“Why are you there?”
He widened his eyes and appeared perplexed. “I don’t know. I’ll be here until I’m not.”
“And. . .” I tilted my head to get a better look at him. “Hold up. Mom said her past lovers would help. So. . .you two had a thing.”
“As much as a thing would be here.”
“Why did you change my room?” I walked over to the bed. Roses lay there.
“I like things to look nice.”
“Do I have to wear these pajamas? Can you change them?”
He shook his head. “Those pajamas are a part of you. The thing you carry just like those bags your mother drags around.”
I frowned at them.
“But I can add some flair.” He pointed.
A red robe covered me.
“Thank you. I don’t like looking at them. They remind me of. . .a rough memory.”
“Then, one day you’ll have to take them off.” He beckoned me forward. “We should begin.”
I swallowed. “Our lesson?”
“Yes.”
“And if I understand the lesson. . .then I won’t need to see the other ghost?”
“That is my understanding.” He held out his hand.
“Okay.” I walked over and reached for it.
As soon as he touched my finger, the world blurred and spun around me. We fell and I couldn’t see what we were descending into. I screamed. His hands gripped me harder. Those fingers were much more powerful than they suggested. My throat went hoarse. I tightened my hold on his hand and turned my gaze to him, trying to speak. He was calm and relaxed. That made me stop screaming.
Stay calm. Stay calm.
Holding on closer to him, I scanned this tunneling energy around us as we continued to fall. I couldn’t make anything out but constantly spinning light swirling around me as if I were at the center of a cyclone. As we dropped, the funnel around us flickered. Wind whistled past my ears. Scared out of my mind, I looked down. A dark expanse spread out below me. It seemed like it would take forever, although everything happened so fast.
And then the falling stopped. My feet sank to a vibrating ground. A wisp of brightness pierced the darkness. The light flickered in the center of my view and in a blink more lights illuminated everything around me as if someone flipped on a switch.
A large forest stood before me, but the trees were different. Instead of leaves, clocks dangled from the branches. Thousands upon thousands of clocks—big and small. A constant clicking filled the air as if it were counting each second that passed.
We entered the forest.
“This. . .” I scanned the whole place. “This isn’t like the place with the doors.”
“We are different.”
“You mean you’re different from last night’s ghost?”
“I am.”
“Then. . .this place. This. . .forest. It doesn’t exist for others?”
“Only if I bring them here.”
I did my best to understand. “These places are each of your creations?”
“My spirit’s creation.”
“Why are there clocks hanging from the leaves?”
His skin brightened. “Time changes like leaves. And the universe is the tree, always sprouting new time. New buds rise. Then it goes green. And then it browns, dies, and falls away.”
“So. . .we’re the leaves?”
“That’s one way to look at it.”
I shook my head. “What happens to the leaves when they die?”
“More important. What happens to the tree?”
I studied all the dangling clocks. “The tree remains.”
“That is correct.”
We walked forward on a brightened path.
The light brightened the closer we got. So close, I realized an intricate webbing of stars and red vines wrapped around most of the trees’ trunks. I followed those plump vines down to where they emerged from the ground. Dry clock leaves covered the forest floor.
The more we went further, the more the trees darkened. The trunks curved inward on both sides of the path. The hovering branches and clock leaves arched overhead, stretching out to cover the path.
We left the forest and continued forward. Abandoned buildings surrounded us. At least I assumed no one lived there. I couldn’t hear or see anybody else. And the whole time we walked, I stepped over the clock leaves. They cracked under my spirit’s weight.
Two huge trees appeared ahead of us. Smaller buildings flanked them. We stopped in front of both.
He pointed at the trees. “Pick one.”
“Which one is the right one?”
“The one you choose.”
I pointed at the tree on the left.
“Not bad.” His voice rose. “Open!”
Crackling sounded. A rip tore into the tree. It broke away and then burst into evaporating bits.
Shocked, stepped back.
And then something even stranger happened. A golden light cut into this reality like a rip in a piece of fabric. And as that tear continued to lengthen, it opened, showing a vastly different reality before us.
Stairs appeared as if to guide us forward.
He gestured to the opening. “Step through.”
“Where does it go?”
“Where it needs to.”Without asking any more questions, I climbed the stairs and stepped into the new reality. It was somebody’s living room.