RedemptionA Story by Birdsong888 A modern ghost story
Michael had been dead a long time, but not as long as he had been alive. He was 36 years old, or he
had been that day. Technically, he should now be 56, had he left the house a few minutes later, or cycled to work. Daffodils were now blooming in the carefully kept borders of the park, in which Michael was a prisoner. Floral gems, which he could neither touch nor smell. Droplets of dew from the freshly mown grass did not cling to Michael’s shoes. A crisp April breeze blew, not ruffling a single hair on his head. He had come to realise a few things in the days and weeks that followed the crash. He had been stripped of his senses. Only his hearing and sight seemed unaffected. Nobody could see, hear or feel him. Although strangely dogs seemed to sense his presence. He was only able to move within the confines of the park, the gates and railings forming his cage. Finally, nobody else who had died in the accident had remained a ghost like him, he was alone. “Here he comes,” Michael said to himself, as he spied a plump middle aged man entering the park at a slow jog, wheezing as he made his a way down the path edging the road side. “Come on, speed it up,” he shouted. “Good lord, you’ve been doing this every day for the last month, you would think you would look less like Jeremy Biggins in a sauna by now,” he jeered as the jogger lumbered past. These one way conversations were the only interactions he had had for the past twenty years and Michael had removed the filter a long time ago, saying exactly what he thought, all of the time. There were none of the little niceties which grace most human interactions. What was the point? Being kind would bring no benefit to Michael. He was that tree, the one that fell in the woods, the one that no one could hear. He thought about the day of his death often. The squeal of the brakes, metal grinding against metal, a blizzard of glass. Details of his life before were hazy, the loss of his senses dulling his memories. That day was clear in his mind though. Cruelly vivid in every way. He shook his head, as if to shake the horror from his eyes and hugged himself in the weak sunlight, from which he could feel no warmth. Why was he here? He had asked himself the question a thousand times. 20 years of joggers and dog walkers, children playing football, mothers chatting over coffee. Tramps swigging cider from cans, fun fairs, foxes, cyclists and yoga, young couples in love, drunken brawls and lunchtime office workers. He was a fly on the wall. Just a spectator, a silent witness, a seedy voyeur, haunted by the living. “Hello Doris, you crusty old bag” The elderly lady was slowly shuffling towards the park’s café, for her usual morning cup of tea. Trotting behind her, were two Westland Terriers, Angus and Morag, who growled as they passed Michael. “Flea bags!” he barked, narrowing his dark green eyes. “Morning Doris,” beamed Todd the café owner with a bright smile. “Would you like a croissant with your tea this morning, on the house?” Todd gave Angus and Morag a dog treat each and returned to the kitchen, leaving Doris to spread her croissant with raspberry jam. Michael glanced at the table, then tore his eyes away. He didn’t want to see the hot tea poured carefully into the cup, drops of cool milk transforming it to a golden brown, as the steam curled languidly upwards. He didn’t want to hear the crunch of buttery pastry or imagine the sweetness of the sticky jam. Torture, by a thousand cuts. Still gazing out of the café window smeared with children’s hand prints, he was pulled back once again to the days after crash. Police tape and officers guarding the scene next to the park. Friends and family of the victims, coming to gently place bouquets of flowers. He used to sneer at those little shrines as he passed them on a roadside, with their faded laminated pictures and wilted moulding flowers. How tragic and crass. Grief should be private, dignified. How ironic, that he should have his own. Seeing his mother that day had made his heart burst. She was helped from a car by a neighbour. Wrapped in a thick winter coat, it had been Christmas Eve and the bitter wind stung the eyes of the bereaved as they wept by the railings of the park. Wisps of her grey hair fluttered around the brim of her blue hat. Skin papery soft, as fragile as a moth’s wings. She edged closer to the gates, clutching a small bunch of roses so hard that Michael could see the whites of her knuckles standing out on her thin veined hands. He tried to read the card on the flowers, but it had turned to the side and he couldn’t move it. What did it say, he imagined. He hadn’t been a great son, not even a good one. She had come back a few times, his birthday and the anniversary of the crash. Each time, smaller and frailer as if she too were becoming a ghost. Then she had stopped coming at all… Bang Bang Bang, Michael was startled from his reverie by a small red haired boy, banging on the window of the café. “Eugh the little maggot,” Michael groaned has he moved towards the door. Following behind was a woman, pushing a buggy. Her red hair was scraped back into a messy bun. She had dark circles under her hazel eyes and she wore a crumpled blue dress and a look of total exhaustion. “You’ve only yourself to blame,” Michael remarked as she tried to control the young boy, who was now throwing mud at the café windows. The woman rushed passed Michael, in order to buy the boy a placatory ice cream. “Unbelievable,” Michael muttered and stuck his foot out, to try and trip the boy up as he ran past, to no effect. If I was his father he thought and then stopped….. Picturing the little girl in her mother’s arms, a shock of dark brown hair and beautiful green eyes, the colour of sun rich olives. She had clutched his finger in her soft pudgy hand. He couldn’t remember her name now, it had faded like many of his memories, the details slipping away. He remembered he had left her though, in the arms of her mother and had never seen them again. The sun rose above the trees the next morning with relentless punctuality, casting long shadows across the parks lawns. “Come on you jelly bellied lump” Michael bellowed, on his way to the tennis courts as the morning jogger wheezed past. Only then did he notice a woman sitting on a bench near the shelter. She was wearing jeans with a faded New order t-shirt. Her long brown hair covering her face, as she held her head in her hands and silently wept. “Oh stop the blubbing, no one wants to see all that snot and self-pity,” he said as he walked passed. The woman gasped and looked up at him with unbelieving hurt etched across her face. Michael froze, in utter disbelief. “What did you say?” She said, her eyes ablaze. Michael could say nothing, his words were caught in his throat. He stared at her, his eyes agog, his mouth open. How could this be? He tried to speak again, but all that would come out was an incomprehensible stammering noise as he backed away from the woman, as if she were an escaped tiger. “That’s right, sod off,” she said as Michael had finally managed to get the message from his brain to his legs, to move. He turned and ran. He hid behind a tree, his brain failing to comprehend what had happened. He waited, his legs trembling all the while, until the woman finally left the park, hand in hand with a small child. That’s when it hit him, like a lorry smashing into a bus on a cold winter’s morning. There had been his chance, his only chance to speak to someone in 20 years and he had run away. This woman might have only just left the park but she may as well be on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. He sat grief stricken and prayed to a god he had long stopped talking to, for her to return. Summer, after a very wet and windy start had finally arrived. Todd the café owner had a spring in his step, as he was dating the café assistant, Belinda. Michael sat with a gloomy expression on his face, as he watched Todd smile over at Belinda whilst she was wiping the tables down. “He picks his nose, you do know that?” said Michael to Belinda as she rinsed her cloth. Belinda gave Todd a smile and a suggestive wink. Vomit inducing, coming in here will be like walking over broken glass, whilst this is going on, Michael thought. Doris was speaking to her new friend Margery at the next table. Angus and Morag eyeing Michael warily. “Well I’ve been on my own for nearly 30 years, you get used to it. Angus and Morag keep me company, don’t you?” said Doris, looking down at the dogs affectionately. “Yes my Burt went a long time ago,” said Margery in agreement. “Was it cancer dear?” asked Doris sympathetically. “No, I wish it had been. He ran off with that woman who used to deliver the Avon magazines,” said Margery. “Course, she left him 6 months later for a man with a fancy car. He asked to come back then, said he missed me and the kids,” added Margery, with a sigh. “I hope you told him to sling his hook?” said Doris. “I did,” said Margery with a chuckle. “Once he’d gone, we all realised we were happier without him. Funny how things work out for the best”. “I’m not listening to this tripe” Michael exclaimed and walked out of the open café door, passed the playground and there she was, the woman from the bench, standing in front of him with her arms folded. “I wondered how long it would be till I caught up with you, where have you been? Victimising some old lady or pulling the shell off a snail?” She said jabbing a finger in his direction. “I don’t know what you are talking about,” stammered Michael. “Yes you do, every time I see you, you seem to be shouting at people, I don’t know how they do it, but they manage to ignore you. I’m surprised someone hasn’t knocked you out”. She said, colour flooding her cheeks. “She’s been watching me!” Michael thought, flabbergasted “Look I’m sorry, I didn’t think you could hear me the other day,” he said, raising his hands apologetically in a don’t shoot gesture. “That makes it worse, you absolute coward! What gives you the right to make these comments, heard or unheard, like some kind of troll. Do you get a kick out of it? I should arrest you on a Public order charge, but you are not worth the paper work.” She said, as she ran her fingers through her long hair, returning them to her hips. Michael was not sure why she was calling him a troll and he knew that he should probably be offended but this was the first conversation he had had in years and it was both exhilarating and terrifying. “I’m really sorry and you’re a police woman, erm officer, erm person.” Michael stumbled and took a deep breath (or would have done if he’d been able to) “Please, I’m sorry, I was having a bad day,” he offered, as some sort of explanation “A bad day?” she exclaimed “when you decided to tell me to stop blubbing, that morning my husband had told me he was leaving me and my little boy. What was your bad day, did you look in the mirror or something?” He was starting to like this girl, very much against his better judgement. “Someone died,” Michael said. It was true, it was him and he’d been having a bad day ever since. “Oh,” she faltered, “I’m sorry, it still doesn’t mean you can go around being awful to everyone.” “You’re right,” he said “I’m really sorry”. “Right well that’s that then, try not to be such an arsehole in future. I had better go, everyone is staring at us,” she said, turning to go. Staring at you, Michael thought. This was not the first conversation in two decades that he had been hoping for. It left him shaky and sweating, but it had also left him wanting more. He felt a spark of humanity ignite in him, so small and weak, but it was there. He returned to the café in a daze, just as Belinda brought Doris and Margery their tea with toast and marmalade. Michael looked at the hot buttery toast and sighed. Doris remarked “Ah look at the two love birds,” pointing over at Todd and Belinda. “It’s nice to see young people having fun.” “Talking of young people, my Grandchildren are coming to stay this weekend or the wildlings, as I like to call them.” Margery cackled. “Bit of a handful?” Doris asked. “You could say that. They’re like three mini tornados. Wouldn’t be without them though. I do love em’, love it when they leave too,” she said, with a wrinkly smile. “How about you, you got any Grandchildren?” asked Margery. Doris turned to look out of the café window, as if she was looking into the past. “Possibly,” she said, mysteriously. “Don’t think I’ll ever know. My charlotte left home at 17 and we never saw her again. She was so impetuous, so angry with the world, with us. We shouldn’t have been so strict, I see that now.” Tears pooled in the corners of her eyes and she sighed and gave Angus a little tickle behind his ear, which was to comfort her, as much as it did him. “Oh dear, I am so sorry,” said Margery earnestly, wishing she had never asked. “Cheery, so very cheery,” Said Michael rolling his eyes. It was a week later that he spotted her. He had thought about their next conversation. He couldn’t talk to her in front of other people. Lest they would start to think the woman was stark raving mad. He also didn’t want her to know that he was a ghost, he didn’t want to frighten her off. She might think she was going insane and would never return to the park. It was dusk and she sat under a tree reading a book. She looked paler and thinner than before. “Hello,” he said, gently. “I saw you from across the park and thought you looked sad….” “And you thought you would tell me to stop whining,” she interrupted him, with a scowl. “No no, I just thought I would say hello that’s all, sort of start again,” he offered, with a shy smile. “Is it your husband, the reason that you look sad.” He winced at this over familiarity. His rusty social skills needed conversational oil. But she just nodded and broke down in silent sobs. Michael tentatively sat down on the grass next to her. He was unsure what to say or do. He was never really very good at these things, even when he was alive. “He’s gone.” she whispered. “He just walked out. The house is on the market already. Poor Mikey doesn’t know what’s going on. He cries at the slightest thing and has night terrors. He just wants his daddy. The b*****d hasn’t called to speak to him, not once. I don’t know why I’m telling you this, I hardly know you. It’s strange, maybe it’s because I know that you don’t feel sorry for me.” She said with a grimace. “I feel sorry for him, he sounds like an absolute arse.” Michael said, vehemently. The woman smiled at him and nodded. “I’m sorry I don’t know your name,” asked Michael. “It’s Kat, Kat Turner.” she said blowing her nose noisily into a tissue. “Or PC Turner?” Michael said, with a smile. “And Mikey is the little chap I saw you with the other day?” “Yes, that’s him, poor little man. He’s at my Mums tonight so I can have a break. Thank God I’ve got her, she’s the only family me and my brother have, my Dad walked out on us a long time ago. Seems like history is repeating itself.” she said, the tears starting again. Michael thought about the child he had left and felt a wave of self-loathing. Why had he left? Was he that selfish? Did he feel trapped in a relationship he hadn’t intended to be long-term? Possibly. The overwhelming emotion he could remember was fear. Fear of failure, fear of rejection, fearful that he simply wasn’t good enough. Walking away was easier than finding out if his fears were valid. “Men are idiots,” he said, shaking his head. “Is that an apology on behalf of the male population?” She asked with a smile. “Yes, that was an official expression of regret,” he said with a bow. “Well thank you…” she paused, realising she didn’t know his name. “It’s Michael,” he said, with a smile. He didn’t offer to shake her hand, one step at a time. “I’m a writer,” he lied. “I often come to the park to sit and think, and people watch.” “I’m not going to end up in one of your stories, am I?” She asked, with a grimace. “Don’t worry, I have plenty enough material with Doris and Margery in the café,” he laughed. He actually laughed. It felt so good. “Well, Michael the writer, I have to go and meet my brother for a drink now, he’s trying to cheer me up,” She said, rolling her eyes. “So I had better go and be cheered up. Thanks for the chat; It’s nice to be able to talk to someone who doesn’t give a s**t,” she said, with a mischievous smile. “Happy to not give a s**t, anytime,” he said, as he watched her gather her things. “See you around some time,” he went on to say, with a forced casualness he didn’t feel. She waved him a goodbye and walked towards the gate. Michael sat on the grass and cried. Tear of joy and grief. He rejoiced in the feelings of what it was to be human, to be kind, to listen, to laugh. He grieved for the loss of his life in which he had taken these things for granted. He sat under the tree as a gloomy dusk turned to night. Thinking of Kat and their conversation, he felt something he had not felt in a long time. Hope. The nights were lonely, he had never slept, these 20 years. He had tried at first but sleep would never come. As the noises of the day faded, other sounds punctuated the stillness. The eerie cry of a fox, the squeak of a fat rat as it rummaged through the café bins. The weekends were better with late night revellers often cutting through the park. Loud and drunk, unsteady on their feet, clutching one another, laughing. Michael heard a noise then that drew him away from his thoughts of Kat. A click clack sound of high heels on the path. He looked up and saw a young woman walking the unmistakeable zigzag gait of the tipsy. She had a phone in her hand, to light her way. She stumbled a little and dropped it. It smashed on the path. She swore and bent to pick it up, it was then that Michael saw him. He was sat in the shelter, dressed in black, hood up. The man started to slowly move then, like a leviathan woken from its slumber. Michael got up, feelings of dread creeping up his body like a cold mist and watched as the man started to take slow lazy steps towards the woman. She had started to walk again now. Click clack click clack, like a homing beacon to him. Maybe she had heard something or maybe it was instinct, but she turned to look behind her and saw him. She quickly turned back and increased her pace. “Run!” Michael screamed and even though he knew she couldn’t hear him, the girl started to run. Michael ran to the man, whose face was a mask of sickening hunger and malice. Michael tried to push him back, his arms sank into the man’s body like smoke through a net. Although he couldn’t look, Michael knew he had caught her once the noise of her heels had stopped. He couldn’t turn around, his impotence paralysed him, that was until he heard her scream. He ran then, to the edges of his confines, to the road and screamed into the night for help, his screams echoing hers. Tears running down his face, he screamed hopelessly until his voice grew hoarse. “Michael?” Had he heard his name? “Michael is that you? What the hell? What are you doing?” From across the road, two figures were running towards the park. He could not believe his eyes. Kat and what must be her brother, were now heading for the gate. Kat’s brother, looking perplexed, repeatedly glanced from his sister to the park in a state of utter confusion. Michael wasted no time. “There’s a man attacking a girl,” he said, frantically pointing into the gloom. Kat nodded grimly and ran past him, her brother in pursuit. He knew when they had caught the man, he could hear a kerfuffle of shouts and punches and then a soothing voice, which must have been Kat’s as she comforted the girl. He could not go over to them, he could not put Kat in that position, she might lose her job or indeed question her own sanity. That night, after the blue lights had faded and stillness had returned. Michael sat with his head in his hands and wept, trembling as he brushed tears from his newly opened eyes. The next morning Kat made her way to the Café, she had searched every inch of the park looking for him, but he wasn’t there. “Have you seen a gentleman by the name of Michael in the café this morning, I believe he is a regular?” Kat asked. Dressed in her uniform, she was questioning Todd the Café Owner. “He’s about 5ft 11, mid 30s, brown hair, always seemed to be wearing a white shirt, thin black tie with piano keys on it and black trousers, which were a little too short, white socks and slip on black shoes. He’s a writer, you must have seen him; he was always here. He witnessed and prevented an attack taking place in the park last night,” Kat added. Todd shook his head apologetically and said that he couldn’t recall seeing him at all. Kat turned to the old lady who was sitting at the table with two Highland Terriers at her feet. The old lady had the most curious expression on her face and seemed to be staring at Kat, opened mouthed. “I’m sorry dear” the old lady said, shaking her head in disbelief “but you are the absolute image of my daughter Charlotte, but she must be at least 50 now,” she added, a little sadly. “That’s funny, my mums called Charlotte,” Kat said, with a smile. “I’m PC Turner, I’m looking for a witness to a crime last night. His name is Michael, he’s a writer….” But Doris wasn’t listening, she just said slowly. “My name’s Doris Turner”. © 2024 Birdsong888Author's Note
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1 Review Added on October 2, 2024 Last Updated on October 2, 2024 Tags: #ghoststory, #lighthearted, #twist |
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