sundaystories.ca

It was raining for the 28th straight day and everything, even birthday parties, felt funereal. As this was a funeral, of sorts, there was a sense of excess to the occasion.

The mourners arrived just in time dressed as clowns. Trent scratched his head, sighed and said, “That’s all they could get? Clowns?”

Flo shrugged. “You’ve got to remember,” she said. “You’re not dead.”

“They don’t know that!” Trent sounded peevish.

“Listen, paperwork’s the only reason they’re doing this. They don’t know whether you’re dead or not. They don’t know you. No one does. Anyone who ever did forgot about you. And so …”

She made a presentation kind of gesture in Trent’s direction and said, “Ta-da! The ghost that ain’t actually dead.”

With a gloomy voice, Trent added, “The dead man who isn’t dead but might as well be.”

With a reassuring smile, Flo said, “Ah, you’re not the first. I doubt you’ll be the last. Anyway, the point is they wouldn’t even be doing this if that woman hadn’t been so finicky with her paperwork.”

A wispy Mr. Franks stepped up behind them, seemingly from nowhere.

“Strange business, that. Reminds me of my wife. Sort of thing she’d do. She was always very fussy. Very particular. What I don’t get is the secretary.”

“Yeah. That is weird,” Trent agreed. “She didn’t know me. No one knew me.”

Flo just rolled her eyes. “It’s not that hard to understand. She’s just a nice girl who wanted to do something nice for someone. Besides, it makes her paperwork look a bit more … oh, I don’t know. Legitimate, I guess. I use to work in an office. I know about these things.”

“She may get into trouble though,” Mr Franks speculated. “Using city funds.

“Good God, look at those clowns. The rain’s making their make-up run. Geez … now that’s depressing. Speaking of which … Trent. Have you noticed anything different in the last day or two? Felt anything?”

Trent frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you seem different to me. Flo?”

“Yes, he’s a bit more … more … oh my! I know what it is!”

Confused, Trent asked, “What?”

“Solid,” Flo said.

“Solid?”

“Solid,” Mr. Franks said.

The clowns began moving away. The brief, somewhat formal ceremony, had ended. There was a sense of haste to their movements.

The rain was still falling.

“How could I be getting more solid? That makes no sense.”

“Fading out of the world without actually dying … that makes sense?” Flo asked, sensibly.

“Yeah, but how? How’s this happening?” Trent was flustered. It had taken him three weeks to get use to being dead without actually being dead. To be possibly coming back to the living, something neither desired nor undesired but rather something he had not really considered, was confounding.

Mr. Franks tried to explain. “It’s all guesswork, Trent. But I’d say someone, maybe that secretary who set this up … maybe the little awareness she has of you is enough to start bringing you back.

“I mean, we’re just guessing here, but weren’t we assuming that’s how all this happened? You’d been living alone for so long, hadn’t been in touch with anyone for years, life forgot you existed. And so you didn’t.”