If You Can Hear Me

The large wooden doors shut with a boom, and I opened my eyes for the night. There is something about the midnight masses that just mess with my flow, my evenings…. but I guess it gave me something else to listen to.

The parish cat wound around my leg as I started my rounds for the night. If you told me when I was alive that I could continue sentient living, but with only cats to keep me company in the parish halls I would have said that was a sweet deal. Yet the loneliness might be worse than the hell the generations of priests drone on and on about each week.

I lost track of the years a few centuries back. Now I keep time by the faces of the priests slowly melting down like rotten fruit, and the new inventions that appear in these halls. For a while the newest technology was these lights that never burned out like the candles used to, just flip a switch and poof. But the church still seems to have a proclivity for candles. Now those even seem mundane, and something called the internet rules the day. When I feel like sitting in on a service (there isn’t much else to do here) I always catch the parishiners sneaking little glances at the machines in their bags or coat pockets.

I floated down the stone hall, peering out the windows, and making laps of the church when I saw a van pull up. The yellow lights shone through the stained glass making rainbows on the wall. Now this, this was something interesting. I stood in the window, trying to make out if it was a face I recognized sat in the car. The driver’s side opened but the light obscured whoever got out as they walked around the back of the van. What in the world? I wondered. If only I could get outside and peek in the truck.

As I continued down the hallway to see if I could get a better view from a higher window I heard doors slam. I breezed around the corner back to the main chapel room, only to pause when I saw the unfamiliar face of a man stood with a flashlight and a black case at his side. Slowly, I moved closer even though no one but the cats have been able to see me since I died. Who are you? I muse. Why are you in a church after dark?

“You’ve got this Ty. You can do this.” the man seemed to whisper to himself. “Andrew may be a little bitch but you are just as capable without him.”

I floated against the back pew, as this man, Ty I presumed, leant down to open the case. “Alright…” he said a little louder, rifling through his box. I got a bit closer and saw what must be more of those internet technologies people use now. Though why he needed more than one is besides me. “Let’s start with the flashlight.”

In all my years here I thought I could not be surprised by the happenings, yet here I am watching in rapture. He placed his flashlight on the pew across the aisle and stood wringing his hands a bit.

“Hello, is anybody here with me?” My incorporeal eyebrow rose. “My name is Tyler, I just want to talk.” I looked around to see if maybe one of the icons on the wall was moving or a priest had snuck back into the chapel. Who was this man talking to?

“If you can here me, can you turn off this flashlight?”

Oh.

I got a little closer to the flashlight, curious if I could do anything to it. I almost felt nervous as I swiped my hand through the plastic. Nothing happened, but Tyler kept talking.

“The church never wanted ghost hunters here, so I hope you don’t mind the intrusion.”

I tried again, attempting to use muscles that don’t exist anymore. The result is the same.

Tyler repeated, “If you can here me… see if you can channel your energy into turning off the flashlight.”

I tried to push my energy through the flashlight one last time and the light flickered. I think I yelped in excitement, but it turns out it was Tyler. “Okay okay, you figured out the flashlight! Oh my god something is here …” he whispered, realizing what the light flicker meant.

“Did you die here?” he asked the room, confidence dipping. I stared, not touching the light. As much as its hard to remember my life, thats one thing I know as fact.

“Um okay, are there more than one of you?” Again I sat and stared. God I’ve wanted the company, but this guy is not that good at small talk.

Tyler jumped up like he’d seen a bug, grabbing the flashlight, and went back to rustle around in his case. He can’t be giving up already, can he? I wondered if he had a wife. No good woman would put up with those conversation skills.

“Let’s try something different.” he said, walking down the aisle. I’m not sure if he’s talking to me or himself. He placed a little black box on the altar, and stood in front of it. I follow slowly behind, curious what has gotten him so excited. “If you are still here, this is a recording device. Try to talk into it and we will see what we can here on the playback.”

For my first 100 years around this place I screamed and screamed and screamed, desperate for someone to hear me, to acknowledge me. The acceptance came in time, the only beings that could acknowledge me are the cats. With no one to talk to anymore, I’m not certain I know how.

“What is your name?” he asked, pausing after.

Skeptically, I tried to speak. “My name is …” I’ve forgotten my name? The surprise shook something lose in me. While I racked my brain to try and remember, Tyler played back the recording. I heard his voice crackle through repeating “What is your name?”. A few seconds later I hear the faintest no from me.

My eyes widened in shock as Tyler replayed the clip. “Oh my god” he whispers. “Okay, lets try again. Why are you here?”

I tried to yell my answer into the machine, “Dead! Buried! My body is over there!” I gestured wildly to the entrance of the crypt under the church.

I waited with baited breath for Tyler to replay, hoping the machine caught any of my voice. A bit of garbled words came through, but Tyler was able to make out dead and buried. “You were buried here? Lke in the cemetary? Or in the church itself?”

“Under!! Crypt!!” I yelled with all my might. If my heart could still beat it would be beating out of my chest right now.

I heard my voice crackle through Tylers speaker’s as he played it back. The feeling was as surreal as it is to talk to someone agian. “Crypt? A crypt?! Under the church?” Tyler was talking to himself now. “God, why didn’t that come up in our research. I bet Andrew found out and when the Church said no investigation he threw it all away.”

I tried to wave frantically in front of him and bring him back to our conversation to no avail. “I’ve got to find this crypt” he said, running back to grab his case, footsteps echoing on the stone floor.

I followed him as he scurried around the altar towards the back of the chapel, trying to urge him left to the heavy wooden door. Without the voice recorder on, I may as well have been a ghost for how much help my directions were. Tyler knocked over the candalabra into an icon of the Mother Mary, sending it clattering to the floor. “Oh jesus!” he yelped. The crucifix leaned over him as he bent to pick up his mess. Tyler looked up in a true vision of repentence. “Shit, sorry Jesus.”

While feeling along the back wall for a hidden passageway, he spotted the door. Putting his whole weight into the wood, it creaked open - spiderwebs and dust glimmered in the glow of the flashlight. “Fuck…” he muttered as he descended the stairs to a somehow even darker basement, dampness hanging in the air. The light cast long haunting shadows over the room, with little alcoves of relics stored under the church coming to view like a haunted storybook. I floated over and sat ontop of my sarcophagus, legs swinging back and forth as I waited for him to take in the place that has been my bedroom for centuries. Nice, isn’t it? I thought to myself.

“Shoot, I should be communicating” he says, pulling out a new black box from his case.

“This is a spiritbox, so it’ll be making a bunch of random noise, but you should be able to hop through and say something to me.” The ruckus that machine made was something like I’d never heard before. Scratchy static echoed around the room as he got closer to my spot.

“Charles Good, 1589” he read. Hearing my name out loud flooded the memories back to me. I almost felt faint. “Is this who I’ve been speaking with?” his hand touched the top of the sarcophagus. It took me a second to snap back to my current existence. “Yes, yes”

“Yes? Oh my god, okay, hi Charles, Mr. Good.” He crouched to look at the carvings made into the side of the sarcophagus, hand brushing layers of dust off it. “Why are you here?” he pondered, then stood. “What is your connection to this church?”

The images flashed in my mind. “I built it!” I yelled over the noise. I saw my team of men, and the years in the rain and the sun slowly watching the church grow around me. It was nearly unrecognizable now, but the foundation … and the crypt were still here. And I’ve been here watching the changes all along.

“Built? You built the church? Wow but that was almost 500 years ago! Have you been here all this time?”

“Yes”

“And you’re alone, there are no other spirits here”

“Yes, I’m alone.”

“Wow, do you just not want to leave your life’s work? Is that it? Why don’t you move on?”

This question gave me pause. The spirit box clicked through channels clouding the moment with noise.

“My heart … my heart is gone.” I held my hands to my chest. I don’t know how I knew this but the emptiness in my chest ached.

“You’re heart is gone? Did you have a wife? Were you not buried together?” Tyler went off hypothesizing.

I shook my head exhasperated. “My heart, my heart” I yelled.

“Your heart? God, I dont know man I’m sorry.” He looked around. “Fuck it I’m calling Andrew”

“Come on, pick up you fucker.” he muttered, phone ringing. “Yooo, Andrew. Yeah, yeah I’m in the church.” I could hear a voice grow louder on the other end. “Whatever man, I think I’m talking to this spirit who built the church in the 1500s, but I have a question about the research. I keep getting the word’s my heart come through the spirit box. Does that mean anything to you? Yeah, yeah, the guy’s name was Charles Good.”

I waited silently, like my noise could interrupt them. “Oh shit, really? Okay I’ll look. No, no I won’t get caught, calm down. Yeah I won’t touch anything! Swear!” Tyler hung up and headed upstairs without another word to me.

We were back on the altar, Tyler muttering, trying to balance the flashlight in the crook of his neck. The light went every which way as he pulled out the spirit box again. The noise echoed off the high ceilings of the chapel. “Charlie, my man! So when you said your heart is gone did you mean your actual heart?” he asked while searching around the altar like he was looking for a clues.

“Yes!” For all the bad things he had to say about Andrew, that guy got him on the right track.

Suddenly, Tyler was stood on one of the altar tables grabbing for something gold off the high wall next to the crucifix. There was no chance the priest doesn’t notice the footprints on his sacremental tablecloth in the morning. I’m so ready for that meltdown.

He hopped down with a huff, holding a gold jar with a bright red heart painted on the side. “Charlie, I wonder if this belongs to you.” I leaned over his shoulder as he pryed it open, a shiver running through him. “I guess you are as excited about this as I am” he laughed. The top is off, and Tyler repositioned his flashlight. Inside looked like calcified rock, grey and hardened with time. My soul knew it was the missing link.

“Me” I said, and by Tyler’s smile I know it was picked up by the spirit box.

“Let’s bring this back to you buddy.” He grabbed his flashlight and the jar with my heart, sticking the spirit box between his lips to try and hold it all. I thought I had felt peace, especially in my last 200 years. I think I had just come to accept that this was my afterlife. Watching Tyler carry my heart back down into the crypt I felt hope for the first time. Maybe it was finally time to rest.

He laid his equipment down, the spirit box still throwing noise against every wall. “Mr. Good, I want to help you out.” He struggled trying to open the sarcophagus. “Keep saying things if you can, so I know if you are still here.” He shoved at the lid.

“Here”

“I’m gonna need something for this.” he sighed, pacing the crypt. “I’ll be right back I think I have something in the van. Don’t go anywhere!” He dashed up the stairs. I looked around the dark room, wondering where he expected me to go.

Tyler returned, panting and holding a crowbar. “This should do the trick” It sounded like stone splitting as he wedged it under the lid. “God…” he muttered, blowing away the dust.

“I don’t know if I can get this whole thing open” There is sweat on his forehead, blood vessels bulged from exertion. I stood dejected, there was no proof this would have helped me move on… but it was the first glimpse of possibility I had ever seen. The mood in the crypt was low as Tyler grunts and throws his whole body into the crowbar. “Sorry” I said into the spirit box.

“No! We aren’t giving up yet. I’m not risking property damage and possible desecration of a grave for you to still be stuck here!” He yelled. He managed to wedge it open a bit further.

“Let’s try this.” He grabbed the jar, removing the heart. Holding the relic in his hands he leaned over the edge of the tomb. His head disappeared inside, then popped back. “Okay Mr. Good. I hope this can fulfill your needs. I probably have to close this up, but if you are still here I can see if I can convince Andrew to desecrate your grave even farther.” He dusted off his hands as I leant over to peer inside. Somehow Tyler was able to put the heart exactly over the center of my chest.

“Thank you” I said, feeling peace settle over me. Tyler pushed the lid of the sarcophagus closed. My eyes grew heavy, as a wave of comforting darkness settled over me. Centuries wandering the halls of my life’s work, it was time to rest.