Rock N Soul by Lauren Sattersby Read Free Book Online

“I’m not sure I can be away from you.”
    I raised both eyebrows this time. “What do you mean?”
    “You got about twenty feet down the hall and then I had to follow you.”
    “Well, that’s sweet and all, but I don’t think I’m your type,” I snapped. “Go away. Go find your sister or Nathan Vale or some groupie with a nice rack. I’ve got work to do.”
    “No, I mean . . . I really had to follow you. As in, when you walked away, I had to follow you. It wasn’t optional.” I scoffed, and he continued, “I’ll show you. Walk away.”
    “That’s what I’m trying to do,” I said. I turned my back and walked another fifty feet or so toward the elevator again. When I looked over my shoulder, Chris was about twenty feet behind me.
    “I didn’t move on purpose. You dragged me with you.”
    “I dragged you with me,” I repeated. “What the fuck does that mean?”
    He glared. “Walk backwards and watch me.”
    I rolled my eyes but did as I was told. For every step I took, Chris stumbled forward a little, reluctantly, as if someone was pushing him along. He could have been faking it, I guess, but it was pretty convincing.
    “Huh,” I said, super eloquently.
    “Yeah,” he said. “So there’s that.”
    “So not only am I the only one who can see you, and not only do you not disappear when I take off your ring . . . but I’m stuck with, like, a restraining order. Except instead of you needing to be more than twenty feet from me at all times, you have to follow me everywhere.”
    “Yeah, that seems about right.” He motioned at my pocket. “Or it’s the ring I have to follow.”
    “Guess we should test that, huh?” I turned away from him and pulled it out of my pocket. “Here goes.” I squatted and rolled the ring along the floor away from him, then twisted around to look at him. He was standing in the same place.
    I stood and took a big step backward, and Chris stumbled forward again. “Guess that answers that,” I said.
    He scowled and walked toward me so that we were at a normal speaking distance again. “No offense, man, but this sort of blows.”
    I laughed. “You have no idea.”
    “Well . . .” He ran his hands through his hair again, and I watched it slowly fade back into its unmussed state, like he was resetting to always look the same. “What are we going to do?”
    “I’m going to finish my shift, and you’re going to stay back and be quiet. And then when I get off work, we’re going to figure out what to do.” I walked over to where the ring had stopped rolling, then picked it up and put it on.
    “So I just . . . follow you around and watch you do your job?”
    “Pretty much, yeah. Maybe it will be educational for you. To see how the common masses live when you’re not Inciting them.”
    “I guess I could do that,” he said. “After all . . .” He paused dramatically. “It won’t kill me.”
    I groaned. “Okay, you’re going to have to stop with the ghost jokes.”
    “That’s the only one I’ve told,” he argued, looking ridiculously put out by the whole thing. “Come on, man, I just found out I’m dead. Worms are currently eating my liver. The least you can do is give me a couple of free passes on ghost humor.”
    He had a point. I sniffed so he knew how generous I was being, then shrugged one shoulder. “Fine. You can have a couple of ghost jokes.”
    “Really?” He gave me a lopsided smile that would have sent Carmen into spasms of pleasure. “Thanks, man. That means a lot.”
    “Don’t think you can just smile at me and get anything you want, though,” I warned, even going so far as to waggle my finger at him. “That only works on girls.”
    He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it. I gave him a moment to decide whether or not he was going to try again with the speaking thing, but he didn’t, so the seconds stretched on until they got sort of weird.
    “Anyway,” I said to break the awkward silence. “I have to get downstairs.