Page 92 of The Drummer

I take a quick shower and grab a snack before staring at my phone, fighting the temptation to message Callie. She probably gave me her number “for logistics,” not so I would bother her while she’s trying to get a break from us.

Maybe just an apology?

My finger hovers over her name.

When did you become a needy teenager?

With a sigh, I shove my phone back in my pocket and decide to check on Luke. I’m a few steps into the hallway when I notice the office door is open a crack. My heart beats faster and a cold sweat breaks over my skin. I’ve never encountered a ghost, but if I did, this is what it’d feel like.

Part of me wants to turn around and go back to the living room. Actually, no. Most of me votes for scrolling streaming menus and pretending I didn’t see anything. But the piece of my soul Callie owns is screaming at me not to let this go. If she was willing to step into a complete stranger’s weirdness, what level of strange should I be willing to tolerate from my best friend?

I don’t bother knocking. He’ll tell me to go away or say nothing at all, so I just push through the door.

Light streams into the room. My gaze shoots to the corner where I expect to find him on a chair like a horror movie jump scare. Instead, he’s seated on the edge of the desk, staring blankly. He turns his head in surprise when I enter, and I offer a weak smile before tracking his line of sight to the opposite corner of the room.

Ah. So the creepy chairisthere. He’s just not sitting on it.

This might actually be worse.

“Sorry about earlier,” he says.

“It’s fine. I get it.”

I don’t know how to ask the obvious question, so I let my wandering gaze do it for me. Luke rests his stare back on the chair and studies it in silence for a long time, so I park myself next to him and get a good look as well. I don’t know why I’m surprised it looks exactly the same as all the other chairs I saw at Jemma’s. Maybe I expected this one to be the gilded version caked in diamonds or something.

But no. It’s… a chair.

“Do you believe in ghosts?” he asks in a conversational tone.

A shiver runs through me.

I scratch at my temple, not sure I’m equipped to do this. “I don’t know. I believe we don’t know as much as we think we do. Every generation thinks they’ve figured it all out, and the next one proves how little they knew.”

He nods without looking at me. “Like The Enlightenment and shit?”

“Yeah. I mean, if you asked a dude in the Middle Ages how the brain worked, he’d tell you with one hundred percent confidence it was because a million tiny elves were running around inside your skull banging on shit. Doesn’t mean he was right about it. How do we know the stuffwe’reso sure about won’t be laughable in a hundred years?”

“So you don’t believe in ghosts but you don’tdon’tbelieve in ghosts,” he muses. A smile cracks his severe expression.

I can’t help but laugh. “Yeah. I guess. I believe if you want to believe in ghosts you have as much basis for that as someone whodoesn’twant to believe it.”

He nods again and squints back at the chair. “Am I still a bad person, Casey?”

I go numb.

His gaze slowly tears away from the chair to find me. All humor is gone from his face. His eyes search mine, open and waiting for the truth.

But whatisthe truth? That was my point earlier. It’s all about perspective. What he’s really asking is if his framework for being a bad person has changed.

“I’ll answer that after you answer a question for me.”

He sucks in a breath. The nervous glance he shoots at the chair makes me think he’s afraid I’m going to ask about it. I will. One hundred percent. But not right now. Callie was right. We’ll know when it’s time.

“What’s the question?” he says when I hesitate.

“What would have happened if Callie had stumbled upon theold Luke in Jemma’s instead of who you are now? Would you have made room for her in your life?”

He flinches and tightens his grip around the edge of the desk on either side of him.

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