The strangest part of this new existence is that no one listens to him anymore.

From a young age, he's always been the voice of reason. The one his friends would turn to when they had questions. His was usually the final word, the deciding vote, because he was smart and everyone knew he was smart and his teachers always said you've got a good head on your shoulders, you're going to go places.

But he didn't go anywhere. He died.

He doesn't remember dying, not really. It happened so fast, a sudden crushing impact and then darkness, that it almost felt like being jolted out of a bad dream.

Those first few minutes after death were more confusing and disorienting than the act itself. He was standing over his body but he didn't recognize it. He was stuck in a state of vertigo, that feeling of going down the stairs in the dark and missing a step. He kept losing time. He didn't know anything. He didn't belong anywhere. He didn't belong anywhere. He didn't belong anywhere. He must belong somewhere.

Then he opened his eyes in a hospital room. It was dark, save the warm-colored string lights someone had put up in the corner. It was quiet.

A boy was there. That bruised, battered face was a familiar, precious touchstone. Those dark curls were a haphazard dandelion mess on the pillow. He remembered a thousand instances of his own voice, fond or annoyed or amused, saying, "Mikey, brush your hair."

Mikey. Of course Mikey.

It was like grasping a livewire. In a sudden rush, Donnie knew exactly who he was. He knew exactly where he needed to be.

The first thing he remembers feeling, in this strange afterlife, was confusion. The second thing he remembers is heartbreak.

How could I leave you? he thought, or maybe said out loud, for all the difference it made, sitting next to Mikey's bed for hours that night. How could I leave you on your own? His poor lonely, troubled brother. His only family. His kid, really, in all the ways that mattered. And Mikey was so strong, so good, but this was just another in a long line of losses that Mikey didn't deserve to deal with, and Donnie was terrified of what surviving this was going to cost him.

The lights had flickered and flared while Donnie wrestled with his grief. He'd touched Mikey's arm, clinging to him as hard as he could, like it might make a difference somehow. Like he might still be able to do anything for him. He was so sorry. He loved him so much. He still existed because he loved him that much.

Then Mikey's eyes had opened. He looked right at Donnie, really seeing him. He said Donnie's name.

From there it was simple. Whatever it took, Donnie was going to stay.

He doesn't regret that. Even as he drifts through the world, pressed behind a glass wall, a million miles away from everything around him. He doesn't feel anything. He can hear his own voice, but even if he screamed and shouted and wailed at the top of his lungs, he'd be the only one who could hear it. At best, he'd give Mikey a headache. At worst, he'd blow all the circuit lines in the apartment building again.

Sometimes he wants to scream anyway. Only sometimes, not always, he's so desperate to be heard that he feels like he might unravel and come apart from whatever it is that makes him human.

He was going to get married. He was going to get his PhD. He was going to change the world. He had to watch his best friends mourn and grieve and put their lives on hold to keep themselves together. He had to watch his brother struggle to juggle his truths with the lies his family needed to hear. He had to watch April move out of her apartment because she didn't trust herself to be alone. It's been two years and she's only recently begun to move on and leave Donatello behind. Which is good. It's healthy, and it's healing, and it's all he wants for her. And it breaks his heart.

Sometimes he's angry.

At the drunk driver who took so much from his family that night in December. At himself, for dying. At Raph and Casey, for letting distance grow between themselves and Donnie's little brother. At Mikey, who puts himself in dangerous situations constantly because he's curious and kind-hearted and only ever wants to help.

They fought about it once, months after the accident. It was a largely one-sided argument, and Donnie withdrew afterward for a good sulk. He returned to a tearful, panic-stricken little brother, and realized that, perhaps, disappearing like that was not the kindest thing he could have done.

It was the first time Donnie had ever texted anyone aside from Mikey since he'd died. A message to Leo that went something like I messed up really bad, please come over and give my brother a hug. And the fact that Leo did, in fact, come over to give Mikey a hug—at a little after two o'clock in the morning, in cold February, on a school night—endeared him to Donatello instantly.

Mikey's friends are good ones. His classmates don't know how to approach him anymore, because as far as they can tell, he was virtually unaffected by Donatello's death; bouncing through every day as though it was business as usual, seemingly untouched by grief. If not for Leo and Woody, Mikey's only company would be the ghosts.

Desperation, sorrow, anger—he's dead and he shouldn't be, he's dead and it isn't fair, it was a freak accident, it wasn't his fault.

But love, too.

God, he loves them. His friends, who doggedly refused to let Mikey slip off their radar, even when they didn't understand him, even when they were frustrated or annoyed or fed up with him, even when caring about him took effort and patience. April, who is dating again but still keeps Donnie's picture on her vanity, who still celebrates their anniversary every year in her own quiet way—at a corner table in their favorite cafe, with one of those little coffee cakes they used to share.

And Mikey. Of course Mikey.

His touchstone. His home.

"Here," Mikey said one day, setting his open laptop on the table. "I was thinking—"

The site itself is self-explanatory. An online, self-guided course on American Sign Language.

Donnie turned to Mikey so fast it probably didn't look human. Mikey jumped a little in surprise, and then laughed at the absurdity of it all.

"I take it you're on board!" he said cheerfully, and signed them up without another word. Casually giving Donnie his voice back, in a way Donnie probably never would have thought of on his own.

Even living in this half-shade of real life, this quiet new existence where no one listens to him anymore, Mikey still hears him loud and clear.

And Donnie loves him. When he forgets everything else he remembers that. When the clawing, cloying emotions threaten to choke out reason and logic, Donnie still never comes close to one of those mindless wraiths that haunt the creepy, condemned buildings Mikey and his friends crawl around in. He's still so human it's painful. He cares too much to let go.

Mikey had been talking about some old farmhouse for weeks. Someone in one of his online circles emailed him about it. He was in the research half of his investigation, the part of it that Donnie secretly thinks is the most charming. He skipped a morning class to drive by it once and poke around a little bit—peek into windows, check out the shed—and that was that.

Somehow, that was all it took.

Over the next few days, Mikey got sick. It seemed like the beginning of a bad cold, maybe the flu. He was groggy and disoriented, slow to wake up. Sometimes he'd zone out for a few minutes at a time. Sometimes he'd stare at Donnie with an unfamiliar look on his face. Little, unremarkable things that were quick to add up only in hindsight.

Then Mikey disappeared. He didn't show up for a movie night. His friends hadn't heard from him. Hours trickled by, and this wasn't like Donnie's brother. Mikey knew better than that. He knew how scary radio silence could be. And Donnie knew, of course he knew, where Mikey had to be.

He couldn't leave the apartment. He'd get lost without an anchor. Mikey wasn't answering his phone. Leo and Woody knew Mikey was looking into a new location, but he hadn't shared the actual, physical address with them yet, and Donnie himself was hesitant to. If it was dangerous, he couldn't just send a couple of kids into it blindly, let alone his own surrogate little brothers.

But Donnie had to do something. So he texted Casey.

Casey, who had given into his own grief and lashed out at Mikey when he refused to go to the funeral, who had hurt Mikey so badly that he still didn't feel entirely welcome in Casey's house.

Casey, who slugged a grudge with a baseball bat because it dared to threaten Mikey's safety. Mikey had talked about that with stars in his eyes, looking a little like the little kid he used to be.

Let this not be a mistake, Donnie thought, or said aloud, and sent the text.

It wasn't a mistake.

Their apartment is fuller now than it has been in years. Donnie drifts down the hall after Raph and Mikey, following them back into the living room. Mikey ducks out from under Raph's arm to join his friends on the sofa, dropping into the seat between Leo and Woody they left open for him.

Leo passes him a paper takeout container of red curry and rice, still steaming. Leo's noodles are mostly untouched, and Woody's only made a few token attempts at his chicken. Mikey eats like he hasn't eaten in days, chewing mechanically, eyes half-hooded and exhausted.

Raph sinks onto the arm of the chair Casey's in and silently accepts a plastic cup of soup. None of them speak for awhile. There's an elephant in the room they're not addressing—or, well, a ghost in the room.

"Can I ask one thing?" Casey finally says.

He earns an icy look from Leo for daring to interrupt the dinner that no one is particularly enthusiastic about, but Mikey just hums an agreeable, "Mm-hm."

"Is he here now?" Casey asks. His voice is hoarse. He must know the answer, but he asks anyway. One of his hands is clenched around one of Raph's, his knuckles standing out like a string of pearls.

Mikey glances up. He doesn't answer right away.

His poker face is a lot better than when he was a kid, but it might also have something to do with the bruises and the bags under his eyes. He's been in this spot before, afraid to offer the truth that's been thrown back in his face over and over again. That's why he learned to lie.

Donnie moves closer, stepping around the dog's boneless sprawl on the living room rug, and waves a hand in Mikey's periphery to get his attention. When he has it, Donnie signs, Time for bed. For all of you, actually. Tell them I said so.

Tell them, Donnie is saying. Mikey hears him.

"Of course he is," Mikey says, still looking up at Donnie, like Donnie makes him feel brave. "This is where he lives."

It takes strength to stay when you're supposed to move on. And Donnie doesn't have a grudge or an important message to impart, but he does have some unfinished business.

He never outright promised Mikey that he'd always be there for him, but only because some things are so obvious they go without saying.

"And he said to go to bed," Mikey adds. Woody sighs, more than used to a ghost-enforced curfew. Leo starts to pack up the takeout containers. Their reactions are pale compared to the animated way Casey gapes, the way Raph's eyes dart around the room like there might be something in it that wasn't there a second ago.

Casey's mouth looks like it doesn't know what shape to take before it settles on a helpless smile. His eyes are bright and wet as he croaks, "Bossy as ever, huh, D?"

"That's the least surprising thing I've heard all night," Raph says quietly. His tone is fierce with fondness, loyalty, more than a little regret. "But we were always better off when we listened to you."

Donnie isn't alive, but this is where he lives.