Smoking with a Ghost

Smoking With A Ghost

by Kristin Knaus Satterlee

When Kristin Knaus Satterlee was 11 years old, she
asked a gangly 13-year-old boy with a big grin to the
Spring Fling. They've been together ever since. In
1999 they relocated to Albuquerque, New Mexico, where
they share their home with four sleek, spoiled cats.
Last weekend Kristin learned how to patch a flat roof,
but she'd rather invent recipes or download obscure
pop music.

At 7:45, I stepped out of the rancid-oil stink and heat of the Chicken Shack for my eighth cigarette in three hours. The "employee break room" was a joke, just a four-foot-square patch of concrete behind the restaurant. It held -- just barely -- two rickety folding chairs, and an old corrugated tin sign served for a roof.

The night was cold and rainy, and though the door was open to ventilate the kitchen, I was the only person out in the alley. Cupping my hands to keep out the wind, I lit a cigarette and sucked it halfway down in one greedy swallow. I closed my eyes, leaned back against the greasy brick wall, and exhaled. It felt so good, the quiet and the nicotine, the break from the chaos in the kitchen, even the occasional spray of water on my face when the wind gusted.

I took another drag and held it, then let the smoke escape my nose and mouth in tendrils. Like a dragon, like Smaug in that cartoon of The Hobbit. I opened my eyes to watch the smoke curling up from my nose and nearly choked.

There was a guy there, standing two feet from me, just outside the protection of the tin roof. He smiled as the rain sluiced through his face. I sighed, blowing out a last wisp of smoke.

Another one.

But gosh, this one was cute. Wavy black hair curled down to his jawline, and he wore a greenish beige trenchcoat and black Converse high-tops. Our eyes were level, which meant he was about five foot eight, but he was slender enough to seem taller. I could see pebbly asphalt through his shoes. He held a cigarette between two long, elegant fingers.

"Got a light?"

I hesitated, then beckoned him closer. He stepped onto the concrete slab, under the roof. He looked a lot more normal without the rain pouring through his face. I took out my battered chrome Zippo, and he put the cigarette between his full lips and leaned forward. I flicked on the lighter and held it up for him, expecting nothing to happen. But after a moment, his cigarette started to glow. Weird.

"Hi," he said. His eyes were big and brown, his lips soft and sensuous as they sucked at his cigarette. Pity he was dead. "I'm Carl."

"Hi, Carl. I'm Karen."

He didn't say "I know" -- so many of them do -- and I liked him for that.

"What brings you to the Chicken Shack on a night like this, Carl?"

Carl smiled shyly, dropping his eyelids so those beautiful eyes were half hidden behind luxurious black lashes. Why do the boys always get the prettiest eyelashes? "You do," he said, voice so low I had to strain to hear it over the clatter of rain on the tin roof.

Me. Well, of course. It wasn't as flattering as it sounds. Still, I blushed a little. To draw attention away from my reddening cheeks, I dropped my half-smoked cig among the hundreds that littered the concrete slab, crushing it beneath my toe. "I don't know what you've heard," I said, "but I don't do that stuff anymore."

"That's okay. You don't even know me." Carl's voice had almost none of that ghost echo. He must not have been dead very long. A couple years, maybe, no more. The old ones have so much echo you can hardly understand what they're saying. "It's just nice to have someone to talk to."

"Yeah. Well, I'm just on a smoke break, I can only talk a few minutes."

"Fair enough."

I leaned against the wall again and eyed Carl, who stared at the toes of his Chucks. It's hard making conversation with a ghost. You can't really ask them what they do for a living, and "How did you die?" is just rude. But I'd done this before. I could handle the silence. Lighting another nicotine pop, I waited for Carl to say something.

Finally, as I dropped my second cigarette on the cracked concrete, he did. "So, um, you work here?"

Not the most stunning opener, but it did the job. "Unfortunately. And, I hope, not for much longer. Place is a dump."

"I know. I used to work here. This is where I met Marla."

Ah. Marla. Ghosts can't help but talk about whatever tethers them to the material plane. Sounded like my boy Carl was one of the lovelorn. I strained not to roll my eyes. The lovelorn are boring. If you've ever had a friend go on and on about some love object who dumped them or doesn't know they exist, you understand why.

"Oh really?"

"Yeah. I was a server. Marla worked the fryer."

I frowned. The fryer? I'd been imagining Marla as a cute little college sophomore, a couple years younger than Carl. Perky, cute in all the ways I'm not, with maybe just a touch of Goth to set her apart from all the other girls.

But someone like that would never work the fryer, not at the Chicken Shack. Practically every piece of food was cooked in that thing; it was four feet high and the filled baskets could weigh up to forty pounds. I know it didn't meet safety codes, but Nancy preferred to bribe the inspectors rather than update the equipment. You had to be tall, strong, and brave to work the fryer. I'm no waif, but I wouldn't get within five feet of that hungry boiling-oil-filled maw.

"So... what happened with Marla?"

Carl scuffed his toe against the concrete. I've never figured out the relationship of ghosts to the ground -- why don't they just sink through? Anyway, he seemed to be composing his thoughts. Then, suddenly, a hand dropped heavily onto my shoulder.

"Who you talking to?" The stubby fingers belonged to Evan, the frycook on weekday evenings.

"Me?" I turned around and looked up at Evan's round face, catching a glimpse of Carl's horrified expression as he dropped his cigarette and stepped backward into the rain. "I didn't say anything."

Evan gave my statement laborious consideration, finally shaking his head. "You did. You said something about Marla."

Damn. You'd think by now I'd have learned not to talk to the ghosts where someone could walk in on me. What can I say, I'm a slow learner. It took me five years to stop doing the ritual for every sad-eyed dope of a dead person who asked me to -- if that's not dim-witted, I don't know what is.

"Marla? I don't think so. I don't even know a Marla."

Evan crossed his arms over his chest. His usually calm Buddha face was clouding up, the spongy lips firming into a frown. I'm a bad liar, too.

"I heard you say Marla." Evan stuck his chin out and narrowed his eyes, his voice a stubborn whine.

Too late to change my story now. "I -- I was singing. La, la, la, you know. It must have sounded like Marla."

My lie was so preposterous even Evan wouldn't fall for it. He was starting to glower, so I said the only thing I could think of. Besides, I was curious. "Who is Marla, anyway?"

The thundercloud I could practically see forming around Evan's head turned instantly from anger to grief. "Marla was my friend."

Was? Uh-oh. "Did she work here?"

His shoulders sagged as Evan nodded. I glanced behind me at Carl. Tears were streaming down his cheeks, flattened droplets sliding slowly against the swift raindrops that washed through his face.

"I'm sorry, Evan. What happened?"

Evan wiped his nose with the back of his hand, head bowed. His voice was viscous with grief as he answered. "It was that bad man. Carl."

I looked over at Carl again. He put his hands over his face and vanished.

"What's going on out here?" Rhona, the other server, stood in the doorway, hands on her hips, nose wrinkled with disgust. "Geez, Karen, what did you say to poor Evan?" Poor Evan, indeed. Rhona wouldn't even talk to him, as if he were beneath her. "Anyway, you've been out here like twenty minutes or something. Nancy's gonna kill you. We've got customers, you know."

After the Chicken Shack closed and Nancy screamed at me about the twenty-minute smoke break, I went home. I usually walked, but the weather that night was so bad I took the bus. Staring out the window at the rain, I thought about Carl. And the mysterious Marla. What had happened to her? Was she dead? What did Carl have to do with it?

I couldn't ask Evan -- he had seemed crushed just thinking about it, and I was sure he wouldn't be able to give me a coherent account. I wasn't going to ask Nancy. And Rhona had only been at the restaurant for two weeks, though you'd never guess it from her attitude. I would have to ask Carl.

Maybe he was a murderer, but the nice thing about ghosts is that, creepy as they can be, they can't actually hurt you.

But I didn't see Carl again for over a week. I'd kind of given up on him when he appeared on another blustery night. The wind played in his curly hair as he stared at me, wide eyes serious.

I closed the Chicken Shack's back door before speaking. "Need a light?"

Smiling sheepishly, he stepped under the tin roof. "You'll still talk to me?"

I shrugged, but softened my words with an answering grin. "No one else to talk to."

"Gee, thanks." Carl laughed. He had a nice laugh, soft and shy like his smile. He took a pack of cigarettes from the pocket of his trenchcoat, shook one out, and slipped it between his lips. My lighter flared with a schht, and the cigarette's end began to smolder.

I watched the glowing end as Carl removed the cig from his mouth and exhaled. "I don't understand how I can do that."

"Two things cross over between your plane and mine: wind and fire."

"Really?" I watched the ends of Carl's hair as they teased his neck in the gusting wind. Why hadn't I noticed that effect before?

"Yeah."

We smoked for a while in silence, watching each other surreptitiously the way you do with someone you don't know well. Even though he was a ghost -- and a ghost several years my junior when he died, from the look of him -- I had a desperate urge to smooth down my windblown brown hair, and I wished I was wearing something besides an orange polyester smock with a smiling chicken on it. Finally our eyes locked. I shivered at the intensity of his gaze. I didn't know what it meant, so I cast about for something to say to break the moment.

"Tell me about Marla."

Well, that worked. The spell shattered instantly. Carl looked away from me and sighed, the air around his head heavy with smoke. "I knew you'd ask about her."

"I'm surprised you haven't said anything yet. Most of your kind can't stop talking about their tethers. I assume she is? Your tether?"

"Of course. I just -- I wish I didn't have to talk about it."

So did a lot of ghosts. Carl's will must have been very strong, to resist the urge so long. "Who is she?"

Carl put his hands over his face. "I'm afraid you'll never want to speak to me again."

"I'm talking to you now, and as far as I know -- from what Evan said before -- you're a murderer."

"No! No, it was an accident." He dropped his hands and looked at me, huge eyes sunk deep into their sockets, deeper than a human's could ever be. His eyes blazed out from those dark holes with guilt and despair. Ghost anguish was an agonizing thing to see. I had hardened my heart against it, turning away so many who wanted the ritual, but it hurt to see that pain in Carl's soft brown eyes.

It wasn't possible to touch him, but I reached out anyway. "I believe you. You don't have to..."

But the floodgates were open. "Marla never liked me." Carl's voice echoed, drum-hollow, as the story poured out of him. "Everyone liked me. I was the nice guy, the funny guy. The clown. But Marla -- I think now that she probably never liked any guy except Evan, but I didn't realize that then. All I knew was that she didn't like me, that even when I smiled at her, tried harder than anything to be friendly, she'd look at me so cold. I tried to help her carry a big box of chicken once and she told me to go to hell."

"Sounds like a great lady."

"She was awful. Except with Evan. She was just different with him. Marla brought him things, little treats. He worshipped her. They were like mother and son, but even more devoted to each other."

Poor Evan. No wonder he hated Carl. "What happened?"

"It was a Thursday. I was in a really good mood because it was the end of my last semester at college. I'd finished all my exams and was pretty sure they'd gone well. So when I got to work and Marla glared at me like she always did, I thought I'd make another go at getting her to like me."

He closed his eyes, and they disappeared into the black pits of his eye sockets. I looked away until he started talking again.

"I can't believe how stupid I was. How needy. It was closing time, and Marla was cleaning out the fryer."

I had seen Evan clean the fryer many times, leaning over it as he ran a sieve through the hot oil to clean particles out of it so the oil would last longer.

"It was my job to mop the floors after closing. I got the mop bucket out of the closet, and as I went through the kitchen I -- God, it seems so stupid now -- climbed up on the big wheeled bucket and pushed myself toward her with the mop, singing like... you know, those guys in Venice who pole the boats down the canal? I was singing at the top of my lungs, making up stupid nonsense that sounded Italian to me. Marla looked over her shoulder and scowled at me.

"And that's when I slipped. I suddenly couldn't get any purchase with the mop, and the bucket kept rolling toward Marla while she was leaning over the fryer. I yelled, and she looked up again and her eyes got real wide and her mouth opened, and then the bucket tipped and I fell off it. Right onto her back."

I'd guessed what was coming, what had to be coming, but the sorrow and pain in his voice made me gasp anyway.

The echo in Carl's voice grew even more pronounced, as if he were standing inside a giant coffee can. "I pushed her into the fryer. Into the oil. She sizzled. I rolled off her onto the floor, and she rose up out of the fryer screaming, throwing hot oil all over the kitchen. My arms got splashed with it. I got minor burns. Minor burns on my arms. That's all. That's all."

Carl shuddered to a stop, and we stood staring at each other. I opened my mouth to say something -- I don't know what, probably just "I'm sorry," as inadequate as that would have been -- and the kitchen door opened.

"Karen, for crying out loud!" It was Nancy. "Get your ass in here, girl, you've been smoking for twenty minutes. Again."

I pushed myself away from the wall, giving Carl an apologetic look as I dropped the cigarette butt onto the concrete. "Okay, I'm coming."

"You better be. I'm taking fifteen minutes out of your paycheck. Five minutes for a smoke, Karen. How many times have I told you?"

Whenever I closed my eyes that night, I saw Carl's face, his eyes sunk deep into his skull with torment. Seeing him like that made my stomach hurt. I stared at the ceiling until I couldn't stand it anymore.

Climbing out of bed, I threw on some jeans, a t-shirt, and sneakers, and went outside. My neighborhood sure wasn't the greatest, but I walked home from work most nights and the worst that had ever happened to me was a few catcalls. There was a little can of pepper spray on my keychain, just in case.

It was a pretty night, with a full moon, clear enough that a lot of stars were visible even in the middle of town. I took off walking. I won't pretend it was an accident that I went in the direction of the Chicken Shack. Still, I nearly jumped out of my skin when Carl suddenly appeared in front of me, chewing gum as he sat on the bottom step of a fire escape.

"Hey." He smiled, a great big grin that made me breathless with the thought that he was so happy to see me.

"Hey, Carl." I sat on the step next to him. The cold of the metal seeped through my jeans almost immediately.

"What are you doing out here? It's not safe, walking alone in the middle of the night."

"I'm not alone anymore." I wanted so bad to put my hand on his leg, to feel the warmth of his presence. But he had no leg to put my hand on, and ghosts have no warmth. If I did try to touch him, all I'd feel was a chill, like someone spraying cold water on the back of my neck.

"As far as anyone else can tell, you are."

I shrugged. "I walk home all the time. It's fine. What are you doing here? I thought you were tethered to the Chicken Shack."

"Yeah. But I've spent a lot of time figuring out just how long my tether is. This is as far as I can go. It's kind of tough, staying here, like I'm at the end of a bit of elastic that wants to pull me back."

"We could go."

Carl shook his head. "A change is nice. Let's stay here a while."

So we sat there, my butt getting colder by the second. I propped my elbows on the step behind me and leaned back, looking up at the stars.

"Do you know the constellations?"

Carl gave a short laugh, just a quick exhale through his nose. "No."

"Me neither. Just the Big Dipper."

"Well, I know that one. Everyone knows that one."

We were quiet for a while after that. It was nice. Comfortable.

I let out a contented sigh. "I don't think I've ever sat with another person like this, just... you know, being together. Not since my mom passed on."

Carl looked over at me and raised his eyebrows just a little, inviting me to continue.

"I don't really get along with other people very well, you know? Nancy and Rhona both hate me -- Rhona never misses a chance to wrinkle her nose when I come near and say how I stink of cigarette smoke. And Nancy constantly screams at me."

"But you got along with your mom?"

"Yeah, but... well, she was a ghost. I get along fine with ghosts."

Carl blinked. "Your mother was a ghost?"

"Yeah. She died when I was two. I wouldn't remember her if it hadn't been for when she was a ghost. When I was sixteen, I figured out how to help her cross over. I know it was the right thing to do. But God, I miss her."

"You exorcised your own mother?"

My stomach plummeted. The hardest thing I'd ever done in my life, and Carl was judging me for it? I glared at him. "Yes, damn it, and I'd do it again."

He reached for my hand, but didn't touch me. Couldn't touch me. "No, Karen, that's not what I meant. I meant -- I can't imagine how awful that must have been for you. How brave you were, to do what she needed even though you'd lose her."

I softened at his understanding. "Oh. Thank you."

"No need to thank me. I meant it."

We smiled at each other and lapsed back into stillness.

Finally, though, the cold metal stairs were just too much, and I stood up and wiped the back of my jeans as if I could somehow swab away the chill. "Come on," I said. "Let's walk."

Carl stood, too, with a fluid grace that a lot of ghosts have. I guess it comes from not really having a body -- gravity just doesn't matter. The hem of his trenchcoat flapped against the backs of his knees as we strolled toward the Chicken Shack. When we got there, we stood under the glowing orange chicken -- Nancy must have forgotten to turn off the sign -- and looked at each other.

"Well, I should probably get home. I need at least a little sleep."

"I'll walk you."

I laughed. "Didn't I just walk you home?"

Carl grinned, his eyes twinkling in the neon light. "That's okay. I'll walk you, and then you can walk me, and I'll walk you..."

"Ghosts," I groaned, rolling my eyes. "You guys never sleep, do you?"

He shook his head. "No body to get tired."

"Well, you can walk me home -- as far as you can go, anyway -- but then I'm going to bed. Sorry."

"I can live with that." Carl grimaced. "Figuratively, that is."

We turned and walked back, Carl on my left next to the street. The night was getting cold; I hugged myself and shivered.

"I'd give you my coat, but..." Carl's voice was mournful.

"It's okay." I smiled at him. "If you could, though, I'd take it."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I'd even let you put your arm around me. If you wanted."

"I would. Want to. You know, if."

I nodded, moving as close to him as I could without touching him. Our steps fell into rhythm together, his hips rising and falling with mine. "I know. If."

We walked on until we'd gone about ten steps past the fire escape we'd sat on together. Then Carl stopped. "I can't go any further."

"Oh. Okay. Well, I guess I'd better..."

"Yeah. But first -- I want to try something." Carl smiled, his eyes crinkling with happy mischief. "Hold still and close your eyes."

I frowned at him with worry that was only mostly in jest. "Do I really want to do this?"

He nodded slowly, his mouth falling open a little bit so I could see the tip of his tongue playing against his front teeth. When he spoke again his voice was quiet, intense. Sexy. I shivered. "Yes. You do. First, push your hair back off your shoulders. Then close your eyes."

My heart raced as I followed his instructions. I felt unsettled, standing there blind on the sidewalk, leaving myself helpless.

Carl's voice came again, right by my ear, soft and breathy. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up at the thought of his lips so close to me. "Stay very still."

I waited, unsteady in the silence, until I almost couldn't stand the anticipation anymore. I was about to open my eyes when I felt a tiny tickle at the hollow of my throat. A breath. It moved slowly, like the gentlest touch imaginable, up toward my chin. I shuddered and let my head drop back, and the thread of breath slid up my throat, over my chin. There was a tiny gust against my lips, like a kiss, and then Carl's voice in my ear again.

"Did you feel that?" The laughter in his voice said he knew I had.

Not trusting my voice, I just nodded.

"Well. Good."

"How...?"

"You know how you can light my cigarettes? Fire and wind can both cross between our planes."

I opened my eyes. His face was just inches from mine. "Breath counts as wind?"

"Seems that way." He grinned, looking almost smug.

"Oh." I smiled back. "Good."

Laughing, he stepped away from me. "Well, you need to go home and get some sleep."

"What?"

"I'll see you tomorrow." Carl took another step back, and then he was gone. He didn't just vanish, like he had when we were at the Chicken Shack; instead he was pulled backwards, almost too fast to see, as he let his tether drag him away.

The next night Rhona didn't show up for work. I only managed to sneak out for a five-minute break, and Carl wasn't there.

But he was waiting for me when I finished my shift. He smiled when I came out the back door, then gave an exaggerated bow.

"Walk you home, my lady?"

I curtsied as best I could in my garish Chicken Shack outfit. "But of course."

Carl and I fell into step immediately, as if we'd been walking together for years. The sound of our footsteps falling in unison echoed from the buildings around us, and I marveled that anyone else listening would hear only mine.

We set off down Oak Street. It wasn't quite the same direction we had gone the night before, probably because we started from the back of the restaurant. We'd walked only a few blocks when Carl stopped in his tracks.

I turned and looked at him. He was standing right next to a bus shelter, staring at the street. A man and woman stood talking inside the shelter, but they were facing away from us, so I walked nonchalantly back to Carl and whispered, "What is it?"

He turned his face toward me. Carl's eyes had retreated into dark sockets, and his cheeks were sunken, hollow. His skin seemed thin, the bones of his face pressing out from behind like knife blades. Carl reached toward me with a skeletal hand, and I took another step toward him, wishing I could pull him to me, warm him with my own heat, fill his empty places with my own substance.

"Carl. Please. Tell me what's wrong!"

The woman in the bus shelter turned slightly to watch me talking to nothing. I'd seen her expression before: mingled fear, disgust, and curiosity. She moved closer to the man, and he put an arm around her.

Frankly, I didn't give a damn what anyone thought. Not this time. Carl's eyes were black pools of anguish as he stared into the road. His body was rigid. A moan, so soft and low I could barely hear it, seeped from his half-open mouth.

I put myself between him and whatever he was seeing. "Carl. Carl. Come on, Carl, it's Karen. Talk to me!"

Slowly, his eyes focused, coming back a little from the abyss. They traveled up until they reached my face. "This... is where I died." His voice echoed like a gong.

Oh, God. Of course. That's why we came this way. He was drawn to the spot of his death without even realizing it. I grabbed for Carl's arm, wanting to drag him away from there, but my hand closed on nothing but a fistful of cool air.

"Carl, come on. Follow me. We have to get out of here."

Slowly, he shook his head. I felt the sting of tears surging behind my eyelids. I didn't want to hear about it, didn't want to know, didn't want to have to visualize whatever had happened to Carl here. But there was only one way we were leaving this spot.

I took a deep breath. "Tell me."

Carl relaxed, just a little. His eyes were focused on my face with frightening intensity.

"I was waiting for the bus. It was two weeks after I... after what happened to Marla. The police questioned me, but they didn't press charges. They made it clear that I was an idiot. A worm. When they ruled the death accidental, they acted almost like I was beneath prosecuting, not worth their time."

A bus pulled up, squealing to a stop in a haze of exhaust. The woman cast a final disgusted look over her shoulder as she boarded behind her boyfriend.

"So I didn't go to jail, but I did get fired. Nancy called me that night and told me not to come back. Of course I didn't blame her. She never wanted to see my awful face again. Neither did I. I stopped going anywhere. I missed graduation. I slept all the time so I wouldn't have to see Marla anymore."

I frowned. "You saw Marla?"

"Not really. She's not a ghost. But I saw her all the time. Every person who passed my window looked like Marla. Every time I closed my eyes there she was, her face a red mass of blisters, oil spraying off her in all directions, and she was looking at me with eyes that weren't eyes anymore, just scorched red sockets where her eyeballs had been burned away..."

"Carl. Please, stop. Just tell me what happened."

He shuddered and took a deep breath, then went on. "Finally I couldn't hide anymore. I was starving. I think it had been about two weeks, and every bit of food in my apartment was gone, even the Saltines that were in the closet when I moved in. I needed money to feed myself. So I screwed up my courage and went to the Chicken Shack to get my last check from Nancy.

"We said as little to each other as possible. No one else spoke to me at all. I took my check and left. It was about forty dollars." Carl laughed bitterly, the sound raw and painful in my ears. "A pretty small amount to die for."

There was nothing useful I could say. "I'm so sorry."

"I don't know when Evan saw me. I don't think he was in the restaurant. I was standing at the curb when I heard heavy footsteps behind me, and then someone shouted my name. I turned and Evan was there, staring at me like I was the devil himself. His eyes were like coals. He roared my name again and charged at me."

I shivered, recalling Evan's fearsome look at the mere mention of Carl.

"It was a reflex. I just stepped backwards. How could I not? It was like being charged by a grizzly bear. I stepped off the curb."

Carl stared at me, his eyes a swirling black vortex. "There was a bus. I don't know why it didn't stop. Maybe it was out of service, or an express. It... obliterated me. I felt like the atoms of my body were all in the wrong places, like I'd been turned inside-out. It seemed to last forever, that time when there was nothing but agony. But then I was looking at myself, on a hospital gurney, and I looked just fine. I'm not even sure any bones were broken. One of the paramedics said something about massive internal injuries, and then he pronounced me deh--- He said I was---"

Carl reached his hands out to me. "Karen, I don't want to be dead!" He swayed and fell. He never hit the ground, but vanished mid-fall.

I ran the six blocks back to the Chicken Shack. He was there, under the tin roof, sitting on one of the rickety chairs with his head cradled in his hands.

I rested my hands on my knees, panting. Finally I caught my breath enough to talk. "Carl?"

He looked up at me. "I'm sorry."

I waved my hand dismissively. "There's nothing to be sorry for." I sat on the other chair and peered at Carl. "Are you okay?"

"I could sure use a smoke."

"Yeah, me too."

"Got a light?"

I laughed. We spent a minute shaking out our cigarettes and getting them lit, then leaned back against the wall and inhaled gratefully. Carl exhaled in a huge sigh. He had sucked his phantom cig down halfway in one desperate suck.

"Carl."

After all the misery I'd seen just a few minutes before, his smile was a benediction. "Yeah?"

"I could..." my voice got tangled in my dry throat. I swallowed and tried again. "I could help you."

Smoke swirled around Carl's slightly cocked head as he looked at me, white-filter cigarette dangling from his long fingers. When he spoke, his voice was soft, cautious. "You mean, like you helped your mother?"

I nodded.

Carl dropped his cigarette butt. It hit the pavement and vanished. "You don't need to do that."

"But -- it's not right for you to be stuck here forever. You deserve a chance to move on. I can cut your tether so you can do that."

"You stopped doing it for a reason, right?" Carl stared at his hands, long fingers laced together on his knees.

"Well, yeah..."

He looked up at me, a lock of wavy hair falling over his eye as he moved his head. "It's painful, isn't it? It tears you apart."

I closed my eyes. Just thinking about the ritual made my stomach twist in knots and rush upward, pushing hot vomit into the back of my throat. Finally I nodded. There was a chill tickle on the back of my hand; I opened my eyes to see Carl standing over me, his hand covering mine.

"I can't let you do it," he whispered. His eyes were sad, not with the traumatic agony of ghost memories, but as a reflection of my distress. "I won't let you hurt yourself for me."

A few days later, Carl wasn't waiting for me after my shift. I dawdled outside the Chicken Shack, smoking a cigarette, but he didn't appear. Disappointment soured the back of my throat as I walked home.

As I stomped up the three flights of stairs to my apartment, disappointment started to turn to annoyance. It wasn't like he had anything else to do. Why hadn't he shown up? I thought it was understood that we hung out after my shift. I thought he enjoyed it as much as I did, needed that time as much as me.

I unlocked the door, banged it open, and threw my keys at the dingy little table by the door. They slid across it and crashed to the floor behind the futon.

"Shit!" I knew I should pick the keys up, or I'd forget where they were by morning; but after a moment of staring sullenly at them, I shrugged and turned away.

Carl was there, sitting in my garage-sale wingback chair, grinning at me. I jumped and choked back a squeak of surprise.

"What the...? How did you -- you can't be here! This is..."

Those mischievous brown eyes sparkled with glee as Carl laughed at my bewilderment. "It's five blocks past the end of my tether."

"So how can you possibly...?"

"I stretched it."

Confused, I shook my head. "Stretched it?"

"My tether. I've been stretching it. "

"You can do that?" I had never heard of such a thing. Tethers weren't negotiable. Ghosts were stuck where they were stuck, end of story. "You can't do that."

"Well..." Carl spread his hands like a magician showing off a trick.

I walked toward him, stopping in front of the chair where he still sat, my chest at his eye level. "You're amazing."

"You're not so bad yourself." Keeping his eyes on mine, Carl leaned forward and blew gently on my breast. His breath ruffled the light, slick polyester of my Chicken Shack smock, and I jumped back with a playful squeal.

Carl stayed where he was, watching me. His expression was solemn, but his eyes were dancing. After a long moment I took another step back. Carl's shoulders fell. Another step back was enough, in my tiny one-room apartment, for my thighs to hit the side of the unmade futon bed.

I put my hand out, palm up, in a gesture I hoped was enticing despite my stained work uniform. Carl was out of his chair even before I crooked my finger and said, "I think we'd be more comfortable over here."

When I woke up Carl was in the wingback chair again, watching me with an expression of bemused affection. The sheet had fallen away from my bare torso, and I pulled it up in a moment of self-consciousness.

"Hi." I smiled shyly. "I'm glad you're still here."

"I got dragged back to the Chicken Shack a couple of times, but I think I've got my tether under control now."

"Good." Sitting up a little, I let the sheet fall again and watched as Carl eyed me. "But what are you doing over there?"

He leaned back in the chair, crossed his legs, and gave a languid smile. "Is there somewhere you'd rather I be?"

God, Carl was a tease. But two could play that game. Shrugging, I glanced away from that sexy grin and those soft brown puppy eyes. "Oh, I suppose not." I leaned over and reached for a t-shirt that was stuffed between my pillow and a teddy bear.

In one step, almost too fast to see, Carl was at my bedside. He reached out and grasped my wrist, stopping my hand mid-motion. I stared at the pale, slender fingers encircling my wrist, then turned my gaze toward Carl.

"But..."

Carl loosened his grip and slid his hand up my arm, slowly, gently. He caressed my shoulder, then let his fingers glide up my neck and into my hair. I stared as he leaned down, eyes holding mine, and kissed me. The kiss was soft but firm, his tongue playing over my lips for a moment before I opened them and let him in. As Carl leaned into me, pressing me back onto the bed, I was surrounded by the smell of him: cigarette smoke, wintergreen gum, a hint of musk.

I didn't understand how this could be happening, but I didn't ask. I grabbed the lapels of his trenchcoat and pulled them back, sliding it down his arms. He broke off the kiss and we stared at each other, gasping for air. Carl's eyes were as surprised as mine must have been. He leaned away from me to pull off the coat. I ripped Carl's t-shirt off over his head. As soon as his arms were free he wrapped them around me, pressing our bare chests together.

Carl's breath was hot and damp against my neck as he sighed my name. I ran my hands up and down the smooth warmth of his back, marveling. How could it be? I plunged my fingers into Carl's soft black curls, lowering my head to nibble at his neck -- and my alarm clock went off.

I looked up at the window. It was still dark. Why was my alarm ringing? Carl pulled me closer, but his hands felt too soft, insubstantial, like they were made of cotton balls.

"No, Karen, please," he said, his breath cooler against my skin with every word. "Please don't go."

I opened my eyes, completely disoriented. I didn't think they'd been closed. Sunshine poured through the window as I lay sprawled in my bed, the sheet pulled down below my ribcage and my chest bare.

"Karen." Carl's voice was almost drowned out by the insistent shrill of the alarm. Squinting, I could just see him perched on the edge of the bed, almost invisible in the bright sunlight.

"Carl?" I slapped the snooze button and struggled to sit up, still boneless and confused. "I was dreaming."

"I know."

I stumbled up and pulled the curtains closed, then fell back into bed. With the room dimmed I could see Carl a little better. "Was I talking in my sleep?" I tried to remember if I'd said anything embarrassing.

"No, silly. I was there. It was real." He was smiling, but his voice was wistful.

"Really?"

The smile widened. "Uh-huh. We were just getting to the good part, too."

I shook my head in amazement. "I'm getting tired of asking you this, but... how?"

"You're closer to the spirit world than most people. That's why you can see me, and other ghosts, when most people can't. Everyone is closer to the spirit world when they're dreaming -- almost anyone can see a ghost in their dreams, if the ghost wants them to. So..."

"So when I'm dreaming, I'm close enough to the spirit world to -- to actually touch you?"

"Yeah. I think so."

I picked up a little stuffed skunk and threw it at Carl. It flew through his chest and he jumped to his feet. "What?"

"Why didn't you tell me?" I complained.

"I wasn't sure it would work! I would have been crushed if I couldn't make it work. Why should we both be disappointed?"

My mouth twitched into a smile as I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms over my breasts. "Big-headed ghost. Assuming I'd be disappointed."

"Yeah, that's right. You haven't been itching to get your hands on me. Keep kidding yourself."

"Prove it."

Carl leaned forward and blew a tickly breath at my sternum, just above my crossed arms. I gave a shaky gasp, and he grinned victoriously.

"Okay, fine, you've made your point. Damn alarm clock."

That night, Carl and I lay together in a wreath of cigarette smoke. The day had been crazy -- I'd been distracted at work and, of course, when I got home it took me forever to fall asleep -- but at that moment, my body and mind were calm, content, satiated. I don't think I'd ever felt so at peace.

Rolling over onto an elbow, I looked down at Carl. He smiled up at me, but not before I'd caught a glimpse of the bleak look in his eyes.

He wasn't floating in a haze of post-coital bliss. Carl's mind was caught, trapped in memories of Marla's death and his own. Incredible willpower allowed him to put on the bravest face of any ghost I'd ever known, but underneath was a constant current of pain.

I remembered my mother's eyes. Even when we were playing at some game or another, I'd never seen them without creases of stress and pain at their corners, the pupils a drowning blackness.

"Oh, Carl." I sighed, sitting up cross-legged and stubbing out my cigarette in an ashtray on the bedside table. "This can't go on."

He quirked an eyebrow. "Was I that bad?"

I knew he wanted me to grab a pillow and whack him with it, to banter with him and not be saying what I was really saying. But I just shook my head.

Carl sighed and handed me his own cigarette. I took a final puff and stubbed it out too.

"It's not right, Carl. You're not supposed to be stuck in this existence forever. You shouldn't be in pain forever."

"I want to be here with you."

I blinked back tears and reached for Carl's hand. It closed around mine, soft and warm and urgent.

"But what if I get hit by a bus tomorrow?" Carl winced, and I realized maybe I should have gone with a different hypothetical. Still, I plowed on, squeezing his hand. "I don't want to lose you either. If you could stay here as long as you wanted, and leave only if and when you wanted, of course that's what I'd want too. But you of all people know how suddenly things can happen. And if... if I died, you'd be trapped here. Forever."

Carl squeezed his eyes closed and shook his head. More a denial than an argument.

I waited until he opened his eyes again, and held them with mine. "Please, Carl. Let me do this for you."

Three nights later, we walked to the Chicken Shack in silence, each pulling morosely at a cigarette. The moon was nearly full. It had been a month since the first time Carl and I had walked these streets together.

When we got to the restaurant we stopped outside the edge of the "break room," staring at the battered metal kitchen door as if it were the gateway to Hell. Finally I dropped my cigarette and approached the door. As I pulled the pilfered key from the pocket of my jeans, Carl placed himself between me and the door, his eyes hollow and cheeks sunken with worry.

"Karen..."

"Carl, it's okay. I'll be okay."

He nodded uncertainly and stepped out of the way. Head bent, hair hiding my face as I fought back tears, I worked the key into the lock. One month. Was it too soon to say goodbye? But how much worse would it be in another month, a year? I couldn't let my affection trap Carl forever. I had to do this now, while I still could.

I hoped I was right. I hoped I would be okay.

Finally the worn old key turned in the lock. I took a deep breath and opened the door. Moonlight flooded in, lighting up the kitchen like the set of a black-and-white horror movie. The fryer lurked against the wall. A troll. An alien. One way or another, the villain of the piece.

The Chicken Shack had been closed for hours, but the gigantic fryer still radiated heat like rank breath. I took a step toward it, my foot slipping slightly over the floor's permanent film of grease. Carl hovered in the doorway, watching me.

"Show me," I said to him. "The exact spot where you ran into Marla."

Carl walked past me, gliding at a speed not accounted for by the movement of his feet. His tether pulled him to a spot a foot from the fryer's steaming maw, and he stopped with a jerk. My eardrums ached when he popped into place, as if the pressure in the room had dropped suddenly. Carl came more sharply into focus and the wall behind him became less visible. He was plugged in now, reconnected with the emotions that pegged him to this place, that would hold him here forever if I didn't do what needed to be done.

"This is it," he said. His fists were knotted tight, his jaw so tense I could see the muscles bulge. Putting on a brave face, as he always did. But his eyes were too bright and his voice rasped as he spoke.

I nodded. "Okay. Okay. Good. Stay there."

Picking up the handset of the wall phone, I dialed 911. When someone picked up the phone, I didn't wait for them to speak.

"There's been an accident. I'm at the Chicken Shack on First Street. Come right away."

I hung up and stepped close to Carl, looking straight into his worried eyes. My arm hair stood up when I got near. The energy rushing through him crawled over my skin like electricity.

"Hold still," I whispered, and then I stepped into him.

Carl gasped as our chests passed through one another. I don't know what he felt, but for me it was like stepping into a battery: cold, but taut with energy that could materialize at any moment.

I was the conduit. It was my job to call that energy forth, to transform it.

The first time I'd done this, with my mother, it had taken me almost an hour to align myself -- to connect myself to the terminals of the battery, so to speak. I'd had practice since then. I closed my eyes and shuffled forward, feeling for the right spot.

I reached out, and there it was. As I touched the source, an overpowering surge of emotions exploded in my head: fear, guilt, pain, horror, so strong I couldn't see. My ears filled with buzzing, my heart stuttered. I wanted to scream, to throw up, to fall to my knees and beat at the ground and weep as images of Marla's blistered face burst in my brain, as my ears filled with her anguished howls.

Somehow I stayed standing. I collected all the emotion that bound Carl to this plane, held onto it despite how badly my body wanted to eject it through screams and tears and vomit. And when I'd gathered every bit, I clenched all my muscles tight and changed it over.

I can't tell you how I do this. It feels like turning the world upside down. One moment the energy built up inside me is emotion, and then it's not.

Suddenly, I was filled with electricity. I screamed as it poured through me, a crackling surge of power and light and heat. It stretched me rigid, ripped through the soles of my feet and surged into the floor. Carl's horrified face was the last thing I saw before I was blinded by brilliant white light. And then, nothing.

Someone was holding my hand. With effort, I opened my eyes. A nurse smiled at me.

"Welcome back," she said.

I couldn't return her smile. Somehow, I had hoped the warm hand on mine would belong to Carl. But of course not. He had never been able to hold my hand, not when I was awake. And now I'd sent him away, sent him on, as I had the only other person I'd really loved.

The nurse's smile blurred as my eyes filled with tears. There was no holding them back. I'd been strong for as long as I could, and now my body betrayed me. I sobbed, my head bowed and shoulders shaking, pain searing through my electrically burned flesh, until I collapsed against my pillow, exhausted. The nurse gently disengaged her hand as I fell into exhausted, restless sleep.

"Karen?" Carl stood at the end of my bed, a coil of dark brown hair spilling over his worried eyes.

I glared at him. Even in my dream my eyes were swollen and itchy, my nose dripping with snot from crying, my whole body aching.

"Go away. You're not real." How could my brain be so damn cruel?

Carl shook his head. His eyes were red -- he looked like he'd been crying too -- but a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

"I am real."

"Are not."

He laughed, and whether or not he was real, the sound was a balm, making every square inch of me feel better for a moment.

"Am too. As real as you are stubborn."

"Prove it."

Carl walked around and perched on the edge of the bed. He leaned forward, eyes sparkling, and blew on my forehead, my cheeks, my lips. Then he kissed me, a long kiss but unimaginably tender, and leaned back smiling.

When I could speak again, I shook my head. "Doesn't prove a thing. I could have dreamed that."

"You could dream anything. I can't prove anything if you're asleep." He ran a hand softly over my hair. "Wake up."

So I did.

And there he was, tinted a little green by the hospital wall behind him, but utterly, perfectly, genuinely Carl.

At that moment, it may have been a good thing he was a ghost; I might have done myself damage if I'd flung myself at him the way I wanted to. If only I could fall asleep as easily as I'd woken up. I settled for staring at him, feasting my eyes on every detail.

Finally I had to ask. "How? How can you be here?"

"Well, I don't have a tether anymore. You saw to that."

"Yeah, but... when the tether is cut, most ghosts move on to the next phase of existence. They don't pop by the hospital for a visit."

Carl's voice was so soft and warm I wanted to wrap myself in it like a blanket. "I'm not most ghosts. And I'd rather be at the hospital, visiting you."

I smiled, though the motion hurt my seared face, and shook my head carefully. "You are the most pig-headed person I've ever met."

Carl grinned back, and I saw that the anguish had left his beautiful brown eyes. "Yup. So you'd better believe that I'm not going anywhere. Not until you're there to meet me."

Though I tried to hold it back, a yawn pushed its way out from behind my teeth. "Sorry. I'm just... so tired."

"Of course you are, after what you did for me. Go to sleep, Karen. I'll be waiting."

So I did. And he was.