store, the emptiness of the isles a testament to the lateness of the night.

The blonde is loud in all she does, Jennie decides. She doesn't come subtle, even for the moments she can get broody.

Kind of like her .

Her eyes fall on her own cup of Slurpee, a drink full of raging red shaved ice. It is a party in her cup that is a contrast to the feelings that are stirring within.

She sighs. She slowly pokes her plastic straw around the mushy cup, letting the ice dissolve into an ugly slush. She reckons it will go further untouched today.

"Who is it?"

The blonde doesn't pause, preoccupied with stabbing her own cup. Jennie thinks she knows what the girl is asking about, but she feigns innocence as her eyebrow raises questioningly. "Hmm?"

The blonde wipes wisps of her bangs away from her eyes and takes another sip.

"The person you think of," She swallows the bit of slushie in her mouth before adding, "When you go quiet like that."

Jennie swallows, then pulls her eyes away from that intense brown gaze. She crosses her arms and looks at them again through the convenience store's mirror, the red and green sticker stripes across their illuminated bodies. She looks at her own reflection, hunched and slightly defensive.

She rights her back and sighs.

"...like that." A soft murmur comes from the blonde.

Jennie looks at the girl through her reflection: there sits another girl; another doe-eyed blonde. She's looking at Jennie through the mirror, a slight lilt on her lips, a certain cockiness to her that Jennie is familiar with.

This was what I'm used to , she tells herself. Not people who pretend they care before they even really knew me.

Her heart immediately skips in longing before it tugs into a twisting, numbing, familiar pain. She closes her eyes, and like how she has deftly done numerous past times, dismisses the feeling, each time pretending to be less heavy than the other.

She would always tell herself: I definitely miss her less today.

That's always the plan.

One day.

She opens her eyes to two girls blurred on top of each other like a double-exposed image interchanging and teasing her. They both speak, "Are you okay?" but they show their nuances in how the other girl's eyes flick intensely, slipping into armour and ready to protect; the other a softer, caring, and more worried shadow.