Murmuration

“As if I ever could,” Sean says. “You’re stuck with me.”

I’m okay with that is what he wants to say.

Instead, he says, “Do you know Oscar?”

And Sean frowns. “Oscar? Who is Oscar?”

“He’s”—fo sho—my friend—going up to them mountains—smoking his cigar in my backyard—the one who took all these photos, right? right? right?—“this guy I know.”

“This guy you know,” Sean says. “How do you know him?”

Mike shrugs.

“Oscar,” Sean says. “Can’t say that I do. Who is he?”

Sean’s still holding his hand. Mike’s other one is forming a fist in his lap. “You don’t know anyone named Oscar,” Mike says.

“No. Should I?”

“Just a name I heard, I guess.”

“Huh. So who is—”

I want you to keep track of these little events, Doc said. Anything out of the ordinary. Anything that you question. Anything that doesn’t quite jibe with what you know to be real. If you see these ghosts, or hear their voices, or find something that doesn’t make sense in the order of the natural world, I want you to keep track of it. That way, we can know just how often these things are happening.

“Where did you come from?” Mike blurts out.

Sean cocks his head. “Why, right here in Amorea, of course. You know that, Mike.”

He does. That’s what he’s always been told. Most of the people here have been in Amorea all their lives. In fact, everyone aside from him seems to be from Amorea. He’s never really thought about it before. Now, it’s all he can think about.

“Before me,” Mike says. “What did you do?”

“Before you,” Sean says slowly. “I don’t… understand? What do you mean?”

“Who did you come from?”

Sean frowns. “Amorea.”

“Not where. Who.”

The diner suddenly falls silent. Every single voice cuts out at once. It’s loud and boisterous and then it’s not. Mike looks around the diner. Everyone is slack-jawed, eyes sliding lazily out of focus. Calvin was about to take a sip of coffee, and now he’s just sitting there, arm slightly raised, cup tilted slightly toward him. Even the grill has fallen silent, Walter standing with the spatula, looking down, mouth open, and—

“Mike.”

The noise comes back like it was switched on. It’s deafening.

He snaps his gaze back to Sean, who’s staring at him worriedly.

“You okay? You kind of just trailed off there.”

He thinks, No. No, I’m not okay.

He says, “Yeah. Just… got distracted. What were we talking about?”

“You were asking if I knew someone named Oscar?”

You make a cheap date, white boy.