No.

You weren't about to pussy out of this because you were starting to get second thoughts. That would be incredibly selfish to make Gwen suffer on that shitty street while you knew you could do something about it, as she herself could not.

There had to be a way, and you would try every way possible.

Starting with this one.

----

You knew what these feelings were, you'd known them for a while now. You've had them ever since you first started talking to Gwen. As her face got less deformed and you started to talk to her more, the feeling just got stronger and stronger.

You brushed it off at first as a stupid feeling that you shouldn't have been getting. Though it wouldn't go away, and a lot of the times you couldn't really look at Gwen straight in her eyes without you blushing a few times when she made her usual jokes.

She really quickly changed from that fragile quiet girl you found on the street to someone filled with personality, who was both funny and caring at the same time. You loved her, yet you still wanted to see her go.

You hoped to god that this ritual wouldn't send her off, maybe at best it would let her free roam around the planet to her heart's content. But even then, that would be dreadful.

If that were to happen then you would need to be with her to keep her company, or at least find other ghosts that could do it as well if she were to get tired of you. Because of all this, you had been delaying the ritual for a few weeks already, it was about to be a month now, as each day went on you kept on hating yourself more and more, though it's not like in that time did you have an opportunity to make her euphoric.


As these thoughts kept on running through your head, an idea came into view.

Maybe if you told her that you loved her, that would make the spark you needed for the experiment to come together. Thinking it over it did sound really self-centered and cliche, but it was really worth a shot, and you wanted to convey your feelings before anything was to happen if she were to disappear or ascend without you knowing or being able to say your final goodbyes.

This led to a whole other set of problems as you started pussyfooting around the whole confession. Although to be fair you weren't exaggerating when you said it had to be perfect, in more than two ways. You had to make sure you did it with enough finesse to swoon her over, and you had to be agile enough to make the cut and start the ritual, or at least persuade her into doing it for you without having to trick her.

This isn't something that you could redo at a later day, it was all or nothing with this.

Though with enough planning and patience, and the knife that had taken a while to get shipped from Amazon, you had planned for your confession and the ritual to fall on the day of Friday.

With each passing day you rehearsed what you were planning on saying in your head countless times, and making sure that Gwen wasn't in a bad mood or anything that would ruin your surprise if she kept up with it for the entire week.

When it finally came to Friday, you were really fucking nervous about how everything would turn out. Like an edgy school shooter emo, you had been fake practicing the cut in the mirror to be as quick and precise as possible. You were really bad when it came to pain so that would probably be the worst part out of this whole experience.

It would be on your walk home when you would confess, and you waited a little bit later before actually starting your walk since you were wanting to do it a bit towards the time that the sun would lower. The last thing you needed was someone calling the cops because they saw a kid cut his wrist.

--

"You're a little late, did anything happen at school?" Gwen asks.

"Yeah had to stay behind for a bit of tutoring is all." You lie with a smile.

"Ah, well that's good, I'm glad you're actually doing something about it now, with how tired you look every morning I could have guessed with how you were doing in school."


"Is it really that obvious..." You frown.

She laughs. "No don't feel bad about it, I'm just really good at reading expressions and all."

You couldn't really tell if you were actually acting like that, or if it was just apart of your fake act from your earlier meetings.

Forgetting about that for a moment, you started to think of your words.

You full on confession right away

Maybe it would be best if you just said everything right away, just full on say 'I love you' and see what kind of reaction you get. But you soon realize that's a really stupid fucking idea and the chance of it working would be extremely slim for you. You had to take this slow and steady.

"Hey are you alright?" You hear Gwen ask you.

You realize that you had been staring into space for a bit as Gwen gave you a worried look.

"Nah I'm fine.....It's just. For the time that we've known each other, what do you think of me...." You ask while looking away to miss eye contact.

Though you see her smirk a little.

"What brought on that type of question?"

"Just wondering."

She seems to think for a moment, seeming to choose her words slowly.

"Well....you were really nice to me. Yo still are, but I'm glad you stopped being super nice after that one day. You also really care about being on time here, which I appreciate....so I guess I think you're OK."

HNNNNNNGGGGG.

"Just OK?" You say half jokingly, although on the inside being completely serious.

She gives you a sly look with her eyes.

"Well tell me then, what do you think of me?" she asks.

"I think you're OK." You reply with a smile.

"Oh fuck off, don't make me say that embarrassing stuff and you not do the same." She said slightly annoyed.

"Well....I think you're a pretty cool ghost. You're very interesting to talk too, and you have a good sense of humor about things. You care about....well what happens to me and my school work so there's that too, I guess." Your carefully picked words cause Gwen's face to shift in a certain way. You couldn't tell if it was from embarrassment or something else, but she also couldn't seem to make eye contact with you either.


"Gwen, I.....well I really like you."

You didn't really know what to say after that, your mouth kind of dried up the point in which you didn't feel as if you could get anything else out of your throat.

"Uh-h well..." You heard Gwen's reaction sounded stiff and hoarse.

"W-Well I like you to I g-guess!" Gwen was a little bit more louder with how she said it, trying to laugh along with it after saying it, though it sounded extremely unnatural.

"Fuck I made things weird didn't I, I'm sorry." you apologize sheepishly.

"No! Please don't. I mean yeah it is kind of awkward the way you said it. I would have worded it a bit differently I mean, but.....well I really do have the same feelings." she replies, a bit more sturdier with her voice.

"Well....I...It's more than just liking....I love you..."She finishes after a brief pause.

"I loved you when you first came here and decided to stay.....you could of walked away but you stayed the first time and that's all that really took....I hated when you weren't here, and I always looked forward to our little talks, even if they weren't for that long. Maybe because they were so short is why I treasure them so much. I like to hear about your day, I want to know your problems, I just want....I want to be with you..."

Man, she was doing a better job than you were doing with this confession. She didn't even lose eye contact when she said that last part, her facial expression was one of seriousness, she didn't laugh that last bit off.

"I love you too....That's why....Well that's why I want to help you. If it's just one way that could bring us together, or let you have your peace. I don't care if you say you don't want it, I'm doing what I'm doing because I care about you, and if a day comes where I have to stop coming that's out of my own control, then I don't want you to be here all alone, at the very best, I want you to be with me." You say, trying your best to sound as sincere as possible with your antics.

"Well, I know that you have my best intentions in your heart, just please don't get yourself hurt over it, that's the last thing I want."

Shit.

"Well that's the thing, please listen to me through before you say anything though." You plead as you see her facial expression darken as she hears this from you.

"I'm going to try a ritual, which just involves he drawing a little blood. After that we just need to hold hands while I say a chant. Afterwards, I think you'll be able to walk free and go with me wherever I go. I wan't that more then anything, to just be with you outside of this street, and I think this way is going to work."

Her attitude on this seems mixed as she seems hesitant about it, although you're already taking out your knife as you flip it open.

"Wait! How do you know this is going to work?" Gwen hastily asks.

"I honestly really don't, but I'm going to try either way. I'm not just doing this for you either, I'm doing it for me." You joke as you reflexively wince while making the cut. Although you make sure to not do it too deep that it would be dangerous or worry Gwen to a extreme level, though blood was easily flowing now if you tipped your wrist over sideways.

You raised out your hand for Gwen to grab.

"Let's try it out Gwen, me and you. You just need to grab my hand." You say.

Again she seems to hesitate. Though much less now as she seems to make up her mind in less than a minute.

"OK. Together then."

Gwen reaches for your hand as your heart beats rapidly, as if ready to explode from your chest.

You feel contact, as her cold clammy hand meets with yours. Your stomach drops as your knees begin to buckle, but you stand as firm as you can as you start to remember the chant.

The words escape your mouth as you look up a little into the sky. You change your gripping from her hand to her forearm as you speed up the chant.

Gwen grips you harder as she looks down.

The chant ends as you finish saying what you needed to say.

You don't feel anything different, and that makes you start to panic internally. Gwen slowly starts to look back up as her grip on your wrist begins to loosen, so does yours.

"D-Do you know where you boundary is?" You stammer, not giving up on your hopes that something had changed.

"Yeah, that fence is where I usually can't pass through...." She says quietly.

Both of you start walking towards the fence, though your pace is slow as it's hard to move your feet with how weak they feel, while Gwen is right beside you at the same speed.

When you reach the fence, you both pause. Both of you don't step forward, and part of you hopes that Gwen does it first. But since this was all your idea, it was best to find out if this was all for naught.

Stepping past the fence, you turn around and look at Gwen, who's un-moving,

You raise out your hand again for her to grab.

"Come on, only one way to find out."

All she needed to do was be able to grab your hand, that was all. Even if she couldn't leave this boundary, the of you being able to make physical contact was already enough to make you happy.

Her hand raised up as it shook with nervously, moving it closer to yours, she grabbed your hand.

She grabbed your hand.

Outside of the boundary.

The two of you froze for a moment as nothing was said. Though immediately afterwards, you felt your body push back as a large amount of weight fell on-top of you from the front. Falling on your ass, you felt arms embrace around torso while loud wails pierced your ears. Gwen was crying, and she was really letting it all out as you felt your shoulder be soaked with tears.Though looking down, you saw that your shirt wasn't wet, which was a really weird feeling. You hugged Gwen back as you let her out what she needed to cry out, rubbing her back to console her a bit.

"It worked....>I-It really worked!" She cried into your ear.

Maybe you should have been crying too, but your face just felt numb as you realized what you did actually worked, maybe deep down you expected nothing out of this, and to have it actually work just shook you.

Though you knew, that now, everything was going to be OK.

You got Gwen off the street.