Phantom of the iPad
Day 48 Quintile 1 of 2024
Phantom of the iPad
Gary, Indiana
The old phantom stared at himself in the dressing room mirror. All he could see was his half-mask floating in the air. He moved it around. It had seen better days. He’d seen better days. God knew he could write a series of books about his downward spiral into invisibility without a problem.
Better days. Bygone days. Days gone by.
His ghostly mind spun through the titles with pleasure. It excited him to know his mind was still sharp and witty enough to surprise him.
The old phantom sighed. He hummed a tune. He sang a song. Nobody paid him any attention. Even the other ghosts ignored this insane phantom who insisted on spending his ghostly energy on wearing masks and costume jewelry. He once put on a suit and scared the other ghosts into haunting seizures for a month.
Ghosts were easily triggered by real people into fits of haunting. It’s like all ghosts had this allergic reaction to the living. The temperature dropped sharply and the people would get freaked out by banging doors and moving furniture.
The old phantom sighed again.
If only I can remember my real name, my once-upon-a-time living name.
He heard if you could find out who you were in real life and you said your name three times while staring into the mirror, you could have another chance at another life. You would be able to live again. Your name would be your anchor and your life.
I could breathe real air and look myself in the eyes. People would know me. I would sing. I would act. I would wear masks and become many versions of myself.
The old phantom remembered everything else about his ghostly life, but his name remained lost to him. Over time the nameless other ghosts made up new names for themselves. The old phantom decided to call himself Anon to make them happy.
Although the happiness of ghosts is not on my list of priorities.
He was a scavenger and hoarder and an avid reader at heart. He’d been rescuing books from abandoned libraries for years. It was as though he became possessed by the pages of a good book.
Up!
At the signal, Anon dropped his half mask and headed up through the floor to the opera theater above.
The opera theater was abandoned. Graffiti covered the walls. Sometimes the wind would blow dust into the building and disturb whatever was discarded by the people who used to live and work in Gary, Indiana. Now the ghosts of the dead roamed the streets, unseen and undisturbed. They were happy to go about their new ghostly lives with a growing population of soon-to-be-named ghosts.
Last month, Anon found an old ipad under one of the opera seats. The charger was still attached and he’d been charging it off and on for a while now. If he could find a stable source of electricity the device would charge much faster.
When the ipad had enough power Anon had searched for wifi. He soon opened an account on Fiverr and was offering up his services as a ghost writer. He had a way with words that his clients found appealing and entertaining. Anon’s bank account grew and he was able to get better tools installed to do his ghostwriting.
Better wifi means more work. More work means more money. More money means more upgrades. I can find out the names of my ghostly neighbors and give them another chance at life.
Anon would make his mark on the world, and he would find his real name, even if he had to ghostwrite for a hundred years.
Soon.
Thanks to Heather for the prompt for this story: Write about a book being ghostwritten by an actual ghost.
Check out the other stories on substack written in response to this prompt here:
Read this post if you want to find out more about how these monthly prompt celebrations work and if you’d like to try to write a story of your own in future.
Thank you. Fun. Nothing more frightening that Scary Gary.
This was interesting to read, well done!