by Dean Cole
‘One night, I was lying in bed. I was upset and couldn’t sleep. When I was lying there crying, I could have sworn someone lied down behind me, placing their hand on my shoulder. I felt it. It was so real. And it was him. His touch. His smell. And I can’t stop dreaming about him. Only, they’re not like real dreams. They’re memories of our time together.’
‘Dreams … of your memories …’ said Esther, squinting sagely through the gloom and taking a long, slow drag on the cigarette. ‘Interesting. I’ve never heard of that before.’
I entwined my fingers and leaned forward, anticipating what she thought it could mean. I felt at ease in Esther’s company. An openness, an acceptance, of which I had never witnessed in another person, emanated from her. I could have divulged my deepest, darkest thoughts and emotions and she would have listened without a trace of judgement. Either that or my senses were being affected by that cigarette she was puffing on; my nose detected something a little stronger than nicotine in the crackling tobacco.
‘What is it you want to know?’ she asked, after her moment of thought.
‘How is it possible? I mean, where is he? Elliot? In this world or another one?’
‘How to explain …’ Esther murmured. ‘When someone passes away, their physical body disappears. But a part of their identity, what you might call their soul, can remain. It’s usually a part of their soul that had a strong energy when they were alive, and was still present during the moment of death, like an intense desire or intention, or a goal they had yet to achieve. When this remnant of their soul takes on form and interacts with the physical dimension, that’s what we call a ghost.’
I held my silence. Esther read my need for clarification and continued.
‘Everything in this universe is made up of energy. The human ego, our identity, our beliefs, feelings, desires and memories are no different. They’re energy known as thought forms. If a person has a strong identification with their emotional self, if they experience great mental distress or die in particularly violent circumstances when they have much desire to live, those are very strong forms of energy.
‘But the residual energy that’s left behind when the body dies usually only has enough power to project itself into the physical dimension, not interact with it completely. And it weakens over time. Think of it as a sort of looping echo, an imprint. That’s why you often hear of ghosts walking along the same corridor or crying coming from one particular room in a house. If the haunting is more on a poltergeist level — apparitions, objects being thrown around, electrical equipment being tampered with — the energy is being fed by something else.’
I frowned. ‘Fed by what?’
‘Our own energy, usually. We keep ghosts alive by being aware of them, by fearing them, by wanting to know more about them. And if their intention is to interact with this dimension, to communicate a message or finish their business, they will take advantage of those strong points of attraction. They will reveal themselves, they will come for our physical energy sources and they will communicate with people who are able to perceive them. People like me.’
A strong point of attraction? Is that what I had created over the last decade? By constantly thinking about Elliot? By longing for him? Refusing to let the memory of him go? But if that was the case, then why the sudden activity now? Why didn’t he make his presence known years ago? I thought about the robin redbreast sitting at my bedroom window. The butterfly that had landed on my specs. Were they authentic signs of Elliot’s posthumous existence I had dismissed as irrelevant at the time?
‘I still don’t understand,’ I said. ‘I mean, why now?’ I shook my head, averting my eyes to the candles, their flickering light mesmerising.
Esther considered me affectionately for a long moment, a blue haze of smoke issuing from the arm of the armchair where the cigarette was held between pudgy fingers. It felt like her eyes were penetrating deep into my soul, seeing things there even I couldn’t see. Calmness suffused my body in spite of my eagerness to discover more.
‘You don’t have to understand everything at once. You just have to be open to the signs, to watch and learn. Recall what I told our writer friend, Mr Anderson, the other night, about twin flames?’ Esther asked. Ash fell from the tip of the cigarette, but she didn’t even flinch. ‘I believe this applies to you and your loved one. You share the same soul, therefore you share a bond like no other. In life and in death. I’d hazard a guess that if he’s still around he has a message for you, something important to teach you.’
My heart began to race. A message?
‘You, Quentin, unlike most others, possess deeply emotional and empathic traits,’ Esther went on. ‘You are affected by the world’s challenges, retaining your own and other people’s emotions like a sponge. Because of this you are gifted with exceptional extrasensory abilities. But I sense you are only just opening up to this gift. When you open completely, however, any spirit would find it hard not to be attracted to your energy. You have the power to create a special connection with them. You are the door they use to stay connected to our dimension.’ Even in the poor light I could see Esther’s face had become sorrowful. ‘Until now you have feared that part of yourself, you have tried to push it away and suppress it. It’s normal to fear it. I should know, I speak from experience. But you must trust it. It isn’t a curse. It’s your super power, there to be nurtured and used to your advantage.’
A shiver travelled the length of my spine. Was Esther saying that I … that we … were the same?
Her words hung in the smoke-filled air for a long moment before she pushed herself out of the armchair, heaving a sigh that carried years of wisdom. She walked over to her meditation space, unceremoniously crushed the cigarette in the singing bowl and seized from beneath the table a large patchwork handbag. She rummaged inside it, retrieving something before stowing the bag away again and sweeping over to me.
‘This is an amethyst,’ she said, unfurling her palm to show me a violet crystal attached to a cord of rope. ‘A good choice for you, I think. It will help bring fortune in love and freedom from past heartache.’
I stared at the stone, the candlelight affording enough light to see the cracks and veins beneath its translucent surface. It was beautiful, almost magical. I glanced up at Esther questioningly. She smiled and nodded.
‘A gift from me,’ she said. And without asking, she looped the necklace over my head and straightened it at the chest with a stroke of her fingers. She stared intently at my eyes, reading something in them.
‘You’re an intuitive soul, Quentin. And strong. Your strength comes from a knowing deep inside that there’s a higher calling. Having that knowing is half the battle, not all people are so fortunate. Trust your heart and watch for the signs. They will guide you. They’re everywhere if you’ll just take the time to notice them.’
I lowered my chin and touched the amethyst necklace, stroking its smooth surface with my thumb. I felt strangely emotional. And slightly intoxicated. I couldn’t work out if it was being in Esther’s presence, the aromatic herbs or those fumes from her dodgy cigarette. Her voice brightened suddenly.
‘Now go and enjoy your afternoon. Tonight we will be delving deeper into the spirit world. I think you’ll be surprised by what we’ll discover. I had a walk around this morning, feeling the place out. Hilderley Manor has more surprises than I first thought. And not all of them benevolent.’
I stood, thanked her, turned and walked to the door. I was just about to open it when her voice came out of the gloomy darkness once again.
‘Oh, and about the smoking …’ She was tapping one nostril with her index finger, grinning mischievously.
I winked and turned the door handle. Esther didn’t have to worry. Her secret was safe with me.
* * * * *
I left Esther’s room deep in thought. Half of me felt relieved, relieved that the uncertainty I’d been feeling for so long was beginning to clear. The other half was bringing up all sorts of new worries, emot
ions and questions. The naive part of me that had believed in the ghosts of fiction — the ones you could see and almost touch, that at least held some resemblance to a human being — felt disillusioned at this new understanding of what a ghost actually was. That part of me hoped Elliot still existed, at least as some sort of shadow of his former self. Remnants of his energy, like an intangible lock of hair or childhood tooth, just didn’t feel the same. But the shadowy figure in my bedroom … the smell of his skin … his unmistakable touch. Those things had felt very real indeed. Do our minds, as Esther had said, have more to do with ghosts than we think? A sort of symbiosis between the living and the dead.
I remembered watching a video online where a woman was helping people question their painful thoughts. In the video a father who had lost his daughter to cancer was plagued with thoughts of regret, of wanting his daughter to be alive when she was not. The questioning process allowed space for an alternative perspective: ‘She shouldn’t have died’ would become ‘She should have died,’ because that was what had happened, and arguing with reality, according to the woman, was a sure-fire way to make yourself suffer. When we allow ourselves this different perspective, not holding on so adamantly to our original thought, it opens space to consider how the turnaround could be a good thing: Why is it a good thing she died? The father thought: ‘Because she’s no longer in pain.’ ‘Because the rift in the family wouldn’t have been rebuilt had it not been for her death.’ But the most intriguing part of the video, once the bereaved father had become untangled enough from his painful thoughts to think more widely, was that he began to see that his daughter wasn’t as dead as he had originally thought. When our loved ones are in another room, if they’re on the other side of the world, do they not only exist inside our heads and hearts at that moment? Who knows if their physical body isn’t already gone? And if it has, does that have to take away our love for them, just because we’ll never get to see them again? ‘But I want to watch her grow into a woman, see her smile again,’ sobbed the tearful father. ‘And therefore you suffer,’ replied the woman. A hard pill to swallow, and a very radical way of thinking, but it was the truth nonetheless.
Why was I letting my desire for Elliot to exist in some shape or form beyond his death dominate my memory of his existence? Why wasn’t I content to just remember him how he was, remember how much he made me smile, remember that despite being taken so young he couldn’t have died a happier person, loving nature, loving life. Because those happy memories were there, when the pain wasn’t so strong, when the guilt and trauma didn’t have me in its grip, and they could light up my heart, make me forget the pain, make me feel exactly as I had felt when I was with him all those years ago. We want love so much, yet when we have it we take it for granted. Is losing love the only way we learn to appreciate it in this twisted game called life?
I needed to take my mind off the thoughts. I went back to our room and picked up Ethereal. There was a couple of hours to go before the prearranged time we had to be back in the lounge for a regathering, and with Kat still busy doing her interviews it gave me time to read a few chapters. I polished my specs, tucked the amethyst inside the neck of my jumper and went looking for a quiet place to settle.
Downstairs, book in hand, I wended the corridors, peering through giant doors. The house was impressively large, so large in fact that it was hard not to get lost in its maze of staircases and passageways. And it really was stunning. Now I had chance to appreciate it without projecting my fears and judgements on the place. Much work had gone into crafting its impressive architecture and Mrs Brown was clearly the perfect woman for the role of housekeeper, given the way every surface gleamed, every room was meticulously presented.
Eventually I stumbled upon what looked like another of the house’s central living rooms. But unlike the lounge’s pictures and paintings, this room’s walls were lined with rows of bookshelves. Two plush sofas were positioned in front of a striking fireplace, where kindling snapped and crackled enticingly in the hearth, keeping the autumn chill at bay. A cosier place to sit down and start a new book couldn’t have existed.
I slipped inside and closed the door quietly behind me. I chose one of the sofas and switched on the floor lamp that stood beside it for better light. Dropping onto the velvety upholstery I wriggled my back into the plush cushions, trying to get comfy. One of the windows was ajar, allowing a cool breeze to snake into the room and take the edge off the heat from the fire. It carried the scent of the garden flora, the singsong of birds and the soothing trickle of the water fountain. The perfect background noise to complement the cosy setting. I flipped the book over.
Ethereal’s blurb said the book’s story was about a parapsychologist named Jack Reid, who ventures to a picturesque village in Yorkshire to investigate a series of disturbing events and reported hauntings. When he discovers Harrington House, an abandoned building with a shady history and infamous reputation, he experiences shocking things that leave him questioning his beliefs and even his sanity. An intriguing premise to say the least.
A couple of pages in I found myself enamoured with Will’s writing style, succinct sentences littered with strong verbs that conjured vivid images of the narrator’s retelling of events. I liked the novel’s protagonist, Jack Reid, a self-deprecating and intelligent Scotsman with a contagious fascination for paranormal claims. I once again wondered if Will had based the character on himself. Jack Reid, toughened and distrustful due to a troubled past, bore more than a small similarity to the northern writer. Both author and main character shared the same preoccupation with uncovering the truth. It made you want to know what was going on deep in their psyche, what was driving them.
I figured it was safe to assume that fiction writers put a little of themselves into all their characters, that regardless of the gender, and the genre, their DNA would be identifiable if you searched hard enough. It was a real talent, to be able to get into so many different heads, to embody someone else entirely, a person who wasn’t even real. A gift you could see came with many benefits. The ability to see the intentions of others, and turn the tables on them should one wish. However Will did it, I liked having at least some insight into the mind of this enigmatic man.
A few chapters in I was already lost in the story. But the lack of sleep after last night’s impromptu nightcap was fast catching up with me, making it hard to keep my eyes open. The soporific effect of the fire wasn’t helping. I had reached what I recognised as the first major turning point of the plot when my eyelids fell shut …
I thought I’d missed the ceremony, that I was too late. But then I saw them, a sombre procession of grief-stricken faces coming out of the church to face the unforgiving daylight. In the time elapsed, I have been watching the proceedings from my discreet spot by the cemetery’s lychgate. I don’t want to get spotted, don’t want to do anything that could disturb this most private service.
The final stage of Elliot’s funeral, the burial, is now well underway. The coffin, embellished with wreaths of white lilies, has already been lowered into the freshly dug grave. Mourners stand around it, their garb as black as the carrion crow that sits and watches from its perch on top of a tilted gravestone. The vicar, an aged and handsome figure, peers up from time to time over his prayer book, keeping his eye on a tearful woman riven with heartbreak. I don’t need to have seen her before to know this is Elliot’s mother, Shelly.
The sombre setting of the church and its graveyard is brightened only by the unhindered sunlight of spring, the smell of flowers in bloom and the buzz of insects as they fly about stealing nectar. So much life and yet so much death in one scene, I can’t help thinking.
A short figure appears beside me suddenly, making me start. I blink through my specs at a blond haired girl with anaemic looking skin and owlish grey eyes. She’s a few years younger than me, maybe fourteen.
‘I’m Amy, Elliot’s sister,’ she says.
I evaluate her nervously, wondering if she’s come to tell me off for
spying on the funeral. ‘Quentin,’ I reply.
‘I know who you are,’ she says with a weak smile. ‘The glasses gave it away.’
This is a surprise. I have never met Elliot’s family before, only heard of them. His mother Shelly, his father Gideon, and his only sibling, the girl standing before me.
‘You do?’
‘Elliot talked about you a lot,’ says Amy.
‘Oh.’ I return an equally faint smile. ‘He talked about you, too.’
Amy’s face becomes sad. Our eyes disconnect and drift to the proceedings taking place in the shadow of the ancient church.
‘Shouldn’t you …’ I start.
Amy shakes her head absentmindedly. ‘Dad gave me permission to leave. I don’t want to see the part where he goes into the ground. It’ll only make me think about it constantly, him down there in that pit on his own, with the beetles and worms.’
I dwell on this mental picture and feel ill suddenly.
‘He never told us,’ says Amy. ‘You know, that he was gay. But we knew.’
Anxiety flutters inside my chest as I wonder where this is going. She goes on.
‘I could tell he loved you. In the way his eyes lit up when he talked about you. He worried about you, too. I never saw him be that way with anyone other than our spaniel, Monty. Elliot looked after him when he was dying. He hated seeing anyone in pain, even small insects and animals. His heart was really big.’
I feel my ears and cheeks burn as Amy no doubt watches them turn scarlet. But she doesn’t have to tell me how big Elliot’s heart was. You couldn’t be around him and not feel it.
‘He loved to write poems, did you know?’ Amy’s face brightens a little as she holds out a cream card for me to take. ‘We had these printed, it’s Mum’s favourite. Uncle Rory read it out at the sermon.’