Carleton is haunted, you know. That's why it's so hard for me to go down there.
Now there are ghosts, and there are ghosts. This is one of the latter kind.
It's a girl. She has black eyes, long hair, and a soft white dress.
She used to live in Watson, but she doesn't anymore.
When I see her, smell her, feel her eyes in the back of my head, I can't stand it. I try to avoid the places where she went - the dining hall, that bench in the arb, the sunny spot near the lakes where she waited for her lover. Basement Norse, where he lived.
And now her ghost walks Carleton's campus.
I look in the mirror and I see her. Her eyes are so brown they're almost black; her hair is long, and she wears the white dress I wear in my dreams. She's so damn happy, so full of life and love and hope. She's done it, done everything and found the life she always wished for. She's home, there in that place. A home where she finally, truly, honestly belongs. Naive and young and full of fire - she can do anything.
And now my ghost walks Carleton's campus.
I worked so hard to be that girl, and now she's gone. I didn't even get to say goodbye to her, to the life I always dreamed of. The life I worked so god damned hard for. And now, every time I try to go back, I'm haunted by that girl that I once was.
I'd do all this a thousand times if I could just be her again.
