The Ghost at His Victory Party

I heard my ex calling me out on camera the second I reached his side, right after he'd won the pro league championship. "Back then, someone told me I was just some loser gamer who'd never amount to anything." "And when she broke up with me, she smashed my most expensive keyboard." Those two sentences made me the vain ex the entire internet loved to hate.

I charged at him in a rage, but my hand went straight through his shoulder. Oh, right. I'd almost forgotten. I was already dead.

Chapter 1 The SAX pro league had finally wrapped up, and Team HS came home to America covered in glory. The most talkedabout person online was the captain, Levi.

He walked at the very back of the team. At six foot one he stood out, and with that sharpjawed, boredwiththeworld face, he looked cool and gorgeous.

Reporters and fans swarmed him, shoving microphones toward his mouth. "Pratt, we heard you were sent to a gaming addiction reform school when you were eighteen.

Is that true?" "After going through something like that, what gave you the drive to get back on your feet?" Levi finally lifted his eyes.

He took the headphones off his neck and said coldly, "Back then, someone told me I was just some loser gamer who'd never amount to anything." "The day she left, she even smashed my most expensive keyboard." A murmur of sympathy went through the crowd.

Someone asked, "And then what happened?" "Nothing happened after that, because we broke up." Levi's face was blank. That was a lie!

It was a mouse I smashed back then, obviously, because the mouse only cost fifteen dollars! Listening to Levi spread lies about me made me so mad I just wanted to smack him.

But my fingers drifted weightlessly through his shoulder. I froze. Ugh. How did I forget again? I was already dead, after all. The livestream chat instantly swung to one side.

Everyone started turning on me. [Can some genius doxx her? Let's see who this golddigger actually is.] [So gross.

How could Pratt's first love be the kind of woman who dumps a guy for being broke?] [If she saw where Pratt is now, she'd regret it so hard, lmao.] I stood behind the reporters and took in every one of those comments stirring up the pileon.

The mindless trolls weren't completely wrong. I really was dead. The old me, who never let a single slight go, would have fired off a comment to put them in their place.

But now I was just a ghost. Focusing all my willpower to touch an object took too much out of me. I was afraid I'd turn even more transparent, so I gave up.

And so I followed Levi into the hotel. In the private dining room, the club had already set up a victory banquet for them.

Besides the owner and the coach, there was one very familiar face. Ophelia, my best friend when I was alive.

She was also the only person who came to tend my grave and leave flowers every holiday. But this year, she didn't seem to come by much anymore. I missed her so much! "Phee, it's me!

It's your Tamsy!" I floated toward her happily, ready to give her a great big hug.

Ophelia raised her eyes and looked at me in delighted surprise, then got up and rushed toward me too. My heart pounded.

For a split second, I even thought she could see me, just like… I was still alive. But Ophelia passed right through my body. I turned around in a daze. "Congratulations, Levi.

I'm so happy for you!" Chapter 2 "After that long flight, you must be exhausted, right?" Ophelia stopped in front of Levi.

She rose onto her tiptoes and pushed a huge bouquet of flowers into his arms. Her smiling eyes were sparkling. I knew that look better than anyone.

That same adoring gaze had once been part of my eighteenth year. "Whoa! You two finally made it official? So do we call you Coach Jarrett now, or Mrs.

Captain?" "You're so bad at this! It's Mrs. Captain, obviously!" Seeing Ophelia blush, everyone started teasing and egging them on. So Levi and Ophelia were together.

The scene in front of me came so suddenly it caught me completely off guard.

For some reason, I remembered what the ghost in the next grave over had said to me after she heard her husband had remarried.

She'd cried and said, "Tamsin, time keeps flowing for the living.

We're the only ones who stay stuck in one place." Actually, after people die, they can choose to be reincarnated, or they can choose to become ghosts.

But souls like mine, the ones holding on too hard, usually refuse to move on. Levi was the reason I stayed. I was always worrying about him, and I could never completely let him go.

So I rested up in the cemetery as much as I could, eating cookies off one grave one day and mooching candy off another the next, until I'd finally saved up enough strength to roam freely and come to his side.

The banquet began. I sat in the middle of the table and watched Levi drink with cold eyes.

Even with Ophelia beside him gently, quietly trying to get him to slow down, he stayed indifferent and barely responded. What a poser. He'd won MVP, so he had to be happy, right?

And he was still putting on this act. I felt a little sour inside, but I still couldn't help roasting him in secret. A few rounds in, someone suggested they all play truth or dare.

Everyone agreed. I leaned over the table next to them, and we all stared hard at the mouth of the bottle. The bottle spun and spun on the table.

When it stopped, it pointed squarely at Ophelia. Everyone gave Levi a meaningful look. They started chanting almost at the same time. "Dare! Dare!" Ophelia snuck a glance at Levi.

Seeing him keep his eyes lowered, she cleared her throat and went with truth instead.

A young player who was completely wasted beat everyone to the question. "Coach Jarrett, when did you and Cap first meet?" She smiled and said, "We met back in school.

I liked him from the first moment I saw him…" Faced with Ophelia's completely unguarded confession, I froze where I was. Ophelia had only met Levi through me.

Back then, he was my boyfriend.

Had she really liked Levi since then? "That's enough." Levi frowned slightly and cut off the conversation. "Is it fun, making jokes like this all the time?" He turned to the one who'd asked, the crease between his brows not easing at all. "And you, Bryce.

It's exactly because you always pay way too much attention to things that have nothing to do with you that you blew the first match point in this tournament." His strange attitude left everyone too scared to push any further.

I really couldn't help it. I rolled my eyes at Levi. The second round started.

This time the bottle pointed at a very drunk Bryce. "I pick truth!" Bryce slumped crookedly in his chair.

The guy next to him nudged him, a little disgusted. "A naive goofball like you doesn't have anything anyone's curious about." Ophelia was very understanding.

Chapter 3 To ease the awkwardness, she smiled and said, "Bryce, you could tell us a secret you've never told anyone." Everyone humored her. "Yeah, yeah, sure, just say whatever.

Nobody's curious anyway…" Levi tipped his head back and drained his glass in one go.

Just then, Bryce hiccuped and said with a big grin, "Actually, I can see ghosts." For no reason, a wave of panic hit me. Sure enough.

Bryce suddenly sat up straight and pointed right next to Levi, exactly where I was. "You don't believe me?" "Ever since we got off the plane, there's been a ghost girl following us." "She just rolled her eyes at Pratt!" Everyone went quiet.

A few even shot him a speechless glare. Obviously, no one believed a word Bryce said. Only Ophelia's expression shifted slightly.

Her back went rigid, and her hands clutched at the hem of her dress without her meaning to. She really was the only person there who knew I was dead. Could Bryce actually see me?

I was half convinced. To test Bryce, I stared at him, pointed at Levi, and moved my lips. Bryce burst out laughing.

Then he repeated what I'd said with perfect accuracy: "Pratt, she says she's your daddy." "She also says her name is Tamsin." Bang!

Levi shot to his feet, not even noticing he'd knocked over the glass beside him.

His handsome face, flushed from the alcohol, turned to Bryce in shock. "What did you say?" At last I was sure. Bryce could see me.

Without hesitating any longer, I rushed in front of Bryce and waved my arms frantically, signaling him not to say another word. Bryce was a little scared by the look on Levi's face.

He caught my meaning quickly, came back to himself, and hurried to cover. "Uh, I was just talking nonsense. Don't believe me…" Of course no one else believed him.

Because they didn't know who Tamsin was. But Levi strode up to Bryce, and his long fingers seized Bryce by the collar.

His eyes were red, his voice squeezed out of his throat. "Say that one more fucking time." "That ghost girl's name… what is it?" I covered my eyes.

I couldn't bear to see how Levi would react when he learned I was dead. "Don't take it out on Bryce. He's drunk and talking nonsense.

I'm the one who told him before that your exgirlfriend's name was Tamsin." Ophelia suddenly called out to Levi, a hint of resentment in her voice. "You're thinking about her again, aren't you?

But have you forgotten?

She already took the money she got paid for hurting you and went abroad." "Because of her, you still won't forgive your mom and dad, and you almost died in that academy… Now the whole world knows how vain she is.

You're the only one who still can't see her for what she is." The moment Ophelia said that, everyone went silent.

I slowly clenched my fists, fighting to hold back the bitterness churning inside me. My heart was already full of guilt, and after hearing that, I could barely breathe.

Everyone knew what a dark place Levi had been in, and no one could imagine how, after going through all that, he'd overcome his psychological scars and climbed to the peak where he was today.

But behind that, he must have worked a hundred, a thousand times harder than anyone else. She was reminding Levi, and telling everyone else, that I wasn't a decent exgirlfriend.

Worse, that I was one of the people who'd hurt him, and been paid for it. Bang! Chapter 4 Bryce slammed his fist on the table in anger. Levi's back stiffened for a moment.

He frowned at Ophelia. "So those reporters who came to interview me today, and the people online stirring up the pileon against Tamsin—you set that up too?" "All I want is to play my matches in peace.

I don't need that kind of traffic and hype." He let go of Bryce, exhaustion showing on his face. "I'm heading back first. Don't worry about me.

Keep going." "Where are you going?" Ophelia stared hard at his back as she pressed him. Levi didn't answer. After a scene like that, naturally no one else dared to stay either.

Only Bryce was left, and at some point he'd crouched down in front of me.

He was sizing me up. "So you're really Cap's badluck exgirlfriend?" "Yikes, you're covered in dirt and you've got a wound on your head. You're pretty pathetic.

Doesn't anyone ever take care of your grave?" When I stayed silent, he snorted. "Don't worry.

I'm definitely not letting Cap find out you're here." "Because Ophelia said you're the one who got him put in that academy back then." "How's that working out?

Money you got by betraying someone who really loved you—you lived long enough to earn it, but not long enough to spend it, huh?" Bryce tilted his head, a mocking smile on his lips, and laid down his threat. "I'm warning you.

Ophelia's been after Pratt for a long time. If you dare get in their way, I'll draw a paper charm and blast your soul into nothing." He was Levi's protégé, all right.

He had the same poisonous tongue