The Short Stories of Peaceful Ghosts

03. Seeing the Good Amidst the Bad

"Leave!"

The man commanded, his voice hoarse and irritated. A pale-cheeked little boy stood in front of him, his hair short and dark with blond streaks. Hiding beneath those strands were glaring eyes as cold as the winter wind. Artifacts surrounded the two lone figures in the room, old things of equal value withholding memories of a painful past. Just as the clock struck three in the morning, the little boy left quietly as his father fell from his feet. The thud on the dark wooden floor signified the end of a life. The next day, their house, along with its ominous memory was burned and forgotten.

Leia moved in to the village because of the war, a war many believed started because of a single man's lust for blood. She became an orphan along with many others not too long ago when the church's bell for the deceased rang for her parents. None of her relatives but those that lived here in Fairlake were willing to take her in. It was a beautiful town, in fact it was too beautiful. Everything was covered in light with every corner smothered with a simple ingredient called happiness.

Born and raised in the ravaged outskirts of the main cities, everything seemed like pretense; a facade in her eyes that only suggested a specious environment, like trees garnished with beauty on the outside but irreparably rotten on the inside. It disgusted her, sickened her to the point of no retreat. She remembered a young male about her age of eighteen, talking to her as she strolled by the town's popular lake---an endless expanse of water that glimmered with all the colors of the world when sunlight hit its pristine surface, almost like a prism.

"Beautiful isn't it?" he said, his eyes trailing the dark shades of the lake.

"I guess," Leia responded, almost with no emotion.

"Yet you seem displeased," he responded as he turned his back to the lake, his eyes now looking at her.

"I am displeased," she gave him an angry expression.

A short silence followed by the occasional gust of wind enveloped them. The waves on the lake were now apparent as the sun began to set into the warm colors of the sky. Dots of glimmer paraded the entire surface of the lake, blinding anyone who dared to look. Unexpectedly, he cupped his right palm on her cheek, surprising her.

"Don't sour your face with that expression. It's a waste,"

"Tell that to the town," she pushed his hand aside.

"The town?"

"Yes. It's souring it's face with pretense and all this disgusting light,"

"Oh, I get it. You're one of those people,"

"...I'm leaving,"

"Hold on!"

As he said this, his strong hands grabbed her hips in a tight lock, pulling her from the ground and into the air. Startled by his recent display of disrespect, she forces herself on the ground in which he peacefully complied with a smile. He patted her head with a gentle touch and slowly walked behind her. He placed his hands on her shoulders, shifting them from one side to the other, overlooking the lake.

"When I was little, I did something I shouldn't have at this very spot," he said in a remorseful tone.

Leia stayed silent, her heart telling her to listen and her mind asking her to be curious. She acquiesced and soon she found herself listening to this stranger's childhood story. He never told her what he did, only the part where he did something wrong. He mentioned burning the house he grew up in, turning everyone inside into ashes in a single night. He fled from that estate and wandered from city to city and from road to road. He never found happiness, not a single pinch of it. Ten years later when he found himself aimlessly drifting to Fairlake, he saw her.

"I saw you, standing in the same place I stood before,"

"Did you... lose someone?"

"Hmm... More of something than someone," he paused with a smile. "But yes, in a way I did lose someone too,"

"... I'm not really the type of person who can comfort you,"

"No it's fine, I find it's better that way!"

With another period of silence the wind blew once more, but this time a little stronger. Somehow, it wasn't the same wind as it was before---it was a lot more tranquil even though it blew harder. Her brown strands of hair blew lazily with the wind, gently caressing the pale bare arms of the man behind her. He withdrew his hands from her shoulder to enjoy the view beside her. Beyond them was a stunning landscape of a fading yellow and red as the sun began to finish setting on the cloudy horizon, giving way to the twinkling of a few white pearls on the sky. Soon after, the darkness had begun to set in as the night lamps started to awake from a long day's slumber. On the water was the same twinkling they saw from the sky, patched in with the same waves they saw before during the afternoon.

"It's mesmerizing... all this beauty in one place," he said.

"Beauty... It covers all the ugly things... always," she said, biting her lip at that first word.

"I guess that's true---" he was cut off by what Leia was going to say next.

"But we see the beauty more than the ugliness in things... So in a way, we still consider the ugly things as beautiful," Leia added.

"Hmm... that's interesting. Well, do you consider the ugly things as beautiful too?"

"I think I do. Before I thought this lake was ugly. I told myself not to be fooled by its beauty," she paused. "But after talking to you, I see it differently now. I think it's possible for ugly things to become beautiful too... in it's own way that is," 

"Well then I'm glad,"

"Huh?" she started to turn to look at him.

"I'm glad I could make you see its beauty,"

When her eyes finally managed to focus on the place where he once stood, he wasn't there anymore. She looked around, scanning the area for a familiar face. No one. Alone by the corner of the lake, she stood looking at the moon which was now high up in the luminous sky. In the middle of the lake was a streak of white coming down from the moon's light, a light so pleasant that she managed to close her eyes to savor it. As the third wind blew, she could hear a faint thank you brushing through her right ear.

~*~

Author's Note: I think it's worth mentioning that I wrote this because I was inspired after reading The Great Gatsby in class --- which was three years ago!