I had my first author reading today! I was super excited for the opportunity. The actual event was… a little underwhelming, but, again, it was a fantastic opportunity and I’m really grateful for it! And it ran late, which is great! Except Akilah and I still had to get something to eat, and I still had to get my steps in and write a story! Fortunately, this story literally came to me on my walk. It was me, Alli, and…
We started up the hill and Alli kept looking behind us. She usually only does that when there’s something back there – a dog, a person – that she wants to pay attention to. But there was no one behind us on the climb up cemetery hill…
Yes, at the top of the hill there’s a cemetery. But it’s still a bit off from the top of the hill – I’ve never actually been inside or close enough to see any graves. And we’ve done this hill hundreds of times now, and she never gets paranoid like this going up (there’s a spot on the other side of cemetery hill that I wrote about on October 1 that we try to avoid in the dark, but this wasn’t that side).
When we reached the top of cemetery hill and turned back on another road, I definitely started to hear things. A rustle in the bushes isn’t anything to write home about. But a rattle in consecutive bushes as you walk along… a little weird. It genuinely sounded like something was following us behind and to the side – where “to the side” would involve the impossible transit through bushes, fences, parked cars…
And then we hit the dark stretch. It’s about a quarter mile where there are no streetlights and the houses are spaced apart with very little lights outside. Alli was looking behind her still; so was I. At one point I stopped and turned my flashlight behind me, I was so certain there was someone or something back there. Cranking up the power of the flashlight beam, I scanned up the dark deserted street, into the bushes, into the trees. I almost hoped to see the mirror-like reflection of a pair of cat eyes in the bushes – at least a flesh-and-blood mountain lion would explain this feeling.
Nothing.
Alli looked at me and I looked at her. And then we booked it down the hill.
Back on the hill two ghosts emerged, one from the bushes, the other floated down from an overhead tree branch. They high-fived each other. “Man, this just gets so much easier when the veil between our world and the living is so thin!”
“It’s almost unfair,” the second ghost said. “We’ve been trying to scare that guy for months!”
My friends ask me why I go see John Edward whenever he comes to town. They figure as someone who sees and hears ghosts, I would be outraged by John Edward’s cold reading masquerading as psychic ability.
Well, okay, I am outraged.
But I decided I needed to see him for myself when he started touring and I saw he was coming to our town. This was more than a decade after his show was cancelled and the whole South Park “Biggest Douch in the Universe” episode. Frankly, I figured he dropped out of public consciousness and, I don’t know, was living large off fake ghost money. I pictured him shirtless (way scarier than a ghost) lounging by a massive pool saying to his butler, “I’m sensing my next cocktail… I’m getting…. A woman’s name…” And the butler sighing and rolling his eyes as he replies, “Sir, you can just ask for another margarita, you know…”
So I figured when he was touring I owed it to my colleagues who actually communicate with ghosts to see what it was all about. Did John Edward come up with some new angle? Did he cash in the whole cold reading thing for something more… authentic?
No, it’s exactly the same old schtick but for the poor ticket buying audience instead of a television studio audience.
But the hardest part of going to see John Edward is not laughing because it is hands down the most hilarious thing I have ever experienced. No, not John Edward — the audience.
Let me take you through this… I don’t care what my seat number is because I’m not going to sit there. I always sit as far back as I can get the ushers to seat me. We all know the show is barely half sold out, so there’s going to be a pretty substantial ring in the back of unused seats. That’s where I go and watch everyone file in.
There’s the living, and then there’s their ghosts. Not everyone inadvertently brings a ghost with them, but most do. There are dead parents, dead siblings, spouses, even kids. They sit in the back with me. A lot of them don’t get out, so this is a big deal and eavesdropping on ghost socializing is part of the fun.
“I hope you don’t mind me asking, but did you get hit by a train? You look like you did? Oh, a bus? That thing must have been really moving to do that kind of damage!”
Or “that head wound looks bad, but it doesn’t look fatal. Oh, it was? My mistake!”
Or “Have you tried talking to Alexa? That scares them every time!”
Then the show starts, and John Edward is introduced and comes out and talks about how he gets feelings about things and a name may be close but… yada yada yada, no one cares. Finally, he gets on to what everyone bought a ticket for!
“I’m getting pulled this way…” he moves towards the left side of the stage. “Is there someone whose loved one died… on an operating table? …I’m getting routine surgery that didn’t go well…?”
A woman two rows back says, “I lost my father in appendectomy surgery.”
John Edward nods thoughtfully, then continues, “he was very close to your daughter…”
The woman looks confused for a moment then shakes her head. “No, my daughter was born well after he died.”
“Yes, but she favors him… she looks like him in some way…”
The woman smiles, “She has his eyes.”
“He wants me to tell you he’s always with you and your daughter’s eyes are just a way to know he’s always there.”
The crowd “aww”s, then applauds. And John is pulled to the other side of the audience.
But that’s not what I see…
“I’m getting pulled this way…” John Edward moves towards the left side of the stage. “Is there someone who’s loved one died… on an operating table… I’m getting routine surgery that didn’t go well…”
A woman two rows back says, “I lost my father in appendectomy surgery.”
Her father, standing behind her, yells, “Are you kidding? My appendix ruptured when I was on a camping trip. When they got me off the helicopter, I was pretty much already dead! That’s not routine surgery! Don’t talk to this guy!”
John, oblivious to the real father, nods thoughtfully, then continues, “he was very close to your daughter…”
The woman looks confused for a moment then shakes her head.
“Ah, you’ve gone too far this time, you yutz! I was long dead by the time Marcy was born. You tell him, Janey, you tell this fraud!”
“No, my daughter was born well after he died.”
“Suck it, Edward!”
“Yes, but she favors him… she looks like him in some way…” John Edward pivots.
“What? No! Favors him? What kind of crap is that? Janey, tell him he’s full of it!”
The woman smiles, “She has his eyes.”
“What?!” her father bellows. “What are you talking about?” He’s turned beat red now and I’m wondering if he can have a heart attack when he no longer has a beating heart. “Marcy has green eyes! I have blue eyes! Blue eyes” He’s pointing at his own eyes as if she could see him.
John Edward says, “He wants me to tell you he’s always with you and your daughter’s eyes are just a way to know he’s always there.”
“Like hell I do!” he yells. “What kind of Hallmark Card crap is this? Janey, are you buying this? Oh my god, you’re buying this crap!”
And it goes on like this for every audience member John Edward “reads”. He genuinely may be the “Biggest Douche in the Universe” but I think it’s wonderful he has no idea how hilarious his show really is.
The gig I worked tonight was supposed to be over by 11, and lately they’ve finished earlier. I figured I had plenty of time! Except it ran long for once and I got in the door at 11:45. I got it in. I leaned into short and creepy! Hold your loved ones close!
We came home to our house in the woods after the funeral. Marian was a wreck and I told her to go ahead into the house – I’d get her bag and the pictures from the trunk of the car. That’s when I heard the laughter. Jared’s laughter. We had just watched his little coffin with his tiny, cancer-wracked body lower into the earth a few hours ago and now I could hear his laughter coming from just beyond the tree line at the edge of the woods.
The tinkling laughter cut like glass and turned my blood to ice. “Daddy,” Jared’s voice came from the woods. “Daddy, come play! Come play with me!”
I knew it wasn’t Jared. But it sounded like Jared.
“Daddy, please! I miss you! Come play with me!”
I didn’t think I had tears left after the last few days. Apparently, I still had plenty. Through bleary eyes I closed the truck, the box of pictures and mementos of our son in my arms.
“Daddy! Please?”
“You’re not Jared!” I screamed towards the woods.
The cicadas stopped their hum in the hot evening air, and everything went deathly quiet.
A moment later a voice rang out from the woods – this time it was almost Jared’s: “I can be,” it said.
