I hoped the video would be like some sort of cheat code for my brain—a quick switch to take me from messed up to fixed again. Unfortunately, life isn’t a game that can be cheated, regardless of what the game of life tells you.

After the video ended, I remained broken, still hollow, and very much stuck in the mess that was my life. It at least answered a few questions that had lingered in the back of my mind since this whole thing started.

Namely, I now understood why Naomi believed Alex when he first called. His call must have sounded like the answer to a desperate prayer.

She was so eager to believe her nephews were still with her that she clung to any sliver of hope, no matter how stupid it seemed.

She didn’t know the truth yet—didn’t know that moving on was the better option.

The living want to believe their loved ones are still around, close by, watching over them. Now that I've seen the other side, I realized how selfish that was.

Alex was right—life as a ghost looked horrible. You can’t blame people, though. It’s not their fault. Love is one of our greatest strengths.

Wait, did I really just think that? Ew, what's wrong with me?

Last week, I was shoveling down chocolate donuts dipped in nacho cheese with grape juice chasers just to win a two-dollar bet.

Now here I am, waxing poetic about life, death, and love like some kind of philosopher. This ghost thing is stupid. I want to go back to being a boring old teenager.

Those thoughts kept me company as I lay in the hospital bed. I tossed and turned while sleep decided to play a cruel game of hide-and-seek with me. The more I tried to catch it, the further away it seemed to drift.

I tried to stare at the ceiling, doing my best to count the number of stains I saw. That didn’t help. It just raised more questions about this place.

There were multiple dark black spots painted on the ceiling, was that mold? It had to be. Gross. At this point, those two star reviews were looking generous.

I needed to switch tactics. I tuned into the noise from the hallway. It was just the sound of different rings, dings, and beeps. I did catch a few faint conversations in the distance, but they were too choppy to make out.

After a few minutes of that, I gave up. My eyes drifted to the curtain that separated me from my roommate. He was an older guy, probably in his late sixties, although I had never been great at guessing age. He’d mentioned something about his leg—some medical issue I didn’t really understand. Poor guy didn’t have anyone to visit him. No family, no friends. Just him and the occasional nurse.

Meanwhile, I had a rotating cast of characters—my parents, friends, even social workers. And here he was, alone, invisible to the world. It made me wonder if there was anyone out there who still cared about him, someone who loved him enough to show up.

While I thought about all of this, I caught the sound of multiple footsteps. They were accompanied by a pair of voices that I vaguely recognized as nurses I'd met. I heard them stop, right outside of my door.

They talked like I wasn’t there, but that was fine by me. At least it gave me something else to think about.

“Any idea what security’s doing?” one nurse asked.

The other nurse, a woman with a deep voice, replied, “You didn’t hear? Someone stole a bunch of medical supplies. Pills, blankets, even blood, for some weird reason.”

“Oh my God, that’s awful.”

“Yeah, they think it was an employee. They’re checking all of us. My money’s on Phil. That dude screams pill addiction.”

“Shit, I’ve been stealing toilet paper from this place for years. How much trouble do you think I’m in?”

“Shhh... Are you crazy? Keep your voice down. You admit to nothing. We’ll pin it on Mercedes. She spends half her shift in the bathroom anyway.”

“Good idea.”

“Alright, I’ve got to change an IV in room 14. Remember, we know nothing,” said the first nurse.

I couldn’t help but snicker. Even adults apparently gossip like high school kids. At least it was a distraction from the panic that spiraled in my mind. Who would steal pills, a blanket, and blood from a hospital?

Pills I get. It would be easy money on the black market. Now that I thought about it, I had no idea if the black market was real or not.

Even if it was real, who’s buying black market blood? Does blood have black market value? Maybe. I hope I never need to find out though.

Whoever stole it could be a vampire. A vampire with a pill addiction and a tendency to get cold at night. Yeah, that seemed as plausible as anything else lately.

At least the absurdity of the thought was enough to make my eyes heavy. I guess distracting myself from my own problems was the final piece of the sleep puzzle. Slowly, my breaths evened out, and the world faded away into darkness.

###

I woke up. At least I thought I was awake. My body felt awake at least. Slowly, I sat up then stepped out of bed.

I stood next to my hospital bed, but the world around me was different. Smoke filled the room, but not normal smoke. Little swirls of blue and white streaks filled the air. I felt a tickle on my cheek as one of the swirls passed over it.

Wisps of smoke—if you could call it that—floated lazily around me. They weren’t the usual dull gray, either. No, these had streaks of blue and white that swirled through them, like some kind of ghostly aurora borealis.

One wisp drifted close to me. It brushed against my cheek and left a tingling sensation behind.

I looked around. This wasn’t my world anymore. Not exactly, anyway. It was like I’d taken a step sideways into a version of the world where everything was almost the same, but… not.

I made my way to the door and peeked out into the hallway. The hospital staff was still there, doing their usual hospital things, but they flickered in and out of focus.

They were there and not there, at the same time. They appeared to be outlines of themselves that pulsed with every breath.

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The closest thing I had to compare it to was how they demonstrate to students how bats use radar to look around. I wonder if ghost-dar is a real thing? I saw nothing about this in Alex’s guide, but this is definitely what ghost-dar would look like.

A noise behind me pulled me out of my thoughts. It wasn’t loud, but it brought me back into the room.

My roommate, the old man who’d been asleep for hours, was now standing. Only he wasn’t entirely… solid. There was a glow around him, that same blue-and-white shimmer I’d seen surrounding Nicole when I first met her.

Only he was much brighter and stronger than her glow. It was as if his flame was newer, more profound.

I approached him cautiously. He was looking around, his eyes wide with confusion and fear.

“What’s happening?” he asked, his voice trembling.

I didn’t have any easy answers for him. “It’s okay,” I said softly. “You’ll be okay.”

But he shook his head, his panic rose. “You… You look wrong. What’s happening? I don’t understand.”

I reached out and took his hand. I’m not sure why I did it, but I knew it was the right thing to do. Sometimes, words don’t help. Sometimes, you just have to be there. And in that moment, I knew what was about to happen, even if I couldn’t explain how I knew.

He was about to leave this world. Move on. Pass through whatever veil separates the living from the dead.

He might not have had anyone here with him in this life, but there was someone waiting for him on the other side. I felt her presence. It was powerful.

She called to him with a pull so strong it made my whole body shake. It was clear she had waited a long time for this moment.

“Barb? Barb, is that you?” His voice cracked, tears streamed down his face.

From the swirling void, a woman stepped forward. Her form shimmered with an orangish version of the same light that surrounded the old man.

Her's was so bright that initially it strained my eyes. I let go of his hand and stepped back. I watched as she approached.

“Hello, John,” she said, her voice filled with warmth and love. “I’ve missed you.”

She wrapped her arms around him, and for a moment, the room seemed to stand still. Then she turned to me, her eyes filled with gratitude. “Thank you for helping him,” she said. “Without you here, I’m not sure he would have let go.”

I nodded. I felt a lump form in the back of my throat. “You’re welcome,” I managed to say after a moment. “You’re one of the lucky ones, John. Go with her.”

They held hands, and together they walked into the smoke, toward whatever lay beyond it. Just before they disappeared, I heard John whisper, “I missed you.” Then they were gone, swallowed by the blue-gray mist.

I felt my reality tug, doing its best to return me to where I belonged. Just before I gave in, I saw a figure by the front door, it was a woman, but her face was unclear.

I couldn’t hold on anymore. My vision flashed.

###

I jolted awake. I looked at the floor. The smoke was gone. I was back in my bed.

“Hey, boy, are you awake?” A voice called to me. I ignored it.

There were way too many questions I needed the answers to. For starters, where the hell did I come from?

As a follow up, what did that woman mean when she said he couldn’t move on without me? Was that the world Nicole lived in? None of this made any sense!

“HEY, Earth to Mr. Raymond!” the voice yelled.

I turned—it was Naomi. What was she doing here? I tried to put myself back together. I found that easier said than done.

“Naomi, what are you doing here?”

“I heard you didn’t listen to my advice to stay away. I would have come earlier, but it’s been a crazy day.”

I looked over to John's bed. He wasn’t there anymore.

“Where’d John go?” I asked the nurse cleaning up his part of the room.

“Somehow you slept through all of the excitement last night. John sadly didn’t make it. He had some post surgery complications. At least he seemed to go peacefully in his sleep. I always thought that’d be the best way to go.” the nurse said.

I didn’t recognize this new nurse, but she seemed more friendly than the previous ones. I smirked, it probably looked a bit out of place given the recent news, but I was happy for him.

“Well, I’m sure he’s with his loved ones now. In fact, I'm positive he is.” For once, I was sure about that comment.

The nurse smiled back. "That's a good way to think about life. You're very mature for your age young man," she said.

Naomi snickered. She walked over to me and grabbed my shoulder.

“Hey, how about you and I take a little stroll around the hospital. You look like you could use some fresh air. Is it alright if I take him, nurse?” Naomi asked.

“As long as it’s alright with him,” she said.

“Yeah, sure. Sounds good to me.” I replied.

“Ok, I’ll go get some staff to help you move into a wheelchair.” the nurse said.

###

It felt good to get out of that stuffy room. I was sore and drugged up, but I was ready to get the hell out of this place.

Naomi waited until we had cleared the main nurses station to talk.

“So, how are you feeling?” she asked.

“I’m doing alright.”

“Listen boy, I’ve seen hundreds of murders and traumas during my time on the force. If you were alright, there would be something wrong with you.”

“No really I’m fine.”

She pulled a card from her pocket and handed it to me.

“Alright, you don’t have to talk to me about it. I do think you should talk to someone though. This is the number for my friend Andrea. I’ve been going to her for a long time. She knows all about the arrangement that Alex and I had. You can be open and honest with her. We all have trauma to deal with.”

You mean like you with your nephews and sister. That’s what I wanted to say. Instead, I kept my mouth shut and took the card. This wasn’t the right time to bring that up.

“Thank you,” I said.

“You're welcome. I didn't just come here to tell you what to do. Like I said, it's been a busy 24 hours.”

“Oh?”

We reached the end of the hall and jumped into one of the elevators headed down to the first floor. She waited until the door closed to continue.

“That guy you saw in front of the Walmart, the one we put a tail on, well it turns out he works at this Hospital. I guess worked is probably the more correct word. He didn't show up for his shift this morning. He lost our tail and no one has seen him since he left here last night. It's the strangest thing. In my 15 years of duty, I've never seen someone vanish like that.”

“Was his name Phil by chance?”

“No, why do you ask?”

“No reason. I heard some nurses talk about stolen supplies from the hospital.”

“Yeah, we’re aware of that. We checked the footage and no one saw him leave the hospital. It’s like he just disappeared.”

The elevator opened, she pushed us back into the hall. We headed to the courtyard.

“What about any bats?” I asked.

“What the hell you going on about? Don’t tell me you think he's a vampire.”

“I haven’t confirmed anything yet, it’s just my leading theory.”

“Well your theory is dumb.”

“Ghosts are real, why can’t vampires be?”

“I guess you have me there. Still, it’s a stupid theory.”

Naomi pushed open the door to the courtyard and wheeled me outside.

“Listen, do I think this is a vampire? No.. well maybe. All I’m saying is it fits the bill. You can’t see him on the tv’s, he vanished in the middle of the night, and he apparently stole blood. Plus when we saw him in the parking lot at Walmart he wore a hat and thick glasses and coat to stay out of the sun. It was like 60 fucking degrees that day.”

“Language around me. Mr. Raymond. Don’t make me...”

I reached my hand out to stop Naomi. Whatever she was about to say didn’t matter now.

In front of me were around a half-dozen vengeful spirits. They were spread out in various positions around the courtyard and parking lot. Like fucking ants to a picnic.