Come Back To Me

Chapter 11

I stand in front of my window, letting the cool night air flow past me and into my room, when suddenly the wind picks up, and the air blowing past me turns icy. I don’t even need to turn around to know that he’s here. I close my window slowly, but don’t turn around. I can feel him standing right behind me.

“Hi Reid,” I whisper to him.

“Hi Hadley,” he whispers back, and he puts his hands gently on my shoulders and turns me around to face him.

I look up into his eyes, and he stares back down into mine with longing.

“So, you were expecting me this time, does that mean you believe me now?” he asks me quietly.

“Yes, I believe you Reid. I did a little research today that helped me understand this a little better.”

“Research? And what did you find out?”

“I found out what you are,” I say nervously.

Reid c***s an eyebrow at me, a small smirk forming on his lips.

“What I am?” he asks dubiously, and I nod.

“You’re an intelligent spirit.”

Reid just stares at me with a blank look on his face for a moment, before shaking his head.

“Man, this is a weird,” he says as he pulls me over towards my bed, gesturing for me to sit down.

We both sit on my bed and lean against my headboard before we continue this bizarre conversation that neither of us ever thought we would or could have.

“An intelligent spirit?” he asks me after a minute of silence, “so what is that?”

“It’s a ghost that has died tragically and unexpectedly.”

My words catch in my throat as I feel a lump form.

“Do you really want to know Reid?”

Reid nods solemnly so I continue, trying hard to not start crying.

“Your spirit may be trapped between two planes of existence, and you can’t figure out how to move on, or you do not want to because you have strong emotional ties to this world.”

Tears start to escape anyway, but I still finish.

“The books I read said that your type of spirits are aware of the livings presence, and may be able to communicate with them in some way, but can usually only be active during the night.”

I look over at Reid who just nods along, absorbing this information.

“Yup, sounds about right I guess,” he agrees, but I can tell he’s uncomfortable.

I can feel it in the air around him, in the coolness that starts to radiate off of him. I reach for his hand, and it’s ice cold. He looks over at me, and wipes my tears away with his free hand, and then he pulls me into him, hugging me tightly.

“This is so messed up,” he groans.

“That’s not all,” I whisper into his chest.

“What else is there?”

“I um…I went and seen your car today,” I admit, and Reid pulls away from me to look at my face.

“You did what? Why Hadley?”

He sounds almost angry.

“I have no idea.”

A new wave of tears start to stream down my face, so Reid pulls me back into him, rocking me gently.

“It was so horrible Reid, it was the most horrifying thing I’ve ever seen. What happened? All I know is what the cops suspect happened, but I don’t know for sure, and it’s something that has been really eating away at me,” I sob.

“It’s pretty hazy for me Hadley, even what I do remember, I don’t think you want to know all that stuff,” he murmurs into my hair.

His breath feels cold on the top of my head. He doesn’t like this line of questioning, but neither do I. However, I feel like I still need to know.

“Please tell me,” I plead.

Reid sighs heavily, and he grows increasingly colder, and it makes me shiver, but I don’t move away from him.

“It all happened pretty fast…” he finally speaks, “one minute, I was driving home, talking to you, and the next thing I know, I look up, and it was too late, and that’s where it get’s fuzzy. It was like I was just yanked out of my body and into blackness…”

Reid pauses and I hear him suck in a rough breath.

“The next thing I knew, I was outside your window. I realized something was wrong when I tried to talk to you, and you didn’t respond. I yelled, I screamed, I tried to touch you, trying to let you know I was there, but nothing. All I could do was just sit there and watch you cry, then I decided to lie down next to you, and you calmed right down and went to sleep. That’s when I realized I could keep trying, until finally, you saw me.”

A fresh wave of sobs wrack my body as my fear is realized, that I am the reason Reid is dead.

“It’s all my fault,” I cry into his chest.

“What do you mean, your fault, of course it’s not.”

He puts a finger under my chin and raises my face to look at him, his eyes are that same dark shade of green they were last night.

“Of course it is, I was texting you, and that caused you to crash. If I had just waited until you got home, you’d still be here.”

I sit up abruptly, pulling out of Reid’s arms, feeling undeserving of his touch.

“Hadley, don’t you dare blame yourself for this. It was an accident, I should have known better, I should have been paying attention, and I wasn’t. This is on me, not you. How could you have known I was driving unless I told you,” he raises his voice, imploring me to understand him.

I just shake my head stubbornly and throw myself down onto my bed away from Reid, crying loudly. I feel him place his hand on my back and he strokes it gently, trying to comfort me. I shiver again from the coolness of his touch, and he pulls his hand away.

“Hadley, you trust me right?” Reid whispers after my crying dissipates a little.

“Yes, of course I do.”

I turn my red face towards him, and he shifts and moves so that he lays next to me, with his face mere inches away from mine.

“Then when I tell you it’s not your fault, believe it because that’s the truth okay? I can’t stand the thought of you blaming yourself for this, it…for lack of a better word, kills me,” he says seriously.

“That’s a terrible word,” I say quietly, causing him to smile weakly at me.

“Yeah, it is,” he replies as he leans in and plants a small soft kiss on my lips.

“Can we talk about something else?” he asks me after a while as we lie there quietly, just staring into each other’s eyes.

“There’s something I wanted to give you,” I say, sitting up.

Reid furrows his brow in confusion, but doesn’t reply. I get up off the bed, and reach for my purse that sits next to my end table. I open the zipper and find what I’m looking for, pulling out the chrome Chevelle emblem. Reid’s eyes go wide when I hand it to him as I sit back down on the bed next to him.

“This is off my car?” he breathes.

“Yes,” I answer simply, unsure of his reaction.

He looks from the small shiny piece of metal in his hand, and up at me, and then he smiles.

“Thank you Hadley…but I can’t take it,” he says.

“Why? You don’t want it? I mean, I understand if you don’t,” I think maybe it’s too weird, or sad?

“No, no I love it, I really liked my car, so this is a nice reminder of what she was, but unfortunately, I can’t take it with me wherever it is that I go. I can move things around and what not, but I can’t take anything with me,” he explains.

“How do you know? Did you try?” I ask him curiously.

“No, I didn’t try, but I just know, that’s just how it works. But I really do appreciate this Hadley. Maybe you can just hold on to it for me, and I can just see it when I visit okay?”

He smiles kindly at me, so I smile back and nod.

“I love you Hadley.”

Reid runs a finger down my cheek, running his thumb along my bottom lip.

“I love you too Reid. I’ll love you forever, no matter what.”

I kiss the pad of his thumb that rests on my lip.

“Not even death will keep us apart,” he whispers, and he leans in to kiss me softly.

I notice that his skin has started to warm up again.

“Lay down with me,” he murmurs, so we lie back on the bed, and he pulls me into him, hugging me from behind.

“Reid?” I ask him before I feel myself start to drift off.

“Hmm?” he hums.

“Wake me up before you leave?”

“Okay, I will.”

“Promise?” I turn in his arms to face him, tucking my face into his chest, inhaling deeply.

“Promise.”

I feel him kiss the top of my head, and soon I fall asleep tucked into Reid’s strong, warm arms.

“Hadley, wake up.”

I hear Reid’s voice coaxing me awake. I groggily open my eyes, and am greeted to the still darkness, and Reid hovering over me.

“Hadley, I have to go soon,” he whispers.

I reach up and find his face with my fingers, and pull him down to kiss me.

“What time is it? You have to go already?” I murmur into his mouth.

“Soon, it’s just after five in the morning.”

“I don’t want you to go yet,” I complain, holding him close.

“I don’t want to go yet either, but let’s make the most out of the time we have left,” he murmurs, reaching for the hem of my shirt, pulling it slowly over my head.

“You can do that?” I breathe.

“I don’t know, lets find out,” Reid says before pulling off his t-shirt.

Reid quickly disposes of the rest of our clothes, kissing every inch of my skin as he goes. His skin is wonderfully warm and comforting on mine, not ice cold the way it is when he’s upset, and I’m happy that he is happy right this moment. I’m so happy in his arms right now, however fleeting these moments may be.

Reid’s body moves on top of mine, slowly and leisurely as he takes his sweet time making love to me, and I am in pure ecstasy. That is until something strange begins to happen. Reid begins to fade. One minute, I can feel him, flesh and bone, then I realize wherever he’s touching me, it tingles like a million little pins and needles all over, like my whole body has fallen asleep.

“Reid, what’s happening?” I ask feeling panicked.

Trying to hold onto him, but it’s a futile attempt as I feel him slipping away.

“I’ll be back again Hadley, I love you,” Reid whispers just before he becomes air, and I hold onto nothingness.

Like on cue, I see the early faint light of sunrise start streaming through my window. I reach down, and pull my blanket up and over my naked body, feeling bereft of Reid’s touch. At least he said goodbye this time, however bittersweet it was. Watching Reid fade in front of me was surreal. Feeling his skin disappear from underneath my fingers, the weird tingling sensation that accompanied the transition. Will I ever get used to this reality, this new way of having Reid? I don’t think so, because I will always know the dark truth behind it, that Reid is here in some form of energy being, but his true self is buried in that graveyard.

After catching a few more hours of sleep, I decide that I should call Julia. I haven’t spoken to her at all since before the accident. I’m sure she’s worried sick and I feel really bad that I haven’t called her yet. I grab my cell phone and scroll through my contacts and find her number. I quickly tap out a message to her.

*Hey Julia, how are you?

Within seconds, my phone buzzes.

*Oh my god Hadley, about time you called me. We need to get together and talk!

*Yeah I know. Are you busy today?

*I will be there in thirty minutes. Be ready.

I smile at her bossy message, she must be kind of ticked off that I haven’t called her. I quickly get up out of bed and start to get ready for Julia.

Thirty minutes on the dot and Julia pulls up outside my house. I jog over to her waiting car and hop in. As soon as I close the door and look at her, she leans over the console and wraps her arms around me tightly.

“Hadley, I don’t even know what to say. I’m sorry I haven’t been here,” she says into my hair.

“It’s okay, I understand. You were across the world,” I say as she pulls back, and I see tears in her eyes.

“I tried to call you as soon as I found out though, and you didn’t answer,” she says, sounding a little hurt. I nod solemnly.

“I wasn’t really ready to talk about it yet,” I tell her.

Julia nods her understanding.

“Okay Hadley, let’s go grab some coffee, and find someplace we can talk, if you are ready now?”

“Okay,” I answer, “I think I am.”

After grabbing two coffees at Starbucks, we go to our favorite park and find a picnic table. We take a seat across from each other, and Julia watches me, seemingly wondering where to start.

“So Hadley, I heard that you punched out Taylor.”

A slow smile spreads across Julia’s face. She decides to start with the easy stuff.

“Yup.”

I smile proudly back at her.

“That’s awesome! How did it feel to give that b***h what she finally deserved?”

Julia smacks the table excitedly.

“Man! I wish I could have seen the look on her face. I wish I had gone to that party, but I was still kind of jet legged. If I had known you were going to be there, I would have definitely sucked it up and came.”

“I didn’t think I would go either, it was kind of last minute. Gavin made me go,” I tell her.

“Gavin?”

“Yup, Gavin. Actually, he’s kind of the reason I punched Taylor in the first place. Taylor tried accusing me of moving on to Gavin already. It was the last straw, and I just kind of lost it,” I explain.

“Wow! How dare she say that,” Julia shakes her head in disgust.

“Yeah, I don’t think anybody else at that party thought what she said was very cool either. Nobody even stood up for her when Cole, Gavin and I tore a strip off of her.”

“Good, I’m glad. So how is Gavin doing anyway? How is his whole family?”

“Gavin has been trying to be the strong one, trying to keep it together for the sake of everyone else. It’s been really hard on all of them of course, but I haven’t seen them that much except for Gavin lately,” I tell her as I take a sip of coffee, and I see Julia’s eyes go wide as she stares at my hand.

“What?” I ask, putting down my coffee, and she grabs my left hand.

“What is this?” Julia gasps, running a finger over my ring from Reid.

I look down at my ring, and I feel my throat tighten.

“This is my engagement ring from Reid,” I say as tears form in my eyes.

“Engagement ring? When did he give this to you?” she asks softly.

“He didn’t give it to me,” I whisper, “he asked me to marry him the night before the accident. He picked this up the next day, and it was found on him when he died. The doctor gave it to his parents in the waiting room, and his mom gave it to me after I told them what it was.”

Tears flow steadily down my cheeks now, as well as Julia’s.

“Oh Hadley, I’m so sorry,” her voice cracks, “I can’t even believe this happened. Reid was just so…” she trails off.

“Amazing,” I finish.

“He was definitely special, not your average teenage boy, always so romantic. Trust me Hadley, you were the envy of many girls, including me,” she smiles as she wipes her face with her sleeve.

“I miss him so much Julia. I don’t even know how I’m supposed to go on without him here. He was supposed to be my forever,” I take a deep breath and wipe my face with the back of my hand.

“It’s going to be really hard Hadley, but you’ll figure life out again someday. Reid would want that for you, and he’ll always be with you in spirit,” she says, and I can’t help but smile, if she only knew the truth of that statement.

“Julia, can I ask you something serious, and you have to promise not to laugh okay?” Maybe I can tell her; maybe she won’t think I’m crazy.

“What is it Had?”

“I uh…I think I am seeing Reid,” I whisper nervously.

Julia frowns at me and shakes her head.

“What do you mean, seeing Reid?” she asks carefully.

“Like, he comes to see me at night,” I tell her.

“As in, in your dreams?” she raises her eyebrows.

I decide then that she will not believe me if I tell her any more than that. Even though I believe it now, I still don’t understand it myself, so how could she? How could anyone?

“Yeah, in my dreams,” I answer her, and she takes a deep breath, maybe relieved by my answer.

“Yeah, I could see that happening Hadley. See? Maybe that’s his way of letting you know he’s okay, and letting you know he’ll always be with you.”

“Maybe you’re right,” I nod at her.

Then I decide to tell her something else.

“I went and seen Reid’s car yesterday,” I say, and Julia’s eyes go wide with shock.

“You did what? Hadley, why would you do that?”

“I don’t know,” I shrug, “I didn’t plan on it, but I just kind of ended up there. It was…the worst thing I ever seen.”

I close my eyes, trying to erase the image of Reid’s totaled car.

“Oh man, I couldn’t have done that.”

Julia reaches over and holds my hand. Her hand feels warm and comforting on mine, and I’m glad to be able to talk to her.

“After that, I visited Reid’s grave,” I continue, “and I fell asleep on top of it, until Gavin found me.”

“Oh, that must have been a really weird situation. What did he think when he found you?”

“Actually, that wasn’t the weirdest part. When I woke up, it was dark, and I thought he was Reid, and so I grabbed him and kissed him,” I admit to her, feeling my face go red in embarrassment.

I still can’t believe that happened, poor Gavin.

“Yikes! What did Gavin do?” she asks curiously.

“He took it pretty well at first, he said he understood that I was confused, but then he got all quiet. I think it might have upset him a little. I can’t believe I did that,” I shake my head.

“Understandable mistake Hadley. Like you said, you were sleeping, and like you said, if you’ve been seeing Reid in your dreams, then you must have thought you were still dreaming…and Gavin and Reid look so much alike, if it was dark, then anyone would have been confused. Don’t be too hard on yourself,” she pats my hand.

“So what was it like?” she asks suddenly after a moment of silence.

“What was what like?” I ask her, confused.

“What was it like kissing Gavin?”

“Julia! That’s a terrible question. I didn’t think anything of it once I realized it was Gavin. I though he was Reid, so obviously at first, I thought it was nice, but as soon as I realized it wasn’t him, I was horrified,” I frown at her.

“Who stopped the kiss first?” she prods.

“Gavin did,” I tell her, getting frustrated.

“So the kiss was nice at first, meaning Gavin was kissing back?” she raises an eyebrow.

I don’t know how to answer this question, so what?

“Only for a second, probably just a reflex reaction,” I guess, of course it was.

Julia just nods, considering this, and seems satisfied.

“I think I’d like to kiss him,” she smiles mischievously, “you know, maybe he could find some comfort from me.”

“You like Gavin?” I ask, surprised.

She hasn’t dated anyone since she broke up with Cole before she left for the summer.

“I think I always kind of had a crush on him in high school, but you know, I had Cole, and Gavin had… well girlfriend after endless girlfriend,” she admits, “and now that I’m out of school, maybe he’ll give me a chance.”

Gavin and Julia, I never knew she had a thing for him, but I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, most girls really like the Thorne brothers. I suppose they would make one very attractive couple.

“Maybe I’ll put in a good word for you,” I say to her, and she claps happily.