April 25, 2021

Little Ghost - Mall Watching

[Posted by Ted H]

New day job brings crazy hours. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

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[Little Ghost - Mall Watching]

They never found the right guy, and Starbucks was slow that morning, so they ended up at the mall sooner than they thought and watched the old people doing their laps before the stores opened. They sat on one of the benches by an exit where the elderly shuffled their way passed. There they remained, at times talking about random things of no consequence, other times remaining silent, and other times going into elaborate anecdotes from their lives whenever someone walked by that reminded them of something interesting.

Sometimes someone would wander by to sit on their bench, and they’d oblige even if the person wouldn’t be affected by them remaining. They’d make a game out of having a one-sided conversation with the people sitting on their bench until they finally left for one reason or another. They stayed until the sun set and darkness reigned outside once more, finally leaving when the mall stores began to close up and there were no more mall goers to watch and comment on. Kristina found the whole day cathartic. She had a chance to decompress her mind from everything that had transpired onto her in the last 24 hours.

As they walked through the Saturday night streets, and the late-night college student crowd as they bar hopped, Kristina let Ricky lead her in the direction she felt the fallout shelter was. “Were you scared?” she asked when they finally got away from the crowds. Ricky was in the middle of some thought when he looked to Kristina and apologized for not hearing her.

“When you died. Were you scared?” she asked again “I was terrified as it happened.”

“I was lucky,” Ricky said “I was high as hell so I didn’t realize I was dead. At first, I thought I was having an out of body experience. I mean don’t get me wrong, I was freaking out after the fact, but I guess I was lucky that I wasn’t aware of my death until it had already happened. How are you feeling now that you’ve had a day as one of us?”

Kristina paused a moment. “There’s no getting used to this, is there?

“Yeah,” Ricky said with a smile “What we are, it ain’t natural. That's what someone told me when I was in your shoes.”