Page 1 of Light As A Feather
OCTOBER 2023
Ghost-touched.
Veil-walker.
My condition has been described in many ways, but whatever name you put on it, it remains a mystery.
Over the years, I’ve met other people like me, and it’s part of how I ended up in the line of work that I’m in. However, all that searching didn’t prove very helpful. Turns out, each person is unique, and so is their relationship with the veil. But talking to others did give me some valuable information that helped me untangle the knots of confusion around my existence. Slowly, with testing and questioning, I’ve discovered the rules—limits, abilities, and things that fall in between. The very nature of it contradicts itself more often than not.
I bleed like any other man, but the concept of death doesn’t really hold any bearing on me. I’m already straddling that line.
There’s nothing distinctly different about my appearance—the only mark the deal left on me is the white streak that runs through my otherwise dark hair. However, people like me age more slowly than the laws of biology dictate we should. I suspect that will become much more evident as the years add up and my skin doesn’t crease and sag quite like it should. Not that I’m complaining. It’s one of the few silver linings.
I can communicate with the dead just as easily as the living, and they never let me forget it. Yes, it allows me to help others, but it would be a lie to pretend it isn’t a heavy burden.
I can walk between realms, and sometimes, that can distort my reality. My friends insist I spend too much time straddling two worlds looking for her.
Solaneen Gomez.
With bloodied hands, I hold onto that fraying cord of hope that I won’t find her among the dead. Yet every day that passes, I fear that she might evade me for the rest of her life.
They’re not wrong to worry. But my love for her is the singular truth that guides my life. And until I get her back, nothing else matters.
Is the risk of losing myself worth finding her?
Of course it is.Without her, I’m lost anyway.
That’s why I don’t hesitate to jump into action when I finally get the call I’ve been waiting years for.
“There’s been a sighting.”Four simple words that mean everything.“Just outside of SF at a little motel. I’ll text you the name.”
Not states away. Hours away. The closest we’ve been in far too long.
This time, I’m not letting her slip through my grasp. She’s coming home with me, even if I have to tie her up and drag her back.
She’s an early riser, but if I make it there before sunrise, I’ll likely be able to catch her before she makes a move. In a blur, I throw on some real clothes: a black coat, a black sweater, and black denim. Then I nearly sprint to the car and drive into the uncertain darkness at one in the morning. I whip recklessly around the winding, narrow road, ignoring the painful promise of the steep cliffs that line parts of my drive. Each mile marker is a mocking reminder of how much distance remains between us. The scenery I’ve spent my life admiring passes by in flashes as I blow past the speed limit.
Rich classical music fills the air, swelling violins coaxing me to press the pedal closer to the floorboard. Beneath the music, there’s a shuddering breath of the pianist buried in the recording, and I imagine it’s hers fanning across my lips with the twin flutter of her lashes against my cheeks. With each mile, my heart pumps harder, searching for hers, trying to synchronize with a distant tune that’s still playing too quietly. Eachthump, thump, a call for the woman who once found sanctuary with her ear to my chest.
Time is in flux as my mind drifts back to the past—late nights dancing to Joy Division and Sisters of Mercy ’til our feet hurt, summers full of sunsets on the shore, ghost hunting in abandoned places we had no business being in… Our life was perfect, should have been. But then came the torture of the years spent apart. My hands tighten on the wheel as I’m battered by an onslaught of pain reminiscent of those first bleak, empty months.
The alert for low gas interrupts my spiral. I make quick work of the task, but the long list of notifications on my phone keeps me from jumping right back on the freeway. The carhums to life, and the thrum of the bass matches the adrenaline pounding through my system. Opening my email, I take a look at the footage and stills Mendez sent over. Solaneen’s naturally brown hair is now green and much longer, with short bangs cut just above her dark brows. Her olive skin is covered in new tattoos. But even with the changes to her appearance, there’s no mistaking those brilliant brown eyes cut with citrine.
A chill chases away the warmth I feel at seeing her again as I take in the looming presence hovering behind her left shoulder.Ivan.The persistent fucker who got us into this mess in the first place. He’ll be dealt with in due time. But first, I need to get my girl back.
My breath shakes on the exhale as I allow myself just a few more seconds to regroup after the unpleasant realization, and then the car is launching forward, racing through the last leg of this unexpected road trip.
Within minutes, I spot the motel off the highway, a scarlet SOS in a sea of neon signs.
So close.
The parking lot is fairly empty as I pull in. Putting the car into park, my hands shake with the overwhelming swell of anticipation and longing catching up to me with the flood of memories that motel lots always bring.
My eyes play tricks on me, the empty night now filled with the image of her stumbling to her door, keys slipping between her unsteady fingers as a random man grips at her hips, his body flush with hers.
The heat that creeps up my neck is as real as it was that night when I first possessed someone. It wasn’t on purpose; it wasn’t even something I knew I could do. Jealousy was vibrating me out of my own skin. My urge to be close to her took on a life of its own. That man became an unwitting test subject as I slippedfrom my consciousness and into his body—mine left in the car in a meditative state. Idling.
I would have felt bad, but he was the one following a drunk woman back to her hotel room. Some men have no morals. Not that mine were all that much better in the moment. But if Sol was intent on fucking away her guilt and worries, I would be that vessel for her. I would do anything for her. Even engaging in a hollow bastardization of the magic our bodies used to make. I resigned myself to the notion that I was doing this for us, a small sacrifice that was also so selfish.
