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Chapter 4

  • Randy hopped into the shower and tried to get warm again and wash the chill from her body. It was just her luck that it would be hotter than a kiln one second and then torrential rain the next. Knowing how things happened in her world, it wouldn’t surprise her if it had only rained on her car and nowhere else in the whole county.
  • As she lathered up her hair, she smiled. The ghost she’d been seeing for longer than she could remember, had actually spoken to her. Finally. She didn’t know why today, after all the years of waiting, but it seemed to take the sting out of her completely rotten day. She quickly rinsed and turned off the water. She should have asked for a time when he’d said he’d come by “later.” Did he bother with time in his state? She wrapped a towel around her chest and tucked it under her arm, grabbing another one she began to dry her dripping hair.
  • She stood and looked in the mirror as the steam started to clear. She scattered her fingers through her hair to separate some of the wavy locks, so it wouldn’t dry a complete mess. “What does one wear for a meeting with a ghost?” She shook her head.
  • Turning, she opened the door and headed toward the stairs; she stopped as she glimpsed him standing on the landing.
  • Jareth let his eyes travel from her still damp ankles up to where the towel sat high on her thigh. He jerked his eyes to her face then lowered them quickly and looked at the floor near to where he stood. “I am... I apologize for being too early.”
  • Her lips quirked like she was trying not to smile. “It’s okay.” She placed her hands on her hips and looked at him. “I guess it’s been a few years since you’ve seen an almost naked woman.”
  • Jareth cleared his throat. “It has,” he said quietly, keeping his eyes on her face. She wore no makeup and was still the most alluring woman he’d ever looked upon. Those round dark eyes seemed to draw him in and make him wish he was still in his true form.
  • Biting her lip, she studied him for a moment. “Okay, I’ll run and put some clothes on... I’ll be right back.” She didn’t wait until he answered, just turned and quickly ran into her room.
  • Randy still lived in the same house she’d grown up in. Her mother had left it many years ago, and she liked having it all to herself. She used her old bedroom as a studio, and now slept in what had been her mother’s room. She barely remembered her father. He had left on her seventh birthday.
  • She stood in front of her closet trying to decide what to put on. Shrugging, she went over and grabbed her favorite worn jeans out of the dresser and pulled them on. Zipping them, she turned and quickly dug around for a tank top or something to wear on the top half. Her arms were already in it when she realized she hadn’t put on a bra. She chuckled. What was she thinking? He was a ghost, not a date.
  • In her bare feet she jogged back down the stairs and found him still standing at the door. She stopped and smiled at him. “Come in. We can sit in the kitchen or—”
  • “That would be fine.” He motioned for her to lead.
  • He followed along behind her and accepted that modern fashions did have many advantages. The curve of her bottom was clear for him to see in her trousers as she walked in front of him. Looking up from it he watched over her head as she led him into a room with a stove.
  • Randy motioned to the table. “Have a seat; I’m just going to make some tea.” She hesitated and turned to look at him. “I guess you don’t...or can’t...have some?”
  • Jareth sat in the chair, or at least he made it appear like he was. “It is my fondest wish to taste something again, but no, I cannot.”
  • She busied herself filling the kettle and putting it on before finally turning around and leaning back against the counter. “You are real, right? I’m not hallucinating? Because I have to tell you, when I was growing up I seriously thought I had just imagined you so I wouldn’t feel so alone.”
  • He remembered her childhood all too well. “I am real, or I am for you. No one else has ever seen me before.”
  • “Really? That sucks!” Her brows furrowed in deep thought. “How long have you been like this?” She waved a hand up and down his body.
  • Jareth heaved a sigh. “I believe, if I’ve kept accurate count, it is close to two hundred and forty-eight years now.”
  • “Wow!” She shook her head. “So you were alive in...seventeen...” She closed her eyes, trying to calculate.
  • “The year of seventeen sixty-one was when I last walked on land.”
  • Randy blew out a breath. “That’s really kind of cool.” She frowned. “Well, maybe not from your point of view, but it’s not every day I get to talk to someone from the eighteenth century.”
  • He slowly smiled. “I can see how that would be interesting for you.”
  • The kettle whistled, and as she turned to pour the water, she smiled at him over her shoulder. “So how old are you...or were you? Because I have to tell you, you do not look like you’re over two hundred years old.”
  • He grinned. “I was thirty-two years when I last drew breath.”
  • She nodded as she turned around with the cup of tea and set it on the table. She sat right across from him and looked at him for a moment. “What exactly happened?”
  • Straightening up, he studied her for a moment. “If I were to say I wasn’t completely sure, would you believe me?”
  • “So...did you die?”
  • “Not exactly, not yet.”
  • “Yet?” Her eyes went wide as she said it.
  • Jareth looked down at his hands. They looked as if they were resting on the table, for her sake, and maybe for his, as well, so he could feel normal for a few moments. “I had a run-in with a...gypsy, I believe you would refer to her as...and she cursed me to live in the in-between for all years to come.”
  • “That sucks!” She sipped her tea. “So you’re not dead, but you’re not alive, either?”
  • He nodded once abruptly.
  • “What did you do to piss her off?”
  • He smirked at her words. “I refused to tell her where I had hidden some objects.”
  • “Objects—like treasure?” She grinned.
  • Chuckling softly, he winked at her. “Treasures to her.”