Ghosts

By Bhuvi Vahi

Monday, 18 January

Time: 12:00 A.M

Hello, brother. I know you’re in there.

Please talk to me, Luca. I need you.

All right, then. Leave it. I suppose you’re asleep or you’ve taken a break to haunt the bathroom. If I find you in there when I go to pee, I’ll kill you. I don’t care if you’re already dead.

It’s the full moon tonight. The night is peaceful; with a light breeze just rippling the grass. The sky is clear as well. Do you remember when we used to talk about ghosts, sitting there in the prickly grass, your big brown eyes turning pale and silvery in the moonlight? I do.

It’s especially lonely here tonight. Papa is working in his bureau and Maria is singing karaoke. I don’t think the ghosts appreciate Taylor Swift; I can feel their discomfort. Fall Out Boy is their favorite. I know they have good taste.

Listen, I know you couldn’t care less about ghosts now that you’re one. You’ve been one for two years. Papa and Maria are unaware of what’s around them; the ghosts tend to stay out of their wing. It hurts, now that I’m the only one in the profession.

I’m going to the cemetery now, to sit on your grave. If a part of your soul is in your smelly and decomposing body (I dug it up last week on your orders, if you’ve forgotten I don’t know what to do), please don’t drag your physical form out of your grave or summon an undead disco. I just washed my hair.

I’m walking down the creaky stairs now. The secret passage. It’s musty and moldy in here; I should really teach the Neanderthals to clean.

I’m pressing my hands to the mossy door. I’m writing in this diary using the trick you taught me; the darkness one. Trap the darkness in your hands like tendrils. Use them as extra limbs, ropes, even.

You taught me that we aren’t in a storybook; we can control our lives.

And that magic is neither good or bad; it all depends on how you use it.

I think that says a lot about forces; or anything, for that matter. Mark Twain believed that humans are the only evil beings in existence, as we are blessed with the power of thought and morality.

I’m walking to your grave now. The moon is covered by a cloud.

I’m coming closer. I’m just about ten meters away. I can read your gravestone.

Luca Montgomery. Birth: 18 January 2005. Death: 18 January 2019.

I want to laugh. You died on your birthday. How ironic.

I still remember how you died. It was the monster, wasn’t it?

You knew about the ghosts. And he was mad you knew.

I knew about them as well. I was eleven. You were fourteen. He thought you more of a threat.

You killed him, didn’t you?

You saved us, didn’t you?

You died, didn’t you?

I remember how you cried that night. You fought him in a dream; he didn’t have a physical form. I remember how you yelled and sobbed and shivered as the winds crept in, chilling us to the bone like the fingers of Jack Frost. I remember how the ghosts looked at me when you stopped; they know when someone will join them. I remember your pale face, paler than Death. I remember how I felt you fading. I just knew you were going. I just knew where the monster went, down into the deepest pits of Hell. I know he’s bound in shackles now, raging while waiting for his release. I know he’s impatient for his next meal of blood.

He took you when he went. Away from Papa and Maria. Away from the castle. Away from the ghosts. Away from me.

I’ve reached your grave. I see the grass, slightly broken from where I dug you up. Why did you ask me to do that? Was it a prank? Your body smells, you know.

I’m lying down on the grass now. I’m relaxing, taking deep breaths of the cold night air, feeling the small, hard blades of grass press into my arms and legs.

I’m sinking in deeper now. The grass is cutting into my shoulder blades and back now. It’s curling around my hips, wrapping around my arms and legs as if to bind me to your grave.

The wind is picking up. I can feel it on my face. It’s pushing the cloud away from the moon, bathing me in a soft silvery light.

I’m feeling this diary exhale a little, as if to expel something from it. I see a small wisp of smoke come out.

I’m feeling it lie down next to me. I’m feeling it breathing. I‘m feeling the uncomfortable yet warm proximity of the ghost’s figure and mine.

It’s turning to me. I can see the outline of a boy’s face; your face. I see you smile softly.

The wind is singing now. I think I understand what it’s saying.

Tisa, it’s singing. Tisa, it says. I’m here.

I know you are, Luca.

Happy sixteenth birthday, my dear brother.

By Bhuvi Vahi