I can see the light. The bright, warm light that people brought to death’s doorstep sees. But I’m not dead. Still it glows deeper before my eyes, brighter for every step I take, because I can see what other’s can’t see. I see what has been left behind to become dilapidated and abandoned. I see the truth. The truth in its most innocent and dangerous form, that is the object that blurs my vision.

As a child, it would not linger. It would present itself when my heart was in disarray. When I wasn’t at ease with my life. With the world. But as I grew older, and became more discontent with the world and more happy with its former glory, it turned up. And suddenly, it wouldn’t leave. It stuck. So here I am now, a seventeen year old. And what is it I try not to say when I meet someone for the first time and shake their hand?

“Hi, I’m Anna. I see ghosts. Nice to meet you.”