Page 97 of Haunt Me

We watched some of the newsreels about my life, Mr. Elliot (Dad) and I. The doctors said it would be a bonding experience, if I was up to it. Mr. Elliot (Dad) was just struggling not to cry the whole time. We only got as far as the headlines: ‘The Lost Girl’, ‘the princess in the tower’, ‘Edie’, etc… Then we turned it off.

We tried talking to each other—we couldn’t. We didn’t know what to do.

Then I decided, what the heck. I’d show him my writing. So Mr. Elliot (Dad) read some of my poetry and his eyes popped out. He said ‘this is good stuff’ and then he cried some more.

We went together to a slam poetry club. It was beyond amazing. (I might have cried a bit too, but I will never admit it. But it was so beautiful there,being among all those true words.) I told him I wanted to try slam poetry, but I couldn’t bring myself to speak in public. So we went there every single night for two weeks straight, until I could muster up the courage to do it. Now I have recited three of my poems in public. He cried every time and I told him he was embarrassing me. He beamed at that. Real dads are weird.

You know this, right? I mean, heisyour dad. He is your dad,too, I should say, but it sounds so strange. So so strange.

I went to a concert. I did not go inside. (Yes, another weird thing I did—this is going to be a pattern, buckle up.) I did not even buy a ticket. I knew I couldn’t handle the crowds. But this person who was singing… His name is Issy Woo and he’s gone viral several times in the past few months—you’ll know him, I bet. Well, here is something you might not know: he wrote his first songs with me.

Forme.

But that’s a story for another day. (For never).

I stood outside his very first public concert, at a basketball stadium. I don’t think I drew a single breath during the whole thing. I sobbed out loud—and it was not a pretty sound, either, just ripped involuntarily from me—but no one heard me anyway.His voice.My God, his voice. It has become a force to be reckoned with. I just stood there, listening to it, feeling the world tilt on its axis. He never saw me, he never even knew. But I was there. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

No way am I going to let him see me now, after everything that’s happened. I am too embarrassed—I feel too disgusting. IfIam disgusted by what’s happened to me, imagine how he must feel. Besides, my story has been all over the news for months now, my face plastered across every TV and online news agency in the country. He knows why I disappeared. He knows, and he wants nothing to do with me. I don’t blame him.

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