Chapter Text
The factory closed in 1967.
Dad had worked there since he came back from the war, like, and then Jamie left school at fifteen to work there too, and then it fucking closed.
And so did half the fucking factories in Manchester, and the ones that stayed open were firing people left and right, and no one could find any work, and everyone was poor and unhappy and on the drink, and their neighbourhood was violent and dangerous, and everything was shit.
And Jamie was a kid. He liked listening to rock and roll music, which Dad hated, and he wanted to be a footballer more than anything, but was stuck just trying to make ends meet, with no time to even think about playing silly games.
They moved to London in 1968, him and Dad.
Mum stayed back in Manchester, looking after Nan and working at the same beauty parlour she always had, and Jamie wanted so badly to stay there with her, but he weren't soft enough to say that out loud. He was a man, and he had to go with Dad to make something useful of himself. When Dad was sixteen, he'd lied to an enlistment officer about his age and gone to fight the bloody Nazis, so Jamie certainly had no right to pout about just moving down the country.
Jamie put on a brave face, said goodbye to everything he knew, and went away with Dad.
A lot of good that did him, in the end.
They were there two months, and Dad killed him. Came home pissed out of his mind, to their tiny flat (which they could hardly afford on Jamie's salary, but Dad hadn't yet found a job), and threw a heavy, full bottle at his head.
Jamie doesn't think there was even a reason for it, at least not that he can remember. He's not sure what happened that night, after the bottle hit him.
He knows, though, that as he was losing consciousness on the kitchen floor, laying in a mess of whiskey and broken glass, unable to move his body anymore, he wanted his mum.
And then things went dark.
-
It was dark for a while— there's an empty patch in his memory where he thinks he might've been good and properly dead— but he remembers watching Dad get evicted from the flat.
He was there, Jamie, but he wasn't. He could walk around, he could see Dad scrubbing at the old, dark bloodstain in the kitchen while all their stuff was in boxes, he could read the notice on the door that said they had to be out in two days or the police would come. But he couldn't touch anything— his hands passed right through— and he'd tried talking to Dad, but couldn't be heard.
He remembers shouting, stomping his feet, doing everything to say: I'M RIGHT HERE, but it was all fucking useless.
His obituary, cut out from the newspaper, was taped to the fridge.
-
James G. Tartt Jr.
5 December, 1951 - 12 May, 1968
In a tragic accident Tuesday night, a young life was lost too soon. James will be dearly missed by his mother, father, grandparents, and friends. A brief memorial will be held at St. Paul's Church in Manchester on 19 May at noon.
-
Jamie stares at it for a moment.
It's terribly short. It says he died in an accident, but he doesn't think that's true. It weren't very accidental, what Dad did.
There's a small photo of him smiling, which he remembers Mum borrowing the neighbour's camera to take, just before him and Dad moved away. He'd been really, really sad that day, but he'd smiled for the picture.
Then Dad stands up, the bloodstain almost fully gone, and dumps the bucket of soapy water down the sink. He walks over to the fridge, walks right through Jamie, and rubs his thumb over the photo.
"You were a good lad. You've no idea how much I fucking miss you. I'm so sorry, Junior."
He takes down the cutout, folds it up, and puts it in his wallet.
He starts carrying boxes out the door.
Jamie tries to follow him, tries to go out to the car with him, but gets stuck in the doorway. He can't go past it. It's like an invisible wall— he can press up against it, he can ram himself into it, and it won't break. He's trapped.
And then Dad takes the very last box, locks the door behind him, and leaves.
Jamie is alone.
-
In 1984, there's a couple living in the flat. They're about to be married.
Jamie quite likes them, more than most other people who've lived here since he died. He spends more time with Stella than he does with Robert, seeing as she's at home for more of the day while he goes off to work in an office, but they both seem nice.
Stella can't see Jamie, has no idea he's there, but she plays music that he likes on her cassette tapes, and she paints as a hobby, and she keeps the flat really nice and tidy, so he's gotten quite attached to her. She's the closest thing he's had to a friend in years.
She goes to visit her mum in Leeds, two weeks before the wedding. (Jamie's been counting down the days on the calendar they hang in the kitchen. He's excited for them.)
While she's away, Robert brings home a girl. Makes her dinner. Tells her they need to keep it a secret.
Jamie's watching them from the living room, arms folded across him, utterly fucking pissed off. How dare he go behind Stella's back like this? And right before the wedding?
His eye twitches in irritation... and the lights flicker.
Robert looks up, startled. His date frowns.
"That's odd. I should talk to the landlord, have the wiring looked at."
And maybe it was a coincidence.
But then they leave the dirty dishes on the table, and they start heading for the bedroom, and anger bubbles up in Jamie's chest, betrayal on Stella's behalf, and—
Pop.
A lightbulb in the living room shatters above them, sparks flying all around it.
All three of them, Jamie included, jump out of their fucking skin.
"What the fuck?" Robert shouts.
Jamie simply stares with wide eyes, becoming rather sure that he just did that. He hasn't been able to do fuck-all in years, and now he's just gotten so angry that he broke a lightbulb with his mind. Fucking hell.
Still quite enraged, and ready to press his luck, he marches right back to the kitchen and tries pushing their dirty plates off of the table. To his utter surprise, his hands make contact with cold ceramic, and the plates clatter to the floor, breaking into pieces.
In total shock, he bends down to try to pick up the shards, scattered around the new flooring that was put down to cover his bloodstain, and his fingers pass right through. Whatever happened has already worn off, and he's back to being useless.
But it did happen, didn't it, and that's something.
Robert's date storms out, annoyed and scared, and then he's such a shit liar when Stella asks him later about the plates missing from the cupboard, that he confesses his entire longstanding affair.
Stella kicks him out, and she moves out herself not long after— Jamie's sad to see her go, but is also quite glad to have helped her dodge what was going to be a terrible marriage. He's happy he was able to do something, for once.
-
He doesn't like the next tenants— they're loud and messy and argue all the time— but he gradually learns that when he's angry, he can harness enough force to interact with the world somewhat. (Luckily, these people make him quite irate, so he gets lots of practice.)
Lights flickering, cold spots, things being pushed off of shelves... they leave within a couple of months, insisting to the landlord that the place is haunted.
And Jamie's quite satisfied with that.
He keeps practicing, gets better at moving things and controlling the lights, and scares out a fair few residents. Some take more convincing than others, but he makes it into a game— sets a record of three days as the shortest tenancy, with a funny young fellow that ran out screaming in the middle of the night. Eventually, there's a new landlord who warns people when they move in that this unit is allegedly haunted, though he doesn't seem to believe it himself.
It's just past the turn of the new century— Jamie keeps track via people's calendars, and newspapers they happen to leave sitting out— when an older woman moves in, all alone, and brings her cat with her. Apparently the new landlord allows pets.
Jamie hates the cat.
It's a stupid little orange menace. Everything he tries to do— knocking things about, making noises, even the lights going funny— the woman, Mildred, blames on the cat.
"A cat can't even do that!" he finds himself shouting one day, after she'd brushed off the sound of him rattling the fucking pipes. "Get a fucking clue, Mildred!"
But she can't hear him, can she, so she just keeps on making her tea, and then walks right through him to go turn on the telly.
He follows her with an annoyed groan, ready to go start pressing buttons on the stupid thing to make her notice him... but then, when she turns it on, she puts on a football match.
Jamie takes some pause. It's been ages since he's seen one— hardly anyone who's lived here has had much interest in it, not since Dad. He sits on the floor, in front of the screen, and stares. It's Richmond away at Chelsea— he's always been a City lad at heart, but he'd grown fond of Richmond in the short time he'd lived here. The pitch looks so green on a colour television. He hasn't seen grass in ages. He doesn't touch a single button.
Mildred's on the telephone behind him, chatting to someone as the match kicks off— by overhearing one end of her conversation, Jamie finds out that her grandson plays for Richmond, and she's never missed watching a match.
"I do think it's settled the ghost down, too," she says to her friend, in her posh fucking accent. "Maybe the poor thing just needed something to watch. It's a terribly restless wee soul."
Jamie whips around to look at her. She seems well pleased with herself.
Has she been fucking messing with him the whole time, blaming the cat when she knew she was being haunted? Has she outsmarted him at his own fucking game?
He frowns, stares at her a moment longer, then realizes he's not even all that mad. Fair fucking play, that.
At least he's got football to watch.
-
As Mildred gets older, Jamie tries to help her more.
It takes him some time to be able to use anything other than anger to interact with the material world— his efforts are fruitless for a while, but when she has a fall one day, after many years of cohabitating and watching football together, he panics, and finds himself suddenly able to pick up her cordless phone and bring it to her so she can call for help.
She looks surprised, but not scared, when it floats into her hand.
"Thank you, love," she says, looking right through him. "I knew you were still around here somewhere."
And when she comes home from the hospital, moving carefully around on her hip replacement, Jamie realizes he can do more. He can carry her tea to the living room for her, and he can draw the curtains for her at night, and he can refill the stupid cat's water bowl. It's hit or miss, innit, the things he can and can't do, but he tries.
One day, she sets a pen and paper on the table and says:
"I'd love it if you could tell me your name, my dear."
Jamie reaches for the pen straight away, but his fingers go right through it. He tries a few more times, but all he manages to do is make it wobble a bit— he never can touch it for long enough to actually pick it up.
"That's alright," Mildred sighs, though she's clearly a bit disappointed. "I'll leave it out, though— maybe it's easier for you when I'm not looking."
And Jamie doesn't think that has anything to do with it, but once she's gone to bed, he stands at the kitchen table and stares at the pen. Tries to make himself angry— thinks, for the first time in ages, about the fact that his own dad murdered him when he was only sixteen years old, and that wasn't fucking fair, was it? He should've had a life, a real life, but he's been trapped in this fucking flat for forty years instead, locked away from the world, all by himself. Can't even talk to anyone or do anything. It's shit.
And the burners on the stove all turn on for a moment— he thinks that might be a sign that he's upset enough to get something done.
He grabs the pen, which feels solid and real in his hand now, and scrawls out: JAMES GEORGE TARTT in the messy, left-handed penmanship that he used to get the strap for in school. Frowns at it for a moment, then crosses out his first name and replaces it with JAMIE.
That's better.
He adds: 1951-1968, just like on his obituary, to tell her a bit more about him. Thinks a moment longer, then writes: I like football
He loses his grip on the pen before he can even add a period to the sentence, and it clatters to the table, passing right through his fingers.
The stupid cat, Ginger, is sat right behind him, staring at him, when he turns around.
Jamie glares at it.
"Oh, piss off, you little twat."
Ginger runs away.
-
"My goodness," Mildred says in the morning. "You're born the same year as my daughter! You're just a young little thing— I must admit, I was picturing someone much more spooky and Victorian."
And that makes Jamie frown, because there's an invitation hanging on the fridge for her daughter's sixtieth birthday party. Sandra has come to visit plenty before— she's the one whose son is a footballer— and she doesn't even seem that old. She's still got a job, and she ran the London Marathon a few years ago, and she comes by often to check on her elderly mum, and— fuck. Mum and Dad might still be alive. They'd be about Mildred's age, wouldn't they... old, but not, like, senile or nothing. If Jamie were sixty, like Sandra, he'd probably be checking in on them and taking care of them, and his children would be grown up and starting their own families, and he'd be happy and loved and fulfilled like Sandra is.
But no, he's here. He's still sixteen, and he's never going to know what's happened to his family or friends, and he's never going to leave this fucking flat.
The lights flicker with his bad mood.
"Jamie George," Mildred sighs, looking fond. "Enough with the lights. I thought we were past this." She shakes her head. "Shall we put the telly on? Chelsea is playing in Germany today, and you know I quite like the look of that Roy Kent fellow."
And Jamie can't help but laugh, because he quite likes Roy Kent, too. He sits beside her on the couch, and for once, he's sure she knows he's there.
-
She calls her grandson, Andrew, the next day, and asks him to bring over a spare football when he has the chance. She tells him she knows a kid in her block of flats who might like to use it.
It's not until Andrew leaves, and Mildred gently nudges the football into the centre of the living room, that Jamie realizes the kid is him.
He's so overjoyed when he tries to touch it that his foot actually makes contact— for the first time, it's not fear or anger that are letting him get through to the material world, it's pure happiness— and he immediately starts doing keepie-uppies right there. He hasn't touched a football in decades, but it comes right back to him, like he's playing ball games outside the old house in Manchester all over again.
Mildred laughs out loud.
"That's it, Jamie George! Well done!"
To her, it must look like a floating football, bouncing around her living room, but she cheers him on anyways while he messes about with it. She doesn't even scold him when he kicks it into the coffee table by accident.
"I imagine it's been a long time since you've been able to play like a child," she says, later on, once he's exhausted himself. (He didn't even know he could feel tired anymore.) "I do hope I've been able to bring you a bit of joy, love."
-
Some years later, Mildred falls ill.
Jamie doesn't know what's wrong— she goes to lots of appointments with all kinds of doctors he's never heard of, and Sandra and Andrew keep telling her she should move into a care home.
"I simply can't leave Jamie all alone," Mildred tells Sandra one day. "I won't leave here. Not a chance."
It's the first time she's mentioned him by name, or spoke about him in any other way than joking about her haunted flat.
"Who on Earth is Jamie, Mum? What are you on about?"
"He's the little boy that lives with me," Mildred says. She's been getting more confused, lately, always forgetting things, and she spends much of her time in bed. "I can't see him, but I know he's here. I won't leave him."
Sandra sighs.
"Are you talking about the ghost, Mummy? You know that's not real."
The lights flicker. Jamie doesn't much appreciate being dismissed.
"That was him!" Mildred says. "Hello, Jamie George. I hope you're well today, my dear."
Jamie walks over to sit on the edge of her bed. He can't touch her hand, not quite, but she's told him his presence makes the air feel cooler. He hopes she can feel him now.
"Mum..." Sandra breathes. "Please. You're really starting to worry me."
"I'm fine, love. Really." Mildred smiles at her daughter, and Jamie gets a strange, creeping sense that maybe she's not fine. Maybe she knows that. "Get on with your day. I'll be here."
And Sandra doesn't seem to want to leave, but she checks her wristwatch and sighs.
"I'll come back later, alright? I'll bring by some meals for you."
"That would be perfect. I love you, dear."
"I love you, Mum."
Sandra leaves, and Mildred falls asleep soon after, and Jamie elects to pace around the flat and worry. He really doesn't want anything to happen to his favourite person. He needs her to be okay. He's too stressed to even kick his trusty football around.
Once he's finally settled in on the couch, to sit there and fret instead, he's not sure how much time passes before he hears a noise behind him somewhere. He turns around to see Mildred, up and out of bed, moving better than she has in ages, and looking right at him.
"Jamie George," she says. "There you are."
Jamie stands. Moves towards her, and doesn't bother to mask his shock. Instinctively, he smoothes his shirt and tries to fix his hair.
"You can see me?"
He hasn't spoken aloud in a long time, nor has he been seen in even longer. He doesn't really remember what he looks like, it's been so long since he's seen his reflection— he has no idea what she's going to make of him. (He's wondered before if his ghost looks how he did in life, or if he's stuck all beaten and bloody and bruised, the way he died. He hopes he looks healthy and presentable.)
"It's so nice to finally put a face to the name," Mildred says. She walks right up and pinches his cheek; her hands are warm. Jamie hasn't felt touch in decades. "Aren't you ever a handsome young man?"
"I— I don't—" Jamie stammers, at a loss. "How can you touch me?"
She shakes her head, and pulls him into a hug. To his utter horror, he immediately breaks down crying— it's warm and solid and perfect, and he really misses his mum and his nan, and he really cares about Mildred, and he's realizing that she must be a ghost, too, and something in him is breaking.
"Oh, Jamie," she sighs, rubbing his back. "You're alright, my dear. It's okay. I've waited a long time to finally do this."
"I'm sorry," he sobs, overwhelmed and unable to stop. "I just— I never thought I'd have a hug again."
She holds him for a long time, doesn't seem to even care that he's crying like a child. She shushes him and soothes him, but eventually pulls back and says:
"I don't think I can stay much longer."
Jamie frowns. Wipes his eyes.
"Why? Where are you going?"
She smiles a bit sadly.
"I can feel a sort of pull... perhaps it's the great beyond. I think it's my time, love."
"No." Jamie grabs her hands, he can't let go of her yet. He's still crying. "What? Why don't I have a pull? I don't— I don't want to stay here anymore. Why do you get to leave, and I'm stuck?"
She squeezes his hands.
"You must not be done here. There's got to be some kind of purpose for you, yet."
Jamie shakes his head.
"I don't want a purpose. I want my mum. I want to go home. I want to be done."
Mildred sighs. Hugs him again.
"Jamie... I can't claim to know why you're here, but I need you to know that you made an old woman's life much less lonely." She wipes the tears off his face. "I'll miss you very much. I do hope you'll be able to cross over soon and leave this place behind."
She's already fading away.
"Please don't leave," he sobs. He holds onto her, even as his hands starts to pass through her again. "Please. I don't want to be here by myself anymore."
But it's useless.
She leaves, disappearing right in his arms.
-
He scares away the next tenants quite easily.
He's so angry all the time that the lights and the stove and the thermostat all have minds of their own— two shattered lightbulbs and a near-miss of a kitchen fire from the burners all coming on is enough to send the young couple searching for something else. And the man after them, and the lady and her dog after him, who all stay less than a year in the flat.
It's bad enough that the unit sits empty for a while, the landlord clearly at a loss. Jamie doesn't mind that too much, having the place to himself— with no furniture in the way, he can kick his football around as much as he'd like. (He hid it in a wee secret cupboard at the back of the linen closet when Mildred's family was cleaning out her things. He's quite attached to it.)
His anger ebbs and flows, but he finally finds himself feeling quite resigned again, and also getting a bit lonely. He still needs to find whatever purpose Mildred thought he had, and he's not going to come across it while he's wallowing in his misery. The next time the landlord comes by, Jamie doesn't make any sort of scene— not even a single flicker of the lights.
"I really do think it'll be perfect for you," the landlord's saying into a telephone— one of the fancy new kind that Jamie's not familiar with, as Mildred never had one. "It's quaint, yes, but as you stressed the importance of location, I think you'll be quite satisfied."
"Well, I'm excited to see it in person. You just go right on ahead and send the lease over, and we can get this show on the road. I'll have some folks from my new job swing by and grab the keys— they're a real kind bunch, offered to get furniture and all that moved in for me before I land."
Jamie blinks.
That's an American on the phone, isn't it, talking fucking loud enough for Jamie to hear.
He's never met an American in real life— outsiders didn't tend to roam around the shit part of Manchester he was from, and then after moving to London, he wasn't really here long enough to go meeting all sorts of people.
The people in Richmond were proper posh, right, and him and Dad were well out of place, but Mum's cousin owned the shop where Jamie was working and had helped them get the flat. (Of course, Dad thought himself too manly and important to work in a wee grocer's shop... and didn't manage to find any sort of suitable job while Jamie was alive. He was more interested in being on the drink full-time anyways.) But Jamie worked long hours in the back room of the shop, and didn't know many people here, so he kept mostly to himself.
And now he's going to have an American in his flat— quite exotic and thrilling, that.
"Very well, Mr. Lasso," the landlord says. "I'll ensure everything is arranged. I'll have my secretary send the you lease this afternoon."
"Well, mercy buckets, Mr. Puckett." Jamie can hear Mr. Lasso laugh through the phone. "Don't you just love a good rhyme? You've got a perfect name for it."
Mr. Puckett's face pinches, annoyed. Jamie snorts.
"Will that be everything for today, sir?"
"Oh, I'm just getting started," the American chuckles. "I've got a goldmine of puns right here, and you've just struck it, Puckett."
The awkward silence is painful.
"Jesus fucking Christ," Jamie mutters to himself, despite knowing no one can hear him.
Because, like, he'd sworn to himself he'd not do any real haunting to the next person to move in. He's been alone in this flat for too long, and he needs another tenant to actually stay and keep him company this time. He's not going to fuck this up for himself.
But, fucking hell, this Lasso lad sounds like a piece of work.