Page 43 of Haunt Me

“Shut up,” she whispers and kisses me before I can argue. It’s warm and slow, like we have all the time in the world instead of the ones we actually had.

My eyes open and the room returns. For a moment, I don’t breathe.

Black vanilla.

The scent is faint, barely there beneath the stale air and spilled whiskey, but I know it as surely as I know the sound of her laugh. It drifts through the room and wraps around me before I can decide whether it’s real.

Every part of me goes still.

“Raven?”

The name comes out quietly as though speaking louder might frighten her away.

Nothing answers.

I turn toward the bathroom. The door’s open, the lights off, and the white shower curtain is hanging motionless inside. There’s nowhere for anyone to hide. Nowhere for her to be.

But the scent lingers.

I push myself upright too fast, and the room tilts hard enough that I have to grab the edge of the nightstand to steady myself. The empty bottle rolls away from my hand and hits the floor.

“Raven?” I call, louder this time.

I cross the room, one hand sliding along the wall to keep myself upright. Even though I know she can’t possibly be there, I pull the shower curtain aside, then stare at the cracked tile, the folded towels, and the tiny bar of soap still wrapped beside the sink.

I catch my reflection in the mirror and stop.

Bloodshot eyes.

Hair sticking up on one side.

Skin gone pale beneath the uneven growth along my jaw.

I look like someone Raven would’ve crossed the street to avoid.

The thought hits me so hard I grip the sink.

“No.”

I don’t know whether I’m answering the thought or the empty room.

The scent is gone now.

I close my eyes and breathe through my nose, searching for it, but all I find is the sour remains of last night still clinging to my clothes.

A laugh escapes me. "Jesus." I grip the edge of the sink until my knuckles ache. "Get it together. Now you’re talking to a ghost.” I look back at my reflection again. “That’s not a good sign.”

For weeks, I’ve been waiting for something to break. I thought it’d be the drinking. My body giving out in a motel bathroom or behind the wheel somewhere no one would know to look for me. I pictured Knox showing up and dragging me home while I fought him every step of the way.

I didn’t think it would be this. Standing alone in a bathroom, smelling a dead woman’s shampoo and calling her name like she might answer.

My knees hit the edge of the tub when I sit down. I press both palms against my eyes until bursts of light appear behind them, but all that does is make her face return.

Raven laughing in the kitchen.

Raven asleep against my chest.

Raven sitting beside the Christmas tree with a blanket over her legs, trying to hide how tired she was.