Story: Prisoner Invisible

A ghost tries to scare a visitor away from her decrepit house so he isn’t harmed, but her attempts have a much different effect.

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I stood on the precipice of a grand philosophical conclusion one afternoon, when a group of boys, stepping over the leaf-drowned border of the estate, bantered back and forth loudly enough to draw me out of reverie.

The chill wind crossed over them in powerful gusts as if to steer them off course, but they ignored it while deep in their early teenage bluster. The leaves sticking to their sides and the flowing streams of air about them outlined the size and shape of their translucent bodies. How long has it been? As in the previous times I had visitors, I could hear them, but only see them imperfectly. There were four of them, each with their own distinct combination of hues, flashing and warping about inside their translucency.

If Harold were still here, he’d remark how I cut a sufficiently artistic figure: the poetic image of a woman pausing to contemplate her lot in life, framed by his study’s window, silhouetted against the blank white autumn sky. There would be a hint of a bare branch poking out from the corner. If he were feeling charitable, he wouldn’t mention my tendency to steep in thought and abandon all the results in the world of my mind. I could construct a proper image of things, especially people, for who I thought they really were, in the theater stage of my mind, but could never hope to match it to the object before me in the real world. Calculating, but never bringing those consequences to bear. Measuring, but never sifting. Considering, but never confirming. He wasn’t wrong.

I stood and pondered the untouched sheet of dust on the desk before me. Unthinking, in the months preceding, I had practiced the only form of writing I could perform on the grand expanse of the dining room table. I should have procured smaller surfaces for practicing before ruining the biggest sheet of improvised paper in the entire house. It would be a few more months, perhaps years, before the dust would reset and I could write afresh on there again.

The group of boys toned down their clamor as they made their way closer to the house, right up to the front door steps. They stopped, their silhouetted bodies now becoming a little more opaque. This was expected. There is something about the proximity of an old and mostly intact house of a certain reputation that inspires automatic reverence in the minds of youth, rouses their sentiments, and excites the colors held within their silhouette. It remains a mystery to me the exact mechanics behind it all.

The boys spread their number out, considered the house’s facade, drawing out the curious rectangular devices that were in high ubiquity these recent years, and discussed the best course of action. The four then came together back at the front entrance, converging onto a common spot in front of them, in a semicircle.

I was mistaken about their number, as there was a silent, fifth boy among them, younger and smaller than the rest, who remained almost transparent, even up to the house entrance.

The four boys deliberated for another round, with the smaller fifth boy seeming to merely follow along with the conversation without adding to it. The boys then turned to the smaller boy, closed in on him more tightly, preventing any escape, and forcing him back closer to the front door. The small boy, with small bursts of dull grays and greens flashing inside of him, with no hope of deliverance from the tightening, pincer-like enclosure of his mightier peers, struggled for a moment to accede less ground than they took.

When he disappeared completely beneath the window frame of Harold’s study, there was a strong commotion coming from the floor below. I rushed out to the mezzanine that ran along the walls and overlooked the foyer. The boy was now just over the threshold of the entrance, inside the house, the door closed tight right in front of him. He at first pulled with both hands to force the door open. It budged little; one of the boys outside must be pulling the opposite way. The boy then resorted to pounding on the door and yelling—no words, just frustration. Even if he could successfully get outside, the boys would be waiting for him: another set of bars in his cell.

He quietly absorbed the surroundings of the foyer for a moment, then looked back at the interior side of the door. Accepting his fate, he turned away from the entrance, sullen, the patches of color inside of him fading to nothingness. He was now my proper guest.

I called out to him—not a name, but a mere noise to get his attention, though I knew any sound I make doesn’t reverberate in the traditional sense. I pushed away the surge I felt of immediate kinship to the boy, as the sentiment would remain unrequited. Though his fate was the result of the cruelty of men, and only temporary, mine was the result of mystery wrought by the divine realm, and who could speak to its permanency? If there’s a lesson to be learned to ensure my complete passing, if there even is such a thing, I haven’t come across it yet.

I flitted over to the opposite, western wall on the mezzanine, to position myself to enact my contingency defense plan when I receive visitors.

The western mezzanine side also offered a view of the heavy curtain that hung over the entrance to the official billiards room, which, at the time of my transition, had been converted into a makeshift study of my own. Harold eventually got his fill of the game at the lodge, instead of domestically, and my books were taking up too much space in his study. The direct inheritor of our estate, someone in Harold’s family (he had passed after me, but before I came to be in my current state), neglected taking claim of any of our possessions. Heaven only knows in whose hands the house is in now, but the neglect has persisted ever since, and very little of our literary collection has escaped the grounds.

Over the decades, the weight of the billiards table and my makeshift library extracted their toll on the floorboards, the drastically weakened conditions of which were hidden underneath thick drapery running up to the edges of the wall. A hapless boy’s cautious footsteps could easily act as the final straw to hasten the demise of the room’s entire floor, and perhaps the tragic demise of the boy himself.

As for my efforts to dissuade the curious from my study, and the house in general: I am able to make sounds, though they do not carry as well in the material world. Additionally, and owing to the deteriorated nature of the house, the sounds get lost among the various creaks of wood and scuttles of rats living in the walls. I can easily produce a disturbance of air, felt much like a gentle breeze, by passing through and around people, but it takes an enormous amount of rapid full-body movements on my part. It becomes a silly chore to hop and twirl like a madwoman around people, and owing again to the windy surroundings, the effect would not at all reach the intensity I require.

I had to develop a different ability. I could write in dust, but would it be possible to move heavier objects? The past few years saw me struggle to do such a thing. I started with small, hard objects: silverware and chinaware, trinkets and figurines, pens, coins, and found I could soon move them upstairs with considerable effort. I would balance these items lightly on the railing, whereupon I could tip them easily over and onto the ground floor below. This is useful for a number of reasons. Besides building up my strength, it relieved boredom, and most importantly, provided the best way to scare off visitors. I then moved onto more sizable items, namely, books from my study. I first piled many of them in front of the curtain that covered the entrance into the study. Onto the eastern mezzanine railing I hauled an assortment of books, all the way up from my study. Though Harold’s study was immediate to the eastern side, it felt deeply disrespectful to use another’s collection for this purpose.

I needed only to employ my books on a handful of occasions, and it accomplished my immediate goal of warding off the curious, but had the opposing effect in the long term. A previous pair of intruders, an amateur investigator of such phantasmagoric things as this place, spoke of it as the “Falling Library.” That I could create this reputation pleased a certain part of me.

Seeing that the boy wasn’t being deterred from advancing closer to the beclothed billiards room entrance, I took to my arsenal. With two rapid, airy strikes I swiped a broken fountain pen and a dull butter knife off the railing, a good six meters to the first floor. The pen’s noise was negligible but the knife landed blade-down and rang out with a silvery chime before flipping over and skidding atop the parlor wood floor. The boy gave a brief yelp, jumped, and turned away from the billiards room.

He appeared to scan the floor near the mezzanine stairs as he approached, perhaps to discover the source of the noises. The floor, though, was littered with other miscellany: some loose papers, leaves, articles of clothing. It was not at all an interesting matter to explore; his research was brief, and he turned once again to the billiards entrance.

As though fated, a gust of wind found its way into the house from some unseen portal and blew the drapery at the billiards entrance, pulling down off of one of the pegs holding up its corner. The slack provided a view into the room’s furnishings, and the dull brassy gleam from the billiards table corner shined straight into the boy’s eyes.

Like automata, the boy quickened his steps to the entrance. What is it with the males of our species that immediately calls them to the velvet greens and wooden panels of this particular pastime?

My mind reeled; he was moving too quickly. I jumped and floated over to the eastern side of the mezzanine—an entirely risky move, since I would coast slowly down to the ground level if I couldn’t “stick the landing.” I didn’t quite achieve the success I wanted, but I was able to catch my hand onto the railing.

Down below, the boy was right at the entrance. No time! I slapped at whatever books were dangling the nearest. Two of them fell, an enormous leather-bound heirloom Bible (Catholic; the Apocrypha would add extra heft) and a much smaller one I didn’t recognize.

My desperation worked: the boy was deterred from going further. He was, in fact, now sitting on the floor, hands on the back of his head, gritting back for all the world what would be cries of pain, blasting little sparks of red and orange everywhere. The Bible must have struck him.

I let go of the top rail, floated down to the floor, and kneeled in front of him. The outline of his form was warbling and waving with outbursts of distress. His arms now covered his face and the top of his head, as though he expected weightier things to crash down upon him. He was clearly crying now, but his unwillingness to let his condition—both the wound and the cruelty of his peers—consume him squeezed out wet, truncated sobs and deep, quivering breaths. The pathetic sounds caught something inside me like a vicious shank hook and pulled. The poor dear! What a damnable fool I was, causing the very thing I was attempting to prevent!

Between us, on the floor, both opened and facing the boy, were the Bible and the second book I had knocked over, the Bhagavad Gita. Adding to the feast before him, by another happy coincidence was a copy of Meditations, a little farther away from me, next to the boy’s hip. Understandably, he paid no heed to them in his travailing.

An idea came to me. Paper is terrifically easy for me to manipulate physically, moreso bound pages, as they can offer a high degree of leverage and angle to turn them. This particular Bible was the apex of effortless maneuverability, as its pages were the most weightless of them all. As there was very little wind now streaming through the house, the effectiveness of my idea would be amplified.

I passed a hand over the open Bible. The paper waved like water, and perhaps a half dozen pages turned over. I did it again, and more pages followed suit.

I then brought the phantasmic force of my other hand over the Bhagavad Gita, and though it required a bit more effort, those pages followed the lead of the Bible.

The boy, hearing the rustle of paper and perhaps noting the privation of wind coursing through the house, let down the guard over his head to take note. I took this opportunity to reach out and begin swiping the pages of Meditations as well.

Ooh, yes, young one, I purred, to rouse my energies. The corpses of dead men, from the crypts of kingdoms past, still speak! How scary, this sinister triumvirate of ancient philosophies echoing through the ages to haunt you! Forbidden knowledge! Trade wisdom and understanding for a piece of your sanity! With much knowledge comes much sorrow! Flee from the horror before you!

As I conducted my macabre symphony, I intermittently glanced up at the boy’s face—or the rather the general area of open air where his face would be placed. His arms dropped to his sides, and I had a hopeful expectancy that the frenzy of self-turning pages before him would distract him from the injury, perhaps ultimately scare him enough to leave. Though, with the other boys shutting him in, would he bother to search the house for alternative exits? What, then, if he actually wants to stay and fulfill whatever wretched hazing ritual the other boys are conducting? How would I continue to keep him out of the billiards room if his curiosity is reignited?

The questions marched in my mind for too long, for I didn’t notice the gray hazy fog forming within him, as though he were awakening from sleep. The outline of the boy’s head started to become visible with the image of his actual physical body. Very faintly so, around the edges, indicating that a strong emotion was taking root. He was wonderfully tow-headed, and a cowlick sprung up at his crown.

I decided to take up my unheard incantations again.

I feel the fright growing within you, young man! What will you do when—!

A flashbulb-explosion of bright anger, and the boy slammed his arms down onto the books to still the pages. It produced such a startling within me that I fell back away, breathless, and regarded the boy with wide eyes.

The boy then began to flip through the pages of Meditations, as it was closest to him, then moving onto the Bible.

“‘Do not be afraid of them; the Lord your God Himself will fight for you,’” he read.

Moving back to Meditations, he read on one of the book’s current pages: “‘Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look.’”

Now onto the Bhagavad Gita. “‘You are what you believe in. You become that which you believe you can become.’”

He paused, as though the words he spoke had to work their way through him before he could move on. And the words did, as all the misshapen spheres of blurry, faded color began to split apart, dance, and flow all around his person, particularly near in his head and chest area, as though they were trying to sort themselves into a coherent pattern. What is this phenomenon?

He leaned forward, hovering over the three books, flipping through their pages, scanning them, looking for more spells to chant.

“’That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.’

“‘Whatever action is performed by a great man, common men follow in his footsteps, and whatever valor, glory, firmness, skill, generosity, steadiness in battle and ability to rule—these constitute the duty of a soldier. They flow from his own nature.’

“‘Choose not to be harmed—and you won’t feel harmed. Don’t feel harmed—and you haven’t been.’

“’So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.’

“‘In those who are strong, I am strength, free from passion and selfish attachment. I am desire itself, if that desire is in harmony with the purpose of life.’

“‘Death smiles at us all; all we can do is smile back.’

“‘But you, take courage! Do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded.’

“‘Arise, slay thy enemies, enjoy a prosperous kingdom.’

“‘The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.’”

And finally: “‘Sever the ignorant doubt in your heart with the sword of self-knowledge. Observe your discipline, arise.’”

By this time, the boy had turned so solid that he appeared as a real, living person. His eyes, where I thought I might see a look of forlorn innocence found in young children, in reality, had the look of understanding with a hint of determination.

He gathered the three books atop of one another, slid them (through me) to the closest wall, and quickly began crawling over to them…and right at me. I tumbled out of the way, to the left, but in my maneuvers, my left right hand shot up and brushed inside the side of his head.

What was this? A stream of color, connecting from my fingertips to one side of his head, trailed away like a strand of gossamer web on a breeze, and floated down to the floor. It disappeared. The boy’s senses must have felt the contact, for as he was settling his back against the wall, he absentmindedly scratched at the same place I had touched him.

He rummaged through the pages of the top book, the Bhagavad, in frantic succession, until he came to a page that met his satisfaction. Immediately, the myriad of colors in his head and chest began their curious dancing and shifting. When he stopped reading, put the book down, and gazed off at the other side of the foyer, the steam of colored movement inside the boy slowed down and attempted once again to sort themselves into patterns. They appeared to have a tough time of it. What if…?

The boy shook the fog away from his head and entered into Meditations. I clenched my hand shut, denying the temptation to interfere, but the prospect of discovering a new power, as well as the drive of base curiosity, overcame me.

I settled down on my haunches to one side of him, and reached out to touch his head with the palm of my hand. The swirling colors inside rushed to meet my touch, and curiously I felt a push back against my hand. Quickly, I withdrew it. The boy didn’t seem to notice the invasion as he did before.

As he continued reading, I drew a deep breath and reached with both hands to the sides of his head. The streaming rush of colors pushed back again, but this time I stayed my hand and began to mold, if one can use such a term for the action, the course of the stream of colors as he read. No better pattern of colors formed from my touch, and at first I thought I was doing more harm than good. I stopped, and was about to withdraw from my work when a single river of bright blue formed from the top of his head down to his chest.

Instead of attempting to force the matter, I simply laid my palms just inside the sides of his head and awaited the outcome. Soon after, a stream of red ran alongside the blue one, which was then companioned by a green, then orange, then other flowing streams of other hues. I slowly removed my hands and examined our—moreso, his—handiwork. It all spun in an endless ladder loop of twirling energy inside the boy’s head.

He closed Meditations, drumming his fingers on its leather cover.

Don’t stop! I thought. Don’t let its bulk daunt you; return to it!

My little patient slid the Bible and heaved it right onto his lap, spine on his knees, and let its heavy halves flop down. He must have come to an understanding of things, as the structure of light inside him endured as he took on the endless, wispy pages of scripture. He was properly trained now to take in fresh information, and whatever passages he was reading added intensity to the paths of color, instead of confusing or diverting them.

After some length of time, he closed the Bible, as reverently a boy could with such a cumbersome object. He stood up and, striding a path through the mess of books, past my billiards-study, to the house’s front door, passed straight through me. A trace of what felt like single-minded conviction sloughed off of him and onto me as sparks of pure white light. I shuddered.

The boy made motions to try to open the front door, but thought better of it, turned around, and walked back to the three books. As I was still sitting prone on the floor, I scampered out of his way.

He picked up the Bible, spun once, and hurled it, not at the door, but at one of the windows adjacent to it. As the window itself was already in poor condition, the glass and a good bit of the wooden framing shattered and broke off easily with the force of the Good Book. The Bible thumped onto the grass outside. The older boys shouted in confusion.

The boy glanced at the vandalized window, perhaps to check for a safe passage through it, and slid his body through the opening. A shard of glass that hung on the window frame’s edge must have caught on a part of his body: it’s very tip showed bright red in the sunlight.
No! I thought, hurrying to my feet. His mission can’t be derailed now…

I floated over to the splintered window opening. The boy stood ankle-deep in a puddle of leaves, unwavering in the gusts of wind, as solid and opaque as a mighty oak, right hand clenched into a fist, strings of blood ringing all around it, dripping with the stuff. He held his fist out to the other boys, who were frozen in horror at the sight, and their hues dulled with confusion, but alight with the yellow and tan streaks of confusion and fear.

With a cracked-voice war cry, the boy advanced in two grand strides onto the one peer closest to him and brought the weight of his bloody fist to bear straight into the other boy’s nose. The color on the older boy’s face turned a sickening bright green, and waves of pain rippled and cracked right through his silhouette like a small exploding star. The larger boy fell flat on his backside onto the round, with a stream of blood strung across his face. His nose, not to be outshined, expressed a crimson stream of its own.

The boy, my newly-minted David with his slingshot, walked past the other three boys to the edge of the property and past it, without looking back. The transpired scene was too much to process for the other boys, as they could only muster dumbfounded looks at each other. The fell boy sniffed and swiped at his bloody nose and chin.

The conquered army gathered the remnants of their pride within the next few minutes, then departed myestate with slumped shoulders. I thumbed my nose at their backs as they left.

Gliding slowly back up to Harold’s study, I considered returning to the abstraction I mused over before the day’s visitors interrupted me, but I felt motivated to begin a work on an epic of the little soldier who discovered a few books on the battlefield and found the will to fight against his oppressors. How long I must wait to write it!