Cameron’s body shot up, choking off. Scream. Confused, he rubbed at his eyes, looking at the alarm clock. He cocked his head, realizing it wasn’t going off.

“What the hell? Ten minutes before the alarm?” He mumbled, still rubbing at his eyes. He realized an odd tingling slithered up and down his arms. Looking up, he realized Michelle stood over him with his arms phasing through her legs.

“Hey, glad you’re up.” She smiled down at him. She spiked her dark brown mohawk up straight today, he noticed. There was also something about the look in her blue eyes. He didn’t like it.

He let out a sigh as he pulled away from the ex-punk. “Morning to you too, Michelle.”

“Did I disturb you?” she asked, sticking her tongue out.

“You’re glad I’m up? Why?” He looked at her, then realized his morning wood was very noticeable with only a thin sheet and his boxers on. Shutting his eyes, he tried to think about something else...anything other than Michelle leaning over him, her thin top hinting at her breasts. Well, that’s not gonna work, he realized, seeing a montage of the various skimpy clothes she had mentally donned while staying with him for the past two years.

Finally, he did math in his head and was relieved when he felt himself relax.

“Needed to talk to you,” she said, her intense blue eyes looking at him.

When he moved on the bed, she slipped away from him.

“About what?” he asked, yawning, and moving to the edge of his bed. Scratching at his thick dark hair of matted bedhead. “I still have ten minutes until I need to get up for school. Why wake me?”

“I didn’t. You were having a nightmare.”

“Were you looking?”

She didn’t answer for a second.

Cameron coughed. “Michelle?”

She sighed. “Told you I needed to talk to you. Yes, I was peeking.”

“Did you see what it was?”

“I didn’t get that far. You were already waking when I touched your forehead. I pulled away. You screamed.”

“What did you see?”

“Nothing,” Michelle said. “I promise.”

“Then what did you want to talk about?” Cameron asked, rolling his hand a few times to get her to continue. “Spill it,” he added, seeing she was ignoring him.

She walked backwards a few steps, jumped up to sit cross-legged on the dresser. She settled between the two big piles of semi-clean clothes. “Look, I think we should go back to that house, the Wainwright House, today. Early too, so you should skip school.”

“No. I can’t miss any more school, Michelle. You know that,” he said, standing up while rubbing at his jaw. “Already missed five days for ‘mumps…’” He didn’t want to think more about the weird ghost that could punch him.

“Told you the ghost was a boxer. He did that all the time when he was alive. He could hit you.”

Cameron rubbed at his jaw and said nothing, just stared at Michelle for a minute while she gave him an innocent smile.

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“Not missing another day of school.”

“Ugh, you and school.” She reached up to run a hand over the shaved part of her mohawk. The movement caused a slight tinkle of the ten bracelets on one arm. “Come on, it’ll be fun.” She gave him a wide smile. “Please?” She asked, moving closer and letting her legs dangle over the dresser.

Cameron looked at her, squinting. “Why are you so keen to go suddenly? Yesterday you said it bored you wanting to come back and watch that silly cartoon on YouTube again.”

“JEM and the Holograms is not silly!” Michelle said, her arms crossed. Her Mohawk grew an extra foot, the hair going from brown to a pale white, the color draining from her skin as well a little. Her eyes glowed with a blue fire.

“Michelle, relax. I’m just curious.”

“I want you to say that it wasn’t silly!”

Cameron actually took a step back. The force of Michelle’s violent energy made his skin crawl. He licked his lips. “Michelle…”

“What?” she asked, her teeth exposed in a snarl, her face draining more and more of any kind of hue.

“I’m sorry,” Cameron said. “You’re right. JEM and the Holograms is great. And the new one can’t hold a candle to the original.”

“Damn straight!” Michelle said. She then shook her head and her features and even her clothes darkened again. The black jeans jacket with a health amount of safety pins and patches that looked like it kept it together, along with her dark dungarees and green and black shirt coming back to the natural color.

More on edge, too. She has never gone spectral like that so fast.

“You sure you’re ok?”

She was quiet for a moment. She looked down and Cameron thought she would just laugh it off. Instead, her voice was quiet as she said, ”I want to help you help other spirits move on,” she said, quiet and sad, her eyes gazing into the distance.

“Alright, let me think about it?” He asked, then let out a sigh.

“Radical!” she shouted, pumping a fist in the air.

Over two years, he’d known her. She’d never once wanted to go to any of the ghost sighting before. He’d seen ghosts for years since he was seven. Since the time…He heard the rushing of the river and turned away from Michelle. He bit his bottom lip, pushing the memory away hard. Focus on the here and now, Cam, he said to himself. He knew he had to focus on when he had first helped one crossover.

Before he’d met Michelle. Well, when he’d met her, she hadn’t glommed onto him yet. He’d helped a young boy about the age of his younger sister crossover. He had seen Michelle when the boy crossed. And when he tried to wave to her, she turned and ran off. She had hung out around his house. And then, about a year ago, she appeared in his room.

“Why?” He asked, he thought there had to be another reason.

“Just curious,” she said. She grew more insubstantial for a breath. Cameron thought she was going to disappear to sulk. Like she does all the time.

“Want to see you work. I’m getting—”

While she stared off again, Cameron moved closer to the dresser, then pulled the top draw of his which passed through her legs.

She let out a small grunt of pain. “Dammit Cameron, you know that fucking hurts!” She grabbed at her legs, leaping through the air to land alone on the bed, hovering and glaring.

“Sorry,” Cameron said.

“Not cool, man,” she said while hovering, her body growing more insubstantial. Cameron thought it was weird how ghosts could interact with some things, yet could still go through other things. Michelle said it had to do with the mind of a ghost, but that made little sense either.

“Then, don’t sit there,” he said with a half-smile, pulling out a dark t-shirt and shut the dresser. He smiled at the logo of the Kool-Aid man breaking through a wall, yet he was full of green liquid and a tentacles face shouting “Hey Cthul-Aid”. He pulled it on and looked at Michelle. “What do you think?”

She turned away from him. He could hear her eyes rolling.

“Fine, be that way,” Cameron said. She is gonna disappear again. He looked at her, seeing the furniture and the door through her, though it was hard. He thought about pulling open the shades and let in more light, which would allow him to see through her even more. It didn’t hurt her, not like solid objects did. Though she was reluctant to be in the open sunlight when he wasn’t around. She said it made her feel “more exposed to the world.”

Instead, she moved closer to him. “Can we please go?” Michelle asked, turning around and giving him her puppy dog face.

“I hate when you use that face,” he said and shook his head. It was weird, seeing a thirty something ghost girl begging him to do something. Though she had been dead for almost twenty years, she looked as though she was just about twenty-one. Michelle had explained that it had to do with aging and death. “Just because you die doesn’t mean you stop aging. Unless you move on. It doesn’t stop, but slows down,” she would say.

“So, we’re going?” She asked, a bright smile on her face.