Shade

by Jeri Smith-Ready

  My thumb curled over his. “I kept one. As a reminder.” I pictured it in its vase on our dining room table, dried to a deep burgundy.

  “Of the past?” Zachary held my gaze. “Or the future?”

  Heat rushed to my face and fingertips. “Both.”

  I pulled my hand out of his before we could go any further. A moment later the dryer buzzer went off. We both startled, and I almost lost my balance. He steadied me as the room quieted except for the shush-shush of the washing machine.

  I gave a nervous laugh. “I guess our time’s up.”

  “It is.” Zachary let go of me and opened the laundry room door. “For now.”

  Days turned into weeks as I waited. I played every bit of music Logan loved. Band after band, the dozens of playlists he’d built for me over the years, stretching back to the mix CD “Songs to Skate Your Ass Off (To),” from when we were thirteen. I even tried the Black Angels’ Directions to See a Ghost, thinking he might find it funny (plus, I read online that the song “Never/Ever” resonates at a dead-friendly frequency).

  I begged. I threatened. I cried.

  No one saw him, in any form. The Keeleys used their multimillion-dollar award from Warrant Records to buy a new, fully BlackBoxed house in the same school district. There was no point in moving far away, since as a shade, Logan could go anywhere.

  January brought mockery and midterms, but I survived both. February iced the streets, sidewalks, and trees, pouring on layer after layer of silver, thawing each day only to freeze again, thicker, each night. Still I waited.

  Until, on the first night of spring, when March had melted the silver into goopy gray slush, I had no music left. I’d played it all.

  So I stood in silence by my open window, watching the cars drift by, their tires swishing through dirty puddles.

  Finally I couldn’t take any more waiting.

  “Logan, where are you?” I banished all fear and anger and pity from my voice. “I know you don’t want to be like this. I know you want to come back. So please come back.”

  And then it hit me. My hands turned cold on the windowsill, though the breeze through the screen held more than a hint of spring warmth.

  “Are you happy this way? Do you want to stay a shade?” My voice broke. “If you want me to give up on you, just say so. Show me a sign.”

  I closed my eyes, expecting more of the same. Expecting nothing.

  The shriek came from a distance, quiet at first, then spiking in volume like a song cranked up at a party.

  “No …”

  The blast of black shot through my window, straight through my body. My knees gave way. I collapsed on the floor, every muscle quaking. My stomach twisted and folded.

  “AURA!!” Logan’s voice crackled like feedback in a microphone. “I TOLD YOU NOT TO WAIT!!”

  “I don’t—listen—to shades.”

  Logan’s scream slurred his response. The room seemed to roll and pitch. I clutched the edge of my bedroom rug to keep from sliding into oblivion.

  With all my will, I wrapped my mind around the DMP’s photograph of him—his eyes lifted to the stage lights, his hand stretched out to the world that adored him. His face full of the future.

  Logan wailed, squeezing his light from my memory. But I would never let go.

  “You can’t fool me.” My jaw locked up, but I forced out the words. “You burn too bright for this.”

  The sudden silence was more deafening than the screams. I kept my eyes closed, afraid they would show me the same dark, empty room I’d seen for three months.

  But beyond my lids, a violet glow emerged.

  I opened my eyes.

  In front of me, clear and crisp as a cold night sky, stood a pair of checkered high-top Vans.

  Then, soft as a prayer, Logan whispered one word.

  “Wow.”