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gray hair wrapped tightly against her skull, a look of resolved
disappointment on her face.
He imagined it next as his wife, dead for almost nine years,
and he dug through storage boxes in the closet until he found
the last set of sheets she had picked out for their bed. They were
soft and white, with small botanical diagrams scattered evenly.
He found her perfume, the bottle he had hidden in the bottom
drawer of their dresser, and sprayed it above the bed. The fine
mist settled on his forehead and arms. It reminded him of
magnolias, and the tree-lined streets of his childhood home. That
night though, his bed was empty.
The first group to visit was a couple with two young children.
He offered them water or sweet tea, but the harried father
declined on the part of his family. They seemed relieved when he
assured them that there was no need to pay. The children
tumbled around the house, spooking themselves with the
creaking floorboards. After a few moments, they returned and
tugged at their father’s pants, asking where the ghosts were.
Without an answer, they began to whine. The father looked at
Clifford, equal parts disappointment and apologetic
embarrassment.
The young woman, whose sweat had made dark half-moons
in the yellow fabric under her armpits, pulled him aside. I thought
I heard a baby crying.
There aren’t any babies here that I know of.
It’s just, she looked down, shifting her weight from one foot
to another, I just lost a baby. And then I heard one crying, and her
husband called her and she smoothed her hair, produced a snack
from her bag for the younger of the two children. They were gone
as quickly as they had arrived.
There was the older woman who came alone and said her
husband had made their rocking chair creak in the exact same
way. Then the young man who ran out sobbing after investigating
a tapping sound in the hall closet. They came in uneven spurts,
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