NOT OF US
When I was a child, my father told me that there are otherworldly beings living among us. Seeing confusion in my expression, he said that when people die they release their spirits into the world. Our body, according to him, is a prison of the soul. And when the soul is released, it lingers in this world forgetting its shell had already died. "Souls mean us no harm."
"How come Mommy is scared of the dark then," my question in reference to the incident of Mother wanting someone to accompany her at dawn when she wakes up to prepare breakfast. My grandfather, who was Dad's father, had just passed away a few days before that. Dad said, "Because she thinks Lolo might show up." Puzzled, I interjected, "Show-up? He's dead, isn't he?" Not getting any answer, I mused at the thought for a bit and forgot all about it.
"How come Mommy is scared of the dark then," my question in reference to the incident of Mother wanting someone to accompany her at dawn when she wakes up to prepare breakfast. My grandfather, who was Dad's father, had just passed away a few days before that. Dad said, "Because she thinks Lolo might show up." Puzzled, I interjected, "Show-up? He's dead, isn't he?" Not getting any answer, I mused at the thought for a bit and forgot all about it.
It would have been just another ordinary conclusion to another ordinary night. Except that night when I was just about to go under the bed covers that I saw him.
His face was nothing I'd seen except during the last few days at the hospital. It was gaunt, whitish and luminescent --- marks that the one I was seeing neither had real flesh nor life. Atop the headboard he stood tall, extra tall from where I was lying. It was not his presence that scared me; in fact, I was starting to miss him. But there was something wrong with his face.
He was smiling--- no! sneering with eyes wide in malevolent excitement and greed.
His face was nothing I'd seen except during the last few days at the hospital. It was gaunt, whitish and luminescent --- marks that the one I was seeing neither had real flesh nor life. Atop the headboard he stood tall, extra tall from where I was lying. It was not his presence that scared me; in fact, I was starting to miss him. But there was something wrong with his face.
He was smiling--- no! sneering with eyes wide in malevolent excitement and greed.
That's when I knew: he was real and he was not of this world, not of us.
