Two-Faced

Chapter 9

          That night, Asriel couldn't sleep at all. Surrounded by a nest of blankets, she kept rereading the answers Amber had given them by the light of a small flashlight she kept in her drawer with her journal. Squinting in the dim light, she tried to piece together the puzzle of Amber's existence, but there were too many pieces missing. She knew that the ghost was adamant about keeping her death a secret, but why? There must be some sort of clue around here somewhere...

          Before she knew it, the morning light was bleeding through the curtains, signaling that it was okay to get up. Leaving the journal gently on the nightstand, she snatched her phone from her dresser. She typed quickly, eager to do more research. First were local police reports. If she'd been killed or kidnapped in the past few decades, she should be able to find it, right? Wrong. Nothing came up about a 16-year-old named Amber being killed anywhere near there. Not even a missing person file. Death records were next. Despite over an hour of searching, she couldn't find anything to prove that Amber was telling the truth.

          She leaned on her windowsill, thinking for a moment. The book! she remembered, making her way towards the door. She never knew what it actually was; it had a very bland, brown cover but beyond that, Asriel hadn't seen anything from it. It was very old though, she knew that. Iris had been the one to grab it, and, knowing her, she was probably too eager to start the seance to look at what was hidden among the pages. Checking the clock, she realized that her mom must have already left, so the coast would be clear. She tried to hurry down the stairs, nearly tripping over her injured foot, to find where the book had ended up.

          To her relief, it was exactly on the table where they had left it the day prior. It didn't seem to have been disturbed at all. Picking it up carefully, she flipped open the worn cover. There were a few blank pages at the beginning, but soon she found the title page; The Edge of Existence. She flipped through a few pages, skimming the text for anything that would stand out. She was so focused on the novel that she didn't notice the figure coming up beside her.

          "It was my mother's," Amber recalled, making Asriel jump. Ignoring her reaction, Amber continued to reminisce. "She always said that I was too young to read it. 'Someday you'll be old enough', she always said, but I started anyway," she shook her head with a smile, more of her blonde hair shifting over her pale face. "She never noticed it was missing when I took it, but I guess she wasn't the most observant person anyway..."

          Having calmed down from the surprise input, she glanced between the book and the transparent girl standing next to her. Something about seeing Amber's smile made her relax, at least a little bit. But as her eyes rested on the ghost girl, she noticed a hint of sadness spread across her face; a single thought sending ripples of sorrow through her being.

          Not entirely sure what caused the sudden change in demeanor, Asriel tried to think of something to say. After a second, she settled on "What's wrong?"

          Surprised by the question, Amber shifted her gaze to Asriel's face, her sky-blue eyes looking into Asriel's silver ones. "Oh, it's nothing. Just miss it, that's all." Her gaze softened, and the smile returned to her face. Pointing to the book, she chuckled a little bit. "I think you are a little bit young for it, though."

          "Can't you still pick stuff up though?" Asriel asked curiously. "I mean, if you wanted to finish reading it, couldn't you?"

          "If I really wanted to, I'd probably be able to pick it up, but reading's a different story..."

          "What do you mean?" Asriel watched her pick up the book and flip through the pages. "Why can't you read it?"

         "Well... There are technically two reasons. One's harder to explain than the other though." Amber replied, setting the book back on the table. "I guess I can try, if you really want."

         "Well, the worst that can happen is I won't understand, right?"

         "Okay, well, let's start with the easy one first," she shifted her hair away from her face, revealing her other eye. It was cloudy in the center, the milky white bleeding into the blue of the iris. Asriel knew right away; she was blind in that eye. "So, there's reason one... The other is my... current situation."

          Not thinking, Asriel asked, "What do you mean?"

          Amber rolled her eyes. "Well, if you can't tell, I'm a ghost," she answered sarcastically. Asriel's cheeks flooded with color. Why did I say that? she thought to herself as Amber continued. "There's something about not being a living part of this world that makes things a bit... blurry. Not so bad that I can't see anything, but just enough so I can't read fine text. I don't know what it is exactly, but that's just the way it is."

         "Oh, I'm sorry," Asriel hesitated, not sure what else to say. Picking up the book again, she glanced towards the stairway. "I'm going to put this back. It's not mine, after all."

         "Thanks, but it's not mine to use anymore," she shrugged. "Never really was."

         Asriel paused, but spoke up again after a few seconds. "Well then, just so we both know where it is. Is that okay?"

         "Sure."

         Carefully she went upstairs, the ghost solemnly watching her leave. Once she got into the secret room, she turned the rocking chair upright and put the novel on its seat. It slid backward, falling through the space in the wooden rods that made up the back of the chair before Asriel could catch it. As it hit the floor with a dull thud, a piece of paper flew out of the pages. She carefully picked it up, unfolding it delicately. It was a note. Why's this in a book? Maybe a bookmark...? she reasoned, wondering how she could've missed it. Her confusion was cut short though, as a familiar scarred hand snatched the paper away.

         "You weren't supposed to see that."