Good Spirits

“The unfinished business I have is with you, Harriet York. You better get used to having me around.”

I sniffle. “Haunting me?”

“No.” He smiles. “Loving you.”

“Maybe I was always supposed to find you,” I rasp. Maybe, my heart adds, you were always supposed to be mine.

She doesn’t even know how well she takes care of me. With her easy smiles and careful touches. Her too-soft heart and that smart mouth. She’s made me feel more alive in a handful of weeks than I have in decades. She’s lit up all of my darkest corners.

He looks like a period drama on steroids. My thoughts are nowhere decent, that’s for sure.

I drowned in the ocean once and I think I could just as easily drown in Harriet. Sink down into her and lose myself for days.

You’re the first thing in a hundred years to make me feel anything at all, Harriet York, and I don’t think that’s an accident.

In addition to every person who has ever been even moderately important to me, I’m being ghosted by a literal ghost. My life is a joke.

Nolan says, matter-of-fact. “You’re boundless.”

“Boundless,” I repeat, unimpressed.

“Aye. Boundless,” he says again. “I could spend an eternity studying you and still not know what you might do next. You give so much of yourself, so freely. You’re . . . wild with your attentions. Miraculous. I’ve seen so many lives, Harriet, but I’ve never seen someone live like you.”