"Say, Yo tengo deiciocho ," I said, and Emery repeated the Spanish sentence.
"What did I say?" he wondered, looking up at me with those wide eyes. One thing I've learned from our little, "sleepover," was that he was cuter than I originally thought. We were acting like teenagers, staying up so late into the night talking about the Harry Potter movies we just watched and waking up to the sun shining. When I walked in the living room the next morning, still in my pajamas, and told him, "Buenas días," he asked me how much Spanish I actually knew. I then told him that my mother was Latin American and somehow it turned into a Spanish-speaking lesson.
"You just said that you are eighteen," I smiled as his eyes lit up, "Now say, Soy muy adorable."
"What does that mean?" he asked, his head tilting to the side like a puppy, and I laughed.
"I'm not telling you," I said crossing my arms. He huffed, digging his phone out of his pocket clumsily. Something else I've learned about Emery: he's stubborn. If he wants answers, he gets them. Something he's learned about me: I won't give answers to him unless he fights for them.
Emery fiddled on his phone for a second, then held it up to my face. He had Google Translate up on the screen.
"Say it again," he commanded, pushing it closer to my face. He was basically leaning over my body now. I narrowed my eyes, wondering how far he would go for an answer.
"No," I said stubbornly, and his nose scrunched up in irritation, he leaned over more, but he wasn't strong enough to hold his torso out long enough. He used his arm to support himself...except his arm ended up bracing using my upper thigh.
He, however, didn't seem to care.
"I want to know what it means," he huffed. I looked at the phone, which was waiting to hear Spanish.
"Okay," I said, smiling, "Tu eres idiota."
~You are an idiot~ repeated Google Translate, but in English.
"No, that's not right," Emery said, not moving an inch, "It sounded different before!"
I looked at him with a face. I don't know what face exactly, but he looked frustrated. We had a stare down, in which I was praying that Emery's hand, using my thigh as support, wouldn't slide down any further north.
I had to do something before that happened.
I sighed, "Tu eres adorable. Yo acabo decir que eres adorable."
~You are adorable. I just said that you are adorable~ Google Translate mimicked.
Emery looked at me with wide eyes and red cheeks.
"I-Is that a good thing?...to be adorable?" he asked, blushing. I couldn't stop smiling at this kid. He seems too innocent and precious to be eighteen.
"Sí," I said, hoping he didn't need Google to translate that word for him, "But like, can you take your hand off of my thigh? I don't want it to end up squashing something else-"
This made Emery's blush immediately deepen and his hand ripped from my thigh as if it had been burned. He looked away as we sat in silence for a moment. We have been pretty good at keeping up the conversation until now, which is amazing considering we're both pretty antisocial.
"S-So," he said, obviously trying his hardest to break the silence, "When is your sister getting here?"
"In a couple of hours. She said she would offer us lunch, " I explained, knowing the conversation would die after that, so I kept going, "How does pizza sound? Knowing my sister, that's bound to be on the menu."
"That sounds great, actually," Emery said, twiddling his thumbs again, "What's she like?"
"Older than me," I said, "And the opposite of me. She's a basic white girl with brown hair and brown eyes, total fangirl, plus ADHD. She's bringing her boyfriend too, who is a true man." God talking about Mike always made me smile. He's a doofus, but he makes my sister happy, which is all I could ask for in my absence. "He's the kind of guy that flexes at the gym, knows every popular video reference, and has memorized every car brand in the universe, yet still doesn't know basic common sense."
"Okay..." Emery trails, "Is he...you know, your type?"
Jesus, he sounded like a jealous boyfriend. I guess my smile made me seem in love or something. Me and Mike? Barf. I could throw up. I don't know how my sister finds happiness in that man.
"Really? God no! According to my ex, my type are 'sweethearts', not numbskulls," I sighed, "And being a sweetheart is really the only common thread. Oh, and I like them small enough to fit into my arms." Emery glanced down at my chest and arms, as if he was imagining himself wrapped in my arms, and blushed. "Other than that, I don't really have a type."
Emery nodded, processing this information. We went back to silence. This is too awkward, but how do we make it un-awkward? It's really hard to think of a topic when you barely know each other. I mentally searched through our conversations, wondering what to ask. I got nothing.
"Can I talk to Severus?" he suddenly asked. Mentally sighing with relief, I got up to fetch a piece of paper and a pen for Severus to use to communicate. I laid the pen and paper on the coffee table in front of Emery and told Severus to do his thing. Suddenly, the pen rose and wrote something on the paper.
God, you guys are cringy to watch, was the first thing he wrote. He was never a person to say 'Hello' before starting conversations. He just started them. And I bet 20 bucks that you were going to make him watch Harry Potter, but I couldn't say the bet out loud...because I physically can't say anything out loud. So...you owe me 20 bucks.
"What the hell are you going to use 20 bucks for?" I asked, "You're dead!" This made Emery giggle a little.
True. My existence is useless, wrote the pen, SO MOVE ON FROM ME.
I rolled my eyes in exasperation, but Emery took what my dead lover wrote seriously.
"Do you think that him being unable to move on is what's grounding you to this realm? Do you think, if Aaron finds another person to be with, that you would return to the afterlife?" Emery questioned, starting his interrogation.
I don't think so, wrote my ex, I CHOSE to haunt him, in order to protect him. Someone killed me. I don't want them attacking Aaron afterward.
"As sweet as that is...y-you were murdered?" Emery continued.
Yeah, gunshot wound. That's how I went out, wrote my ex, Even so, Aaron needs to move on.
"Do you...still love Aaron?" Emery asked slowly, glancing from me back to the paper.
Of course I do, he wrote, I really don't want Aaron to move on. Part of me is against it. But more of me wants Aaron to be happy, and I don't want him moping around, waiting to die so that he can reunite with me. I want him to be with someone that makes him smile.
"That's...so sweet of you..." Emery said, looking at the paper in admiration. He was smiling, looking at my boyfriend's words as if he was looking at Severus's face. I know, he's an amazing person.
You make him smile...he continued to write, You're gay too. And you're his type. If only he can get over me long enough to be with you.
Emery blushed and I looked away, blushing slightly as well. God, Severin. This is an interrogation, not a window of opportunity to set me up with people!
Soon the questions turned kind of boring, consisting of "what's your favorite color?" and "what do you look like?"
It would be funny if Severin, because he died in that Jack Skellington sweater, would still be wearing that sweater that he hated. I mean, I'm sad that he's dead, but that doesn't mean I can't find happiness in teasing him for it.
Soon, we were settled down and having a bunch of conversations with my ghost boyfriend. Thankfully, Severus made no more attempts to hook me and Emery up.
At one point, Emery and Severus were having a one-on-one conversation together, so I took that moment to observe Emery Adams in his element. He seemed more comfortable talking to Severus than to me, which made me wonder why. Maybe he was more used to talking to ghosts than humans? But he acted as if he'd never spoken to one before. Maybe that was it. Maybe he was so excited to meet a ghost that he just couldn't care about awkwardness. Yeah...that was it.
But some part of me screamed that it wasn't.
"Can you touch humans?" Emery asked curiously. Even if he was more comfortable around the ghost, his fingers were twiddling with each other. I guess his hands had nothing else to do.
Yes, Severin wrote quickly.
"Can I feel?" asked the curious boy, referring to his last question. Severus didn't answer, but instead touched Emery on the arm. How do I know? Because all of a sudden, he yelped and almost jumped into my lap.
"Woah! That was freaky!" he said, rubbing his arm. His back was pressed onto the side of my body, and he cowered underneath my arm. Did Severus freak him out on purpose?! I mean, Emery was cute, but he was even cuter in my arms like this.
"Yeah, you get used to it," I replied, not leaning into him and not pushing away. I was completely still.
Emery looked up at me as I spoke, and he just stared at me, blushing. He didn't move, unlike the other times he's been in a situation like this with me. This time, he just sat still staring into my eyes. It was a little uncomfortable, allowing him to stare at me, but I did. After all, I didn't work hard to get these looks for nothing.
But I did wonder sometimes what was going on inside of his head. He seemed like a switch, shy one second and super child-like and hyper the next.
He scooted back over to the other side of the couch, blushing even more after he realized he was staring at me.
Oh boy.
This was going to be a long week.
Comments (4)
See all