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“So I know this is probably like, super insensitive, but - why don’t you act like Flower? Since you…you know…”
Sam had asked him that once, the question trailing off while she made vague hand gestures instead. He’d still known what she’d meant. Why aren’t you high all the time? Trevor had just shrugged, given a glib response about how Flower had gotten the fun drugs and he hadn’t, how they’d been out of his system by the time he’d kicked the bucket.
Neither of those answers had been true. The drugs had been fun, right up until they killed him. And they weren’t out of his system, not entirely.
What is true is this: he wishes he could be like Flower.
She gets to see rainbows and butterflies and kittens. She doesn’t even remember how she died half the time. Trevor has to admit it makes him jealous. He doesn’t get any of that. The effects of the drugs only show up when he relives his death, broken jagged lights and distorted sounds and ice water creeping slowly into his veins. The terror of it - the realization that something was deeply, deeply wrong - still hasn’t faded, even two decades out.
The others don’t know about it. They don’t need to. It doesn’t happen that often, anyway. Once or twice a year, maybe. Usually around his Death Day.
Or right now.
It’s a beautiful summer afternoon and Trevor is panicking. It’d come out of nowhere. He’d been in the kitchen with Isaac and Thor, watching Sam work on her computer, cracking stupid jokes like always. Then the shaking had started, tremors spreading slowly through his body. Hands first. Then legs.
Then his chest, constricting. Lungs caught in an iron vice. Throat tight. The ghost of the heart he no longer has beating frantically. He needs to get out of here. He can’t let the others see, can’t ruin his suave image.
He slips away, mumbling an incoherent excuse. He’s not sure if the others even notice. Trevor makes his unsteady way to the staircase, takes the steps as fast as he can. It’s not that fast in the grand scheme of things. He wishes he could hold onto the railing, have some semblance of security. The house is starting to pitch and yaw around him, the floor running away from his feet. He stumbles down the hallway, hand automatically going to the wall in an attempt to steady himself. It phases right through it. He keeps going, not even entirely sure where his final destination is. He just needs to get away , like he can somehow outrun the memory of his death.
The room he winds up in is small, tucked away in the far reaches of the manor. None of the ghosts ever come this way. There’s nothing exciting over here. Peeling, stained wallpaper, a boarded up window, curtains chewed to pieces by moths. There’s a narrow bed stuffed in one corner. He staggers over to it and falls back on it heavily, surrounded by the smell of musty sheets. Trevor takes a deep breath and then another and another and another, growing quicker and shallower and desperate as he struggles for air, choking and gasping and trying to remind himself that he doesn’t need to breath he’s a ghost just stop it just calm down-
It’d been like this when he died too. Everyone had just watched, Ari and David and that other guy whose name he can’t even remember now. Trevor thinks he’d been holding something. A bottle, maybe, slipping from his numb fingers and shattering on the ground, tiny splinters of glass exploding outwards in slow motion before his body had followed suit, crumpling without ceremony.
He thinks he tried to say something too. Help. This isn’t supposed to be happening. It hurts. His voice had stopped working. Maybe he’d only thought it.
Trevor tries to tell himself that the feeling of his heart imploding isn’t real. It’s a phantom pain. Just a memory. But it still hurts just as bad as it did twenty years ago, sharp burning wrong. The panic is still just as fresh.
He lies there and dies and dies again and again.
This is why he wishes he was like Flower. So he wouldn’t have to remember.
The door to the room opens. The creak of wood echoes in his brain. Trevor turns his head to look at it. His vision’s hazy, black around the edges. The figure that enters is distorted, an indecipherable smear of color. It slowly coalesces into a familiar form. Trevor can’t help the little irritated huff that escapes him when he realizes it’s Jay. If he’s going to have his quality alone time (that he’s currently using for a panic attack) interrupted by a Living, it should at least be Sam.
But then again, he really doesn’t want Sam to see him like this.
He sits up slowly, watching Jay. He’s looking at his phone, carrying a toolbox in his other hand. He sets it down in the center of the floor and folds his arms, surveying the room with a thoughtful expression.
“What are you doing?” Trevor asks just for the sake of asking, intrigued despite himself. Curiosity might’ve killed this cat, but he doesn’t have much else to do in the afterlife except be nosy.
“I’m stripping the wallpaper in this room,” Jay announces, the reply catching Trevor off guard. Wait, did he actually hear him?
“Just, um, narrating my actions in case there’s any ghosts in here.” He follows it up with a sheepish shrug. “I can never tell with you guys.”
Well. That answers that question. Trevor can’t quite place his finger on why he feels so disappointed. It’s not like he particularly wants to be able to talk to Jay. He thinks. Maybe it could be nice.
“Sam says you guys don’t usually hang out in this part of the house so I’m probably just talking to an empty room, but just in case, you know? That way you can feel included.”
Dumb. But also sort of endearing.
Jay wanders over to the wall by the bed, running a palm across its surface. He’s standing close enough that Trevor could reach out and touch him if he wasn’t a ghost. He keeps talking to himself, moving along the wall. “The B&B’s been really kicking off lately, so we finally have enough money to tackle these last few rooms. I mean, still not enough to hire someone, but I watched a bunch of YouTube videos this morning so I’m pretty much an expert at this point.”
“Right,” Trevor says, dubious. He’s seen too many of Jay’s home improvement attempts backfire to put much stock in that statement. He should probably leave now, before things get out of hand.
He stands up and the room tilts on its axis, the door shrinking away into the distance. Trevor immediately sits back down again. He’s lightheaded. The ghost of the drugs that killed him are still in his system, phantom side effects working overtime. He’ll just wait it out. They have to wear off eventually.
Focus on Jay. He’s real, living. Grounding. Something to keep him from slipping back into the past.
Jay stops by the door and tugs at a strip of paper that’s starting to peel off the wall, exposing the layer below it. “Aw, man, are you kidding me? There’s more of this stuff?” He scratches at the revealed section, tearing off a small piece and frowning at the wall.
“Yeah, bro, that’s kind of a thing with old houses.”
“God, it’s going to take forever to get rid of all of this. It’s like a nesting doll of ugliness.” Jay runs a hand through his hair, sighing loudly.
It’s almost like they’re bantering back and forth. Trevor can’t help a small smile at the absurdity of it. Jay has no idea he’s even here.
He looks at the wall and the smile drops. The section of paper two layers deep is the same pattern as every other room in this house. Same as in the parlor the night he died. The room they’re currently in must have been redone at some point, the old wallpaper covered up, but now it’s here again, exposed to the dusty air for the first time in who knows how long. It feels like an eye in a way, peering out through the hole Jay made. Trevor finds he can’t move, pinned beneath the weight of its gaze. He’s nauseous suddenly, stomach roiling.
He’s going to be sick he’s lying on his back and he’s staring at it at the wallpaper and the colors are wrong and the patterns are melting off dripping onto the floor running towards him he’s going to throw up and choke on his own vomit if the pain in his chest doesn’t get to him first his heart is going too fast it hurts it’s going too fast it hurts-
“Mix water with vinegar to help remove old wallpaper,” Jay says suddenly. He’s looking at his phone, brows furrowed. Trevor latches on to the sound of his voice like a lifeline, dragging himself out the memory. Keep talking. Distract me. His pantomime heart is still racing, the ebb and flow of blood a deafening roar in his ears.
“None of the tutorials mentioned that ,” Jay grouses, looking up from his phone. The two of them make unwitting eye contact. “Okay, I’m going to run down to the kitchen and grab some stuff, so be right back.”
“Wait!” Trevor blurts it out on instinct, belatedly realizing Jay can’t hear him. God, this would be so much easier if Sam was here. The thought of being alone again - being abandoned - threatens to send him into a tailspin, panic eddying in the corners of his mind. He tries to tell himself that it’s just for five minutes, that it doesn’t matter, that it’s the drugs making him irrational, but his throat closes up all the same.
He needs Jay here.
Trevor scans the room, searching for something he can interact with to get the Living’s attention. There’s nothing. The toolbox is too heavy for him to even begin to think about tipping over.
Jay’s leaving God think of something-
Wait. Wait. He still has his phone out.
That’ll work.
He catches up to him in the doorway, peering over his shoulder at the phone. The screen’s still on, which makes this easier. Trevor knows Jay’s passcode (he uses the same one for everything, despite Sam constantly telling him to change it) but he doesn’t have the time or energy to push multiple things right now. It takes a few tries for him to actually make contact, his finger phasing uselessly through the screen. Trevor grimaces, concentrating. He finally manages it, pulling up the menu and turning on the flashlight.
Jay jumps, nearly dropping the phone. He fumbles for it, looking around wildly. “Holy - hold on. Is this one of you guys or just my phone glitching out?”
“What kind of - it’s obviously ghosts,” Trevor mutters under his breath. He turns the flashlight off.
“Okay, yeah, that’s probably ghosts,” Jay admits, looking at his phone. “I’m kinda busy right now, Trevor, ‘cuz I’m assuming that’s you, so go talk to Sam if you need something.”
Trevor grits his teeth, frustrated. This isn’t working. He jabs at the text icon once, twice. It opens on the third try, going to a text from Sam asking if celadon or amaranth is a better paint color for one of the rooms. Trevor doesn’t think either of those are real, but he disregards it, hitting a letter and accidentally sending the message early.
“C,” Jay reads back. “A little cryptic there, Trev.”
God, it’s going to take forever to type all this out. He’s going to try swiping instead. He’s figured out by now that touchscreens are a little finicky about that due to his whole lack of body heat thing, but maybe…
Can you stay
Please
He clears the message and then looks at Jay, waiting for an answer. Trevor knows he’s not exactly the Living’s favorite ghost. For good reason, he has to admit, but still…Jay doesn’t hate him, right? The thought of it makes him almost as sick as the drugs did, nausea churning in his stomach and bile creeping up his throat. He swallows it down, wondering how and when he got so attached to this man. Sam makes sense - he can actually interact with her, and she’s smoking hot. But Jay?
“Is everything okay? Is there like, a ghost issue I should go get Sam for?”
Trevor shakes his head, remembers Jay can’t see him, and presses the thumbs down emoji.
“Feels like I’m playing the world’s worst game of charades,” Jay says under his breath. He clears his throat. “What’s the issue then? Why do you want me to stay?”
Don’t want to be alone , Trevor types.
Jay squints at his phone for a few seconds, slow realization dawning on his face. “Are you doing okay?”
He doesn’t know how to put it into words, how to explain that he’s been reliving his death on loop and Jay being here, warm and solid and alive , is the only thing keeping him from getting lost in it completely, so he just presses the thumbs down again.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to get Sam?”
Thumbs down.
“Okay, uh…” Jay looks like he’s floundering. “What do you want me to do?”
Just talk
“Talk. Right, okay. I can do that. Uh.” He pauses for a moment. “Do you want to hear about the new D&D campaign I’m planning?”
Normally Trevor would’ve been out of the room before he even had a chance to finish that sentence, but right now, that sounds pretty damn good.
Ok
Jay lights up. “No kidding? Awesome! Okay, you might want to sit down because it’s like, super cool and intense, real knock ‘em dead sort of thing-“ he cuts himself off with a grimace. “That was a very poor choice of words, sorry.”
“You think,” Trevor deadpans back. He goes and sits down on the bed anyway. It shifts slightly as Jay settles down next to him, the wood of the frame letting out a distressed groan. He wishes for a moment that he was alive or maybe that Jay was dead so they could touch each other, because he could really do with a hug right now.
“So I’m thinking this,” Jay starts, launching into a complicated, long-winded spiel accompanied by animated gestures. Trevor tunes out a few minutes in, not following any of it. Jay’s voice fades into the background, soothing white noise. Cicada hum on a hot summer night, rain pelting against a pane of glass.
The ghost of his racing heart finally slows and stops. It’s not the sudden, sharp pain he’s felt a dozen times over in the last hour, just a gentle fade. He takes a deep breath, the vice around his ribcage loosening. It’s over.
“I’m probably going to have to alter some of the gameplay elements to-“
“There you guys are!” Sam pokes her head into the room, interrupting Jay. “ I’ve been looking all over. Are you okay, Trevor? Thor said you weren’t looking so hot earlier. I mean, not in so many words, but you know what I mean.”
“Hey, I’m always hot.” He gives her an easy grin and a wink. Sam scrunches her nose up. “I’m fine. Just hanging out with Jay.”
“Really?” She sounds surprised. “What were you two talking about?”
“I was running my new campaign idea past him,” Jay answers, trying to point at Trevor and getting the complete wrong direction. “Oh, hey! Since you’re here, can you let me know what he thinks?”
Sam looks at Trevor and he shrugs in response.. “Got to be honest, I wasn’t paying attention.”
“He said it sounds great, babe. I’m just going to talk to him out here in the hallway for a sec, okay?” She beckons him over as she speaks.
Trevor hesitates briefly, then complies, meeting her outside the room. “What?”
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Trevor, I’m not really buying that you of all people willingly listened to one of Jay’s D&D rants, so something’s up.”
He sighs, bringing his hands to his face. "Okay, okay, I'll tell you, but you can't let anyone else know, all right? It's embarrassing."
Sam looks at him for a long moment, head tipped slightly to the side. "Okay," she says, finally.
"I just- sometimes I get stuck reliving my death, alright? So I left because I didn't want anyone to know." He watches Sam's expression soften, turning pitying. Normally he'd be all over having a pretty lady fawn over him, but not right now. "But then Jay showed up and I realized I didn't actually want to be alone after all, because..." he trails off, suddenly unable to finish.
"Because?" Sam prompts, gently.
He looks away, focusing on a crack on the wall. Spiderweb fissures creep towards the ceiling. "The people I thought were my friends left me to die and threw my body in a lake, Sam. They abandoned me. I couldn't go through that. Not again."
Being this vulnerable hurts. He'd been on top of the world before he'd died, before he'd had the rug yanked out from under him and gotten stuck haunting this place as a ghost. Just an impression of his former self. If he'd still been alive he could've just run away from this mess, distract himself with drinks and parties and hot chicks, but when you're dead there's not much else to do except talk.
“Aw, Trevor.” She sounds sad. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize - you know you can always come to me if it happens again, right? Or Jay. We’re not going to leave you.”
“I know,” he says, and he means it. “Thank you.”
“Any time.” Sam gives him a little smile. “You’re family. Of course we’re going to do our best to help you get through stuff.”
Trevor tries to pretend like that hadn’t just gotten him choked up. “Thanks,” he repeats, not sure what else to say. He clears his throat. “Hey, tell Jay that too, would you? And also tell him to go run that nerd game past Pete, because he can give him way better feedback than I can.”
Sam snorts back a laugh. “I’ll pass it on.” She pauses, studying him. “Are you doing alright now?”
“Yeah.” He nods. He’s feeling mostly back to his usual self - witty, charming, in control. Trevor tucks the small fragile part of him that falls apart back away. Out of sight, out of mind. But knowing he has people he can turn to now makes him feel more - he doesn’t know. Stable, he supposes. Secure. It’s nice.
“Okay, great.” She smiles at him again, wider this time. “Oh, also, before I forget again - we have a guest arriving in a few hours, so make sure to behave, okay?”
“When am I not on my best behavior?” Trevor protests, pressing a palm to his chest in mock offense. Same just gives him a look and he relents, raising his hands. “Okay, okay, guilty as charged. Jay did me a favor so I’ll do him one back and stay out of your hair.”
“I appreciate that, Trevor.”
“Any time.” He repeats her earlier words with a grin and then wanders off, trying to think of something to entertain himself with that still counts as behaving.