Seventy Second Friday Flash: Love Beyond Death

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“You're doing it wrong,” said his girlfriend.

“Woman!” said Hamill with a mouth full of foamy toothpaste. “Will you leave me in peace!”

“Ha! If it wasn't for me your teeth would have fallen out by now.”

“And for that I thank you, my dear,” said Hamill, his voice softening.

Hamill spat out the toothpaste and gargled water before turning around and walking straight though his girlfriend. For you see his girlfriend Angie was dead. She had been for over a year now, but it hadn't meant that she had stopped telling him what to do.

oOo

“Slow down,” she said. “Your work isn't going anywhere.”

She sat next to him like she always had. Her mother was an English teacher and her father a concert pianist. Prim and proper described her to the bone. Her eyes watching his every move. It had been different when she was alive. Then he could keep her quiet with a kiss on her beautiful lips.

At first he thought it was madness of the grief he was going through that produced the manifestation. Over time it became all real, even some of his friends and family swore they saw glimpses of her.

oOo

“Sit up straight!” she said from over his shoulder at work.

“Yes dear,” he mumbled.

“Talking to yourself again?” asked a coworker.

“Yup,” said Hamill with a sigh. He had given up trying to fight the reputation that he spoke to himself.

oOo

Hamill snapped when he was eating food with his hands.

“How many times have I told you to use utensils!”

“Why couldn't you have stayed dead!” he growled.

Hamill instantly felt guilty and his heart sank when he saw the shock and hurt look on her ethereal face. He approached her to try comfort her, but she disappeared before he could. With a heavy heart he carried on with the rest of the day's duties. The incident playing over and over in his mind, wishing he had reacted differently.

Expecting to see Angie waiting in the car, he was sad she wasn't there. He leaned against the door and cried. Maybe her soul was finally in a happy place.

Driving along slowly back home he was taken by surprise when an unseen force slammed his foot into the accelerator. The only thing he saw before the truck hit him was Angie's lips mouthing the words “I love you.”