Page 14 of Meet Cute Magic

She opens the door, then yells, “Honey, we’re home!” And I think she truly has lost it.

But then I hear an echoed response in an all-too-familiar tone.

“Well, well, well. Look who we have here,” the voice says.

And then a translucent form appears, and I fall to the ground.

CHAPTER 6

Jack

48 days until Halloween

“You could have been more subtle!” a woman’s voice says in a hushed chide.

“You could have warned me!”

“Windows exist! I figured your nosy ass would be watching from the front!” My arm aches, and my mind is hazy, and the two voices arguing are not helping.

“I trusted you would get things done on your own. I didn’t want to stress you out.”

“You know what stresses me out? Having my neighbor faint in my fucking living room.”

“He always was a bit of a scaredy cat,” the man’s voice says. I could be wrong—no, I know I’m wrong, since my grandfather died last year, but I could swear that was my grandfather’s voice.

But that’s impossible.

“You could have warned me of that,” Rosemary mumbles. “I would have prepared a better lie.”

“No, you wouldn’t—”

“Hush, I think he’s coming to,” she says, and when I open my eyes, blinking to clear my vision, I see her strawberry blonde ponytail draped over her shoulder and her bright smile pointed in my direction, leaning over me.

“Hey, buddy. There you are.” The words almost sound… gentle, like she’s concerned about me.

Now, why would my annoying neighbor be concerned about me? We’re not close or—

And then it all comes rushing back.

Rosemary breaking into my place.

To get my grandfather’s flask.

Because she is a witch who needs to break a family curse.

Walking to her house so she could prove herself.

Watching her ass up the stairs—no, no, that’s not vital to these memories.

Walking in and seeing… I look over Rosie’s shoulder.

“What the fuck is happening here?” I say, and even I can hear the clear panic in my voice. Rosie and my… grandfather give me pitying looks. I move quickly to stand then back away as if the vision before me is a threat, and I suppose it is, in a way. At the very least, it’s a threat to my sanity.

A perfect replica of my grandfather stands before me, the all-too-familiar smile across his face. The hair on the back and sides of his head is a mess, just like it always was, the top thick and messy but neater, like he ran a hand over it in the mirror as I saw him do a million times. His eyebrows are thick and chaotic, like uneven caterpillars. His eyes used to be a green-blue color, but now they’re a monochromatic gray-white just like the rest of him.

A ghost.

My grandfather is a ghost.