A Blue Sky Existence

Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight

Lessons to be Learned

 The pencil was stationary. Charlie had tried to move it for an hour. He put his head in his hands, wondering how much more of this fruitless task he’d have to endure.

    ‘Victoria, please. You can see for yourself I can’t move something just with my mind.’

    ‘Nonsense. Practice will ensure that you can. Try again.’

   Too mentally exhausted to argue, he placed both hands on his knees, closed his eyes, and then opened them, trying to clear his mind of any and all cluttered thoughts. Until he moved this pencil, he would never be free from Victoria’s Grim lessons. After all, they had between a hundred and a million years to kill.

   But again, his mortal condition betrayed him: Charlie’s mind wandered to repetitive thoughts along the lines of, “This is boring” “Is this pencil black or navy?” “How old is it anyway?”…

   FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE, CHARLES, you will never get anywhere in furthering your abilities unless you actually trouble yourself to CONCENTRATE.

    ‘Okay, you know what?’ snapped Charlie, turning away from the pencil. ‘If you’re going to have a go at me again, could you at least say it to my face and not in my head?’

    ‘I wouldn’t have to “have a go” at you if you didn’t let your mind wander so much. It’s infuriating!’

    ‘What do you expect?’ Charlie got up from the sofa, trying to ignore the head rush he received from sitting for too long. ‘You know, I may be infuriating, but I’ve never met anyone as stubborn as you. It’s ridiculous! You’re like a child who doesn’t want to admit they’re wrong when it’s so clear that they are.’

    At this, Victoria also stood up.

    ‘How dare you speak to me with such disrespect! If you really feel that working hard and putting in effort to become what you are meant to be is so beneath you, then by all means,’ she pointed to the door that led onto the street. ‘Leave.’

    ‘Well, maybe I will,’ retorted Charlie.

   ‘Yes. And then what? It would be as I said: your mind is using all of its current strength to keep your mortal and ghostly traits in as much harmony as it can, but that makes it vulnerable to fragmentation, breakdown. Madness. The moment you exile yourself from your future is the moment you choose insanity. Charles Pounce will no longer exist. There will only be a broken soul doing its feeble best to imitate him. Are you willing to declare that quitting this exercise is worth that outcome?’

    Charlie looked at the door. Then he looked at her, before looking at his hands as they came to support his aching head. He sank back down onto the sofa, worn down. Victoria, satisfied enough, also sat, although due to her consistency as a ghost she could only perch on the surface of the flat sofa panels. Her white hands clasped together evenly in her lap, and she waited for a reaction from Charlie.

    ‘All right, you win. I’m sorry. I just…’ He tipped his head backwards until he stared at the ceiling, his hands at the roots of his hair. ‘It’s tough getting used to this, you know. I’m tired, and overwhelmed. I can’t stop thinking about my family, Ma and the twins, probably wondering where I am. Victoria.’ He shifted himself to face her, swallowing back numb feelings.

    ‘It’s killing me inside that, on top of my dad’s death, and the house in ruins, they’ve now got to cope with me just vanishing, with no explanation, nothing. If I could have an hour, anything, to see them, then I promise I won’t move from this Room until I’ve moved that pencil.’