To say that the guy looked surprised to be addressed in this manner would have been a massive understatement. He didn't just look surprised. He actually looked over his shoulder, to see if it was really him I was talking to.
But of course, the only thing behind him was the window, and through it, that incredible view of Carmel Bay. So then he turned back to look at me, and must have seen that my gaze was fastened directly on his face, since he breathed, "Nombre de Dios," in a manner that would have had Gina, who has a thing for Latino guys, swooning.
"It's no use calling on your higher power," I informed him, as I swung the pink-tasseled chair to my new dressing table around, and straddled it. "In case you haven't noticed, He isn't paying a whole lot of attention to you. Otherwise, He wouldn't have left you here to fester for – " I took in his outfit, which looked a lot like something they'd have worn on The Wild, Wild West. "What is it, a hundred and fifty years? Has it really been that long since you croaked?"
He stared at me with eyes that were as black and liquid as ink. "What is … croaked?" he asked, in a voice that sounded rusty from disuse.
I rolled my eyes. "Kicked the bucket," I translated. "Checked out. Popped off. Bit the dust." When I saw from his perplexed expression that he still didn't understand, I said, with some exasperation, "Died."
"Oh," he said. "Died." But instead of answering my question, he shook his head. "I don't understand," he said, in tones of wonder. "I don't understand how it is that you can see me. All these years, no one has ever – "
"Yeah," I said, cutting him off. I hear this kind of thing a lot, you understand. "Well, listen, the times, you know, they are a'changin'. So what's your glitch?"
He blinked at me with those big dark eyes. His eyelashes were longer than mine. It isn't often I run into a ghost who also happens to be a hottie, but this guy…boy, he must have been something back when he was alive because here he was dead and I was already trying to catch a peek at what was going on beneath the white shirt he was wearing very much open at the throat, exposing quite a bit of his chest, and some of his stomach, too. Do ghosts have six-packs? This was not something I had ever had occasion – or a desire – to explore before.
Not that I was about to let myself get distracted by that kind of thing now. I'm a professional, after all.
"Glitch?" he echoed. Even his voice was liquid, his English as flat and unaccented as I fancied my own was, slight Brooklyn blurring of my t's aside. He clearly had some Spaniard in him, as his Dios and his coloring indicated, but he was as American as I was – or as American as someone who was born before California became a state could be.
"Yeah." I cleared my throat. He had turned a little and put a boot up onto the pale blue cushion that covered the window seat, and I had seen definitive proof that yes, ghosts could indeed have six-packs. His abdominal muscles were deeply ridged, and covered with a light dusting of silky black hair.
I swallowed. Hard.
"Glitch," I said. "Problem. Why are you still here?" He looked at me, his expression blank, but interested. I elaborated. "Why haven't you gone to the other side?"
He shook his head. Have I mentioned that his hair was short and dark and sort of crisp-looking, like if you touched it, it would be really, really thick? "I don't know what you mean."
I was getting sort of warm, but I had already taken off my leather jacket, so I didn't know what to do about it. I couldn't very well take off anything else with him sitting there watching me. This realization might have contributed to my suddenly very foul mood.
"What do you mean, you don't know what I mean?" I snapped, pushing some hair away from my eyes. "You're dead. You don't belong here. You're supposed to be off doing whatever it is that happens to people after they're dead. Rejoicing in heaven, or burning in hell, or being reincarnated, or ascending another plane of consciousness, or whatever. You're not supposed to be just…well, just hanging around."
He looked at me thoughtfully, balancing his elbow on his uplifted knee, his arm sort of dangling. "And what if I happen to like just hanging around?" he wanted to know.
I wasn't sure, but I had a feeling he was making fun of me. And I don't like being made fun of. I really don't. People back in Brooklyn used to do it all the time – well, until I learned how effectively a fist connecting with their nose could shut them up.
I wasn't ready to hit this guy – not yet. But I was close. I mean, I'd just traveled a gazillion miles for what seemed like days in order to live with a bunch of stupid boys; I still had to unpack; I had already practically made my mother cry; and then I find a ghost in my bedroom. Can you blame me for being … well, short with him?
"Look," I said, standing up fast, and swinging my leg around the back of the chair. "You can do all the hanging around you want, amigo. Slack away. I don't really care. But you can't do it here."
"Jesse," he said, not moving.
"What?"
"You called me amigo. I thought you might like to know I have a name. It's Jesse."
I nodded. "Right. That figures. Well, fine. Jesse, then. You can't stay here, Jesse."
"And you?" Jesse was smiling at me now. He had a nice face. A good face. The kind of face that, back in my old high school, would have gotten him elected prom king in no time flat. The kind of face Gina would have cut out of a magazine and taped to her bedroom wall.
Not that he was pretty. Not at all. Dangerous ! was how he looked. Mighty dangerous.
"And me, what?" I knew I was being rude. I didn't care.
"What is your name?"