The Ghost in Love (8 page)

“Good.” Danielle opened the door. Ben stepped quickly through it.

Out in the hall again, German said to Danielle, “Can I ask one last question before I go?”

Because he was so eager to hear the question, Ben did not notice the old woman down the hall who he had seen the first time he was here.

“That's him, Danielle. That's the man I was telling you about.”

The three turned toward this neighbor who was once again standing twenty feet away near the door to her apartment. She had a broom in her hand and was pointing with it at the empty space next to German.

“Remember I told you about the man at your door that day? Well, that's him.” Face set in accusation, the woman pointed again at invisible Ben.

Danielle was regretting ever having answered the door this morning. “Who are you talking about, Mrs. Schellberger?”

“
Him
. That's the man who was fiddling with your door that day.”

Danielle couldn't see Ben, although the others did. Except for the dog, none of them saw Ling the ghost, who was also there. But Pilot didn't understand what the human beings were talking about. On the other hand, Ling saw everyone and understood everything. However, the ghost could do nothing to resolve this.

Maybe there was a way. Snapping its fingers to get the dog's attention, Ling said to him, “Run away.”

Pilot tilted his head to one side, confused by the command.

“Run away. Create a diversion.
He needs your help
.”

Now the dog understood and, without further ado, jerked his leash out of German's relaxed hand. He sprinted off down the hall toward the stairwell. Ben ran after him. Luckily, Ben was wearing sneakers, so his footsteps weren't really heard in the confusion of the moment. The three women watched Pilot run away. Only Danielle was surprised when German didn't go after her pet. Mrs. Schellberger wasn't surprised because she saw Ben chase it.

“Aren't you going to try and catch your dog?” Danielle asked.

Ignoring the question, German looked instead at the old woman, who appeared to be growing angrier the longer she stood there waiting for a response to what she had said. “Uh, yes. Yes, I am.” Her eyes moved from Danielle to Mrs. Schellberger and then back to Danielle.

Danielle smiled thinly at her snoopy neighbor and then looked down the hall in the direction that the dog had fled. Nodding one last time at German, she went back into her apartment and closed the door.

“Well, excuse
me
for being a good neighbor,” the old woman squawked, and marched away.

Ben didn't have far to go to catch the dog. It was sitting on the
sidewalk in front of the building. Back to the door, its face was turned up toward the sun.

“How did you get out here?” Ben asked Pilot, as if he understood.

Standing nearby, fingers steepled against its chin, the ghost watched. Since coming here, it had constantly wondered when something like this was going to happen. Ben Gould had died. Granted, he was alive again because of that computer glitch, but he
had
died. And so had Danielle Voyles during the operation on her head. So the ghost assumed other people were also walking around on borrowed time.

“Ben?” German strode quickly out the door and walked straight through Ling.

Ben pointed to Danielle's building. “You saw what happened in there.”

“Yes, I did.”

He nodded, glad at least that she admitted to having seen it. “And what do you think?”

“You need help, Ben. I don't know what
kind
, because this stuff is way, way beyond me. I don't know what else to say except you frighten me.

“I don't know what's happening with you, but whatever it is has ruined us. If it's getting worse now, then you can't ask me to be here. You can't ask me to be in your life.

“I still love you and you know that. I
never
wanted to leave. I wanted you and me to be forever. But too bad: we're here now and here is impossible. No.” She waved her hand in front of her face. “I can't do this. I love you, but I have to go. If you love me, too, you can't ask me to do this.” With that, she strode away without looking back at any of them—the man, the dog, or the ghost.

When German called Ben's apartment
an hour later, no one answered the phone. No one answered when she called again one, two, and then three hours later.

Guilt, worry, and love gnawed on her heart. For so long she had puzzled and then agonized over what was going wrong with their relationship. But today, on finally learning the cause of all the trouble, her first reaction had been to run away.

Now when someone knocked on her door she rushed to answer it, hoping it would be Ben. Instead it was one of her landlords from upstairs reporting that garbage pickup day had been changed. As usual, the old woman wanted to hang around and chat. But German was in no mood for that and got rid of her quickly.

The shabby basement apartment did not help improve her frame of mind. In this time of doubt and confusion the place felt even smaller, darker, and unfriendlier than usual. Some homes are the perfect friend, womb, safe harbor, or hiding place when one is needed. Others are nothing more than spaces to sleep, eat, and store your belongings. The last and worst kind of dwelling doesn't even deserve to be called home because it offers nothing: no comfort, rest, or shelter.
You get the feeling that if it were a person, it would not only resent your presence but would also turn you in to the authorities if you were in trouble. Bad moods darken in these places; despair grows like bacteria.

While pacing back and forth across the floor, German knew she had to get out of that dank cave right away. She would go over to Ben's apartment and apologize about before. All of it had been just too much; I couldn't cope. I'm better now, so let's talk some more about it.

But it turned out he wasn't home and neither was Pilot. When German moved out of his apartment, Ben had insisted she keep her key to the place. She used it now because no one answered her repeated knocking. It was the second time today she had been here but so much had happened in between visits. It felt as if a week had passed since she'd come by earlier to pick up the dog.

Once inside, she went from room to room searching for Ben or Pilot or she didn't know what. The word “clues” kept turning in her mind, but clues to what? Why Ben was invisible to Danielle Voyles?

It was such a great apartment. With no one around to distract her, it felt as though for each step she took in there another good memory surfaced. Everything was so clean, tidy, and bright. Light loved living there. It filled each room like milk in a glass. In depressing contrast, German couldn't drag light into her basement apartment even if she put a chain around its neck and pulled. She entered the bathroom and opened the medicine cabinet over the sink. She looked at the familiar bottles and tubes in there. She had used so many of them. When she saw his cologne she touched it, remembering the time she came into the room as he was spraying it on his neck. She came up behind him, took his chin in one hand, and licked the side of his throat because he smelled so delicious.

For obvious reasons, she saved looking in the bedroom till last.
But a few moments after entering and seeing that it was empty, she heard the front door to the apartment slam shut. Ben was back!

Hurrying down the hall to meet him, German stopped short when she saw instead an old man, a complete stranger, standing just inside the doorway holding a slack leash attached to Pilot. The man was looking around with his mouth open in dismay. Even from a distance it was easy to see that he was confused and disoriented.

German approached cautiously. She was bigger than the man and undoubtedly stronger, judging by his age and appearance, but you never knew for certain. Seeing her, Pilot wagged his tail and padded over, pulling the leash out of the man's unresisting hand. This brought the old guy's attention back from wherever it was roaming and he focused on her for the first time.

German asked, “Who are you? How did you get in here?”

Slowly lowering his head, he looked at his hand, which was holding a brown key. He lifted it to show her, but German was only interested in watching his face. She could see he was trying to figure out how this had happened. His expression, a combination of consternation and surprise, said Why
am
I here?

Then he rubbed his nose. It was a most singular gesture; she had only ever seen one other person do it that way. Putting an open hand against the end of his nose, he patted it a few times and then rubbed it. Patted and then rubbed. It was ridiculous looking, the kind of gesture that, if she had seen someone else doing it, she would have smiled or even laughed.

Not now: now she froze. She barely managed to croak,
“Ben?”

His hand stopped rubbing his nose. The old man's eyes, clearing now, looked at her. They were kindly and embarrassed. “I'm sorry, but do we know each other?”

“Ben? Is it really you?”

He looked at both arms as if checking to see if they were his. Then he smiled. “I think it's me. But are we talking about the same Ben?” His smile was cute and old-person gentle. “I'm Ben Gould. I'm really very sorry, but I have to admit that I don't remember you. Please don't take offense, though. I have Alzheimer's disease, or at least I think I do, and it's really made my brain into Swiss cheese.”

German didn't know what to say. She didn't know what to think. She didn't know anything at that moment but the need to stare and deny. The old man continued looking and smiling at her but his eyes said No one's home.

Leash dragging behind, Pilot left the room unnoticed and walked toward the kitchen for a drink of water and a quick check of his food bowl.

The ghost was sitting at the kitchen table smoking a cigarette and staring at the drifting smoke. “What happened, Pilot? Who's that old man? Where did you get him?”

Instead of answering, the dog bent over and took a long drink.

“Pilot?”

“Wait a minute, willya?” He drank some more and then stopped. “I don't know what's going on. We were walking down the street and gradually started going slower. I didn't pay any attention until we stopped moving. I turned around and there
he
was.”

“From one minute to the next he turned into an old man?”

“I guess so. I told you, Ling, I didn't see it happen. Suddenly there was an old guy holding my leash and looking around like he was completely lost. I led him back here and he let me. End of story.”

The ghost put the cigarette out on the tip of its tongue. Then, after laying the butt carefully down on the table, Ling said, “This is not good news. Not good at all.”

They heard the sound of footsteps coming down the hall toward
them. German Landis entered the kitchen. She went to a cupboard and took out a teapot and two cups. After filling a kettle with water, she put it on the stove to boil. Opening another cupboard, obviously familiar with where everything was kept in this kitchen, she looked at the large assortment of teas arranged on the shelf. Ben and his teas: Ben and his love for good food. How on earth could that old man in the other room be him?

The dog and ghost watched intently as she moved around, preparing tea things on a tray. Before leaving the living room she had helped old Ben into a chair and said she would make them some tea. Afterward they could talk. The old fellow sat down with an exhausted groan and nodded gratefully at her offer. He looked so spent that she was almost afraid to leave him alone.

A few minutes later in the kitchen the three of them snapped to attention like an animal when it hears a piercing whistle. But a whistle didn't capture their attention: it was singing. Someone was singing in the living room, which meant it had to be the old man.

Rapt at the unexpected sound of his very good voice, all three of them listened to the singer.

“ ‘A-live-a-live-oh
,

A-live-a-live-oh,'

Crying ‘Cockles and mussels, a-live-a-live oh.'

“In Dublin's fair city
,

Where the girls are so pretty
,

I first set eyes on sweet Molly Malone . . .”

Pretty as it was, the dog and ghost thought the singing was strange. German winced. The song was the Irish ballad “Molly
Malone” and it was what Ben sang whenever he was happy. Often he sang the song when he wasn't even aware of doing it, such as when he was cooking something challenging. No matter where German was, whenever she heard Ben singing “Molly Malone,” she knew he was content.

Leaving the tea tray on the table, she hurried out of the kitchen. She found the old man singing in front of Ben's bookcases. He was looking at an open book in his hands.

Glancing up at her, he said in an excited voice, “I know this one; I
know
this book!” He sounded so pleased, as if he had found the way home all by himself. He held it up for her and she saw the name John Thorne printed on the spine. Thorne was one of Ben's heroes. He loved to read to her from the writer's books on food and often tried the recipes in them if they weren't too exotic. German didn't like complicated food.

As quickly as his face had lit up, it shut down again. The hand holding the book trembled and dropped to his side. “It's horrible. Can you understand how horrible it is not to be able to remember your own life?

“When you're young, it's all about what you do with your life. When you're old, it's really only about what you remember. The only thing I've got left of my life is my memories, but now they're leaking out of my head. And there's nothing I can do to stop it.

“What's worse is sometimes I remember things very clearly. Like when I saw this book on the shelf: John Thorne. I know that name. I know his work. I once made his winter corn chowder. My mind blinks on and suddenly remembers everything just like it used to be. But ten seconds later or ten minutes or whenever, the lights go out again and I look at whatever I'm holding, this book or this memory, and I think, What's this? How did it get here?” He frowned. “At my
age, you don't have
anything else
but your memories. I'm not trying to sound self-pitying but it's true. So when that goes away, who are you?” He sighed again. “What is your name? Would you tell me your name?”