Chapter Text
Jared stands in the bathroom, fingers gripping the sink so tight the muscles in his forearms stand out like cords. He stares at his reflection in the mirror, beads of sweat rolling down his forehead. He grits his teeth, jaw clenching hard, and stares himself down with savage intensity.
“Do. Not. Fuck this up,” he grates, hissing out the words.
He stares at the mirror a moment longer, letting it know he means business. Then he lets go, steps back and wipes the sweat from his forehead.
He takes a moment, takes a breath, and then gathers himself, turning to open the door.
*
Twenty minutes later...
“I’m sorry. I am so, so sorry,” Jared apologizes, hands fumbling at Rick’s shoulders, trying to help the other man get his jacket on.
“Dude, that end table attacked me,” Rick says, shrugging off Jared’s hands. He’s hobbling out the door of Jared’s apartment, and is that blood on his shin? That looks like blood.
“The floor in this apartment is crooked,” Jared says hurriedly, “and the hardwood is very slippery. “Come on, you don’t have to go—”
“Look,” Rick says, holding up a hand to stop Jared. “You seem nice. You’re really fucking hot. But after the wine bottle falling on my head and the end table cracking my shin, I’m thinking this isn’t worth it.”
“We could go to your place?” Jared offers, hopeful. Rick’s place is almost an hour away though, and he already knows it’s useless.
“Good night, Jared,” Rick says and shambles out the door.
“Good night,” Jared says, voice limp.
He closes the door a moment later, turning and leaning his back against it. He sighs and begins buttoning up the shirt Rick had started unbuttoning a few minutes earlier on the couch. He buttons it wrong and rips it back open in frustration, gritting his teeth as buttons fall to the floor with dainty clatters.
“God dammit, Chad,” he grates.
*
Jared brushes his teeth in the bathroom the next morning as he gets ready for work, ignoring the mirror still fogged up from his shower. He rinses his mouth and spits, looking up enough to turn the water on, and glimpses a question mark etched into the condensation on the glass.
“I’m pissed because you chased off my date. Again ,” Jared adds, venomous.
He finishes rinsing his mouth and stands up, running his toothbrush under the water.
Written in unsteady, lopsided letters on the mirror is the word “Dickbag”.
“Maybe he was,” Jared agrees with sarcastic alacrity. “But now we’ll never know.”
He watches as an invisible finger underlines the word Dickbag, and sighs.
“Whatever,” he responds, rubbing a hand across the mirror, erasing it all.
*
Jared has to do something about this. He hasn’t gotten laid since he moved in here six months ago and discovered he had a ghost living in his apartment. He doesn’t know much about Chad besides his name, that he’d lived here, and that, much like Jared, he’d been an aspiring actor. He’d died in a pretty freak accident—the landlady had been very forthcoming about that—but mostly, Chad is a complete stranger he’s shared living space with for six months. Jared wouldn’t even mind, except that Chad refuses to let Jared have a love life.
He’s a healthy 26 year old gay man living in California. There are people living in stairwells nearby who’ve had sex more than he has in the last six months.
It’s that thought, really, more than anything else that makes him walk to Main Street, seeking out a store front he’d seen last time he’d gone out to the bars.
Felicia’s Fortunes , the neon sign reads, not as bright in the light of mid-day as it had been at three am two Saturday nights ago. It also looks much less mystical, although that’s probably—at least in part—due to the fact that he hasn’t had nine shots this time.
He stands there on the street, feeling silly now that he’s here. What’s he going to do? March in there and pay some stranger to listen to him complain about his lack of a sex life? Explain to her that it’s really not him, it’s his ghost? She’d probably tell him he needs a psychiatrist, not a psychic.
But what else can he do? Go home and not jerk off because he’s too worried about his ghost watching?
He hesitates outside the wooden door for a moment longer, then seizes the handle.
*
“It sounds like this Chad has unfinished business,” Felicia tells him. She’s tiny and pale, her red hair shimmering in the low light of the room, blue eyes serious as she regards him from across the table.
The room is draped with nice fabrics, one of which adorns the round table they’re sitting at, but there are no crystal balls or tarot cards laid out on its small circumference. The most mysterious thing in the room is the black cat lying on top of a tall, skinny dresser in one corner, its luminous yellow eyes drifting lazily at half mast. There are candles, and some crystals, and some interesting art on the walls, but all in all, it’s not the overdone mystical extravaganza Jared had expected.
“You said he died unexpectedly in a freak accident, right?” Felicia asks. “Sometimes, if a person dies suddenly, too quickly, they don’t have a chance to realize that they’re dead, much less make peace with their death.”
“Okay,” Jared says, and nods. “What can I do about it?”
“You said he can communicate with you…” Felicia trails off, musing.
“Just short words written on my mirror and the whiteboard in my kitchen, but yeah. Kind of.”
Felicia looks at him with an inspired, bright light in her blue eyes. “I think we can do better than that.”
*
“Normally I wouldn’t suggest using a Ouija,” Felicia tells Jared as she sets the board down on his kitchen table. “But since this spirit is already summoned, we don’t have to worry as much.”
“What do you mean?” Jared asks, frowning.
“The danger of using a Ouija to communicate is inviting spirits into the place where the ouija exists. If you’re not careful, they become trapped there. Sometimes they just decide they like it anyway and stay. But you’re already haunted, so that’s not a problem.”
“I still don’t understand what getting him to talk is going to accomplish.”
“We want to find out why he’s here. If we can find that out, then maybe we can help him find peace and move on.”
Jared doesn’t have much in the way of candles, but Felicia makes a nice arrangement with what he does have, lighting them and closing the curtains in the apartment.
“Have you ever done this before?” she asks as she settles in across from him.
“Used a Ouija board?” he asks, debating whether or not to lie; wondering if she might sense it if he did. “Once. When I was a kid.” Felicia looks at him expectantly, and Jared continues, hedging. “My friend down the street had a party.” That’s it, that’s as much as he wants to tell.
“And what happened?” she asks, making him regret his decision to tell the truth.
“We...uh…”
Felicia arches a brow at Jared.
“We drank a bottle of peach schnapps and tried to summon Tupac,” he says, the words blurring together in an embarrassed rush.
She looks at him, considering, and Jared wants to slide out of his chair and underneath the table, cursing his 12 year old self.
After a moment, she asks, “Did he show?”
Jared blinks, surprised by the question. “Um. No.”
Felicia nods like she’d been expecting the answer. “Yeah. He’s really picky about who he talks to,” she tells him with an air of authority.
It makes sense. Even if he wasn’t picky, Jared can understand how a bunch of white boys drunk on peach schnapps wouldn’t be his first choice.
“This is going to be different,” she goes on after a moment. “Chad is likely to talk to us. He’s probably been dying to talk to you.”
Her smile fades as they look at each other, and Felicia glances away first.
“Yeah. I really should have used a different word,” she says, awkward.
*
A few minutes later, they both have their fingertips on the wooden planchette, Felicia calling out softly for Chad to speak to them.
Jared feels the planchette wiggle a little, and then jerk slightly to the left, and Felicia smiles.
“Hello Chad,” she greets. “Jared’s told me a lot about you. We were wondering if you would tell us why you’re here.”
The planchette jerks slightly to the right this time, hesitates, and then begins to move, gliding across the wood. It stops after about an inch, going still.
“I know it might be hard for you to move objects in the physical realm,” Felicia says, sympathetic. “You don’t have to make complete sentences.” When nothing happens, she urges, “Try it in four words or less.”
The planchette begins to move, slowly spelling out words: “i… live… here.” The planchette hesitates, then begins to move again, faster “...dumbass”.
Felicia’s pleased smile fades with the last word, her lips thinning. “Actually, you don’t live anywhere,” she corrects. “You’ve passed on from the mortal world,” she adds, her voice gentling. “Do you know that?”
The planchette spells out, “duh”, and Jared has to stifle a grin. Chad could have gone for the word YES instead of spelling anything out, but he’d gone for being a dick instead. It’s kind of admirable, really.
“Then why are you still here, Chad?” Felicia goes on. “Is there something holding you here? Did you have a girlfriend, or—”
Felicia breaks off suddenly, her face going deathly pale, blue eyes wide and fixed on a point over Jared’s left shoulder.
“What?” she asks, befuddled, seeming uncomfortable. “Why would I have a girlfriend? I’m not gay. I don’t—
She breaks off again, almost as if listening to something.
“Wait. Can you hear him?” Jared asks.
Felicia nods in acknowledgement of Jared’s question and then suddenly, she gasps as if deeply offended. “Of course I haven't,” she hisses. “I would never —my parents would—-”
Felicia falls silent, two red spots rising to her cheeks, the only color in her entire face, and Jared really wishes he could hear whatever Chad is saying. Maybe if he focuses… tries to concentrate really hard...
Felicia’s eyes go wide and she stands up from the table so fast the chair goes skidding out behind her. “How dare you.” She lifts one finger, pointing it at something behind Jared. “You don’t know who you’re messing with, buddy. You’re lucky I use my powers for good or you’d be haunting the toilet for the rest of eternity.”
She gives the air one last, vicious poke, and then spins, storming towards the door of the apartment.
Jared takes a deep breath and turns in his seat.
There’s a man standing behind him. Jared can see his computer desk through him.
Chad has his arms folded across his chest as he watches Felicia leaving.
The door to the apartment slams behind her, and Chad shakes his head, proclaiming:
“So far in the closet she’s eating Turkish Delight with the White Witch.”
*
Chad is the only name Jared has known the spirit in his apartment by, and to be honest, it never registered much on the ‘how hot is this ghost’ meter, because who would even wonder that? Well, okay, Jared had wondered, maybe he’s weird. But with a name like Chad, Jared had figured he probably wouldn’t be that hot.
Turns out, Chad is that hot. Squinty hazel eyes, angular jaw and spiky blond streaked hair. He’s the living embodiment of a teenage heartthrob, and it gives Jared a moment of pause.
Chad is a ghost. Chad is a hot ghost. A hot ghost that Jared can see, and for a moment, Jared wonders if he can do more than see Chad. Because, seriously, a guy this good looking, trapped in Jared’s apartment for eternity might not be such a bad thing. Especially since this guy has been cockblocking him for the last six months. Maybe Chad has a thing for him? Maybe that’s what’s been going on?
Or maybe… just maybe... six months without sex is doing weird things to Jared’s brain?
Probably. But still. Chad presents an intriguing possibility. Kind of an asshole, yeah, but he’s funny.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” Chad demands, surly. And then he blinks, arms falling to his sides as he straightens. “Wait. You’re looking at me. You can see me.”
Jared nods, still too dumbfounded to speak.
“That’s great,” Chad says, slapping his hands together, his face lighting up with excitement. Mere seconds later, his suspicious scowl returns. “Why are you looking at me like that , though?”
“I…” Jared fumbles for words. “I was just… wondering. I mean… you’ve been cockblocking me since I moved in and…”
Chad’s brows rise as he regards Jared, his face otherwise impassive.
Jared hesitates for what feels like a long time. It’s one thing to have these thoughts; it’s a whole other thing to say them out loud. But, well, he really kind of needs to know.
“I… Are you…? Are you jealous, Chad?” Jared pauses, awkward, and then forces himself to go on. “Are you… in love with me?”
Chad laughs like it’s the most absurd thing he’s ever heard. When he’s done, he bends down and looks Jared straight in the eye, suddenly dead serious as he says, “No, dumbass. It’s because you have terrible fucking taste in men.”
“I do not ,” Jared blurts, offended.
Chad lifts his chin a fraction, giving Jared a canny look. “When you first saw me, what did you think?”
Jared opens his mouth to speak, and then stops, realizing.
“Come on. Out with it, Jared.”
Sheepish and guilty, Jared mumbles, “I was attracted to you.”
Chad nods. “I rest my fucking case.”