Chapter Text
Rhonda lifted her head, her gaze moving from the dirty, grim soaked gym floor to rows of rusted bleachers across the room. One foot tapped impatiently, helping her drown out the voices of the ghosts around her. Their words were unintelligible to her as she sat next to them all in the same folding chairs they always had during their meetings.
They were discussing the boundary. Or the new found lack of boundary. Each ghost was sharing their ideas, their thoughts, their worries. Each ghost was expressing the possibilities this would bring them. But Rhonda couldn’t listen to any of it. The excitement in the room seemed to eat away at her like a parasite that was slowly draining the energy from every cell in her body.
So, instead, Rhonda sat wordlessly in her seat, arms folded across her chest and wishing she was anywhere but there. Her mind was empty, an almost static-like feeling whirling around in it. It prevented her from having to listen to anyone. She scratched at her arm, concentrating on the feeling of her nails against her skin. She did this for longer than she was willing to admit. If she was alive, she was sure it would be raw and bleeding by now. There was a small part of her that wished for it.
“Rhonda, you’ve been awfully quiet about all of this.”
Hearing her name drug Rhonda out of her unfocused state. She cut her eyes over to Mr. Martin who had his hands clasped together, looking at her expectantly. A dull sense of irritation hit her at how hopeful he seemed for her to contribute to the conversation. Why did he care? He wasn’t their leader anymore. He didn’t need to make efforts to guide her.
And she wouldn’t allow it.
“Do you have anything to say?”
Rhonda pressed her lips together and shook her head. “Anything to say about what?”
“Uh, the boundary,” Yuri said shortly, as if she was somehow stupid for asking the question. “I jumped the fence and didn’t get sucked back to the greenhouse. You were right there when it happened.”
Rhonda squinted at him. He sat across from her with his legs spread and his arms hanging limply in his lap. “Why would I have anything to say about that?”
Yuri laughed in disbelief, looking around at the other ghosts to confirm how strange she was acting. “Well, it’s a pretty big fucking deal, don’t you think?”
“I’m sorry.” Charley held up his hand before quickly dropping it. He shifted in his seat. “All you’ve ever talked about is leaving and now—what, you’re suddenly okay with staying in this hell hole?”
Her eyebrows knitted together and she clenched her jaw, unable to hide anger that was bubbling inside her any longer. “Yeah, leaving as in crossing over,” she spat. Her nails dug into her arm. “I never had any intentions of going off frolicking to the town square.”
Quinn was in the seat next to her, watching the back and forth silently. They seemed to be deep in thought as their gaze stayed trained on Rhonda. She could practically feel their eyes boring into her, but she ignored them. If she looked at them, she feared she may snap at them too.
“We’re not talking about going to the town square to watch a movie and pick up a sundae.” Charley threw out his hands. “We’re talking about the possibility of seeing our families.”
“M-maybe Rhonda just has some trepidations,” Mr. Martin suggested and she bristled. “Like we were saying, there is a lot to consi—”
“I don’t have trepidations,” she hissed. “It’s just stupid. This doesn’t help us cross over in any way, so what’s the point of sitting here and discussing it. If you guys want to leave, you can go right ahead.” Rhonda hit both of her hands on her legs before rising from her seat. “Just leave me out of it.”
She made her way out of the gym, walking faster at hearing the others calling after her. None of them made any moves to follow, which she was grateful for. She couldn’t bear to look at any of their faces any longer, the looks of judgement and bewilderment causing an embarrassed heat to rise in her face.
Her legs were moving with a mind of their own through the empty halls of the school. It didn’t feel like she would ever stop walking as she passed rows and rows of lockers and doors. It wasn’t until she passed through the most familiar hall that she realized where she had been walking to and stopped.
She exhaled deeply and let herself fall back against the lockers behind her. She slunk down to the floor, eyes trained steadily on the door in front of her. Rhonda shouldn’t be surprised that she ended up here. It was the same place she always ended up when she found herself overwhelmed or helpless.
The old door to the guidance center.
Rhonda took off her hat and set it in her lap. She rubbed its fabric with her fingertip in an attempt to keep her mind off of the exchange back in the gym. Everyone was so eager to leave this place now that it was actually something within their grasps. It wasn’t like she actually could blame them. Being stuck here was its own form of torture. But to her, it felt like leaving would simply open the door to another kind.
Sixty years. It had been sixty years since she had left the grounds of this school. Sixty years she was left wondering about the life outside of it, wondering how things had changed in the world, wondering about the people she left behind. What was another sixty in the grand scheme of things?
“Can I join you?”
The sudden voice cut through her thoughts and she jumped, sucking in a sharp breath. Rhonda tore her eyes away from the door to see Quinn taking a step back and holding their hands out in front of them. “I’m sorry, I-I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Rhonda drug a hand over her face. “Don’t worry about it.”
“You’re really jumpy, huh?”
“Oh, really? I hadn’t noticed.” Her voice was dripping with sarcasm, though her usual maliciousness that came along with it was not there.
The side of Quinn’s mouth turned up in a small smile. They gestured to the empty floor next to her. “So can I? Join you.”
Rhonda hesitated, looking from the floor to Quinn and back again. She wanted to be alone. She didn’t want anyone there because she knew of the impending questions that would be asked of her. And she especially did not want Quinn there. Quinn, who always seemed the most capable of pushing her beyond what most others couldn’t. There wasn’t a single part of her that thought she could handle it.
But instead of telling them no, Rhonda found herself slowly nodding. They sat down next to her, crossing their legs to mirror her. In her peripheral vision, she could see them looking straight ahead at the door.
“You come here a lot,” they said thoughtfully. “When you’re upset.”
Rhonda blinked. That hadn’t been what she was expecting them to say. “So what?” she shrugged, an anxious buzz radiating off of her. If they asked her why, she wouldn’t even know what she would say. Why did she come here? She really had no idea what her reason was. It should be the last place she would ever want to spend her time, but she always seemed to be drawn here during her darkest moments. Like there was some sort of energy force pulling her there that would somehow help her find clarity. Though it never actually did. “I can do whatever I want. There’s no reservation on the floor space in front of Mr. Anderson’s door. And besides, who says I’m even upset.”
She could see the wheels turning in Quinn’s head as they were deciding what to address first. Would it be her calling it Mr. Anderson’s door, her being flippant about sitting here, or her pretending she’s not upset?
“Everyone in the gym would say that you’re upset.” Unbelievable. Of course Quinn would settle on the thing she wanted to avoid the most. “What happened in there?” they asked, eyeing her carefully. “What was it really about?”
Rhonda tilted her head up and looked at the ceiling. Tears had sprung in the corners of her eyes. There wasn’t any part of her that wanted to talk about this. And yet, just being around Quinn, alone, made her unable not to.
“Everyone has a family they get to go running off to,” she started slowly. “Charley, Yuri, you. Even Mr. Martin. He had a brother who had kids. And those kids had kids. I didn’t have siblings. My parents are dead.”
She choked on the last words, a hollow ache settling in her chest. Quinn scooted closer to her. So close that their knees brushed against each other. If it was anyone else, Rhonda would have snatched her knee away. But she allowed it, soaking up the feeling and wishing that she could actually feel their skin against hers.
“I hadn’t thought of how this could be different for you—being so much older than everyone else.”
Rhonda forced out an emotionless laugh and bobbed her head. “La mort frappe tout le monde.”
She could practically feel the sympathy seeping off of Quinn. “You don’t have any other family?”
“Anyone that’s alive is somewhere in Europe. My parents came here from Germany in the 30s and they told me a lot of the family tried to find refuge in other places before the Holocaust.” Rhonda hesitated, eyes fluttering. She couldn’t remember which countries her parents had said their family had fled to. It startled her. The longer she was dead, the more she forgot from her time alive. “It doesn’t matter anyway. I didn’t know them. I don’t know them. So even if they were here it wouldn’t make a difference. I have no one left to see. So forgive me if I’m not jumping for joy to leave.”
None of it was a lie. It just wasn’t the whole truth that she knew Quinn had asked for. But she hoped that this was enough to satisfy them. She hoped that it was enough that they would nod and comfort her and then leave her alone. Rhonda knew better than that though. Quinn would always try to go above and beyond for her. It was something that normally, she would be appreciative of. But not today.
“You could see Marjorie.” Rhonda went rigid and shifted on the floor uncomfortably. That was exactly what she had been trying to avoid hearing from anyone. “She’s probably still alive right? I mean, she was when I was alive. She came and spoke at the school for an assembly a year before I died.”
Rhonda clenched her jaw. She was painfully aware of the fact that Marjorie was at the school that year. She spent the whole month after it was announced ripping the posters off the walls and smashing anything she could get her hands on. It had been during the many years she had thought Marjorie blamed her for her own death. Now, she wished she had gone into the assembly. But she also knew that, even if she had known what the song was truly about, she wouldn’t have been able to bring herself to.
“I think…Rhonda, I think she was talking about you.”
It was as if Quinn had taken her heart by their hands and ripped it straight from her chest. Rhonda tried to keep herself composed, making herself scoff and force out a laugh.
“No, I’m serious. You died in 1963, right?”
Rhonda shrugged, picking at a loose string on her pants. A lump had formed in her throat. “Yeah, so?”
“She came and spoke in 2003!” Quinn exclaimed. “It would have been the anniversary year. She was…she was talking about following her dreams and-and how the death of someone close to her pushed her to do it and—”
Rhonda cut them off, unwilling to hear anymore. “I’m so glad my death could give her the motivation to become a singer. Really just warms my heart.”
“No, that’s—Rhonda, that’s not the point she was trying to make.” Her stomach churned. “I think you know that.”
“That was twenty years ago,” Rhonda muttered, anticipating that Quinn would catch onto her pessimism.
They didn’t.
“Yeah, but she could still be alive.” The hopefulness in Quinn’s voice was grating. “Janet’s friend was, right? And he was older than you guys. Have you ever…have you ever looked her up online?”
This conversation was becoming too much for her. Her hands were trembling now. She tried to hide it by clasping them together, but Quinn had already noticed.
“Are you okay?”
Rhonda wasn’t looking at them. She couldn’t bear it. Instead, she stared straight ahead at the door, eyes unfocused and body tense. “I don’t want to see her.”
Quinn seemed utterly and completely confused by this.
“Why not? Don’t you miss her?”
The truth was like a poison sitting on the tip of her tongue needing to be spat out. But she swallowed it. Because it was easier to lie. It was easier to deflect, easier to get angry.
“I just said I didn’t want to fucking see her,” Rhonda hissed, pulling her knee away. “Can’t that be enough for you?”
“Well, you said back there that this wouldn’t help us cross over, but—” Quinn’s voice was low, unsure. They were trying to be delicate, especially now since Rhonda had snapped at them. She had never done that before. Not when Quinn first woke up, not when they tried to rejoin their loop, not even when they kept bringing up their failed kiss attempt. It was a shock to them both. “—but what if it did. What if seeing her could help you get your—”
“Jesus Christ, Quinn!” Rhonda yelled. “You just poke and prod and poke and prod. You don’t stop. Just take the fucking hint for once and leave me alone.”
Rhonda rose to her feet, not looking at Quinn who had shrunk away from her. The words cut deep on an already open wound that Rhonda knew they had. She started down the hall, tears prickling in the corners of her eyes. A desperate need to apologize surged through her, but instead of stopping, she continued to walk away from them. She feared if she didn’t, she would crumble to the floor in a heaping mess and make things worse. The real, whole, truth may actually come spilling out.