Since I last met Hayden, I haven’t had a good night of sleep at all. At first, I tried the sleeping remedies that I read about online. Everything that didn’t sound too crazy or difficult, I tried. Sadly, none of them worked for me.
I would end up spending hours tossing and turning in bed until I got bored and had to get up to walk around the small apartment or sit and stare at the night sky from the balcony. Sometimes I had to read a boring book to help calm my mind.
Unfortunately, tonight was no different from the previous nights. I knew well by this time that the problem that I was having wasn’t physical but more psychological. To be frank, I was stressed and deeply disturbed by the choice that I had to make. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to live my life involved with the mafia; on the other hand, I couldn’t bring myself to let go completely of Hayden.
I sighed loudly and before I could think twice, I started dialing a number. I’ve saved this number for a while now thinking that I will probably need it.
"Hi. Sorry for calling so late but do you have a car that I can rent right now?" I spoke through the phone.
"Of course. We are open 24 hours so there’s no need to apologize and of course we have many cars available for rent. Are you looking for something specific?" a man’s voice replied.
Within 20 minutes, the car that I had rented arrived at the bottom of my apartment building. The young man who came to drop off the car at my place gave me a polite smile before asking me to make the deposit and sign some papers.
"Where you off to so late at night?" the guy asked in wonder.
I knew that it wasn’t my responsibility to tell him where I was going, and neither was it his business.
"A graveyard," I replied before handing him the signed documents.
...
The silence and lack of response was unnerving. Maybe it would be better if the tombstone could talk and give me some advice. I smiled at my own foolishness as that thought ran through my head.
"Harvey...you’ve forgiven Hayden, right? There’s no way that you’re still mad at your little brother, right?" I asked as I continued to stare at his tombstone.
"You think?"
I heard a man’s voice reply to my question and I jumped up and screamed. Covering my eyes with my hands, I continued to scream. There’s a ghost! Really?!
Harvey...
"Stop screaming. You’re disturbing the dead..." the voice said, sounding slightly irritated.
I shut my mouth at the same time that my hands were pulled away from my eyes. I blinked in shock and confusion at the man standing in front of me. He’s not a ghost, right?
"Hayden..." I whispered half in disbelief and half in relief.
"Yes, I’m Hayden. Harvey is dead so he’s no longer here," Hayden said with slight annoyance that he had to explain something as obvious as that to me.
"Why did you creep up on me suddenly like that? I was so scared..." I whined.
"I didn’t creep up on you. I’ve been standing here for a while now, but you were too wrapped up in your conversation with my brother’s tombstone that you didn’t realize..." Hayden said with a shrug.
--To be continued...