Being a Ghost Sucks (Pt. 3)

Holy shit she's listening. She's going to help me get out of this damn thing! Roberts thoughts are a jumble and he feels a sense of exhilaration and a certainty that if he still had a heart it would be beating wildly. Just knowing that someone was there to help, someone to talk to, and someone to save him from an eternity in a vacuum cleaner was enough to fill him with exultation and hope.

But how the fuck is she going to help me get out of the vacuum cleaner if even I don't know how? And despair creeps back in.

Words appear in the dust once more, “I'm a ghost.” Blurred lines. “I think.”

“You think? You think? Like, you think you're a ghost but you might just be a vacuum spirit, like a dryad but for vacuums, something like that?”

“No! I'm a person.”

“Well you sure look like a vacuum cleaner to me.”

“I mean I was. I died here and woke up in this thing.”

Trish bends over the front of the vacuum cleaner and wipes the dust from the front of it underneath the torn catch bag, “This thing is a Hoover model 8760GT, serial numbe 87625149. Man, for a self aware appliance, you aren't very self aware.”

The dust is still for several long moments. “You're kind of a jerk.”

“Yep, okay, back in the closet for you and then to the dump tomorrow. Have fun at the junk yard!” Trish jumps to her feet and makes as if to grab the Robert's handle.

“No! No! Please, I'm sorry. Just listen to me!”

“Hmm... One more chance mister suckmaster.” The dust is still in response. “Okay, that was a bit harsh. Go on, please.” Maybe I should be nicer, the poor guy is stuck in a Hoover, she thinks, barely suppressing a giggle. She sits back down, brushing the dust away from a spot on the floor directly in front of the vacuum, unsure of exactly where she should be facing.

“I'm scared and alone.”

“Man, you are sad and. . . I mean, look, I feel for you but what do you want me to do?”

“I don't know. I can't do any research like this but there has to be a way.” The words are spelled out slowly, no more than four or five at a time before they have to be smudged away to make room for the next. Suddenly she noticed that the words are all carefully formed, the letters very exacting as if the hand writing them were being very deliberate and precise. “I didn't expect to be a vacuum cleaner. I died in this house and ended up here. Could you try to help me get out? Maybe find a way?”

“I guess I could go on wikipedia.” She bites her lip and pulls a stray clump of wavy blonde hair from in front of her eyes. Robert watches her in the weird way that he does, for the first time wondering how exactly it works since he doesn't have any eyes. He catches himself thinking how cute she is when she's pensive. “So, how'd you die anyway?”

“That's not important.”

“Ha! You have to tell me now, come on! I bet it was something embarrassing! Was it auto-erotic asphyxiation? Like that David Carradine guy?”

“No.”

“Oh, oh, I know, you died on the toilet like Elvis, didn't you!”

“Kind of. Please, this isn't a game.”

“Well, just tell me then!”

“I was drunk. I died of alcohol poisoning at a birthday party for my best friend.”

“Oh shit dude, I'm sorry. Still, it sounds like you died at a baller party. That's kind of cool. I mean, not like cool 'cause you're dead, but you know. . .”

“No, I don't.”

“So, were you like old or what?”

“I was about to turn twenty one.”

“Oh for real? Were you cute? Do you have any pictures?”

“I'm a vacuum cleaner.”

“Oh, right. I guess they took your stuff.” Suddenly it dawns on Trish that she is literally sitting cross-legged on her bedroom floor in a pile of dust talking out loud to a vacuum cleaner. Eagerly awaiting its response no less. This can't be healthy.

“Hey, I'm sorry I was a jerk earlier and I'm not trying to be one now, but this is a bit much. Let me clean up and—well, I guess I can't clean up or we can't talk. Tell you what, let me take a shower and change clothes and get my head straight and then we'll talk, OK?”

“OK”

Trish stands and looks down at Robert for a minute, debating whether to put him away before she decides to avoid the issue and just go take a shower. Now I'm talking to a vacuum cleaner. What. The. Fuck. And I asked him if he was cute. Ugh. . .

Sitting in the center of the room Robert sits in his spray of dust, almost happy for the first time since he'd found himself here. I'll have to ask her the date, so I'll know how long it's been, he thinks, but then he wonders if he'd really like to know at all. Now that he knows there might be a way out, it makes it a little more bearable, but only just.

So now that I'm certified crazy and talking to a household appliance, Trish idly thinks in the shower, I should have no problem adapting to a new high school, right? I mean, if I'm uncomfortable I'll just start talking to my desk. Or a pencil. It'll have to be easy to meet cute guys when I'm holding conversations with pencil sharpeners and toilets, right? But when she starts thinking of the logistics of realistically starting at a new school, the odd situation with the vacuum cleaner fades from her mind and by the time she wanders back into her bedroom she's almost forgotten the bizarre events of the last hour.

She walks, stepping over a box and tossing the towel on top of it as she slams the door shut behind her. Digging around in the mass of clothes on the bed she pauses to stretch and yawn. It's been a long day.

Holy shit. She's naked. While lost in his dreams of escape and carefully avoiding what might come after, Robert is startled to see Trish walk in and fling her towel aside. She bends over the bed, facing away from him and pulls out a cute pair of pajamas before turning back, stretching with her arms over her head. Robert isn't sure how since he's been deprived of his body but certain feelings well over him in waves and he, or at least the Hoover, starts to shake a little. Maybe this isn't so bad after all. . .

Yawning, Trish glances over at the vacuum and freezes, her pale skin blushing from head to toe. 

“You. . . You can see, can't you.”

She looks down at the spread of dust on the floor apprehensively, waiting impatiently for an answer. 

“No.”

Oh thank God! She thinks as she lets loose a deep breath and relaxes. That's one thing I don't have to worry about at least.

“OK, that's good. I mean, I guess not for you, but it makes my life easier.”

For an instant Robert feels his conscience twinge but he consoles himself with the thought that if he's going to be stuck in a vacuum cleaner for all eternity after dying a virgin there should be some sort of perks involved. “How?” He tries to stop the shaking so she won't notice that or the way that the letters in the dust are kind of erratic now.

“Um. . . nothing. Still, if it's alright with you I'm going to put you in the closet so I can get some rest, OK?”

“Sure.”

“Sure, huh? I never expected a ghost to use words like 'sure.'” She puts on the pajamas, glancing over her shoulder at the vacuum, wondering suddenly if maybe . . . No, it's just a ghost anyway, better not to think of it. “Tell you what, Robby the Robot Vacuum, we're gonna get you fixed, OK? Besides, if nothing else it'll be a great distraction from this train wreck my stupid parents made of my life, moving me to this dumb podunk town. At least I kind of have a friend now. Maybe I'll meet a nice toaster tomorrow too.”

Trish grabs Robert roughly by the handle and notices a strange shake come from it when she does. Maybe he's scared to be alone? She thinks as she gently sets him down in the closet. Well, screw him. I'm the one stuck with a haunted vacuum cleaner. This whole situation sucks.

She chuckles softly to herself as she readies for bed.