Page 60 of The Accidental Ghost

Gutted physically, Ralph pushed futilely against his thin chest as he held her tight. “Let me go, Michael!”

But he shook his head, his greasy hair, drenched in perspiration, hanging in her face again. “Not until my friend gets here,” he said through clenched teeth, sweat beading his brow. “He’s coming!”

Okay, so he’d killed her, and that was really bad, but now he looked as though he was in physical pain. He looked as bad as she felt, and even in her fear Ralph saw his agony…and she hated it.

What had happened that he despised her so?

Gripping his arms, she begged, “Tell me what’s wrong with you, Michael? What’s happening?”

His chest rose and fell, harsh, choppy breaths escaping his lips. “Withdrawal, you dumb bitch! I’m in withdrawal. I haven’t transitioned all the way yet. I’m stuck just like you. That’s why I need you. Not only are you gonna give me your power, you’re gonna take my place in Hell.”

Of course it was drugs. That she hadn’t realized only spoke to her state of mind, but how could she give him her power? It made no sense. Did it automatically default to him in she ended up dumped in Hell? Or was someone going to steal it from her and give it to him?

“Michael, please, please let me help.”

He gave her a hard, jerky shake. “What the fuck do you care, anyway? You don’t care! You’re just trying to save your skin. Shut up! Just shut up and stay still!”

But rather than yell at him again, Ralph decided upon a softer approach as he lay on top of her, anchoring her to the ground by squeezing her thighs with his legs, which, despite his scrawny appearance, were quite strong.

Bracketing his face with her hands, she searched his eyes, brushed his hair from his face with gentle, shaky fingers. “Michael, how did this happen? How did you get here?”

He grabbed her by the front of her shirt, hauling her upward so fast she thought her back would break. “You! You did this to me! You killed me!”

Well, wait one ding-dang second. The nerve of this little shit. Who’d killed whom? And to think she’d been so distraught over fighting back and killing him in self-defense.

But it would do her no good to get angry about that now.

So again, she chose a gentle approach, one she might have taken with one of her students when she knew they were wrong but wanted a confession, rather than give them a browbeating.

“But you killed me first, Michael,” she huffed, her breathing labored as she held his face. “Why did you do this to me? To us? You were young, you had so much to live for…”

He yanked his face away from her touch with an angry cry. “I told you why that night, Ms. Tucci. I told you!”

Ralph frowned, still unable to remember a single thing about that night. “Tell me again, Michael,” she encouraged, forcing her voice to stay calm, soft. “I can’t remember what happened. Please, tell me again.”

His grip loosened ever so slightly when he said, “You really don’t remember me, do you? You made a promise to me when I was six years old. You promised if I ever needed you, you’d help me. But you lied. You lied just like everyone else!”

Ralph’s mind raced with his words, when I was six years old… Had he been her student? “Were you a…a student of mine?”

“Now she remembers,” he hissed in her face, his eyes bulging in mock astonishment. “Yes, Ms. Tucci. I used to be Michael Stevens, until my mother married that asshole of a boyfriend and made me change my name. The fuck who beat me every day of my goddamn life. You saw the bruises. You told me I could come to you for help!”

The memory of Michael’s recollections smashed into her head.

Oh, no. No, no, no.

She scrunched her eyes shut to block out the memory of that small boy with bruises on his arms and legs, refusing to tell her what had happened to him.

She knew his home life wasn’t a happy one. She knew that dark-haired little boy had suffered at the hands of one negligent parent or the other. His mother hardly, if ever, showed up for parent-teacher conferences or their class play or almost anything. No one did, and it hurt her heart to remember.

He’d sobbed that day when Ralph had approached him, raw and broken, shaking and frightened as he’d told her nothing had happened. Michael claimed he fell…and without anything other than her concerns, no one would look into it.

But she’d known then someone was abusing him, and it had once kept her up at night. Then he’d quite suddenly moved away without a forwarding address, and she’d lost track of him.

This was the sweet, small boy who’d sat next to her after story time, crying as she bucked all the rules and held him in her arms? He’d turned into this monster?

Ralph’s head had begun to throb, almost harder than her heart, and she felt weaker by the minute. “I did promise, Michael. I still want to help you. Let me help you now. Please…”

He clenched his fists as he grabbed up more of her shirt and shook her like a rag doll. “You want to help me now? Now? You didn’t give a shit about helping me that night! Why do you care now?”

---