Flying from Seattle to Phoenix tonight. Full flight. I’m grateful I haven’t been witness to any egregiously bad behavior on board. I’m sure I’ll encounter it sooner or later, but for now I’ll leave the terrible behavior on the page.

Somehow I won the flight lottery and pulled group A for boarding. With assigned seating and always checking my bag, my boarding order has never been a big deal for me. But still, I’d never been group A. I was waiting to ask the gate agent about whether it was going to be a full flight or not when I overheard her conversation with the steel gray bun.

“But if the seat is open, why can’t you move my husband to the window seat?”

The gate agent bore the interrogation with aplomb, but the crinkles at her eyes belied her frustration. “I’m seeing what I can do, ma’am.” She tapped at her keyboard and frowned. “I’m sorry, ma’am, the system won’t let me move anyone into that seat.”

“I don’t understand,” the steel haired lady said, her volume increasing with each protestation.

Another gate agent, an older man with salt and pepper hair perfectly trimmed and a pencil thin mustache stepped next to the frustrated agent and spoke to her in hushed tones.

She pointed at the screen and quietly explained the issue.

“This is silly,” the steel woman said, voice rising higher.

The man met her with piercing blue eyes and silenced her with a curt, “Ma’am” whose tone made it the most strident order to cease talking. The woman looked outraged and was about to say something when the senior gate agent raised an eyebrow. The steel woman stopped talking.

He nodded at the original gate agent and said, “Ah, this is N47869. That’s why that seat isn’t available.”

“But it shows as available online,” the steel woman said brandishing her phone.

“Ma’am, that seat is not available. The online information is wrong. Please sit down.”

“But..”

“Now.”

And she did.

And so did I, because my query wasn’t worth even asking at that point t. Besides, group A what?!?!

So I was surprised when the seat being discussed – 12A – was occupied. I was 12C, so I settled in and waited for the rest of the flight to board. The man sat with his fedora low over his eyes, like he was already napping. The fedora looked good on him, and I dug his style.

However, the steel woman appeared indicating she was in the middle seat. I stood up and she plopped down in 12B. She wasted no time trying to plead her case.

“Sir? Sir?” She said too loudly for a person sitting right next to her to hear.

He didn’t respond. Instead, just adjusting his hat further over his eyes.

Undeterred, the steel lady pressed on. “Sir, would you trade seats with my husband? He’s back in 22B. You wouldn’t mind, would you?”

The man’s sigh seemed to come from his soul, but that was the only indication he gave that she even spoke to him.

“Sir? SIR?” She employed her rising volume technique, but followed it up with tapping his shoulder.

Her fingers went right through his shoulder.

“Oh my God!” She screamed and practically ran off the plane shouldering aside a flight attendant in her way. Her husband followed a few moments later from further back in the plane apologizing to the flight attendant on his way by.

Another flight attendant hurried to her side and whispered something, eyeing the now-vacated 12B. The other shrugged and they continued pre-flight preparations.

Despite the high strangeness I just witnessed, I wasn’t about to bother whatever it was in 12A. Frankly, I didn’t care if it was a gelatinous mass, we had an open seat between us and that’s gold on flights this time – I won the flight lottery twice!

Midway through the flight, I was surprised to catch movement in my peripheral vision. The person? Ghost? Fedora in 12A tipped his hat back and sat up. “Sorry ‘bout that,” he said in a slow gravelly drawl.

I turned to him and saw he was actually slightly translucent.

“Uh, no problem,” I pasted on my best smile. “Besides, that means we’ve got an open space between us!”

He let out a little chuckle. “Yeah,” he started slowly, scratching his 5 o’clock shadow. “See, it’s just his is MY seat.”

“Oh, sure, I get it…” The idea of someone having their own special seat on an anonymous flight seemed ludicrous, but I wasn’t about to argue with Fedora.

“No, I don’t think you do,” he drawled. “See, I died in this seat.”

“Uh, come again?”

He let out laugh that started hearty but quickly dissolved into a coughing fit. “Sorry,” he croaked when he could manage. “About five years ago. I had a heart condition – I had no business on a plane.” He shrugged.

“Wow… I’m… I’m sorry.” And i genuinely was.

“Eh,” he waved a hand. “Everyone’s gotta die somewhere…”

“Well, I guess that’s true enough. So now you’re stuck here?”

“Something like that…” he nodded behind me and the flight attendant was asking if I wanted anything to drink. I got my Diet Coke and ever-tinier bag of pretzels.

She nodded at Fedora. “Good to see you, Frank.”

“Janet,” he said tipping his hat. When she moved on to the next row, he continued. “So you can see why I call it my seat.”

“Yep, makes perfect sense,” I said toasting him with my cup.

He grinned and nodded, then settled back in his seat, pulling his hat back down over his eyes.

When I finished my pretzels I looked over to check on Fedora, but he was gone.the seat was empty.

The flight attendant came by for my trash. “Huh,” she said regarding the empty 12A. “Frank usually doesn’t hang around past takeoff.” She flashed a smile at me. “He must have really liked you!”

I smiled back, partly because I didn’t know how to feel about a ghost liking me, but mostly because I had the whole row to myself!

Flight lottery for the third time!

We’ve had quite a few short stories lately, and tonight’s will be short as well – we have a our big Birthaversary party tonight. Stories should start getting longer after tonight, though. Hopefully it makes up for its brevity with some spookiness.

Ian had a suspicion his house was haunted, but the pragmatic side of him chalked the weird noises and cold spots on the age of the house – foundation settling, pipes creaking, floors shifting. When his Ring doorbell camera started alerting him around midnight every night, he started to wonder whether it was just the inside of his house that was haunted.

He studied the Ring footage the first few nights, certain he could see a dark shadow where someone would have stood. After the fourth night his annoyance outweighed his reticence, and he swung the door wide as soon as the alert went off only to find his front stoop empty. He stepped out and looked around, hoping to find some teenagers engaged in some long-running prank.

No one was there.

Same thing the following night: doorstep empty, street empty.

By the sixth night he was genuinely agitated. Empty porch. Quiet street.

The seventh day he’d had enough and was ready to yell at the empty space as soon as his Ring notification on his phone went off.

But just when he expected the alert, three heavy knocks came at the door instead.

His irritation evaporated into fear as he knew there had to be someone on the other side of the door this time. He cautiously opened the door to reveal a tall, clean-shaven older man in a black three piece suit.

Ian opened his mouth to ask who this man was, but the man spoke first.

“Why haven’t you answered my knocking before tonight?”

Ian paused, surprised by the question. “This was the first time I heard your knocking,” he started to say.

But the man looked over his Ian’s shoulder, eyes widening as he took a step back on the porch. “It’s too late,” he said, stepping backwards again. “She’s already inside…”

Ian felt an icy breath on the back of his neck as the doorknob slipped out of his hand as the front door slammed shut.

Reading last night’s story isn’t exactly essential, but it’s short and it’s exactly where we’re starting tonight. Not a part 2.. more like what happened next.

As she reached for the doorknob, the deadbolt clicked in place. She tried the lock, but it wouldn’t budge.

The lights turned off all at once.

In the darkness, Julie held her breath. The kitchen light flickered on unnaturally. She watched as the magnetic poetry words moved on their own, the cloud of words spreading into a frame around a single sentence.

“You won’t leave again.”

The lights went dark again.

And then the lights came up again. Standing in front of the refrigerator, blocking the ominous words stood a short, stocky, middle-aged man with a halo of graying hair around a bald pate and matching bushy gray mustache. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he said, holding up his hands palms out. “Let’s dial it back about a thousand notches, there, Carl.”

The door to Julie’s bedroom slammed shut.

“Jesus, Carl, settle down already!” He yelled towards the door. “Ma’am, I’m really sorry for my friend, here…”

“Who… who are you?” Julie managed to say.

“What? Oh, I’m Joe, ma’am. I’m the super.” At that point the cabinet doors started opening and closing wildly. “Carl!” Joe bellowed. “If I have to come over there…”

The cabinets continued opening and closing chaotically.

“That’s it, Carl…” Then, to Julie, “Pardon me, ma’am…” And he disappeared.

A moment later, the cabinets stopped moving, some still open, some closed. Julie stood rooted to the spot, her breath coming in fearful gasps as she stared into her kitchen. “What. The. He—”

“I’m sorry about that, ma’am,” Joe’s voice came from behind her and she literally jumped and spun to face the short balding ghost. “Oh, geez! Sorry again! I didn’t mean to scare you, especially after Carl…”

“Carl? I don’t understand…”

“Yeah, I can understand that, ma’am. You’re new here, right?”

Julie nodded slowly. “About two months.”

“Uh huh,” Joe said. “Carl’s pretty new, too. He’s only been dead about six months. He’s still holding on to his issues from when he was alive.”

“W-what issues did he have when he was alive?”

“Umm…” Joe furrowed his brow and bit his lip. “…Let’s just say he had an unhealthy relationship that ended poorly… for both of them.”

“Oh my God…” Julie said, now terrified of a homicidal ghost.

“No, no, no!” Joe said quickly. “You’ve got nothing to worry about ma’am.”

“Julie.”

“Sorry?”

“My name is Julie.”

“Oh, yeah, okay. Ma’am, err, Julie. You don’t have anything to worry about. I just had a… talk with Carl,” he winked conspiratorially. “He’s not allowed here anymore. He’s now going to be stuck in the empty apartment 3B right above you – you might hear some footsteps up there, but that’s all. He can’t come down here. You’re safe.”

“How… Who are you?”

“I’m Joe, the super, ma’am—uh, Julie.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head slowly. “I met the super. Tony. He’s very much alive and… everything…” she gestured to Joe’s translucent body.

“Oh, right, yeah, that’s understandable. Tony is the super these days. Great kid… I knew his parents – they lived up in 5D, wow, must have been thirty years ago. Before Tony, you understand. Now that I think about it, it’s funny he works at the building his parents lived in before he was born. Huh. Strange world, right?”

“Tony is the super…” Julie repeated.

“Oh, that’s right,” Joe smacked his head. “I get sidetracked these days. You’re right, Tony is the super for the living. I was the super for thirty years before I died – fixing the boiler downstairs, I might add. Since then I’ve stayed on as kind of a super for the supernatural.” He laughed, “Ha! I just thought of that! Super of the supernatural. I should get that on a business card…”

“What does that mean?” Julie asked.

“It means that when some young ghost like Carl goes messing with the living, I have to straighten him out. You see, this building is over a hundred years old. There’s been a lot of life here. And some death (ask me about that damn boiler sometime). Someone needs to make sure that the ghosts here behave.”

Julie sat down on her couch, only then remembering she was still in her bathrobe. “This is a lot to take in…”

“I know, I know. Take your time… You seem like a really good tenant. I’d hate for you to go. Tell you what, Burt haunts 2C next door. He was a doorman for a place up on East 57^th Street for years. I’ll have him check your door and your windows – the things that Carl did that were helpful. But he won’t come in. Won’t make a sound – he was a great doorman.”

“Oh… Okay.” Julie nodded.

“Thank you, ma’am—Julie. I’ll be on my way then.” As he reached the front door he stopped and added, “Oh, if you need anything – even stuff Tony can fix – just write it down and leave it on the table. I’ll make sure it gets taken care of.”

“Thanks…” Julie said.

“Oh course. Have a good evening,” Joe said as he turned and walked through the door.

Julie sat in her quiet apartment, alone – truly alone. Suddenly she really appreciated the quietude.