“What? What are you talking about? You said I’d be going home!”

This couldn’t be happening.

“I said I would organize for you to be released. This was the best I could do under the circumstances.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Well, it would look very suspicious if you’d suddenly recovered overnight, don’t you think?”

“I guess… but I still don’t understand.”

“The people at Waratah Estate are good people and they can help someone like you to get back on your feet. They will even help you find employment and you’ll be able to support yourself. It’s all part of giving you a helping hand.”

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. What could I say? All my dreams of going home slipped away like sand through my fingers. He kept talking about the place and how fantastic it was and I felt deflated.

I couldn’t believe it. I was supposed to be seeing Mum tomorrow. Going back to my room. Going back to my life. Spending time with Alina.

“Don’t cry, dear. They’re truly a nice bunch of people and they will help you tremendously.”

What? When did I start crying?

He placed a box of tissues on the desk and I took one to dry my tears. “Thank you.”

Dr Calthorpe smiled. “I’ll arrange for Nurse Janice to drive you there tomorrow—”

“No!” Not her. He blinked at me. Oops. “Please. Not Janice. The things I told you about her are true. I can’t be alone in a car with her.” Ice shot through my veins at the thought and I shuddered.

He cleared his throat and looked embarrassed. He’d probably forgotten I’d reported her. “Yes, well. Okay. I’ll see if I can spare Nurse Holly for the trip.”

My shoulders slumped in relief. “Thank you.”

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Early the next morning, I slipped out to the garden after breakfast. I didn’t know if Mrs C and Mr J could go with me and I suspected that they probably couldn’t.

I was bracing myself for disappointment as we were saying our goodbyes just in case.

“You’ll be fine without us, dear,” Mrs C told me for the fifteenth time.

“That’s not the point,” I said. “I want you to come with me.”

“I know. But it seems that spirits can only go to certain places. I’ve only been able to go to wherever my loved-ones are and that other plane I told you about.”

“The waiting area thing?”

“Yes. That’s what it seems to be. I can obviously be here too; I think it’s because I died here.”

I suppressed a shudder at the image of some crazy patient running a knife across her throat in a desperate attempt to escape and shoved it from my mind.

I guessed that spirits could go to some places so that they could take care of their unfinished business or whatever they were supposed to do before they could cross over. All that meant for me at the moment was that it was more than likely that they couldn’t go with me and I’d be alone.

“Remember what I’ve said about finding your families? Now that I’m leaving, I think it’s time you went to see them.”

They both nodded, but didn’t seem enthusiastic. They needed to face their families and their unfinished business so they could finally cross over. I knew they were afraid of what they might see. Afraid their families had moved on and forgotten them. But now they assured me that they would do it after I’d left.

I wondered if they would go through with it.

Mr J had his back to me. I didn’t want to embarrass him, so I let him have a moment. He’d always said he hated goodbyes.

Mr Newbie walked up from the bottom of the garden. I wasn’t sure what would happen with him. He’d been to a lot of different places before he found me, looking for someone who could see him, so he didn’t seem to be tied to a location. They were all going to get in the car with me when I was leaving, just to see if they could.

The trouble was, we didn’t know if it would actually work and I didn’t really want the new guy to come with me. I still couldn’t forgive him for the mess he’d made for me.

As I watched him saying his goodbyes to them in case he could go with me and they couldn’t, I watched the muscles under his shirt stretch with the movements. His dark hair fell forward over his forehead as he turned to me. I sucked in a breath. He’d just caught me checking him out. What was wrong with me?

But I couldn’t help myself. He oozed masculinity and reminded me so much of Johnny Depp; same colour hair and eyes. Same physique.

He still couldn’t remember his name and it annoyed me that I was stuck calling him the new guy or Mr Newbie.

When he looked away, I just blurted it out. “I don’t want to keep calling you Mr Newbie or ‘hey, you’ all the time, so I’m gonna call you Johnny.”

He turned back. “What? Why Johnny?”

My cheeks heated. “I was thinking you look like Johnny Depp.”

His face kind of lit up, so I guess he thought that was a compliment. My face flushed even more. I hadn’t thought of how it would make him feel. I just wanted a name to call him.

“Just till you remember your name.” I had a thought. “I just hope your name isn’t Benedict Cumberbatch or something.”

He laughed at that, then turned serious. “I hope so too.”

There were hugs all round, then we turned to head up to the building. As I made my way around the bushes that hid me from sight, Holly was walking toward me. “There you are. Have you finished saying goodbye to your ghostly friends?”

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Author's Note: She has known all along?

* Fire and Magic is a fantasy and is ongoing. It’s a full-sized novel and Book 1 in a series. My other story on here is called The Alien and it has 7 chapters. It is complete.

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