For a Ghost Free Time, Call Read online

  Emerald Inkwell

  Eugene

  2016

  EPISODE ONE

  AN EPISODIC SERIES BY SEAN KELLY

  .

  Published by Emerald Inkwell

  © 2016 by Sean Kelly

  Inspired by and written in the Pacific Northwest

  First Edition,

  Published 2016

  All rights reserved. For permission requests beyond brief quotations, critical reviews, and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law, email the publisher at the email address below, addressed: “Attn: Permissions Coordinator.” For ordering information and quantity sales, see the website below.

  Emeraldinkwell.com

  [email protected]

  This book is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  The views and opinions expressed in this work of fiction do not directly reflect the views and opinions expressed by Emerald Inkwell or any of its partners or subsidiaries.

  Cover art by Emerald Inkwell

  EPISODE ONE

  I

  EUGENE IS TEEMING with ghosts and for some stupid, God damn reason, I’m the only one who can see them. The truth, that most people aren’t ready to accept, is that there are things in life that are scary. Not like “Finals are on Monday” or “I’ve got a date with the most popular girl in school” scary, but actually scary. Like, if you knew half the things taking place around all of us at any given time, you’d probably have a heart attack…if your heart wasn’t ripped out of your chest first. We don’t think anything of most of it, like the creak of a house’s foundation or the chilly breath on the back of your neck when you’re certain no one is behind you. What’s worse still is when you’re sitting on the couch reading or watching your favorite television show and out of the corner of your eye, you see a figure standing across the room or something zip by in the shadows. Those little things that should scare the hell out of most people are actually a lot worse than we know. The reason I say “most people” is because…well, that sort of stuff never really freaked me out. Even when I was little. Except for the first time…that one got to me. I was only nine.

  I was in the living room of my parent’s house, playing with my blue, semi-transparent Game Boy Color when I had a hankering for some orange juice. Without taking my eyes off the pixelated screen, I wandered into the kitchen, picked up my plastic Goosebumps cup off the kitchen table and opened the fridge. I set the cup on the linoleum floor and carefully poured the half-gallon until my cup overflowed a bit. After putting the juice back in the fridge, I picked up the cup with my left hand and continued to play Pokémon with my right. When I reached the edge of the living room carpeting, I felt a light tap on my right shoulder. I spun around, but no one was there. Suddenly I could feel the air around me growing cold. I returned my gaze to the game, but before my toes felt the short carpeting beneath them, I noticed a shadowy figure standing on the other side of the room. My eyes slowly raised and I stared at the dark silhouette. It was a tall, burly man facing the window, staring outside through the curtain. My brow furrowed a bit and my head tilted with curiosity. “Hey!”

  Nothing. The man stood still.

  My brow furrowed more and my cheeks puffed out. I set down the cup on the coffee table and pressed “Pause” on the Game Boy before setting it next to my drink. “Hey!” I said as I stormed over to the man. I reached out to grab the cuff of his coat, but my hand passed through his arm, dispersing it like cigarette smoke in front of a desk fan.

  The man’s arm slowly reassembled itself and he raised his palm towards his face, examining both sides, then lowered it again. He slowly turned around and stared down at me. His jaw was missing; a mangled tongue and an exposed, bloody esophagus leered in my direction.

  “Who’re you?” I asked him.

  He didn’t utter a word, only tilted his head as he stared down at me.

  “I’m Jared, I’m nine and I like to play soccer.” He’s still not sayin’ anything. “What’re you lookin’ at?”

  His head tilted further and a deep laceration opened up below where his chin was supposed to be. The wound gaped more as his head tilted; any further and it would have separated from his shoulders and fallen to the floor.

  “Ew…that’s so cool! Are you okay?” I sneered as I reached up towards the gaping wound.

  A toilet flushed down the hallway.

  “Jared, sweetie, what do you want for lu—” My mother walked out into the living room, freezing at the sight of her boy inches away from some strange man. She screamed in terror.

  The nearly headless specter twisted his neck around to see her. He howled back, matching the intensity of her screams with a gravelly, angered screech. He vanished in an instant. Reappearing inches away from my mother’s face and screeching at her again. His arms flew through the air, slamming her into the nearby wall.

  I watched in disbelief as the spirit leapt on top of her, wrapping his hands around her neck and squeezing tightly. His ghastly fingers clawed at her throat, peeling it like the skin from a potato.

  “Hey…” I squeaked, confused.

  The spirit ignored me, tearing at her throat and collar.

  “Stop it,” I said louder.

  Still no acknowledgment.

  “Stop it!”

  Some invisible force shoved the ghost aside, his attention shifted in my direction. He froze for a moment before his hand shot out, gripping her throat tightly and he tore out the front of my mother’s esophagus, slinging it against the wall before vanishing in a cloud of smoke. I never saw him again.

  My mother bled out before her esophagus slid down the wall and hit the floor. I stood over her, staring, trying to figure out what had just happened. The one thing I do know is that I didn’t cry. I never did understand why, but I just remember not being able to.

  Anyway, sorry. That got way too real, way too fast. Since that day, things changed quite a bit. My dad was never home—always at the bar, drinking his life away. I never made any friends, not “real” ones anyway, but people did hang around me pretty often. But it was dead people, sort of like that nearly headless guy when I was little. As I got older it got worse and worse. I could see more and more dead people everywhere—yeah, I saw dead people, but not like that one movie—I didn’t see Bruce Willis everywhere. It was more like…seeing shadows, a reflection of who they were before they passed. But this…gift, which I only saw as a burden, plagued me everywhere I went. So, when I was able to strike out on my own, I rented my own apartment—on the second floor to try and deter random apparitions from wandering in—and I chose to not leave as often as possible. Which, in turn, made it more difficult to pay rent, but I eventually came up with a few “unique” ways of paying the bills. And then, one day after my twenty-first birthday, even with all the precautions I took, an average, scrawny ghost found his way into my apartment. He looked like all the other ghosts: see-through and a sort of bluish color. Otherwise, his hair was short and he wore a long-sleeved sweater, ratty jeans, and low-top sneakers. Pretty boring honestly. But he just wandered in off the street one day and now that he knows I can see him, he won’t fucking leave. He just sits there on my crappy old couch, watching me, following me around…all the time.

  In fact, he’s doing it right now. “What!? What the hell are you staring at?” I shouted at that ghostly bastard sitting next to me.

  He immediately averted his gaze towards my tiny black-and-white television. The TV itself wasn’t black-and-white, something was just broken inside of it. That’s what you get when
you snag a TV out of an alleyway.

  I stared at him for a moment, waiting to see if he’d look back at me, then I slowly turned back to the sitcom I was watching. He’s fucking looking at me again. I could see him out of the corner of my eye. “Okay, is there something you want to ask me?” I waited for a response that I knew wouldn’t come. “Oh, that’s right, you don’t talk. You never say anything. You just stare and follow me around…” I turned away again. “Like a deaf, mute, stupid puppy.”

  For the first month or so, I never did get why he never said anything. I figured if he was a ghost he had to be here for a reason and wanted something. Eventually, I realized that he’s just a reflection of whoever he used to be—a photo negative. Reflections can’t talk—they don’t have a voice box. It wasn’t that he was just the shyest of ghosts; he just couldn’t say whatever it was that he wanted to get out. Knowing this doesn’t really make it any less annoying, I just wish I could stop him from— “Stop staring at me, Toby!” About a month or two after he showed up, I started calling him Toby. Not sure why; he just looked like a “Toby” to me. I don’t think he liked the name, but I couldn’t really tell. His eyes sort of dimmed every time I said it. “Alright, I’m going out for a bit. Are you staying here?”

  He stared at me with his big, transparent eyes.

  “You’re welcome to go wander the town, you know, if you want. But just don’t follow me around. Go get laid or something. Can ghosts get laid?” I paused again, as if I was having an actual conversation. “If not, remind me to never end up like you.” I got up off the couch, grabbed my coat and keys, and opened the front door. “You want a burger or anything? Just speak up if you do.” I smiled at Toby and my stupid jokes then left the apartment. Not sure where I was actually going, I headed to the stairs at the end of the hallway, bumping into Jane—the cute girl in apartment twelve—on the way down.

  “Hey, Jane. Sorry, I wasn’t really watching where I was going.” My hands found their way to my pockets, seeking comfort from the awkward encounter.

  “It’s alright.” She brushed a rogue strand of blond hair out of her face. Her hazel eyes were wet and inflamed from crying. She stepped past me a bit.

  “Are you…you okay?”

  “Yeah. Just guy troubles.”

  “Hey, I understand.” It took me a second to realize what I’d implied. “Wait, I mean…that’s not what I meant, exactly. It’s just—”

  She smiled and giggled. “Don’t worry, I know what you meant. Thank you, for caring.” Her smile disappeared. “I’ll see you around.”

  “Yeah, see ya.” I watched her walk down the hall and disappear into her apartment, right across the hall from mine. “Stupid…” I whispered in anger. At least she smiled. That smile…I turned to go down the stairs. Toby appeared in front of me. “Jesus! Toby, no!” I caught myself shaking my finger at him like a poorly trained animal. “Go back to the apartment! I mean, no! Don’t go there, go anywhere else. Shoo!”

  Toby just glared at me, as usual, and slowly walked back through the closed door to my apartment.

  “Son of a...” I’m never getting rid of him. My day had just started and I was already in a shitty mood. My stomach growled as I reached the lobby. “God, I’m so hungry. Might as well just go to that bagel place on the corner.” As I walked down the sidewalk I was reminded of why I stayed at home as often as possible. Everywhere I looked I could see those creepy dead people just following the living around. Not trying to scare them or communicate with them, just following people around for no apparent reason. My best guess is that they were following their “unfinished business,” but I had never met Toby before. All of the spirits were shades of that same bluish color, some more green or white than others. A number of them looked like normal people, like they died naturally or from some unforeseen cause, but some were clearly disfigured, sporting missing limbs or large, grisly wounds. Toby didn’t have any clear cause of death; probably downed a bunch of pills to off himself. Hell, if I was as creepy as he was, I’d probably take ten too many painkillers too. Poor bastard.

  I walked into the bagel place near my apartment, “Bagel Hole-in-the-Wall”—stupid God damn name. It was sort of busy, a few people in line; two of them were being “shadowed.” I stopped in line, standing behind a little old lady who was being followed by an equally old ghost. Probably her dead husband, I guessed. The other ghost in the room was a cyclist, sitting across from a young guy at a window table, a few transparent metal spokes sticking out from his chest. I’ll bet that guy ran the poor bastard over while he was on his bike. The door chimed behind me and a middle-aged man wearing a long coat walked in, followed by a pretty dead girl with long curly hair who was around his age. I couldn’t help but smile and shake my head at the cute, burnt up little nighty she was wearing. I turned away when the guy snarled at me funny.

  The old lady picked her bagged bagel off the counter and walked out, followed by her man, so I walked up to the counter.

  “Welcome to the Bagel Hole-in-the-Wall. How can we fill your bagel hole this morning?” The young man tending the counter was smiling away. Maybe a little too much.

  God, I have about a dozen ways I could answer that question. I smiled a bit, holding back my laughter and dirty remarks. “Just an onion bagel, please. With cream cheese.”

  “Toasted?”

  “Sure, why not? Live a little! Right?” I couldn’t help the cynicism in my voice.

  “Three-fifty, please.” He nodded in agreement and smiled, confused at my tone.

  I dug through my pockets, only finding a crumpled dollar bill and a handful of quarters. Jesus, I need some work. I handed the cashier exact change from what I found. “Thanks.”

  The boy turned around and gathered my order from a prep table behind him.

  While I waited, I peered behind the counter and saw a young dead man in the kitchen, who appeared to be wearing the same uniform as the cashier. He was just standing there, staring at the racks of bagels. Weird, just like Toby.

  A few seconds later, the cashier placed my bagged bagel on the counter in front of me.

  I picked it up and smiled at him before walking out of the shop. With nothing else to do, I headed back home. From the hallway, I could hear Jane sobbing inside her apartment, so I stopped and leaned in close to the door for a second to listen. I wish there was something I could say to make her feel better. Knowing there wasn’t really anything I could do, I stepped over to my apartment. The “3” in the number “13” was dangling upside down on the door. Inside I found Toby sitting on the couch and staring at the blank screen on the turned-off television. “Oh, good, you’re keeping my seat warm.” I tossed my coat and keys on the kitchen table and returned to my seat on the couch. “What’d I miss?”

  Toby slowly turned his head and looked at me, then returned his eyes to the blank TV screen.

  “Nothing important, then?” I picked up the remote and turned the television to the local news, Channel Five. The news is always boring, but sometimes it’s funny to see ghosts rise from horrifying accidents. Not like, funny, just…strange…I guess. Anyway, I opened the bag containing my still-warmed onion bagel and raised it to my mouth.

  Then someone knocked on the door.

  “Who the…” I got up off the couch, walked over and opened it. “Yeah?” I said to the prim and proper middle-aged woman standing in the hall.

  Her hair curled down to her shoulders, a vibrant and styled blonde. She held her Gucci clutch with both hands close to her chest and examined the drab, somewhat disgusting hallway she’d found herself in—a far change from her high-class world, I’m sure. The scowl on her face was almost amusing. “Are you…Mr. Lamronarap? The”—she started whispering— “ghost whisperer?”

  Time to play the part. I started acting dramatic and poked my head into the hallway “searching” for any spying eyes. “Who sent you?”

  “Um…Josephina Morello. She said you took care of her…problem.” She retrieved a worn-out business card from her
clutch. It read, “For a good time, call,” on the front, but the word “good” was scratched out and I’d hand-written “ghost-free” above it. I found a couple of those cards in a bathroom stall once and I thought it was clever, seeing how I wasn’t about to waste money on my own. “She told me where to find you and I didn’t want my husband finding your number on our phone bill. Besides, I wasn’t sure if this was real, with the strange card and all.”

  “Well, how do you think the printing place would respond to ‘ghost whisperer’ written on a business card? It could cause a panic.” I showed her how serious I was, my eyes not flinching one bit.

  “Oh-oh, yeah! That totally makes sense.” She covered her gaping mouth with her hand.

  “Quick, come inside.” I pulled her in, nearly tripping her in her heels. “Thank you, you can never be too careful.” I led her to the couch and let her sit down; she was clearly uncomfortable. If only she knew that she was sitting next to Toby…who, for once, isn’t staring at me and is staring right at her. I stood across from her, leaning against the wall next to the TV. “So, tell me about your problem.”

  “Well, Josephina”—each time she said that name she used a stereotypical Spanish accent— “told me about how you were able to cleanse her house of her dead husband, God rest his soul, poor man. But I think my home is being haunted by a poltergeist. It feels like an old ghost to me.” She shook her head up and down as though she knew what she was talking about.

  “An old ghost, interesting. Does your house have a history? Behind the location or previous occupants.”

  “I did a little research, and it turns out the house once belonged to a slave trader in 1822. He was actually killed by one of his slaves.”

  “That makes a lot of sense. Often times, when people are murdered, there is a lot of resentment and hate left behind. Especially during a time of so much strife and oppression.” It always made my job easier when the mark does the research for me.