The Expectations of a Ghost

‘Once it’s over, it’s over. There is no stopping it, even though you and the people surrounding you have fought so hard.’ So that was my grandmother’s speech at my funeral. I never expected that I would live shorter than my grandmother. She’s sixty-four and has cancer. I expect she’ll be joining me soon. Maybe by then I’ve been here long enough to show her around.

A lot has happened in the last three weeks; First of all, I died. I had AIWS also known as Alice In Wonderland Syndrome, search it up, it’s a real thing. I mean it was hard living with it but it shouldn't have killed me and, technically, it didn’t. Most people get Alice In Wonderland Syndrome at the age of six. I got it at the age of five. This means I was extra unlucky. It was so unlucky that I had to be that one in two million people who got it, and then I had to get it a year earlier. The syndrome didn’t kill me, the side effects did.

What happened after I died was a bit of a roller coaster and I hate roller coasters because I’m not tall enough to go on them yet. I was dragged out of my body by my feet. Then a cushion was placed on my head which, I thought  was quite nice of them until I had experienced what came next. I was dragged around in a complex arrangement of tubes and slides and gaps. But that was nothing yet. I still had to meet the other ghosts.

Ghosts are expected to be horrible creatures. Ghosts were still nice when the first people died. But then, then it became too crowded and ghosts started to cause chaos. They didn’t have enough space and they wanted to go back. Back to their nine to five money making jobs. Back to their ordinary lives. Back to their families who now do nothing other than wait for death since they have lost one of their own. But they can’t. And even if they could, they would already be old. I’m young. I’m going to be young forever. I still cared while I lived. I still loved who I lived with. And I have the right to miss it all.

Since it’s too crowded now, ghosts want to escape. Back to before. And believe me they have tried. They have tried in ways you didn’t expect it. They are things that you think are nature. They are the wind, looking for their families. They are the ocean, looking for joy. They are the wild, just looking for an escape. An escape from the escape of life.

As I said before, ghosts are now horrible. And while some have succeeded at escaping the escape, others are still desperate to do so. They have horrible ways of trying to escape the escape. They haunt people, they steal things and they kill. If they kill, they try to sneak into the gap in the floor that the dead person makes. But then they are trapped in another's body.

Killing brings me to the third thing that happened and that is still going on. I need to prevent people from killing my parents. My mom being very caring and my dad hopefully being a little more talkative now that I’m gone. There is only one place I can see my parents again, the elevator in their office building. Apparently it was the location of the first memory I had with both of them.

 

I go to that elevator daily, except for on the weekend because then they don’t go to work. As long as I’m there with them, others won’t try to kill them, I hope. Yesterday I went and it was a close call. Jerry, another ghost, was already at the elevator. I thought that it wasn’t a problem because it was still a bit early for my parents to go to work. But then they showed up. It was like Jerry had arranged it to be that way. I was surprised that I was thinking that because Jerry had been the captain of a cargo ship and wasn’t very smart. 

I was thinking fast. Well I tried to think fast. I started shouting and I sounded like a one year old. My parents looked around the elevator. Of course there normally wasn’t a baby in their office building but this wasn't a normal day. Jerry was about to kill them. Jerry put his hand through the floor and started reaching towards my mom's neck. I kicked him. Away from my parents and away from life. He started screaming this really high pitched scream. The Headmistress came. I was in trouble now. The Headmistress would never believe me because Jerry had an advantage. Jerry had been the Headmistress's girlfriend when they were both still alive.

The Headmistress started walking towards me. She had a really fake smile on her old and scarred face just like always. She asked what happened. I spoke the truth. That didn’t get me far. Jerry told a lie. That got him everywhere. Wouldn’t you believe a constantly drunk forty three year old over an innocent eight year old. The headmistress did. She let Jerry go and took me with her. To ‘ghost jail’. It’s not horrible here. Well, it’s not more horrible than the rest of this place. 

And currently, I’m still in jail. Writing this statement to you madam Judge. Deep down you know that I didn’t do anything wrong. And deep down you know what Jerry was trying to do. Because I believe that you were a good person. And I believe that you are a good ghost. They wouldn’t let you be the Judge of this ‘world’ if you weren’t, right? 

You see, madam Judge, I don’t think ghosts are horrible, I am a ghost myself. I was just trying to protect my parents. I would want to be with them but not in this way. You see, they didn’t want me to come here in the way I came here either. But I must confess, the Alice In Wonderland Syndrome didn’t push me in front of that bus, a ghost did.

 

The Fortibi

The Fortibi are Roman mythical creatures but many people mistakenly believe that they are monsters. The Fortibi don’t really have a purpose either and it doesn’t really contribute to society in any way. Because it doesn't really do anything, people think that it kills people during the night even though no one has ever mysteriously died in its region.

What most people don’t know is that a Fortibi actually has a very personal goal in life. Every Fortibi has to have travelled one thousand kilometers without returning to its home location. It needs to make it back to the place he was born in time to be able to die peacefully. But once a Fortibi sets off on its journey, it does become very nice. If Fortibi sees anyone that clearly needs help, it has to help him or her or otherwise, its kilometer count starts all the way at zero again. 

There was once a female Fortibi who was about halfway through her journey and was starting to head back to the place she was born. She was already about twenty-five years old and would only have three more years to live. The first half of her journey had taken three and a half years because she was so old and now she needed to make haste. Before leaving on her journey, she had enjoyed twenty-one and a half years of calmness and peace. But people had been warning her since she was three months old to complete her journey in time or her death would be very cruel. So she began her journey having calculated that she would have just enough time to complete it. 

This Fortibi, like all others, had very weak legs so she had to walk the whole journey by hand. After the five hundred and sixty third kilometer, her hands really started to ache. Because of this, she was happy that she heard a beeping sound in her head which meant someone needed help. She looked around and saw a little girl crying and shouting something in Russian. Fortibi didn’t understand Russian but it was clear that the girl had lost her parents. Fortibi was thinking quite fast because she knew that the child would start crying even more if she saw her. But it was already too late. The little girl had seen her. 

Unlike almost everyone else in the world, this little girl wasn’t scared of Fortibi. She stood up and started waddling to Fortibi. Her hazel coloured curls were bouncing with each step. She had dirt all over her face and clothes. It seemed like she had been on her own for a couple of days. Fortibi scanned the rest of the area but there was no sign of any adults anywhere. Fortibi decided to put the girl on her feet and continued walking. She would probably bump into the girl's parents. Fortibi’s kilometer count started declining. It didn’t go all the way to zero, probably because she was helping the girl but not in the right way. 

Fortibi had started walking again and her kilometer count just stayed the same. She figured that once the girl had been returned to her parents, she would get all the kilometers she had walked back. 

After walking for what seemed like seven kilometers, Fortibi couldn’t know the precise count, there still wasn’t any sign of the girl’s parents. 

Fortibi feared the worst. For the parents and for the girl. 

It had now been a few weeks and Fortibi and the little girl were still walking. Fortibi’s kilometer count was now declining by five kilometers every day but Fortibi was almost back home. Fortibi spent all her time thinking of all sorts of scenarios and she had finally figured out a plan. She would just raise the girl herself. That must be some sort of a good deed. The girl was already so familiar with Fortibi that she spent all of her time talking to Fortibi. Fortibi thought that the little girl didn’t even know that she spoke a language that Fortibi wasn’t familiar with but, Fortibi had already learnt a few Russian sentences which might be useful in the future. 

After three more years of walking, Fortibi and the little girl had reached Fortibi’s house. The little girl had grown a lot and Fortibi was very old. Fortibi’s kilometer count was at four hundred and fifty because even though her kilometer count declined daily, she had done some good deeds along the way. Fortibi didn’t fear a painful death anymore. She was happy that the little girl was now big enough to be able to take care of herself and frankly, the little girl was all that mattered to Fortibi now.

         

Grootmoeders pure diamanten

Amber zat gewoon rustig in de trein, ze keek naar de brede bergachtige landschappen van Finland. Ze had deze rit al meerdere keren voltooid maar deze keer had ze er een vreemd gevoel bij. Ze legde haar boek aan de kant en bekeek de trein en zijn passagiers. Er was niets abnormaals. Sommige mensen waren aan het slapen. Anderen waren een krant of een boek aan het lezen, verschillende waren naar hun telefoons aan het kijken en nog anderen waren door het raam aan het kijken. Er was maar één verdacht geval: een man met een hoed die dicht bij het einde van de wagon stond terwijl er nog meer dan genoeg zitjes vrij waren. Hij keek op en keek diep in haar grote bruine ogen. Het was haar vader.

Hij zag er boos uit en hij had het recht om boos te zijn! Amber was haar grootmoeders diamanten aan het transporteren van het ene rusthuis naar het andere en niemand in de familie had haar vader verwittigd. Amber wou de confrontatie niet aangaan dus greep ze haar rugzak die nu duizenden euro's waard was en ging in de volgende wagon zitten. Ze zette haar rugzak voorzichtig neer op een stoel en ging zelf op de stoel ernaast zitten. Ze begon weer te lezen. Twintig minuten gingen voorbij en ze had weer dat vreemde gevoel. Haar vader had haar toch zeker niet achtervolgd! Hij was niet perfect maar hij ging meestal niet zo over de top. Amber draaide zich om en zag dat het wél haar vader was. Nu met twee mannen naast hem. Ze begonnen in haar richting te wandelen.

Amber was moe. Ze was nu al een tijdje aan het lopen met die zware maar kostbare rugzak en ze was al zes wagons verder. Hoe lang was deze trein wel?

De volgende wagon was die met de zakenmensen en hun assistenten. Ze zou erdoor moeten wandelen in plaats van lopen. Haar vader en zijn 'helpers' wisten dat ook. Ze waren al zo dichtbij dat Amber de grijns op hun gezichten kon zien wanneer ze zich omdraaide. Een grijns die maar bleef groeien hoe dichter ze bij de zevende wagon kwam. Amber was aan het snelwandelen. Ze glimlachte naar de zakenmensen en sommige glimlachten terug. Ze probeerde om zichzelf en haar rugzak er zo onverdacht mogelijk te doen uitzien.

Ze had de wagon verlaten. Nu was haar enige kans om een voorsprong te krijgen op haar vader en zijn team. Drie wagons verder waren er nog maar twee wagons over. De trein was bijna aan het station waar Ambers moeder en plusvader op haar zouden staan wachten. Amber had het einde van de trein bereikt. Haar vaders team was er ook bijna en het zou nog een hele minuut duren tot de trein effectief tot stilstand zou komen.

De trein kwam aan in het station en Amber had geen andere keuze dan van de trein te springen. Ze viel. Alles werd zwart. Ze hoorde glas breken.

De diamanten.