Recorded in Moonlight

By: Alison Palmer

Don’t ask me about the afterlife: I’ve never been there. I died, and I didn’t go anywhere. No fiery pit opening up, no tunnel of light calling my name.

That’s all fine by me. I never liked to travel, anyway.

I’m a ghost.

I can go anywhere, within reason, and I can have fun moving things about and occasionally frightening someone who sees me. Mostly, my days are full of nothing. I sleep, I take strolls on the roof, I philosophize (the way only a 14-year-old dead person can), but mostly I write.

That’s the funny thing, really. I didn’t like to write when I was alive. My English teachers all hated me. Well, at least I’m pretty sure they did. My penmanship was horrible and I couldn’t write an essay to save my life. After I died, I figured out that I needed to write, to save my life. So to speak. My memories are what keep me alive. Well, maybe alive isn’t the right word, but here at least. They keep me, me.

You don’t get to take much with you when you die. We keep our personalities, the things we’ve learned, and our memories. If a ghost doesn’t write these things down, if they don’t continue to log their existence, then after a while they won’t exist.

You start to forget. The more you forget, the more you fade away. The way I understand it there’s no tunnel of light then either. It’s just nothing.

Sometimes when a ghost starts to write, he begins to feel really bad about this past or that. They rush around for years trying to make up for their failures. In affect saying “oops, sorry, didn’t mean to” and scaring the people their trying to apologize to half to death.

Not me. I figure I did the best I could. You can’t please everybody all the time, and all that. Besides, I don’t like to travel. I used to get really bad motion sickness. Now it just makes me EXTREMELY nervous. Like your mom used to get when she was sure she left the iron on before the family vacation. (Who irons before going on vacation anyway?)

It’s really just been me and my writing for more years than I was actually alive. I hang out in an old Victorian home near the place where I died, and write.

Learning to write was a little curious. I could hold a pen for a minute or two, but that would take so much concentration that I was always forgetting what to write. It was just like school all over again.

Instead, I write with moonlight.

When the moon comes out, I find a bright stream and dip my hand in. I can draw the light back out in my cupped hand. Then, I can dip in a finger from my other hand. It picks up a little of the light on the tip, and I write.

I write on everything. Mostly, the living will never see anything that a ghost has written. But, there are times when it will show through. Dust won’t settle on moonbeam residue. So, a few words might appear to be a pattern in the dust before it gets wiped away. Or, a patch might get to much sun. It takes about a decade, but the words will begin to turn a reddish brown.

Usually a surface will just appear smeared or “dirty” to a living person and they’ll clean it, or paint it, or throw the item away. Wham! There goes 20 years of a ghost’s record in one fell swoop. When that happens, there’s nothing to do but start over again before the memories fade completely.

That’s my complaint today.

I’ve lived in this house for close to 20 years with no one to disturb me. Every where I look, my memories call to me in little silvery wisps. It’s peaceful and secluded, and no one bothers me.

Then, last week, a nightmare occurred. I was lying on the roof enjoying the afternoon sun when a moving van pulled up and stopped at my house! It was followed by a passenger van. I watched in complete horror as 2 adults and no less than 6 children spilled out of the van from all sides.

It was bad enough when they started unloading things from the hauler, but it didn’t take long to go from bad to worse. After the beds and dressers, a shabby couch and warped table; came table saws, electric sanders, levels, hammers, nails, gallons of paint, and a huge tub of cleaning supplies.

All the things a ghost can dread were coming into my peaceful home. Not only did these loud obnoxious people intend to live here: they fully intended to “renovate” the place. I can’t believe it! Do they have any idea how many years of my life (and unlife) they’re about to destroy in the name of modern convenience?

I tried to scare them off. Don’t think I didn’t try. But, with 8 people in the house, everything I did got blamed on someone else.

How can I get rid of them, if no one can see me and they can’t be bothered with noticing what I do?

The first few days were horrible. I spent two nights frantically rewriting all the bits of my life and thoughts they had managed to obliterate with all their cleaning and repairing. I was completely exhausted by the third day of the family invasion. Then, I figured something out. They all seem to have an aversion to the attic.

Finally, a sanctuary.

These invaders clearly intend to stay, but I don’t have to like it. I could leave, but there’s the whole traveling thing. Especially since I don’t know of any other empty houses anywhere around. Where would I go? It would be much better if I could just make them leave. But, I’ve tried everything within my power, and they refuse to care.

Ghosts really don’t have as much power as people give them credit for. I’d heard my share of ghost stories when I was alive, and let me tell you: most of them are just stories.

Somehow people feel the need to justify their fright. After many tellings, when the fear begins to fade, they begin to embellish things to bring the fear back. That’s how “It scared me so bad I jumped out of bed” becomes “I was floating 3 feet above my bed.” Trust me. If I couldn’t do it in life, there’s even less chance I can do it while living impaired.

The only exceptions that I know of are the moonbeam-writing-thing, and the walls. I really can walk through them, but I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. The cobwebs still manage to attach themselves to you. Walls are full of them and it can be just plain gross.

So, here I am suddenly trapped in the attic of my own home watching these warm blooded terrors taking over. I haven’t bothered to learn their names specifically, but I hear a lot of names being yelled at different times. Mostly I try to ignore them during the day. At night, I write.

Last night, as I began to write, something happened that threw my world into chaos once again.

It was late, I know. I woke up when the moon was already half way across the sky. I was just about to go pick my moonbeam for the night, when I noticed that something was different in my attic. There was something extra. There was a child.

He couldn’t have been more than four years old. Too young to know he shouldn’t be here and too young to care that he was alone. He was poking around in a pile of junk near a window. At least, it used to be a window. The glass was gone, and the board that covered it had long since rotted.

Now I really felt torn. On the one hand, I didn’t want him here, he shouldn’t be here, and he could hurt himself. On the other hand, there was nothing I could do about it unless I tried to give him a fright.

I sat debating my options and didn’t even notice that something at the top of the pile had caught his attention, till I heard the crash.

When I looked up I caught a blur of green pajama falling through the gap in the window, and I panicked. I mean really, what could I expect to do? But I forgot all that and ran toward the window.

My mind was full of images that I will not write. I don’t want to remember them.

When I reached the opening I was relieved; and that relief brought back my helplessness. There was the boy, hanging by the shoulder of his sleeper, caught on a rusted nail.

I shouted “Hang on!” He couldn’t hear me.

I pleaded “Don’t move!” He started to look around, stunned by the turn of events.

I whispered “Don’t be scared!” His lip began to tremble and the tears began to pool.

What could I do? Well, something was better than nothing, so I tried.

I gathered my strength and bent down to grab his arm. I felt his flesh and gripped as tightly I as could, concentrating all my energy to hold on to someone who didn’t even know I was there.

Suddenly, the fabric tore through, and my invisible hand was all that held the child above the ground. My strength was already giving out, and with it my concentration. I gripped tighter, not realizing till it was too late, that my fingers had gone too far. My fingers had entered the child’s flesh. I could feel his warmth: his blood rushing to meet the new adrenaline demands on his tiny body. I couldn’t loosen my grip; for fear that the child would slip entirely from my grasp.

I held on, and I pulled. I gasped “please”, and looked down at the child.

He was looking back at me. He could see me. He heard my last plea. He tried to reach for me, and his eyes widened in surprise when his hand passed through my arm. I could tell I was frightening to him; but, the fear of falling was worse, so he held on to a bit of window ledge, and tried to help me pull him up.

I don’t know how long it took. Time seemed to freeze from the moment I saw him fall. Yet, finally the waif was back inside my attic.

I sat atop the pile of clutter; unable to go any further, and watched him clamber down. Then, he stopped. He stood very still for half a moment, and then turned back toward me. Had I the energy, the smart thing would have been to disappear, to get away, and to pretend the whole thing had never happened. I couldn’t. All I could do was watch in horror as he climbed to where I sat. He could still see me. He reached out a hand and watched with wide-eyed fascination as it melded into the features of my cheek. Then, he smiled, tumbled back down the pile, and ran at full speed from the attic.

Today, I learned his name is Timothy. I heard him being scolded for the tear in his pajamas. He didn’t explain how they got that way; but, I heard what he did say. “It’s ok mommy, I have a friend.”

A week ago my undead life changed forever. My home was invaded, my life was almost completely erased and had to be rewritten, and I made a strange new friend. It’s clear these people intend to stay. I’ve tried everything I know to drive them away and they won’t go.

They’ll stay, but I don’t have to like it.

But then again, maybe I will.