Chapter 11
A week later, Bianca was trying to get back to a normal life. Well, not normal really – she hadn’t
had a normal life since before she started dating AJ – but as normal as
possible, under the circumstances. She
had stayed in North Carolina for a week following AJ’s funeral and had returned
to Florida just a few days earlier. She
was not sure whether she had made the right decision in deciding to stay in
Florida – after all, there were so many memories of AJ there. But it was her home now - it had been for a
few years - and she did not want to leave it.
Besides, Howie and Nick both still lived there, and although they
brought back painful memories of AJ, they were Bianca’s friends (well, Howie
was anyway – Nick still didn’t seem to like her much), and she liked having
them around.
She had returned to her job at Barnes and Noble and was working
more hours than ever. She had found that
the more she worked, the less she thought of AJ, so she tried to keep herself
as busy as possible. It was hard though,
spending all day in that store and seeing people she knew or people that knew
her, knew who she was and whose girlfriend she had been. Luckily, no one had given her much grief so
far, but everyone who knew who she was stared at her in sympathy, and that was
almost worse. She didn’t like people
staring at her all the time, feeling sorry for her. She actually had begun to miss the
teenyboppers who used to either bombard her with questions about AJ, beg for a
chance to meet him, or send her death threats.
Bianca was brought out of her thoughts by the sight of a familiar
face coming towards her cash register.
“Good morning, Mr. Gunzenmeier,” she greeted the old man
dully. It was hard to be cheerful and
personable with the customers when her heart was broken and her life was
shattered.
“’Morning,” Mr. Gunzenmeier grunted and set two hardbacks down on
the counter. Bianca glanced at the
titles as she rang them up. One was
about Jack the Ripper, and the other was about medicine in the medieval
times.
“Your total is $32.78,” she told him. He paid her in cash, as he always did,
counting out exactly the right change, and she put his books into a bag and
handed him his receipt. “Have a nice
day.”
“You too, dearie,” Mr. Gunzenmeier replied and bared his snaggled,
yellow teeth at her in what he considered a grin (though it looked more like a
grimace). He left the store, and Bianca
set about ringing up the next customer’s purchase.
***
AJ walked slowly through the aisles of Barnes and Noble. He had been there since early that morning,
when Bianca had come to work, and had spent at least two hours sitting behind
the counter and just watching her. He
had grown bored of that after awhile though and decided to browse through the
books, hoping to look up some information about ghosts – or whatever he had
become. There was just one small problem
though – his hands were useless. He was
unable to touch or hold on to anything – his hands just went straight through
things.
“I’ve got to figure this out,” he said aloud, knowing no one could
hear him anyway. It had been over two
weeks since his death, and he still had no idea what was happening to him, what
he had become. He had spent most of his
time roaming around and following Bianca.
She didn’t know he was there, of course, but it brought him some comfort
just to be near her.
AJ turned a corner and walked into the next aisle of
bookshelves. It was deserted, except for
a teenage girl sitting on the floor at the end of the aisle, her back against
the shelves, her legs sticking out straight in front of her, an open book on
her lap. She was busy reading it and did
not look up. Not that she would anyway;
she wouldn’t know he was there anymore than Bianca did. As he walked on down the aisle, AJ happened
to glance down at the book she was reading and was surprised to find a large,
glossy picture of himself on one of the pages.
Glancing up at the sign on the shelves she was sitting by, he realized
they were in the music section of the store.
There was a whole shelf filled with Backstreet Boys books, many of which
were on sale.
AJ rolled his eyes bitterly.
“Nice way to capitalize on my death, put all our books on sale,” he
muttered to himself.
“Don’t worry, I’m not buying any. Just looking up information,” the girl
murmured without glancing up.
AJ stared down at her for a moment in shock. “What did you sa-“ he started, then
stopped. She couldn’t have heard him,
not when no one else could. Maybe she
was just talking to herself. He slowly
backed away.
The girl looked up… and at him.
Directly at him.
AJ blinked in disbelief.
“Y-you can see me!”
The girl gave him a strange look.
“‘Course I can,” she replied.
“Our kind can see each other; it’s just the mortals who can’t.”
AJ stared blankly at her.
“Come again? What do you mean,
‘our kind’?”
The girl gaped at him as if he were a complete moron. “Well, I’m one of you; haven’t you figured
that out yet?”
“One of me? And what
exactly am I?”
She stared in disbelief for a moment, then rose to her feet and
stood before him. “It’s been two weeks,
and you haven’t figured it out yet?!”
“No…” He felt really stupid
now.
She shook her head in exasperation. “Well, it’s obvious isn’t it? You’re an angel!”
***
