Before You Ghost - Helena Hunting Page 0,1

but he was unable to grab them. I did it instead.

It was the first time his mood dampened. The wicked, semi-opaque sparkle left his eyes briefly.

I needed to hike back down the mountain. I was grateful that we took my car and not his earlier—at least I had the keys in my fanny pack. The hike down was much shorter than the hike up had been. Of course, Evan and I had stopped to fight and then kiss and then fight some more on the way up.

“What were we even arguing about?” I pointed to a distinctive row of trees that had the bark smoothed off from either animals or weather. He’d pressed me against that tree and kissed the hell out of me earlier while we dry humped each other, back when he was alive.

“I don’t remember. You were angry, which makes you even hotter. And then your nose flared a bit and it was over for me. Whatever it was, just remembering it makes me horn…” he trailed off and looked down. I looked down with him. We were like two dogs that had their favorite toy taken away for misbehaving. The silence filled itself with the sounds of nature. Birds chirped and a couple of squirrels made that annoying clicking noise.

“Is it...doing anything?” I tried to squint to see if his ghost pants had moved in any way.

“Holy crap. Do not squint at my dick. Can you not? I mean, try to look a little impressed or something.” He gestured to his crotch.

I looked from his face to my hand to his crotch once, twice, and by the third time, Evan had resigned himself to what must have been clearly obvious.

I wanted to touch it.

I stretched out my hand, palm up, and stepped closer to him. I held my breath. His ghost eyes were wide and slightly untrusting, which was fair. Neither of us knew what was going to happen if I managed to cup his ghost junk.

Closer still. And then, just as I was about to make contact or slide right through his body, we both heard the cops jingling down the mountain.

“Nice shot, man. I didn’t think you could cover a whole body with one tarp like that. If there was a body covering event in the Olympics, you’d get at least a bronze, Michigan.” We heard the telltale sound of two palms slapping together in a high-five. It was followed by birds cawing their annoyance and squirrels nattering angrily.

Evan’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down as we overheard the police talking about his corpse.

“Yeah, well, you can’t leave a man uncovered like that. His twig and berries were out.” They came into the clearing just as the pants adjusting cop finished up his observation.

I pulled my hand away from Evan’s crotch. It was weird that his ghost was fully dressed, but his body was naked as the day he was born. Maybe there was such a thing as ghost modesty?

“You okay, miss?”

I took a deep breath. Maybe this would all hit me soon. Maybe my shock was a real thing that was just hovering on the edge of my sanity.

“You know what? I think maybe I shouldn’t drive home. Would it be cool if you dropped me off? I’ll come back later to get my car.”

Red Ears nodded quickly. “Yeah, of course. You know what? Michigan here can drive your car home, save you the trouble later.”

“Thanks. I feel like this hasn’t hit me yet, you know?”

“That makes sense.” They went from joking about Evan’s body to being understanding about my concerns at the snap of the fingers. They must bounce from emotion to emotion all day, every day. Like squirrels hopping from tree to tree, or electrical pole to electrical pole.

“We’ll take you home. No problem.” They all handed me business cards. I didn’t know cops even carried them.

I made sure Evan was able to come with me. He sat in the back of the squad car as I sat up front with Red Ears. I noticed that the back car door never opened, yet Evan was still present. We’d have some things to discuss tonight, for sure.

________________

I got ready for the evening like I always did. Took a shower, washed my face, used my toner, put on my night cream, and made sure my armpits were hairless, as well as my lady business. I made Evan promise he’d stay in the living room since locking the bathroom door was pointless. He could