A Ghostly Discourse

Thomas and Giles were sitting at the kitchen table preparing for Halloween night. Though the boys were unaware of his presence, Arthur sat at the table listening to his two grandchildren.

“No, the holes in the sheet aren’t the eyes, idiot!” Thomas exclaimed.

“Well, what are they then?” Giles asked. “Is this more comic book knowledge?”

“Listen. The reason a ghost looks like a sheet isn’t because they are white and wavy. It’s because they are invisible. They drape a sheet over themselves so people can see them.”

“Ah, so the holes are like spying holes?”

“Yes… finally! Pass me that carving knife, please.”

“How do they walk through walls then?”

“What? How is that relevant?”

“Well, if they can walk through walls, they can pass through physical stuff without resistance. If they can do that, then the sheet shouldn’t drape over them like they are physical, themselves.”

“Leave the physics out for once, Giles. I am assuming they can control that kind of stuff. Like when someone comes in the room… and they have moved things around.”

“So, they can choose when to be able to interact with the physical world?”

“Yeah, like when Patrick Swayze learns how to touch objects from that funny-looking ghost on the subway.”

“Ah, I see… nice reference. Not seen it. Unscrew that fake blood for me. My hands are tied… Wait, hang on a minute. If they can drape a sheet over themselves, they could just move around with normal clothes. They could even put eyeglasses on… like the invisible man. Why don’t they do that more often?”

“Erm, well, maybe T-shirts, jeans, and stuff are all fashionable looks we cling to in life. Once you’re a ghost, the quicker and easier, the better.”

“So, you’re saying our sense of style disappears when we die? Heaven must look drab.”

“Well, no one said heaven is like a nightclub.” They both laughed. “Don’t kick the chair, Giles.”

“Huh!? Yeah, but anyway, it’s objectively worse. Isn’t heaven supposed to be better?”

“Maybe that is better. People are not clinging to superficial things.”

“That’s deep! So, like, once you’re dead, you shed some of your ego?”

“Yeah, maybe even all of it…”

“Nah, not all of it,” Giles interrupted. “Why would they be moving stuff around if they didn’t have an ego? They still want to be noticed.”

“Good point. Maybe the dead only move things around to help the living,” said Thomas, shrugging.

“Like ghostly altruism? Like giving a warning or a nugget of wisdom. I can buy that.”

The boys continued to tinker with their costumes as Arthur listened. Thomas carefully carved a pumpkin, while Giles decorated a werewolf mask with fake blood drops around the mouth. On the table were various tools and accessories: a carving knife, a rubber bat, the open bottle of fake blood, some glue, and a bag of frozen peas, only half open but spilling out.

“What are you doing with those peas?” Giles asked.

“Err…” Thomas lifted the pumpkin and rotated it in the air. “I’m gonna glue them to the pumpkin’s face for extra features.”

“Carving not enough, eh? Well, it’s gonna be one glamorous pumpkin. Too glamorous for your egoless afterlife.”

“Touché, Giles.” Thomas began gluing peas to the pumpkin, forming green-spotted eyebrows.

“Hang on a minute. So, the holes in a sheet are not the eyes, right. Only eye holes?”

“Back on that, are we? Yeah, that’s right.”     

“Well, does that mean the holes carved in a pumpkin are the same? Is the pumpkin just like a funky motorcycle helmet for some ghostly entity?”

Arthur leaned in closer to the conversation of the boys.

Thomas continued: “Hmm… I think the pumpkin head is different. Like The Pumpkin King in The Nightmare Before Christmas. It’s really just his actual head, isn’t it?”

“Now, that’s a film I have seen! No raunchy pottery in that one… I’m pretty sure his head isn’t an actual pumpkin. It’s kind of a skeleton thing. It’s white anyway.”

“Maybe... You do raise an interesting point, though.” Thomas sat back and pondered. “Now I don’t know what to think anymore. Maybe the pumpkin is some kind of vessel for a ghostly head.”

“Either way, I wonder what kind of physical interactions are happening with the ghost and the physical stuff. Like, how does the ghost’s composition interact with the physical world.”

“This sounds like nerd talk again, Giles.”

“No, but really… My physics teacher said that at the atomic level, most of the atom is just space anyway. Tiny electrons whizzing around a tiny nucleus, with lots of space inside.”

“And?”

“Well, maybe the ghost is made up of the same stuff as all that space in the atom. So, it can go through stuff but interact with the particles when it wants to.”

“Interesting, Giles! So… ghosts are like an inverse Higgs Boson?”

“Alright, Neil deGrasse Tyson!” Giles laughed. “Have you been watching my shows over my shoulder again?”

“Maybe…”

“Well, I think we’re on to something, Thomas.”

“That does leave one question. If a ghost can interact with physical stuff because it is made of the same stuff as the space in atoms, how do they possess people?”

“No, I can’t think of a mechanism for that. Is that even real?” Giles looked to the ceiling in thought.

“Yeah, Giles, I agree. I think possession is nonsense. As I said, ghosts can only do stuff to help the living. Possessing them can only be traumatic and even physically damaging… and if what you say is true, and ghosts have the same composition as the space in atoms, then there is no way they could possibly possess anyone.”

“Then we agree, Thomas. Ghosts can move stuff at will and pass through walls at will; they don’t have the ability to possess people and have absolutely no fashion sense. That doesn’t sound so scary.”

“Agreed, Giles,” laughed Thomas before Giles burst out laughing, also.

Arthur watched the boys for a moment before standing and leaving the room. He walked lightly up the stairs and into the master bedroom.

“You know what I miss about Halloween, Giles?”

“The glorious age of pumpkin glamour?” Giles replied, grinning.

“No, I miss Grandad. Trick-or-treating with him was the best. He had no limits. People would answer the door ready to scare us, and they would end up screaming themselves.”

“Yeah, like when he had that speaker strapped to his chest under his shirt to blast out that scream when he opened his mouth.”

“Yeah, the Wilhelm scream. I guess he was the film buff before me.”

“And he was the physics professor I want to be.”

"The nerd-gene does run strong in you Giles. You did unravel the mystery of ghosts though, i'll give you that!"

"We unravelled the mystery! Science plus Hollywood knowledge goes a long way."

"Yeah, Grandad did like his films. Like when he dressed as Frankenstein and..."

"Frankenstein's monster..."

"Frankenstein, Giles. He was literally wearing a white coat!"

"Oh yeah. Touché Thomas."

"Anyway, he was dressed as Doctor Frankenstein, pretended to hand me the candy bucket and his fake arm fell off at the shoulder. That woman nearly fainted!”

“Oh man, that was hilar…”

The boys heard a creak on the stairs. Both looked to the doorway leading into the hall, then to each other. The creaks grew louder as Arthur descended the steps more heavily.

“Giles? Didn’t Mum go out?” asked Thomas, widening his eyes.

“Yeah, she did. And isn’t Dad at work until 6 p.m.?” His own widening eyes met his brother’s.

“Yeah, they’re both out.”

They looked again to the door in silent anticipation. Arthur walked into the kitchen, and their jaws dropped as they witnessed a sheet floating before them. The top of the sheet draped over something dome-like, and two holes had been crudely cut into a hanging region.

“Look! Underneath, Thomas,” Giles whispered. “No legs.” Thomas was frozen in silence.

Arthur moved closer, and the sheet glided across the kitchen, continuing to hover above the floor. Thomas grabbed Giles by his sleeve, but both remained fastened to their seats. Arthur lifted the sheet upwards from the bottom, revealing nothing, only clear air. Further and further up, the sheet was pulled before being scrunched into a ball before their eyes. Their mouths gaped at the floating mass of white cotton collecting above them. Arthur finally gripped several layers and yanked the sheet upwards. He tossed it into the air, revealing to the boys a pumpkin carved with eye holes and a jagged mouth. The pumpkin floated in isolation six feet above the kitchen floor.

Thomas looked at Giles, and Giles looked back. They both let out a piercing scream and ran out of the kitchen, up the garden, and into the street.

Arthur removed the pumpkin from his head and placed it on the kitchen table. He then began to push frozen peas with the tip of his index finger, one by one. He looked for several seconds at the peas and sat back before dissolving into nothingness for another year. Amongst the various tools and accessories on the table, the peas spelled out:  

Never stop asking questions, boys

Happy Halloween