Duh. Who wouldn’t be friends after a casual cold-handy?

“Um… uh… yeah… what?” I said, surely sounding very intelligent.

“Friends? Pals? Buddies? Heard of ‘em?” Vanessa grinned. “Though, if you’re new to this, word of advice: don’t try and get a handy from other friends. I’m… let’s just say I’m special. I mean, besides the ghost shit. I mean, their’s a reason I…” She suddenly got a lot more serious. Her dress reappeared onto her figure. I took that as a ‘get respectable’ and pulled my boxers up.

Soon, we were both cross-legged on the bed, looking at each other. More accurately, I looked at her and she looked down in her lap. She fidgeted with her hands, nervous about something.

“Are… are you okay?” I asked tenderly. I was numb to the ridiculousness of the entire situation, and attempted to approach this how I thought any normal person would; there was an upset girl in front of me, and I should try and help. Right?

She looked up at me. We’d been sitting silently for a while now. She didn’t seem happy. “Well, I am dead. I died alone. I’d never been able to live a normal life when I was alive, for reasons I can’t explain right now… so, no. I wouldn’t say I’m ‘okay’.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that. From my understanding, this wasn’t like how you could deal with someone having a bad day. It seemed like Vanessa had a bad life.

“I’m sorry, by the way… I shouldn’t have done all that. I…” she took a breath and looked away from me. She stared at something in the room, but I didn’t know what. “I didn’t live a… sociable life. I can’t say why. I’d never really had a connection with anyone before. When I was moved here, I was told to…” she stopped again. It felt like she was trying to explain her life, but it was written out like a classified document with all the sharpie lines blotting out the specifics.

“I… couldn’t be me. But… I’ve gone up a step. I have more… freedom. I can do things I’ve wanted to. I… I saw you, right? And I just kind of… reacted. I’m sorry I put you through that.”

I reached over and placed a hand onto one of her icy ones. “Hey, listen: this entire situation is… odd. But, honestly, I’ve had two world-changing days in a row, and this was the far better one. I regret a lot of things, but what you did isn’t one of them. I liked it.” She smiled softly. I was doing well! So, I kept on: “Listen, not having a sociable life? I understand your pain, I also wasn’t very popul-“

She cut me off, recoiling her hand away from mine. Her look had become venomous, like I’d just told her to go fuck her own mother.

“Do NOT say that you understand my FUCKING pain!” She screamed. If anyone but me could hear her, I’m sure it would have woken everyone else up.

“You… you don’t get it.” Vanessa had tears welling up in her eyes. “You do NOT get it. You couldn’t. So don’t fucking try that shit. Oh, no girls would suck your dick in high school, boo-fucking-hoo. I didn’t even-“ she stopped again, tensing up. She took a shaky breath and wiped her tears. “Sorry. I just… I get you’re trying to be nice. There’s a lot going on in my head, and I keep having to reword everything and I just… fuck, man.” She curled up and put her face to her knees, bundling up tight.

I stared for a second. This was a tough conversation already, and now it felt like there were landmines surrounding me as well.

Silently, I scooted over to her side and put an arm around her. She leaned into me. I could have been wrong, but I think she may have been softly crying.

We sat there for some time.

Eventually, she sat up, wiping her face again. “Sorry. Fucking… I’m sorry. I’m a mess.”

“It’s okay, really. I’m… I’m here.” I assured her, squeezing her softly.

“No, it’s not okay. I fucked with you, almost got you in trouble, spied on two of your friends, and then I fucking jerked you off? You didn’t ask for any of that. Maybe you liked the HJ, but the rest was definitely a boundary-cross. What’s fucked is that I’ve never done anything like that before. I mean… I’ve had thoughts, obviously… but I acted rashly. I’ve never had… liberation before. I went on a power trip.”

What do I say to that? I don’t have enough backstory, and I can’t exactly refute the morals. I doubted ‘yeah, but I got to cum, so that’s cool!’ would smooth things over. This was clearly something much deeper.

“I don’t want to talk about myself anymore. It’s just a vortex of shit resting on my brain. Tell me about that thing you said earlier.” She looked up at me. Her head was resting on my shoulder. Her coldness was strangely comforting. Her request, however, was not.

“What are you talking about?” I asked, trying to play it cool. I knew she was talking about the slip-up.

“You know what I’m talking about. When I first scared you? You guessed the dyke-looking chick, then said something oddly specific.”

“I… oh, yeah, yeah! I was just, yaknow… joking.”

“Dude, you said ‘Mystery lady who is testing a mystery **** on me?’. That sticks out as more than a random joke.” She did that thing where she does an exact replication of my voice. It was really bizarre to see her lips move and my voice come out.

She saw me tense when she parroted it. “Wait, someone is actually testing shit out on you? What is it?” She stopped leaning on me, moving in front of me and looking concerned.

“I…” I hastily looked around the room. I don’t know what I was looking for. Cameras? Microphones? The lady had said they’d know if I told anyone. How? I didn’t know. I should have asked, I guess.

I hadn’t blown up when I’d said it before. Maybe I could risk speaking about it more? “I saw something I shouldn’t have. I made… a deal. I be tested on, and live.”

“Holy shit, what the fuck?! What did you see?” She looked shocked. I liked seeing her more expressive. It was depressing to see her shut down like she was a second ago. I was also amazed at how connected I already felt to her. I met her less then two hours ago, why should I give a fuck?

“I… fuck.” I groaned. “Okay, I know you just said not to try and say I relate to you, but this time it’s actually truer; I literally can’t tell you. If I do, then… uh… something really, really bad will happen.” I said. Every word felt like I was walking on ice. Like any step could be my last before I’m plunged into the freezing depths of ****. I felt cold, and not the nice cold that Vanessa exhibited; a deep, uncomfortable cold.

“Why not?” She asked. Hey, that’s no fair, I’d never questioned her on the boundary that caused her lack of exposition!

I thought for a second, and then had an idea. I could imagine them having a way to hear me, but not a way to see me.

Charades.

I reached around my back pointed to spine with a surprised face.

“What the hell are you doing?” She asked.

I pointed again and made an explosion sound with my mouth, throwing my hands up as if replicating an explosion.

“Are you retarded?”

I did it again, but quicker.

“Are you doing chara- oh, you have a… wait, you have a bomb in your fucking spine?!”

I did a shush sign and a thumbs up.

“Why are you acting so fucking weird? Do they have, like a microphone and camera in you? If so, have fun explaining why you stared at a wall for 10 minutes and then came. Because I’m not going to show up on any of that footage. Only people I allow to see me can see and hear me.”

Good point.

“Okay, well, I don’t want to bore you with the details, but I can see that there is no secret surveillance shit in here. I mean, it wouldn’t work anyway, I have some protection set up.”

I almost felt relief… but then I had a thought and shook my head. “What about… inside me?” I asked.

She looked at me and pondered. “Okay, well… I can’t check inside you without… entering you. In layman’s terms, it’d be possession. I know that sounds scary, but, if you trust me, I can see. If I enter you, I can check to see if you need to be worried or not. I know I’ve already proven myself to be a creep, but I promise you: I wouldn’t do anything to hurt you. I’d be in and out. I… I understand if you don’t trust me though. I haven’t earned that; far from it.”

Her words made me queasy. It wasn’t so much that I didn’t trust her, but it felt… violating. And if I was in her shoes, would I not take the opportunity to reclaim a body? Live a life that I can no longer live? But… her self deprecation near the end brought out that saddened demeanor in her. I hated it.

Fuck it.

“Alright… go ahead.”

She looked at me with wide, surprised eyes. “Really? Are you sure?”

“Yeah. I trust you, Vanessa.”

“Well… okay. I’ve never done this before, so I’m sorry if there is any… discomfort. I wasn’t taught how it felt to be possessed, just how to do it.” She crawled to me and placed both hands on my face. She closed her eyes and began speaking some language I’d never heard. I’d translate here, but I physically couldn’t process what it sounded like. Every time I tried to listen, I’d hear one sound, but if I focused in on the sound it would morph and change as I thought about it. Hard to explain, but that’s the best I can do.

Soon, I felt bad. Really, really bad. I would have screamed my ass off if I could move. Whatever process was happening made me feel like my body had been submerged in acid - no, SUPER-acid - and I found myself unable to move my mouth to scream. I couldn’t move anything, in fact; I was rag-dolling. I would have fallen over completely if Vanessa wasn’t holding my face up.

Suddenly her eyes opened. They were completely white now, instead of the beautiful grey that they had been before.

Just as suddenly, I saw black.

Was… was I dead?

I wasn’t necessarily a religious man, but I was kind of hoping there was some kind of afterlife…

Hm.

Well.

Fuck.

I looked around. There was nothing. I was nothing. Wait, was I even looking around? I didn’t know if I had a body in which to look around with.

Suddenly I was back. I was drenched in sweat. I was on my back on the floor. I felt light-headed. I inhaled like it was the first time I’d ever taken a breath in my life.

I pushed myself into a sitting position and looked around. Vanessa was curled up against the corner of the room, as far away as possible. She was crying.

I looked down at myself and was horrified to see scratches leaking blood all over me. Turns out some of the wetness I’d assumed was sweat was also blood. It wasn’t a lethal amount, but my chest and arms looked like I’d been attacked by a rabies-afflicted cat.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry-“ Vanessa weeped and apologized over and over again.

“Wh… what… what happened?” I **** out. It was hard to speak.

“Your… body… it… it… it didn’t…” she was hyperventilating between words.

“Hey. Calm down. I’m… I’m fine.” I tried to soothe her. I was freaking the fuck out. I wasn’t sure if I believed the words I was saying.

She looked over at me. Her grey eyes were back.

“You… you knew. Your body, that is. It knew I wasn’t you. You started to attack yourself. I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t… I couldn’t control you like I thought I could. Fuck, I could have made you kill yourself if I’d stayed any longer! I said I wouldn’t hurt you, but fucking look at you! Fuck!”

“How long were you in me?”

“10 seconds. 10 FUCKING seconds.”

I looked down at myself. It was unbelievable to think I could do this to myself in such little time. There were shallow scratches all over me. They stung like a bitch, but the blood was slowing. There were a few deeper ones that weren’t stopping though.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry-“

“Hey, I forgive you, okay? We didn’t know. We couldn’t have. Did… did you figure it out? What in me?” I tried to divert the conversation to the entire reason we’d started this. I took my dirty work shirt off the ground and pressed it to the wounds. Not ideal as a bandage, but I wasn’t sure how I’d explain to a roommate that I had cuts all over my body in the middle of the night.

“I saw. You have a bomb. I don’t know how they did it, but it’s there. Perfectly placed for you not to feel it, but it would fuck you up if it went off. It seems small. I don’t think it would hurt people around you. I tried to see what the **** they were giving you did, but I couldn’t tell anything. I’m sorry.”

“Any, like, cameras in my eye? Microphone hooked up in my ass?”

“No. Just the… fucking bomb.” She wiped her eyes.

Weirdly, it was reassuring to only have it be a bomb. “They said they’d know if I said anything. How would they know if they have no surveillance?”

She shrugged half-heartedly. “Maybe they’re bluffing. I don’t know. I… I need to go. I… fuck. I’m sorry. I just… I need time alone.”

This was sudden. She must have been hard on herself over this situation. I doubt this helped with the self-hatred she’d been showing earlier.

“Hey, Vanessa, I’m really not ma-“

She was gone.

I stared at the spot she was at moments before. How did her powers work? Was she really gone? Or was she just gone for me?

I tore my work shirt apart and made make-shift bandages to tend to my wounds with. Stupid, I know, but I really didn’t want to burden anyone with this shit, and this shirt was already ruined with blood anyway.

After fixing myself up I crawled back into the bed.

It’d been a looong night.

I was quickly asleep.

I imagined Vanessa watching over me. I just hope she wasn’t crying.

-

Okay this chapter has no reason to have an author’s note but I realize that this one is literally twice the length of what I usually write for this story. Uh… my bad?

-

Sober author returns the next day! I cleaned up the chapter a bit. Nothing major, though I’m admittedly not the happiest with it upon re-read. I’m sure if I was a more seasoned veteran of the arts, I could redo the chapter better. But… eh. It’s fine. It planted the seeds I needed it to, and it gave a wild impression of Vanessa’s broken psyche. Again, if you’re worried that I changed the chapter because you’ve already read it/ didn’t read the first draft, don’t worry! I only changed a handful of lines to add some smoothness to the interactions.