“Yeah, it is. And right now? Right now, it’s better than being alive, because I didn’t have you when I was alive.”
My eyes water. I don’t know what to say to that. Why does he care about me so much? He has climbed into my heart and set up camp without me realizing—and it sounds like I’ve done the same for him.
We keep talking until I drift off to sleep, knowing full well that when I wake, Kit will no longer exist with me in here. I’ll be alone in the void once more. How I feel about Kit is so incredibly complicated. To put the most basic feelings forward, I care about him, but I cannot have a relationship with someone I am sharing a body with. I cannot have a relationship with a demon. What’s between Kit and I is not a relationship. It’s… It’s… I don’t know.
I’m not sure how much longer I can take this.
twenty-eight
. . .
When I awakefrom the strange unconsciousness that is not quite akin to sleep, I wander over to my window and take a seat. Kit is on the laptop drafting notes on our haunted house.
“Good morning,” I say pleasantly.
I hear the smile in his voice when he says, “Hey,” back.
“Whatcha doin’?” I ask, even though I know the answer.
“Making notes for the hunt tonight—if you still want to go. I’m putting all the research we did in one place and making a list of our potential ghosts. The baker lady, the sex fiends, everyone.” He clicks save on the document then closes the laptop. “Can I show you something?”
My eyebrows rise in curiosity. “Sure.”
He gets up and does a little jog into the kitchen where he brings out a brown paper bag. And out from the bag, he pulls?—
“Is that a thermal camera?” I ask. It’s exactly the one I wanted. I shake my head. “Kit, you don’t need to get me gifts. It’stoo much. Even if you are stealing them.”
“I didn’t steal this. I swear. I promised I’d get this for you, so I did.”
“Yeah, but only if you won that poker game, which you did not.”
He shrugs. “I had some cash left over from the Market. You need this, so I got it for you.”
“Thank you,” I say quietly, knowing that camera was expensive. “When did you have time to buy this?”
He sets the camera on the counter. “You’ve been asleep for nearly twenty-four hours.” He angles toward the window so I can see the dark sky. Oh, wow. It feels like every time I “sleep” I’m out for a bit longer.
Almost as if I’m fading away.
I don’t voice this observation aloud.
It’s getting late, and by the time we arrive at the house, it will be around midnight, so we decide to go ahead and leave. While Kit can successfully jump, he’s still wary of going long distances, so driving is his preferred method of transportation.
We pull up to the multi-level white house, situated at the end of a neighborhood street, hidden behind trees. Kit parks farther away so no one will suspect we’re at the house.
We need to be careful, even though the contest said that if they choose you and decide to air your footage, they will make sure to secure any of the necessary permits for anywhere you visit, even if it is after the fact. It’s fine. It’s not like I haven’t done this before.
Kit finds an unlocked window, pushing it up and open before putting both my tripods and my bag full of all myequipment through the window then climbing in himself.
The inside of the house represents every decade it’s been around, rooms at different stages of updates—a living room lined in wood panels that scream ’70s, a kitchen with dark-brown cabinets and stainless-steel appliances that feel like the early 2000s, ’80s floral wallpaper in the bathrooms, glow-in-the-dark stars still stuck to the ceiling in one of the bedrooms. There’s an odd chair in the kitchen, but other than that, there is no furniture in the house. It’s generally well-kept, since it’s still on the market, but it has been for sale for over a year. I eventually land on the upstairs main bedroom for where I want to start my night. Kit says it feels a few degrees colder than the rest of the house.
I want to leave August’s camera recording in the kitchen before I go upstairs. Kit sets up my tripod and the camera atop it, but doesn’t secure it perfectly.
“You need to screw it in tighter. Or, like, at all.”
“I’m sure it will be?—”
He’s cut off by the camera tipping off the tripod.
