My husband didn’t run. He didn’t understand why I did, but he supported me. He bought me a neon vest an always charged my flashlight when the days grew shorter and I was out past dusk. I told him not to worry – I always ran on busy, public streets (or at least as busy and public as our sleepy suburb would get), always carried something to defend myself, and then a backup something. And if everything else failed, I wasn’t afraid to scream really loudly. I demonstrated for him once; he asked me to never do that again.

And then he died.

Aortic aneurysm last spring. He had time to know it was something bad and to say goodbye. It was that fast.

Getting over it has been anything but fast. I turned to running further and further. My best friend, Annie, says I’m running away from it. Frankly, I don’t care if I am. I’ve seen grief counselors. Annie, Taylor, Mitch, they’ve all been great friends, but… they’re not James.

And so I run.

But the days have been growing shorter, and my runs keep me out later. And I’m crap at keeping my flashlights charged these days…

And so I was out well after dark. I took a side street to get home faster and immediately felt something was off. But I told myself I was being stupid and to just keep going. That’s when I saw the man ahead of me crossing the street, his gaze fixed on me. All my womanly instincts screamed for me to Get Away Now™. I felt panic start to rise, anxiety disrupting my breathing as the man drew closer.

Then I felt a hand on my shoulder – yeah, that should be terrifying in this situation, but it wasn’t. It felt familiar, warm. It felt like home.

And then I heard his voice deep and resonant from behind me. “Hey, do we have a problem here?”

The man in front of me paled, his eyes going wide and I thought he was going to trip over himself he came to a stumbling halt and hurriedly turned and sprinted in the opposite direction.

I spun to face the voice, the reassuring hand, my James…

And there was nothing behind me but the dark sidewalk.

No, that’s not true… from the wan light of the streetlight two houses back I could make something out on the ground. It was my little flashlight. And a blackjack. I picked them both up, verified the beam of the flashlight was bright, tested the weighted leather pouch, and felt the tears start to fall.

My husband didn’t run. But he clearly does now.

I’m currently on the first leg of what is shaping up to be a really busy flying month for me. I’ve already flown more this year than I’ve flown the last ten years combined. I’m not complaining – flying still seems like magic to me: you get into a steel tube, noise, vibrations, and hours later emerge from the tube in a different part of the world. I guess I’m too much of a roadtrip person – I only believe I’ve arrived somewhere if I’ve passed through (and experienced the passing through) the space between point A and B.
But I digress…
This was mostly composed on my phone flying to Philly, so forgive any typos!

I love flying.

No, I mean it. Some people say they enjoy flying, but for me there aren’t many more peaceful places than in a plane high above the ground. High above the ghosts.

Yes, “I see dead people,” as they say. But there’s a lot of dead people around. Since practically no one can see them, when you make eye contact with them, they know. And from that moment on, they’re not going to leave you alone. Sure, there are ways to get them to go away (though few that don’t make you look like you’re talking to yourself), but as with most inconveniences in life, the best way to deal with them is to avoid them in the first place.

I won’t look directly at anyone until I’m sure they’re living or dead. You’d think that’d be easy, but it’s not. Ghosts are only slightly less distinct around the edges than living people. So, you have to look without, you know, looking. Especially in a crowded place like an airport, it can be exhausting.

But when you get on a plane? Peace!!

I don’t know why there aren’t ghosts on planes – maybe it’s that aircraft don’t stay in service long enough to gather spirits? Maybe it’s the transient nature of passenger aircraft. But in fifteen years of flying heavily for work I haven’t encountered a single ghost.

Until today.

Packed flight, cross country from LAX to JFK. I nearly made eye contact with half a dozen ghosts on my way to my gate, even having to walk through a few to “prove” I can’t see them (and that’s not a comfortable sensation). Get to my aisle seat, window is taken. I look down the line of people still boarding, hoping I hit the lottery and have an open middle seat. The tall, thin man with a spreading bald spot walking down the aisle stops at every row looking for his seat. He stops at my aisle and I look up at him and.. damnit!

“You can see me! Yes!”

I look away quickly and pretend I don’t hear him. He’s not buying it.

“No, no, no,” he said, bouncing with glee. He doesn’t even flinch when the woman walks through him and points to the center seat. I awkwardly stand up, trying not to come into contact with the ghost and yet still do my best to actively ignore him.

“Stop pretending you don’t see me! I know you see me! I’m going to sit here in the aisle and jabber on until you talk to me.”

People were still milling around and trying to stuff an over-sized carry-on bag into an already-full overhead bin to notice me stare the ghost in the eyes and mouth the word, “Wait!”

Surprisingly, he did.

People finished boarding, the plane taxied, the flight attendants gave their safety spiel, we took off, and the pilot hit the seatbelt sign. I made a beeline for the lavatory, followed by the ghost.

I locked the door and he moved through the closed door. I stepped back and the two of us stood nose to ghost nose in that tiny space. “Look,” I said before the ghost could speak. “Yes, I see you. But only I see you up here and I can’t exactly talk to you without looking like a loon and getting placed on a no-fly list. And what the hell are you doing on the plane anyway? I’ve never seen a ghost on a plane.”

A wan smile creased the ghost’s face. “Funny story… I actually died in this bathroom.”

I started with the realization that I was in a bathroom where someone died… and that someone was standing inches from my face. I managed to cross into his space, causing an electric jolt in me and I kicked the door and nearly fell over.

“Sir, are you okay?” came a muffled voice on the other side of the door.

“Yeah, fine… just a second,” I called through the door as I scrambled to my feet. In a whisper to the ghost, “This bathroom?”

The ghost nodded. “Right at the end of the flight. No one noticed until the cleaning crew found my body that night.”

“Yikes…”

“Yeah. And I’ve been here since,” he said, eyes falling off into the distance.

“Huh,” I said and started thinking. “I have no idea how to get you to pass on…”

His eyes snapped back to me. “Pass on? What? No, I like it here. Hanging out, watching movies, catching people’s drama… I’m not going anywhere.”

“Sir?” The muffled voice came back through the door.

“Almost done!” I called. “Oh… okay. Well, then how about I come back here and we can talk a few more times on the flight?”

“I’d like that,” the ghost smiled. “I don’t get to talk much, like I said before. Sorry I was a little over-excited.”

“It’s all good. I understand. And, hey, I’ll see if I can get this flight back when I head home.”

And that’s how I gained a friend at 30,000 feet every time I head to or from New York. And the best part? He knows how to get into the electronics – I’ve been getting bumped to first class every time. Sometimes it pays to be able to see dead people!

When Alex and I moved into the house on Charleston, down by the railroad tracks, we knew the entire neighborhood was sus. I mean, we could afford it – enough said. The two-story house with peeling turquoise paint was a hundred years old if it was a day and stood defiantly as the last house before the weed-choked lot that separated the residential from the industrial warehouses that butt up against the railroad proper. Long ago it had been converted into two units – upstairs and downstairs. We had the downstairs unit.

After I’d told her I found us a place we could afford that was larger than a shoebox I tempered her expectations by saying the magic words – “Keep an open mind…” She rightfully raised an eyebrow in suspicion.

“Oh, this place is haunted as hell,” Alex said when we moved in.

“Keep an open mind…” I admonished as I carried a chair across the threshold.

“Ruby,” she said accusingly.

“Seriously…” I protested, a little crestfallen at her implied criticism.

She chuckled as I set the chair down. “Ruby, I didn’t mean I wasn’t stoked that you got the place.” She wrapped her arms around me as she looked around. “I just don’t think we’re going to be the only ones here…”

We both jumped at a loud knock on the door.

“Hey neighbors!” The tall thin man with the tanned skin and wide smile called from the doorway. Seeing our reaction he frowned, “Oh, sorry! Didn’t mean to scare you!” He stepped forward, hand outstretched, broad smile back in place. “I’m Elan,” he said as Alex took his hand. “My wife, Shadi, and I live upstairs.”

I shook his hand with a friendlier smile than Alex. “Oh, good to meet you, Shadi. I’m Ruby, this is Alex. We… well,” I gestured to the one box and single chair in the room, “we’re moving in, as you can see.”

“I saw you and I thought I’d say hi,” he said. “I’ll leave you to it. If you need any help or anything, feel free to stop in!” And he left as quickly as he arrived.

Alex and I exchanged a look. I shrugged and we wordlessly headed back to the truck for more stuff.

It didn’t take long for Alex’s first impression to be proved true. With both of us working from home, finding a place that was large enough for both of us to have our own workspace where we wouldn’t kill each other was paramount – hence my celebration at finding this lower floor unit we could afford.

I heard footsteps run across the floor upstairs first and I told myself I was making it up. Then I heard it again. And another set of footsteps. And then the muted laughter of a little girl made my blood run cold.

Alex appeared in the doorway, her face pale. “What in the hell was that?” she asked.

“Shit,” I said. “That means I didn’t hallucinate it.”

“Elan and Shadi?” Alex asked hopefully.

I shook my head. “I saw them leave for the University this morning. Besides… that sounded like children.”

Alex nodded solemnly and looked up at the ceiling. As if on cue, the footsteps rain across again, followed by the second set, followed by the peal of children’s laughter. She took in a deep breath then looked at me. “We can afford this place?”

“Yes.”

She shrugged and said, “We’ve got headphones…” and started back for the spare room she used as an office. Before disappearing down the hallway, she turned. “Whoever said ‘the sound of a child’s laughter is the music of the home’ never heard it come from an empty apartment.”

Fortunately, the footsteps were about the worst of it – and only from upstairs. Whatever ghosts lived in the house didn’t come into our flat – for which I gave thanks to the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Alex, ever the curious one, spent her free time at the library looking for references to our little haunted house. She discovered one of the first residents of the house had two little girls who died in the house in the 1930’s. She found microfiche of the town paper describing the death of the two little girls from carbon monoxide poisoning “…from a blocked fireplace flue,” she read. Both of us turned to look at the bricked-up fireplace in the family room where we sat. Neither of us spoke for a long moment.

I started, “But, the girls,” as we’d started calling them, “are always upstairs…”

“Yeah…” Alex agreed.

“Even though they…died,” the word came out choked, “down here.”

“Hey, don’t invite trouble,” she smiled wanly.

***

A few days later we went upstairs to have dinner with our neighbors. We agreed not to say anything about the ghost girls. “Maybe they don’t know about the girls,” I offered as we climbed the rickety outdoor staircase to the second floor.

“So, like it’s some sort of spectral subletting while they go to work and leave them be when they’re home?”

“I don’t know…” I admitted as I knocked on the door.

“Don’t know what, dear?” Shadi asked as she opened the door. With a build nearly as wiry as her husband and skin just as dark.

I stammered, but Alex covered perfectly. “Much about the area. We don’t know much about the area. We just moved to the area a few months ago.”

“Oh,” she smiled. “This part of town isn’t much to look at, but it’s safe and quiet – well, except for when the train comes through.”

“We noticed,” I chuckled remembering the way Alex and I stared at each other as the walls shook the first night when the endless train stacked with shipping containers roared through.

“You should try it on the second floor,” Elan said as he joined us. He reached over to a bookshelf covered with nicknacks. He plucked a small carved owl figure which took more force than the little carving should. “Museum putty,” he smiled, showing the beige smudge on the base. “Shadi figured that out shortly after we moved in, what? Ten years ago?”

“Twelve, dear,” she smiled. “And we use it in the museum, so it seemed natural.”

“Makes sense,” I said to fill the momentary silence.

“Tł’ohchin biiyaazh is ready!” Elan exclaimed as if he just remembered why he came into the room.

Alex and I exchanged confused looks.

Shadi rolled her eyes. “Navajo tacos, dears. Elan just likes to make it sound fancy.”

When we finished our frybread tacos sitting contentedly around their round kitchen table, Elan started, “We were wondering if you ladies could do us a favor. Shadi and I are going to visit her mom in Salt Lake and hoped you could water our plants while we were out.”

“It’s just for a few days,” Shadi added.

“Sure,” Alex said. “I mean, I’m guessing you don’t have a massive grow lab up here, right?” she laughed.

“Well,” Elan said seriously, “there are a couple of those… but only a couple…”

Shadi stood, “Everything is on the patio through our bedroom.” She headed for hallway.

We rose and followed her as she opened the closed bedroom door. “It’s this way…” she said, but Alex and I stood staring at a bookshelf just inside the room. The bookshelf was the inexpensive kind we have several of that we bought at Walmart – about six feet high, five or six shelves. But this unit was packed with small porcelain figurines of people and animals. Some looked positively antique – one crude coyote figure looked carved from red clay. Others looked more contemporary, but all had eyes that seemed just a little… off. Almost like they were looking at us.

“You found our family,” Elan came up behind us. His voice sounded almost resigned.

“You’re family?” Alex asked.

“Spirit dolls, dears,” Shadi said, coming back into the room from the patio.

I spotted the figures of two little girls front and center on a shelf at eye level, their eyes on me, their painted faces seemingly grinning at me. “I… don’t understand…” I stammered.

Elan let out a deep sigh. “When we come across a spirit wandering this plain, Shadi and I are able to contain its lonely spirit in a figure that we place here.”

Alex raised an eyebrow. “That’s better?”

“Oh yes, dear,” Shadi added. “A spirit left alone on this plain will eventually just fade away. Here they have us and each other for company.”

“It’s a safe place,” Elan said.

“Those…” I stammered, “Those girls?” I pointed at the two on the shelf.

Elan nodded seriously.

“They were here when we moved in,” Shadi said.

“We’ve heard them,” Alex nodded.

“Heard them?” Elan looked quizzically from Alex to Shadi.

“Yeah, running around up here when you guys have gone to work,” I said.

Elan shook his head, “That doesn’t make sense. When they’re in the spirit dolls they aren’t able to come out…”

Alex shrugged. “It sounds like two little girls are up here during the day.” Then she asked practically, “They’re all, uh, stuck there with what did you call it? Museum paste?”

“Museum putty,” Shadi said, pulling a cow figurine off a shelf, showing us the beige blob before returning it to the shelf.

An awkward silence fell on the room.

“Well,” Shadi said, startling us all. “Let me show you the plants.”

***

A few nights later I stared at the figurines while Alex watered the plants out on the porch. I reached out for the same cow figurine and found the museum putty indeed fixed it in place pretty good. I picked at a snake figurine to check it, too – I don’t know why I was more comfortable touching the animal dolls but not the people. No, I know why – I mean, right?

“Creepy as hell…” Alex said, coming back into the room with the watering can and locking the balcony door behind her.

“Yeah,” I said distractedly. My eyes traveled over each shelf. The girls weren’t front and center. In fact… I couldn’t find them at all. “Alex, I don’t see the little girls.”

“What?” She came up behind me and looked at the shelf, searching for the little girl figurines. “There,” she pointed to a tall shelf. “There’s one of them.”

“How…” I started but was interrupted by the sound of a distant rhythmic and repetitive bell-like clanging outside.

Alex and I looked at each other and said “Train!” at the same time.

The shaking came on gradually. Sure enough, though, the intensity of the shaking was magnified by being higher off the ground. But the shaking and accompanying roar grew past what I thought was natural.

“What’s happening, Alex?” I pleaded. Then I followed her eyes up to the top of the bookshelf. The second little girl figurine stood on top of the bookcase and seemed to wedge itself between the bookcase and the wall, the shaking of the house causing her to wedge into the crack. The bookcase began to lean precariously forward, its movement exacerbated by the unnatural shaking.

I stood fixed, in shock by what I was seeing, but Alex was already at the doorway and grabbed the collar of my shirt. “Ruby!” she called as she pulled me out of my reverie.

We slammed the front door and had our feet threshold of the stairs when we heard the bookshelf topple over in a crash of broken glass.

Broken figurines.

Broken spirit dolls.

Alex and I looked at each other.

“Run,” she said. And we did.