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thebrotherssalvatore321 · 4 years

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Keeping Secrets Ch. 1

Keeping Secrets Masterlist

Pairing: DamonxOc. TylerxOc in future chapters, ElijahxOc, KlausxOc is endgame. She’s never sleeping with more than one guy at a time. This is just a long story with 25 chapters so far that I’m also posting on FanFiction.net. Warnings: She does however cheat on someone in future chapters if that counts as a warning.

Keeping Secrets

Katie Finnegan’s house sat on a beautiful street lined with beautiful houses. It was actually right down the street from her best friend Elena’s. Elena had recently lost her parents and was now under the guardianship of her aunt Jenna. It was a bleak situation, but one that Elena and her brother Jeremy could with time bounce back from with the loving support of their aunt. Katie on the other hand had long been plagued by the loss of her parents who died from a cause unknown to her when she was just ten years old.

Unlike Elena and Jeremy, Katie didn’t have any loving aunts or uncles to take her in. All she had was the abusive grandfather who she had never even met despite the fact that he lived in the same town that she did. She didn’t even know what he looked like until he showed up on the doorsteps of her parents house with a suitcase and two moving trucks. One was for her parents stuff to be packed up and auctioned off and the other was full of his.

Only after he showed up did she realize that she had seen him around town, but her parents never acknowledged him. At first she couldn’t understand it. For the first few months he was okay. He didn’t talk to her or play with her much but that was fine with her since she was always good at playing by herself, but once the social workers stopped coming by to make sure she was settling in okay, things started taking a turn for the worse. If she accidentally spilled her drink or dropped even a crumb he would lash out at her. Then she started understanding why her mother ran away with her father at the age of seventeen.

As she got older she got to know how to stay out of his way when he was sober, but when he was drunk there was no avoiding him. By the time she was seventeen she was sneaking out of the house on weekly biases just to get away from him. She thought over the years that her friends, Elena, Caroline and Bonnie would have figured out what was happening to her at home, but they never did. She became too good at hiding it and brushing off the bruises and cuts as her being clumsy. So they never asked more and she never told. She put on a good face and acted like every other sporty teen age girl looking forward to getting into college on a scholarship. She dreamed of the day she could leave Mystic Falls in her rear view and never look back.

Chapter 1

Katie Finnegan sat at the dimly lit roll top desk, in her bedroom writing in a spiral notebook that had the word journal written on the front cover in black ink. Her auburn waves, tamed with just the right amount of styling product, hung around her face and she tucked one tendril behind her ear then pushed her glasses up her nose and continued writing. "Today was the second day of school. Summer is officially over, no more avoiding my friends as much as possible. I saw Caroline and Bonnie at cheer camp, but Elena didn’t make it this year. So it's back to the real world. And the real world has given us high school girls some new eye candy. His name is Stefan and he already has eyes only for Elena. Although, it seems like Caroline is going to give her a run for her money. She's already practically stalking the guy. I'm supposed to be getting ready to go to the stupid back to school bonfire tonight, but I don't really want to go. Why would I? It's just going to be a bunch of people getting drunk and hooking up and that will just remind me that no one wants to be with me. I'm invisible. Sometimes I think I'm just a ghost that only my friends can see and sometimes even they don't see me. I'm not looking forward to sneaking out tonight. Last time I got caught Grandpa nearly beat me to death. But I have to go tonight otherwise I will never hear the end of it from Caroline in the morning. So I’ll talk to you later, Journal."

Katie tucked the pen inside, closed the book and pushed it away from her. With a sigh she pulled on a pair of dark wash distressed jeans, a black ac dc tank top and her favorite black leather jacket that she'd found for a good price at the local resale shop. She finished the look off with red converse and touch of tastefully smudged eyeliner.

With tentative steps she pushed open her bedroom window and eased herself out onto the roof. After glancing over the edge to make sure her grandpa wasn't waiting for her at the bottom like the last time, she started climbing down the surprisingly strong rose trellis. Now that she was safely out of the house she put her car into neutral and pushed it a few blocks away then started it and headed to the party.

The party was what she expected it to be and after drinking a few cups of beer and having a few laughs with Bonnie, she decided to stop, otherwise she wouldn't be able to climb back up to her room. She was tossing her empty cup into the trash when she spotted Stefan, who had taken up most of Elena's time, near the treeline watching her talk to her ex boyfriend Matt. Excusing herself from Bonnie who was telling her how she saw a crow when she touched Elena's hand she headed over to Stefan. "Hey." She greeted him with a small smile that he returned with his own greeting as if he didn't want to talk to her. "Don't worry unlike every other girl at this party I'm not going to throw myself at you." She laughed as she moved to stand a few feet beside him, making Stefan surprisingly give her a laugh and a genuine smile. "I just wanted to introduce myself. I'm Katie, Elena's friend." She informed him. "I saw you over here looking all jealous and I figured I'd let you know that you don't need to be."

"Yeah, why's that?" He asked turning toward her without moving his feet as he stuffed his hands in his pockets.

"I know it's not my place to say and I'm sticking my nose where it doesn't belong, but...she's over Matt. Has been for a long time now. She just couldn't make herself hurt him." She answered. "She's sweet like that."

"Well, you're..."

"Weird." She finished since it seemed like he was looking for the right word to describe her.

"I was going to say forward, but weird works." He laughed. "You know, you're the first girl that hasn't tried to hit on me since I got to this school. It's kinda refreshing, but I don't get it." He looked at her with pursed lips and puzzled eyes. "Why are you trying to help me get the girl?" Stefan asked.

"Because I’m weird.” Katie answered as if she were trying to sound mysterious then laughed. “Na, it’s really because I knew I didn't stand a chance." She answered as she dropped her eyes to the ground then got quiet for a second. "And also because she's one of my best friends and she's had a hard year. She could use a little happiness."

"How do you know I'll make her happy?" He asked with a tight lipped smile.

Katie glanced up at where Matt and Elena had been to see that Matt was gone and Elena was looking at the two of them. "Because," she started then turned to look at Stefan across her shoulder, "now she's the one looking jealous."

She was pretty sure that once Stefan looked at Elena he forgot all about her. So she went back to the party, meeting Bonnie at the top of the small hill. "Hey, where you goin'?" Bonnie asked when Katie walked past her.

"The grill. I need coffee if I'm going to sober up enough to get home before Grandpa leaves for work and realizes my car isn't there." She replied and kept walking.

"Okay, we’ll meet you there later." Bonnie called after her and Katie waved over her shoulder letting her friend know she heard her.

After getting a hot coffee Katie chose a table outside and pulled the book they had been assigned for English out of her bag. She was half way through the assigned chapters when sirens started blaring and cop cars sped past the grill toward the party. After they passed out of sight her phone vibrated and she looked at the screen to see a text from Bonnie that said, "Vicki was attacked by an animal."

She didn't have enough minutes left on her phone to text Bonnie back, so she called her since it was free. "Hey, what do you mean she was attacked by an animal? Is everyone okay?"

"I don't know, Elena and Jeremy found her in the woods with some kind of bite on her neck. No one else seems to be hurt, but they’re putting Vicki in an ambulance right now." Bonnie answered, sounding worried and tense.

"Oh my god, do I need to come back?" Katie pressed her fingertips to her lips not knowing what else she could say.

"No, me and Caroline are about to head your way. We’re gonna sober up while we wait for news." Bonnie told her.

"Okay, just...stay safe okay?" She got a positive answer from Bonnie then hung up the phone. Not being able to read anymore she tucked the book into her bag and focused on sipping the still hot coffee. Ten minutes later Bonnie pulled up and parked in front of the grill. They got a table inside and the other two girls ordered coffee.

"Why didn't he go for me?" Caroline asked sounding whinier than usual, clearly talking about Stefan. "How come the guys that I want never want me?"

"I'm not gonna touch that one." Bonnie answered.

Caroline looked to Katie for answers. "Yeah, I'm not answering that either."

"I'm inappropriate. I always say the wrong thing..." She started listing off the things wrong with herself. Katie pulled a I'm gonna keep my mouth shut look and took a sip of lukewarm coffee. "And Elena always says the right thing. God, she doesn't even try and he just picks her. She's the one that everyone picks for everything. I try... SO hard and I'm never the one."

"It's not a competition." Bonnie said, looking at Katie for back up.

"Sorry, Bon, but sometimes it kinda feels like one." Katie said with a shrug.

"See." Caroline said with a motion to Katie. "Thank you."

After things calmed down and Caroline sobered up a little, Bonnie left the table to go pay the bill. Katie looked up from her empty cup and noticed Caroline smiling at someone and followed her gaze to a dark haired, ice blue eyed, gorgeous guy who was smiling back at her. "Looks like you found someone to like you back." Katie told Caroline with a grunt as she slid out of the chair and grabbed her bag. "Tell Bonnie I said good night."

"I will." Caroline replied not breaking eye contact with the guy. Katie just rolled her eyes and walked away.

She managed to sneak successfully back into her room and sat down at her desk, pulling her journal out and flipping to a fresh page. "Well the party was as I predicted it would be, except Vicki Donovan got attacked by some kind of animal. I wasn't there to see it, but it was apparently pretty bad. After the party Caroline, Bonnie and I met up at the grill to sober up. I got to listen to Caroline complain about how she never gets the guy and Elena gets everything. Of course right after this conversation she catches some super hot, blue eyed guy’s attention. Like, I can't stress enough how hot this guy was. The contrast of his dark hair and ice blue eyes was enough to make a girl's heart melt, not to mention the cute smirk he was giving Caroline. I hate to sound like Caroline, but why don't guys ever look at me? I mean I may not be crazy beautiful like Elena, Bonnie and Caroline, but I don't think I'm ugly either. Maybe that's why, because no one notices the average girl. And that's exactly how I would categorize myself. Whatever, who needs a guy anyway? All they bring is trouble. I need sleep. Ttyl Journal."

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ghoulboyboos · 6 years

Note

Hey dude! Big fan of your work here. If you are taking prompts, I'd like to suggest a Beetlejuice AU where Shane and Ryan are a loveable ghost couple (bonus points if they adopt a neglected goth kid in the end). Thank you in advance💕 Spooky season, hell yeah🎃👻💀

This one took a lot longer than I anticipated! I apologize for making it kind of cheesy and feelsy instead of creepy but I figured that Ryan would be too scared and Shane too soft to summon fucking Beetlejuice on someone’s butt. ;D Hope you enjoy!

Meenasquints up the outer wall of the house. It looks vaguely Victorianwith the brick walls, pointed slate roofs and a porch that is reallymore of a gazebo. Gothic Revival left its mark,she thinks as her parents and the movers take the trips to and fro toget everything inside. There is a large iron fence surrounding thehouse, but the bars are wide enough to not make it feel like aprison. She looks at the house again, taking in the small tower – Ithink the term is “turret”?- just left of the middle. Maybe if she got there first she couldclaim it as her room.

Thestairs look new, but the sixth one stillcreaksloudly. Something to keep in mind if she wanted to sneak out sometime. Usually Meena didn’t give her parents much trouble. Theyweren’t terrible,they were just busy all the time and boring as dust. Her dad was ininsurance and still in the mindset that he had to protect her fromher first boyfriend. Yeah good luck with that, Dad.Meanwhile, Meena’s mother tried her best to turn her into a“respectable young woman” which didn’t really work out,considering she nearly screamed when Meena showed up with a black andpurple undercut and refused to go back to her natural chocolatebrown.

Shewas much happier alone and alone she would be once the tower washers. Turret. Whatever.

About a week after moving in, she notices something strange. Wheneverher parents are out, things seem to be moving on their own. She hasyet to catch it, but she is sure that someone is moving stuff around.

Herparents’ bedroom is one of the spaces. The house had been nearlycompletely empty when Meena moved here with her parents, but a coupleof objects seem to have been forgotten by the original owners. On thewall, right above where a bed must have been for many, many years,was a wooden frame with a butterflybehind glass. It was a real one, very pretty in brightshades of blue. His mother considered it tasteless and put it in adrawer. When the butterfly somehow ended up onthe wall again, Meena didn’t think much of it until her motherasked her not to put that horrendous thing back up and that it wasn’ta funny prank. Meena didn’t say anything, just nodded and rolledher eyes as always. But she had grown curious. She took the butterflyfrom the drawer and hid it under her bed, making sure that herparents didn’t see her take it away. The next day, sometime in the afternoon whileher dad was busy in his office and her mom was shopping, Meenachecked under her bed.The butterfly was gone. She rushed down the stairs to the secondfloor and peeked into her parents’ bedroom. The encased butterflyhung above the bed as if it had always been there.

Meena chuckled and carefully took it down to tuck it under her arm.

“I’ll get you a new space. Otherwise my mom is going to throw youout.” She whispered to the frame, even though the butterfly waslong dead and couldn’t hear her.

She drove a nail into the wall of her little room and hung thebutterfly over her desk. Her mom was horrified but allowed it whileher dad only shook her head when his wife told him.

The butterfly stayed put after that.

When Meena had opened the door to the room that would be hers for thefirst time, an old guitar had been sitting against the support beamin the middle of the room. Meena didn’t know how to play guitar,but she had brushed her fingertips over the strings anyway. Up here,the acoustics were nice. The tone of the instrument had echoed alittle in her still empty room. She had put it behind the door whenshe made the room her own, not wanting to knock it over.

A few days after, Meena stirred from her sleep in the middle of thenight because she could swear she could hear music. Just a couple ofsoft chords and something else, maybe a voice humming a song shedidn’t know. When she opened her eyes, the room was empty andquiet. The guitar rested innocently in its original place against thesupport beam.

She screwed her eyes shut and counted to ten before pinching herselfin the arm. It hurt. She wasn’t dreaming. Meena opened one eye andglanced over. The guitar still sat against the beam in the middle ofher room.

Meena pulled the blanket over her head. Creepy.

Shefinds out aboutthe source of the strange moving objects one night when she can’tsleep. The new school rubsher the wrong way, because the kids thinkshe isweird and creepy – which isexactly what she isgoing for but there was no reason for them to be rude about it –and Meena liesawake thinking about what to do if the teacher reprimandsher for her hair againwhen she hearsthe shuffling of footsteps outside. At first she thinksher mother isgoing to check in on her, but then she hearsmuffled voices. Two male voices. She frowns.None of them sound like her dad. Issomeone breaking in? How did they not trigger the alarm downstairs?The only window up here isin her room and she definitely would have noticed someone creepingin.

She freezes when the door to her room suddenly unlocks. The click isincredibly loud in the quiet of the night and her eyes are wide whenthe door slowly but surely swings open, creaking only a little bit.Her breath stops when she sees two shapes move in, slightly hard tomake out in the bit of moonlight that’s falling in through thewindow.

“I think these people are alright, Shane. We should just leave andlet them have their lives.”

“You know we can’t leave. We tried.”

Meenastrains her eyes. She can make out the man that was addressed asShane. He is really, really tall and it’s kind of freaky to seesomeone that tall in herlittle space. He is slim,too. Lanky, Meenathinks. The moonlight falls on his face and her worries aboutburglars are calmed while the other, slowly growing worry in the backof her mind is confirmed:

Ghosts.

Theman called Shane looks younger than Meena’s parents, maybe in hisearly thirties and from what she can tell, he looks kind of pale. Abig head full of fuzzy hair and kindof hard to see, a plaidflannel shirt and jeans. There are onlyhints of color to him, thered of the shirt and the blue of his jeans washed out like he’s aphotograph left in the sun for too long. He’s a little bit seethrough and in the moonlight there is a silver glint to his outline.The other person steps closer. He’s about a head shorter than Shaneand maybe a few years younger. His hair is dark and his skin, despitethe ghostly pallor, is darker, more bronze. He’s clad in a t-shirtand a zipped up jacket, the mustard color of the jacket as washed outas the red of Shane’s flannel. He is wearing jeans as well and apair of sneakers that Meena expects are the kind of shoes that thepopular jocks at school would wear. The shorter guy seems to be asporty guy, but she doesn’t get a jock vibe from him. Neither ofthe men seems to notice her.

“I know we can’t leave. But we could… you know, stay back. Letthem have the space.”

“Ryan…”Shane looksat the other man with a look that Meena sometimes sees her mom giveher dad when he’s overworking himself. Caring but exhausted.Loving, but witha hint of innerpain. She glances over at “Ryan”, who seems to deflate.

“I know, Shane. I don’t want to leave this place either…” Hiseyes are locked on something and Meena follows his gaze to the guitarthat sits in the middle of the room. She looks back and watches asShane curls an arm around Ryan’s neck and presses a kiss to histemple.

Suddenly,she feels like she’s intruding on a private moment, which isridiculous because this is her room.So, Meena sits up and turns on her bedside lamp.

Ryan screams.

The scream echoes in the octagonal room. It’s how Meena finds outthat her parents can’t hear these two at all, because the volume ofRyan’s scream causes the glass in the windows to vibrate and herdad wakes up at the slightest of sounds.

Everything stays quiet downstairs. Up in her room, however, Shane ishowling with laughter while Meena and Ryan stare at each other. Ifshe’s honest, she is a little afraid. Who wouldn’t be? But seeingRyan that frightened just because she turned on her light helps alittle. Shane’s laughter does, too. Finally, Ryan gathers himselfand slaps the other man against the arm. Meena can see them connectand hears the smack, even though they look like they are not quitethere.

“Will you stop laughing? You’re making me look like an idiot!”

“You managed to do that yourself, man, that’s not my fault!”

“Hey!” Meena interrupts, because she hates being ignored.Somewhere downstairs, her father snores really loud and she holds herbreath for a moment. He can clearly still hear her. Not adream, then. But there are no further noises so she looks at the twomen again, who have stopped arguing and are staring at her.

“Wait…” Shane blinks, staring at Meena. He takes a step to theside and stops when she turns her head to follow his movement.

“You can see us?” Ryan’s voice is quiet and he still soundsweirdly scared. Meena looks at him and nods and the two look at eachother.

“Holy crap.” Ryan whispers and Shane reaches out to take hishand. Meena can see how hard Ryan is squeezing it.

“Uh…” She blinks. “Who are you? I mean… I gathered yournames-”

“We kind of… caught yours as well.” Ryan says quickly. “Throughyour parents. We’re around here a lot, you see. Sorry.”

“It’s fine.” Meena sits up more and pulls her cold feet underher to sit on them. “I kind of spied on you, you kind of spied onme. Seems like we’re even.”

Shane chuckles and Ryan breaks out into a surprised grin. Theyexchange a glance and Ryan wheezes.

Meena catches Shane murmuring “I like her.” before he squares hisshoulders and holds out a hand towards her.

“Hello, Meena. I’m Shane. Sorry for invading your bedroom but yousee, it used to be our shared office and we’re still kind ofattached to it.”

Meena reaches out and takes Shane’s hand. Or rather, she tries tobut her hand just passes through. A tingle brushes through her skin,as if her hand had fallen asleep for a second.

“Oh. Well. I could have seen that coming.” Shane laughs, clearlyembarrassed as he rubs his nose. Ryan behind him is shaking his head.

“I keep telling you things about ghosts but you never listen tome.”

Shane turns his head and crosses his arms.

“You still didn’t give me a single good explanation why we’restill here, Ryan. We don’t have any regrets or unfinished business,right?”

Ryan bites his bottom lip and nods. Meena clears her throat, stillfeeling like she’s intruding and both men start and look at her.

“Sorry.” Ryan says, deflating. “We’re not used to… otherpeople anymore.”

Meena looks from one to the other.

“How long…”

“I don’t know.” Shane sighs and sits down on the floor, foldinghis limbs into a cross-legged position. “Time is passing…weirdly. I don’t remember dates. Not years, at least. Sometimes Ithink we’re asleep-”

“Not asleep.” Ryan interrupts. But he sits down next to Shane.“More like… gone. For a while. We completely missed you guysmoving in. For a while, we thought you were the ghosts.” Heexchanges a slight smile with Shane and Meena bites her bottom lip.

Shane smiles slightly.

“I didn’t want to believe I was actually a ghost… you know, Inever believed in this stuff when I was alive. And I might havegotten… a little angry when we noticed you guys. It wasn’tanything personal. I just felt like our home was being invaded.”

Meena remembers the fuse blowing when the movers put up the diningroom lamp. She remembers the loud crash upstairs nobody couldexplain. The cold breezes her mother would complain about…

“I don’t know much about ghosts.” She finally says. “Butmaybe you still feel like you belong here because you two are soyoung…?”

Both seem surprised, but then smile. Ryan shakes his head slightly ashe’s smiling, as if remembering something fondly and Shane’s eyesseem to glint in the moonlight.

“Oh no, don’t worry about us.” Shane chuckles. “We’re not…we didn’t die like this. We lived here together for a long time.Actually…” He frowns, glancing over at Ryan. “I think we wereclose to our Gold Anniversary when I passed.”

“We were.” Ryan’s voice is softer and the smile is slowlyslipping from his face. Shane reaches out and takes his hand again,their fingers entwining.

“You were married?” Meena asks. She looks at their hands,expecting to see wedding bands, but there is nothing.

“Yeah.” Ryan rolls his eyes but he looks affectionate. “He beatme to the proposal, I remember.”

Shane shrugs, smirking.

“Not my problem if you fret so much about it. You postponed it onetime too many and missed your chance.”

“I still did propose to you.” Ryan’s sidelong glance is softerthan it seems at first. “The right way.”

“You cried when I proposed to you, babe. You loved Disney.”

“Shut up.”

Meena giggles. They were so different from how her parentsinteracted. Teasing, joking, but clearly affectionate. Her parentswere quiet and their conversations and movements practiced andrepeated to death. It was strange, but these two seemed much morealive than her parents.

Ryan smiles at her.

“I’m sorry if we creeped you out. And… sorry for screaming. Iused to be terrified of ghosts my whole life and it’s a hard habitto break.”

Shane giggles a bit, but he shuts up when Ryan shoots him a glare.

“It’s alright.” Meena says. She has pulled her duvet aroundherself to keep warm and glances over to the guitar.

“I heard one of you play…”

Ryan flushes and Shane starts to grin widely.

“That was the one and only Bergara Guitara!” He is laughing whenRyan pushes at him. “No but really, he kept it to himself but hedid play beautifully.”

“Shut up.”

“I mean it. You would play for me sometimes and it was alwaysbeautiful.”

Ryan huffs.

“I kept it to myself. I liked to play to relax, you know.”

Meena nods.

“What about the butterfly from downstairs?”

Ryan groans and rolls his eyes.

“That’s Shane’s stupid thing.” He shakes his head when Shanegrumbles “It’s not stupid” and holds up a hand to stop him. “Itwas a gift he got forever ago. The room your parents turned intotheir bedroom was ours long ago and he had to win a long, gruelingtrivia game against me to be allowed to put it there where itcontinued to creep me out for decades. So yeah, he’s used to itbeing there and wanted it to stay there.”

“I like it here, too.” Shane says, smiling. “This was our…workshop. I liked being here.”

Ryan snorts.

“That makes us sound like we were artists. We weren’t. We madeYoutube videos about conspiracy theories and haunted houses andstrange history.” He’s smiling, despite his dry tone and Shanegrins widely, spreading out his hands as he turns to Meena.

“It was amazing. We were friends long before we got together andjust butting heads on all of that stuff was so great. Sometimes wewould talk for hours on end about all kinds of stupid stuff and thenonly stop because we were starving.”

Meena laughs and Ryan seems to mellow a bit.

“Maybe that’s why we can’t leave. We’re really attached tothis place… And we found out that we can only touch the things weowned in our time… There isn’t much left of it, though.”

Meena nods and looks over at the wall where the butterfly is mounted.

“I’m sorry you’re stuck here.” She whispers. “But I’mglad I have someone to talk to, now.”

Both men pause at that and exchange glances.

“Your parents seem… busy.” Ryan says diplomatically. “Theywill probably be right back caring for you after the first stress ofthe move is over.”

Meena shakes her head.

“They are always like that. It’s fine. I’m comfortable withbeing left alone.” She swallows. “Most of the time.”

“You know,” Shane begins softly. “We’re not able to leavethis place… and it’s been a long, long time since we had avisitor. A real one to talk to. I think it could be nice if we…hung out sometimes.”

“Really?” Meena sits up a bit. Ryan nods.

“Sure. We could tell you some history about the house. There are alot of great things that happened here. If you want, that is.”

“Deal.”

Meena holds out her hand before she realizes that shaking Ryan’shand will be as impossible as shaking Shane’s.

Shane saves the situation by giving her finger guns and a wink,causing his husband to roll his eyes and do the same. Meena gigglesand points her fingers at them, adding a little click sound as shewinks back.

Thus, a pact was made.

Meena starts to look forward to coming home after school, now. Herparents are usually not in, but Ryan and Shane will hang out in herlittle attic space, usually talking about some theory or another.Sometimes Meena will catch them talking about their situation and howto solve it. On rare occasion, she catches them talk about her. Fromwhat she can gather, they are worried about her. Not in the fussy,annoying way her mom is or in the distracted, serious fashion her dad“tries”.

Shane and Ryan ask how school has been, what subjects are herfavorite. They catch on when she’s upset about the other kids.Shane talks her through re-dying her hair, revealing that he had alifelong friend who loved to die her curls purple or turquoise.

Somehow, having Shane lazily float over the empty bathtub while shewashes the rest of the dye out is reassuring.

“Looks pretty rockin’” Shane says, waggling his eyebrows andMeena is sure that “rockin” was already out of fashion when Shanewas young, but she still appreciates it.

Ryan teaches her how to play the guitar.

Shane is usually banned from their sessions because he can’t stoptalking about Ryan playing the guitar and while it’s always sweet,Meena is sure he does most of it to tease the other man.

It’s strange, having Ryan’s fingers pass through hers to connectwith the frets and strings, pressing down to show Meena where to puther fingers. Still, she adores the sessions, because she is actuallystarting to like playing and because the glances her friends shootthe instrument when they think Meena isn’t looking become lesspained.

Somehow, the guitar is starting to become hers. She can’t quiteexplain it. Ryan is still teaching her and encouraging her topractice, but he doesn’t have to lead her hands anymore. She isstarting to remember the chords, or looks them up online. One night,she catches Ryan brushing his fingers across the strings.

There is no sound.

She gets in an argument with her mom. A bunch of kids chased afterher after school, yelling about her having bats in her hair and ratsin her clothes. She slams the door.

Her mother is home, which is a rare occasion and she is not pleasedat Meena slamming the door.

“You know, darling, I just think that if you got dressed a littlemore… appropriate, the other kids would find you a bit moreapproachable.” Is all she says when Meena tells her.

It’s one of the rare occasions when Meena looses her cool.

“Mom! I’m being treated like shit because I’m being myselfand all you got to say to me to help is telling me not to be me?Spoiler alert: You’re not helping.”

She runs up the stairs, ignoring her mother call after her as sheruns up both flights and slams the door behind her, sliding downagainst it.

“Leave me alone!” She shouts when she hears shuffling steps,burying her face in her arms.

“Hey kid…” She can hear Shane’s slightly drawling voice andfeels a tingle against her shoulder. “Come on, want to talk aboutit?”

Shane talks to her a lot. About a lot of strange subjects.

Meena loves his stories. Shane had delved a lot into history when hewas still alive and he collected some of the weirdest, funniest andunbelievable tales on the way. Meena is glad that her parents areaway on the afternoon when Shane tells her stories about Anne Bonnie,because it ends with the three of them racing around the oldworkshop, shouting things in overblown pirate impressions andlaughing way too loud.

She starts reading more, borrowing books from the schools library andignoring the other kids who call her a “weird gothy nerd”.Instead, Meena chats with the librarian and runs into a group of kidsthat meet after school to play Dungeons & Dragons in the libraryafter school. She originally doesn’t want to get into it, but theillustration of the tiefling warlock is too cool to pass up andsuddenly she’s knee deep in lore and holds a pencil smearedcharacter sheet.

When she tells her ghost friends about it, Shane is laughing outloud. Meena learns that Shane would host D&D games for years,playing with his friends. Ryan never quite got into it, but he wascomfortable sitting by and listening to the insane antics of hishusband and their friends.

Ryan tells her about the basketball games he would play with hisfriends. Meena never really cared for sports, much to Ryan’schagrin, but she does find some of the pictures from the charitygames Ryan played at.

Both men become very quiet when they see Ryan pose with some of hisold friends, grinning brightly with the gleam of the post-game flushon his cheeks.

Meena cheers them up with stories of her own D&D game and becauseRyan can’t really teach her how to dribble without Meena drivingher father insane, she buys a small hoop from her allowance, puttingit over the trashcan. She’s getting better at tossing her crumpledpages of writing and doodling that don’t please her through thehoop. Ryan is keeping track of her points.

“What kind of butterfly is it?” She asks one evening when she’ssitting over her Biology homework.

Shane looks up from her book. He’s perched on her desk, watchingher like a hawk so she will get her stuff done before dinner. Theyhave begun to watch over her homework and eating habits and whileit’s kind of annoying, Meena has to admit that it’s better thanbeing shouted at to bring home better grades because she couldembarrass her dad at the PTA meeting otherwise.

“I actually don’t know.” Shane admits, looking at it. “Inever bothered to check.”

Ryan chuckles in the back, leaning against the support beam in theroom while he watches both of them.

“He only had the terrible thing to annoy me anyway.” He quips.Shane sticks out his tongue at him.

While they were arguing, Meena has executed her best Google-fu.

“Morpho peleides!” She calls out, probably butchering the Latin.“Also called the emperor.”

“Huh.” Shane mutters, looking at the butterfly. “An emperor.Like Napoleon himself.”

“Guy also wore blue.” Ryan adds, only to get startled whenShane’s head whips around to him.

“So you do listen to me when I talk about history.”

Ryan seems annoyed for a moment, scoffing.

“Of course I do. Even if I don’t care about what you’re sayingyou’re… a good narrator.”

“Awh.” Shane starts to grin and Ryan rolls his eyes. “Likewise,babe.”

“Gross.” Ryan says and Meena starts to giggle.

Later that night, Shane tries to straighten the frame of thebutterfly hanging on the wall. His fingers pass through the glass.Meena looks away when Shane pauses to frown at his fingertips.

They all know what is coming. Things have been changing.

Meena doesn’t always come home after school. She has friends tohang with outside of the library and D&D.

Shane’s little advice about being yourself with confidence that hegave Meena once in a while has helped at least a bit and the otherkids have decided to give Meena a wide berth instead of honing downon her. Ryan was delighted to see pictures of Meena playing Lacrosse.She will never get into basketball, but she has to admit there is funin playing team games with others. People who actually want herthere.

She had a talk with her parents. Surprisingly, her mother had beenharder to get to come around, but they had long, evening talks. Itdidn’t change everything. But it helped. They let her wearwhat she wants and buy her the books she wants for Christmas. Whenshe talks about the girl she’s crushing on, there are no weirdglances exchanged between her parents. In fact, her father stops herin the kitchen when they walk into each other one afternoon.

“I might not… be an expert on this kind of thing. But… I’mglad you get to be who you are, now.” His face is honest, even ifMeena is sure he’s uncomfortable. They share a hug. It’s a start.

Her mother helps her re-dye her hair the next time. She commentsabout how she used to have blue streaks in her hair when she was ateen. She laughs when Meena suggests they could buy some dye for her.

They are fading. Meena hates it but she doesn’t know how to stopit. Ryan and Shane, however, seem mostly happy with it.

“Don’t worry about us.” Shane pets her hair and even thoughMeena can’t really feel it, it helps to soothe her. “We got thesehuge, long lives behind us. We have to move on at some point.”

“Yeah.” Ryan is sitting on her other side. “Also… Shane hatesbeing a ghost. I just know it. Because it proves I’m right.”

Shane makes a mocking face at him but laughs.

“I was wrong about ghosts. I wonder if I was wrong about theafterlife as well. And… you know, this is your home now. Not oursanymore.”

Ryan smiles at him and shakes his head a bit.

“You know.” He turns to Meena. “When we were still upset aboutnew people living here, another ghost gave us a slip of paper…contacts for a “Bio Exorcist”. A poltergeist to drive you allout.”

Shane puts an arm around Ryan and smiles at Meena.

“Ryan was against it from the start. He never was big on conjuringanything.”

Ryan takes his free hand and rubs his thumb over the back.

“Shane was tempted, but he’s a good guy.” He elbows Shane inthe side when his husband waggles his eyebrows at him. “He thoughtit was too harsh and there were other ways.”

Meena wakes up and instantly knows they are gone.

She sits up, slowly, eyes still closed and hoping to see them whenshe opens them.

Ryan and Shane are gone.

She takes the time to curl up in bed for a while and cry over theloss of her two friends. It seems silly, since to everyone else Shaneand Ryan didn’t exist, weren’t more than some strange imaginaryfriends, but Meena misses them anyway. She knows they had to goeventually, but it still hurts.

That afternoon, she packs some things and takes a trip to the localcemetery. It takes some time to find them, but eventually, she isstanding in front of a double grave with a wide stone.

Shane Alexander and Ryan Steven Bergara-Madej. She runs her fingersover the engraving and looks at the dates. They grew old, very old.Ryan outlived Shane by two years, which meant that both lived intotheir late eighties. Meena can’t help it. She giggles a little. Thetwo of them didn’t sound like old men at all. The line under theirdates makes her tilt her head in confusion. She isn’t sure what“Apple Taters” are, but apparently the two of them loved that.

There are fresh flowers on the graves and she remembers them talkingabout their adopted kids, about how Ryan had always been a father andhow they eventually moved but still visited on the weekend.

Meena takes the guitar from her back. She has her own by now andshe’s getting good. This was Ryan’s anyway and she thinks it’stime to hand it back.

Carefully, she leans the instrument against Ryan’s side of thestone, making sure it doesn’t fall over. Next, she pulls themounted butterfly from her bag and puts it under Shane’s name. Thelight catches on it and causes the blue wings to shimmer.

“Thank you. Both of you.” She puts a hand on the stone, smilingdown at it.

“I think I cracked it. You two were still stuck there because Ineeded to figure some stuff out. Sorry for taking so long getting myshit in line.”

She chuckles and takes a step back, looking over the grave one moretime before turning and leaving. Meena has only taking a couple ofsteps before she thinks about something.

“Oh right. If you guys want to come to my Halloween party and hauntsome of my friends and I, that is absolutely cool. You’re invited.”

She turns and gives the graves double finger pistols and a wink. Sheclicks her tongue when she winks.

“Smell ya later.”

#ask #prompt #skeptic believer #shyan #haunted-gays

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