Day 81 "A Petraitis Christmas Carol Part 4"

Petraitis reached out to take the hand that seemed to creep out of the darkness like a serpent. "Are you the ghost that was foretold?" asked Petraitis. The ghost stared with eyes blue from a face that seemed cold and brittle, and yet there was a strength there. "I am the ghost of winter break past. Come take my hand and behold what I have to show you." Petraitis asked again, "No really, are you the ghost that was foretold? I mean I'm waiting for a ghost and I don't want to miss him or her because I just went with the first spirit that showed up in my room." The ghost sighed. "Yes, I am the ghost that was prophesied. Honestly you have two more coming and this is sort of eating into my time. So, hurry up and come with me and behold the past as you have lived it."

Petraitis stood up in his room. He was wearing his Optimus Prime onesie, only and wished to change but the spirit beckoned him to the window. "Take my hand and you will not fall as you leave your window, for it is only in the spirit form that we will travel." Petraitis was annoyed to have to leave through the window because he had a perfectly good sliding door and his house was only one story. But this was his first haunting and he didn't really know the etiquette. So he reached out and touched the hand of the spirit and for a moment he was in darkness and then when he looked again he was standing on a forested lane and the sun was just going down.

"Do you know this place?" The spirit asked? Petraitis looked around and he recognized every landmark. "Yes, I know every mailbox and every no trespassing sign. This is where I spent my childhood. That is the barn that my friend Richard took me into, to show me a frozen opossum. We poked it with a stick and then Richard fell through the floor and had to get stiches. In fact look! It is as if it is happening right now and I am watching from afar. Look how lustrous and beautiful my hair looks!" The spirit said nothing and once again took Petraitis by the arm.

"Spirit I know this place. This is my home and those are my dogs, Dolly and Annie. And that is me curled upon the couch with them sleeping. We used to walk for hours together in the forest. I spent many days with them as they were the closest family I had! And look at my hair! It is truly more beautiful than I remembered. It is almost as if it were spun of gold! Spirit? Why did you bring me here? Is it to torture me for all that I have lost? This was a winter break spent by the fireplace, and with friends and with dogs, and with hair. Do you try to make light of my present by making me long for my past?"

The spirit took him again by the hand. "I know this place too." Petraitis said. "This is at my college. There I am! I am the one standing alone outside of the dorms. There was a party happening inside, I remember. It was a winter break party and I was invited to go."

"We shall go there now." the spirit spoke and together they entered the dorms and Petraitis called out. "Hello there! Hi, Steve! How are you? Are you looking forward to break? And you there! Anne! I know you remember us being in class together today, but for me it has been a lifetime. I am filled with warmth seeing you after so many years of living in coldness." The crowd remained and the party continued but no one acknowledged him.

"Spirit, I see now that in my ghostly form they cannot see or hear me. How I wish that I might speak with them again. Can you not make me visible for a moment so I can enjoy this past break for just one more moment?"

The spirit looked at Petraitis a little uncomfortably. "Actually, They can all see and hear you. Sorry. I didn't realize how cringe this would be for us both. It's actually my first haunting. I didn't really do a lot of research"

"So they are just ignoring me willfully?" Petraitis asked. "Yes I'm afraid so. Sorry. I don't really know what I was thinking about when I brought you here. Do you want to go somewhere else in your past? Like remember the time that kid stole your bike?"

"No spirit. I remember that party now. It was all of my friends from the ocean studies program. Or I thought friends. I remember that after that party I switched majors to education. That was the day my absolutely beautiful mane like hair began to thin. Yes, that was the day. Spirit, you have shown me my past and how I lived my winter breaks. How the decisions made then pulled the switch on my track into the future. Allow me to go back and tell myself about this day. Let me warn myself not to make such a fateful decision. Give me back my life with the whales and the tides. Let me sleep in the warmth of winter's sunshine through windows, with my dogs once more. Let me warn Richard that the floor in the barn with the dead opossum is probably too weak to hold him. Let me shampoo my hair one more time."

And in that instant Petraitis was back in his room and in his bed. The spirit of Winter Break Past was fading and left him with this message. "The next spirit will be here on the hour. Our time has not been long and yet it has felt so. As the clock reads two, you will meet the second ghost. I leave you now to ponder what I have shown you." And then the ghost was gone and Petraitis was alone.

END OF PART 4