Although he was a firm believer that everything is possible and nothing is certain, Jerry nearly tripped over his own feet when he came face-to-face with a transparent, teenaged girl with golden hair cut in a scruffy bob, dressed in a simple, bullet-hole-riddled and blood-stained, black linen dress taking shape in the middle of his IKEA coffee table. Blood-loss was making him hallucinate a ghost! “Holy crap–! Wha–?! Who?!”
SHE WASN’T ALONE! There was the man, again, from her dream. He stumbled back to the kitchen island, as shocked to see her as she was to see him. He flinched and she was hurt. She was harmless. She was Ana, and she would never hurt a flea! Just ask her younger brother. “Where am I? Who are you?”
FREAKED OUT, BUT pretty sure a hazy, glowing girl couldn’t hurt him, Jerry stepped toward the coffee table where he could get a better look at his “houseguest”. “Who the hell are you?” Could she be the girl he’d been dreaming about?
The ghost tilted her head as if to hear better, but shook it, frustrated. She pointed at her ears and shook her head again. Jerry guessed that she couldn’t hear him any more than he could hear her. With the headache still thumping but slipping slowly into the background, he took another step closer. The ghost moved back, eyes wide and hands raised just a bit defensively. Recognizing fear when he saw it, Jerry stopped advancing and held up his hands in an “I’m-unarmed-and-come-in-peace” gesture. As he addressed the girl again, he accompanied his spoken words with sign language.
“Hello. My name is Jerry.”
ANA COULD SEE his lips move, but she still heard no sounds whatsoever. She shook her head. “I do not understand.” The man held out his hands to show that he was no threat and stepped toward the table, pointing at a pen next to a book. Ana shifted warily to the side but didn’t feel the need to flee. He carefully picked up the pen in a bandaged hand, held up a greeting card of some sort with the other hand, and began writing on the back of the card. After a moment he held it up for her to see. She took a tentative, floating step so she could see what he’d written.
“My name is Jerry. Who are you?”
She smiled.
THE GHOST GIRL pointed at Jerry, mouthing words. Understanding, Jerry grinned and nodded. “Yes, I am Jerry.” While Jerry signed, the ghost watched closely. “Yes! My name is Jerry. J-E-R-R-Y.”
The ghost copied the signs to spell his name and Jerry laughed. “Yes! Jerry!”
The girl continued, signing slowly, a look of concentration on her face as she tried to remember what Jerry had just shown her. “My name is…” Not having the signs for the necessary letters, she silently mouthed her name. Jerry didn’t understand her. He could sign with the best of them but he never needed to develop his lip-reading until now. The ghost held out her hand for the pen but when Jerry handed it to her it fell through her fingers and onto the table, landing on the book of poetry. The girl looked at the pen, frustrated, but then she pointed at it excitedly. Jerry picked it up and offered it to her again but she waved it off and pressed her finger down and into the book.
Understanding finally dawned on Jerry so he picked up the book and offered it to her. With a half-smile she shook her head “no” and mimed for him to open it. Jerry opened the cover and showed her the note inside the cover. Written on the title page in faded blue fountain pen was “To Ana, Love Mama. Christmas 1915.” The girl pointed at the inscription and then at herself.
Jerry got the message clearly, if not loudly. “That’s you?” he signed and spoke. “You’re Ana? Anastasia?” He signed slowly. “Your name is A-N-A?”
ANA NODDED VIGOROUSLY. Hand signs! She put her palm over her heart like she had seen him do and made the finger shapes for her name. “I am Ana.”
“Hello, Ana.” His words were simple so she could both read his lips and follow his hand signs.
“Hello, Jerry.”
THE HEADACHE SWEPT in again and grabbed Jerry’s attention. His eyes went wide and he stumbled to the closest seat, dropping the book back onto the coffee table. Ana followed him, a look of concern evident on her transparent face.
Jerry pressed on his temples with both hands. “Headache. Bad one.”
Ana glanced around the apartment, saw the kitchen sink, pointed at it, and mimed that Jerry should drink lots of water and then sleep.
“You’re pretty smart for a ghost. Sleep. I need a week’s worth of sleep.” He forced a smile, levered himself slowly up out the chair and stumbled to the kitchen area. When he got to the sink, he grabbed a clean tumbler with his good hand and held it up for his guest to see that he understood what she’d suggested.
ANA SMILED BACK, pleased that Jerry was able to understand her, but suddenly the darkness was there again, beckoning her, pulling her away from this new world of light and colour and Jerry. No! It couldn’t be over! Dream or no dream, she wanted to stay. She reached out for him, as if he could grab her hands and pull her into his world, but that world was fading fast. The darkness swirled up and out of the book but she finally realized that it wasn’t dragging her back in; it was simply embracing her while her strength waned. Suddenly she was so very tired and the dark seemed like a perfectly reasonable place to rest and get strong enough to return to the world of this Jerry person.
She looked up as she left the dream, and waved to Jerry to say “goodnight”. Jerry waved back, but she thought he looked more than a little bit confused. Then her world went black, and she was once again alone, but now it didn't bother her in the least. She knew now that there was somewhere other than the darkness, and in that dream place there lived a very sweet, somewhat handsome, man named Jerry.
JERRY RUBBED HIS eyes, shook his head, and took another swig of water. He wanted to pick up the little book but didn’t dare touch it. She was gone, but he wasn’t even sure she’d actually ever even been there. Had his headaches gotten so bad that he was hallucinating? Had one of his new West Coast friends slipped something into his drink? Were the mushrooms on the crackers magic ones? He had no idea, and if he were honest with himself, he didn’t have the energy to think about it much longer. He needed sleep more than he needed answers right now. To that end, he tugged off his party clothes, dragged on his grandpa-style flannel pajamas, and crawled into his antique, solid pine, spindle bed in the loft’s screened-off sleeping area. He fell asleep quickly, feeling much older than his years.
SOME HOURS LATER, Ana reached in the darkness for the seam of light that led to the dream world where Jerry lived. Much about it was familiar, yet there were differences she couldn’t, yet, put her finger on. Unsure of what to expect, she pushed just her face through. She kept her eyes closed at first, fearing what might be truly beyond in the light, but then realized that she was being silly. She was quite certain that she was dead and so what could possibly be the worst that could happen to her? There were no tales she’d ever heard of people dying twice, except maybe vampyres. Even Our Lord Jesus Christ died just the once.
Ana snuck one eye open. She appeared to be alone, so she opened the other, and “pulled” herself fully into the flat. She turned a circle, admiring the beauty of the space. She was certainly used to much grander, but near the end of their exile, this would have been truly luxurious. The warm woods and plush furniture were so sumptuous compared to the sparse, drafty conditions of the rooms they had been confined to for their last days. She admired the beautiful, dark, hardwood floors and the Persian rug—and then she saw that she was floating eight inches above the floor. Well, that’s silly! She frowned, scrunched her face up to focus her considerable will, and “told” her feet to go lower. She dropped too quickly and ended up four inches into the floor. Disappointed, she put her hands on her hips, concentrated harder and, a moment later, Anastasia “stood” on the flat’s floor, quite pleased with herself. I wonder if… She concentrated a bit harder and soon she could actually feel the solidity of the floor through the leather soles of her lace-up boots.