A familiar sensation woke me from sleep.
My ghost sense was going off.
'That's weird.' I thought, throwing the covers back. 'There hasn't been an attack for years.'
I heard something move around in the room behind me and I turned around.
"I heard you'd quit fighting ghosts." Someone said.
I whirled around and changed to ghost. "Whatever you heard, you heard wrong."
"So, it's not true what went down between you and the old man?" Skulker demanded, stepping out of the shadows.
"That's none of your business." I replied, hurling an energy beam at him.
It knocked him backwards, and into my desk chair.
He stood up. "You've gotten better."
"Yeah, I've had lots of time to practice." I replied.
"Have you?" He asked, grinning.
I sighed. "Look, Skulker, why don't you just tell me what you're looking for?"
"You, essentially." He said.
"What are you doing? Trying to provoke me back into action?" I demanded. "Not going to work."
Skulker laughed. "Not even close, Ghost Child. You always were a step behind."
"What are you talking about?"
"You're worth an awful lot these days, Phantom." He responded.
I narrowed my eyes. "Well some things never change, I guess."
He laughed again and I sent several blasts his way.
I duplicated myself and sent the duplicate after him.
He ran from it, and while he wasn't paying attention, I sent a ghost blast his way.
It knocked him over and I used my duplicate to bring him down and freeze him.
After that, it was a simple matter of using my ghost ray as a means of exploding him. His form would regenerate in a few hours but for now, I threw his shards out the window.
Sighing, I climbed back into bed, my adrenaline pumping.
I lie awake, listening to my heart rate climb.
After a few minutes, I rolled over and checked the time.
The digital clock read 3:45 AM.
Sighing, I stood up out of bed and headed to the bathroom.
It was pretty much inevitable that I wasn't getting back to sleep.
I jumped into the shower, letting the cold water wash away any traces of sleep.
Skulker showing up out of nowhere reminded me of my high school life. My past life.
I closed my eyes and stuck my head through the shower water, letting it run down my face.
The sensation was both calming and energizing.
After I got out of the shower, I had a cup of coffee and read for a few hours.
A little while later, I went out for a walk.
The wind was bitter cold so I doubled up layers.
A snowstorm had blown in overnight and as I walked, my shoes disappeared in the snow.
On my walk, I saw a few people that I recognized and I stopped to tell them hello.
I walked out of my area and went over to a different apartment complex. I decided that I'd take the stairs instead of the elevator today.
This apartment complex was a lot different from my own.
It housed twenty five different apartments while mine housed only ten.
Instead of spacious balconies, it had one large patio on the lowest level.
Another way it was different from my apartment building was the occupants.
While this apartment building housed regular apartment-dwellers, mine was geared more toward the wealthy.
Like myself.
But I liked this apartment building better anyway. Because one of those occupants was my girlfriend, Sam Manson.
When she came to the door, she was still in her pajamas.
"Well, hello." I said, grinning. "Did you sleep well?"
She mumbled a response and walked back over to the couch, leaving the door open for me to follow her inside.
I shut the door behind me and walked over to the couch.
She smiled sleepily up at me. "I would kill you for waking me up, but you look handsome today."
I laughed. "Only today?"
"Yeah. The rest of the time, you could use some work." She replied, then winked.
I crouched down in front of her, smiling.
She leaned forward on the couch and put her hand on my white t-shirt.
"I love it when boys wear white t-shirts." She said. "But you know what I love even more?"
I put my hand on her knee. "What's that?"
"When boys spend time with their family." She said.
I stiffened. I knew exactly what she was getting at.
"Come on, Danny. You said so yourself, you haven't seen your parents in years." Sam said.
"That doesn't mean I want to go and stay with them for two weeks, and through Chistmas." I said.
"Why not?" She asked. "The holidays are a perfect time to reconnect with old family members."
"Maybe so, but not for me and my family." I said.
"Why not? I'm sure if you went up there they would-"
"I don't want to talk about this." I said, rising to my full height.
After I became a junior, I shot up to almost six feet, eclipsing my old high school bully, Dash Baxter.
She stood up too. "All I'm saying is this. You haven't seen your folks in so long. And I'd really like to re-visit our old town…"
I looked to the ground. "I don't know if that's such a good idea right now, Sam. Maybe next year."
I exited the living room and walked the few steps over to her kitchen, expecting her to follow.
She turned around but didn't follow me.
Her arms were crossed so I knew she wanted to talk about this some more.
I sighed. "What else?"
"What?" She asked.
"I know that you have other reasons why you want to go. What else?" I repeated.
She sighed. "Danny..."
"Come on, I know you have another reason." I said.
"I just...I think it would do you good to see your parents again." She hesitated.
"Why?" I asked.
"Because." She crossed her arms.
I raised an eyebrow. "Sam?"
"Because you've built a wall between you and your parents and every day that you don't talk to them or at least talk about them, that wall just gets bigger and bigger." She said.
I narrowed my eyes. "You don't know what happened between us back then, Sam."
"Well I would know if you'd ever tell me!" She yelled.
This wasn't the first time we'd had this fight.
About six months ago, she bugged me to call up my folks and see if we could spend the Fourth of July with them.
I told her that I did, and my parents were going to visit Vlad for the weekend.
Sam believed me, up until about a week before the Fourth, when she called Jazz.
Thankfully, when Sam mentioned to my sister that I hadn't told her what had happened between the two of us, Jazz wouldn't tell her either.
Sam and I had this crazy fight and I apologized. She didn't see me all week, went to visit her family.
When she got back to New York, she said we could be together again, but I couldn't lie to her ever again.
At least during this fight, she hadn't gone storming off yet.
"Sam, I told you before, I just…can't tell you about that." I said, massaging my temples.
"Why not? You know, you say that you're ready for this huge commitment to me, but you won't even be honest with me about this?" She demanded.
"Sam, my family has nothing to do with my love for you." I said.
"I'm not saying that it does. But if you can't open up and be honest with me about this, how on earth am I supposed to believe your 'till death do us part'?" She asked.
"That's not fair." I took a step toward her. "Sam, you know that I'm completely in love with you."
"But you don't trust me." She said.
"That's not true."
"How do I know?" She asked.
I sighed. "You have to trust me."
"Wow. That's so going to happen now." She said, eyebrows drawn down.
"I came over to take you out to breakfast." I said.
"Really? I'm not really hungry anymore, Danny." She said.
"Yes, really. And Sam, what do you want me to say?" I demanded.
"I want you to say something! Anything about your family! Instead of just burying it and never talking about!" She screamed, walking toward me.
When she reached me, she put her hands on my chest. "Danny, you have to let me in."
I sighed and closed my eyes, wrapping my arms around her.
She snuggled against my chest and I held her tightly.
"Danny, please." She whispered. "I need to know what happened."
"They disagreed with me." I said. "About my life."
"What?" She pulled away. "What do you mean?"
"About what college I wanted to go to." I said. At least that part was semi-true.
"What?" She demanded. "You mean that you've been fighting with your parents for five years because they didn't agree with your academic choice?"
I shrugged.
She narrowed her eyes. "Look me in the eye and tell me that."
I met her stare. "They didn't agree with what I wanted to do with my life."
She sighed and closed her eyes.
I leaned her head against my chest again, and listened to her breathe.
At least what I told her was almost true.
I'm sure that this wouldn't be the last time I heard this argument.