No Vacancy

Juan couldn’t have told you the date to save his life, so luckily he's already dead. Now that’s odd, dead people don't think, do they? That’s what Juan had thought before he'd gone and died. He’d been a spirit for about a week now and he figured that this was it; he's doomed to walk the earth for eternity. Forever watching his mother cry, family visiting his grave with flowers, and random animals pee on his neighbour’s tombstones. If he's supposed to walk the earth forever it would be nice to walk somewhere other than in a circle around his buried body. While he was grateful he hadn’t been sentenced to damnation, Hell might be more interesting. You can only count the ducks so many times until you start to recognize them and give them names. Carlos was a real asshole. Maria had the most babies. Gloria’s babies disappeared. Yolanda had an affair with Miguel behind Martin’s back and then fooled around with Carlos behind Miguel’s back before Carlos hurt her and she ran back to Martin with only god knows whose ducklings.

Duck soap operas could only occupy Juan’s mind for so long because the ducks could leave the cemetery and he couldn’t. Juan likes to think that he’d have something better to do if he leaves the cemetery than follow ducks around town but he’s not sure. Even with this soul-draining boredom time stubbornly continued on, the sun rose and set, and the ducks came and went. 

Now, if he had to guess it’s been a year since his death, judging by the fact his family visited to cry. But after a few heart wrenching minutes they leave too, leaving Juan alone again. His baby girl had gotten taller, his eldest son was a spitting image of him, and his wife seemed just as broken as she had when they had gotten his diagnosis all those months ago. Juan was looking forward to seeing them next year. Ten people came to his grave that day.

He was watching over the second generation of ducks when his attention to reality began to falter. He could no longer tell the ducks apart. Had he ever been able to? Ducks all look the same; perhaps he’d been painting an imagined fantasy over their feathers all along. If the ducks all represented someone then Maria represented his sister, Gloria represented his aunt and Yolanda represented his wife. Where did that leave him? If he had to choose he’d choose Martin, with a dash of Carlos. It was insane, but nothing made sense anymore. It's best if he stops the stories and leaves that life behind.

“There’s been a vacancy,” Juan vaguely hears someone say. He’s watching the ducks, and he’s noticed that is he keeps his eyes on a single place things begin to blur and warp. The ducks are eight feet tall, their wings stretched for miles, their black eyes no longer looked through him but at him. Accusing honks echoed in Juan’s ears. “There’s been a vacancy,” he hears the voice again, maybe a little closer, maybe further. He doesn’t turn around; stays perched on his tombstone watching the ducks. There’s a funeral happening a bit past the ducks, but Juan’s eyes are fixed. He wonders how his family is doing and if they are also counting down the days until they can visit. He tries to ignore that they could visit any time of year.

The people are gone. The sun has set. The ducks are back. There’s a squirrel drinking from the lake. There’s a car going past. The sunsets again. If Juan had eyes they’d be dried up and empty. 

“Juan,” the voice says incessantly with an annoyed lilt, “there’s been a vacancy.” Juan’s a common name. Apparently, there are many people in the cemetery named Juan this late at night. Or maybe it’s high noon. At some point, the voice stops. Was his house number 292 or 392?

There’s someone at his feet crying, they’re wearing purple. His wife Teresa loved wearing purple. Or maybe she’d loved blue? The two colours are so hard to tell apart now. Throughout the day more people come to cry at the base of his perch. His baby girl’s boyfriend looks awkward. He counts four people that day.

Someone is walking through the graveyard in a dark dress. They’re carrying a small body with them. That’s not Juan’s problem. The sun rises and sets. His legs dangle from the tombstone. Ducklings are as yellow as the sun. A cat walks by with a mouthful of sunshine.

There's red and blue lights everywhere. The dogs scared off the ducks. Suddenly there’s yelling and then silence. A body’s walked off on a white sheet; behind it trails an unwilling wisp. The wisp is screaming murder. Juan looks up, holding his transparent hand up in an unsuccessful attempt to block out the bright lights. His hand no longer glows, fading in and out of the darkness. How long had it been since he’d looked up?

It’s another spirit, being moved as if on a string. The boy’s body is a few feet ahead of it and he’s struggling against the magnetic pull. Something’s wrong. The boy is still screaming, almost as if the tug of his body is hurting him. The policemen don’t seem to hear anything, their heads bowed in respect as the body is moved past them. Juan wonders why they dug him up. He was dead, he’d been buried in a cemetery, what more could they want? Why dig him up and then bury him again later?

Later, Juan has stopped guessing when, there’s a procession of people. He’d seen a hundred funerals but none of them have had a screaming boy sitting atop the coffin. He’s almost invisible in the harsh daylight. Juan wishes he’d shut up. No one else is reacting to his cries of help.

The boy is buried closer to Juan than he’d like. Once the people stop talking and leave the boy is left all alone. Juan sees him looking down at the ground level tombstone. The sunsets. The boy watches the ducks too, Juan wonders if he paints his own story on their feathers. 

A purple woman cries at Juan’s feet. He counts two that day. Teenagers come and drink on his tombstone. The boy hasn’t noticed Juan; maybe the boy can’t see him either. A woman in a dark dress cries at the boy’s feet. The boy yells and swears at her, his voice scratchy from disuse, and the words disconnected by a scrambled mind. She doesn’t seem aware that he’s unforgiving and she leaves feeling as if she’s repented. The sunsets. There’s a shadow behind the boy, “there’s been a vacancy.” Juan looks at the shadow and it looks back at him, but there’s nothing there to look at. There’s something wrong. The boy looks behind at the voice and then the boy is gone. The woman never returns to the boy’s grave. No one does.

The sunsets. A stray dog walks with its mouth full of feathers, six ducklings trailing behind him oblivious to the knowledge that they’re doomed. No one cries at Juan’s feet that year, and when he looks down at himself there’s nothing left.