Stephanie heard her phone vibrating from across the room where it had sat unanswered for nearly four weeks. She had not replied to a single message or answered a single call in all that time.
Everyone knew she was alive as her mother checked on her daily and fed the reports back to everyone through social media. Social media was something else Stephanie did not miss. Her mum kept at her every day, that she needed to reconnect with the world. That it was time. Four weeks was long enough.
Every time her mum uttered those words she wanted to scream and launch herself at her mum in a fit of pure rage. Every time she just shook her head no. She kept everything she was feeling and thinking to herself. It was better that way. All they wanted to know was that she was not going to inconvenience them by doing "something silly".
She had no intentions of doing so. She just was not ready to face the world yet. She had lost the love of her life mere minutes after he had proposed. He had asked. She said yes. He dropped dead. Brain aneurysms they said, and apparently, they happen every 18 minutes with 40% being fatal.
That is what the doctor had explained to her like that somehow made a difference. It had been 100% fatal in the case she cared about.
Stephanie had not touched the television since that night. The gentle hum of its standby light felt too harsh, a reminder that life moved on around her while she was stuck in a suspended state of grief. The rooms in the house seemed larger, and emptier, as if echoing with the memory of a shared life she dared not disturb.
Then, one night as she lay in bed staring at the ceiling, a familiar scent filled the room—his cologne, a whiff of cedar and spice that had somehow lingered on his clothes long after his body ceased to warm them. Her heart jolted. It was not possible. The room was cold, the windows shut tight against the autumn chill, yet the fragrance was undeniable, intoxicating.
“Chris?” Her voice was a hoarse whisper, breaking the silence like a rock through glass. No reply came, but the air shifted, charged with a presence that tingled against her skin. Stephanie sat up, her breath visible in the moonlit room.
Compelled by a mix of fear and hope, she swung her legs out of bed. Her foot struck something hard. Glancing down, she saw the book Chris had been reading in bed before he had passed — a book she had put away a week ago on the bookshelf in the spare room, unable to bear seeing it on his bedside table, knowing he would never finish it. How had it gotten here?
Stephanie picked up the book, her fingers trembling as she traced the title embossed on its cover. Emotions surged within her, a mixture of sorrow and fear. She set the book down on the nightstand, the gesture seeming to acknowledge Chris’s presence.
In need of a compassionate ear, she confided in a trusted friend the next day, hoping for understanding or maybe confirmation that she was not losing her mind. However, her friend, overwhelmed by concern, betrayed Stephanie’s confidence and informed her mother of her daughter's "hallucinations."
Her mother confronted her the following afternoon, her words sharp and demanding. “Stephanie, you need to get over this now! It’s been long enough.”
Stephanie had opened the front door but not the locked security screen door. She knew this moment would come. She was prepared. The argument heated quickly, with Stephanie asserting her boundaries, insisting that grief was a personal journey and that her mother had no right to dictate its duration.
“I’m not ready, Mum! And you don’t get to decide when I am.”
Her mother’s face tightened, a mix of frustration and worry etching her features. “I’m just worried about you, Stephanie. I’m going to get a doctor to see you, maybe a psychiatrist—”
“You only care about appearances, about your social standing!” Stephanie exploded, the words harsh and loud. “It’s pathetic. Don’t come back.” Slamming the door shut, seething with a mix of betrayal and indignation.
Her mother’s voice softened, muffled through the door, “I’ll get you the best help money can buy, Stephanie.” But Stephanie ignored her and walked further into her house until she could not hear her mum.
That night, shaken and desperate for a sign from Chris, she unplugged all devices to prevent any disturbances and settled in the living room, hoping for his apparition. As the clock ticked past midnight, a shadow moved in the corner, subtle but unmistakable. It drew closer, shaping into the outline of a man—the slope of his shoulders, the tilt of his head, all achingly familiar. Chris.
But as he stepped into the moonlight, Stephanie gasped. His eyes, once a soft brown, now glinted with a cold metallic sheen.
“Chris, is that... is that really you?” Her voice trembled, a mixture of fear and longing knotting in her throat.
“It’s me, Steph,” his voice was the same, yet carried a hollow timbre that echoed oddly in the room. “I’ve come back for you.”
Tears welled in Stephanie's eyes as she reached out, her fingers brushing through the apparition before her, feeling the ice-cold mist rather than the warmth she craved. “How is this possible?”
Chris’s form flickered, his outline shimmering with each word. “I couldn’t leave you, not after everything. I found a way back, Steph. But I need your help to stay.”
Suddenly, his image wavered, and he disappeared, his energy not strong enough to sustain his form.
Overwhelmed and fearful she was losing her sanity, Stephanie paced the house, her mind racing with possibilities—is this real? How can this be happening? Exhaustion finally took over, and she dozed off in the late afternoon. When she awoke, her determination had settled. She needed answers. She used her work laptop in incognito mode to search for any information that could explain or help her situation, researching until the sun began to set.
That night, around midnight, Chris returned, stronger than before. Stephanie smelled his cologne first, then felt his presence, and finally saw him appear.
“I’m fading, Chris. What’s happening to me?” she asked, noticing for the first time how pale her own reflection had become.
Chris’s eyes shifted a flash of guilt — or was it desire? — flickering within them. “It’s a balance, Steph. I draw a little from you, to keep me here. It’s the only way.”
“What will happen to me? Am I going to take your place?” Stephanie was beginning to doubt herself. To doubt Chris.
“No, no. Of course not.” Chris reassured her. “That can’t happen. It’s not your time to go. Once I am alive again, I’ll nurse you back to full health and we can continue our lives together as we were meant to.”
Chris sensed the doubt and could see it in her face.
“Where is this crazy talk coming from? You’re really overthinking things here, as you always do. Do you really think so little of me? I’m a bit hurt by that Stephanie. We always talked about how we’d always be together, no matter what, we’d find a way. Did that mean nothing?”
Stephanie yearned for that. She believed in the future he painted for them, together. Her love for him blinded her to the reality.
But as the nights passed, and the more Stephanie justified his presence, the weaker she felt. During the day, lethargic and disconnected, she barely functioned, moving through her home as if through a fog. Everything appeared to her through a grey-like filter, a haze hung around everything in her home. Like nothing was fully there. Or perhaps she was the one not fully there.
Until one shocking moment, her hand passed through a door handle she tried to turn. Her mind snapped out of the fog-like state it had been in, suddenly clear. Panic-stricken, she tried again and felt it solidly under her grip. She entered the bathroom and stared into the mirror.
She saw herself flicker from solid form to an almost apparition form and back. Brief, yet consistent event every few minutes.
Then... the realization dawned on her with chilling clarity. Chris hadn't just returned to be with her; he came back because he couldn't bear to be alone in the afterlife. But at what cost to her? Stephanie lost track of time; what she thought had been only a couple of nights had stretched into weeks. Notes from concerned friends piled up at her door, unopened and ignored, while her sink filled with a stack of mostly coffee cups.
As days turned into weeks, Stephanie found herself growing progressively weaker. Her steps faltered, her breaths grew shallower, and her world seemed to narrow to the confines of her dimly lit home. In stark contrast, Chris seemed more vibrant than ever; his form gained colour, his voice grew stronger and more present. He no longer just visited at night but lingered throughout the days, always there, always watching.
She knew her friends and family were deeply concerned. They had not seen the pallor of her skin or the hollows beneath her eyes. They suspected depression, or perhaps something worse, but how could she explain that her fiancé had returned from the dead, only to slowly steal her life in exchange for his ephemeral presence? The thought of her mother threatening to get the police or the fire department to break in echoed in her mind, a stark reminder of the reality she faced.
Her world was collapsing inward, and as she watched Chris, who now seemed more ghost than man, a profound sense of betrayal began to overshadow her initial relief at his return. The man she loved was draining her life away, an insidious parasitic existence masquerading as a miracle.
She knew she had to confront Chris, tonight.
That evening, as she watched Chris reading beside her—the same book she had kicked the first night he had come to her, the one he had never finished in life—Stephanie knew she had to make a choice. Did she continue to allow this spectral parasite to consume her very essence, or did she fight back, reclaim her life and accept his death? She looked at him, really looked, and saw the man she loved but also the entity he had become: a shadow tethered to her soul, pulling her towards oblivion.
Realizing that Chris's presence was leeching her very essence, she confronted him. As they sat together, with Chris appearing more vibrant than ever, she knew what she must do.
“Chris, I love you, but I can’t do this. I can’t let you destroy me, not even for you,” Stephanie declared, her voice firm despite the tears streaming down her face.
Chris looked up from his book, his face showed sorrow and something darker, a desperate craving. “But I can’t go back, Steph. I won’t.”
Stephanie reached for a book on the shelf, her fingers trembling. It was their favourite, a story of love transcending time. She opened it to a bookmarked page, a spell of severance, a parting of souls she had never thought she would use.
“Then I must help you,” she said, tears streaming down her face as she began to read aloud, each word a goodbye, each sentence a step back towards life.
As Stephanie recited the ancient words from the book, Chris's desperation grew palpable. His voice softened, the cadence turning pleading. "Steph, just one more night. I'll be alive again, truly with you. We'll be together, and I'll nurse you back to health," he implored, his eyes glistening with a feigned sincerity that twisted her heart. He crafted his lies carefully, promising her recovery, insisting that her life was not in danger because "it's not your time yet."
But Stephanie knew better. She saw through his façade, recognizing the desperation of a soul too afraid to face the afterlife alone. Tears streamed down her face, her resolve firm yet aching with the betrayal of the man she had once loved so deeply. Chris’s mask began to slip, revealing the true ghoul he had become—a shadow of the man she once knew, his eyes black voids of deceit, his skin a ghastly grey pallor, and the dark essence of his spirit wafting around the form she had unwittingly sustained.
His form began to disintegrate as she continued with the incantation, his features distorting into a visage of rage and desperation. Words poured from his gaping mouth, now distorted and unintelligible, turning into a high-pitched shriek of fury and fear. In a final, desperate attempt to maintain his grasp on the mortal world, he lunged at Stephanie, his hands reaching to snatch away the life force that tethered him to existence.
But Stephanie remained steadfast, her voice unwavering as she spoke the final words of the spell. Chris’s figure blurred, wavering between the form of the man she loved and the monstrous entity he had become. In his last moments, he conjured the face she had fallen in love with, his eyes softening as he whispered, "Stephanie, don’t—"
Yet, she did.
She finished the incantation with a shuddering gasp, and with it, Chris’s spirit dissipated into the ether, his final scream echoing in the empty room, leaving behind a silence that was both terrifying and liberating.
Collapsed to the floor, the book clutched against her chest, Stephanie whispered into the void, her voice a mix of grief and relief,
"Goodbye, Chris. Find your peace."
And in the haunting quiet that followed, Stephanie felt the painful yet necessary beginnings of healing weave through the remnants of her shattered heart, ready at last to rebuild and move forward from the shadows of the past.
