Back home for today and tomorrow before I fly to Las Vegas for the next conference. Akilah pitches ideas at me throughout the month and then chides me when I don’t immediately use her incredibly pithy and fantastic ideas (they’re solid gold, babe!). She might have suggested “The Boo Club” before we actually ticked over into October. In any event, it’s overdue. So, make sure your criticism is constructive and settle in…
Headlights shone in through the windows of the closed Starbucks. From inside you could hear the driver shouting at the dark drive through menu, waiting a moment, swear loudly, and drive off too quickly. This store closed early, which was why the ghosts gathered here weekly.
A loud hiss of steam came from one of the espresso machines.
“Dale, when are you going to give it up? You can’t make espresso as a ghost and even if you could, what are you going to do then? You can’t drink it!”
“It’s the principal of the thing…” Dale said quietly, focusing his energy on closing the steam valve.
“Okay, Dale, Steve, can we please get started?” the ghost of a slight man in a plaid button down shirt and slacks said as three other ghosts sat in the seats arranged in a circle. Dale managed to silence the espresso machine and glide through the counter to join the assembled group. “I’d like to thank Laurie and Cathrine for moving the chairs into this circle for us. I know that took a fair amount of energy, but this is sure to freak them out tomorrow when they open.” A murmur of laughter arose as Laurie and Cathrine smiled. “Does anyone want to get started?”
Before anyone could say something, a new ghost drifted in through the door and looked around sheepishly.
“Hi,” the man in the button down shirt greeted. “I’m Greg. Can we help you?”
The new ghosts eyes flicked from ghost to ghost nervously.
“This is my friend, Edgar,” Cathrine said, standing and coming to Edgar’s side. “He’s a friend of my brother and he’s pretty new – I mentioned him to you at the end of last week?” She said to Greg.
“Oh, of course,” Greg gave a warm smile. “The more the merrier.” He looked to the circle and noticed Catherine and Laurie had included an extra seat in the circle. “Please join us!” When everyone was seated, Greg explained to Edgar, “So, Edgar, I don’t know what Cathrine has told you about our Boo club, but I’ll just go over how we usually run the meetings. We each take turns presenting a scare we gave during the week. Afterwards we discuss and offer pointers, making an effort to be as constructive as possible.”
“Yeah, Steve,” Dale said under his breath.
“What are you talking about? ‘You scare like a fog machine at a church Halloween fair’ is a perfectly constructive criticism.” Steve threw up his hands.
Greg smiled at Edgar, “Some of us are better at ‘constructive’ than others.”
“Oh, okay…” Edgar started. “Do you guys want to see one of my haunts this week?”
“You’re new,” Greg offered. “We’ll go through some of our scares and if you’re still willing we’ll see.”
Edgar nodded.
Laurie held up a hand tentatively. “I’ll go first, Greg,” she said meekly.
“Thank you, Laurie.” Before she started, Greg turned to Edgar, “We get to ‘watch’ the hauntings here in the middle of the circle we inscribed on the floor.”
Edgar looked into the circle and noticed coffee grounds scattered around in a ritual circle.
“Don’t worry,” Steve stage-whispered, “That’s their dark roast – this is a way better use than making coffee from it.” Dale guffawed and fist bumped Steve.
“Ready Laurie?” Greg asked.
Laurie nodded. “This one was from last Thursday, two am. The two-story townhouse I used to live in.” She closed her eyes, and a scene emerged in the middle of the circle, hovering off the ground.
A man in boxers shuffles into the kitchen, opens the fridge, and the light flickers. Laurie materializes in full Victorian mourning gown behind him, whispering from the shadows, “Leeeeave this place…”
The man squints in the direction of the voice. “Crap, should have put on my glasses… Alexa, turn on the lights.”
The lights come up. Laurie panics and steps into the kitchen island, only her head visible above the fruit bowl.
He gasps—not in terror but annoyance. “Oh my god, I really let those bananas go!” He reached through her head and picked up the overly brown bananas. He sets them back down and absently closes the fridge.
Laurie lunges out of the island for one last scare, wails… and sets off the motion-activated Roomba, which bumps into her spectral hem and starts vacuuming right through her. She shrieks as it drives through her mist and gets stuck under the table.
The replay ends.
The ghosts were silent for a long moment.
“Strong entrance,” Cathrine offered.
“Yes, the tone and pitch of the initial wail was perfect… as was the gown. Really solid,” Greg added.
“You should have faded out when he didn’t jump at the beginning,” Dale said. “Better to haunt another time than let Alexa get the drop on you like that.”
“Yeah,” Steve added. “Setting off that Roomba was hilarious!”
Laurie blushed and looked down.
“I-I really liked that you tried that last time for a scare,” Edgar said. “You didn’t give up.”
“Eh,” Steve gave a dismissive wave. “You gotta know when to abandon the scare.”
“That’s tough to figure out in the moment sometimes,” Greg tried to rein in Steve’s comment. “Does anyone else have any comments?” A long moment of silence. “Okay. Thank you for kicking us off, Laurie. Anyone want to go next?”
“I got next,” Steve said, cracking his ghost knuckles. “Alright, alright, buckle up, this one’s a classic. Family of four. Split-level ranch. Friday night movie. I go full unexplained phenomena…” he closed his eyes and the scene of a man and woman on a couch with a pre-teen girl laying on a beanbag chair, all three watching television.
With a bang, every cabinet in the kitchen flies open. Pots and pans clatter out and onto the floor noisily. Steve’s voice fills the room chanting Latin.
“You know Latin?” Dale whispered.
“No, I just made that stuff up to sound scary,” Steve whispered back, eyes still closed in concentration.
The dog starts barking. The little girl lets out a scream. The mother stands and holds her daughter against her as she stares around
Steve, clearly enjoying himself, goes too far. He tries to spin the ceiling fan the opposite way, and it pops with a shower of sparks. The whole room is plunged into darkness before the ceiling fan creaks and falls to the ground as the father announces, “Crap, we tripped the breaker. What was that crash?”
Steve, meanwhile, tiptoes sheepishly out of frame before the scene fades away.
Everyone was quiet for a long moment.
“Umm,” Cathrine started. “Great enthusiasm, Steve.”
That opened the floodgates.
“You scare like a construction accident,” Dale said, shaking his head.
“Ten out of ten for volume, zero for artistry,” Laurie laughed.
“Maybe try to minimize the property damage next time?” Greg offered. “Thank you, Steve. Did you want to share, Edgar? You don’t have to…”
“Y-yeah,” he stammered. “I mean, this isn’t really a scare… it just sort of happened…”
“Lay it on us, Edgar!” Steve roared.
Edgar closed his eyes and a small apartment appeared, sink full of dishes, a half-empty wine bottle on the counter, string lights glowing weakly. A young woman sat at her kitchen table, head in her hands, shoulders shaking.
“She’s my wife,” Edgar said softly. “Was.”
The ghosts in the circle went still.
“She fell asleep on the couch the first night after I… didn’t come home. The next morning she put out mugs for two before she remembered.”
In the vision, the woman wiped her eyes and stood, staring at the empty mug across from her. She reached for it, hesitated. And the mug slid across the table toward her, gently, as if nudged by a loving hand. Steam curled from the mug, though it had sat empty on the counter for hours.
She smiled through her tears. “Hi, Ed.”
The scene held there a moment, golden and still, before fading.
The ghosts in the circle in the Starbucks sat silent for a full minute.
Finally, Steve cleared his throat. “That…” he tried nonchalantly wipe at his eyes. “That wasn’t scary.”
“No,” Laurie said with a sniffle. “That was haunting.”
