Sam Williams - Tales from the Swollen Corpse

“What are you saying, you said we don’t have to eat, why would..”

“We don’t, but these things eat. They are born here- a natural part of this place. I am sure of it. You need to be alert at night. Listen for a flapping sound. It’s not like wings but more like the sound of a sheet blowing in the wind. If I hear it I’ll warn you. We have to curl up on the floor, like that corner we were at. If we keep our eyes closed and don’t move they will leave us be. But if you look at them or so much as move a leg, they will take you and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Bill didn’t want to take this too seriously, but with everything he’d accepted so far he was trying to keep an open mind.

“Curling into a ball and hoping they go away isn’t a very reassuring plan.”

“It works for me Bill and I have been here a long time. “

“You said there were others. What happened to them? Like that guy that was here when you got here?”

Helen looked at the ground.

“John and I spent years here. He became a dear friend. He was young when he died, barely a man, but he was old beyond his living years here.”

Bill noticed affection in Helen’s voice when she mentioned John’s name.

“He said he was part of the first class here, back when it was a normal school. And he had already been here longer when I got here than I’ve been here even to this day. I could tell it had taken its toll. I loved his little heart but I feared for his sanity. And yes Bill, I do believe we can lose it. One day another little boy appeared, but unlike us he was a real little boy, being only seven when he died. John and I looked after him. He became like our own son, but the nights were too much for him.”

Helen began to cry. Bill tried to touch her to comfort her but she pushed his hand away and continued.

”One night we couldn’t keep him calm anymore and he tried to run while they were standing over us. We heard…oh God Jacob, my Jacob.”

Helen’s sobs overpowered her and she could no longer talk. She still motioned for Bill to leave her be, regaining composure after a few minutes.

“That was the end for John as well. When the next day’s class went to recess he followed them. I watched him disintegrate in the sun just out this window here. John turned to dust and blew away before my eyes. I have thought many times about taking that walk into the sunlight.”

“Why haven’t you?”

Helen looked out at the leaves blowing across the darkening sidewalk.

“Fear, fear of the unknown, it’s awful when you think about it. You would think oblivion wouldn’t be so scary when you’re already dead.”

“Do you think that’s it then? After this- oblivion?”

Helen looked back at Bill, he seemed very concerned with her thoughts on the matter.

“I don’t know Bill.” She shrugged.

The room had gotten very dark. Bill could tell it had gotten very cold too but it didn’t feel bad, just odd. His new perceptions of the five senses were going to take some getting used to. They took seats back on the floor, talking through the night. Every so often Helen would stop and ask him to be quiet so she could listen. Nothing came of it but twice Bill thought he heard something that was more than the wind rustling through the trees outside. Helen warned him not to look out the window at night and he heeded her advice.

Bill spent the early morning lying on the floor, watching the darkness fade and the first rays of the morning sun materialize and grow. Lying there, he thought about his family. Anxiety was building over the possibility of never seeing them again and the idea of spending years, or longer, in the classroom. He wondered if ghosts really could lose their sanity and how Helen was holding on to it, or even if she was.

“You need to get up; the kids will be here soon.”

It took a minute for Bill to break from his thoughts and remember where he was and what Helen meant.

“Follow me.” Helen said, then climbed a tall book case in the back of the room. Bill found it surprisingly easy to do. There was no exertion, he almost felt weightless as he climbed. On their perch they watched the kids arrive for the school day. Some came in packs of twos and threes and others by themselves. Helen seemed to know each and everyone by her countless hours of observation, she shared with Bill their names and idiosyncrasies and even her hypothesis of their futures.

They sat there and watched the kids. Bill enjoyed the diversion but soon became restless. He watched two boys pull a diorama of a castle out of a cabinet to work on.

“That looks interesting.” Bill said as he poised to jump down.

“Please be very careful.” Helen warned.

Lifting himself with his palms, he slid his legs forward and jumped. It was an unusual feeling as he went through the air and he misjudged the effort needed. He landed on the side of his foot and rolled to the ground. Helen screamed.

“I am fine, remember I’m already dead?”

But it wasn’t the fall that caused Helen to scream. Bill looked up to see the sole of a sneaker coming down onto his face. There was no pain but an almost unbearably uncomfortable sensation and for a moment he saw only blackness. When the boy moved his foot, Bill’s vision came back. He looked up to see Helen sitting with her face buried in her hands. She raised her head and looked at Bill with tears rolling down her cheeks. Climbing down, she stood by Bill.

“I told you, you have to be careful.”

“It’s ok. I am fine.”

“No Bill you’re not and now I have to look at you! Come with me.” Helen took Bill by his hand and rushed them to the nearest wall.

Bill didn’t like Helen’s tone. It occurred to him her calm and understanding demeanor was the only thing keeping him calm since he found himself here. He wondered what the big deal was; if maybe she wasn’t as sane as he thought. Then he looked at his reflection in a mirror on the wall.

He had seen his reflection in the window earlier. The sight of his child self looking back had made him uncomfortable and he only stopped long enough to ponder why ghosts had reflections. He came to the conclusion some spectrum of light must reflect off them or he wouldn’t be able to see Helen. As hard as it was for him to see his surreal image before, his reflection now was even harder to see.

Looking back at him was an almost unrecognizably disfigured face. His nose and most of his skull had been pushed in. Several red cracks ran through the flesh of his face, exposing tissue and bone and in some places even brain. There was no blood, giving him a strange lifeless appearance as if he was made of layers of wax.

Bill turned and ran back to Helen’s safe corner where they had spent most of the day before. There he knelt and wept. Helen knew her new friend wasn’t a child but the image of a boy running off and crying reminded her to be more delicate. She decided to give him some time and space.

She kept an eye on him but when Bill didn’t move from the corner the entire day she got very worried. Helen watched the kids leave. She watched the room yellow with the setting sun. The shadows crept in and expanded. So did the feeling of loneliness, the feeling that had been constant until Bill arrived. She knelt next to Bill and put a hand on his shoulder.

“Bill, its dark, why don’t you come and sit with me for awhile?.”

“I want to see my wife and son. I don’t want to be here anymore.”

“I know you do, come and sit with me, we’ll talk about it.”

Helen tried to sound motherly; her efforts to coerce Bill from the corner were halted by a familiar sound. It was just as she said before, a sound like a flag flapping in the wind. First just one, then several. Bill lifted his head and listened.