Bob's Ghost

The moment he entered his house, Bob knew the ghost was gone.

Over the past four weeks, the ghost had welcomed Bob home, whether in the evening after work or Saturday afternoons when he returned from his weekly visit to Mother’s or Sunday mornings after church. The ghost was a voice Bob had grown accustomed to and now it was gone.

He waited another moment, hoping the ghost would speak. Perhaps she (the voice had a definite feminine quality) was playing a game. Or busy. Bob had no previous experience with ghosts, so maybe today, the third Thursday of the month, was when they ran their errands. He smiled at the thought of the ghost at the spectral grocery store. Maybe the ghost was at the ethereal DMV. He wondered if theirs was as much a bother as the one he visited annually to update the tags on his ten-year-old compact sedan.

When it became apparent there would be no greeting, Bob removed his shoes, placed them neatly on the mat by the door, easing his feet into the slippers just as neatly located next to the newly-removed loafers. He placed his laptop bag on the small table in the small foyer near the front door of his small home. He entered the living room, also on the smallish side, and turned on the lamp. He was greeted by an old recliner, a new couch, a well-used stationary bike (a fact that filled him with no small amount of pride considering he could still wear the suit he wore at his high school graduation), a glass-fronted cabinet displaying mementos of his life (there weren’t many), and a 65-inch 4K TV mounted on the wall. The latter was a gift to himself. Not a birthday gift or a Christmas gift; a just-because gift.

He referred to these self-awarded pleasures as his Stuart Smalley Presents, a reference to the Saturday Night Live character whose credo of “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and doggone it, people like me!” never failed to give Bob a chuckle. While he felt, for the most part, he was in fact good enough, Bob had neither felt particularly smart at any point in his 30-some odd years on Earth, nor did he necessarily feel that people liked him. He wasn’t disliked that he knew of. In fact, had an independent survey taker decided to take the time to conduct a poll of the people in Bob’s life (Mother excluded) to suss out for themselves the level of Bob’s popularity, said pollster would find Bob barely moved the needle of recognition beyond being the person occupying Workstation 42 at the call center where he convinced people of their need to purchase additional insurance, regardless of their current level of financial protection in the event of a disaster. Bob was simply “there.”

Simply “there” was how Bob thought of the ghost. He was startled the first time she had first spoken about a month ago, but since then, he had come to think of the ghost as something slightly supernatural and odd, but beautiful. Like the Northern Lights or those fish at the bottom of the ocean with the weird stalk on their foreheads that had the little light…for the life of him, Bob couldn’t think of what they were called. It would come to him. Things like this usually did when he stopped thinking about them. So he made the decision to stop thinking about it and did.

Bob sat down in his chair and picked up the TV remote, but didn’t turn it on. Instead, he quietly stared at the blank screen. He was thinking. He was thinking about the ghost and why she hadn’t spoken to him. Was she mad at him? That thought gave him the teensiest bit of discomfort. He didn’t believe so. He and the ghost had a cordial relationship with the only bone of contention being what to watch Tuesday nights.

Perhaps the ghost’s time with Bob was done and she had been called home, like Dudley in The Bishop’s Wife. He didn’t feel that was the case. He had no great struggle in life. He experienced the usual hardships in life; deaths, separations (most recently in the form of a divorce from his wife of two years), the usual spate of slings and arrows one faces in the course of a normal existence. If she was a part of Bob’s life for a specific purpose, he was unaware of it. But that didn’t feel right. If the ghost were a guardian angel, Bob thought she would’ve announced herself as such by now.

So he sat, pondering. Unable to come to a satisfying conclusion, he rose and walked into his kitchen, which was like the rest of his home, small, but clean in a manner that stated the person in charge of tidying was at least a little obsessive compulsive. Everything was in its place. All plates were stacked in perfect order, like equally-measured porcelain pancakes. In the silverware drawer, the fork and spoon slots were filled with an even number of utensils, piled perfectly atop one another. Had a white-gloved military inspector entered the kitchen, or any room in the house, Bob would have passed with flying colors.

He walked with purpose to the cabinet above the sink and opened it, retrieving a three-quarters full bottle of Jameson’s. As he did this, he was reminded of Tina, his newly-divorced wife. She was a tiny woman; barely five feet tall and a hundred pounds. With a flawless Irish accent, he called her his “wee slip of a lass.” He usually did this as he filled a shot glass with the Irish whiskey and hoisted it to his lips with his pinky finger out, consuming it in two or three sips. It was what Tina referred to as, in her not-so-flawless Irish accent, Bob enjoying his “wee sip of a glass.”

Thinking of her, Bob felt a twinge. It wasn’t a terrible feeling or a sense of something dreadfully wrong, nor was it long-lasting. Just an odd twinge he forgot as he finished his “wee sip of a glass.” In fact, Bob hadn’t thought of Tina since the divorce, a painless process lasting less than a month from the time she announced it would be best for them to split up to the day they stood before the same judge who married them, decreeing the marriage irreparably damaged and approving the motion to divorce.

Having finished his whiskey (in three quick sips), Bob replaced the cap on the bottle, putting it back in its place. He was washing the shot glass when the ghost spoke.

“Bob.”

He started, but didn’t drop the glass. As he set it down, he considered not responding, thinking the silence would relay his hurt. Bob also considered the opposite: asking why she only now spoke and if he had done something wrong.

He did neither because he sensed a tone. He was familiar with a tone. He had heard it from Mother growing up when she needed to stress to Bob the importance of listening, especially to her. She said (so often, he thought it of others no fewer than five times a day, every single day of his adult life), “God gives us two ears and one mouth because listening is more important than talking.” He had heard a tone from every boss he worked for when they wanted to ensure he would do what he was told, to the letter. “Wandering off the path” is how many referred to it. Bob never wandered off the path. The path was well-worn without a single footprint in the grass.

The ghost had that particular affectation in her voice, so instead of passive aggression or an inquisitive mea culpa, Bob did what he always did. He turned to the direction he thought the voice was coming from, smiled, and said, “Why, hello there. How was our day today?”

The ghost completely ignored Bob and, with a tone, said, “You haven’t checked today.”

Two things slammed through Bob’s mind: The ghost had never brought this subject up and she was right. He hadn’t checked, mostly because her not being here had rattled him, causing him to forget. Bob was good about following directions but only if his daily patterns weren’t interrupted. Some people didn’t react positively to change, but in Bob’s case, confusion reigned in his mind when things didn’t happen exactly the way they were supposed to.

“You weren’t here,” Bob said, trying to (avoid eye contact) sound nonchalant. “I forgot.”

“Don’t bother,” the ghost said. “It’s gone. It’s gone and you need to take care of it.”

Panic chilled him. It’s gone, Bob thought. But what is it? He couldn’t remember, but he knew it being gone was bad. Very bad. In fact, it would be the most bad thing to ever happen.

Bob ran through his small house to his small bedroom. He saw his bed, still made from this morning; the night table with the digital alarm clock; and his reading glasses atop a book, one of a series of weighty tomes regarding a young magician and his friends. His dresser was across from the bed, a chair next to it. The closet door was closed as always. Bob made these observations in less than a second, but knew the ghost was right.

It was gone.

“What are you going to do?” said the ghost. Bob didn’t know. Bob didn’t even know what it was, only that it should be here and it wasn’t. He was about to respond when he thought: She asked me what I was going to do. All their conversations had been from the point of view of we. “How are we doing today?” or “What are we going to watch this evening?” The ghost had asked, pointedly, what he was going to do. And it was a valid question because Bob had no idea what he was going to do considering he still couldn’t remember what it was or why he should be concerned about its disappearance.

In the midst of his anxiety, Bob remembered his and Tina’s final conversation. The same feeling coursed through him then as now. She was returning to retrieve the last of her things. Some clothes, some DVDs, and a couple small knick-knacks. Bob was busy baking bread prior to her arrival. She loved his homemade bread. He wasn’t cooking her favorite treat in an effort to win her back. As with everything and everyone else in his life, when it was gone, it was gone. Jobs, friends, the few girlfriends he had had, material things, whatever. When they left, he spared them hardly a second thought. That was another of Mother’s lessons: “Don’t focus on what you’ve lost. Look forward to what you can gain.” In Mother’s case, that lesson translated to: “Don’t worry about those things I told you to leave alone in the first place. Return to paying attention to me.”

No, he was cooking the bread because he knew Tina would like it. While Bob had no emotion about the divorce, the same could not be said for Tina. She was elated. She had never loved Bob, but never hated him and never took advantage of him, either. She had been in a spot in her life where family and friends had begun to turn up the pressure about getting married and Bob, whom she met at a work thing, seemed as good a man as any. He was well-mannered, attractive enough, and gave off the distinct vibe of a man who would not wander off the path.

And he didn’t. Which was good for Tina because if Bob had set his feet upon the virgin grass lining the path of his life, he would discover Tina’s girlfriend of eight years and their plan for Tina to stay with him until marriage equality was legalized in their state, which it had been two months ago. If someone confronted him and informed him his wife was a lesbian, Bob wouldn’t have been more surprised had he learned Mother played shortstop for the St. Louis Cardinals, was a three-time All-Star, and a former league MVP.

Their sex life was normal (his and Tina’s). At least it was what he considered normal. He had never been comfortable with the act in the first place, but the fact Tina allowed him to engage in coitus with her from time to time made him think they had at least an average sexual relationship. Tina saw sex with a man as a way to get things done. She and her partner had an understanding. If it took taking the high hard one to get a promotion or a vacation or, as in this case, attention away from them until they could legally live their lives as they saw fit, then that was no issue whatsoever.

So Tina stuck it out with Bob for a couple years and grew to care for and pity him. She didn’t love him, but she made sure to never hurt him. She understood the trauma his mother (vile, vile woman) had inflicted upon him and while she knew she wasn’t going to change her plans, she made his life comfortable as possible when she was able. As such, it was with mixed emotions she watched her governor signing the bill for marriage equality into law. She loved her girlfriend and knew they were getting their happily ever after, but she also knew Bob was going to be hurt.

It was with great surprise she discovered he didn’t seem upset the night she told him the spark wasn’t there and she wanted a divorce. Bob smiled a sad little smile and said OK, mostly because he wasn’t surprised by the announcement, but also due to a tone.

She entered the house while Bob was taking the bread out of the oven. He had already packed her things neatly into two medium-sized boxes sitting next to the front door. She smelled the fresh bread and smiled her own sad little smile. Bob may have the emotional range of a sack of nickels, but the man could bake his ass off.

“Ah, my wee slip of a lass,” Bob said in his brogue as Tina walked into the kitchen.

She smiled as she saw the shot glass on the counter. “I see you’ve had your wee sip of a glass.” Their eyes locked for a moment, but they quickly looked away. Tina turned around, taking her jacket off and setting it on the kitchen table. “Mom and Dad said to tell you hi and to not be a stra-“

Her words were cut off as Bob put his hand across her mouth from behind with astonishing strength. Or rather, Tina would have been astonished had she had time. She didn’t. The moment he silenced her, the serrated edge of a bread knife touched her neck, just below her left ear. It began moving to the right, digging deeper into her flesh and her throat as it made its journey to her right ear. By the time the knife arrived near the diamond in Tina’s dainty earlobe, the knife (a gift from her), had cut to her spine, blood erupting from the wound in seemingly impossible amounts.

He kept his hand on her mouth, holding her to him as she struggled. He felt her weakening, weakening until she was a dead weight he slowly lowered to the floor, now flooded with his ex-wife’s blood.

“Bob, we need to take care of this.”

It was the first time he heard the ghost. He was surprised, but not startled, just as he was surprised by what he had done to Tina, but not horrified or panicked. He listened to the ghost (he thought of it as she), doing what she told him. After cleaning the kitchen and removing every drop of blood, he cleaned Tina as best he could, wrapped her in two of his bedsheets, and laid her beside his bed. The ghost said this was for the best until they decided how to dispose of her.

It was Tina, Bob realized back in the present. He had killed her. He had killed Tina and had kept her in his (their) bedroom the past four weeks. And now she (it) was gone. Bob’s legs gave way and he fell to the floor, landing on his behind, panic threatening to shut down his mind.

“We’re going to take care of this.”

“Really? This is really going to be OK?” Bob asked, a mixture of fear and childish hope in his voice.

“Oh, yes. We’re going to be just fine,” she said. “There’s a box under the couch. Get it.”

Bob ran to the living room. He shoved the couch from the back, looking down as he pushed. There was a smallish cardboard box there. He leaned down and picked it up. It was much heavier than it looked. He hesitated, then opened it. Inside was a gray .380 pistol. He stared blankly for a moment, finally asking, “What am I supposed to do with this? Do I shoot myself?”

For the first time since he had known her (it), the ghost laughed. “Oh, no, Silly Bean!” Ice water filled his veins. Silly Bean had been Tina’s pet name for him. “You need to take the gun and look outside.”

He pulled the gun from the box. His eyes blank, sweat beading on his upper lip, he turned around and walked through the foyer to the front door. He looked through the window on the left. The street was filled with police. He saw at least five cruisers with lights flashing, what looked to be dozens of officers, two ambulances, four news vans with the tall satellite antennas and, of course, the entire neighborhood, members of which whom would later provide the stereotypical quote to the assembled media: “He seemed so normal.”

An officer must have noticed the movement of the curtain because a second or two later, an amplified voice pierced the air.

“PLEASE COME OUTSIDE WITH YOUR HANDS ON YOUR HEAD! WE DO NOT WANT TO HURT YOU! WE JUST WANT TO TALK!”

“They’re not going to talk to you,” the ghost said. “There’s twelve snipers on the rooftops across the street. Why do you think there’s an ambulance and no paddy wagon? You’re going to the morgue, not to jail.”

“I didn’t want this!” Bob wailed. “I didn’t want any of this! I just want to lay down, read my book, and go to sleep. You told me we were going to be fine!”

Again, the ghost laughed. “Oh, Silly Bean! That’s a royal ‘we!’ Let me rephrase. I’m going to be OK. You are fucked.”

Hearing this, Bob’s lip quivered and the first tears began to appear as he continued to look in the direction of the voice. “You say you didn’t want this?” the ghost said. “Then you shouldn’t have killed me.”

“T-tina?” he whispered hoarsely.

“Yep,” she said, her voice still smiling. “Never thought you had it in you. But you know what they say, still waters run deep.”

Bob looked like he had aged 30 years in five minutes. Tears were streaming down his pale cheeks, mixing with the nervous sweat from his brow. “Tina. Oh God, Tina. What do I do? What do I do?”

“You’re going to walk out the door and you’re going to take your medicine. You’re going to have a wee sip of a glass today!”

Bob looked around, the weight of the situation finally settling into his brain. He had killed his wife and either her ghost or his own guilty subconscious was going to make him pay for it. He shivered as he went into shock. He again looked out the window and saw the officers and, for the first time, realized they were not only armed, but standing with their weapons pointed directly at the front door.

“SIR!” the voice from the bullhorn screeched. “PLEASE COME OUTSIDE SO WE CAN TALK ABOUT THIS!”

“What should I do?” Bob asked, but the ghost (Tina) was gone. For possibly the first time in his life, he was alone. No one to tell him what to do. No one to make his decisions for him. It was just Bob.

He placed his hand on the doorknob and turned it. He looked down at his hand and then looked straight ahead, pulling the door open. As he did, the assembled mob released a collective gasp. He thought he heard the klak-KLAK! of a pump-action shotgun as the lights from the media’s cameras blinded him. He stumbled two steps and stopped.

“GUN!”

The word shook him out of his stupor and he looked at the pistol in his right hand. He had forgotten he still had it. As he looked up, he raised the gun, meaning to tell the small army of police this was a mistake. They did not give him the chance.

The volley of bullets were close enough he felt them zipping past his face. As one round shattered his left knee with the one that would crash into his brain less than a second away, Bob thought, lantern fish.

It was called a lantern fish.