Chapter Text
The cosmic joke goes something like this; they are dead, and you are not, that's it, that's the punchline.
Sam’s life is a great big joke, likely the cosmic kind of joke. Or at the very least if it isn’t a joke it is definitely the plot of some B string movie. The genre of which Sam desperately wants to be comedy or romance or something normal, unfortunately due to Sam’s whole ‘thing’ the genre is definitely horror.
Sam’s whole ‘thing’ is the seeing ghosts thing. At the age of sixteen Sam argues the front seat away from his younger brother. At the age of sixteen a car runs a red light and slams into the left side of Sam’s mother’s car. At sixteen Sam’s mother and younger brother die. At sixteen Sam’s heart stops twice on the way to the hospital. That is the important part.
Here is the thing about ghosts, you only see them once you’ve crossed that paper thin barrier between life and death, something very few people do and live to see the results of.
Unfortunately for Sam he wakes up and lives. When he wakes up it is to his brother, Boomer, at his bedside complaining about the news playing on the crappy hospital television.
The best part is no one else could see Boomer, no matter how much Sam insisted that his brother wasn’t dead, that he was right there, that for fucks sake I’m not crazy my brother is alive this isn’t fucking funny, no one else could see Boomer.
After a week long stay at the hospitals psychiatric ward, with his broken ribs still healing, Sam learns to keep his mouth shut about the whole ghosts thing.
Its fine. Sam is fine with the fact that the afterlife apparently exists, and that most of his family is dead, and that now as a twenty something most of his friends are ghosts. Sam is fine. He is totally content with how his life has gone.
Sure, he works a soul sucking nine to five in which he operates mostly on autopilot and he eats mostly microwave meals not because he can’t cook but because they are so easy. But it’s fine. Really.
Most of Sam’s days go the same way. He wakes up to his alarm and Hannah flicking his lights like she pays the damn electricity bill, he makes himself a coffee and drinks it as he makes the ten block walk to work. Then he works eight hours and goes home to make himself a microwave dinner and watch whatever game show is on that night. Maybe if Sam wants to switch things up he’ll get lunch with Puffy, the only coworker who will talk to him considering Sam almost never focuses on anything anyone else can see.
Sam should have known his day was going to be shit when he started his morning with a deviation in his admittedly bland routine.
“Sam!” Tina sounds way too excited for, Sam rolls over to eye the glowing red numbers on his alarm clock, five in the morning.
What Sam wouldn’t give to have the energy of a ghost. The lack of need to sleep and never ending desire to complete whatever goal they died needing keeps them pretty damn hyper.
“Mrfffm.” Sam says, because he is very eloquent and went to college and everything.
“I made a new friend!” Tina continues unbothered.
Sam gives himself enough time to count backwards from ten and remind himself that he can’t strangle an incaporal ghost.
Tina’s friends always range from sickly orphan ghosts who’s dying wish is to eat an orange, to elderly women who call Sam’s slurs and only want to wait around bitterly until their husband dies to join them, and on a few memorable occasions roadkill who want Sam to do insane things like slash tires.
You think being an centuries old European ghost Tina would be a bit less friendly with literally every ghost she comes across, at the very least Sam thinks she would spend more time hovering around her equally dead girlfriend who never seems to leave Sam’s apartment.
“If I open my eyes and I am met with a gore covered animal.” Sam threatens.
“It’s not an animal.” Tina promises.
Sam opens his eyes not fully believing her.
“This is so much worse.” Sam says, eyeing the ghost of their towns recently deceased mayor.
Supposedly Schlatt died of a heart attack, only that definitely shouldn’t have left a ghost, let alone one so flushed red and twitchy.
“I found him outside this super nice house when I was taking a walk.” Tina reports now floating backwards.
“No. I have work in four hours and I can get at least two more hours of sleep.” Sam says. Maybe if he closes his eyes and tries to go back to sleep they will leave him alone.
“I want you to help me get revenge on my husband and kill him.” Schlatt says like he is proposing a business merger.
“What the fuck!” Sam’s eyes snap open. “No. I will not be doing that. Get out!”
Sam’s neighbor in the next apartment over slams something against their joint wall. Sam will have to bring her a pie or something as an apology.
“We’ll try again when he is less cranky,” Tina says now tugging Schlatt out of Sam’s bedroom, “you know how the living are.”
Sam definitely won’t be killing anyone, let alone the mayors fairly young widower.
Sam definitely will be however getting some more sleep and snoozing his alarm until he is scrambling to get to work in the morning.
If past lives truly exist Sam must have done something truly horrible in his to be put in this position. It’s bad enough that he is constantly and literally haunted by death and grief, and if he ever acknowledges it in public he will definitely be institutionalized. But to top it all off every ghosts who realizes he can see them seems to think that makes him their personal assistant in finishing their unfinished business.
Sam just wants to have a normal life and not do any of that thank you very much.
Sam, thankfully and surprisingly, makes it through his morning without further interruption from dead mayors or ghosts who have no concept of time.
Work is as mind numbing as always and Hannah hovers mostly in Sam’s periphery. She likes to cause trouble, and as the dead princess of some tourist trap of a European castle she has enough offering energy to do so. Thankfully her entertainment today seems to be reorganizing the desk of a coworker who called in sick.
Sam would stop her, feeling bad for the poor coworker who will come back to find everything moved, but if she is doing that she isn’t bothering him where he can’t react without seeming crazy. So desk reorganizing it is.
“Lunch?” Puffy asks, her heels clicking in a satisfying manner as she walk over to Sam’s desk.
Puffy if 5’2 but what she lacks in hight she makes up for in curly hair and intense vibes. She’s one of maybe three women working in the office, which unfortunately for her makes her choices for friendship pretty small.
It mostly leaves Sam, not straight, avoided by everyone else because he stares off into empty space, and a general pushover which Sam is almost positive is the real reason Puffy likes him.
“I forgot to pack a lunch so sure.” Sam says, looking away from a mind numbing spread sheet.
“Great I want tacos and that truck is at the park.”
Hannah perks up at the mention of the park and leaves what she was doing to hover around Sam’s shoulder.
Ghosts usually mimic the living, their chests move because they think they should be breathing, they float as close to the ground as they can without phasing through it so it looks like they are walking, they love nature.
That last one may just be Sam’s ghosts in particular.
Sam closes out of his work and follows puffy out of their stuffy gray office for their hour lunch break. Sam probably shouldn’t stop in the middle of his work but that is a level of care he simply doesn’t have.
The park is only a block away and comprised mostly of sparse trees and biking trails. It also houses the best taco truck within several blocks. Sam and Puffy both place their orders to an uninterested looking employee before claiming a bench near by to wait.
Hannah drifts off to go inspect the sad looking community garden. Sam has a very strong suspicion that he will be strong armed into coming over to water the dying plants.
“So Sam.” Puffy says turning to face him with a look in her eyes that screams ‘I dragged you here for a reason.’
“Puffy.” Sam says, because he has so few options for real living adult contact these days so he will just suffer.
“You’re single right? Like tragically single? In need of human contact that isn’t me?”
“Uhh.” Sam says.
“I’m right. That’s good. Well my girlfriend, Niki, you’ve met her, her roommate is single too.”
Sam realizes where this is going with dawning horror. “No.” He says.
“Oh yes!”
It is only years of practice that keep Sam from jumping as Hannah’s voice suddenly sounds from behind him. She probably wants people to think he is crazy.
“Puffy, thank you really. But I am good. I’m so good.” Sam says, quickly.
“All you do is work. You’re objectively not bad to look at.” Puffy says. “You should be out sowing your wild oats or whatever.”
“I have no oats to sow. Let’s just stop with the oats metaphor.” Sam begs.
Their names are called providing Sam with a quick and convenient escape as he goes to grab the paper boats with their tacos in them.
Unfortunately his escape can’t last too long as he has to return to where Puffy is to give her the food. Maybe he could just leave. Burn this bridge and move to a new state. Better yet a new country.
“Quit stalling you big baby.” Hannah snickers. “She’s right. You need to get out more. You’re a total loser. The psychology textbooks at the library would call you depressed.”
“Well good thing I’m not asking then.” Sam hisses under his breath so no one else hears.
Hannah shoves him forwards. Or she does her closest approximation which is putting her hands up and letting them phase through Sam leaving his skin tingling with electricity. The phantom touch of the undead is a very distinct and uncomfortable feeling.
“Look.” Puffy says, shoving her phone in Sam’s face as soon as he sits back down on the park bench. “This is Ponk.”
Unfortunately Ponk is hot. Not just hot but down right gorgeous, with warm dark skin, and long bleached locs. Clearly they didn’t know their photo was being taken because they are caught mid motion, eyes bright, mouth open, and hands moving.
“If you leave your mouth open like that you are going to catch death.” Hannah says, she is also leaning over to examine the photo. Sam makes a mental note to correct her on her usage of modern idioms when they are somewhere private.
“Great!” Puffy says brightly. “Now I just need to find a suitable photo of you. Do you have an instagram?”
“I didn’t agree.” Sam says flushing red at his frankly strange reaction. He is usually a bit more composed than this.
Puffy shoots him a look. “Yes you did. You’re free on Friday aren’t you? Who am I kidding yes you are.”
“Um.” Sam says. In his defense he was woken up so early today.
“Instagram. Come on Sam I need a photo where you don’t look like death warmed over.” Puffy waves her phone like a weapon. It should certainly be classified as one.
“Get it?” Hannah giggles. “Death warmed over? That’s what you are.”
Sam will blame it on the shock if anyone asks why he rattles off his instagram handle without any further thought.
Puffy scrolls for a while, making some frankly hurtful noises. Eventually she must find a photo she deems okay though because her fingers fly across her phone screen again as she sends a text with a ding.
“Great,” Puffy says putting her phone away to grab a taco, “I’ll text you your date details later.”
Sam, face a shade of red that could best be called warning and danger, just takes a bite of his taco and does his best to ignore the fact that Hannah has definitely floated off to go tell Tina the latest news on Sam’s disaster life.
On the bright side Boomer has been on the other side for weeks so Sam can save himself the few scraps of dignity he has left in his brother not knowing.