Chapter Text
Craig stood in the middle of his apartment, a half-packed box at his feet, and let out a slow breath. The place looked different already, bare walls, empty shelves, and stacks of cardboard scattered across the floor. After a year of living across the hall from each other, he and Kyle were finally moving in together, leaving behind the apartments where everything had started.
He ran a hand through his hair, glancing around the space. It was strange how much could change in a year. How much he had changed.
As he reached for another book to pack, his eyes drifted to the corner near the window, and his thoughts wandered. This wasn’t just the apartment he had lived in, it was the apartment Tweek had haunted.
A smirk ghosted across his lips as he remembered Tweek’s earliest attempts at being scary. Slamming doors, flickering lights, windows rattling in the middle of the night. None of it had ever actually scared him, just annoyed the hell out of him. He could still hear his own irritated voice muttering, “real original, dude.”
Craig stepped toward the window, absently wiping his sleeve across the glass. There had been messages in the dust once, stupid little things Tweek had written, like “hey handsome” or “you should smile more.” Craig had rolled his eyes every time, but he had never wiped them away completely, always letting them fade on their own.
His gaze swept the apartment again, and he thought about the times when his furniture would mysteriously rearrange itself. He had come home more than once to find his couch at an angle or his books stacked in weird formations. Tweek had claimed it was all part of his “haunting duties,” but Craig had long suspected it was just to mess with him.
Despite the chaos, despite the annoyance… Craig felt a familiar pang in his chest. He still missed him.
That evening, Craig sat at his desk, his laptop open in front of him, but his fingers hovered over the keyboard, unmoving.
For a year and a half, he had avoided this moment. He had told himself that it didn’t matter, that looking up Tweek wouldn’t change anything. But the truth was, he had been nervous, afraid of what he might find.
But now, with his apartment packed up and a new life waiting just ahead, it felt like the right time. Maybe even the last chance he’d have to do this while still in the place where it all happened.
Taking a deep breath, he finally typed the words into the search bar: Tweek obituary.
The results loaded instantly, and his eyes landed on an article from thirty years ago. He clicked it, and as the page loaded, his breath caught.
A black-and-white photograph stared back at him, a young man with messy blond hair, wide, expressive eyes, and a familiar nervous energy captured in the slight tension of his posture. Craig didn’t need to read the name beneath the picture to know. It was him. Tweek.
His full name was Tweek Tweak.
Craig let out a small, disbelieving chuckle, shaking his head. Of course that was his name. It suited him perfectly. His amusement faded as he skimmed the obituary. It confirmed what he already suspected, Tweek had died in the apartment building. It didn’t say how, though.
Craig frowned, rereading the article as if the missing details would suddenly appear. There was no mention of an accident, no cause of death, just the usual condolences and a brief note about his surviving family. What it did mention, though, was where Tweek was buried.
Craig leaned back in his chair, staring at the screen, his emotions twisting into something complicated, grief for someone he had never known in life, curiosity about the story left untold, and something else, something quieter. Something like closure.
He had always known Tweek wasn’t just some lingering ghost, he had been a person, once. And now, finally, Craig had proof. A little crumb of information about the ghost he used to share an apartment with.
The next day, as Craig and Kyle loaded boxes into the moving truck, Craig found himself turning the words over in his head, trying to figure out how to bring it up.
It wasn’t like he needed to tell Kyle, Tweek was gone, and the past was the past. But after finally looking him up, after seeing that picture and reading his name, it didn’t feel right to keep it to himself anymore.
So, as they took a break, leaning against the truck with the summer heat pressing down on them, Craig finally said, “hey. There’s something I wanna tell you.”
Kyle wiped sweat off his forehead, looking at him curiously, “yeah?”
Craig hesitated for only a second before saying, “I was haunted.”
Kyle blinked, “what?”
“By a ghost. In my apartment. His name was Tweek,” Craig crossed his arms, “I looked him up last night. He lived here, he died here. Thirty years ago,” the words just tumbled out of him nervously, he had no clue how to properly go about telling Kyle the only reason he had the balls to ask him out was because of a ghost.
Kyle stared at him like he was trying to figure out if this was a joke. Then, a slow smirk tugged at his lips, “that's really spooky, Craig,” he chuckled.
Craig smiled back at him, debating whether or not to tell his boyfriend the whole truth. Kyle was already skeptical about the ghost thing, this part would just make it worse. Still, he figured if he was going to tell Kyle, he might as well tell him everything.
“Tweek had a crush on me,” Craig said casually, watching Kyle for a reaction.
Kyle, who had just taken a sip from his water bottle, nearly choked, “wait. What?”
Craig smirked slightly, “yeah. He liked me,” I liked him too, left unsaid.
Kyle squinted at him like he was waiting for the punchline. When it didn’t come, he let out a short laugh and shook his head.
“So, let me get this straight,” Kyle said, crossing his arms, “a literal ghost haunted you and fell in love with you?”
Craig shrugged, “yeah. Pretty much.”
Kyle let out a disbelieving huff, “Craig, come on.”
“I’m serious.”
Kyle stared at him, still clearly skeptical, but Craig could tell he wasn’t entirely dismissing it. And for some reason, that was enough. Kyle shook his head with an amused sigh before pushing himself off the truck, “man, you have way more interesting exes than I do.”
Craig let out an actual laugh, grabbing another box from the pile, “yeah, well, good luck topping a ghost.”
Kyle grinned as he hoisted a box into the truck, “I don’t think I want to top that. I’ll stick to dating living people, thanks.”
Craig smirked, “coward.”
Kyle rolled his eyes, but there was warmth behind it. They fell into an easy rhythm, loading up the rest of their stuff, the conversation lingering in the air between them like a secret only they shared.
A few weeks after settling into their new place, Craig made a quiet decision: he wanted to visit Tweek’s grave. He didn’t tell Kyle where he was going, not because he was hiding it, but because this felt like something he needed to do alone.
The cemetery was quiet, tucked away behind an old church, the kind of place that felt forgotten by time. Craig walked slowly between the rows of headstones until he found the one he was looking for.
Tweek Tweak.
The name was partially hidden beneath a cluster of overgrown daffodils, their yellow petals swaying gently in the breeze. It looked like someone had planted them years ago, and they had spread unchecked, covering the base of the headstone.
Craig knelt down, running his fingers over the rough stone before carefully pulling away the weeds. He brushed off the dirt, clearing the letters until Tweek’s name was fully visible.
He sat beside the grave, leaning back on his hands as he gazed at the headstone. Despite the strange weight in his chest, he felt oddly at peace.
“So,” he started, exhaling softly, “it’s been a while.”
He let the quiet stretch for a moment before continuing.
“I, uh… I moved. Kyle and I got a place together. It’s nice. Feels weird not living across the hall from him anymore, but it’s good. Feels like a fresh start.”
Craig talked about the past year, the little things, the big things, the way life had shifted in ways he hadn’t expected. As he spoke, he found himself smiling, the memories filling the silence between them.
Eventually, he hesitated, glancing at the daffodils swaying in the breeze.
“I miss you,” he admitted quietly, “I know you weren’t exactly here. But when you were haunting me, I think,” he stopped, shaking his head with a small, fond smile, “I just hope that wherever you ended up, you’re happy. You deserve to be happy.”
Before he could say anything else, his phone buzzed in his pocket. Craig pulled it out and saw Kyle’s name on the screen, his contact photo, a candid shot Craig had taken of him laughing, lighting up the display. He huffed a small laugh, then turned the screen toward the tombstone.
“He’s my boyfriend,” he said, “can you believe it? Well yeah, you probably would,” he sighed, “I gotta go, but… I miss you. I’ll visit again sometime.”
He lingered a moment longer, letting the words settle in the air. Then, with one last glance at the grave, he stood up and answered the call.
As he walked away from the cemetery, he felt something shift inside him, like a door gently closing, not shutting him out, but allowing him to move forward.