Ghosting

Words: Stella Small (she/her)

Wouldn’t you give anything to be wanted? Desired? Even if it meant being plastered on a poster somewhere, dead or alive, a shoot-em-up in the saloon, an empty barn with a stinking cadaver and a wooden wall ridden with bullets? Wanting to be wanted is so unfashionable nowadays, but it’s the only thing we’ve got in common here. Forget the pretence – long walks on the beach, searching for the Jim to my Pam. We’re all here for the same reason. 

I don’t even remember when I first saw Gregory. I must have fancied him, and he must have said something interesting, but I can’t remember what. How’s that for a love story? He wasn’t going to be my ticket out of the Wild West, but he would be fun to have along for the ride. 

‘I’m a lone ranger,’ he told me, over drinks. Bit on the nose, but, fresh out of a long-term relationship, my heart was too broken to fall for anyone, let alone someone so riddled with red flags. I wanted the thrill of it, to watch my friends’ expressions as I produced a photo. ‘Isn’t he gorgeous?’

‘How many girls are you sleeping with?’ I asked, three weeks into seeing him. In bed, amongst the shadows, I forgot about the inadequacy I ascribed to my own body when it was next to his. I imagined myself as an interpretation of negative space, rather than what was there. I enjoyed reducing the distance between us until nothing was separating us. Of course, it was all separate.

‘Oh, I lose track,’ he said, grinning. I smiled. I understood the ruse.

We were still essentially strangers. I mean, he obviously got around. When we were arranging plans, he made me feel, in a very diplomatic way, like I was an errand he had to schedule in. His flat was a shrine to himself – gifts and letters, signed with love, someone who was not only adored but blessed with the ability to bask in it. Drinks with endless genderless friends, made suspicious through the vagueness of his words. A few times, he stopped to tie his shoelaces in the street, only to reappear with a crimson face. ‘I used to date her!’. Each time, a different woman. 

I enjoyed the sleaze. I never felt like I was in any danger other than being made a fool; demoted to one of the girls he had to avoid on the street. 

Two months in, it just ended. We were nothing more than casual, the way we both wanted it. Or, that’s what we both projected, though the mutual desire for connection cowered in the corner of our every interaction. That’s why he was the first to bolt – to win the showdown. I accepted it dutifully. It was so dreadfully cliché – sitting in the restaurant, waiters refilling my drink with sympathetic smiles. He didn’t appear.

I waited, in case he texted, or turned up at my door with placards and a boombox, but nothing. I couldn’t be disappointed, I was just pissed that he could take the easy route out. I had some of his things in my flat, so I decided to take the bus across town.

When I knocked on the door of the flat opposite his, I was greeted by an old man.

‘Hello,’ I said, suddenly bashful. ‘I was wondering if you could give this to Gregory?’

He looked puzzled. ‘Who’s Gregory?’

The first hint of dread hit me. ‘Your neighbour across the hall?’

He shook his head. ‘I’ve never met him. I think he’s a bit of a hermit. But I can take this anyway.’

I gave him the box, and as I turned to face Gregory’s door again, the bright paint flashed like a warning sign. I rang the doorbell, pressed my ear against the wood to hear it chime from inside. I leaned against the door, and it creaked open.

I noticed the silence first. Then the smell. His bathroom door open to the hall, inviting me, for the first time, to get a good look at him. A tragic accident. Dark blood splashed across the edge of the bathtub, a rotten hand clutching his toothbrush. He had been here long enough that he had begun to disappear – skin liquefying, teeth and nails gone.

I did not get closer. I stumbled into the kitchen, where his phone was still charging. It lit up when I tapped the screen. Not a single call, text, email, or notification. While he had decomposed on his bathroom floor, not a single person had wondered where he was.

Just two small sentences, ascribed to my name, luminous in the dark: ‘looking forward to seeing you later :)’ followed by, ‘hey, where are you?’

Just the door, unlocked, waiting for someone to find him.