Disclaimer: I don't own.
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Jade stopped, her eyes scanning the small house, taking in the new resident who somehow had moved in while she was at work. "Okay, and you are?"
"I'm Andre." The dark skinned man said. "Apparently I'm the new resident…"
"TORI!" Jade screeched. "Victoria Vega, get your hot Latin ass out here and explain why we have yet another roommate?"
Tori walked out from the kitchen, flanked by Cat and Robbie. The latter two had become an item as of late, and while Jade really did pull for them, she didn't like how full their little home was becoming. "Oh, I see you've met Andre. I ran into him a while ago, and we got to talking…"
"Vega, we don't just take in strays." Jade scolded. "We only have so much room, and we're getting crowded as is. Honestly, I don't know what you were thinking when you asked Rob to move in." Blue eyes flicked to the nerdy boy. "Not that I'm hating on you, but…"
"No, I totally get it." Robbie smiled. "But they'd torn down the mall where I died, and were going to put in, I don't know what. Maybe a prison. I really didn't want to haunt a prison. So when I found out Tori here could relocate me, I jumped at the chance."
Cat had been a flower girl back in the sixties, and died in the previous house that had stood there before the new project brought in a renovated home. Contrarily, Robbie was a victim of a Christmas sale in the late eighties. Jade honestly liked both of them, and had originally chosen this house because of Cat, who haunted it and a good half dozen houses around it. Then Jade had started romancing Tori, an old rival, and ran into the problem that Cat could do just enough to haunt the home to freak out Jade's pragmatic girlfriend..
"Hay, you're the one who taught me how to move ghosts." Tori argued.
"When I thought you were gonna help that one girl." Jade shot back.
"They built a gym where she'd died." The Latina smiled. "Once she found out she'd be haunting a place where guys got naked, no way was she leaving. Gym rats and showers. Yea, Tiffany wasn't going anywhere."
"I thought she was done with men." Jade sighed. "I mean, sure, we talk when I go to the gym and all, but given that she was sold as a prostitute, working as a mattress girl in early California, you'd think she was done with sex."
"So, why is it you never taught Beck how to see ghosts?" Cat wondered.
"He never believed me." Jade repeated. The problem with Cat was, while the girl was deceptively smart, she could be total ditz. "And I developed that spell for transporting ghosts all on my own. Was supposed to be my masters project for the coven that trained me. They told me, while impressive, they didn't see the practicality in relocating ghosts. Helping them move on, sure, but not relocating."
"Shows you what they know." Tori scoffed. "We've relocated two, and I'm working on a third…"
"Tori, who's the cute guy in the living room?" Trina wondered. "No, wait, he's a ghost. Why is it, when you bring a guy home, they're dead?"
"No, why the holy fuck did you teach your sister how to see ghosts?" Jade demanded, once again wondering about that.
"That's just it, she didn't." Cat explained.
"Then how is it she can see ghosts?" Tori asked. "But yea, I never wanted her to think I was crazy, so I never brought it up."
"I've always seen ghosts." Trina shrugged. "The medium, who was an extra large if you ever saw her…. Okay, no fat jokes, she was a wonderful person who tried to help me. But she said I probably had a traumatic near death experience some time when I was young, and it locked in my ability to see ghosts. See, some kids can see ghosts naturally, but they grow out of it, and people think their ghostly friends are imaginary. Worse, some kids can make ghosts temporarily look ridiculous, because imaginary friends." She smiled at Jade. "But when I found out you could see ghosts, and teach others how to interact with them, I was finally on board with Tori dating you."
"Never needed your approval." The goth snapped. "Okay, learned a bit I should have known today. But Tori, this isn't that big a house. Please, just don't bring home more stray ghosts. Honestly, I thought the two we had were enough…"
"If you find a cute girl, who's into musicians, that'd be okay." Andre added. "Gonna be a trip staying with living people who can see me. And not just one, but three. From what I heard, finding one is a feat. Three, man, won't the other ghosts who haunt that old speakeasy be jealous."
"Wait, speakeasy?" Robbie asked, looking at the dreadlocks on the dark skinned boy. "I wasn't aware that look was popular back in the thirties."
"It wasn't." Dre told him. "I can change my looks. It's within the limits of what I'd look like anyways, but shifting my hair, my clothing, that kind of stuff is easy. I could show you."
"Then I'll show you how to exert a small amount of force." Cat offered. "Useful for such things as watching television while they're out, and proving to love interests that the place is haunted." Brown eyes shined with mischief as she remembered what she'd had to do in order to help Tori and Jade get past their issues and build the trust that led to them becoming intimate.
"You know, with two guys here, I'm glad I can see ghosts." Trina commented. "I'll know who's invaded my shower." She leered at Andre. "So learn yourself how to move things, cause I have a few things that could use a good moving."
"Trina!" Tori snapped. "Stop hitting on the ghosts."
Jade exhaled, releasing a sigh as the sisters got into more of their arguing banter. "Could be worse. They could think I'm crazy."
"True." Agnes agreed. The spirit was old, older then any of the current ghosts, and lived in a haunted doll two houses over. She liked to visit Jade and company because they could see her. This wasn't a very haunted part of California, so other ghosts were a bit rare. Also, she understood the real secret Jade had been hiding from her lover. "And as none of them are remotely ready to move on, we get to avoid that difficult conversation. Still, after your coven cleared this neighborhood out, I was surprised they missed Cat."
Jade sighed. "They didn't. She was my childhood imaginary friend. Only, while not that present sometimes, she was present enough to know, she could come back, assuming she really wanted too. Moving on isn't always for the best, not if you're carrying too much baggage from the past. Still." She turned back to her growing family, thinking about the possibility of adding another couple of living children to the mix. That was when she realized how whole, complete and in love the witch had become.
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So, thoughts? I only planned a few stories for this short anthology. Hoping you enjoyed it.
