Annie Proulx's brilliant characters, and I make no profit from them. I promise I did write this on Halloween, and before I read the similar-yet-better versions of other authors.
His Private Ghost
It started small. Things weren't where he thought he put them. Put down a coffee cup by the sink, find it on the table. Put a pack of cigs on the table, find it by the sink. And weren't there seven? Six now.
Find a butt floatin' in the toilet. He didn't smoke that, did he? Did he?
He thought he must be sleep-walkin', an' it were a private shame. He didn't think too much on it 'cause he wanted it ta go away.
Wanted it ta go away when he got home from a day a work an' found his bed unmade. Wanted it ta go away when he got home from work an' found his mostly-empty pantry spilled out on the floor. What the hell? Couldn't be he was sleep-walkin'. Someone was getting in his place.
Even so, Ennis didn't get too alarmed. Could be he was goin' crazy. Felt like it most days anyway. Didn't want a tell no one in case that was the truth.
But one morning Ennis got up an' groped into his closet for a clean work shirt, an' knew, just like that, it couldn't be him doing these things. Couldn't be. Wasn't.
For, right there on the door a his closet, where those two skins of twenty years of life an' goin' on this second year of Jack's death, Ennis's-- what?-- maybe death too, right there where they made one skin. Right there where everyday kept that plaid folded around blue denim-- Ennis finally holdin' on to Jack like he shoulda done long time ago-- right there, only this time, this time--
Denim was holdin' on to plaid.
Ennis knew what was goin' on like some instinct he didn't know he had, like how you know what ta do when your horse is throwin' you, even though it happens quickly, it happens slowly, too. Be a lie not ta say it scared him, but he didn't say nothin'. Shiny-eyed, he switched them shirts back and went to work. When he got home, he heated up some beans he'd put back in his pantry, dropped a pack of smokes on the table, an' went to bed.
An' that was how things was for a while. Ennis stopped makin' the bed, knew Jack was usin' it days. Flushed a butt or two of a morning. Started buyin' things other than beans so they wouldn't be dumped on the floor. Put on a couple pounds that way. An' every evening, he threw a pack on the table, switched those shirts, an' dropped off ta dream sweet dreams an' salty of Jack.
Some mornings, Jack hadn't been around, Ennis's dreams hadn't been too good, but those days grew fewer an' fewer. Even on those days when the wind was cold and buffeted his small trailer, Ennis's waking hours were suffesed with a sense of peace, because Jack Twist was in his life.
Until one day the bank came to drag his trailer away an' Ennis moved in with Junior an' Kurt.
Ennis hadn't felt more fearful in a long time, worried that his private ghost-- ghost he never talked to, never mentioned, never feared no more, the ghost of a man he took in his arms in the night, talked to him then, only then, because he couldn't bear if only silence answered him in waking hours-- worried that this private ghost wouldn't follow him.
Worried, too, that he would.
But Jack did follow Ennis. Ennis should a known he would. The shirts switched at Junior's, and his smokes disappeared, an' sometimes Junior would gripe about butts or ashes here or there, 'bout things bein' moved, 'bout hearin' her back porch rocker middle a the night one time.
That next night, Ennis took his beer out to the back porch with his smokes, blew smoke up inta the night air. Drinkin' an' smokin', Ennis didn't even pretend to be startled when the rocker next ta him started ta creak.
"Come you never talk ta me?"
"Didn't know you'd answer."
"Hell, I'm dead, not mute."
"Well, I don't know how this works here, Jack."
"Yeah."
The chairs moved, creaking through the silence for a while, 'til Ennis took a gamble, held out his pack towards the other chair. He watched in wonder as the pack crinkled, a smoke lifted an' waited expectantly. Ennis mumbled what was meant as (an' he knew it would be taken as such) an apology, and lifted a flame to Jack's smoke. Ennis watched the end flame up and the smoke drift lazily up towards heaven.
"You ought to quit these things."
"Mmm."
"No, I'm serious. Look, I'm right here. Don't kill yourself on my account."
"Maybe."
"Not maybe. Not goin' nowhere."
Silence fell down from the crystal stars and they both stopped their rockings, lost in thoughts. Ennis watched the stars for a second before he said, "I miss seein' you, Jack."
He heard a sound like a hard exhalation off to his left.
"I miss yer smiles, an' yer eyes, Christ, an', an' yer smartass smirk," Ennis smiled to himself, more things missed, but not mentionable even now.
"Yeah."
"Yeah."
"But you waited long time. Reckon you can wait a while longer."
"Sometimes I think maybe I'm goin' crazy."
Jack snickered, and Ennis thought it was the most beautiful sound he ever heard. His eyes went wet an' thick.
"You was always crazy, Ennis."
"Yeah, 'cause you done drive me crazy." Ennis smiled through his eyeshine.
"Well, least if yer crazy, it's a good one, ain't it? Ya got me, an' ya don't gotta be scared 'bout nothin'."
"Sure 'nough. Cept'n yer spooky ass."
Jack laughed again.
They sat an' talked all night, talked even 'bout the bad things, 'bout how Jack died, 'bout what they done to each other, 'bout how it was nice ta live together, have each other everyday after all.
Ennis did eventually move back out. Junior always did worry about her father. He'd developed some forgetfulness in where he put things, started talkin' to himself when he thought no one was around.
He didn't die for another twenty four years, an' when he went it was at home in his rough shack, in bed. He hadn't smoked for years, but there was a butt on the nightstand. Junior hated the fact that he'd died alone, but there it was. They buried him behind the Methodist Church, along with his most treasured things, some of which seemed to involve another man, but Junior didn't think about that too hard. Her daddy was bein' put to rest, so she thought it best to put it all to rest along with him.