The first time I met Chan was at Dusty’s funeral and every time I’ve seen her since she’s always looked flawless, but I didn’t realise until this moment quite how much losing Dusty had dulled her shine. She not only looks a lot more flamboyant and definitely more colourful now, but there seems to be a lightness to her that wasn’t there before.
She heads into the kitchen, and I follow. Dusty is now planted at the small kitchen table with a bottle of ketchup, and she’s spread out the wrapping from her sandwich on the table, not bothering with a plate as she begins to separate out the layers and add ketchup.
“And you said you’d be no good at a post-mortem,” I mutter as she looks up at me and grins. “I can feel my arteries hardening from over here. Will you please treat my body with a little respect?”
She doesn’t answer and instead lifts the thick reassembled sandwich to her mouth and takes a huge bite. As half the filling is pushed out the other side of the soggy bread and drops to the packaging with a wet thud, her eyes roll back in her head, and she lets out the most obscene and borderline pornographic moan I’ve ever heard.
I watch as she chews like a little chipmunk, humming in pleasure and almost dancing in her chair like a child would. Thin stripes of ketchup smear from the corners of her mouth to her cheeks, making her look like the fast-food version of the Joker.
“I’m getting heartburn just looking at that,” I say with a wrinkle of my nose.
“Ohhh, soo good.” The words are slightly muffled due to the amount of sandwich she has crammed into her mouth, or I should say, my mouth. At this rate, when I get my body back, I’m going to be ten pounds heavier.
“You know, Tris,” Dusty says around another mouthful of food. “I didn’t realise how much I’d missed certain things. For the most part, I’m more than happy being dead. I’ve gotten used to it now plus, you know… Bruce… he’s just a big shiny bonus. But I can’t deny missing certain things, like hugging Chan and hanging out with her or, you know, eating and sleeping. If we figure out how to switch bodies, maybe we could make this a regular thing. You know, like I could book your body for a week at the end of July.”
“I’m not a caravan park in Devon, so no, you bloody cannot.”
“It was just a thought.” She grins and I’m pretty sure she’s just messing with me.
“So what’s the plan?” Chan asks as she makes herself a cup of tea.
Dusty swallows and wipes her mouth. “We’re going to the bookshop in Whitechapel. There’s a ghost there, Evangeline Crawshanks, who might know how we can switch bodies back. It’s worth a shot anyway.”
Chan nods slowly, turning around and leaning against the counter as she sips her tea. “It’s been so good having you back. I don’t want it to end but at the same time, I feel awful for Tris. I adore him and this has got to be really hard on him, especially considering how awkward it was yesterday with Danny. I wish there was some way I could keep you both.”
“Hey.” Dusty reaches out and grasps her hand, squeezing affectionately. “We’ll figure it out, I promise. I have to give Tristan back his body, but I’ll find a way for us to be close again, even if we have to use a damn Ouija board.”
“No, absolutely not,” I say firmly. “We will find a way for you and Chan to stay close, but you are not using one of those filthy boards. You know both Evangeline and Bruce told us that they only attract the lowest, most base earthbound spirits. Let’s not borrow more trouble. We’ve got our hands full as it is.”
“Fine.” Dusty rises, patting her stomach happily. “Right now I’m going to get dressed. Chan, are you coming with us?”
“Oh, I wouldn’t miss this.” She grins.
I leave Chan to finish her cup of tea in peace; it’s not like I can have a conversation with her anyway. I check in on Mrs Abernathy, who is still randomly watching the blank screen of the TV, but whatever, it’s keeping her quiet and in one place so I’m not going to disturb her. Dusty has disappeared into the bedroom to get showered and dressed, and I find myself once again wandering aimlessly. I kind of get it now. No wonder Mrs Abernathy is always wandering off. Being a spirit is really boring. I can’t touch anything, I can't talk to anyone… well, anyone living.
I stop in front of the window and stare out onto the street miserably.
My thoughts are once again drawn back to Danny. The next few days are going to be rough on him, and there’s nothing I can do to change that. Until I get my body back, Dusty is going to have to try and avoid him as much as possible to avoid sticky situations, but there’s no way for him to take that anyway other than as a rejection.
He looked so dejected when he left the flat last night. It almost killed me to see that look on his face. It’s not like we can tell him the truth. It’s going to be hard enough convincing him I can see ghosts and not sounding completely nuts, but add in a freak body swap and it’s tough to see how that’s not going to completely mess up our fledgling relationship.
I love him more than anything and I know he loves me, but sometimes love isn’t enough. These days my life is insane. Displaced spirits looking for closure, weird dark wraith things floating about all over the place, and now a dead drag queen in charge of my body while I roam untethered, not living but not dead either.
Life is not supposed to be this hard.
I’m going to have to tell him the truth. I want a life with Danny, I’m pretty sure I want to grow old with him. I want to spend my old age hiding each other’s false teeth and laughing at each other’s incontinence pants. I can’t do that if I’m not completely honest with him. I can only hope he’ll accept all the weird parts of me as well as the good parts.
I really don’t want to lose him, but I can’t share a home with him and constantly try to hide every conversation I have with spirits. It’s exhausting just thinking about it. No… I’m going to do it. I’m going to tell him the truth… I’ll maybe just wait until I have my own body back.
“Okay, I’m ready, let's go,” Dusty says from behind me, and I turn.
“No, absolutely not, go and change.” I shake my head slowly.
“What?” Dusty looks down at her outfit innocently.
“What?” I repeat as I stare.
She’s dressed my body in the tightest pair of jeans ever invented. They might as well be painted on. Not only that, but they’re bedazzled with lines of rhinestones running up the seams.
