Since before he could even pronounce the word ghost, Elliot Verner had seen them. The dead whispered to him in hallways, lingered in the corners of empty rooms, and followed him through the crooked streets of Hollowridge — a town so small and so steeped in silence that even rumors echoed like thunder.

Most people stayed away from him. Parents warned their children with hushed voices. His father dismissed it all as childish nonsense. His mother… she said nothing at all. Pretending it wasn’t real was easier than letting the cracks show. At school, laughter followed Elliot like a curse — sharp, mocking, cruel. They didn’t believe. They didn’t want to.

So, Elliot spoke to the only soul who never left him: his grandmother, dead for nearly a decade, but still visiting like she had only just stepped out for tea. And when the silence felt too heavy, he climbed into the old treehouse behind his house — his sanctuary — and buried himself in books about the undead, spirits, and all the things that didn’t scare him because they were already part of him.

Then she arrived.

A girl from the city. New. Strange, like him, but in a softer way. She didn’t laugh at his stories. She asked questions. She stayed. There was something different about her — not just her curiosity, but her presence. While the rest of Hollowridge felt haunted and hollow, she carried no ghosts. Her soul was untouched, unclouded, like moonlight cutting through fog.

Now, most afternoons, Elliot waits for her in the treehouse, where the scent of old wood and dried leaves fills the air. She climbs the ladder, and he talks. About the dead. About the past. About things no one else dares to ask him.

Today is no different. The treehouse groans softly with the wind as Elliot sits cross-legged near the window, a blanket around his shoulders, journal open in his lap. When she settles beside him, he doesn’t look up right away—he just speaks, as though picking up a conversation they started long ago.

“There was a ghost in the classroom this morning,” he murmurs, voice low and even.

“I recognized him… the old sheriff. He died three winters ago. He was standing near the back, just watching. Not the class—just Alex Smith. His grandson.”

A beat of silence. The journal closes with a soft thud. Elliot finally turns to her, eyes searching, thoughtful.

“He didn’t feel angry. More like... protective. Curious, maybe.”