The Great Beyond that Wasn’t There
I was flying carefree among the trees, swirling and flip-flopping as I pleased. I breathed in the fresh young morning air and marveled at the tiny drops of dew that dotted the leaves. It was as if the entire forest was adorned with sparkling pearls. Golden glitter came down from the sky, landing on my hair and my wings. Wait what? I have wings? I tried to catch a glimpse of them while flying, but I lost my balance and started diving down, to the ground below me. I was so scared, that I couldn’t even scream during what seemed to be a never-ending free fall. I managed to stop right before crashing into a puddle that came out of nowhere. That’s when I saw it: my reflection. A beautiful blue fairy with delicate yellow wings and purple hair was hovering in the air, exactly where I was. Am I a fairy? Could it be? I dipped one of my toes in the puddle and observed the gentle wavelets that tried to escape its watery boundaries. I’m a fairy! Woohoo! I rose in the air again, enjoying what I knew must be one of the greatest dreams ever, when a shimmering, blinding light sprang into my eyes. The sun was making its way through the foliage, casting its warmth on the awakening forest. No, I don’t want to wake up! Please let this wonderful dream last forever. But the light was too bright, and it hurt my eyes.
I opened one eye, blinded by the ray of sun that rested on my face. Of course, it made sense; I had forgotten to close the shades before going to sleep last night, and now my entire room was sun-washed. I could hear the birds singing cheerfully outside. There was a huge oak tree just outside of my window, and the damn birds always had their choir practice when I was trying to sleep. I reached for my pillow, wanting to cover my face with it, but when I tried to grab it, nothing happened. The pillow resumed laying there undisturbed on my bed. I looked at the time; it was already 7:30 AM. I might as well get out of bed and get ready for work, I thought. But not before my morning cuddle with Oliver. Oliver was my gorgeous, blind black cat and I couldn’t make it throughout the day without our pre-work quality time.
“Oliver,” I called. “Oli, come to me, sweet cheeks!” I made kissing sounds, expecting him to jump on me straight away, as was the usual case with him, but Oliver was a no show.
“Oliver, where are you?” Reluctantly, I got out of bed and walked to the living room. Oliver liked to sleep underneath the black and white, zig zag Ikea sofa. I bent down and peeked under the cover. All of Oliver’s toys were there, in his lair—Oliver had built it himself, snitching a towel and blanket from my laundry rack, then carrying all his favorite toys and bringing them there; Oliver was the only one missing.
He’s probably hiding in one of the kitchen cabinets. I stood back up and dragged my feet to the kitchen, letting out a big yawn. I desperately needed my pre-work coffee. I placed my hand on the water kettle when the weirdest thing happened: I couldn’t feel it. I was touching it and not touching it at the same time. What in heaven’s name? After ten failed attempts to pick it up, I gave up and got down on my knees.
“Oliver, it’s time to wake up, you sleepyhead,” I said. Oliver liked to sleep in the cupboard under the sink. I touched the brown knob of the awful, mustard-colored cabinet, but just like with the kettle, I couldn’t sense anything, let alone open the cabinet. What’s going on here?
As if not being able to touch anything for some reason wasn’t enough, the kettle—my kettle!—rose in the air, all on its own. Then, the cold-water faucet opened, filling the kettle, which had managed to fly all the way to the sink. I screamed and ran to my room, trying to close the damn door, with no apparent success. With a racing heart and a spinning head, I crawled under my bed, hugging both of my legs.
“Oliver,” I whispered. I begged him in my heart to come to me. Well, now I was also part of the statistics; I had a ghost in my apartment. I had been living here for the last three years of my life and nothing. Why did the ghost (or whatever it was) in my kitchen suddenly choose to appear now, after all this time? I heard noises coming from the kitchen: cupboards opening and closing, a spoon stirring inside a ceramics cup, keys moving inside the keyhole. This can’t be happening. I’m still dreaming, I’m sure of it. My heart was beating so loud, I was sure the ghost would hear me and find my hiding place. I covered my mouth with one of my hands, hoping this would prevent me from screaming my lungs out. Another panic attack was on its way. Every breath was a struggle. If I hadn’t known any better, I’d think that I was dying now; that weird sensation, that mysterious, ancient knowledge that it was all about to end, that invisible wall of fear that, just like a sharp guillotine, came down on me, cornering me and blocking all the escape routes.
Nope, ghosts and people who suffer from an anxiety disorder don’t mix well together.
I had no idea what time it was. The clock on my wall wasn’t visible from my hiding place. The noises from my kitchen had stopped, but I was still afraid to crawl out. My stomach started growling and I needed to use the bathroom. I wondered how my boss would react when I tell him I had missed the much-anticipated morning meeting with our biggest client because I had a ghost in my apartment. Although I was a junior copywriter, my boss still wanted me to be there at the meeting. The entire staff of the posh advertisement agency I had been working for was asked to attend. We fought hard with other big, Tel Aviv-based agencies to win this campaign. I knew this could be my big break, my one shot to make a name for myself as a copywriter not just in Tel Aviv’s advertisement scene, but in the international one as well. Of course, the ghost chose to show up at the most inconvenient time. What was I going to do?
“You can come out now,” a masculine voice said.
My heart sank. Oh no! The ghost found me. “Please don’t hurt me,” I sobbed, my eyes firmly shut. I wasn’t prepared to meet a ghost. I couldn’t bring myself to watch horror films, so how could I face a real, live ghost? “I’ll find another apartment, I promise. You can stay here and haunt this apartment for all eternity,” I added.
The voice broke into a wild fit of laughter. “You poor thing,” he said. He had a deep, bass voice and his laughter matched it perfectly.
“Please, I’m begging you…”
“There’s no need in begging. I can’t hurt you. Neither can they.”
“Uh? They? There are more…more ghosts?” Cold shivers went down my spine.
“There are more ghosts, but it’s not what you think,” the man-ghost said, then giggled.
“What do you mean?” I couldn’t believe it. I was talking with a ghost. I expected the fear would knock me out, but apparently, I was still awake. Or was I still dreaming?
“The voices you heard didn’t come from ghosts; they came from people.”
“What? But I saw it with my own eyes; the kettle was flying on its own, the faucet, the keys—”
“You can’t see them, and they can’t see you. That’s how it is. The person who lives in your apartment was the one who picked up the kettle, opened the faucet, and filled it with water. He was the one drinking your coffee and putting his keys in the keyhole before leaving for work. Because you’re a ghost, you’re not able to see him.”
None of what the voice said made any sense. I was gasping for air, a stabbing pain tearing apart the insides of my stomach. Was this some sort of torture technique he was using on me before going for the kill? My kill?
“I can’t believe you still haven’t figured it out after the time that has gone by since your death,” the manly voice let the words slip. “The reason you can’t see that person—his name is Anthony, by the way, he’s an agonizing writer who had moved here from England six months ago—is because you’re, well, you’re a ghost.”
No, no, no. This isn’t happening. I slapped myself three times, hoping it would help me wake up from that terrible dream within a dream in which I had been stuck. Needless to say, nothing happened; I was still there, under the bed, listening to a voice tell me that I was dead, that I was a ghost!
“I’ll give you whatever you want, ghost, but please leave me alone. Please, I just want to wake up and go to work.” I wiped away the tears that burst out my eyes, but new ones kept on coming out. It was mission impossible.
“We all freak out in the beginning, don’t worry, it’s perfectly normal. Once you get used to it, it’s not so bad anymore.”
“Who are you?” I mustered up the courage to ask.
“I’m Dan. I used to live here fifty years ago, until that car accident ended my life.” He sighed and grew quiet.
“I’m Grace, and I’m late for work.”
“I can assure you that you’re not late for anywhere,” Dan said and laughed. “That’s the upside of being dead; there are no schedules and no responsibilities.”
“I’m not dead!” I insisted. “I woke up feeling thirsty and hungry, I have a craving for coffee, and I need to go to the bathroom. I can even hear myself breathe and my heart is beating like it always does. If I were dead, would I have felt my body?” I was sure I had a winning argument there. Let’s see him now.
“Oh, that’s because you’re a newbie ghost,” Dan said, his tone annoyingly all-knowing. “You, newbies, cling to the memories you have of how it felt to be human. You’ve been dead for almost a week now. In about one to two weeks, you’ll stop imitating your ex, human sensations.”
That’s it. There was only one way of knowing who this Dan person-ghost-whatever really was. I crawled out slowly, with only my head and arms sticking out from under the bed. Oh, Dan was a ghost, alright. He was hovering in the air, right next to my bookshelf. He looked like a pale, see-through man with no legs. He was actually kind of good looking: he had dark brown eyes (well, relatively dark, he was still a pale ghost), long, black hair, a wide smile with two dimples, wide shoulders, and an athletic ex-human body.
“Come on, Grace, come out. I won’t bite,” he winked at me. “But that’s only because I don’t have teeth.” He giggled playfully.
I dragged the rest of my body, then stood on my feet. I took a deep breath and walked to the long, narrow mirror next to the door. A terrifying scream came out of me, although I don’t remember screaming. I wasn’t standing on what I had believed earlier to be my feet. Just like Dan, I didn’t even have legs. Not that it made any sense, as I felt my legs. I looked like a paler, sicker, see-through version of myself: My curly hair was all tangled up, my blue eyes had a sickening shade, my skin had lost all of its summer tan, and my body, or rather, upper half body, slimmer than I had remembered. I closed my eyes, then opened them again. My ghostly reflection was still there, looking at me disbelievingly from the other side of the mirror.
“So, I’m a, I’m a ghost,” I mumbled. “Dear God! Wait, if I’m a ghost, then what about Oliver?” I was afraid of the answer. If I was dead for a week, and this Anthony dude was in my apartment for the last six months (the time gaps didn’t add up, but I figured ghostly time must be different), then where was Oliver? Why were all of his toys still there?
Image by <a href="https://pixabay.com/users/sciencefreak-97947/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=602060">Karin Henseler</a> from <a href="https://pixabay.com/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=602060">Pixabay</a>;