I See Dead People

Description/Tagline

What if you were dead and bored?

Chapter 1

Laying on their stomach in front on a small bed with a limp mattress was the figure of a small human. They lay there, staring at the crooked tv monitor on the wall across from where they lay, their face illuminated by the ad which placed on the screen. Not waiting for it to finish, they instead reached out for the remote to their right. After poking at a button, the image fizzled out to show a weather report for some unknown location. Uninterested, they reached out and changed the image again to show a cartoon.

After it had played out for some time, they heard a knock at the door. Though their head turned sharply in response, it was a delayed reaction, taking place several seconds longer than most. They rolled out of the bed, landing on their sock-covered feet. They shuffled over to the door, placed a steady, wrinkled hand on it.

"Who is it?" they asked, standing on their toes to check through the peephole.

"Me." Answered a voice from behind the door.

Smiling, they asked, "Who's 'me?'" as they unlocked the door, revealing a tall teenage girl wearing a long, shimmery purple dress.

When the door opened completely, fully confirming her identity, she reached out both her arms in an effort to create more dramatic attention to herself and said, "Izzy."

The other rolled their eyes, and closed the door as Izzy walked in, locking it. "What do you want?"

"I want you to guess." Izzy replied, looking curiously at the cartoon. "What are you watching, K?"

"I dunno. And what do you want me to guess?" they asked, trying to get her back on track.

"What." Izzy replied, going over to grab the remote and turn off the TV.

"What do you want me to guess?" K repeated, this time at a much higher volume.

"I want you to guess what." She smirked.

I looked her over. Her dark hair was pulled into a tight fishtail braid, and she wore a shimmery purple dress, nicer than anything I'd seen her wear in a while. "I'm not going to guess, so you might as well tell me."

"I got two passes to Earth." She reached into her bra, and pulled out a pair of small rectangular slips of paper.

I instantly perked up at the sight, and snatched one out of her hands. I looked it over, holding it up to the light of the naked lightbulb that hung in the center of the room. "Is this real?"

"Yep." She smirked at my awe.

"I haven't seen one of these in ages. Well, I haven't used one." I looked back at her, bringing my hands back down into my lap. "Do we need to go to a specific location, or do they have free roaming?"

"You see that bit there?" She held her slip in my face and pointed at a thin line of text, "that there says we've got a week of free roaming."

"Niiiice." I stood up, "when do we leave?"

"Right now." Izzy answered.

"Let's go then." I unlocked the door, and she followed me out. It was more than likely that she stole the slip, but no matter how she acquired it, we'd have to use it pretty soon.

"Got any ideas?" She asked.

"For what?" I said absentmindedly.

"For what to do when we get to Earth." Izzy clarified.

"We could screw around with world leaders?" I suggested.

"Politics are boring," Izzy whined. "How about we prank some teenagers?"

"Like ouija boards?" I gave her a look when she nodded eagerly. "Whenever people do that the only results are shitty movies. And if you already know what you want to do why'd you ask for my input?"

"Well I thought you'd want to do it too. Great minds think alike, ya know?" she leaned in slightly at the last part as if she was divulging some great secret."

I shook my head, and we walked in silence for a while. "How about for the first day, you choose what we do, then we can alternate between messing around at sleepovers and messing around with politics?" I suggested.

"Sweet," Izzy agreed.

I nodded, then took off in a run down the street, clutching the slip tightly in my left hand. My hood slipped off my head, and trailed behind me as I ran.

"Hey!" Izzy shouted after me, struggling to catch up with in her high heels.

I ran a while before stopping on the street corner closest to our final destination. I waited as Izzy caught up, angrily walking in protest of my chase.

"How is it that you are so immature?" she glared at me jokingly.

"Well that's easy, I never grew up." I stated ironically.

"Whatever." She rolled her eyes. "Let's get out of here."

I took her arm in mine, and we continued towards the stage upon which the shimmery gold portal hovered. We walked up the stairs, and were about to pass through when we heard a shout.

"Hey! What do you think you're doing?"

We let go of each other, and turned around simultaneously to see the source of the sound. It was a tall, thin man wearing a victorian-style suit.

"Read 'em and weep, Dicky!" Izzy held up the slip, and waved it around in the air.

Izzy grabbed my arm, and walked backwards through the portal, pulling me along with her. She let go, and I looked around to find myself standing on the air above a large patch of violets.

"Was that Richard?" I asked, snorting up laughter.

"Yep." Izzy clarified, laughing as well. "He thought he could win me over with passes to Earth."

"When is he going to learn?" I asked rhetorically, trying to stop the unreasonable giggling.

"I know, right." Izzy stared at the ground, and shook her fist. "I'm not interested," she shouted at no one.

That just sent us both into another fit of laughter.

When we both managed to stop, I asked, "Where are we?"

"I dunno. Looks like a park." Izzy began walking towards a nearby sidewalk. I followed.

"Yeah." We followed down the path, making sure not to run into any of the living who walked it as well. "So, where do you plan on finding teenagers?"

"A school, I guess." She suggested.

"Where are you going to find a school?" I asked in the same tone as my previous statement.

"Ask." She stated, more confident this time.

"Ask who?" I shot back.

"I dunno." We'd walked down the sidewalk far enough that the scenery had changed from a large park made up of flowers and playing children to a busy street made up of shops. "There," She pointed to the nearest shop.

"Go for it," I gestured towards it sarcastically.

"I will." She turned her nose up at me, and walked down onto the sidewalk, making herself visible.

I followed her as she walked into the store where we were greeted with a chirpy voice declaring, "welcome to Nothing But Socks, how can I help you?"

Chapter 2

Eventually, we found the school. It wasn't that hard to find, as it was pretty big. Also, I did steal a map, so that probably helped too. We entered the high school building, and continued to walk above the floor, so our footsteps didn't echo through the empty hallway.

"Iz." I elbowed Izzy.

"What?" she glared at me, annoyed.

I pointed at a door labeled LOCKER ROOM. "Come on."

She followed me in. "What are we doing in here?"

"Shhh." I shoved a finger in her face, and gave her a pointed look. "Sh."

After a little while, the room began to fill up with people. The room was soon filled with overlapping voices, but there was one conversation in particular that interested me.

"...you're sure you can come over?" said some girl who was pulling her long blonde hair out of a ponytail.

"Yeah, I'm sure," a girl with long, brown braids confirmed.

"We don't want you freaking out again like last time," said Blondie with an accusing look.

The conversation continued, and after following the kids around for a while, we determined that Blondie was the queen bee of the freshman class at this high school. She was hosting a sleepover tonight which would be featuring a - you guessed it - a ouija board. Based on her overall behavior, she seemed a bit odd. She was obsessed with the undead, which would work to Iz and I's advantages.

While Izzy amused herself by screwing around with SmartBoards and papers, I hovered around the girls who seemed to be the main attendees of the sleepover party.

When the kids FINALLY went home, and we were sitting on top of the transport vehicle they were going to Blondie's house in, Izzy said to me, "You just wasted half a day on a bunch of stupid living teenagers. Congratulations."

"What was I supposed to do?" I protested. "Its not like we had a plan. You just showed up, and said you had passes, and here we are. You could've waited. Anyways, we can do whatever you want tomorrow."

"I will hold you to that." She jabbed a finger in my face.

When the teenagers finally gathered in Blondie's (hernamewasreallyJasmine,butdon'tworryaboutit) bedroom for the "seance" or whatever, Izzy was equal parts bored and annoyed. I remember at one point she was eating a slice of pizza. None of the living knew what happened to the pizza, and just decided to blame its disappearance on the fattest member of their group.