Perched in the attic of the solitary house on the hill, I gazed down at Winter River. From this distance, the town seemed almost like a shy toy model, nestled far below. One leg carelessly dangling out the window, I lazily flicked the whip in my hand.
Being dead, as it turned out, was an exercise in tedium. In life, I had dabbled in Necromancy, well-versed in the dead's yearning for life. But this yearning, I now understood, was less for life itself and more for its nuances—the pulse of excitement, the richness of sensation, the ever-changing tapestry of experiences.
Consider, for instance, the nature of desire. Stripped of flesh, the act of love became a hollow echo of its former glory. Sensations were not felt but remembered, echoes of a past life rather than the vibrant reality of the present. The fervor that once drove my passions had dissipated, leaving behind a void. It had been weeks since Archer and I had last indulged, and the absence of this desire barely registered in my spectral existence.
I had access to only one book, and it was dry as a desert. But I did read from cover to cover. Figurately, since mine was in digital format. Well, that and the smartphone manual.
While I had a smartphone, I was stuck in the nineties so no apps for it, save one, and the internet was primitive.
There was one more feature I had found out.
The phone could reach anyone in Netherworld, but there was no one there I particularly wanted to talk to.
I thought about making some of my own apps, but there was no editor or compiler installed, so I had nowhere to start.
I was almost bored enough to try that app. Keyword almost.
It had been a long and mind-numbing ride to Winter River. At least Archer had fun riding the modified motorbike.
And we could not even ask for directions. But I have discovered that I could pull out small objects from the pockets of my suit, including a crystal pendulum. It had proven to be an able navigator. It even led to this house.
There we had met the owners: Barbara and Adam Maitland. Well, not met. Not yet. They had been still alive when we first arrived. And I had finally understood which World was this.
Beetlejuice.
A charming ghost story about two inept ghosts, a goth teenager, a demon straight from hell, a fake guru, and a very dysfunctional couple.
Which meant that there had been a possible medium just as we had awoken for the first time after dying. Lydia. We had missed her.
Though was something a bit strange. That had been her mother's funeral. And if I remembered right, and my memory had been absolutely perfect ever since I stopped thinking with my brain, she was not supposed to be dead, just divorced.
But that didn't really matter, Lydia would be coming here soon.
"We should take our younger forms," I had said to Archer, once I determined the World.
"Why? In a mood for young flesh," he had said back.
"The medium that will be coming here is a teenager. I don't wasn't to look like a creepy old guy to her."
"In that case, pretending to be a kid hardly helps," he had said in reply. But I had managed to convince him in the end.
The horn drew my attention back from reminiscing about the past and I saw the moving truck in the distance. Finally. They were coming.
I took out the bullhorn from the pocket of my suit, and yelled, "HOUSE MEETING!"
Archer was the first to arrive. He rose from the floor and then sat on the floor under the window, between my legs.
He was the first of two of us to figure out how to fly, but then he had experience with an incorporeal form. He did teach me how to do it.
Barbara and Adam followed, entering through the door. They still wore the clothes from their last living moments – a stark contrast to the striped monochrome attire that Archer, Betelgeuse, and I donned.
That Handbook for Recently Deceased was of no help. And I had read it from cover to cover. Perhaps this sartorial difference was related to having a celestial name.
How would I have described them? Those two were so painfully average that they could be used for a stock picture of a white American middle-class couple in the nineties.
Adam had glasses and wore a checkered plain shirt. It was not just because he died in one. I have been observing the couple for some time, and I noted that he had quite a lot of similar shirts.
Barbara wore a one-piece dark blue sundress with white polka dots and there was nothing more to say about her.
Speaking of the devil, he was the last. Betelgeuse entered through the wall, yawing hard enough to expel a few cockroaches.
He looked like a bloated zebra that a lion ripped apart and then didn't eat because there was obviously something wrong with it, so it just rotted in the hot African sun.
Whether he dyed his sparse hair green, or it was mold it was hard to tell. Suggesting mold there were patches of the same green on his skin, but it could be that he was just inept at applying hair dye.
Barbara and Adam's relationship with the three of us was, to put it mildly, strained. Their reasons were varied and perhaps justifiable.
Firstly, there was the issue of us squatting in their home. They were either too polite or too intimidated to outright demand our departure, but their discomfort was palpable in every cautious step and hesitant glance.
Perhaps it was because the first words I had said to them were, "So you have finally died." In my defense, I had spent a very boring half-year in the house waiting for them to go on that fatal vacation. A vacation they had planned to spend in their own house. Well, in their defense it did need some maintenance as they had found out only too late.
Or perhaps it was the mess we had made fighting. Archer and I had caught Betelgeuse trying to swipe Maitland's Handbook for Recently Deceased. We had made quite a mess, but none of it was permanent. None of us could affect the living world. Fixing that problem was the reason we came here.
Or perhaps it was because Betelgeuse hit anything that moved. I would say breathed, but none of us did.
On further thought that was the reason they liked him even less.
"Young man there was no reason to be so loud," Barbara attempted a mild rebuke, her tone soft yet firm.
There was one minor, almost insignificant, side-effect of two of us taking kid form. From time to time, our host would forget to dislike me and Archer and tried to parent us. It was mildly more annoying than the alternative.
"Show him who the boss is," Betelgeuse said, his voice so gravely that he sounded like he had cobwebs for vocal cords. "Take him over the knee and spank him hard! Pull his pants down first. Proper spanking should always be bare."
"No, there will be no need for violence," Adam said, wringing his hands, "But could you not use that thing inside."
"I didn't yell just because I was bored," I said, shaking my head.
"Like two last times," Archer dryly interjected.
"Like two last times," I acknowledged and then continued, my lips stretching in a wide grin "Someone is moving in. Living someone. I could see the trucks."
Finally, the long boring wait was over. My heart would pound if it was still beating. And soon, if things go as planned, it should beat again. No matter the cost.
"But this is our house," Barbara almost yelled, jerking her head back.
"An opportunity, " Betelgeuse said at the same time, rubbing his hands together. That made skin flakes fall like snow. Very disgusting snow.
"Was your house," Archer added. I started absentmindedly to run my hand through his hair. "Some bonds do end in death."
"And some don't, like a murder-suicide," I added, thinking about our death and what led to that. I wished that I had the courage to talk about it with Archer. But as long he did bring it up, I would avoid the topic.
"You have nothing to worry about." He said, moving until he was standing between the dead couple. He put his hands on their shoulders "I am an experienced bio exorcist; I have been scaring for millennia." His hand slipped slowly downwards as he was talking. "For just a low price, a favor really, I am willing to give courses in haunting and adjacent practices. Get rid of breathers in five easy lessons or your money back, except you not giving any money."
And then both of them jumped in place and hurriedly moved away from the green-haired ghost. I guessed that he grabbed their asses, again.
"Or you could just wait," Archer added, "Perhaps you will like them. Barbara, you have been complaining about dust. A living resident would maintain the house."
Adam and Barbara turned face to face, gazing deeply into each other eyes, and after a pause seemed to come to a silent consensus.
"We should wait," Adam said, hurriedly nodding.
"It would be for the best," Barbara agreed, "And who knows maybe the kid is right. We could find them agreeable."
The absurdity of their optimism struck me as so hilarious that I erupted into uncontrollable laughter. It wasn't just a chuckle, but a deep, resonating laugh that filled the attic.
Barbara, looking puzzled and slightly concerned, asked, "Why is he laughing like that?"
Adam, visibly uncomfortable, added, "It's quite unsettling."
Betelgeuse, reveling in the chaos, chimed in with a twisted sense of admiration. "I kinda like it. Has that touch of deranged madness to it. Just needs a few bloodstains to round it off." He suddenly produced a sign, scrawled with a bloody '8'. "Eight out of ten," he declared, as if judging a performance.
Archer cleared his throat. "He can see glimpses of the future. It's... rather annoying at times."
After I calmed down, we all sat on the top of the stairs leading to the second floor watching the new tenants move in. I was next to Archer; Adam was next to Barbara and Betelgeuse was being the fifth wheel.
First to enter were the movers. Dressed in drab uniforms they were bringing the new furniture and taking out those things previous inhabitants cherished.
"No! Not the crib!" Adam cried out. Two of them have been trying or planning to try for a kid, while they were alive. I was not quite sure. In the movie, they had been trying for quite some time, unsuccessfully, but there were some notable differences.
He ran down the stairs trying to stop them. Barbara followed. And last Betelgeuse floated after them.
"Should we follow?" Archer asked. And offered me his hand.
"Nah, let us watch from here," I replied. But I took his hand, nevertheless.
"Hey! Stop that!!" Adam yelled wildly gesturing at the movers.
"Yeah, you tell 'em Adam!" Betelgeuse shouted "encouragements" from the side.
"Put that down!" Barbara tried to help
"Get in there Babs! You both get 'em."
They were all ignored. It was to be expected.
"STOP!... they can't see us," Adam said.
"Told you so." I raised my voice so they could hear me downstairs. And I did tell him so. And it was in the manual, which I managed to save, and gave back to the couple. "The living often ignore unpleasant things, like homeless, climate change, the health risk of smoking, and ghosts. Especially ghosts. They don't like reminders of their own mortality. So, they do what they do best. Ignore the problem and hope it would go away."
"And why are you so surprised?" Archer added. "We have been haunting your house for half of a year, and you never noticed."
"It's one thing to be told, another to experience it. So, we can do nothing?" Adam said, his posture sagging and hands going limp, "Just watch helplessly as they tear our home apart?"
Betelgeuse had got a metal pointer from somewhere and used it to strike Adams behind. "Chin up. You are a sad sack already, no need for an extra portion of depression. If they won't see you, you just have to make 'em."
"We can do that?" Adam asked.
"Breathers worry so much about their stupid little lives, most of them never notice anything strange or unusual unless you make them. So, you just need to make them so afraid that they stop worrying about anything else. And that is why you need me!"
"Would it work?" Barbara said reaching toward us.
"Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is a little death that brings total obliteration." I quoted, and then added, "So, yet it would work."
"That's from Dune," Adam added.
"So, you can read. Who cares? Now, is that yes? Please let be yes."
"You're hired!" Adam cried out. That was quick. I thought they would be more reluctant. The newcomers haven't even begun to remodel the house. Well, perhaps Barbara would be a voice of reason.
"Tell us what to do!" And perhaps not.
"They said YES!"
Archer tensed next to me, so squeezed his hand, and said softly, "Don't."
"They are going to get exorcised," he whispered back, "We should put stop to this."
"We'll stop it if it goes too far, but it's not there yet. They have the right to make their own decisions, even if they are short-sighted and self-destructive."
"I know I can't save everyone."
"You can save them. But you should not from this."
And while Archer and I were talking Betelgeuse had been dragging the dead couple to the attic for their lessons. After pushing them through the door, the green-haired ghost stayed back for a moment and pointed a finger accusingly at us. "I know why you are here."
"Aren't you the master detective? It's quite obvious why are we all here. What we all want."
"I will get it first."
"Want to bet?"
"Stakes?"
"A favor."
"A sexual favor?"
"Possibly."
"Hight stakes. I like it." He made a sick gurgling cough and spit a mixture of radioactive green phlegm and rotting blood into his hand. "Shake on it."
I brought forth the mercury, coving my hand in a glove of mirror-bright poison, and took his hand, "Deal."
"That was disgusting," Archer said after he left.
"We have both seen worse."
"I meant the bet. Are afraid of losing? Owning that kind of favor to something like that could have unpleasant consequences."
"He is barking at the wrong tree. This bet was as good as won. The movers are nearly done, now let the last actors in our little drama."
"I'm not sure winning is any better," Archer mused, "In this case, it's quite literally your ass on the line."
Delia marched boldly through the front door and announced her entrance into the house by ringing a triangle.
"Mmmmmm Yes! There's very good energy in here. Very good energy."
"Good vibes in this house." Arched added, "I am losing faith in your medium."
"You have yet to meet my medium."
"So not her."
"Not her."
"Why are you frowning then?"
"She was not supposed to like the house. He was." I said pointing to the new arrival. Although he was different than I imagined him to be. Less sedentary and more boisterous.
"I'm glad you like it. I took a very big risk with this place. Can you believe people actually lived here? It's like a nursing home for sad cats."
"I can just feel the love. Are sure you don't need glasses for your third eye?"
I couldn't help but pout a little. Yes, there were several discrepancies from what I had expected. Adam and Barbara had met their demise from a fall inside the house, not by drowning in a car accident on the nearby bridge. Betelgeuse had shown up a bit early. And then there was the matter of Charles hiring Delia as a life coach for his daughter, rather than being her stepmother as I had anticipated. It seemed Charles and Delia were embroiled in an affair, a secret kept from his daughter.
These differences were significant, but I hoped the essence of the situation remained the same. Otherwise, I'd have to rely on Adam and Barbara's ability to be frightening, which was a concerning prospect.
As the movers brought in a stylish couch, my attention was drawn to a girl sprawled across it, her attire entirely black. She lay there with such stillness, that she was doing a passable impression of a corpse.
"Hey, Dad? Does this couch make me look dead?"
That was by design as could be seen from what she said.
"Behold the bride of chaos. Out path to the rebirth," I said pointing at the girl.
"She looks the part. But can she really see us?"
"We'll find soon enough. But let us hide for now. It's not a proper time for the introduction."
"When it will be?"
"When she is alone and vulnerable."
A few hours later I was straddling a chair, in the corridor that Lydia was about to pass by while taking pictures with her camera. I knew that she was coming this way because a crystal told me. Crystals were turning to be bigger gossip than trees.
I was playing with a riding crop to pass the time.
Archer was not with me, he was keeping an eye on the other ghosts, it would not do to be interlopers to mess up my introduction. First impressions were important.
"You shouldn't be here. Not that I care," she said. The faint blush was noticeable on her pale skin. "Feel free to rob the house blind."
"You can see me," I replied, grinning like a Cheshire cat, "I knew that would be a case, but still glad to have it confirmed."
Well, "knew" was a bit strong word. But the first rule of being a seer was: never to show doubt in your own predictions.
"Why I wouldn't be able to see you?" She asked pressing her lips in a fine line.
"Because I am a ghost. See." And to demonstrate I pushed my hand right through the wall.
She moved to examine the wall, pushing at the place where my hand went through. Then she tried to poke me. Then her hand went ring through me.
She nearly jumped in place.
"Oh my god! This house is haunted! That is so cool! I have so many questions. Did you die in this house?"
"No. That would be Maitlands. The previous owners. They should have invested more in sturdier floorboards. Like they say: it's not falling that kills you it's the sudden stop in the end."
Lowering her voice to near whisper she asked, "Someone really died in this house?" while she tried to grab my arm, but her hand just passed through me, again.
"And quite recently too. I must admire your realtor if she managed to sell you the house without mentioning that they had just removed bodies from the basement. Ruthless and probably illegal."
"I got to see that! And takes some pictures too."
"Nothing to see there. They were quite thorough in removing the corpses. Besides Adam and Barbara are not in the basement. They are in the attic. I would offer to introduce you, but they are currently busy taking professional haunting lessons."
"Why do they need professional haunting lessons?"
"Because they are as scary as a wet puppy, and your father has no taste. But enough about them let's talk about us."
"Us?" She asked leaning towards me.
"After all I came to this house to meet you. Half a year ago."
"But I wasn't here half year ago. I was in New York."
"But you came to this house. You were always meant to. It is your destiny."
"I don't believe in destiny. You sound like Delia."
"I remember her. She said that this house has good vibes. Considering that two people died in it recently she is either spiritually blind or a deranged murderer."
"I wish she is a deranged murderer. At least she would be interesting."
It was nice chatting with her, but I did have an agenda. "About us?'
"There is no us."
"But there could be."
"Just because I wear black does not mean I want to date a dead guy. Even if he is cute. And riding crop is a little too much for me."
"But I made it myself. Besides, I was not talking about dating. We could be just friends. Everyone needs a friend on the other side. And I sure there something you want."
"What I want you cannot give me."
"Try me."
"I want to speak with my dead mom."
I almost laughed but managed to contain myself. I licked my lips and said, "And I thought it would be something difficult."
"What?!" she breathlessly asked, "Is she here? I knew it. I could sense her presence."
"No. But I can call her up." And then I took out my smartphone.
"What is that?"
The nineties. I forgot for a moment how primitive tech was at this time.
"It's a phone. And camera. And a computer."
"It's so small."
"All famous scientists end up in the Netherworld eventually. But I mostly use it to read, take pictures and prank call Hitler."
"Then give it to me," she commanded and tried to grab my smartphone. But her hand just passed through it.
"One problem, you can't touch it, unless I physically manifest."
"Then do it," she growled. She was ready. And now to seal the deal.
"One little problem with that. This house is not a place I have died. I can't do anything without first being invited. I am all about consent."
"Then I invite you. Now can I have the phone?"
"Invitation needs to be a bit more formal. You must speak my name three times in a row. It must be spoken unbroken."
"I don't know your name."
"I can't tell directly. There are rules about such things. So, we are going to do an ancient mystic practice. A game of riddles. I hide behind a mirror yet fly closest to the sun. I am every doctor's friend, but I drive hatter mad."
"Mercury."
"That was fast. You are good at riddles."
"Mercury."
"Just one more time and I will lend you my phone."
"Mercury. Phone?"
It was like a barrier that I did know was there suddenly shattered. Everything felt so much more real. No Od though, but I could finally sense the man in the air. It seemed that I would need a living body for that. No tether to her either, just to the house.
"Here," I said offering her my smartphone. She snatched it right away.
"I have entered the number for you. Just touch it to call. Enjoy your conversation. I will be back later for my phone, but first I got to go and paint this town red. And don't look at my pictures. Those are private."