Once bitten twice shy ergo sum
It's the same way a flame doesn't really, really Mum, really?? burn until you roast an inquisitive finger in one. See, for the last two nights we've been ghost hunting. Locke would've done the same, and, like atoms, black holes, God and places you've never been to, do you really know something exists if you haven't seen it with your own eyes?
(A moment, while I duck out of theist crossfire).
I spent the first night expedition being reminded of how land can be so much darker than the night sky, and how a tombstone-pocked valley sunken into mist both conceals and reminds of death, and how the dead don't stir at the deafening whir of crickets. But, no ghosts, apart from what the mind gleefully supplies in the shadows.
And I spent last night extrapolating. I imagined white curtains into hooded women. I thronged the empty rooms with disgruntled spirits roaming those wards and hallways where death had seeped into the walls, and strange stains spoke quietly of wartime blood. In my mind, somewhere a door would resist, and we'd lean heavily into it and burst through into some looped segment of the building's past, where everything was in the faded sepia tones of old photographs, and we'd see the soldiers writhing on the hospital beds. Or maybe we'd climb the stairs and hear the footsteps of some misguided soul dragging its amputated limbs behind us. Or maybe we'd flash our bright white torchlight into the darkness and see a hellish orange light blinking back.
And maybe that last one wouldn't be imagination anymore. A mere blink, at first; a tight fist of orange that would bloom at the far end of the corridor, slowly, until our skin would flicker vermillion, and a sound like some concerted intake of breath would roar in our ears. In the distance, a dog would bark once, sharply; in the air, a sudden tang of gunpowder and acid. Rapid shadows, a metallic clink, the inexplicable taste of antiseptic. And something would laugh.
but no, sadly, it was a security guard with an orange flashlight, and he wanted to know what the hell we were doing there. "Just looking around," we apologized. "Is there anything to see here?"
I couldn't help but extrapolate anyway, later, as we walked back to the car. We'd go back and tell our friends of the failed ghost expedition, and laugh and joke about the appearance of the security guard, until someone would look at us strangely and say, "What security guard? There hasn't been anyone there for years."
but all this proves to me is that ghosts, like fear, can be engineered. And I'm reminded of that security guard, looking down at us from the top of the stairwell, his face cast in shadow, answering in that painful Singaporean vernacular:
"See what? See what? See kids like you all the time lah."
Says it all, really.
but we got some cool photos.
