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[darkelf105]

Short Story one--though I am still working on it...

Katie O’Keefe

Writing Fiction

February 26, 2007

 

William Rhetoric did not like it when it snowed. Especially it snowed huge, fluffy flakes twirled sadistically from the sky. The lacy curtains of the stuff made it easier for the ghosts to sneak up on him. Or at least some of them.

            “Samantha,” he sighed,” I know you’re there. I don’t care how transparent you go, I can still feel you laughing at me.”

            He turned to glance behind him, but was only rewarded with a view of the skuzzy gray lake that lurked like a big open mouth in the middle of LingeringView Cemetery. The snow skidded briefly across its frozen surface before settling down like so much plaque. He sighed again as he kicked more of the glittering, hateful stuff in front of him. It didn’t matter how pretty the snow looked in the rest of the city, here in Lingering View, it looked like God’s dryer was spewing out all its lint.

            As he knocked it along, spraying it in front of him, an outline of a woman appeared briefly within the swirling flakes. She was definitely giving William the finger. He sighed once more.

            “Must you be so standoffish? We’ve done this before. You try to sneak up on me. I feel you coming from across the cemetery. You flip me the bird and hide for a while and then we start the whole routine again. If you’re not going to talk to me, why bother following me?”

            “Why bother following me? Why bother following me?” Her tone was mocking, cracking like the cold against his teeth.

“God, you act like you’re the only thing in this cemetery that’s worth my time. Well, I got news for you, buddy, the groundskeeper got himself a new cat, and it’s about time I went and found it. I love it when their tails get all bushy and their eyes go all huge and they stare like you’ve slapped ‘em in the face. Priceless.”

            William’s shoulders hunched as a particularly nasty gust of wind blew against him, carrying more snow and the sounds of Samantha’s laughter drifting further away. He felt a trifle bad for the cat, but not much, since Samantha was torturing it, it meant she was not torturing him.

He walked deeper into the cemetery, heading away from the twin iron gates that led into the place. As William trudged along, he left a trail of displaced snow in his wake like a slug.

            As he wound his way through the cemetery grounds, he brushed snow from the tops of grave markers. It was a futile gesture and it wasn’t like anyone but him read the names and dates and poems and prayers. At night, he dreamed about them gnawing on him like stone teeth.

As a balancer, that was exactly what the dead did to him anyway, gnawed at him like a bone until they felt the urge to move on. William was one of the unfortunate people for whom the dead were always present, not just when they were freshly dead, but always. The normal population could feel the ephemeral anxiety of the dearly departed zinging along their unconscious nerves, firing synapses and causing general sleeplessness, but balancers could actually hear and see them. And fight with them. And plead with them. And be followed home by them. It was all in a day’s work.

William snorted as he remembered the days when he was young, before there had been balancers. At first people had been in love with the dead. They asked them all sorts of questions and gave them special status. Worshipped them. There had been psychics and ghost finders and all sorts of priests and witches who had said that they could communicate with the dearly departed.

 But then the dead started talking back. And instead of telling people their fortunes, their fates, the truths of the universe, the dead really just wanted to talk about how much they missed turkey sandwiches and if their cocker spaniels were okay and how did Thanksgiving go. And so the dead were relegated to the cemeteries, tucked away, and only the balancers ever really went into them, for the dead were, in a word, annoying. Most people showed up for the funeral and never really looked back. They would come while they could still see the faint outline of their loved one, and talk to them, but eventually time would fade the ghosts from view until only the balancers were aware that they were still around. Hopelessly floating in the ether until someone gave them a reason to move on.  And all that hopeless floating grated on everyone’s unconscious minds, thus the need for people like William, who could communicate with the dead, no matter when they had died.

William thrust his chapped hands into his pockets as he slogged along, contemplating the turning of the universe. He was going to double back and begin his lonely circuit of the cemetery once more, when a little girl in black popped quietly into existence directly in his path. William stopped. He had never met this particular phantom before. She must have been new.

“Hullo,” he said softly, his breath hanging in front of his mouth like incense.

The little girl looked startled, her transparent features arching in surprise, the eyes behind her shimmering glasses gone wide.

“You can see me?” The question was a faint scratch in the air.

William nodded. The girl looked perturbed. She made herself even more transparent, fading in and out of view like static.

She suddenly reappeared, almost opaque. She had a delighted look on her face.

“No one paid attention to me when I was alive. It’s going to be nice to have someone to talk with now.” These words were bright and glittering, like snow fall. William grimaced. The ghosts who were lonely in life were the hardest to convince to move on. They seemed to feel like they had to make up for lost time. William kept his glum thoughts to himself.

He motioned for her to follow him and she scampered behind him, ghostly pigtails flopping like dead fish.

“My name is William. What’s yours?” William was trying desperately to remember what Ludovich’s Book For Dealing With The Dead had to say about the spectres of children. There was trick to getting them to move one, but he just couldn’t seem to remember what it was. Not many children were ever buried at Lingering View.

“I’m Georgina. My mum and dad picked out my grave here when I was real little,” she informed him solemnly.

William looked at her from the corner of his eye. He couldn’t tell if Georgina, who looked to have been about ten when she died, was upset about that or not. He couldn’t tell, but the little girl was scoffing her spectral feet along the ground and not looking at him.

Comments

[darkelf105.livejournal.com]

Arghhhhh, now that I reread this, I realize that there are whole chunks that don't make sense...I'm too lazy to edit though.

sweet

[rokk-lobster.livejournal.com]

Hokay... Let us begin by saying that William's characterization is pretty damn good. The piece is short so it is hard not to info dump. Snow descriptions seem a bit varied (for instance once you describe it as glittery then described it as God's dryer lint). Pick a way to describe the snow and stick with that. Samantha seems like a fairly interesting character and so does Georgina. The info dump about people seeing the dead might be a little too much. It fits better with the Lau story but it may be a bit hard for readers to grasp a world where the dead can speak to them. Though it is better that there was never a reason given for this, people are going to want to know what happened to make the ghosts start talking.

I already know how he and Lau will first meet! :)