MicroHorror

Not everybody gets to be a ghost. It requires strong motivation and iron determination to haunt whatever it is you intend to haunt possibly for centuries. It is certainly within one’s power to frighten people but that is not usually the sole purpose of the uneasy spirit. It is considered bad form. Such souls are shunned by those of us who truly walk the paths of shadow. This is not merely my lot. I remain by choice, as does every ghost. The Powers allow us to linger only at extreme persuasion.

I am–was–very much attached to the house. Generations of my family had been born there; lived, loved, died there. The fabric of it was infused with the history of our lineage–our “house,” if you will.

Randal, Randy, my great-great-grandson by all accounts, had a different view. He inherited just few years ago. I was at his father’s bedside as he passed over, as I have been there for all my sons’ sons. Tried to persuade him to stay here with me–not to abandon our heritage to his wastrel son–but he would not listen.

“I’ve always known you were there,” he said to me.

I knew then he could see me and recognized my presence. He’d been an affable child and I used to pay him visits in the night but I’d never shown myself openly. Sometimes when he was older, he used to stop and listen intently when I was in the room and I felt he knew me and I, him.

“My parents thought I had an overactive imagination,” he laughed.

“So stay with me now. Help me protect the house.”

“Sorry, Great-Grandfather,” he said. “I want to be at rest. Don’t you?”

And his spirit departed.

Well, this Randy started knocking walls down, renovating, rebuilding, putting windows where they had never been. Something called a loft conversion. He destroyed my attic, threw out my things and moved some harlot into my home. I could hear them knocking about at night. Disgusting brat! Whore! There was no sanctity of wedlock and no promise of legitimate heirs in this… this… My house had become a brothel!

I tried to scare them–something I abhor. It didn’t work. He thought a ghost would “put value on the old place.” There was practically nothing of the old place that I could recognize. Anyway, when, by his words, I knew he intended to sell, I took the ultimate step. I showed myself. I took corporeal form and summoned my gravest tones. “You will not sell. You will die before I let you sell!”

I don’t know why I said that. I couldn’t bear his smug expression a moment more. He looked vaguely alarmed for a moment, and then do you know, he looked at me and said, “Are you a genuine ghost, old fella?”

“I am.”

“Ooooh, not half scary!” he said and he guffawed.

They both laughed at me–laughed! That was when I knew I meant it.

Now I preside over charred remains.

It gives me no great satisfaction to have put an end to the family line. I lost control and with it, everything I valued. The Powers recalled me to review my spiritual status. I asked to remain a while, to contemplate what I have done and its consequences, though it torments me. I have been lessoned by young Randal, his father, his father’s father. I see now what I should have seen long ago. There is perhaps wisdom in letting go of the past.

Randy saw me clearly as his soul departed. I made sure he did. And I can tell you–he looked frightened then. But that is not the image that haunts me. No, what I can never forget is the confusion in his eyes. Why would anyone choose this living death?

There is nothing left for me to cling to. Yet I cannot let go.