Modern Ghost Story

During the tail end of a rather dull party, she came in like a winter draft. I instantly got goosebumps. Before her arrival, I had preoccupied myself with anxiously peeling off labels of sweaty beer bottles to distract myself from whoever hovered around me. It was always the same kind of person that cornered me at a gathering: a beard, a plain sweater, and a long story that absolutely needed to be told to me. When she came in, I felt myself trying to get a look at her, as if her mere presence could rescue me.

Charming would probably be the most common way to describe her, yet there was something more to her even from a distance. She moved in a confident way that hinted that she had been here, had done all this before. Her eyes nonetheless remained soft, calm, inviting. My gaze fell to her lipstick, which was a shade darker than I would’ve expected for her complexion, yet it added to her air of mystery. Wispy curtain bangs framed her delicate face. Even her self-knit sweater seemed to welcome others to come closer to admire her.

No longer able to even half pay attention to the conversation around me, I quickly excused myself to get a drink. Approaching the counter where she stood and was selecting her own beverage of the evening, I inhaled deeply, hoping to catch her scent. Even in this chaotic scene of too loud Indie music and overlapping conversations, the moment of coming into her orbit was one of slow motion. Then I caught her perfume: A hint of honeydew and a tone of lychee. She seemed to be answering a message on her phone. Hanging loosely from her wrist was a worn festival bracelet. I found my ticket to strike up a conversation with her.

“I haven’t actually been there before,” I pointed to her bracelet, “but I’ve only heard good things. Tell me, are these reviews true or does everyone wear rose colored glasses when remembering?”

—

Her phone number was a reward that evening. Pulling up her contact photo and status brought up a familiar feeling from early online instant messaging where each character in the away message felt cryptic. We were some troubled poets in puberty trying to cry out to the world. Her own black and white photo portrayed another time, her once long hair blowing in the wind and covering most of her smile. Her away message, her crying out to the world: Two emojis of smirking gray and gold moons. My thumbs hovered over our blank chat. I thought about all the things we talked about in that first encounter, how it all seemed to vanish when I got too close to the memory. There were also laughs, what had we even laughed about? Then it came to me in that quick flash that feels like the flip of a light switch. Suddenly I was back in that conversation where we had laughed at all the stereotypical things we had done in this city we called home. Climbing the tallest tower, visiting the famed graffiti walls, eating the “local” dessert that no local actually seemed to eat. There seemed to be an instant connection in how we viewed ourselves here as something between a tourist and a citizen. And then in a lower register of voice, we listed all the other things we secretly still wanted to do here, an embarrassed admission. Maybe we could live out our private wants together.

“Hey hey, interested in some sightseeing next week? I can highly suggest overpriced drinks at the 1920s underground jazz bar.” Sent. A sigh. Before I could go into obsessive overthinking of wittiness and syntax, a buzz signaled her response.

—

On a Tuesday evening where the cherry blossom leaves look like they’re glowing against the indigo evening sky, we stumble upon some rarity of two unchained carts free to use in a nearly empty parking lot. There’s a soft buzz in our bodies: we have walked hours through side streets, handing back and forth a clove cigarette, and delving into the lives left behind and dreams of the lives ahead of us. It feels like a perfect scene as we each grab a cart. It spurs something in us, possibly some juvenile yearning or a feeling that we could temporarily go off course without punishment. There’s so much laughing, we sometimes have to call a time out on this made up grand prix we’ve created. Rusty wheels and wide smiles, we are refusing to turn to dust.

We walk back to the station to catch the last train. Our unsteady steps manage to stay in sync as our brains spew out random topics to chatter about. People who protect pigeons. How frozen yogurt shops seemed to disappear. The trials and triumphs of language learning. Before long, we arrive at the platform and we can no longer avoid that the night is coming to an end. My train is the first to arrive with a rush of air and screeching of the brakes. She walks me directly to the edge and before the doors close, she leans in to kiss me. It’s a quick peck of soft lips, a more intimate handshake. That leaves us giggling as the doors close. We wave to each other through the glass, our images getting smaller as the distance becomes greater. I place my hand on my beating heart.

—

Weeks went by without a word from either of us. I don’t know what it was, but suddenly we were two magnets pushing each other away. Her lack of response only encouraged me to stay silent. So I occupied myself with the usual outings with friends and freelance work that funded the friend outings. Days became longer in a way that felt like they were tormenting me. The sun didn’t even set until after 9pm now. This period made me feel as if I had awoken from a dream and saw it disappearing before my conscious mind. I was trying to grab on to memories as proof of the experience. My only evidence that she was real was a phone number with a first name, a nickname at that. The two smirking moons taunting me. Had I somehow fabricated an enthrallment between us? Had I sent the wrong signal? Did she even kiss me?

To my great surprise, I found a notification from her after putting up the wash on the balcony. A curt apology for the delay and a suggestion to grab drinks tomorrow. Just like that, she was real again. Normally the brevity of her reply juxtaposed to the lengthy silence would upset me, but her showing up again pushed away all other possible negative feelings. She wanted to see me. And I wanted to see her.

—

We meet at an organic wine bar outside the bustling city center. Somehow it’s still crowded leaving us with torn leather bar stools as our only seating option. Swishing my rosé wine and feeling the silence bubble, I turn over an apology for every possible way I could’ve slighted her in my head. Before I can open my mouth, she says cooly that she’s getting married. I glance down and notice the gemstone engagement ring. Emerald. Pear-shaped cut on a gold ring. Of course she’d want a unique ring. It suits her. My eyes stay glued there, unwilling to look her in the face. Instead of asking questions, of getting upset, of leaving, I tell her as neutrally as possible, “Congratulations” and then we switch to discussing other wines on the menu to try.

I see her lips move and shift, forming sounds that amount to sentences and ideas, but I’m not able to hang on to anything. The last times we were together left me in a loose state of euphoria where it felt like anything could happen between us. Now I’m left to drift here; she’s leaving us.

We go outside for a smoke and continue to talk about everything except her future marriage, her future without me. I realize I am pouring salt in the wound, but I need to know more. My words feel shaky as I try to broach the topic.

“So tell me more about, uh, it,” I gesture to her ring and take a drag. Then I hear all about it. His name. The bachelorette boat party. The wedding in another country down south with more sun. The decision to move back home across the ocean. I plaster on a supportive face, taking in the information as neutrally as possible, as if she were merely recounting the plot of a film and not her future. She has at least spared me the pain of inviting me. That is my only balm to take this information in; I won’t have to witness any of this first hand.

At one point, a man in a trenchcoat walking his two beagles strides toward us, forcing us to lean against the building to give way, our shoulders brushing. My cheeks blush as I keep my gaze toward the end of the cigarette. It feels like a moment where one of us would make a joke about the man who looked straight out of an old-timey detective movie. But instead she says that it’s getting late, a first time for this concern. She walks over to her bike, unlocks the linked chain, clips on her helmet, and waves me off.

“Oh, the bike’s new,” I say to her fading silhouette.

—

If you asked me what she looked like now, I wouldn’t know what to say exactly. She was taller than me. She had freckles on her arms but not her shoulders. She leaned in when someone told a particularly good story. She often wore a subtle expression on her face as if she was thinking about what she would cook that night, but when she laughed, you would get the feeling that everything was alright in the world. She wore an engagement ring.

It’s been four years since I last saw her. She promised to write me a postcard once she made it back home. After half a year, I stopped checking my mailbox in the hope that something would be there from her. Nothing ever came. My best friend asked if I loved her. I don’t know. Love doesn’t feel like the right word. Maybe I was just an adventure.

She disappears a little more each day. I am forgetting her age, her hometown, how many siblings she has. I am losing sight of her wispy hair, what color was it? I am missing moments between us, did we even go to the wine bar or only talk about it? There’s not much of her left as the seasons pass again and again.

Once in a while she will appear somewhere and beg me to remember. An old photo, a familiar street, an abandoned shopping cart. Instantly I will be grasped by my shoulders as the fleeting sensation screams, “The ghost is back!” Then my head will tilt ever so slightly and my eyes will close. I’ll be instantly back there and I’ll repeat her name aloud as if tasting it once again. My heart will flutter. Then my eyes open and it’s just me.

No, I don’t remember her.