by Alex Rost
While you were in the shower, I flipped through the guestbook on the coffee table.
Normal shit, written by people like Kimberly and Krista from CA, the Dendrick family from Kayle Point, the Miltons from Seattle, all saying how great their stay was, how much they appreciated the A-frame’s proximity to the remote park’s entrance.
But then this guy named Kelso, up from Phoenix wrote:
I slept on the pull-out couch and on my last night I woke up to the sound of crying. I opened my eyes and saw a woman floating above me. During that day, I went to the visitors center and found a book about a lady murdered at Crescent Lake. The woman floating above me looked exactly like her.
Kelso had rated the house 10/10, with the note – Haunting! Gorgeous voice!
The following entry in the guest book was a Tony from Vancouver.
His entry simply said, What the hell?
I flipped the page.
More comments about the floating lady.
A few in a row said things like—
I didn’t see the floating lady. Disappointed.
And—
Amazing views, but no floating lady.
But then, another sighting.
Beautiful cabin and cozy with the fireplace. The floating lady appeared with a hoarse scream but she was pleasant after we made her tea.
I scoffed.
Tea? You made the ghost tea? I read the name—Dave, from Indiana—and thought, fuck you Dave.
It seemed like everyone agreed that Dave had ruined the joke, sullied the mystique of the floating lady, because the next bunch of entries were just the normal happy to have been here bullshit.
Until the last one, written just two days before, signed Landon and Nora from Boca Raton—
I saw the ghost. She was floating above my bed and she was crying. She kept saying ‘rope.’
And then I had an idea.
An idea that brought glee.
The best kind of glee.
Terrible glee.
I’d put the book back without saying anything and we’d go to sleep, then in the middle of the night I would wake you up, wake you with fear in my eyes and panic in my voice. I'd tell you I saw something. A woman. A ghost that floated above us, crying and whispering secrets of her death. In the morning I’d make sure you stumbled across the guestbook and watch as you read the entries, at first fully believing in the floating ghost, until doubt crept in to darken your expression, wondering if I found the guestbook the night before and concocted the whole ruse. But of course I would deny, play naive and swear by my encounter. Give you the gift of possibility.
I tucked the book away just as the shower turned off.
***
You fell asleep before me, which was rare. I laid awake imagining the floating lady, logically knowing that the whole thing was a joke but allowing a latent anxiety to creep through my thoughts while trying to keep my wide-open eyes from veering into the cold darkness beyond our open bedroom door.
A tic tic tic noise? No. Maybe?
I got up, flicked the switch to flood the living room with light.
Nothing.
Back in bed.
Sleep, eventually, came.
***
I woke with a start.
Above me, not a foot away, a slight glow emanated from the darkness.
The woman, floating, not like she was in the air, but underwater.
Her tattered white dress billowed out and around her thin body, her long, mangled hair crawling out from her pale head. Her dead eyes locked onto mine, bulging, pleading and confused.
She wasn’t crying.
She wasn’t screaming.
She wasn’t singing.
I shut my eyes, squeezed them tight, did that thing that kids do, that thing we all do to keep away the monsters—I pretended I didn’t see her.
I thought, I’m sleeping here.
I thought, don’t worry about me.
I thought, I didn’t notice you, no way.
But then I heard her. A whisper. A whisper of a whisper.
“Help,” said the voice.
“Help me,” said the voice.
I opened my eyes, just a slit, just enough to see out while thinking, I’m still asleep. I’m still asleep, see? My eyes are closed. If I was awake would my eyes be closed like this?
She was closer.
Inches away, nearly nose to nose.
I smelled the stink of water, the odor of rot.
“Come with me,” said the whisper of a whisper.
A tremble ran through my veins, I tried to swallow through a dry throat but my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth.
I took a shaky breath and sat up, felt a rush of cold sweat cover my face, my shoulders, my chest. Tore off the blankets and stood.
She was gone.
I left the bedroom, went through the small cabin and turned on all the lights, looked behind the shower curtain, every door, sat on the couch to gain my composure, sat there until the sky outside transitioned from black to dirty blue then climbed back into bed, woke you up and told you what happened.
Of course, you didn’t believe me.
“I’m tired,” you said
“No, really. It’s in the guestbook. I’m not the only one who has seen her.”
“The guestbook?”
I went and got it, brought it back and watched you read.
“You’re so full of shit,” you said.
“Yeah, I thought it was a joke, too. And you’re right, I was going to tell you I woke up to see this woman floating above me, then have you find the guestbook and act all surprised like I hadn’t seen it before.”
“So you’re saying that originally, you were planning on doing basically the same exact thing you’re doing now?”
“Well, yeah, pretty much. But that was before. Before it really happened.”
I could see that you didn’t believe me, but I could also see that a little part of you did, a little part that wanted to believe, wondering if I would keep this up if I was lying while knowing that I would, that I would act the same way whether I was telling the truth or not.
Before we left, I signed the guestbook.
I signed it as Bruce and Molly from Long Island.
I wrote—
I see people making jokes about the floating lady. Well, I saw her, and it’s NOT funny.
______
Alex Rost runs a commercial printing press outside of Buffalo, NY.
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