“Oh, that’s right,” I say. “I guess we haven’t. I’m just so used to seeing you in here, visiting with Dianna.” I offer him my hand. “I’m Cora.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” he says, “to really, really meet you. Dianna told me that you were here…umm…in the flesh if you don’t mind the expression.”

I chuckle. “Not at all.” I walk behind the counter and pull out a vase to put the flowers in.

“…don’t know what to tell you. They will arrive…” Dianna rolls her eyes at me, undoubtedly dealing with a difficult customer.

I shake my head and move over to the sitting area near the shop’s large bay windows and set the vase on the table. I then take a seat and motion for Parker to join me.

“Thank you again for the flowers,” I say. “It’s so sweet.”

“I just feel like I’ve known you for a long time, even if we had never seen each other before. It felt appropriate to mark the occasion in some way.”

“It is strange to finally be able to talk to you and not just blow on the back of your neck or something,” I say.

He wrinkles his nose. “Yeah, why do y’all do that, anyway? It’s…so weird.”

I have to laugh. “Well, I can’t speak for the others, but the back of a man’s neck, or a women when their hair is short enough, is quite sensitive. And it is usually exposed. Right now, for instance—” I motion to his outfit. “—you are covered from head to toe. Hat, coat, gloves, boots. The only exposed skin is the back of your neck, and that’s only because you took your scarf off.”

“Hmm. I guess that makes sense,” he says, removing his gloves and jacket in the warm shop. “So, when you say you can’t speak for the others, that’s because you can’t—”

“Can’t see them,” I say, completing his thought. “Or couldn’t see them, I should say. I’ve traveled all over the world as a ghost. I’ve been to countless graveyards, battlegrounds, so-called haunted houses, and I’ve never seen another ghost. I’ve even been to your morgue.”

“I know for certain there are other ghosts there,” he says. “Most don’t stay long. It’s as if they are accompanying their bodies. They are there while I clean them up and leave when I send the body to the church or funeral home. There are a few regulars, though.”

“I believe you,” I say reassuringly. I’m sure he has had plenty of people not believe him over the years. “I cannot, in the whole world and out of all human existence, be the only person to have turned into a ghost. But why I cannot see the other ghosts is a mystery to me that I cannot begin to explain.”

He nods. “That must have been frustrating for you, I’m sure.”

“That’s putting it mildly.”

“It’s possible the ghosts all exist on slightly different planes,” he says, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

“That was one of my theories, too,” I say, nodding.

“You know you were not the only ghost here in the shop, right?”

“I know you sometimes…sensed ghosts that weren’t me,” I say. “But I never saw them.”

“What about now?” he asks.

“What do you mean?”

“Can you see ghosts now?”

I look around. The only person I see is Dianna, still behind the counter but off the phone now. “I don’t…I don’t think so.”

“I’m pretty sure there is one sitting next to me,” he says, motioning to his right side, where the couch is empty.

For the first time, I get gooseflesh of my own. The hairs on my arm and the back of my neck stand to attention. “How…how do you know?”

“I can feel…a chill on my arm that I don’t feel anywhere else.”

“Is it just a draft?”

He glances around for an open door or window, but there isn’t one. “I don’t think so. And it feels familiar. I don’t know who it is, but I think it’s one of the regulars.”

“Ask them to do something,” I say.