WHISTLING SHADE


Afternoons with My Stepmother

by Holly Day

 

She tells me the dog park is haunted, that every time

we take the dog there, he plays more with the ghosts than he does

the other dogs, that when he starts barking at trees or birds or strangers

he's warning us that we're in a bad place. She tells me

we should find another dog park, she tells me

she's heard of a nice one a little bit farther away from home

but it's close to her church and probably free from ghosts.

 

She tells me the parking lot at the mall has too many ghosts

for her to buy shoes there, that every time she goes shopping

she's accosted by the same group of ill-mannered ghost children

they know she can see them so they're especially drawn to her.

She wants to got to the museum sometime, look at old photographs

see if she recognizes any of those awful children from the pictures

see if she can figure out what's wrong with them so she can offer them

some sort of help or advise, like they say to do on tv.

 

She tells me that she thinks her house is haunted, some new ghost

probably brought in by something she picked up at a yard sale or the thrift store.

She worries that this new ghost is attached to something she herself

is particularly attached to, the nice set of earrings she got a good deal

on at the estate sale around the corner, the almost-new glass-fronted hutch

that works so perfectly with her living room set, that ornately-carved doorstop.

She wonders if it's worth the trouble to find out how the ghost got into her house

if it just means she has to get rid of something she really likes.