David Newkirk is a retired attorney living in Kansas City, Missouri. After thirty years of writing boring legal documents, he decided to try writing things that people might actually enjoy reading.
~~~
That Simmons kid, Bradley, who lives two doors down in Apartment 2A, is convinced that my apartment is haunted.
It isn’t, of course, at least not in the sense he thinks it is. There’s no Casper or Beetlejuice; no ghost of Christmas, past, present, or future, nothing like that. There’s just me, Jake Grafton, and I live alone. Now, as for my phone being haunted? Okay. I’ll give you that one. It sort of was. But if my theory is right, dead people aren’t involved in that, either. An old, hairy, supernatural guy who hangs out in disappearing coffee shops seems to be the culprit there.
But I digress. How do I know little Bradley thinks a ghost lives here? The most direct proof is that on Tuesday, the day after things started, I heard Bradley tell his Dad, “There’s a ghost in there,” as he walked by. His dad, being the often-drunken ass that he is, said “shut the hell up,” and slapped the back of the kid’s head, making Bradley cry. The poor kid has had it rough since his mom died.
He looked back and crossed himself repeatedly as Mr. Simmons shoved him along. That made me think the Simmons family must be Catholics. Or at least not casual, generic protestants, like Laura Lee Logan is. Or Baptist, like Karen Archer. Or even Hindi like Shakti Vadakar. In fact, as far as I remember, back in my own uncaring jerk days, not a single one of the conquests I made trying to prove my fragile masculinity ever crossed themselves. Although I did get a lot of them to call out to God, if you catch my meaning.
But the biggest reason for thinking that Bradley believes a ghost occupies Jake’s Abode of Formerly Poor Life Choices is simple. I accidentally gave him reason to believe it. I convinced his dad that ghosts were real, too, except that time it was deliberate.
But we’ll get to me terrorizing his dad later.
On Monday night, the day everything first happened, I was sloppy when I opened my door. In my defense, I had just discovered my… umm… condition. I was still in shock and hadn’t thought everything through yet. So I opened my door without looking, and that was all it took. I mean, if you were eight and saw a door open on its own, then a DoorDash delivery seemed to rise in the air and float into my apartment, followed by the aforementioned door closing without any visible cause, wouldn’t you run away screaming, too?
You probably have questions now. Floating DoorDash bags alone would seem to violate any number of physical laws. Would seem to being the key words. So let me explain. Somehow, I became invisible. Not invisible in a metaphorical sense. Not in a “damn, man, that homie sure be easy to forget” sense. Not occupationally, although as a work-from-home customer service chat agent, that one comes close. No. I wish it were any one of those. But the truth is that I’m invisible in the full-on, transparent, see-right-through, Claude Raines, Harvey the Rabbit way.
So now, you probably have even more questions. Like “How does invisibility work?” (not a clue) “Can invisible people rob banks? (Sure, but the whole floating money thing might be a problem, not to mention the ethics). Could you just wrap yourself in bandages? (Wouldn’t work. The clothing is invisible, too). Could you walk into locker rooms or changing rooms and … umm … see things? (Yes, but I’m not that guy anymore. Besides, I suspect it’s overrated).
But aside from your salacious curiosity, all of those are the wrong questions. The right ones, the really interesting ones, are “How and why did that happen?” and “Can you fix it?”
I have a theory about all of that. So if you’re reading this because it happened to you too, stick with me, I promise we’ll get to that too.
But be forewarned, you may not like the answers.
* * *
So let’s start with the “how.” I have no idea if most ontological erasures start at coffee shops. Or even whether they’re common. I don’t think I’m the first, but I might be the millionth. It’s not like there is a guidebook called “Why the Universe Erased You” or something. Believe me, I looked.
There were clues as it began to happen. Secrets dressed as coincidences; hints disguised as happenstance. Things that I imagine the old guy who was responsible for the change lingered over with quiet, perverse amusement. “Oh,” I imagine him saying as he twirled his moustache like an old-time villain with a damsel tied to a railroad track and chuckled, “let’s see if he notices that one.”
I didn’t. He’s good, I’ll give the old bastard that.
Monday morning, I just wanted a triple espresso. I was hungover after the previous night with Megan, or Maggie, whose name I didn’t fully remember, and I staggered into a new coffee shop, a place named “No Name Coffee,” two blocks over. The location had changed overnight from Becky’s Brewhouse, a bar that had been there for ages, to this new business, and I decided to try it. I now surmise that the name itself was hint number one, since the very next day, when invisible me went back there, the place was back to being Becky’s Brewhouse, precisely as it had been before. The coffee shop had disappeared back into whatever dimension it called home.
The inside was completely forgettable. The room was furnished with bolted-down off-white chairs that surrounded bolted-down off-white tables. The poster behind the counter featured kittens dressed as baristas and announced that the establishment served “purr-fectly brewed” coffee. My pounding head decided that, even generic and cheesy, the place would do. I just wanted to taste the bitterness of concentrated caffeine and enjoy privacy as my body recovered. Mainly, I didn’t want to run into she-whose-name-might-have-been-Megan from the night before. Or Laura Lee. Or Amy. Or Shakti.
“Americano for Jace? Double Americano for Jace?” the barista asked. Her voice wasn’t doing good things for my headache. I sized her up. Her nametag said Doris. She had a flat, pale face and a nose ring that looked slightly uneven. Our interaction would be just coffee, I concluded, not any attempt at a pickup. I wasn’t up for that, anyway. I decided to think of her as “Drab Doris,” and smiled inwardly.
Sorry. That’s who I was and how I thought back before I was taught better.
I remember thinking that Drab Doris, looking right at me and yet forgetting me one minute later, was odd. The place was pretty empty. There was an old man by the window, wearing a suit and honest-to-God cravat, topped by a wrinkled face complete with a scraggle beard and handlebar moustache. He was deeply occupied, pounding away on an ancient mechanical calculator with a pull arm and roll of paper for output. But other than him, I was the only customer.
“Jace? Jay-cee?” she called out again, louder, as she scanned the room.
I sighed. “Umm, it’s Jake? And it was a triple espresso, not an Americano.”
Drab Doris looked startled. “Oh. Sorry. Didn’t see you for a second. Are you sure it wasn’t a double Americano?”
Maybe she was Dumb Doris, I thought, not Drab Doris. “Yes. I ordered a triple espresso. Can you just . . . I don’t know, maybe make that, please? I’ll wait.”
She frowned and dumped the Americano in the sink. Two minutes later, she handed me a new cup. The name written on it was “Jason.” Whatever. It would still have the jolt I needed. Sometimes it took more than one, anyway. I had a full two hours before my shift started.
I shuffled to a table in the far corner, as far away from calculator guy and Doris as I could get. My phone immediately rewarded me with a way-too-loud ding. Ugh. A text from Sandra Wiley, the woman before Megan/Maggie. “Hey Dude, I don’t appreciate being ignored. It’s been nearly two weeks and ten texts. Real men don’t ghost women. They have the courage to say it’s over. Your loss, scumbag. You weren’t that good anyway. Bye, Loser.”
I really had to stop giving them my numbers. No good ever came of that. I blocked her and deleted the text. Then I also preemptively blocked Megan or Mary or whatever last night’s notch on the bedpost had been named. That block stung a bit because I had wanted at least one return visit before I ghosted her.
I set the phone down and got exactly one sip of espresso down before the cursed thing had the audacity to actually ring. It was a number I didn’t recognize. To my further misfortune, I hit the little green circle instead of the red one.
“Hello?” said a female voice. “Jake?”
Crap. It sounded like Laura Lee, as persistent as ever. But it couldn’t be, or so I thought. I’d blocked that number. And the one she got later. And the one after that. If I had been thinking more clearly, I could have gone the tried-and-true “new phone, who dis?” route. That one works more than you’d think. But in my mildly hungover state, I answered. “Hello? Who’s this?”
“Oh, sweetie, it’s Laura Lee. I’m so glad that you answered!”
Double crap. My own stalker-adjacent situation, my personal paparazzi, my lingering lurker. Granted, once upon a time she had been my longest relationship ever – nearly six months – but that was four months ago, and the woman still hadn’t gotten the message.
Best to be direct. “Laura Lee,” I answered. “Look, like I said last time, I’m wayyyy busy and . . . “I know, I know,” she answered. “I’m being inappropriate. It’s just, we were so good together, I just feel that you’re my one and only in the universe, my . . .”
“I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go, umm, my sink is overflowing,” I lied.
Her voice fell. “But can’t you just give us a chance? I see something in you, I really do love you. Jake, you volunteer at the shelter; you were generous to my mom, so much more. You bought me a car when the Datsun quit, for god’s sake. Sure, I see the bravado, the neediness, but behind that, there’s the real you, and I love him. Couldn’t we just meet for a drink and…”
“Gotta go, bye,” I said and hung up.
Again, sorry. That was me back then.
I gulped the rest of the espresso and headed for the door. As I passed near the old man, he pulled the lever on the calculator, which made wah-wah noises like an arcade game right before it declares “game over.” He stood up, shook his head, and said. “You’re in the red, son. Way in the red. Too many debits, not enough credits. In the hole, that’s what you are. Gonna’ take some work to get out.”
Great. I remember thinking that I did not have “confrontation with a schizophrenic geezer” on my bingo card for that morning. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I asked.
“Sorry, son,” he answered. “I just thought you should know. I tell all of them, you know, but usually they don’t listen. You’ll see soon enough. Or rather, you won’t.” He chuckled, seemingly pleased with himself. “That’s a joke, son. You’ll get it later.”
“Whatever, dude,” I said. So much for ever hanging out there again. I decided to head back home. As I started down the sidewalk, a man in a tan suit walked into me. He looked puzzled, frowned, and said, “Sorry. My bad, didn’t see you.”
I said something bland and automatic like “no worries.” As I walked off, I noticed he turned to look at me and moved his head back and forth. Looking like he was searching for something, but couldn’t find it.
Yeah, like I told you, hints.
But the kicker was the two crosswalks between the coffee joint and my apartment. I ended up being two-for-two. Two near-death experiences as cars made right turns and came close enough that I felt the breeze. I flipped both of them off as they sped off.
I unlocked the door to my apartment and lay down on my sofa. I had a good hour plus before I had to log in for work, and a snooze might hit the spot.
Thankfully, it would be around four hours before I looked in the mirror.
* * *
An hour and a catnap later, the pounding had stopped. I sighed, went into the second bedroom I use as a study, and logged in to work. Or tried to, anyway, because I was immediately hit with “Associate ID Not Found.” I tried again, and the system locked.
Great. Way to kick the week off. That meant a call to support. “Um, yeah, this is Jake Grafton, Associate 24601. I’m logging in, and it can’t find my ID?”
“I’m sorry you are experiencing that,” a pleasant female voice answered. “Let’s look you up.”
“Sure,” I answered. I heard keys clacking on the other end.
“That’s odd,” she said. Your associate number is registered as valid, but all identifying data is missing. Can you give me your full social? And your name again?”
I recited my information and waited. There was more clacking.
“There you are,” she said. “You just dropped off the login roster, somehow. Odd. I’ll go ahead and give you a one-time password set to your first and last name, lowercase, no space, followed by a dollar sign.”
“Great,” I answered without enthusiasm.
“Happy to help, James,” the woman said. “Have a Sterling Day!”
The line went dead before I could object that my name was Jake, not James. But my user ID and “jamesgrafton$” worked, and I was in. I hit “accept customers,” and the Sterling logo was replaced by my stats from the Friday before – total interactions, average handling time, post-interaction surveys completed, satisfaction score, and the worst of all, customers waiting.
I dove right in and accepted the first customer.
Agent: (10:03):
Hi, this is Jake, your Sterling Enterprises Customer Care Agent. Thank you for filling out your contact information in advance. Am I chatting with Galen Wareham?
Customer: (10:03):
Yes, this is Galen Wareham, from Minneapolis.
Agent: 10:04:
That’s a great city, Galen. I always say Minneapolis is the Paris of the Plains. How can I help?
Actually, I never say that. Or, more accurately, I’ve said it about a lot of cities. See, I know how the building rapport game is played.
Customer: 10:04:
I really like your products. I have the blender, the toaster oven, the massager, and a couple of the signature lamps. They’re all great.
I was waiting for the “but.” Sometimes, customers like to butter you up before they drop a five-minute all-caps rant about whatever is wrong.
Agent: (10:04):
That’s great! So how can I be of assistance?
Customer: 10:05:
It’s my daughter. She never calls anymore. No one does.
Well, okay then. This happened every so often, people who just wanted to talk. The problem was that it played hell with my average handling time statistics.
Agent: (10:05)
I’m so sorry to hear that. Maybe you can give her a call after we talk about your issue with our product?
Customer: 10:06:
Oh, your products are fine. No issues with any of them. It’s her. My daughter. She moved away, and I never see her. She never calls back. I’m so lonely.
Customer: 10:06:
So lonely
Customer: 10:07:
So lonely
Wow. The old man was bad off. I minimized the screen and googled “senior peer support, Minneapolis.” A group called “Seniors Meetup” popped up. Worth a shot, I thought.
Customer: (10:08):
Are you still there?
Agent: 10:08:
Yes, sorry. I was looking up something that might help. Galen, after you do the survey that comes up, I want you to call 612-555-1212. It’s a group of older people like yourself. Maybe you can make a friend there. Make sure to do the survey, though.
Agent: 10:09:
Are you still there, Galen?
Customer: 10:09:
Yes. I’ll try that. But I want you to be my friend, too.
Great. Not exactly what I was looking for. But helping the guy felt good, though. And, I thought, he’ll fill out a positive survey each time we talk.
Agent: 10:09:
Sure! I’ll be your friend! If you get a different agent, you can ask for me. But I will only have a couple of minutes each time. Just do the survey each time, please.
Customer: 10:09:
Okay. Bye Jake. I think all this really helps me.
As I ended the chat. I heard an odd ding from my phone, followed by a voice saying “credit.” What the hell, I thought? I picked it up, and the screen said, “One credit earned: a good beginning, kid. But your motives were mixed. Focus more on helping.”
Out-freaking-standing, I thought. On top of the circus morning, my phone had apparently been hacked. I powered it down. I’d run a virus scan at lunch; check my credit cards, the full drill. Right then, my computer was telling me I had six customers waiting in queue.
May you never have a lunch break like the one I was about to have. As lunch breaks go, that one was Chornobyl. Bhopal. Vesuvius. The dinosaur-killer asteroid. Pick your poison. But if you’re reading this for help, for advice, because the old guy and his calculator zapped you, too. . . well, you’ve probably already had that kind of lunch.
* * *
After two hours of customer servicing, the coffee was catching up with me, and I needed to hit the bathroom. My bathroom. With the tub. And the toilet. And the medicine cabinet. And the towel bar. And … the mirror.
Which showed absolutely nothing as I passed. Zero. Zip. Zilch. Zil-wad. When I lifted a towel to rub it off (because it had to be some problem with the mirror, right? Right?) – the towel appeared in the mirror, floating up as I lifted it.
In my twenty-two years, I’d never had a panic attack before. I made up for that all at once. My heart pounded so hard that I could hear it. I hyperventilated as I ran to look at every reflective surface in my house. I wondered if I was dead. In a panic, I ran out into the hallway and pounded on the Simmons’ door. No one home. No one at 2B, either. I ran down the stairs. Ditto at 1C, and 1 B. At 1A, Mr. Blanton, the retired guy I knew in passing, opened the door. I “heard him say, “Who’s there! Who’s pounding on my door?”
I was out of breath and panting. He slammed the door before I could catch my breath to talk. I heard him yell to Mrs. Blanton, “Some damn prankster. Probably that Simmons kid. No one there. Just air.”
I ran out onto the sidewalk. Let’s just say there are almost certainly people other than Bradley Simmons who now believe in ghosts. Why? Because my voice worked fine. And people who get grabbed by something they can’t see, then hear my voice coming from seemingly nowhere, saying “Help!”– well, their beliefs on the subject of ghosts will probably change. Especially if they scream. Which most of them did.
After the fifth screamer, I gave up. At this point, I was still thinking, “You’re dead. You’ve died. R.I.P. Jake. Sayanora the Jakester.” I wandered back to my apartment and looked for proof of my newly acquired dead-osity. My thermometer, guided by my invisible hand, floated to my invisible mouth and registered 98.6. Stone cold normal. The Cardio app on my phone, which was now acting normally, showed my pulse at 105. High, but understandable, and well above zero. So I wasn’t dead at all. Still, the selfie I tried to take showed only the room behind me.
I tried one last experiment. My computer was still connected. “Twelve customers in queue” flashed angrily. I connected with Support. “This is Jake Grafton, Associate 24601, again. I’ve been taken ill, really ill. Sorry. I’m logging out.”
“Understood,” the same pleasantly voiced woman answered. “Feel better, James.”
I started to correct her, but the fact that my name seemed to be invisible, too, was the least of my troubles. “Thanks,” I said.
So, I could still interact with people normally, as long as I played it right.
Then I went into my bedroom and passed out for six hours.
* * *
I awoke absolutely famished. I ordered DoorDash. You know what happened next. The Simmons kid ran away screaming after I opened the door to pick it up.
What I haven’t told you is everything else about that night and the next day. I ascertained that I couldn’t see food pass through me as I ate. I found that every set of clothes I had became invisible when I put them on, and visible when I took them off. My phone became invisible when I picked it up, too, unlike other objects. I determined that I could still feel pain after a way-too-hot shower. I dived down every Google rabbit hole on invisibility -- curses, voodoo, cackling old men, Harry Potter’s stupid cloak, Plato’s Ring of Gyges. Nothing seemed to fit me.
Tuesday morning gave me the beginnings of a theory. I had only slept about two hours. I told agent support that I was still “sick” (technically true, I suppose) and went for a walk. It was then that I noticed “No Name Coffee” had morphed back into “Becky’s Brewhouse.” I looked through the window, and it was clearly a bar again. There was no old man with a calculator in sight. Barstools, wooden tables, and dartboards filled the space again, with no plastic chairs or tables in sight.
So whatever supernatural cursing was at play, the disappearing coffee shop and the old man were involved. The question was why.
It didn’t take long for the next clue to come, either. A man in front of me dropped his wallet and continued walking, oblivious. Normally, I’d grab it and hand it back to him. Yeah, even with my failings, I was never all bad. Given my “condition,” I thought improvising was in order. I grabbed the wallet and threw it at his back. He was startled when it hit, but looked down and picked it up. As he looked around, trying to figure out what the hell had just happened, my phone dinged again. “Credit.” I looked at it. “Only a couple hundred more to go, Jake.”
It hit me. The old man. Maybe he was some kind of wizard. He’d… done something. His big speech was that I had too many debits and not enough credits. The credits . . . those had to be for helping people. For being a decent human. The debits . . . well, even at my worst, I had the self-awareness to know I was a bit of a jerk. Plenty of women had certainly told me that.
I headed back to my apartment. Now that I had zeroed in on the old man, maybe I could at least figure out what kind of entity he was. Wizard seemed to fit him, but genies came to mind, too. Although, if he were a genie, he’d shorted me three wishes.
I got behind my door just in time to hear Bradley’s “There’s a ghost in there,” and see the slap. Interesting. And... maybe I could figure out a way to help the kid. Credits seemed to be the name of the game. I started thinking. Maybe, just perhaps, random strangers weren’t the only ones that I could make scream.
My opportunity came later that afternoon, when Mr. Simmons returned, loudly singing “Sweet Caroline.” “SCHWEEEEEETTT CAROLINE!!! Good times nebbbbber sssheeeemed ssssoohhoo Gud!! SCHOOO GUUUUUDDDD!”
Gag me with a spoon. He was drunk, probably fresh from Becky’s Brewhouse.
I slipped out and wedged through his door before he shut it behind him. He headed for a picture of his late wife. “Ahhh, Evie, I missshh ya, terrible bad” he said. “I’ll honor ya’ with another widdle drinkiepoo.”
Excellent. It wouldn’t be perfect, but I could do falsetto. Some of my karaoke nights would serve me well. “HENRY SIMMONS,” I began in a high pitch, “OoooOOooo . . . . Henry Simmons . . .”
He looked around the room, puzzled.
“OooooOOOO . . . I am the spirit of Evelyn . . . .” The falsetto was iffy, but so far, so good.
“Blessed Mother Mary protect me,” he said. Fear can sober somebody up really fast. “Evie?”
“OOOooooOOO! I am VERY displeased! You mistreat our son!”
There was a pause. Then he said, “Ah, Foook right off. Little shit deserves it. You were too easy on him.”
Well. Okay then. I hadn’t seen that coming. But I’m nothing if not adaptable. One time at a Greek restaurant, the owner put on a show and let people smash their plates. It had been a lot of fun. It was time for an encore. I headed for the kitchen.
For a drunk, the guy was agile. I only hit him with five of the dozen or so plates, but they all shattered to good effect.
“OOOooooOOO! DO NOT MOCK ME!!!” I’d accidentally lost the falsetto, but he didn’t seem to notice. “Hell!!! HELL!! Hell waits for you, Henry Simmons! Repent now and save your soul from HELL!!!!”
I admit it. I was having a ball.
There was an ashtray and a lighter, and I briefly considered a small fire. But I saw a better target. There was a dusty bottle, almost enshrined on a shelf. Redbreast 21, Small Batch, 1975. About a hundred bucks a glass, if memory served. Unopened. It had to be one of his most prized possessions. I grabbed it and held it suspended in the air.
“NO! NOOOOO!” he shouted, “Not the Rebdbreast! Evie, anything but that! Not the Redbreast!”
“Repent! Repent! Swear you’ll change! OooooooOOOOOoooooooooooo!” I swung the bottle wildly.
“Okay. I . . . I . . . promise,” he said weakly.
I set the bottle down. “Henry Simmons! Listen well! If you so much as touch a hair on Bradley’s head, I’ll be baaaaccckkkk! With . . . things worse than me!” I growled as loudly as I could. “Swear it to me!”
He went white and shook a little. “I . . . I swear it.”
Okay. Mission accomplished. “OOOOOO! I’ll be watching you, Henry Simmons!!! Always!!” I said.
Not being an actual ghost, I couldn’t walk through walls. So I just opened the door and left. Back at my apartment, my phone was dinging madly. “Credit, credit, credit.” I looked at the screen. “Not bad, son. Not bad at all. Fifty credits. But you know what else needs to happen, right?”
I did. And the next part . . . well, it wouldn’t be as fun. I owed a lot of apologies. Karen. Shakti. Sandra. Megan. Others, too. And not because of the old man, not because of the invisibility. Well, not entirely, anyway. That had been the wakeup call. I owed the apologies because I’d been an ass. It felt good to help Bradley. It felt good to help the guy in Minneapolis. The more I thought about it, my hit and run dating, my serial ghosting . . . didn’t feel good. Not at all.
I spent the rest of the day unblocking and texting. They all started with “Hey, it’s Jake Grafton. I need to apologize. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I know I probably hurt you . . .” The response varied, from nothing to women who called me back and screamed at me. But each time, the phone dinged “Credit.” But I was procrastinating. I’d left the biggest one of all for last. The woman who’d seen something in me, despite the way I’d treated her. The woman who wouldn’t give up on me.
I dialed Laura Lee’s number.
It went to voicemail. I started to leave a message and saw the screen flash, “Positive balance achieved. Don’t make me come back, son.”
I hung up and tried again. She answered.
“Laura? It’s Jake. Look, I’ve been a jerk. That drink? I’d love to, if you’ll have me. I’d love to talk. Meet me at Becky’s Brewhouse?”
“Oh, Jake! She answered, “Yes!”
“That’s wonderful,” I answered. “But can you make it in two hours or so? At six? I have a new guy friend in Minneapolis I need to call.”
I looked toward my television. It was off.
But I could see my reflection on the screen.
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