Free Manifest by Artist Arthur Page B

girlfriend.
    She’s also glowing.
    There’s this bright haze around her body like she’s there but not really, almost a shimmer instead of a solid-looking figure. That’s how the lady on the beach looked. Ricky doesn’t look like that when he appears. I wonder why.
    Ricky underestimates you. He said you were young and naive. But I don’t think so. I think you’re more mature than he realizes.
    “I think you should mind your dead-ass business!” I snap because she’s getting on my nerves. Ricky doesn’t know me and neither does she.
    This time she laughs loud. So loud I look around like I think somebody else might hear. Oops, I forgot I’m the resident medium, meaning I’m the only lunatic that can hear her. Just so happens, I’m the one she’s laughing at. Ain’t that a trip.
    Yeah, you’ve got a little spunk in you. Too bad you’re so into yourself you can’t use that to help somebody else.
    “Why should I help him? I don’t even know him. I don’t even know how to help.”
    Then I think about what I am saying, like I am seriously considering helping Ricky get to the other side, or wherever he is supposed to be. Flashes of Poltergeist enter my mind.That tiny woman with those huge sunglasses on standing in front of the door with all that light, telling Carol Anne’s mother to go in and get her daughter. I wonder if I’d have to do something bizarre like that. God, I hope not.
    “Wait a minute,” I say, having another quick thought. “Why are you here? Are you stuck on this side, too?” Maybe her and Ricky are trying to get a two-for-one deal. If that is the case, I definitely don’t do hookups!
    Nah, I died before Ricky and went on without a glitch.
    “So why didn’t he?”
    She shrugs, which only makes her hair bounce off her shoulders, her gold earrings sparkle and her face look prettier than I want to admit.
    I don’t know. At first I thought he was just being stubborn, but even when I try to get him to walk with me, he can’t.
    “What? Walk with you where?”
    It’s kind of complicated.
    “And talking to spirits isn’t? If you want my help then I want information.” I think. I mean, how much do I really want to know about the afterlife?
    All right, well, it’s like this. You die and then there’s like this break in the road you’re taking. You go one way and it leads you to what I figure now is eternity. Like where you’re supposed to spend the rest of your afterlife. You go the other way and it’s a dead end. You don’t go anywhere, you just stay dead.
    “That makes absolutely no sense at all,” I say, then realize that seeing and talking to a ghost isn’t high up there on the intelligence list either.
    It does, I’m probably just not explaining it right. Anyway, Ricky’s stuck. He said you can help him and I believe him.
    I sigh. “I don’t know how to prove who killed him.”
    You can start by talking to Twan and the other guys. I think they know something.
    “I can’t do this.”
    Can’t or won’t?
    She doesn’t wait for my answer but huffs and disappears. Is there such a thing as a temperamental spirit?
     
    I am so late.
    Because of my screwed-up day I totally forgot about meeting with Mrs. Lightner, the guidance counselor. Technically I should have gotten a pass from last period like Mrs. Lightner suggested. Instead I’d spent last period ignoring Alyssa’s and Camy’s gibes and not paying a bit of attention to Mrs. Tremble’s lesson, for the second class in a row.
    So as soon as the final bell rings and I am on my way to my locker to grab my stuff and head for the bus stop, I remember the stupid appointment and run like hell to get to the first-floor administrative offices. Unfortunately, Mrs. Lightner had already gone.
    So now I’m on my way back down the hall, heading to the front door so I can hopefully catch the bus home. Although I’m not playing any sport or involved in any other after-school activity they should still let me on the bus. God, I