“We found your grave, Will.”

I stare at Kasey, shocked beyond all comprehension.

“How - what?”

“We found it in the middle of the forest. It was within the boundaries we figured out from looking at that old map in the archives, but all the way on the farthest edge. The town must have shifted a little further away from where it was before, for the church to be built all the way out there.”

“But-” I can’t believe this. I’ve looked for the graveyard many times over and turned up nothing. It staggers my mind to think that Kasey came here three days ago, told me she was going looking for it, and now here she is, back to announce that she found it. Is there anything she can’t do?

“Also, I jumped off a cliff, several times, and when you’re corporeal, I’m totally taking you back so that we can do it together, because it’s the best.”

“I - what?”

“Oh, and Jamie did okay, surprisingly. He didn’t have a full-on camping meltdown, anyways, although I think we came pretty close once or twice.”

“That’s-”

“Your grave, Will. Do you remember what it says?”

“No...”

“There was a poem inscribed on it. It said…” She closes her eyes and recites from memory. “To nicest honour he be consign'd, while virtue rules his generous mind, and friendship crowns his love.”

I sit down slowly on the street before Kasey. Her words have unlocked long-lost memories within me, ones I thought were gone forever.

Yes, of course. How could I ever have forgotten the poem? Kasey leans back on her palms, her legs stretched out on the pavement, crossed at the ankle. We always sit in the middle of the road, let the cars pass straight through us.

“I had Jamie look up the line when we got back,” she continues. “It’s from a poem by someone named Elizabeth Hands. It was published in 1789, and it was called… The Favourite Swain. I thought I knew what a swain is, but I had Jamie double-check, just to be sure. I was right. It means a young lover. A suitor.” Kasey smiles. “So you were someone’s favorite suitor, I have to assume. Or… someone’s lover.” A pause. “Do you remember her name, Will?”

I do, though I’d even forgotten my own.

“Ariana.” I haven’t spoken it in so long. Something in my chest stings, a deep ache from centuries past.

“Do you remember what she was like?”

There are only very few things I remember with any degree of clarity from my life. The final argument with my father, the one that led to the permanent break between us. Slamming the newspaper down on his desk, storming out. My first day on the beat crew, the adrenaline of the first leap. The night of my death, the raging, pitch-black water. And… Ariana.

I’m not sure who left the first flower. It was a frilly, pink little thing, and whichever man had the idea left it directly on her windowsill, the one overlooking the garden. A desperate appeal for her love.

After that came many flowers, many suitors. Every night, her window was piled with flowers, each man hoping she might pick his. There were oversized red ones, ones with greenery still attached, entire bouquets. Every morning they’d have blown away, scattered down the muddy road. She never brought any inside, never even came to the window. Her street was always paved with flowers.

It was no tradition, only something someone had started, a quest for the girl with the stunning sapphire eyes.

I went far into the forest on my search. I walked past all manner of bright and blossoming things, until I found something that stood out. A solitary flower, crisp and white, with the tiniest dusting of gold on its innermost petals. It was a lonesome thing; there were no others growing with it. It had a small face, unlike the extravagant others left at her window, but it spoke to me of her, and I plucked it. Walked it carefully back to town, waited for nightfall.

When the gibbous moon rose, I went to her garden, to her windowsill. A healthy pile of flowers sat there already, and the temptation to sweep them all away struck me. I did not. I only left mine, one little offering, cut by my own hand.

It was a strange thing indeed when, two nights later, I found the flower resting on my pillow. Somehow its brilliance was not diminished, the edges not even beginning to brown. I'd sat down on my bed, holding it, wondering. Surely Ariana would not - sneak into the men’s quarters and leave this here? It would have been scandalous, an outrage if she had been caught. But I could see no other explanation. She was a wild thing, like the flower I brought her. On more than one occasion I’d seen her tearing through town at a full sprint, her skirts billowing around her legs, running off to who knows where.

I walked back to the garden, flower in hand. I found her window open, but she was not there. I could see her bed, and see that she was not in it. I carefully dropped the flower through the window, so that it fell on her pillow as it had been on mine.

Her response came a day after that. I had left my lunch wrapped up by my coat when I went to work; by the time I took a break and returned, the flower was there, tucked neatly up against the buttons.

I waited until we were both on our way out of church, then slipped it back into her coat pocket. No one saw, none but the Virgin Mary always watching from the wall.

A few days later, I had to kick off my shoes in haste, plunge into the river to grab a man who had slipped from a log. The flower was resting on the leather toe of my left workboot when I returned.

I decided that boldness was required. The following Sunday, I followed her out of church, then bent to the ground on the pretense of picking something up.

“Pardon me. Did you drop this?”

She had turned, fixing me in her sapphire stare, and I had offered her the flower. Wordlessly, she held out a gloved hand, and wordlessly did I drop the blossom back into it.

The next morning I reached into the pocket of my trousers, looking for my tobacco, and - there the flower was. Somehow. I could not fathom it.

I waited until nightfall again and returned to the garden, intending to leave the flower on the sill. As I moved to set it down, the window swung open, and there she was. Her hair unpinned and uncurled, spilling down the front of her nightgown. She leaned out of the window, resting her elbows on the sill.

We stared at each other for a moment.

“Why me?” I asked, holding up the white blossom.

“I like the sound of you.”

I’d hesitated, confused. “Mean you not the look of me?”

“That, too.”

“I have precious little to offer. You should choose another.”

“Yet you left this for me.” She took the flower from my hand, her fingers tracing up my palm.

Reckless. Bold. Just the kind of woman that I wanted. She leaned through the window and kissed me, and that was also reckless and bold, and my heart had spoken to me, and said: her. She’s the one.

It was the only kiss I ever stole from Ariana, though I returned to her window many times. I only went back to talk. We spoke of everything, our families and our histories and our plans. I confirmed what my heart had already told me, that I was in love, and she told me that she loved me, too.

I wanted to give her everything, but I had nothing.

I would not ask for her hand until I had something substantial to offer. A better title within the company - walking boss, at the very least. Money with which to buy or build her a home. She could not move into the men’s sleeping quarters, after all. It was the only time I truly regretted forfeiting my inheritance, but I steadfastly refused to go back to my father for help. I was determined to find a way on my own.

Of course, things didn’t quite work out like that.

I needed time to find a way, and Ariana promised to wait. In the meanwhile, I met the needs of my heart by sneaking to her window to speak with her, and by shared, intimate glances across the market. By smiling to myself after taking off my hat to find a white flower sitting on my head. Wondering when she’d had time to hide it in the hat, wondering how I hadn’t noticed when I put it on.

After my death, Ariana mourned, but eventually, she chose another suitor. They had three children, all boys. One died in infancy, another moved away from town, and the third inherited her unusual eyes. When she died - some fifty years after I did - I had waited by her grave for an entire week. Hoping, hoping. But she did not come back.

I stopped watching over her family, after that. It felt wrong, an invasion of privacy, and she was already long gone.

“I remember her,” I tell Kasey. “I…” Still love her, and always will. “Yes, I remember her.”

Kasey has fallen silent, thoughtful.

“I’m guessing that things didn’t work out for you two. All the documents say that you died unmarried. And even if you had been married, you died at twenty-five. That’s tragic no matter how you slice it.”

It’s worse than she thinks, I’m afraid. The last time I saw Ariana…

“I had someone, too,” Kasey continues. “I - let him get away, I guess.”

I didn’t know that. She’s never mentioned it before. I reach for her and melt a little heat into her wrist. She smiles, touches her own fingers to the same spot.

“It’s okay. Don’t feel sorry. Actually… the team and I, we took a chip from your headstone. We’re going to see if it makes the map work, so we can finally give you back your body and your voice. Then maybe we’ll both get to have someone again.” She smiles again, this time a little wider. “Do you know how fucking excited I am to actually meet you?”

The sorrowful memories clear from my mind. I’m back here, with Kasey, on Benton Street, and now that I have something to look forward to in the future, it’s the slightest bit easier not to dwell on the painful past.

“We think we’ll probably need one more thing. One item for each corner of the map. So we took some dirt from your grave, but I’m not sure if that’s going to work, honestly. If not, we’ll need to find some other piece of you. But we’re getting close. I can feel it. I hope you’re excited.”

I am excited, and yet - I’m also afraid. I was fearless in life, but that was before I experienced death. Now I face new possibilities with a degree of measured fear.

The possibility of a mistake has occurred to me. An incorrect summoning that either releases me or - damages me, somehow, if that’s possible.

I’m also afraid to learn more about myself. My body feels entirely the same as it did when I died, at least to me, but I haven’t actually been able to see it. Regardless, I can’t even remember what I looked like. Perhaps when Kasey can see me and speak to me, she won’t care for me so much. She’s never heard a word I’ve said, and she’s never laid eyes on me, so how can I know if I'm what she might want?

Overall, I am simply frightened at the prospect of such a monumental change, after so long of everything being the same.

But I’ll be damned if I’d forfeit such an opportunity over these fears. Some things are worth the risk. Looking at Kasey right now, I have the distinct feeling that after a lifetime of supreme misfortune, the world has finally done me a lucky turn. A second chance with a wild, beautiful spirit, who might just feel about me the way I feel about her.

I will not make the same mistake again. I will not let this one slip through my fingers.

Am I excited?

One tap. For yes.