Chapter 2

Clarke was walking back and forth across her room, occasionally stopping to look at the door before continuing on her path again.

She kept trying to rationalize what she saw, but the only explanation she could come up with was that she had somehow gotten very drunk after only two shots. Or maybe she wasn't drunk at all and she had suddenly developed hallucinations. Whatever it was, she knew for sure that what she saw wasn't normal. People certainly didn't just disappear into thin air.

Every now and then she would look down at her hand and remember the sensation of it going through the girl's arm. It had felt unlike anything she had ever experienced. It was as if her hand had been thrust into ice water without the wetness. Although, it felt slightly more solid than water. Like how she would imagine it would feel to stick her hand in a huge bowl of pudding.

Clarke sat down for a moment before quickly standing back up and walking around the room once more. It had been hours since the incident and she couldn't seem to sit still for more than thirty seconds. She just kept going over and over everything in her head, looking for any little indication of what the hell happened.

"Shh," she heard someone loudly whisper outside her door, and a few moments later, Raven walked in with Octavia trailing right behind her. "Clarke's probably already—awake. Never mind."

"Hey," Clarke said, stopping in her tracks. "I thought you would be out later. And I thought you would be with Lincoln."

"I realized I forgot my phone here earlier," Octavia replied. "I'm gonna head back."

"Why do you look so freaked out?" Raven asked, eyeing Clarke.

"Oh, I—"

"What happened?" Raven asked. "Did Bellamy try something?"

"What? No!" Clarke quickly replied. "He walked me to the building and then left."

"Good, because I would have kicked his ass if he did," Raven stated.

"You do look freaked out," Octavia said, furrowing her brows slightly as she studied Clarke.

"What happened?" Raven asked, crossing her arms over her chest, and turning serious.

"I—" Clarke sighed as she sat down on her bed, running her hand through her hair. "I don't really know." She shook her head and then looked over at her two friends. Okay, I know this is going to sound crazy, but I've been seeing this girl around campus."

"The cute one?" Raven asked.

"Yes, her," Clarke said. "I saw her on my way to the room tonight, so I decided to, you know, say hi and apologize if we disturbed her last night."

"I'm missing the crazy," Octavia replied.

"She looked surprised that I was talking to her, which was a little weird, but I really didn't think anything of it," Clarke continued. "But then she suddenly said she had to go and I don't know why I did it, but I reached out to grab her arm to stop her."

"And?" Raven prodded.

"And my hand went right through her," Clarke replied.

"Like, through her through her?" Octavia asked.

"Yes," Clarke replied.

Octavia and Raven exchanged a look for a moment before the latter shrugged her shoulders and said, "Maybe it's the ghost."

"I'm sorry, the what?" Clarke asked.

"Supposedly Polis Hall is haunted," Raven replied, shrugging again as if it was no big deal. "You really haven't heard the story?"

"Yeah, two girls died, like, twenty years ago," Octavia said. "They lived on this floor in the corner room. They found one of their bodies a couple days later, but they never found the other one."

"I heard they found them both," Raven said.

Octavia shook her head. "They found the one dead in the lake."

"I heard it was the woods," Raven replied.

"Whatever," Octavia said, shaking her head. "The point is weird things have been happening in this building for years. People getting locked out of their rooms, stuff moving around when no one's been in the room."

"Jasper swears she's the reason he can never find his keys," Raven added. "I've never really heard of anyone actually seeing her, though. Usually it's just weird stuff happening; the kind that makes you question your sanity."

"Oh, I'm definitely doing that," Clarke mumbled.

"So, you really saw her?" Octavia asked, actually looking excited at the prospect of Clarke seeing ghosts.

"I don't know exactly what I saw," Clarke said, shaking her head.

Octavia hummed and then grabbed her phone from where she'd apparently left it on Raven's desk. Raven, on the other hand, was still looking at Clarke in concern.

"Do you want me to stay here?" Raven asked. "I was going to go back to the party, but I can stick around if you want."

Clarke shook her head. "It's okay; go have fun."

"Are you sure?" Raven asked.

"Yeah, I'm sure," Clarke replied. "I should get some sleep." She gave her friends a weak smile. "I'm probably just tired."

Clarke rubbed her eye as she read the paragraph for the third time. She couldn't seem to concentrate, and after several more attempts to get through the rest of the chapter, she finally gave up, pushing the book forward and leaning back in her seat.

She had tossed and turned most of the night, regretting her decision to tell Raven to go. She kept feeling like she was being watched, but every time she would turn the light on and look around, she was completely alone in the room. She knew it had been her imagination, but with what Raven and Octavia had told her on her mind, she couldn't help feeling a little paranoid.

Despite how freaked out she had been, though, she was equally as curious. It all seemed so crazy, but at the same time, it was the thing that made the most sense. She knew she hadn't had enough alcohol the night before to even be tipsy, so she couldn't blame what she saw on that. So unless she was developing schizophrenia or some other mental disorder that made her hallucinate, there was no other explanation she could think of, and as much she didn't want to believe in ghosts, she wanted to believe that even less.

With a long sigh, Clarke looked around, her eyes landing on the computers at the side of the room. She hesitated for a second, but after a few moments, she grabbed her notebook and stood up, walking over to one of the computers and sitting down.

"Okay, let's see if you're crazy," Clarke mumbled to herself.

She didn't have a lot to go on—no name or anything like that—so she started looking for articles about any deaths that may have happened at the university. The first few were about a suicide that happened the previous year, and then she found what she was looking for. The double murder that happened at the University of Arkadia exactly twenty years before. And it included a picture of the two roommates who were killed, one of which was a face she would never forget.

Clarke didn't know how long she was looking through article after article before leaning back with a sigh. It was real. The ghost was real. It hadn't been a hallucination or the vodka. Octavia and Raven had been right, and as Clarke hit the print button, she wondered whether or not they would truly believe her or if they were simply humoring her.

After sending several more articles to the printer, Clarke grabbed her student ID out of her wallet and walked down the hall to the printer. As she was standing there waiting for the articles to print out, she suddenly felt like the air had shifted somehow, and when she glanced over her shoulder, she saw her. She was walking down the hallway, seemingly unaware to everything going on around her, not even pausing when Clarke called out.

"Hey!" Clarke tried again. "Wait!"

Abandoning the printer, Clarke quickly began following the ghost, apologizing when she bumped into someone in her haste to follow. The ghost moved a lot faster than she did, moving through walls when Clarke had to go around. After a minute or two, though—after Clarke had to run up the stairs when the brunette went right through the ceiling—Clarke finally caught up to the ghost.

When Clarke rounded the corner in the stacks, she finally stopped, trying to catch her breath. The ghost had finally stopped moving so quickly and was now slowly walking down the aisle, looking at the books on the shelves.

"Hey," Clarke softly said, not wanting to risk upsetting the ghost by startling her. If you could even startle a ghost.

She hadn't exactly planned what she would say the next time she saw her, and she hadn't given any thought to what would actually happen once she caught up to her. But when Clarke saw her, she couldn't seem to stop herself from running after her.

"I know who you are," Clarke found herself saying, internally cringing at how abrupt she had been.

The ghost stopped and looked at Clarke for a second before turning back to the row of books. "And who am I?"

"You're Alexandria Woods," Clarke stated. "You were a student here." Clarke paused for a moment. "You died in 1996 along with your roommate. They found your body in the woods two days after you disappeared, but they never found your roommate's, and the police never found out who killed you."

She slowly began walking again, tilting her head to look at the titles of the books. Clarke instantly regretted her choice of words, wishing she would have been a little less blunt, but just as she was about to apologize, the ghost whispered, "Lexa."

"What?" Clarke asked, furrowing her brows in confusion.

"Most people called me Lexa," she said, locking eyes with Clarke for a moment before turning away and walking straight through the wall.

Clarke let out the breath she didn't know she had been holding and nodded to herself. It was a start.

Clarke stared at the news article, no longer really seeing the words. She had already read about the murders so much, reading and rereading the articles she had printed, and she didn't even really know why. It's not like anything new would suddenly appear in them or as if it would change what was happening.

After checking her phone to see what time it was—and seeing she had several texts from Raven asking when she was going to be back or if she was going to spend all weekend at the library—Clarke decided to call it a day. As much as she needed to study for her test, it clearly wasn't going to happen with her mind so focused on other things. So, Clarke shoved the articles into her bag next to her notes and books that had never even left the bag.

After shouldering the bag, Clarke sent off a quick text to tell Raven she was leaving the library. As she neared the building, she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. Before she could pull it out and look at the text, though, she saw Lexa sitting on the steps to the building and she froze.

At first, Lexa seemed distracted as she stared off in the distance, but then her eyes slowly met Clarke's. They stared at one another for a few moments before Clarke broke eye contact and looked down, clearing her throat. She didn't want to say anything stupid and make Lexa disappear again, but she was taking it as a good sign that she didn't vanish the moment she noticed she was there.

"I—" Clarke paused when the front door opened and two people walked out. She waited for them to pass and then looked over her shoulder, making sure they were far enough away to not overhear her since she didn't want to look like a crazy person who was talking to herself. "I didn't expect to see you again so soon. I actually thought you may avoid me, but I guess there's no need to when you can vanish out of a conversation at any moment." Clarke gave her a wry smile. "Anyway, I'm sorry about earlier; it was a little insensitive."

Clarke walked up the steps and glanced at Lexa before sitting down next to her.

"Can I ask you something?" Clarke asked, looking over at Lexa, who paused for a moment before giving a barely-there nod. "Have you always been here?"

"Yes," Lexa answered.

Clarke hummed. "I wonder why I haven't seen you before?"

It was more of a question for herself than Lexa. She had been living in Polis Hall the entire past school year, and the night before was the first time she had seen Lexa. And she knew she would have noticed her if their paths had ever crossed. Lexa was too beautiful not to be noticed.

She didn't know why she was suddenly seeing a ghost. It was certainly something she had never experienced before, and given the amount of time she had spent around hospitals since her mom was a doctor, she assumed it would have happened a lot. So she couldn't help wondering why she was seeing this ghost in particular. What made her so special that Clarke could see her?

"I don't know," Lexa said in a soft voice. "I don't think anyone else has. I thought maybe someone did once or twice, but if they did, it passed."

"So, I'm the first person you've talked to in, what, twenty years?" Clarke asked.

Lexa gave a brisk nod. "Yes."

"That's—I'm sorry," Clarke replied with a frown. "I can only imagine how hard that must be."

"You get used to it," the ghost said, clasping her hands together, and looking down at them. "I wasn't the most social when I was—"

Clarke nodded in understanding, not needing for Lexa to say the words. She wanted to say something comforting, but what could she possibly say? It was a shitty situation, and she didn't think anything could make it better.

"Do you know why you're still here?" Clarke wondered. "I mean, why you didn't go on? I'm sorry, is that a rude question? I haven't exactly been in this situation before."

"That makes two of us," Lexa replied. "And to answer your question, no, I do not know. One moment I was alive, and the next I was not. I don't remember the in-between."

"So, you don't remember what happened to you?" Clarke asked.

"No," Lexa answered.

Clarke nodded. "Maybe that's for the best."

"Talking to yourself again, Griffin?"

Clarke jumped at Raven's sudden appearance. "No, I—" She glanced at Lexa before looking back at Raven. "Yes. I was just thinking aloud."

"Well, stop talking to yourself and come on," Raven said, walking up the steps. "Octavia's waiting for us."

"For what?" Clarke asked.

"Lunch," Raven answered.

Clarke nodded and then quickly looked at Lexa and mumbled, "I'll see you later."

"What was that?" Raven asked, looking over her shoulder.

"Nothing," Clarke lied.

Clarke was wide awake, listening to the sound of the rain hitting the window and the soft snores that told her Raven was still sound asleep. Something Clarke had failed to be all night.

It was the second night in a row that she had barely slept. Except instead of wondering what the hell was going on, this time she couldn't help thinking about Lexa's situation. She just kept thinking what it would be like if it was her that was stuck there, unable to communicate with anyone, forced to watch everyone else live their lives while she could never move on. Clarke couldn't imagine spending a month like that, let alone twenty years.

While she still wondered why she was suddenly seeing a ghost, Clarke had decided it really didn't matter. She knew she should probably be more freaked out about it, but now that she actually knew what was going on and that she wasn't crazy, she had come to accept it. It was just one more thing in an already eventful year. Unlike all the other things that had happened that year, though, this was one of the few that wasn't bad. Weird and unexplainable, but not necessarily bad.

With a low groan, Clarke sat up and ran a hand through her tangled hair. She still had a few hours before she needed to be at her first class of the day, but she was tired of lying there, staring up at the ceiling. So, with a yawn, Clarke threw back the covers and swung her legs over the side of the bed.

After grabbing her things, Clarke walked out of her room and down the hall to the showers. As she entered the bathroom, she couldn't help glancing around for Lexa, but aside from Octavia, who was standing at the mirror, the room appeared to be empty.

"You're up early," Octavia said when she noticed Clarke's reflection in the mirror.

Clarke shrugged. "Couldn't sleep."

"Why not?" Octavia asked as she turned around and leaned against the sink.

"I'm not sure," Clarke lied. "I guess I was just restless."

"Thinking about your close encounter?" Octavia asked with a slight grin.

"That was—" Clarke shook her head.

"What?" Octavia questioned. "Are you taking back what you said?"

"Not exactly," Clarke replied, looking down for several seconds before slowly looking back up at Octavia and hesitantly asking, "Do you believe me?"

"I don't know," Octavia replied. "I guess I don't not believe you. If you say you saw something then you saw something. Whether it was a ghost or not, who knows."

Octavia shrugged and Clarke nodded. "Well, thanks for not thinking I'm crazy."

"What are friends for?" Octavia replied.

"I should get ready," Clarke said, nodding toward the shower room.

"Later," Octavia replied as she pushed off the sink.

Clarke walked into the showers, glancing into each open stall. She didn't really expect for Lexa to be hanging out in one of them, but she still looked anyway in the off chance that she was around. The stalls were all empty, though, so Clarke walked to the back of the room, where she turned the water on and took a long, hot shower.

"What are you doing?" Raven mumbled as soon as Clarke walked back through the door. "Why the hell are you up so early?"

"It's eight," Clarke replied. "It's not that early."

"It is when I stayed up 'til two in the morning," Raven said, pulling her pillow out from under her head, and putting it over her face.

"Weren't you just saying the other day how I sleep too late?" Clarke reminded her.

"No," Raven mumbled from underneath the pillow.

"Well, it was implied," Clarke said.

Clarke quickly got ready, throwing her hair up in a ponytail and putting on less makeup than usual. She didn't want to waste time since she only had a little under an hour and a half before her class, and she had no idea how long things would take.

"I'm never going to fall back asleep now," Raven said, throwing her covers to the side, her pillow falling to the floor.

"Sorry," Clarke replied as she put on her jacket.

"Where are you even going?" Raven asked. "Your class doesn't start for forever."

"I need to go help someone," Clarke answered.

"You need to help someone?" Raven repeated.

"Yes," Clarke replied.

Raven shrugged, clearly too sleepy to care very much. "Whatever. I'll be out late, so you can study here tonight if you want."

"I'll probably do that, thanks," Clarke replied. "I'll see you later."

Clarke silently watched Lexa for a few moments, the ghost smilingly unaware to her presence. She was exactly where Clarke had followed her to the previous day, and Clarke couldn't help wondering how much of her time she spent in the library stacks. As far as she knew, Lexa could spend her time anywhere, so she had to wonder why she spent it there.

"You're staring."

Clarke shook her head as she pushed off from the shelf she had been leaning against. "I like to think of it more as watching."

"What do you want—Clarke was it?" Lexa asked.

"You can move things?" Clarke said, furrowing her brows as she watched Lexa turn the page to the book she was staring at.

"Yes and no," Lexa replied.

"What's the yes and what's the no part?" Clarke wondered.

"I have to concentrate, and even then, I can only move certain things," Lexa answered. "The lighter something is, the easier. Fortunately, books are not too heavy."

"So that's why you spend your time at the library? To read?" Clarke asked.

"Yes," Lexa replied.

Clarke smiled. "Well, at least you have something to help you pass the time, right?"

"You didn't answer my question," Lexa said, looking over at her. "What do you want, Clarke?"

"I just—I don't know," Clarke replied, looking down, and shaking her head. "I couldn't sleep last night. I kept thinking about you and how much I would hate to be in your position. I can't imagine how lonely you must be. How frustrating it would be to have to watch everyone around you live their life but to never be able to move on yourself. That's why I decided that I want to help you, Lexa. If you want my help, that is."

"And how do you propose to help me?" Lexa asked.

"By finding who killed you," Clarke answered. "That has to be the reason you're still here, right? They never found out who murdered you, and I thought maybe you could move on if I could somehow figure out who did it. What do you say? It can't hurt, right? I mean, if you're ready to move on." Clarke shrugged. "Maybe I'm wrong; maybe you like it here and never want to leave. If that's the case, tell me and I'll drop it."

She didn't know if she could help Lexa, but she felt like she had to try. She knew it would be a long shot—the police hadn't figured it out in twenty years and she certainly didn't have any investigative skills—but she still felt like she needed to help Lexa. Or at least attempt to help her.

"So?" Clarke said, giving Lexa a questioning look. "Do you want to think about it?"

"You can do whatever you wish, Clarke," Lexa replied.

"I know, but I don't want to do it unless you want me to," Clarke said.

"Well, I certainly don't want to only be able to talk to you for the rest of my existence," Lexa remarked.

Clarke rolled her eyes when Lexa smirked at her. "You're lucky I feel sorry you. And that I can't throw anything at you because it would go right through you."

"You wouldn't throw anything at me," Lexa said. "I've seen you with your friends, and you never throw anything at them despite how annoying they can be."

"That's because they're my friends," Clarke replied. "Wait, you've been watching me?"

"I watch a lot of people, Clarke," Lexa said. "As you pointed out, I cannot do much else. And you and your friends are—particularly lively. It's hard not to notice."

Clarke took a few steps toward Lexa. "So, what all do you watch us doing?"

Lexa shook her head. "Don't worry, Clarke, I'm not one to watch people when they are—how should I put it? Intimately involved with others or themselves. I usually stay in public places."

"Usually?" Clarke questioned.

"I occasionally get bored and will join someone while they are watching a movie," Lexa replied. "I always make sure they are decent, though."

Clarke nodded. "Have you ever been there when I was watching one?"

"Wouldn't you know if I had?" Lexa asked.

"I don't know," Clarke said, shrugging. "I have no idea if I've always been able to see you or if this is a new development."

Lexa hummed. "So, Clarke, how are you going to go about solving my murder?"

"I guess I'll have to figure that out, won't I?" Clarke replied.