Ghosts of Halloweens Past (Short Story)

Ghosts of Halloweens Past

  By

  Ingrid Seymour

  Ghosts of Halloweens Past

  Copyright © 2010 by Ingrid Seymour

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  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

  Ghosts of Halloweens Past

  Is this always part of his routine? Or is he like me and the changing colors and falling leaves set off this lonely dance of remembrance and blame?

  I follow him into the next room, hypnotized by the sway of his long arms. It must be a weekday or breakfast would have been a glass of whiskey accompanied by a few bitter tears. Instead, a cup of coffee and a cigarette open up his groggy mind and steel him to face the world.

  On the ride to work, he smokes another cigarette and listens to the traffic report. Interstate sixty-five is clear. He turns off the radio. No music, no morning show, just Vincent, his tortured thoughts, and the ghost of a dead girlfriend he will never ever forget.

  A breath mint and a hand through dark curls spur him into his office. The receptionist, a young brunette I didn’t see last time I was here, perks up when Vincent steps out of the elevator. Then her expression changes giving a subtle jealous twitch, which was once very familiar to me when I used to walk arm in arm with Vincent.

  “Good morning.” She looks at him wistfully and then…she looks at me! I freeze.

  “’Morning, Lauren.” Vincent walks on and disappears into a maze of cubicles.

  Lauren is looking me in the eye. No one has ever done that since…well since Vincent leaned over my mangled body, begging me not to die. Why can she see me? My mind reels. Maybe she’s a medium, a voodoo woman, or…a fluke.

  The receptionist raises an eyebrow and turns her attention back to the computer screen. Did she really see me? Or was I imagining things?

  “Good morning…?” I say tentatively. It sounds stupid, like a question. But if she can see me, it shouldn’t be a question; the morning is indeed good if she, if anyone, knows I’m still here.

  I take a few steps toward the counter. “You can see me.” I croak.

  Her eyelids lift very slowly, what I just said gives her pause. She winces at my stupidity and her expression seems to say: Sure I see you, what’s the big deal?

  I move right in front of her. She leans back. “May I help you?”

  “You can see me.”

  “Uh, I thought you were with Vincent.” Both caution and relief register on her face. The crazy woman is not with Vincent, she must be thinking. One hand moves toward the phone. “Is there someone else you’re here to visit?” Her hand hovers on top of the receiver.

  With a desperate urge to know if I can touch her, I reach for her extended arm. My hand jerks forward, penetrating the flat screen monitor and appearing on the other side. Lauren screams and tries to roll her chair back, but my fingers seize her arm, a weak hold that I can’t seem to retain.

  The receptionist stares at me in horror. Her eyes switch from the pierced computer screen to her arm. “Let go, let go, let go!” she cries, sounding as if a thousand cockroaches are climbing up her dress. A few heads appear above the cubicles.

  My hold starts slipping as she desperately pulls on her arm; it’s like trying to hold on to retreating Jell-O. Lauren’s shrieks are now hysterical, punctuated by approaching voices asking her what’s wrong.

  She extricates herself, leaves her chair and backs into the wall. Several people stand behind me.

  “Are you okay?” One voice asks.

  “Lauren, what’s the matter?” Another one says.

  She points a finger at me, but no one can see me, only Lauren knows I’m here.

  “They can’t see me, Lauren.”

  As if trying to get away from a mouse, she runs in place, hands and back pushing against the wall in a vain effort to escape. Shrill cries make everyone panic.

  “Lauren calm down…maybe we should call for help,” someone suggests.

  “I’m dead, that’s why they can’t see me. But you can.” My voice shakes with disbelief. In all this time, no one has ever seen me or heard me.

  The color drains from her face completely. She is mute now, pale and possibly questioning her sanity. For an instant she goes still. Then her legs buckle and as she slides down the wall, out of nowhere, Vincent steps in and catches her.

  “Lauren,” he says gently, pushing the hair away from her eyes. Vincent cradles her in his arms and lays her on a sofa in the waiting area.

  Lauren’s eyes flutter open and lock with Vincent’s.

  “Are you all right? Do you need a doctor?”

  She shakes her head.

  “You sure?”

  Lauren looks over Vincent’s shoulder. My hand goes up, and I wiggle my fingers as a way of greeting. She gulps and her gaze springs back to Vincent’s face in useless denial. She knows I’m here.

  “I…I think I’ll just go home. Uh, I need some sleep. Yeah, that’s it. I haven’t gotten enough rest lately.”

  “Good luck with that,” I say.

  Lauren giggles nervously and gets up in a hurry. “I need to get outta here.”

  “You probably shouldn’t drive,” Vincent says.

  Everyone in the room agrees.

  “Yeah, you might end up like me.”

  “Shut up,” she says, covering her ears.

  “I was just trying to help.”

  “No. Not you, Vincent. I…” But she can’t finish, and she stalks out and slips into the open elevator.

  She doesn’t know there’s no escaping me.

  “Leave me alone,” she tells me when my reflection on the mirrored walls spooks her. I can move very fast when I want to.

  “Like I said, I just want to help.” Obviously Vincent can move fast, too. He finds his way in before the elevator doors close. “Let me drive you home, Lauren. You’re in no condition to do that.”

  Why do I feel like an intruder all of a sudden? I examine Vincent’s face, trying to understand if it is intimacy that’s weighing down the atmosphere within the cramped space. He is unreadable, different from the open, contented man I once knew.

  “You’re right. I didn’t even grab my keys, anyway.” She looks at me out of the corner of her eye, trying to pretend I’m not here.

  They get in the car and head out. “Where do you live?” Vincent asks as they pull out of the parking deck.

  I wonder if she knows where he lives. Has someone finally been able to get through the barriers Vincent erected to punish himself? Doubt makes me shake my head; Lauren doesn’t seem like the right type, too brunette and plump. I remain quiet, out of Lauren’s field of vision, hoping to figure out what’s between them.

  “Just a few miles down the street. Take a left, and I’ll show you.”

  Lauren stares at her hands. The silence seems to weigh heavily on Vincent. “Better?”

  “Uh-hum. Go through the next two lights,” she instructs.

  He does. Only the hum of traffic breaks the silence. Vincent clears his throat. “About your e-mail…”

  “Yes?” she looks at him hopefully with big, expectant eyes; then stares back at her hands when she realizes I haven’t gone away.

  “I don’t do Halloween parties.”

/>   “Oh.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s okay. Maybe some other time,” she says.

  “I don’t know, Lauren…” The words dangle from his lips, polluting the air worse than a simple ‘no’ would have.

  Lauren sinks visibly.

  “He thinks he’s punishing himself,” I say. He needs to try harder.

  A sudden tension across Lauren’s shoulders reveals she can still hear me.

  “Why?” she asks.

  “Why, what?” Vincent plays the fool. He knows perfectly well why he won’t go out with Lauren.

  “She’s not talking to you, Vincent. Or are you?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Nothing,” Lauren answers him. “Turn into that apartment building. I live in the last unit.” She sounds glad to be home.

  Vincent turns the wheel and exhales, probably happy he’ll be rid of her.

  “Such damn relief,” I yell. “Everyone gets a break but me.” I’m sick of being this way. I want to be heard, seen, touched. Eager for a semblance of substance, of meaning, my hands reach through Lauren’s seat.

  She screams and Vincent slams on the breaks. A strange force pulls me forward and in an instant I find myself looking with human eyes. Lauren’s panic still seethes within her, and I try to smother it, but I can’t. Her body, this body I now occupy, convulses.

  “Lauren, what is it? Oh, crap.” He fumbles for his cellphone.

  Lauren’s arm, now my arm, flails. I take hold of Vincent and pull him toward me.

  “Vincent,” I try to say, but the word comes out as gibberish.

  The faceplate on his phone lights up when he dials the first number, but I don’t want him to call anybody. I just need a few minutes to remember how to be human.

  “Shit,” he curses. His phone is lost, gone through a crack too small to maneuver without sliding the seat back. “Why did you do that?”

  “Don’t call anyone. Just hold me,” I say, preying on his inability to control any emotions that relate to our past.

  Vincent goes still and his face wan. “What did you say?”

  “Don’t call anyone. Just hold me,” I repeat, confirming that those long ago words haven’t been forgotten.

  “Please, hold me,” I plead with my new voice.

  He looks hurt, vulnerable.

  “Please.” My voice is a soft whimper that Vincent cannot resist.

  His arms wrap around me, and I slide forward as he pulls me into a tight, quivering embrace.

  “Tell me I’ll be okay.”

  A breath catches in his throat and his body goes rigid. I fear I’ve gone too far, but then he relaxes, goes limp in my arms, so I push further. “Tell me there’s nothing wrong with me.”

  He starts sobbing quietly, his tears wet my neck. So much hurt, all for what? For nothing! I let him cry and remain silent. The quiet brings him back to the present.

  Slowly, he releases me, bewilderment plain on his face.

  “I…I don’t…”

  “It’s okay, Vincent. I know you’ve been through a lot.”

  His hands clasp the wheel, and he looks ahead, jaw tight and brow furrowed in a puzzled frown.

  Maybe Lauren is too new to know any of this. “People gossip,” I say, trying to dispel his distrust.

  “Do they?” he asks, sounding like he already knows the answer.

  I simply nod.

  “That was uncalled for. I apologize,” he says, stepping on the gas and finding a parking spot in front of the last building in the apartment complex.

  “No need to apologize. I understand.”

  “Do you?”

  If you only knew.

  He looks at me and then at the building in front of us, a clear suggestion that he wants me out of his car.

  “Just so you know, I --” my fingers tap my chest for emphasis, “ -- don’t gossip.”

  Vincent has always hated being the center of any conversation. I know this will make him feel good. My hand moves slowly to the door handle, suggesting my departure.

  “About that party,” he says, looking as if a small window has opened up in his wall of impenetrability, “Let’s give it a try.”

  I temper my smile of satisfaction and exit the car quickly. An idea has started forming in my head. I can’t give him an opportunity to change his mind.