Memoratory

Henry built this house in 1878, and I met him after I passed away during the 1966 New Year’s party. We danced with everyone at midnight. Over the decades, multiple families owned Henry's house. He didn’t haunt them, but Henry found a way to help them. For instance, the baby’s mother was in the kitchen making lunch and the child was alone in a playpen with toys. Henry believed the boy could see him, so my friend entertained the baby. Henry could blow breath at the living world and knock over block towers or make cars roll. 

I was with Henry forty years before I felt the familiar sensation of fear. Henry was playing with the baby, just like he did every morning, when the nesting cup disappeared from the child’s hand. I told Henry that I thought the baby might still hold the toy. He didn’t cry like a toddler might when something was taken from their grip. Henry denied that the red cup existed in the first place. 

"I know what I saw," I felt my earlobes swell and got hot. Cursed, even in death. Henry will always have the upper hand because of my tell.  

I was a mother once, and I told Henry that the boy was too young to know whether a plastic train should move on its own, or not. My friend only walked out of his precious nursery. Although, I should’ve given Henry a break. As a living person, he had a wife and nannies to spend time with his children. I wasn’t interested in the living people like Henry because most of them can’t see us. I wanted to spend time with Henry. It was just the two of us after all, and we were a handsome pair, in my opinion. 

Over the next couple of weeks more items went missing, like when I watched the lady of house use the blow dryer. Her hair was moving, but her hand was empty. I considered it, but decided it was pointless bringing it up to Henry without proof. He would only stare at me. During the anniversary party, when the dining room table disappeared, and the family floated midair in a seated position, I turned to Henry, who had been laughing at the father's jokes, but I only saw his feet climbing the stairs. All the appliances and fixtures eventually went missing, one by one and I was right; the family could use the missing items. The wife cooked, the father washed the car, and the kids used their computers, but I couldn't see anything in their hands.  

"Henry," he sat in the den where the father spent his Sunday afternoons. "What is he doing?" 

"Hm?" Henry looked up as if I took his attention from an exciting ball game.  

"What are you looking at Henry?" 

My friend was stoic and there was also nothing in the den. No furniture, no television, no books, no fireplace, nothing.  

The afterlife is not death and we needed to learn about it. I guess it was stressful, but I'm not sure. I never thought about it before. I began to wonder if I should leave the house. I watched people out the window, and could see out the screen door, but I was never tempted to leave. On one of the last days that I could tolerate Henry’s avoidance, I gathered the courage to ask if he ever left the house, but my friend only turned and walked away. Later, I found him in the attic. Henry sat on an old chest. 

“Half of the rooms have disappeared and we can’t see the family when they’re inside the empties.” 

Henry faced the small oval window under the peak. 

“I’m going out.” 

I walked across the street and looked at Henry’s beautiful house and there he was, in the attic window, watching me. 

It was the weekend, and people were out pushing babies down the sidewalk, mowing lawns, raking the first colored leaves on the ground, or shopping. I hitched a ride in a car and ended up at the grocery store. I couldn’t believe the variety. I should have expected it. I watched enough television while Henry pretended to play baseball with the living kids. 

“Maria!” 

I whipped my head around and saw my best friend. She was about ten years older than me, but I knew her. She died of cancer and wore a wig. 

“I thought you were trapped in a never ending party?” 

“It didn't occur to me.” 

“Weren’t you lonely?” 

I told her about Henry. She apologized for never paying back a loan when we were alive. Then my best friend said that I needed to see the Oracle right away, and gave me the address. 

The next day, Henry sat with the kids before school when I saw the wall between the kitchen and living room disappear. I called to him, but Henry ignored my excitement. I felt a swell of determination and walked to the bus stop. The driver must have been speeding. The row homes melted into one long auburn tenement. The sky was blue with fluffy clouds. I was grateful to have friends in death. 

It was dark by the time I found the Oracle. She lived at Rudolph Home for the Blind and had a fridge full of chocolate pudding cups. The old woman had orange hair and cat eyeglasses. The Oracle was petite and wore a black cashmere sweater and velvet pants. Her nails were polished red and her hair was turned up at the ends. 

“We were born the same year,” the wrinkled woman said to me. “How can I help you, Maria?” 

I explained Henry and the disappearing rooms. Her cigarette smelled like my memories. 

“This is not Heaven.” 

“No, it’s not.” 

The old woman’s face was grave when she asked, “Are you willing to pay my fee?” 

I told her I had no money and she laughed through her nose. 

“I’m sure if your friend had told you my price. My fee is one memory.” 

“Henry won’t talk about his past.” 

“You, are here.” 

Cigarette smoke filled the tiny yellow kitchen. I inhaled and pictured Henry sitting inside a big rectangular hole where his house used to stand. I realized I hadn’t considered my own fate. It was my home, too. I tried to think of angry memories, or hate filled ones and big mistakes that I made. I don't know which one it was now, the witch took it. 

“Thank you child,” she smiled and the skin on her face smoothed. “I hope your friend will listen for once.” 

“The Oracle said you’re in bad shape.” I met Henry in the den. 

“Cliche,” Henry pretended to smoke the pipe he died with. “You look charming by the fire.” 

“Charm won’t keep me happy forever,” I sighed. “The house is disappearing.” 

Henry played with his mustache, “Nonsense.” 

“The kitchen is gone.” 

He was silent but his eyes changed. When you’ve spent decades with someone, you learn subtleties. I saw a nick of trust. 

“The Oracle said that the house is disappearing because you’ve forgotten most of your past.” 

I explained further that ghosts could ascend if they connect with their friends and family descendants. 

“I know it seems ghosts shouldn’t go out in the world and live, but that is exactly what we must do.” 

Henry squinted while he sucked on his curved pipe. The family was asleep, and Henry liked to sit by the warm fireplace with the father of the house as it smoldered. The coals sighed with a crackle or two, and the pulsing heartbeat of the dark wood slowed. Truth is that the husband always passed out on the wing chair before he finally went to bed. My friend stood up and left the store. I found him sitting on my chest again. 

It was three days later before Henry looked into my eyes. A lot happened while he was pouting, and I was on my way to the maid’s room when he found me. I saw it in Henry's face that he knew. The nursery had disappeared. 

“I cannot overcome my shame in life, or death!” I wasn’t sure if Henry had cried since he was an infant. 

Henry confessed that his death was the reason his wife and children had to leave their new home in the city and return to her father’s farm, where winter felt six months long. He couldn’t face what they might’ve become and that he should’ve given his children and wife more of his time. The living families distracted Henry from thinking about his own. 

“When you arrived,” Henry said to me. “I thought I’d found the last piece to my new world, but you only want to leave.” 

“Exploring is what a ghost should do, but first, we must visit the Oracle and ask how to get your memories back.” 

The blind witch didn’t expect payment from the worst case she’d seen in hundreds of years. 

“Nostalgic items will spark your memory." The old woman wore all gray that day. 

“Impossible,” I was the pessimist for once. “Six families lived in the house since I arrived and seven more for Henry. We would have seen them by now.” 

“The attic has an old chest that’s locked,” my friend pointed out.  

Henry asked me to haunt the mother of the house. He was confident she would follow my voice to the attic, but it wasn’t as easy as Henry expected. Another room disappeared. 

The missing rooms created invisible cubes. When a person walked in, they vanished, and when they walked out, we could see them again. Henry is lucky the master bedroom was still around because a ladder was built into the closet wall and led to a full-sized door. The attic rooms had faded wallpaper and a dusty braided rug.  

Henry looked out the oval window and sighed. “Beth came up here the day before she moved back to her father’s farm with the children. She pulled the chest up with a rope and said goodbye to me. Her hands were shaking. My lovely Elizabeth said she would have to marry for money and hated me for it.” 

I hugged my handsome friend and gave him the attic.  

Over the next couple of days, Henry paced around the braided rug. The attic was the only room we could see and if the chest lock couldn't be broken, and the whole house was gone, what disappeared next, the neighborhood ? Several times a day, I used a childlike voice and called for mommy when the lady of the house walked by. The last time I called her from the attic door while she was hanging clean laundry. Finally, she entered the attic, but before she touched the chest, the lady cranked the window open. Dust danced in the breeze. 

Now that she was in the room, I could whisper in her ear. I told her I was left here by my parents and wanted to see their picture. After a few trips to the garage, the lady of the house pried open the lock with a hammer and some pliers. 

White and black satin cloth sat side by side under a lid lined with beautifully handwritten letters. The lady carefully removed the time-stained clothes and placed them on the floor. Layer after layer, she removed personal items and made little stacks on the braided rug. Sometimes she held a thing to the light and rubbed it with her thumb. The lady of the house smiled at newspaper clippings and baby shoes. Then she found photographs. 

"Henry," my friend turned to look at me. "How are you?" 

My friend had tears running down his mustache. “Elizabeth left her memories of us behind.” 

When the lady of the house pulled out a Teddy Bear with a music box and it still worked, Henry crumpled on the floor. I held my friend while his shame was released and I was there when he saw the ladder reappear. Henry kissed my hand and we left the attic. When we found the nursery again, he squeezed my hand. The baby was asleep in the crib, his little belly rising and falling. 

“The boy can’t hear me,” Henry said, and I agreed. 

“Will you ascend with me?” I wanted a commitment. 

“What, exactly, is your proposal?” 

Today, Henry and I are partners in death. This is living. I have someone to talk to about memories, lessons learned, regrets, and how the world is changing. We vowed to help one another find our descendants and those of our friends, and to improve their lives until we both ascend.