What remains after

CW: Suicide or self harm, Mental health

The art studio was always the coldest at 3 AM. When the radiators gave up. When the November wind found every crack in the windows.

Eli didn't mind. He barely noticed anymore.

His hands moved across the canvas in the dim light of a single desk lamp. Mixing prussian blue with burnt umber. Trying to capture the exact shade of Jamie's eyes. That particular afternoon light. The kind that came through his bedroom window around four o'clock.

He'd gotten it wrong again.

Eli stepped back from the easel. Paint-stained hands hanging at his sides. He surveyed his failure. The forty-third failure if he was counting.

Well he was always counting.

Forty-three paintings in seven months. Seven months since Jamie had been found. Wearing Eli's grey hoodie. The one that had stopped smelling like him weeks before.

The painting showed Jamie laughing. Head thrown back. That strand of dark hair falling across his forehead the way it always did. But the eyes were wrong. They were always wrong.

Eli could capture everything else. The curve of his jaw. The small scar above his left eyebrow. The way his smile was slightly crooked. The small gap between his front teeth.

But the eyes. The eyes defeated him every time.

Because how do you paint eyes that had stopped wanting to see?

Behind him. A sound.

Eli froze. The familiar creak of floorboards. The specific weight of someone moving in the dark.

He didn't turn around. Didn't need to.

"You're here again," he whispered.

No answer. There never was. But Eli felt it. That presence. Standing just behind his left shoulder. Close enough to touch. But never quite touching.

He'd stopped being afraid of it weeks ago. Had stopped questioning his sanity. Had stopped caring whether Jamie was really there or just a manifestation of sleep deprivation and guilt.

It didn't matter. Real or not. Jamie was here.

"I can't get your eyes right," Eli said to the canvas. To the silence. To the ghost. Maybe even the wind. "I've tried forty-three times. Every time I think I have it. But then I look and they're wrong. They're always wrong."

The studio settled around him. That particular quality of silence that felt like listening.

Eli's phone screen read 3:14 AM. Another graveyard shift at the easel. Another night avoiding sleep. Avoiding dreams. Avoiding the moment when he'd close his eyes and see Jamie's face underwater. Hair floating. Eyes open. Staring at nothing.

He opened his sketchbook. Pages brittle with dried paint and charcoal smudges. Five years of Jamie stared back at him.

Jamie at fourteen. At fifteen. At sixteen. At seventeen. At eighteen.

The progression of a life. The documentation of a slow drowning Eli had witnessed but not understood.

Mrs. Chen. His secondary school art teacher who still let him use the studio space. She'd stopped asking if he was okay. She'd see the paintings. All of them Jamie. Always Jamie. Lined against the walls like a gallery of ghosts. And she'd leave fresh coffee and biscuits on the desk without a word.

Sometimes she'd stand there looking at the canvases. Her face doing something complicated. Her son had died young too. Different circumstances. But dead was dead in the end.

She never told Eli it would get better. That meant something.

Another creak. Closer now.

Eli's breath caught. He could smell it. That specific scent. Jamie's soap. The cheap one from Boots. Coconut and something else. Something that was just. Jamie.

"I know you're not real," Eli whispered. His voice rough from disuse. From too many cigarettes and not enough water. "I know you're just. In my head. Grief. Sleep deprivation. Going mad."

The presence shifted. Eli felt it like a change in air pressure. Like standing too close to a cliff edge.

"But I need you to be real," he continued. Desperate now. "Just for tonight. Just for this shift. Can you. Can you just be here?"

Silence. Always silence.

But the presence stayed. And that was enough. It had to be enough.

Eli picked up his pencil. Opened to a fresh page. His hand moved without conscious thought. Muscle memory and grief guiding every line.

Jamie's profile emerged. The slope of his nose. The curve of his ear.

Behind him. Breathing. Soft and steady. The rhythm he'd memorised. The rhythm that had stopped seven months ago.

Eli's hand trembled. The line went wrong. He didn't correct it.

"You're obsessed." His sister Maya had said. Standing in the doorway last week. Arms crossed. Voice breaking. "This isn't healthy Eli. You're twenty years old. You can't spend the rest of your life painting a dead boy."

But what else was there? What else did Eli have?

He'd turned back to his canvas without answering. And Maya had left. Crying. He'd heard it in the corridor. Her footsteps. Her sobs.

He'd felt nothing.

That was the worst part. The numbness. The way everything that wasn't Jamie felt distant. Muffled. Like living underwater.

The only time Eli felt anything was here. At 3 AM. With Jamie's ghost. With these paintings. With the familiar ritual of failure.

"I saw the signs," Eli said to the empty studio. To the presence behind him. "I fucking saw them and I did nothing."

The way Jamie had started giving things to him. His favourite books. His lucky coin. The bracelet Eli had bought him.

"You keep it," Jamie had said. "It looks better on you anyway."

And Eli had taken it. Had worn it. Wore it still. As it sat heavy on his wrist.

The way Jamie had held him tighter than usual that last night. Face pressed against Eli's chest. Listening to his heartbeat.

"I love you," Jamie had said. "Whatever happens. I love you."

And Eli had said it back. Had stroked his hair. Had fallen asleep thinking about nothing. About everything being fine.

Had woken up to a text from Jamie's mum. Three words that rewrote his entire existence.

Please come quickly.

But quickly hadn't been quick enough. By the time Eli arrived. By the time he ran to the lake. Jamie was already gone.

They'd pulled him from the water four hours later. Eli had watched from the shore. Wrapped in a blanket. Not shaking from cold.

The note had been on Jamie's desk. Forty-seven words Eli had memorised.

I'm sorry. I'm so tired. Please don't blame yourself. This isn't about you. I love you. I'm sorry.

But it was about Eli. Of course it was. Because Eli should have saved him. Should have seen. Should have asked the right questions. Should have loved him better. Louder. Enough to make him stay.

The charcoal pencil snapped in his grip.

Behind him. Movement. The sound of someone sitting. The specific creak of the old chair by the window. Jamie's chair. The one he used to sit in while Eli painted.

Eli's heart stopped. He didn't turn around. Didn't dare.

"Are you really there?" His voice barely a whisper.

No answer.

But Eli felt it. That presence. Solid now. Real. Watching him the way Jamie used to watch. Patient. Still. Full of love Eli hadn't deserved.

"I can't do this anymore," Eli said. His voice breaking. "I can't keep painting you. Can't keep failing. Can't keep. Existing. Without you."

The presence didn't move. Didn't speak. Just. Watched.

Eli turned slowly. Heart hammering. Knowing he'd see nothing. Knowing the chair would be empty.

It was.

But. There. On the seat. Something that hadn't been there before.

A single stone. Smooth. Grey. The exact size and weight of the ones they'd found in Jamie's pockets.

Eli's breath stopped. His vision blurred. He crossed the room. Picked up the stone. It was cold. Solid. Real.

Impossibly real.

"Jamie?" His voice cracked. Split open. "Jamie please. Please I need. I need to know. Why? Why did you leave? Why wasn't I enough?"

The studio settled into silence. The kind that felt like an answer. Like the absence of an answer. Like the only answer there would ever be.

Eli sank to the floor. Stone clutched in his fist. And something broke. Something that had been holding. Barely. By threads.

He sobbed. Properly. For the first time since the funeral. Ugly choking sounds that hurt his chest. That tasted like salt and seven months of holding back.

"I miss you," he gasped between sobs. "I miss you so fucking much. I don't know how to. How to do this. How to wake up. How to exist. How to breathe without you."

The presence moved. Eli felt it. Felt it settle beside him on the floor. Felt the weight of it. The warmth.

"I should have saved you," Eli whispered. "I should have asked. Should have pushed. Should have made you talk. Should have loved you better."

And then. Soft. So soft he almost missed it.

A sound.

Not breathing. Not movement. But. Something. Like an exhale. Like a sigh. Like forgiveness offered from beyond.

Eli looked up. The studio swam in his vision. But there. In the corner of his eye. A flicker. A shadow. The suggestion of a shape.

Jamie. Standing by the window. Backlit by streetlight. Not looking at Eli. Looking out. At the night. At the world he'd left behind.

"Jamie," Eli breathed.

The figure didn't move. Didn't turn. Just stood there. Present. Impossible.

And Eli understood. With a clarity that hurt worse than the grief. Than the guilt. Than everything.

Jamie was here. Had always been here. Would always be here. Not as comfort. Not as forgiveness. But as weight. As haunting. As the price of loving someone who chose to leave.

"You're not going to let me go," Eli said. Not a question. A realisation. "Are you?"

The figure by the window remained still. Silent.

"I don't want you to," Eli admitted. His voice small. Broken. "I don't want to move on. Don't want to heal. Don't want a future without you in it. Even like this. Even as a ghost. Even as madness."

The figure turned. Slowly. And Eli saw him. Really saw him. Not the painted version. Not the memory. But Jamie. As he'd been at the end. Hollow-eyed. Exhausted. Already gone.

The Jamie Eli had refused to see. Had refused to paint. Until now.

"I'm sorry," Eli whispered. "I'm sorry I didn't save you. I'm sorry I wasn't enough. I'm sorry I'm still here and you're not."

The figure watched him. Those eyes. Finally. Finally Eli understood them.

They weren't the eyes of someone who wanted to die. They were the eyes of someone who was already dead. Who had been dead for months. Years maybe. Who had been going through the motions. Performing life. Waiting for permission to stop.

And Eli had missed it. Had looked at Jamie every day and seen what he wanted to see. The happy boyfriend. The bright future. The life they'd planned.

Not the drowning boy. Not the silent scream. Not the goodbye happening in slow motion.

"I see you now," Eli said. Tears streaming. "I see you. Finally. Is that what you wanted? Is that why you're here?"

The figure didn't answer. Just looked at him. With those eyes. Those finally correct eyes.

And then. Slowly. It faded. Dissolved. Like smoke. Like memory. Like morning mist.

Gone.

But not gone. Never really gone.

Eli sat on the floor for a long time. Stone still clutched in his fist. The studio growing lighter. Dawn creeping through the windows. Grey. Then purple. Then that soft pink that meant morning.

When Mrs. Chen arrived at 7 AM she found him there. Surrounded by paintings. Surrounded by ghosts.

She didn't say anything. Just sat beside him. Her hand finding his.

"He was here," Eli said quietly. "Tonight. He was really here."

Mrs. Chen looked at him. Her face doing something complicated. "I know."

"You think I'm mad."

"I think grief does strange things." She squeezed his hand. "I think we see what we need to see. Feel what we need to feel. And maybe that's not madness. Maybe that's survival."

"He's never leaving," Eli said. "Is he? Jamie. He's going to haunt me forever."

"Probably." She said it gently. Honestly. "My son still does. Fifteen years and I still see him. In crowds. In mirrors. In the corner of my eye. And I've stopped trying to make it stop."

"Does it hurt less?"

"No." She looked at the paintings. At Jamie's face repeated forty-three times. "But you learn to carry it. The hurt. The haunting. You learn to live with ghosts."

Eli opened his fist. Looked at the stone. Smooth. Grey. Impossible.

"I don't know how to live with this."

"Neither did I." Mrs. Chen stood slowly. "But you do it anyway. You wake up. You breathe. You paint. Not because you want to. Not because it helps. But because stopping means dying too. And maybe. Maybe that's not what he'd want."

She left him there.

Eli sat in the growing light. Looking at the paintings. Looking at the stone. Looking at the empty chair by the window.

His phone buzzed. Maya. Again.

Therapy appointment at 3. Please Eli. Please.

He stared at that word.

Please.

He could go. Could try. Could take the first step toward whatever came next.

Or he could stay here. In the studio. In the cold. In the familiar embrace of grief. With Jamie's ghost. With these paintings. With the graveyard shift that never ended.

Eli looked at canvas forty-three. At the wrong eyes staring back.

Then he looked at his sketchbook. At the new drawings from last night. The honest ones. The hollow eyes. The exhausted face. The truth he'd finally seen.

He picked up his brush. Started mixing paint. Prussian blue. Burnt umber. A touch of grey.

The right colour this time. Finally. The colour of eyes that had stopped wanting to see.

He would paint number forty-four. And forty-five. And forty-six. Would paint until his hands forgot how to do anything else. Until Jamie was all that remained.

Would paint through every graveyard shift. Every 3 AM. Every cold November morning.

Would paint until he got the eyes right. Or until the haunting stopped. Whichever came first.

He suspected neither ever would.

Outside. The city woke. People went to work. To school. To therapy appointments they'd keep. To lives that continued. To futures that existed.

Inside. The studio stayed suspended. Frozen. A place outside of time where dead boys lived in paint and grief had weight and ghosts sat in chairs by windows.

Eli dipped his brush. Touched it to canvas.

Started again.

Behind him. So soft he almost missed it. That sound. Like breathing. Like presence. Like Jamie settling in to watch.

Like he always did.

Like he always would.

And Eli painted. Haunted. Willing. Forever caught in the graveyard shift between living and dying. Between letting go and holding on. Between the boy he'd lost and the ghost he'd keep.

The brush moved. The paint flowed. The eyes began to take shape.

Wrong again.

They would always be wrong.

But Eli would keep trying.

That was the curse. That was the haunting. That was love after death.

Eternal. Painful. Inescapable.

Perfect.