Although it was twilight, Grant took in the surroundings of his home’s kitchen and imagined it was a Sunday morning. He could almost hear the bacon sizzling on the stovetop, almost smell the coffee brewing in the pot on the counter beside the refrigerator. He imagined the warm morning sun illuminating the kitchen just the way it did when things were good. When the world had been uncontaminated. When his wife and daughter had been alive.

The reality was, however, that the kitchen was dark and empty. Floating ash particles were caught in the late afternoon sun before falling to the ground or settling on countertops and long-dead appliances.

Grant walked to the sliding glass doors that opened onto the deck overlooking his backyard. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary; no strange presences or mutated animals, so he slid open the door and walked outside. Resting his hands on the deck railing, he observed what was once a pristine and manicured area with neatly trimmed flower beds surrounding an inground swimming pool. Now, he wondered what might be growing inside the dark, murky water.

All day while he restlessly searched the house and the property looking for signs of his daughter’s presence, Grant thought he had heard sounds elsewhere. When he was in the kitchen, he heard something that seemed to be coming from one of the bedrooms. When he was out in the yard, he’d heard sounds in the house and when in the house, thought he heard someone outside. They were not from animals; these were noises a person might make; floorboards creaking under someone’s weight, doors opening and closing. Each time he investigated, it terrified him, but he needed to understand what the earlier encounter had meant. Grant did not dispel the thought that the noises could’ve been made by a desperate – and therefore, dangerous - person scavenging for food. He had a hunch, however, that there was something special occurring here…something spiritual even.

Grant had given Laird nearly all the supplies left from his own private storage, hidden in a crawlspace in the basement. If was enough to keep Community going for another week at most. What remained would keep Grant going for maybe two days with rationing. After they were gone, he wasn’t sure what he would do. But he couldn’t leave after yesterday’s event. There was a deeper mystery at work here and he needed to know what it all meant.

Was his daughter’s spirit here, at the house, thinking she still belonged in this world? He had never believed in such things until yesterday’s encounter in the garage. Even then, he might’ve dismissed it as a hallucination. But Eva had seen it, too.

Leaving the deck, Grant wandered over to the garage, hoping to find her there, dancing among the shadows again. The structure, however, was silent and still. He stepped inside, almost against his will, at first believing the area to be hallowed ground; maybe his occupation of the space might somehow disrupt the residual energy. He wondered if his action could frighten and prevent her from returning. Perhaps he cast his own energy toward her, appearing as a shadow, just as she did to him.

Emotion welled inside him and Grant lowered onto one knee. Before today, he’d never been much of a believer in God, but if anything had convinced him that there were greater mysteries beyond the physical world, it had been witnessing the existence of his daughter, after death. Closing his eyes, he envisioned his wife…envisioned his daughter. He remembered the wonderful times they’d spent together. Thanksgiving dinners, birthday celebrations, his daughter’s eighth grade graduation.

Grant heard something behind him – someone approached. He was so convinced there was a person there – and so caught up in his memories - that he stood and moved aside, almost saying “Excuse me.” When he turned however, he found no one. Something breezed past him however, and he swung back around to the garage and there, just as yesterday, was his phantom dancer.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Grant froze and studied the apparition. She was more defined today. Whereas yesterday she had melded with the shadows, now the outline of her form was more distinguishable. He could see her hair set into a bun atop her head as she twirled across the wooden floor. Then, slowly, there arose a familiar composition. It sounded distant, then filled the air about him…classical music. The melody engulfed Grant like the embrace of an old friend; it was the piece that Samantha had rehearsed to for months. The music fluctuated in volume, as if it were a material thing in the air, at times wafting toward him on the wind, then receding, only to return again.

Samantha’s figure leapt, spun in a circle, then pranced across the garage. Enraptured, Grant couldn’t take his eyes off her. It wasn’t until he heard the shattering of glass that he checked behind him. Someone must be in the house.

*********

Watley stumbled along a dirt path. He was aware of it only now, despite turning to see the barn he’d been in all night nearly a hundred yards behind them.

Them?

It was a funny thought. As far as he could tell, he was alone; just acres and acres of farmland, with some sort of strange crops growing in fields on either side of the path. Didn’t look like corn or anything else familiar.

Watley remembered being severely hungry when he’d first arrived at the barn. Then, somehow, he’d become full – so full that he didn’t really feel like walking now. Taking a nap was what he wanted to do, but some inner voice compelled him, urged him to keep moving. It was that Goddamned thing in the barn; the face in the plant. It’d kept talking all night, whispering things to him. Watley had no idea what the plant had said to him, just that it wouldn’t shut up.

Shit. He really didn’t want to be doing this. Where was he even, for Christ’s sake? What was he doing?

Stopping abruptly, Watley doubled over and vomited. He stared at his upchuck and waited for the next wave. He didn’t wait long and heaved again. The contents were dark and organic looking, like parts of him had come up. Things that shouldn’t have been expelled.

Wondering if dying might be less miserable than this existence, Watley reached for a sidearm that wasn’t there. He double checked, but it was gone.

“Keep moving.”

Ordinarily, the sound of the robot’s voice would’ve caused him to jump out of his skin, but in this condition, staring down an oncoming locomotive wouldn’t stir Watley from his fog.

Locomotive…

The train takes them to the ferry, and the ferry to the craft…

The words came to Watley like a voice inside his skull. He had no idea what they meant or why they suddenly came to him. His gut cramped again, and he bent over, but only dry-heaved.

“This sickness will pass,” the hulking metal thing insisted. The globe stared at him with that indefinable gaze that Watley now remembered and hated. He preferred that it go back to forming the words inside the globe than hear that voice.

Forcing himself onward, Watley felt a bewildering fullness, despite having just vomited. He was no longer hungry, just nauseous. He thought of how he’d referred to himself as they, but didn’t think that suggested himself and the robot, but someone else…something else. Oddly enough, and quite comicaly he thought, Watley entertained the notion that perhaps he was somehow…pregnant.