Lost in La La Land(32)

Even if it meant me being forthcoming about my location and offering an address, I would see this assault charge through.

The mayor would try to buy his way out of it, but this wasn't New York. And these people weren’t on his payroll. It wasn't even his state.

I had to have hope that good would win against evil.

Even if this world was mostly evil.





Chapter Fourteen


I sat on my bed, staring at the fireplace and wondering if Jonathan would ever show himself to me. As much as I had desperately wanted to see him, his was not the face I needed.

I was eager to see Wentworth. I wished I could tell him about the horrible thing that had happened to me. I wished he would offer me comfort and protection. I wished he could come out into the real world with me, and maybe even kick the mayor’s ass.

Instead, I stared at the brick and waited for a ghost to come.

The house was silent, as everyone else was sleeping.

The candles made for a perfect scene in which a haunting would occur.

Even my crisp white nightgown was exactly what a girl wore when a ghost entered her room at night.

But he didn't come.

So I went to him, certain I would see him in the secret passageway, certain he would be spying on me.

I pushed the brick as Mrs. Humboldt had, making a ton of noise as it slid open, dragging along the floor. I winced and glanced back at the door, hoping I hadn’t woken anyone.

It was open enough for me to slide through so I grabbed a candle in a holder and carried it into the shadows.

The flicker of the light danced on the walls as I made my way down the stairs, casting my own shadows.

“Emma?”

I spun, seeing him standing on the stairs behind me, the ones I’d just come down. I must have walked right through him, considering I could see the bricks through him now. “Jonathan,” I whispered. He looked exactly as he had the day he died, same clothes and all. My heart leapt at seeing him. It was the moment I had been waiting for all this time.

“You’re here?” He scowled. “How?”

“I’m in my dream. I’m in a story where I created you with lies of an ex-husband.” My explanation sounded insane. I hadn’t thought it through well enough.

“Ex?”

“You’re dead, my darling. You died. You left me. I came here looking for you.”

“No. Impossible. I would never leave you. I love you.” He rushed me, but his hands went through mine. He didn’t sound like himself, but rather what I would want him to say to me, what I wanted him to say a long time ago.

How was Danny there for Lana, so real that she gave up everything to be with him, and I got Jonathan the ghost who spewed words like the hero in a romance?

This was not my funny and pragmatic Jonathan. This was not Jonathan but a cheap copy, a version my brain weakly made up to satisfy a lie I told. My own creation.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, fear whispered that my loss and grief and imagination were not the same as Lana’s. I couldn't make Jonathan real. Maybe it was the denial. Maybe she had a much better case of it than I did.

Or maybe it was that my rational brain, my scientist’s brain, saw through the fa?ade.

“My hands.” He swiped them through mine again and again, confused as to why we couldn't touch. “You’re a ghost,” he spoke softly.

I thought about arguing the fact but then I realized, the story was real to them and I was the ghost in the machine. I was the outsider. “Yes, darling.”

“Is this the only time we’ll see each other? Is this you saying goodbye to me?” Was it? Was that why, after all these years, I was having the least realistic interaction with my husband possible?

“I don't know.” I stared into his eyes, lost in their unnatural glow.

“I came to Sir Walter Scott’s house to wait for you. I knew you’d be back. It was your favorite place.”

“Of course.” The memory I couldn't believe I’d forgotten slipped back in. I’d been here before. I came on a tour with Jonathan once. We came to Sir Walter Scott’s house, but we never saw secret tunnels.

That was why I’d linked him to this house—the lies in my brain told the nanobots about this place.

“How are you?” he asked so delicately.

“I miss you.” Tears flooded my eyes. So many things were different now. So many things ruined.

“I miss you too. How’s Lola?” He chuckled bitterly.

“Well. She’s with Stan and Marguerite. They’re taking care of her now. She loves the kids and the yard. And my lonely life isn’t good for a dog.”

“You must miss her.”

“I do. I miss you both. I wanted to say sorry. I wanted to try to explain how sorry I am.”

“Sorry for what?”

“That I let you go back in. I should have stopped you.”

“In where? Did you sell the house?” he asked, clearly unaware of the fire. Unaware of how he had died. Unaware of being dead. Because this was not him and it was never going to be him. That bitterness of truth stung but I forced myself to see it, scared to go backward from it.

“Yeah. I did. I bought an apartment in the city and then I sold it too. And now I’m living in your gloomy old aunt’s house. It’s creepy and Gothic and sort of exactly what I needed.”