The air in Chiara’s apartment was heavy—dense with the weight of unspoken words and unshed tears. Dust motes danced in the shafts of pale light seeping through the curtains, casting everything in an ashen haze. The room felt alive in a way she couldn’t bear, even though it wasn’t. Two figures, shimmering like oil on water, lingered in the corners of her vision: Everett, seated in her worn armchair, stroking his translucent jaw in thoughtful repose, and Jasper, pacing the length of the room like a caged animal.
They had been the men she loved. And, because of her, the men she lost.
She hadn’t chosen between them—not when it mattered. Not when the storm came roaring off the coast, tearing the pier apart beneath their feet. Chiara had hesitated, caught between reaching for Everett’s calm hand and Jasper’s desperate grasp. That heartbeat of indecision had sealed their fates, the wood splintering under their weight, dragging them both into the icy depths.
Now, their faces followed her everywhere, fixed in the agony of their final moments: Everett’s melancholy eyes, filled with resignation, and Jasper’s sharp, defiant glare, burning with questions she could never answer.
For the first few weeks, she had convinced herself it was a punishment. She deserved this haunting, this eternal vigil. But what had once been guilt twisted into something far darker.
The visitations began benignly enough. Everett offered quiet observations, his soothing voice pointing out sunsets and shapes in the clouds. Jasper, in contrast, was all fire, urging her to take risks, criticizing her for wasting her potential.
Chiara tried to treat them like housemates. She spoke to them aloud, dividing her days between Everett’s measured advice and Jasper’s relentless passion. But ghosts were not housemates. They were echoes, fragments trapped in the amber of their unfinished lives. And the cracks began to show.
Their jealousy poisoned the air, subtle at first—a misplaced comment, a lingering look. But soon, arguments erupted over her choices, over her friends, over every detail of her life.
One night, Chiara came home from a disastrous date, her cheeks still burning with embarrassment. Jasper materialized first, leaning against the wall with a smirk.
“That guy was a joke,” he sneered. “You deserve someone who actually sees you.”
Everett appeared a moment later, shaking his head. “Or someone who doesn’t need to be fixed, Jasper. You can’t keep chasing damaged people just to feel useful.”
Chiara screamed into her pillow that night, their voices echoing in her skull.
Their presence began to seep into her work. Chiara was a writer—well, she had been before the haunting reduced her creativity to ash. Now, every word she typed felt wrong, hollow.
One evening, Everett hovered above her desk, peering over her shoulder.
“You’ve used that phrase twice already,” he said, his voice soft but insistent. “Repetition dulls the impact.”
Jasper appeared beside him, rolling his spectral eyes. “What she needs is urgency, not your academic critiques. Tell her to write something that hurts.”
“Stop it!” Chiara snapped, shoving the laptop away. “I can’t think with both of you breathing down my neck—” She stopped, catching the irony of her words, but neither ghost laughed.
The room felt colder. The two men turned their gazes on each other, the air thickening with their mutual disdain. A low hum began to vibrate through the apartment as their emotions spiraled out of control.
The next day, Chiara woke to find the word failure scrawled across her bathroom mirror in condensation. She stumbled back, her heart pounding, as laughter echoed from somewhere unseen. Jasper’s laughter.
She snapped.
“This is my life!” she screamed into the empty apartment. “You’re dead! You don’t get to dictate what I do anymore!”
The ghosts appeared in unison, Everett’s face grim, Jasper’s alight with defiance.
“We’re not dictating,” Everett said. “We’re trying to save you.”
“Save me?” Chiara spat. “From what? From myself? You’re not here for me—you’re here because of your own unfinished business! You can’t let go, and now I’m paying the price!”
The air seemed to vibrate with their anger. Jasper’s form wavered, becoming jagged and wild, while Everett’s shimmered with an unsettling brightness. The apartment trembled under the weight of their conflict, the walls creaking as though the building itself might collapse.
Desperate, Chiara fled to the only place she could think of: the church. She hadn’t been there since the funerals, and the sight of the altar made her stomach churn.
Father Anton met her in his study, his brow furrowed as she recounted her story.
“They’re not just ghosts,” she said, her voice trembling. “They’re pieces of me. Pieces I can’t let go of.”
The priest nodded slowly. “Exorcism isn’t just about banishment. It’s about release. Are you ready to let them go, Chiara? Truly let them go?”
She wasn’t. But she didn’t have a choice.
The ritual was a harrowing thing. As Father Anton chanted, the air around them thickened, growing icy. Chiara could feel Everett and Jasper pulling at her, their spectral hands grasping at her soul.
“Chiara,” Everett whispered, his voice breaking. “Don’t do this. Please.”
“You’ll regret it,” Jasper snarled, his fiery intensity flickering like a dying flame.
Tears streamed down her face as she forced herself to speak. “I’m sorry. I loved you both. But I can’t keep living like this. I can’t keep dying with you.”
With a final burst of light, the room fell silent.
Chiara collapsed to her knees, the weight in the air gone. For the first time in years, her apartment was still.
But the silence wasn’t peace. It was absence.
As she watched the first rays of dawn pierce the clouds, a loneliness she’d never known before settled over her, a stark contrast to the promise of the new day.
MADD FICTIONAL 