by Jerry Cole
I laughed a little nervously. “Am I one?”
“You were. But I technically invited you this time.”
I smiled. “Do you get a lot of people coming here at night? Besides the actual ghosts.”
“It’s more of a tradition,” he said quietly. “But I caught some high school kids making out in a mausoleum once.”
The way he said ‘making out’ was the way my grandmother would say it; a mix of distaste and misunderstanding what the big deal about it was.
“Who would pick this place to do that?” I had kissed in some fairly strange locations but never in a literal graveyard.
He shrugged. “No one around to see.” He looked at me and I saw the shadow of a smile on his face. “Except the ghosts.”
I don’t know what I expected from such a soft-spoken person, but I was a little surprised by his small jokes.
“You told me you were going to tell me a story,” he reminded me.
“Oh yes of my tragic situation, all about how I am locked in a tower cruelly like a fairytale.”
He frowned slightly but motioned for me to continue.
“I suppose it all started when I was born,” I began.
“Do you really need to go that far back?” he asked incredulously.
“Well, maybe not but it adds context.” I continued on without waiting for a response, “I was an oops baby. My parents were happy with my two siblings, the evil twins in this story. But they said that I was a happy accident whenever it got brought up.”
“That’s how they talked about you?” Cecil interrupted.
I waved my hand. “I really didn’t care. They were rich and I had a very comfortable life...until now.” I explained about my previous lifestyle and the day that happened only a week ago, even though it already felt like ages, where I was shipped off without any time to prepare myself mentally. I tried not to insult the town too much since he’d lived here all his life and may have even liked it. I also didn’t mention how creeped out by the cemetery I was when I first saw it.
Once I finished the story I waited for his response. We continued walking in his path around the cemetery in silence for a few moments, like he was really thinking about what I said. That was new. I was used to telling stories at parties that were quickly forgotten and it’s not like I could talk to my siblings much.
“I don’t think parents should do that kind of thing to their kids,” he said finally.
“I agree,” I said miserably. “But I didn’t have a choice. I’m sure your family is normal despite your job.”
He shrugged. “I don’t know what normal is. I don’t have siblings and anyway my parents are dead.”
I almost fell completely over as I stopped dead in my tracks. He said it so casually, like it was like saying the sky was blue. “I’m sorry?” The words spilled from my mouth.
He shrugged again. “It happened many years ago.” It was hard to gauge his emotions. His voice was always the same even, soft tone.
“I’m sorry for bringing it up then.” I didn’t think I had ever spoken to someone about death before. My grandparents died when I was a baby and I’d never even been to a funeral. The voice of Beth replayed in my head. If she weren’t exaggerating, I’d be having this kind of conversation a lot more often.
“It’s fine. My family isn’t normal either.” He kept going but I felt awful once again.
Last time I also felt like I’d been an asshole to Cecil. What was it that made me lose all sense of poise around him? I could be blunt and direct everywhere else but here I didn’t want to make Cecil mad or sad. People didn’t talk about this kind of subject when you were laying on a sofa upholstered with fine silk while eating gold foil off of peanuts and feeding them to the man you were taking home that night and then never seeing again. I missed those days. It was so much simpler than. I didn’t have to worry about offending anyone or saying the wrong thing; we were all piss drunk most night anyway and I said whatever I wanted. That attitude got me a job today too.
We walked in silence for a while longer and I began to see my house in the distance once again. We made a loop around the cemetery without me really noticing it.
“You do this every night?” I asked again. I just couldn’t believe it.
“I take care of this place.” I saw a shine in his eyes and his voice raised just enough for me to notice. “I will do whatever is best to protect this place. It’s the least I can do for all the people who trusted me and my family to watch over their loved ones.”
“You really love this place, don’t you?” I knew the answer, but I liked how firm and sure of himself he was sounding all of the sudden. I made something tighten in my chest. I wanted to hear it more.
“It’s my home,” he said with a smile. “And I’m the caretaker. It’s important to me.”
I wanted to ask him how he managed to care so much about a place so terrifying to the average person, but I had stuck my foot in my mouth enough for one night. I thought I might come here, satisfy my lingering curiosity, and then go back to spending my nights here in hell bored. But I just had more questions about Cecil and his life here. I realized I wanted to come back.
“I think I ought to head home, I have a job to think about now,” I said while making a show of yawning and stretching. I was tired but I felt a buzz in my chest that wasn’t going to let me sleep just yet.
“You did get a job?” Cecil asked.
I smiled. “I’ll tell you about that next time.”
He turned away, but I thought I caught him mouthing the words after me: next time?
He turned back. “Next time.”
I felt a rush at the promise. “Goodnight Cecil.”
“Goodnight Adam.”
I flashed a peace sign and turned back around to head back to the house. I felt an energy in my step that wasn’t there before. I guess I was more excited to see him again than I would have thought. He was just so interesting. At least, that’s what I told myself.
***
I thought I was very sneaky getting back into the house close to three o’clock in the morning, but as I crept up the stairs and into the hallway, suddenly the lights flipped on and Stacy stood at the end of the hallway in her pajamas with bags under her eyes and her arms crossed.
“Hey—” I began but was quickly cut off by a glare.
“Where did you go?”
“The cemetery.” I decided it was best not to lie, she could see right through them.
She looked lost for words for a moment and continued to glare at me, only now the glare was confused too. “What do you mean you went to the cemetery?”
“I made friends with the groundskeeper,” I said, not sure if that was Cecil’s title or not.
“You are going to get murdered in this creepy town,” Stacy ranted. “I’m supposed to be watching you and making sure you don’t do the kind of dumb shit people in horror movies do.”
“I promise you Stacy, he’s nice and the same age as me. He isn’t some axe wielding zombie man or whatever you are picturing, I promise.”
She squinted her eyes. “It’s still dangerous to go out at night alone.”
“I’m an adult Stacy. And the only thing keeping me here you have no control over. I promise it’s fine.”
“I want to meet this “groundskeeper” sooner than later,” she said firmly, clearly ignoring my previous points.
“Fine, fine.” I raised my hands in defeat. “I’ll invite him over some time for our homemade delivery. It will be fine, he’s my friend.”
She rolled her eyes. “You don’t have friends.”
I said stuff like that about myself all the time, but for some reason this time I felt a tightness in my chest.
“Yeah,” I agreed and looked away.
“Of course you’d manage to pull something like this,” I barely heard her mutter to herself. She spoke up again after pinching the bridge of her nose, “Get to sleep Adam. You have work and if you are late for your first actual shift, I’l
l have to have a meeting with your groundskeeper about buying a new plot.” With that she turned sharply and went back into her bedroom, closing the door firmly behind her.
I didn’t know Cecil well enough to invite him to dinner, did I? It didn’t stop me from thinking about it though. And I couldn’t stop thinking about it either.
Chapter Six
Beth said I could wear jeans so I wore the only pair my father had packed and a cropped yellow button up which you couldn’t even see the front of due to the apron which was a little disappointing but that was what let me sneak it past Stacy that morning so it least that was something.
The worst part was waking up in the first place. It was a morning shift and I had to wake up at 7 AM for maybe the first time in my entire life unless already being awake the whole night counted. Stacy had probably been awake for hours when I got up and had half a pot of coffee waiting for me. We didn’t have any creamer so I struggled to drink half a cup with sugar and milk but it wasn’t the same. I shamefully poured most of it down the sink.
I had to walk to work as my parents hadn’t left me or Stacy a car at the house. I eventually made it, five minutes early even and found the door locked. I knocked a few times and then a few times more. Finally, Beth unlocked the door and let me, looking almost out of breath.
“Sorry! Didn’t hear you,” she apologized and then immediately turned around and headed off into the backroom so quickly even though she was only walking.
I followed after her and into the cool back room. I had found out the other day that it was so cold because a fridge as big as a room was keeping flowers fresh. I had no idea that would help but I didn’t really know much about flowers before this. I couldn’t stop thinking about how desperate Beth must have been to hire me. “What do you want me to do today?” I asked.
She grabbed a pair of flower cutters and began working on an arrangement of yellow roses and daffodils. “I mostly need you to take orders once we actually open. I have a feeling today’s going to be very, very busy. Do you remember how to use the register?”
“I do.” It wasn’t that hard to learn, but the register looked like it might die at any moment. Beth said it was as old as the shop.
“And when it is really slow I’m going to need you to organize orders in the fridge and print off invoices, and clean up around the shop, and there’s a few phone calls I need you to make, and you could give me a hand if everything else gets done.”
I waited for her to take a breath but it seemed like she never did. “That’s a lot.” I felt a little distressed.
She turned and smiled. “I think we can get it all done. I know you’ve only worked one shift before this, but you caught on really easily. Just work on one thing at a time. I think you can handle it.”
Another weird feeling manifested in my ribs in the center of my chest. It was happening a lot lately. “You do?”
“Of course.” She winked at me then turned back to her work. “Go ahead and unlock the doors again, we are open now.”
Again, I felt strange as I flipped the lock open and flipped the closed sign around. But it wasn’t a bad feeling. I just didn’t know what to call it.
***
We were as busy as Beth said we would be. The hours seemed to pass by quickly as I took down orders and, in the meantime, worked on her list. Throughout the day Beth kept telling me how I was doing a good job and thanking me. It was strange.
I was working on sweeping the floors when the bell on the door chimed again. I set the broom up against the wall and headed to the counter.
“Adam?” Cecil and his shocking white hair, somehow warmer in the lights, turned around at the counter.
“Oh my God,” I couldn’t help the words falling from my lips.
Cecil scrunched up his forehead. “What?”
“It’s,” I was sputtering. “I’ve never seen you in the daylight before?”
“Did you still think I might be a ghost?” He asked.
I felt a little embarrassed. “No,” my voice trailed off, basically revealing the truth.
He smiled a little. “It’s fine. It’s nice to see you before midnight.”
“It’s nice to see you too.” It was nice to see him. I meant it. It made me realize that I didn’t just have to keep meeting him in the middle of the night, we could do it anytime. I wasn’t sure why that made me so happy. “What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you that too. I see this is where you got your job.”
“Yeah. I was going to tell you about it next time but I guess the drama has been taken from it.”
“I’m sure you could still tell a good story. But does this mean your parents will let you come home?”
“No way.” I shook my head and laughed slightly, humorlessly. “I have to prove I can stick with this.”
There was something like relief on his face. “You got the first step done at least.”
“At least. Now you have to answer my question.”
“I’m here to order my regular, but I guess you don’t know what that is.”
“Yeah no, Beth didn’t mention anything like that, I’ll call her in here,” I said and then turned to where the backroom was and yelled, “Beth! I need you!” I found out earlier that I had to yell or she would be too caught up in her work to hear me.
Beth came bustling out and her eyes immediately softened when she saw Cecil. “Cecil! You are right on time; I just was so caught up in everything.”
“It’s fine Beth,” Cecil said in his soft, gentle voice.
“Oh right.” Beth clapped her hands together. “Adam this is Cecil, he takes care of the graveyard—”
“Oh Beth, I already know him,” I interrupted her.
“We are friends,” Cecil added.
The tightness in my chest returned. I did have a friend. But it seemed too easy to me. How could he call me a friend so quickly? How was I supposed to know if it was real?
Beth’s eyes widened as she looked between us. She faced away from me and mouthed something to Cecil that I could barely see and couldn’t make out exactly. She wasn’t exactly subtle about it so I knew it was about me.
Whatever she was saying to him he just nodded a little to her and then cleared his throat. “My regular?”
“Yeah, what is that?” I asked Beth.
“Cecil can explain it to you while I go grab it from the back. And I can show you where later Adam so you can get it for him from now on.” Beth left quickly, a strange small smile on her face.
Cecil suddenly looked embarrassed. He had a light dusting of pink on his pale face. “Beth has a lot of left-over flowers, or ones that are wilting, or whatever that she can’t sell. So I buy them for a discount and then take them to the cemetery.”
“What for?”
He looked away. “A lot of people don’t have people to come visit their graves for whatever reason. So I,” he paused like he was nervous. “So I leave flowers for all of those people who don’t get any from anyone else.”
“That’s so sweet,” I blurted out without thinking. I never thought about that, about the people who had no family to remember them.
“You think so?” Cecil looked up at me. “You don’t think it’s weird?”
“Yeah, I'm pretty sure you are going above and beyond what a graveyard keeper is supposed to do but it’s awesome.”
“I just don’t want anyone to feel alone,” he said, his voice barely above a murmur.
“No one wants to be alone,” I echoed.
He looked like he was going to say something else but Beth walked in carrying two large buckets full of flowers. Like Cecil said some were wilted and several were missing more than half of their petals. Even as sad as they looked individually, together it looked like a bounty of colors.
“This is all I have for this week, I’ll add it to your tab,” she said looking between us. “Sorry did I interrupt something?”
“No,” Cecil said quickly. “Thank you, Beth.” He took the buckets from her
and seemed to struggle with the weight a little. I found it almost endearing but locked that thought away to deal with later. “I’ll be seeing you Adam.”
“Tonight?” I tried to be casual but hope snuck into my tone.
He grinned. “Tonight.”
Chapter Seven
My days for the next week and a half happened the same way every day. I would go to work in the morning until the evening when we closed. I would go home and sleep then eat dinner. Then I would waste time until the sun went down before heading over to the cemetery. Then I would hang out with Cecil for as long as it took us to walk the perimeter of the graveyard. Stacy commented on my going out less as I proved to her that I was still going to work and on time. She still kept mentioning I needed to bring him over soon for her to meet. She kept saying it was part of her “job” or something like that.
I hadn’t asked him yet. It felt too official. I’d never brought anyone back to my house to just sit down and have dinner. Stacy was right. I didn’t have friends. I just knew other young rich kids wanting something to do, someone to do, to pass the time. Cecil was so sure that we were friends but I had no idea how to be one. I wanted to be for him. I wanted to be a good friend too.
“You’re funny,” Cecil said once as we passed several mausoleums standing stark with their white marble against the black night.
“I am?” I asked. I had just said that I wondered if ghosts had to hang around their grave or if they could go anywhere. I asked him if he thought there were ghost trains and ships so they could travel the world. “I’m just saying whatever comes to my mind.”
“I like that about you,” he admitted quietly.
“Thanks?” I wasn’t sure how to take the sudden compliments.
“I wish I could do that. I just overthink, I think,” he said with a little sad smile on his face.
“You can say whatever you want around me.”
That seemed to catch him off guard.
“I just mean, you don’t have to worry about me judging you if that’s what you’re worried about. I’ve been told by many people that I should think a bit more about what I say before I do, so I can’t judge you without judging myself.” I smiled at him in what I hoped was comforting.