Don't Go [Muke Clemmings]

Chapter Twenty Five

Luke

"Well, Luke," Karen said quietly, sitting down in the raggedy arm chair next to where I was on the couch, "Michael really likes you."

I nodded, smiling. "I know."

"There's just one problem." Oh, shít, here we go... "Michael has a disease, called--"

"He knows," Michael interrupted, walking into the room holding a bowl of popcorn. "Wait, I thought you said she already told you, Luke."

"Um..."

"I didn't tell him," Karen insisted. Shít, shít, shít, shít!

"Luke... Mom, can you give us a second?"

"Sure." She walked back into her bedroom and Michael turned to me with the most confused expression.

"Michael."

"I want an explanation. How the hell do you know about my disease if my mom hasn't told you?"

"I..."

"Luke, tell me the truth or I'm leaving."

"This is your house."

"I'm not going to leave the room, I'm going to leave you. As a boyfriend, as a friend, everything. What can I say? I don't like liars."

"Okay, fine, but you're not going to believe me."

Michael sat on the edge of the couch and pet my hair. "I promise I'll believe you. Just tell the truth."

"Fine. You died. You died and you came back, but not to the present. You came back about two years earlier, and you confronted me in the bathroom, talking about how weed is bad for me and blah blah blah..."

"Weed?" I nodded slowly. "You smoke weed?"

"Smoked. I wasn't addicted yet, so I was able to give it up pretty easily. As I was saying, though, you knew all sorts of stuff about me, some that I didn't even know myself, like you took me to a park I had never been to and said it was my favorite, you even called me 'punk rock' once."

"Punk rock, huh?"

"Yeah, like, 'I'm punk rock, I do what I want.'"

"Well, that sort of sounds like you."

"Yeah. Anyway, you also told me stuff about you. You told me that you were in love with me when you died, you told me about your disease, you told me about some chick I've never even met, named Anna."

"Ew, I hope it wasn't the same one at Sara's funeral."

"Probably was, you said she knew Jamie and Sara."

"So Jamie and Sara were there too?"

I nodded. "Yeah, but Sara couldn't see you. I'm still not sure why Jamie could, the whole reason you came back was to make someone fall in love with you to complete the list, and I don't think she would fall in love with you, you know, since she's a lesbian."

"Yeah... Wait, how do you know about the list?"

"You told me."

"No, I didn't--"

"Ghost you did. You told me all about it. You told me everything. That's how I know everything now."

"Wow. So how did you know I would die if you told me you loved me? What did you even mean by that?"

"Your last diary entry ended in the middle of the word." Michael knit his eyebrows. "You also gave me your diary when you were a ghost. I still have it, which is why I saw that no matter what I did, it still ended in the middle of the world. The rest of the diary changed every day, just not that one word. I realized you didn't die in the middle of the word, you were interrupted. By me. That was when I would tell you I love you."