Quiet Nights [Claire]

Makara was a quiet person. As far back as he could remember, he'd been so. He spoke quietly, when he chose to speak at all. He moved quietly. Everything he did was precise and practiced. People he worked with frequently only realized he was in a room when he spoke, which led to a whole lot of startled professors. He'd mastered the art of blending in, and it wasn't at all because he was a ghost - he'd always been like that. It was simply the way he held himself that led people's eyes to slide right over him.

During the day, he looked human. Like a small, thin, and stunted human, but a human. He was solid. He functioned as anyone else would. It was only at night (or, strictly speaking, when he died) that anything amiss was obvious.

When he had no class (which was often) or counselling appointments (which was less often) he found himself roaming the halls, doing rounds. It made him feel calmer to do so. It helped him relax.

Or at least it did when he didn't turn the corner, spam into someone, and end up on the ground.

The boy he'd run into was about average, and looked fairly thin, but Makara was even thinner than that, and he landed without a single noise. He'd gotten distracted. He'd let his mind wander, and not bothered to give the corner a wide enough berth.

"I apologize." He was stiff and formal when he spoke, pushing himself up off the ground.

​

Tag to @"ClaireGirl" - I wouldn't be surprised if he had a lot of very vague spirits around him he can't see that probably look a lot like him. But there's probably dozens of them, and I doubt any of them is solid enough to talk - basically half passed on. ​

Standing up, he dusted himself off carefully. Not that there was much dust or dirt to get rid of. The school was kept clean, and at worst there'd only be a few hours grime on the floor at any given time. Some people were bothered by people running into them, but Makara was not one of them. Very few things bothered him anymore. He'd grown to be able to easily shrug off almost anything. Even when people were actively trying to irritate him, he refused to let it get to him.

Inevitably, he had better things to worry about.

He had never had any affinity for ghosts in life, and in death he wasn't much better. Sometimes, if a spirit was particularly strong, he might get feelings - but standing in the hallway, that was all he got. A feeling. He couldn't see anything, couldn't hear anything. There was just a feeling, as if something was off.

He should have simply set off, his apology said, but instead he stood there, sunken eyes staring up at the boy in front of him. A student. A normal student. So what was the feeling, exactly?

​

Tag to @"ClaireGirl" - I assume we'll skip ahead to the night next posting round, unless Pario wants to say something​

At night, Makara could be mistaken for human only at a distance. At a distance, it was common for people to spot him and think he was a human. Once upon a time, he'd hardly been there, but since coming to the islands he'd become a lot more... well, there.

Even still, up close anyone would have a hard time mistaking him for human. While he gave off no actual light, he seemed to glow softly, making him look wrong and entirely out of place. Most concerningly, he didn't seem entirely solid. The edges of his outline seemed vague, as if someone had taken a photo of a person and run the blur tool around the edges. His face seemed solid enough, but the farther you looked from it, the fuzzier things got. His feet were barely there, and his fingers seemed oddly out of focus.

Someone was in the hallway. He heard a voice, although only one, and he paused when he did, turning towards it after a moment. The boy from earlier. Out late for who knew what reason, walking in the dim hallway. No doubt he'd spotted him, but he was far enough away that Makara had to wonder if he'd realized.

He hadn't run away screaming, so he doubted he had. Even on the island, people were alarmed by the sight of something that appeared to be a ghost, and he opted to stay still. If the boy wanted to avoid him, then so be it.

Most people did at night after all.

​

Tag to @"ClaireGirl" ​

Of all the possible reactions, Makara was certainly not expecting to be invited back to someone's room. Normally they screamed. Or, if they had been on the island longer, they might back off, avoiding him entirely. To have someone be so fearless in the face of something so creepy was unusual, to say the least.

Because even on an island where almost everyone was unusual in their own way, lots of people were still uncomfortable with the dead.

"I..." He had to compose himself, entirely unprepared for the question. "If you'd like." He finally finished, his voice sounding strangely far away, as if it wasn't coming from his mouth so much as coming from everywhere at once.

​

Tag to @"ClaireGirl" ​

He did not quite walk. He moved his legs, and he moved forward, but those two things didn't seem to quite match up. Like he was miming the motions but being moved by a treadmill. He was walking because he thought he was walking, but his feet weren't actually pushing him along the ground.

He stepped into the room, focusing hard to let himself actually close the door. He was not usually solid. He was only half there on a good night, and it took actual focus to make himself solid enough to do something so basic. The room was ordinary enough - he'd seen plenty of dorms, after all - and he glanced around only briefly before turning back to the boy.

Man? He was probably in college, now that Makara had gotten a second look at him. "You are in college?" He said, his voice still sounding strangely far away. "Do you realize I'm dead?" He suspected that the boy did, because this close it was awfully hard not to guess he was a ghost.

His face scrunched up slightly. "You aren't dead, but something is... different." He knew something was off. Like the boy had a foot in the grave.

​

Tag to @"Claire" ​