Goodbye, Evan

22

I've been standing outside the goddam mansion for the past fifteen minutes, trying and failing to muster the guts to knock on the door.

It's actually fucking embarrassing. To think that I ran all the way here, madly following Theo's bus like a guy trying to stop his girl from getting on an airplane in one of those crappy romance movies, only to arrive here five minutes after him and not be brave enough to ask to be let back inside the house. By this point, it would've made no difference if I'd just walked.

Just as I wonder whether or not I'll be sleeping outside tonight, I hear somebody say, "...Evan?"

I turn around, hoping for one irrational second that Theo has appeared behind me despite being inside the house (also, that he suddenly has a feminine voice.) My eyes meet Georgia's instead. It's disappointing, but a massive relief at the same time.

"What are you doing here?" she asks, hefting the shopping bags she's holding further up her arms. "Wait, scratch that: why didn't you say goodbye, you asshole?"

She's surprisingly focused.

"I... had to go," I say. "Immediately. I didn't want to. But I'm back now."

Georgia walks up to me and hands me a few of the shopping bags, smirking. "Good. He's been a grumpy little shit these past few days."

Really focused.

"Oh," I say, because what else can I?

Georgia unlocks the door with her free hand. "Come on, then. Don't just stand there like a twat."

Taking a deep breath, I follow her into the house.

"Theo!" Georgia screams up the stairs, making me jump and nearly drop the shopping. "Get down here!"

"Why?" his voice responds, equally screechy.

"Your boy's here to see you!"

A moment later, a noise akin to thunder echoes through the house. And a bit after that, Theo appears at the bottom of the stairs. His eyes lock onto me and he stops dead, teetering a little.

Georgia, smirking, takes the bags from me and disappears into the kitchen.

Like a zombie, Theo steps off the bottom stair and walks towards me as if in a trance. When he stops, he's stood so close that I have to crane my head to look into his dark eyes.

They're wet.

"I knew you'd come back," he says quietly. Not angrily, or happily, or anything. He just states it.

"I didn't know I would," I say truthfully, almost whispering. "I thought I was stuck."

"At the school?"

"Yes. I was invisible again."

He looks down at his shoes. "Why did you disappear?" he mumbles. His hand seizes his school tie and he begins to twist it in his

fingers. "I blinked and you were just gone."

"It took me away."

He looks up, eyebrows dipping. "It?"

"Whatever's made me a ghost."

"Why did it take you?"

"I don't know."

Theo drops his tie and instead shoves his hands in the pockets of his hoodie. "I kinda want to slap you right now."

I blink. "I'd prefer it if you didn't."