"Paige Samuels, Paige Samuels..." James mumbles, reading the results. "I don't think this is you. Do you have Facebook?" he asks.
"What's Facebook?" I ask back and he just mumbles some gibberish.
"LinkedIn?" I just stare at him with blank eyes and he chuckles. "Thought so. Twitter?"
"Is that like a virtual pet? Like Tamagotchi?" I ask and he laughs louder this time.
"No, it's a social network. But I think you... passed away... before all these were created so it clearly isn't you. Why do you have such common name, Paige? You're not making this easy."
"What? Would you prefer if I were named Petronila Leopolda Eustanaquia de las Mercedes?" Now it's James watching me with a blank expression. He doesn't even know how to react to my suggestion. "Mum watches Latin-American soap operas," I explain and this time he laughs out loud, almost losing it and I just smile sheepishly.
"I don't think that name suits you, but oh well, we need to keep doing this," he remembers and types again, this time adding my middle name but the results are basically the same. Other people's social accounts, even if I have no clue what these are and how they work. Furthermore, these are all recent results, people that are still alive.
"What if you add like the year I died?" I suggest and he tries that but the results aren't much different.
James tries other words, like 'Paige Samuel's death', or 'Paige Samuels bullying' and even 'Paige Samuels Strode College' but nothing shows up.
"In films it always looks so easy. They type what they are curious about and the first result is exactly what they need. What a scam," I pout, folding arms and everything because we've been more than twenty minutes at this with no results whatsoever. I have seen, however, many other girls with my name, and they all look so happy and young. Some others have lives and families and jobs, and here I am, a ghost. "Google isn't magic."
"I think we need something more specific to find an article that might or might not exist. I'm not sure if an article written fifteen years ago will be online, specially if it was covered by a local newspaper."
"I feel cheated. I will not believe what I see in films anymore," I continue and James chuckles again. I try to think how we can narrow down our research considering my name won't give us anything. And then I remember something. "I died at seventeen. I was still a minor, which means an article can't even use my name, right? They have to use my initials."
"Well, that certainly narrows it down, Paige," James says with a derisive tone and my head snaps to glare at him.
"Are you being sarcastic, James Black?" I ask, my voice dangerously dark and his expression changes completely to a more concerned, even embarrassed one, I daresay.
"No?" I can't help it, I laugh at his hesitant and careful tone, and for a moment I feel this urge just to bump shoulders with him, let him know I was just teasing him somehow, but I stop myself before I can make contact. "Anyways, if that's the case then we won't find anything using your name. Maybe focusing on college instead of you. Maybe we can't find exactly an article about your accident but another more recent that will connect with your case."
"Can you actually find that?" I ask because he's said many times his searching skills are very lacking.
"I can try," he replies with a shrug and I sigh.
And there he goes again, trying to find anything that can tell us what exactly happened to me. The best way would be to ask someone who was alive back then, like Mum or maybe the principal, if he's the one still in charge. But I'm too scared what might happen to Mum if someone suddenly came asking about me. So we have to try this, even if it's more futile than all the other things we've tried before.
James tries with different things like 'murder in Strode College', 'bullying in Strode College', 'accident gone wrong' and so many other options, but we can't get to anything concrete. He even adds my initials at some point but still we can't come up with one result that helps. All we ever find is an article from five years ago that mentions the new policies anti-bullying in Strode College and a faint mention that's always been a problem but they have always taken action regarding that. I would like to differ, but then I don't know what happened after my death. Maybe things changed or maybe they just covered it up...
Oh.
"What if they covered it up, James? If it was an accident or anything else, it happened in college and if it happened there then it would actually affect them negatively. It wouldn't be the first time something like this is covered up," I suggest and James freezes, his fingers hovering the keyboard and I just wait for a response.
"You think they could be that low as to hide something like this?" he asks, not meeting my eyes, his are still fixed on the large screen.
"I dunno. Possibly?"
James' hands fall on the keyboard, smashing it and his shoulders slouch, showing his defeated posture and I feel so bad for causing all this to him. I'm also impressed he's that invested in this. He decided to help me today and we've done a lot, but just now I notice how into this he is. What happened during that week I was out? What went through his mind to make him care so much?
"Or maybe we just suck at online research," I suggest, trying to lessen the burden he's feeling but he shakes his head.
"No, by now we should've found something already. So either it's not an article online or they covered it up. We could go and ask for the records of your death, but I'm not a relative and they wouldn't let me see them."
"Don't you have a hacker friend? Aren't those like super good at finding things in less than thirty seconds?" I ask next and he laughs humourlessly.
"Do I look like the kind to have friends, Paige?" he asks back but I can't answer that. For me it's obvious, he could have all the friends he wanted, but he refuses to even acknowledge his classmates. "The closest things I've had to friends are ghosts. And in my whole life you're the only one I haven't felt scared or angry at, I would even dare say you're my first friend."
I feel a lump in my throat when I hear him, and when he gives me a smile I get my breath caught in my throat and I don't even know what to say.
A friend. That's something I never had before, something that looked so foreign to me and almost like a dream upon a star. And here is James, telling me I'm his first friend and I can't remember when I've felt this happy. I have to press my lips together so I don't burst out giggling, but that's not even enough, I have to press my hands to my mouth but I guess my eyes are giggling already because James chuckles.
I guess I'm too drunk in this newfound happiness because I don't react when I see James moving his hands away from the keyboard and to my face until he grabs one of my hands in his. And because he doesn't show pain or struggle, I don't realise what he's doing after several seconds have passed.
"James!" I snap, trying to pull my hands away but he doesn't let me.
"No, focus on that feeling. That happiness!" he cries out, showing the first sign of pain. But instead of doing what he's told me to, I only get concern and I struggle to let go of him, to cease the pain I'm causing him and that only seems to make it worse. "Paige! Relax. Just focus on the happiness you were feeling."
His hands hold mine tighter and I get frantic, so scared for him but I try to obey and do what he's asked me for. I close my eyes and focus on the happiness I was feeling, the fact I'm someone's friend and I finally have a friend, but it doesn't work. I can't. I can only think of James, suffering.
"Ugh," he sighs, finally releasing my hands and I even stand up, taking a few steps back and putting distance between us.
"Why did you do that?" I demand, slightly shaking because I'm just so concerned.
"You were so happy, you looked so damn happy that I thought maybe it wouldn't hurt," he explains, taking deep breaths and then looking up to meet my eyes. "And I was right. At first, you were so happy and that overpowered all the other negative feelings and it didn't hurt, Paige. When I touched you, it didn't hurt... until you realised what I was doing and lost focus."
I don't know how to react and what to say. My mind is still processing the information and this new discovery.
I didn't hurt him-at first-because I felt happy. That means I don't always bring pain and sorrow with me. I just transmit what I'm feeling, but more powerfully. So if I'm in pain, I share pain, but if I'm happy, I share happiness?
I want to touch James again, I even take a step forward but then stop myself. I'm still scared and concerned I might hurt him this time. The happiness I was feeling before was overwhelming, I wasn't thinking of anything else, and that's why I could transmit that. That feeling was stronger than any other before, but now it isn't. Even if I think of what he told me, I can't feel equally happy. And if I don't feel like I did at that moment, then I might hurt him now.
"You see? It's not always bad, we've learnt something new again. We just need to give you more positive feelings," he says and the first smile after what happens comes to my lips, a bubbly feeling being born in my guts.
"You think that once I solve my unfinished business I won't have so much sorrow inside me?" I ask as if he knew everything about being a ghost and crossing over.
"Maybe. That would make sense. And it'd be a good way to know if you actually finished that and can cross over," he comments. "But do you realise what this really means, though?" I look at him, confused. "It means that you can touch people without hurting them. There is a way for... us... to touch without hurting the other."
I stare at him, trying to calm my heart and everything that is twirling and spinning in my chest. I can't even take a breath, I just look at him, feeling something I can't even describe, something I've never experienced before. It's not exactly what he says but the way he looks at me that carries so many meanings I can't pick up. His words are just a few but what's between the lines is so much more and I can't read all that.
He stands up, still locking eyes with me and takes a step forward, closing the distance between us, and without even allowing me to blink, he takes my hands again, lacing our fingers together.
For a second my eyes dart to our hands. "Paige!" he calls, making me meet his blue eyes again, these are so intense that my breath gets caught in my throat.
I see a bit of struggle in his eyes, but not enough to make me panic. He's also smiling and seeing him like that makes me smile back, feeling even happier because I'm not bringing misery to him right now. Even if there's a bit of pain, it's bearable. It is working and the result of this experiment is making me deliriously happy, and I think James is also feeling that because his smile widens and even a small chuckle escapes his lips.
"The happier you feel, the less painful it is," he tells me before releasing one of my hands just to cup my cheek ever so softly. I see him flinching a bit, but not enough to make him stop or make me react. "It's possible, you see?"
I nod. That's all I can do, because he is touching me. This... it's been so long since someone touched me like this, with care and almost love. Only my family touched me like this before, and now James. And it's so different now because I don't have a body to actually feel, it's not on my skin and nerve ends, but I feel it. All over me. I feel his hands as if they were touching my very soul, and I think that's exactly what he's doing.
I close my eyes and lean into his hand, feeling like my whole body is tingling and I sigh in delight, feeling calm and happy at the same time, blessed and accepted.
We didn't learn how I died, but we found out something even more powerful and important: my touch isn't always pain.
~·~
I don't know about you but this chapter gave me so many feels when I was writing it. I just wanted them to kiss sjhgahssafs What do you guys think about it? And you see? You can't discover the world with just a name on Google. Try it if you don't believe me.
Dedication to smileybooklover
Bel, xx
NU: Monday