... 2 little ghosts
"Hey man, imagine if, like, humans exist," one began slowly. He paused, then added: "And what if, like, they tell ghost stories instead of telling human stories."
"Yeah that's...that's really deep man," his friend replied.
"What if, we were alive at some point, and we used to tell ghost stories?"
"Woah, that's- yeah that's def far out." There was another pause.
"Hey man, I got an idea. Let's, like, do a ghost story thing. Like, I'll tell one, and you listen."
"Okay, yeah, that's cool. Def cool. I'm liking the irony here man, I'm liking it."
"Okay, I'll go now. This one's called..."
The Perfect Couple
I finished
unpacking the last of the boxes, heaving a loud sigh. We had finally moved in!
I turned to my wife and saw that she had, at that same moment, finished dusting
the shelves. We smiled and laughed like normal couples do. She twirled across
the living room and into my arms, because this was supposed to be a whimsical
moment. Unfortunately, I didn’t catch her, and she went crashing into a pile of
empty cardboard boxes, clouds of dust flying into the air.
“Ouch,” she said, and we laughed again. Our old neighbors
would avoid us, saying we had “plastic smiles, and soulless beady looking
eyes”, but I disagree. Our smiles are made of steal. Quite literally, as a
matter of fact. My wife and I both wear braces, because we believe that as good
citizens it is our duty to have good teeth.
“Our new house is looking mighty fine!” she said, brushing
the dust off of her red, polka-dotted a-line skirt. I clenched my hands, so as
to look manly before placing them on my hips in agreement. My stomach growled.
“I’ll go and make us some lunch,” she proclaimed cheerfully.
In the
meantime, I decided to visit our new neighbors. Stepping outside under the
musky October sky, I paused to look at our wonderful new house. It was
dilapidated, with partially boarded up windows, the roof caving in, old egg
stains from sugar high trick-or-treaters of past Halloweens stuck to the
façade, and a dead yellow lawn. It was perfect. The neighboring ones, in
contrast, were all cream colored with two windows, and a red door. I figured
I’d go for the one on the right, and knocked on the door.
“Hello?” a tentative looking young boy cracked open the
door. I stuck my face into the gap, smiling, the metal in my mouth gleaming in
the light. You have to let kids know that you’re friendly. He whimpered, and
ran crying “there’s a funny man at the door!”.
“Tell him we don’t want a Bible,” I heard a voice answer.
Soon after, a boy was tugging his mother towards the entryway.
“Wadda you want?” she asked. Curlers were in her hair, and
she was wearing a pink bathrobe. I motioned towards our house.
“Oh, you’re the one that lives in the shack?” I wanted to
add that my wife lived there too, but she cut me off with:
“I thought they’d given up on selling that thing. You know
you shouldn’t have bothered, you can’t even renovate. Can’t sell it. Tear it
down maybe, but nobody’s gonna want whatever you build on top. Some weird folks
used to live there, and now nobody wants nothing to do with it.”
I heard my
wife call for lunch, and waved goodbye to the woman as she stared at me with
intense curiosity and a hint of repulsion. When I stepped into the house, it
was silent. I could hear no sign of life, and certainly smell no lunch.
Suddenly, I felt something hit my back, as though I were being punched. I fell
to the floor and noticed blood running along the wooden boards. The room span,
I had to concentrate for every breath I took. Slowly, the corners of my vision
grew dark, the lights started fading out. The last thing I saw was my wife’s smiling
metal mouth.
When I woke up, I was in the same spot I had left off. Only
this time, something was different. I stood up, looked around, and to my grand
disbelief saw that my body was still lying on the floor. Yet, somehow, I had
managed to successfully stand up. I ran frantically upstairs towards the
bathroom, looking for a mirror. I stared at my reflection. It was definitely
me. I hit my head against the wall and felt no pain. This could only mean one
thing: I was dead and a ghost. This was not a dream; only irrational people
would have come to a conclusion like that. As if to confirm this, I heard
noises going on downstairs. I hurried to inspect, and found my wife dragging my
body across the floor with incredible strength. “She must have worked out while
I was not looking,” I thought, before abruptly switching my focus to that the
fact that she had, it seemed, been implicated in my death. A knife was lying on
the floor, bathing in the pool of blood. She had obviously stabbed me with it.
I felt more horrified than sad. How could you live with someone for so long
only to have them stab you? They should
use poison, like everybody else. This was embarrassing. I watched her drag my
body towards…the kitchen? What was she going to do, cook me? I then realized
that she hadn’t made lunch and was probably starving by now, especially after
hauling a corpse through the house. My insubstantial heart leapt as she
brandished a butcher’s knife and chopped off my left arm. I began to cry. That
was not the correct way to prepare a body, she was doing it all wrong!
She then
proceeded to wash the limb with dishwashing liquid before seasoning it and
placing it in the oven. I stepped into the kitchen and kneeled down, peering
into the oven window. I was invisible to her. The skin on my arm slowly
crackled and curled under the heat. Oddly enough, I began feeling pain. I felt
as though I were being sucked into the oven, the unbearable heat surrounding
me. Before long, it was as though I were in the oven. As a matter of fact, I was in the oven. I tried to move, to get out, but all I
could do was crinkle my fingers. I saw my wife’s face on the other side of the
window, chuckling. She had done this on purpose. Somehow, she had managed to
transfer my soul into my arm. I was alive again, but not in the way anyone
would ever want to be. As my skin slowly peeled back, like a sticky band-aid
being ripped off an unhealed wound, I wanted to shout “Ow! This hurts more than
a thousand paper cuts dipped in lemons!” Unfortunately, only writhing fingers
could express my excruciating torment. After what felt like years, I was
removed from the oven, the cold air burning against my naked flesh, and placed
onto a platter. My wife sharpened a large knife. An icy blade sliced through
me, and I felt my bones crack as she cut me to pieces. I was submerged in gravy
and cut as she feasted. I could feel every crunch, every bite, in her mouth. I
slid down her throats and landed into the bile of her stomach. It would have
been fun, had it not been so painful. I could feel her digestive fluids
working, and prayed that it stop there. Finally, it did. I could no longer feel
anything, except claustrophobic. Everything was dark.
“Now you’ll be with me forever darling,” I heard her merry
voice say from outside.
That’s when I
fully realized what she had done. She had simply transferred my soul to a
modest portion of my body so as to eat it, thus conserving me forever. Why my
wife was just the smartest! We could now be together for the rest of our lives,
thanks to her mature decision. I suggested to her, from the depths of her
gastric fluids, that maybe the neighbors would like to try. She agreed, before
adding: “Shush! Don’t tell them. It will be a surprise.”
I could almost see that beautiful metallic smile as she
began carving her knife.
The End
"Woah man, woah," the ghost said, after hearing the story.
"I know right?" he lay down on the grass and stared at the stars.
"I met a human once..." he sat silent for dramatic effect.
"No way."
"Yeah... but I can't tell you much because I ATE IT!"
They howled with laughter for the next several hours, until the breath they didn't have left their lungs. The only thing ghosts love more than stories is telling them.
Disclaimer: this is not an accurate representation of
cannibals, nor does it attempt to be. It is, however, an accurate
representation of people with braces.
Remember to check tomorrow's surprise, as it's sure to carve a smile on your face!
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