We did it again! We made it to Halloween, the 31^st night of October for the ninth straight year. Thank you all so much for coming along for another year of 31 Ghosts. I hope you’ve enjoyed these stories as much as I’ve enjoyed putting them together for you. Now is the time in this editorial that I promise to write more stories or finally publish the second (and third?) edition of the print version of 31 Ghosts. But, you know what? I’m going to see what happens. As the calendar turns to November, we’ll see what happens. Maybe there’s ghosts that don’t confine themselves to October alone… Thanks again, everyone. Hope your Halloween has been spooky!

We lived on the edge of the suburbs, right up against old farmlands that climbed into the foothills. Our subdivision, like so many in the area, had been farmland not so long ago. So, when we were growing up, the old farmhouse at the end of the street didn’t seem particularly out of place.

Creepy? Very much. While our white, gray, and blue houses were cookie cutter models with still small, spindly trees struggling to grow in our newly planted yards, the Midgley place (though none of us kids had any idea who the Midgleys were – we all just knew that was the name) was dark wood, peeling paint, and rusted shutters. We’d occasionally see a car go onto the property, but we never saw anyone in the house – though Joey swore he see lights upstairs at night.

Suffice it to say, we’d all give the place a wide berth.

At least we would every day of the year except for one.

On Halloween, when we were old enough to go trick or treating by ourselves we’d always work our way down Sycamore Street, criss-crossing back and forth until we made our way to the last two houses.

We stood in front of the Midgley place, right where the sidewalk ended and the dirt road ran up the lane to the dark, imposing house lurking in the darkness.

“You said you were going to do it,” Joey said to me.

“Yeah,” Tamara said. “You’re not going to chicken out now, are you?” She was a year younger than us, but she was mean.

“Alan said he was going to do it, he’s going to do it,” Sam patted my shoulder confidently. Then, more quietly just to me, “You are going to do it, right? You’re not chickening out?”

I stared ahead and nodded. “I’m going to do it,” I said. I took a deep breath and started up the dirt driveway. I swear the night got colder and darker not ten feet after I’d left my friends watching me from the safety of the street.

I could feel their gazes on me, and I kept repeating to myself, “Don’t look back, don’t look back,” because I knew if I did I’d lose my nerve and run back. No, I kept my eyes forward on the dark porch of the farmhouse that kept getting closer as my feet carried me down the driveway.

Finally, I reached the steps. I put my hand on the railing, feeling the pronounced grain of the wood sharp and scratchy under my hand. I took one step onto the first creaking stair, and the second step bowed under my weight but didn’t break. I stepped onto the porch and felt a board crack under my feet, stepping quickly to the side before it gave way. Enveloped by the shadows of the porch, my hands were sweaty as I stepped up to the door.

I took a deep calming breath, raised my fist, and knocked three times on the peeling door. It sounded like three peals of thunder – or at least that’s what it seemed like to me. After the third knock I added, “Trick or Treat,” in a voice I tried to keep steady, but it came out as a question, nonetheless.

The door never moved. No lights winked on. I didn’t discern any movement at all. But I felt a shift in my pillowcase of candy gripped tightly in my hand. I opened the bag and looked in and there was a king size Baby Ruth sitting on top of the other candy. I gasped and stepped quickly but carefully down the porch steps and ran back to my friends at the end of the driveway.

“We heard you knock, Alan,” Sam said. “I knew you would,” he added confidently.

“What happened?” Tamara asked.

“I knocked, and then I felt something in my bag and…” I opened my bag and showed them the massive king size Baby Ruth. They all gasped. I could see them looking from the bag to the house, then back to the bag, weighing whether it was worth it.

In the end they decided it wasn’t.

Over the course of the year, the story had grown through retelling to include phantom lights, somehow a glowing dog chased me… I don’t know who or how it got embellished. I certainly never added to it, but I wasn’t going to complain when, in the retelling I managed to come off as some incredibly brave adventurer. But that next Halloween, they dared me to do it again. And I did. And I got a king sized Butterfinger. And still, no one dared try their luck.

The Midgley place got knocked down before the next Halloween, so I didn’t a chance for another king sized candy bar. They turned the whole property into a county park, complete with planted trees that grew up with me. By the time my parents sold me their house, the trees were respectable and the park seemed overgrown and darker than it should be at night after the park rangers locked the front gate.

So when our own twins were old enough to trick or treat on their own, I might have eavesdropped on them being dared by their friends to go see the phantom lights in the park on Halloween.

But that’s a story for another Halloween…

We’re one day away from the completion of another year of 31 Ghosts. And, as is tradition, today is a birthday ghost story. I’ll be honest, I went through the last EIGHT YEARS of birthday ghost stories looking for… not inspiration, but some sort of blueprint. Coming into this year’s 31 Ghosts I started by looking for the same thing – what did this year mean? What am I trying to say? And then, tonight, what does this, my fifty-first birthday mean?

Dear reader, I don’t have an answer. But I have a story. I have a birthday ghost story for you – the ninth birthday ghost story, in fact. It’s been a great year so far, and I know we still have one more night to go, but thank you for coming along for the ride this year again. Let’s close out my birthday with a Birthday Shade.

I don’t know if it had been there for every birthday in my life, but I distinctly remember my sixth birthday. We were coming back from Bullwinkle’s Restaurant. The house we were living in had a big porch out front, and I remember walking up the steps ahead of my family and seeing the dark shadow seated on the porch swing. I blinked rapidly, but it didn’t go away. My family caught up with me and my dad moved past me saying, “What’s got you stalled there, squirt?”

They clearly didn’t see it. So, my young mind figured, neither did I and I hurried after my parents and sister into the house.

That’s how it went for a number of years – every birthday. When we were still in that house, it would be right there on the porch. When we moved into an apartment three towns over when I was ten, I remember it leaning against the hallway just past our door. Then I remembered it distinctly because where I could convince myself after the fact that the shadow wasn’t actually an entity, but a trick of the dim light under the cover of the porch. That year in the apartment building, though, the fluorescent lights overhead illuminated everything evenly – even the dark void that made up the shadow entity. Still, though, I hurried inside without so much as a second glance, another birthday, another sighting of the entity.

Maybe it was newfound bravado when I hit my “teens,” but on my thirteenth birthday we were living in the back half of a duplex on the east side. I came around the side of the first unit and spotted the shadow entity squatting on the far side of the front door. I saw it, it clearly saw me, and I nodded at it. That’s all, but that was unprecedented. That was bravery personified for newly-minted thirteen year old me.

And it nodded back.

When it did that my blood froze in my veins. But I was a cool, mature thirteen-year-old. I did my best to play it off like it was no big deal that this entity that had been haunting my birthdays for as long as I could remember just nodded at me. I slowly, carefully closed the front door behind me before I started hyperventilating.

Two years later my dad died. He’d had cancer for a while, but I… I don’t know. I guess I knew – hard not to when words like “terminal” and “incurable” get tossed around. But he was my dad and dads don’t die. Unfortunately, the world doesn’t stop when dads do, in fact, die. And a month later, I approached the front door of the tiny two-bedroom prefab house we were living in. In the bleached-green plastic lawn chair next to the door, the shadow entity sat.

“Hey,” I said starting up the three steps to the door.

“Hey,” it responded, its voice deep and sonorous, coming not from the entity exactly but from the whole area of the entity.

The voice stopped me. It should have scared me. Any other year it would have terrified me. But not this year. “This year sucked,” I said, anger seeping into my tone.

The entity nodded.

“This isn’t how life is supposed to be. Dads don’t die. And I shouldn’t have a birthday without my dad.” Hot, angry tears came unbidden and unchecked down my cheeks.

The entity nodded again.

“That’s it. That’s all you’ve got? You’ve been here every…” I sought a word that sounded profound, sounded adult. “You’ve been here every fucking year and that’s all you’ve got?”

The entity stared at me. And then it sighed deeply. It was the sound of a strong gust of wind gathering and passing through a tall forest, rustling all the branches on its way. The sound of a deluge of rain trailing off into a sprinkle.

I stared back, but the fight had left me. Without anger, without vitriol, without enmity, I opened the front door, stepped inside and closed the door behind me.

The next year I got my license on my birthday – Mom took me straight to the DMV after school. We got home, but before I got out, Mom asked me to go get milk from the store, and she got out of the car. I stared at her but her smile told me she wanted me to use my newly minted license. I smiled and nodded back before pulling away from the curb. She was already inside when I returned fifteen minutes later. Walking up to the door, I saw the entity sitting in the same faded green lawn chair by the door.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey,” it responded.

“This year was better,” I said shifting the gallon of milk from one hand to the other.

“I’m glad,” it said and regarded me as I nodded again and went inside.

My first year away at college, I found the entity standing by the door to my dorm room when I finished my classes for the day on my birthday. The hallway was empty – it was still early in the afternoon – so no one was around to overhear me talking to – what must have looked like to anyone else – myself.

“I didn’t think you would be here this year.”

“You’re here, aren’t you?” It asked in that resonant directionless voice.

“Yeah…” I said. “You’re here for me, then?”

It nodded.

“Huh…” I said, thinking about the implications as I unlocked my dorm room door and stepped inside. I closed the door and then immediately reopened it, sticking my head out and saying to the shade, “Thanks.”

It nodded back.

In that first year after we got married, Nancy and I were living in that tiny little studio on the other side of the campus where I was going to grad school. As had been the case recently, birthdays haven’t stood much on ceremony, and I had just finished the office hours for the Intro Lit class I taught when I saw the entity standing by the front door. “Hey,” I said, smiling.

“Hey,” it responded.

I sat on the stairs next to it. “I’m married,” I said.

“You are,” it agreed.

“Did you know Nancy is pregnant?”

It nodded.

I sighed. “I haven’t told anyone yet. I don’t think she has either. It scares the hell out of me…”

The entity stared at me.

For some reason, I found that funny and laughed. “Am I ready for this?” I asked.

The entity was quiet for a moment then responded, “Are you ever really ready for anything?”

“Yeah… no. No, that’s a… that’s a solid point,” I said, nodding. “Thanks,” I said, getting to my feet and going inside to kiss Nancy who surprised me with a homemade confetti cake.

The entity sat on the porch swing I had built the previous year. I stepped up on the porch as the taillights of the old Subaru headed back down the street. I sat on the opposite side of the porch swing next to the shade. We sat there on the porch, looking out at my front yard in silence. Finally, I broke the stillness. “How is she already driving?”

“You’re fifty today,” the entity said in that same deep voice.

I sighed deeply and laughed. “I sent her to get milk.”

“You’re lactose intolerant.”

“It’s the principal of the thing,” I waved a hand. “You know…”

The entity nodded.

We were both quiet for a long time. So long, in fact, that the lights of the old Subaru flashed across the porch as Sasha pulled into the driveway. She turned the car off and practically bounced across the driveway and up onto the porch. She bounded onto the porch swing right where the entity had been sitting. She looked at me with a grin a mile wide. Then she held up a small carton.

“Almond milk,” she said. “You’re lactose intolerant.”

I chuckled to myself and nodded to her.

She dropped the keys to the car in my hand and bounded inside with a quick, “Thanks dad!” as she closed the front door.

I turned back to the entity who sat on the end of the bench still. “Same time next year?”

The entity nodded.

I stood up and walked to the front door. Opening the door, I could hear Sasha giving Nancy a breathless play-by-play of her driving test. I smiled and turned back to the entity. “Next year?”

It nodded.

“Thanks,” I said, closing the door behind me.

“Tessa, explain to me why we’ve come back to the house? It’s 8:30 at night?”

Tessa closed the door behind them and turned on the light in the living room. “I know, Arturo. We’re starting on the most invasive part of the reno tomorrow and I want to introduce you to the house first.”

“You want to, what?”

“Trust me, Arturo.”

“I do boss, but…” A door slammed upstairs. Arturo jumped. “What was that?”

Tessa smiled. “That’s the house letting us know it’s listening.”

“Uh huh…” Arturo looked around, eyes wide.

Tessa took a few steps into the middle of the empty living room, work boots sounding on the wooden floor. “It’s just me,” she addressed the house, looking around as she spoke. “I came back tonight because we need to have a talk. There’s some major work that’s starting tomorrow and I want you to know what we’re going to do and what we’re not going to do.”

The house creaked audibly.

“This is some weird shit, boss…”

“First,” Tessa ignored him and continued addressing the house, “I want to go over what we have done.” She looked down at the rich grain of the floor. “We cleared out all the laminate flooring and the shitty MDF that was coving your gorgeous floors.” She walked to a wall and ran her hand along the warm plaster. “We pulled the MDF off your walls, exposing your plaster walls so you can breathe.”

Footsteps sounded overhead.

“All of this is to say, I’m here to help you. But the next step is… well, it’s a lot. I’m not going to lie.” Tessa took a deep breath and then just said it: “We need to cut into your walls and replace all your wiring and plumbing.”

A bang sounded somewhere and everywhere in the house and the lights all went out. More than the loss of light, though, a psychic weight seemed to descend on them. She heard Arturo’s quick steps towards the door.

Before he could get there in the dark, she had her flashlight out and shone it on him. “Arturo, don’t freak out on me, okay?”

“Boss, we’re way past freaking out,” he said, fear evident in his voice.

“We’re good,” Tessa said with as comforting a tone as she could. Then, to the house, her voice stern, she started, “Now, you need to stop that. I came here to talk to you and I don’t need you throwing a tantrum.”

A long, heavy silence passed. And then the lights came back on, but the heaviness remained.

“Thank you,” Tessa said. Then, continuing in her stern tone, “You’ve seen the work and care me and my team have put in here. Tomorrow’s work is going to be a lot, but I brought Arturo here because he’s the best plasterer in the state.” She gestured for Arturo to join her in the middle of the living room.

“H-Hi, house,” he said haltingly.

“We’ve taken to calling it ‘Rutherford’,” Tessa offered.

“Hi, Rutherford,” Arturo said. “I’ve, uh, worked with Tessa on a lot of jobs and she’s the real deal. And, uh, I am too. I don’t know if you remember, but earlier today I was looking at your walls. We sourced soil and sand out behind the garage and mixed it up and it matches perfectly. So, yeah, Tessa’s got a lot to do and it’s going to be a lot, but she’s super qualified. And I promise you I’ll put your walls back better than they are now.” His fear gone by now, He moved to a wall and traced his fingers down a line of holes. “We’re going to repair all the damage from when they covered these up.” He smiled and nodded. “You’re in the best hands you could hope for.”

“Thanks, Arturo.” Then, to the house, “He’s right. You managed to scare more than a few contractors off and we lucked out that they called me back. But it would only be a matter of time before they either found some butcher to just go in without any care for your bones or, worse, they just knock it down to a single wall and replace you with a McMansion.” Every door in the house started opening and closing loudly. Tessa held up a hand and the house quieted. “That isn’t going to happen,” she said with certainty. “But you have to trust me.”

The next morning, the house was quiet. Dust sheets hung like ghosts from the ceiling joists and heavy plastic covered the newly exposed hardwood floors. Lines of blue painter’s tape marked the paths for the new wiring.

“We start here,” Tessa said, resting her hand flat against the plaster by the staircase. “Old knob-and-tube. We’ll open it slow.”

Arturo pressed the edge of his plaster saw against the wall. The blade’s first pull made a soft rasping sound, more whisper than cut.

The house answered with a groan deep in its ribs.

“Easy,” Tessa murmured. “Let her know why.”

Arturo kept going, careful, respectful. Chips of plaster drifted down, revealing the thin wooden lath beneath. The smell of chalk and iron earth filled the air.

“See that?” Arturo said, brushing dust from the exposed section. “She’s got good bones. They mixed her plaster from this soil. You can see the red from the clay.”

Tessa nodded. “Then let’s make her whole again.”

The house shuddered once more, then stilled – a sigh, almost approval – as the morning light poured across the open wall.

Six weeks later, the house had settled into its new rhythm. When Tessa met Matheson on the porch, sunlight pooled across the freshly restored steps. “Mr. Matheson,” she greeted him with a smile. “Good to see you.”

Matheson’s face looked pinched. “Nice to see you, Ms. Calder. I hope you have good news for me. My investors are extremely nervous with how long this renovation has taken already.”

“Mr. Matheson, I told you I was going to do this right. I think you’ll be pleased with where we’re at.” She turned and headed up the steps to the porch.

“I hope so,” he said. Then, looking at the door, “This… this is a different door.”

“Perceptive,” Tessa smiled. “We talked about this that first day, remember? Henrick, my go-to restoration carpenter took care of this one first,” she traced her finger along the detailed woodwork of the inset. “He does amazing work – he’s finishing up the back door right now.” As if on cue the whirr of a sander started up in the detached garage.

Matheson inspected the door carefully. “It really is nice work,” he said somewhat begrudgingly.

Tessa opened the door and led him into the living room, the walls now completely repaired.

“You changed the color!” Matheson exclaimed. “We didn’t talk about that!”

Tessa laughed. “I didn’t. This is the same color plaster as when I showed you when we first exposed it.”

Matheson moved to a wall and ran his hand along the plaster. “How can that be? It was that dull gray. This… this positively glows. The room feels positively… alive.”

Tessa chuckled to herself. “It does. A lot of the credit goes to my plasterer, Arturo. He’s the best and  he matched the original plaster absolutely perfectly. Seriously, I’ve never seen better work.”

Matheson continued moving around the room, examining the walls, the floors, the wavy glass windows.

“Final inspections were last week,” Tessa said. “Plumbing and electrical both passed with compliments.”

“I saw the reports.”

“HVAC signed off Monday, and Jacobs from County Building gave us final approval yesterday.”

“This… this feels like a different house,” Matheson said staring around.

“Well, in many ways it is. We undid a lot of damage and trauma that happened over the last, I don’t know, sixty years. Structurally, it’s in way better shape, and psychically she’s much, much happier.”

Matheson gave her a quirked eyebrow. “I’m not going to get into your methods, but there’s no arguing the results…”

“Oh,” Tessa said. “The basement door…” she started through the house to the door.

“Oh, darn, I forgot all about that. We never found the key, and haven’t had a chance to get a locksmith out here. I can have my folks call the people we use…”

One hand on the knob, Tessa looked back at him quizzically. Then, she turned the knob and opened the door to the basement easily.

Matheson gaped. “That… we haven’t been able to get into that door. It’s been locked solid. The last contractor was going to break down the door, but they got scared off before they did… but… No, how did you do that?”

Tessa smiled. “The house trusts us,” she said.

Matheson rolled his eyes and followed her down into the basement. Despite the few window wells, the basement felt much lighter and airier than Matheson expected.

“This is the new Air-Handler for the heat pump – you can see how we rout into the old furnace ducts and the refrigerant lines to the outdoor unit. And the tankless water heater replaced the ancient unit here…” she showed him the finer points of the new electrical panel they put in, pointing out the joints and inspection tabs.  Finally, she led him to a dark section of the basement. “Over here,” she started to pull back a dusty sheet, “we found some of the original built-ins from upstairs. At least the folks who tore them out had the courtesy to put them all down here.” She pulled back the sheet. Dust motes whirled in the air, catching the light from the window well. “See?” she said softly. “She kept them safe all these years. That’s really our last major step. We have the original dining room buffet, there’s bookcase dividers with Inglenook benches, and even the original cabinet doors from the kitchen. Henrick has looked it all over and is going to give it all a nice refresh before we get it installed.”

“Uh, well, we’ll have to check with the investors to see if that’s the look they want to go for,” Matheson said matter-of-factly.

The door at the top of the stairs slammed shut and the light from outside seemed to dim a little. Matheson flinched and visibly paled.

“Sorry, Mr. Matheson, that’s non-negotiable. It’s part of me doing this restoration my way.” She gestured to the covered pieces, “This is part of putting the house back together. Believe me, your investors will want a happy house.”

Matheson eyed the closed door and clearly wondered whether the stubborn lock would reengage trapping them down here.

Seeing his unease, Tessa smiled. “Don’t worry, Mr. Matheson. As I said, these are going back in place and the house will be happy. We’re not trapped.”

The door above them creaked open again, slow and deliberate. Tessa looked up, smiling. “See? She agrees.”

Final walkthrough occurred two weeks later.

The air inside the Rutherford house was lighter now, warmer. Sunlight through the leaded windows painted soft gold on the restored floors. The buffet and bookcase dividers were back in place, their oak gleaming like honey. Even Matheson had to admit it looked perfect – maybe too perfect. Tessa felt it the moment she crossed the threshold: the stillness wasn’t absence. It was contentment, the kind that comes when something broken has been made whole again.

Matheson’s face bore the genuine grin he had from the moment he stepped onto the porch. Tessa knew it was more dollar-sign inspired than true appreciation, but given how far they’d come from the contentious first meeting, she’d take it.

“Ms. Calder, this is spectacular work. You were absolutely correct on everything. My investors will be exceptionally happy. I’m sure we’ll have new owners for this gorgeous place in short order.”

“Thank you, Mr. Matheson. About that,” she sighed. “I wanted to see if I could put in an offer on the house. As you can imagine,” she said smiling as she ran a hand along the rich wood mantle, “we’ve become pretty close over the time working here.”

Matheson’s face fell. “I’m… I’m so sorry, Ms. Calder. We already have several solid offers lined up. We were waiting on final walkthrough before showing them, but at this point it’s practically a fait accompli.”

Tessa’s heart sank and she sighed heavily. She pasted on her best consolation smile and said, “Well, I’m sure whoever is lucky enough to purchase her will be more than thrilled.”

“Oh, I have no doubt,” Matheson said, the grin returning.

Tessa made polite conversation and left as quickly as she could. She patted the newel post at the foot of the porch stairs. “Be good,” she said, swallowing tears, her heart a little broken, if she was honest with herself.

A month later she was finishing up on another job across town when her phone rang. She saw the caller ID show Matheson’s name and number.

“Mr. Matheson? I didn’t expect to hear from you again. Do you have another property that needs my special brand of house whispering?” She smiled as she spoke, even if her heart still ached.

“Uh… no,” he said, his tone serious. “It’s about the Rutherford house.”

Tessa’s blood ran cold. “What’s happened? Is she okay?”

“Oh,” he said, surprised at her visceral reaction. “It’s fine. Well, it’s not fine… The house is there, your work was impeccable. But… we’ve had some issues with the buyers.”

“Oh? That’s too bad,” Tessa lied. “But it sounded like you had several lined up, right?”

“Uh… yes, well, that’s the thing… they all fell through.”

“I’m sorry, what?” Tessa shook her head. “You said… what was the term, it was a fait accompli?”

“Yes… it seemed the house had different ideas…”

Tessa raised an eyebrow at hearing Matheson talking about the house as if were more than a building. “Oh really?”

“Yes,” he took a deep breath and then let out a litany of problems with the showings: “Doors wouldn’t unlock, lights wouldn’t come on, doors slammed unexplainably. Footsteps overhead when the only people were downstairs. And then…” he paused.

“And then?” Tessa encouraged.

“Tessa,” her ears perked up as he used her first name for the first time that she could remember. “The walls literally dripped blood.”

Tessa let a cackle of laughter out before she could stifle it. Then professional concern reasserted itself, “Did it stain the plaster?”

“No, that’s the thing – as soon as the would-be buyers left the blood disappeared like it was never there. But I saw it. I touched it. It was blood.”

“Oh wow…”

“The basement flooded on a perfectly dry day. Two feet of water – only it was bone dry again later that same day. No sign of water when the plumber showed up. Neighbors saying lights are coming on at night when there’s no one there…”

“Our electrical work was flawless,” Tessa got defensive.

“Yes,” he agreed. “We brought in our own electrician who said it was some of the best work he’d seen. Yet the lights kept coming on without explanation.”

Tessa sighed and tried her best to suppress her grin coming through in her voice. “Sounds like the house isn’t happy.”

“No shit,” Matheson cursed. Tessa’s eyes went wide at his outburst. “All of this is to say that our investors are extremely agitated. They want to get rid of this property as quickly and quietly as they can. To that end, if you are still interested in putting in an offer I can assure you that any reasonable offer would be happily accepted.”

Tessa let her tears of joy run down her cheeks unchecked. “I’ll have an offer for you in the morning.”

In the end, Tessa’s offer was less than they had expected, but she knew she had them over a figurative barrel and her offer was fair – just not the windfall they had hoped for.

Two weeks later, Tessa smiled as she climbed out of her F-150 in front of the Rutherford house – her house – just as the sun dipped behind the neighbor’s elms. The leaded glass glowed faintly with reflected firelight from the setting sun. When she opened the gate, the porch light flicked on before she could reach the switch.

“Miss me?” she murmured.

The front door eased open by itself with a slow, contented sigh.