A Ghost Story - Part IV
Image: Craig Adderley
Lydia didn’t understand how Jennifer could take off on vacation while her father, Danny, was literally at death’s door. And stick him in a nursing home! What normal person would do that?
She figured that Danny himself had insisted, while he was still lucid, that it was fine for his daughter to travel even though he was so sick. “You guys go off and enjoy yourselves,” he would have said. “Nothing’s gonna happen. I’ll be okay. I don’t want you to cancel a prepaid vacation because of me.”
And now here he was in a brand new nursing home that was out of the way, difficult to get to. His room was at the end of a long, wide, empty corridor. To Lydia, the place was so quiet it seemed as if no one was there. She found Danny scrunched in a fetal position, looking as tiny and transparent as the wing of a moth. He was no longer able to talk. She sat with him a long time, just studying the tightly closed eyes, the gaping mouth. That was on Saturday the twenty-seventh of July. Two days later he was dead.
In the two days before he died, Lydia encountered no visitors in Danny’s room. She knew his son lived in Washington state, but never saw him. Where were all of Danny’s friends? It made her sick to see him dying alone. The nurses told her Jennifer called every few hours from Canada. They also told her Jennifer had said her father was too far gone for social visits, just to let him rest.
Bullshit, thought Lydia. She didn’t want to get mixed up in family business, but there was maybe one small thing she could do to make the situation right. Outside it was hot and sunny. For Lydia the day was black. When she arrived home that night, she got on Facebook. She wasn’t supposed to put anything about Danny online, but the hell with that -- she posted the following:
The next night, the last for Danny on earth, Lydia drove to the nursing home straight from work. Danny seemed to have shrunk even more, if that were possible. His breathing was raspy and sporadic, despite the nasal cannula providing oxygen. He looked like the shriveled carcass of an insect, not a happy thought.
Lydia sat down by his bed. She put her hand over his, thinking she should sing to him though she had a terrible voice. As she started the first line of Goodnight Moonshine, by Molly Venter, a woman walked in with a guitar which she unloaded from its case and began strumming gently. Five minutes later a man entered with two small drums, and the music really got going. Then a woman with a flute. Pretty soon there were six people around his bed, then seven, then eight, all of them singing. The music didn’t necessarily bring joy to Danny’s face, but it did bring a feeling of solemnity and awe to the room. More people arrived. Now there were ten, now thirteen, now twenty. All sat or stood around Danny’s bed, swaying together, reaching down to pat his arm and face and hands. It felt as if they were in a very sacred space, about to witness a miracle.
And then, shortly before midnight, the miracle occurred. Lydia saw it with her very own eyes. Danny’s body had become translucent.
He lay still and peaceful until suddenly, with a frantic movement, he attempted to raise his arms as if beckoning to someone. His mouth opened and closed, but no words came out, just a strangled cough. And then, as everyone in the room watched, a ray of light that was visible under his skin traveled from Danny’s heart to his throat and out the top of his head -- a bright white incandescent ray that circled close to the ceiling three times, dimmed and brightened purposefully, and faded away.
Image: Vinicius Pimenta
“Goodbye, Danny,” whispered Lydia. She didn’t know where the light was going, but she knew what it was, and she felt privileged to have seen it. Perhaps, she thought, some of it had entered her own body to remain treasured there forever. For a few days she felt oddly light and buoyant. But it wasn’t till Jennifer returned home and contacted her that she learned more about the light and where it had really gone.
Cover photo: Daan Stevens