“Good evening, I’m Saint Andrew Avenillo,” The tall wiry man in a long, white, robe and an aquiline nose spoke with a light Italian accent to the dozen ghosts sitting or hovering on folding chairs. “Welcome everyone, you may call me Andrew. You are among friends here,” he smiled warmly. “Would anyone care to share?”
A young man with bleach-blonde hair raised his hand.
“Signore Chad,” Saint Andrew called on him.
“My name is Chad.”
“Hello, Chad,” the group replied as one.
“Uh, it’s been two weeks since I scared anyone. But, man, it was hard this week. I was haunting the house I died in and the family there is so jumpy! The mom is always on edge. The dad is worse. The kids, oh man, they’re better than their parents, but if I so much as walk up the stairs they shriek.”
“Signore Chad, you did scare them for a while,” Saint Andrew reminded.
“I know, Andrew, and I acknowledge that wasn’t right of me. And I’ve been better. But with Halloween coming… Timmy, the boy, came down into the basement by himself. How tempting is that?”
Several people around the circle nodded in agreement.
“But… I didn’t. I didn’t.”
“Way to stay strong, man,” a man with dark skin and a bald head.
“Thank you, Signore Chad.”
A wrinkled old woman raised her hand.
“Signora Beatrice, please,” Saint Andrew acknowledged her.
“Hello everyone, my name is Beatrice.”
“Hello Beatrice,” the group said.
“It’s been a full month since I scared anyone. I haven’t even taunted Mr. Meow Meow, the residents’ cat. I heard the mother talking about how Mr. Meow Meow hasn’t had any anxiety furballs lately. But… it’s hard. My Abraham and I built that house and I just overheard the father talking about how they want to renovate the kitchen – ‘stainless steel’ this and ‘marble counter’ that. I fed my family of five in that kitchen. If it’s good enough for my family, it’s good enough for them. I was so mad, I wanted to throw all of their designer China out of the cabinets.”
“But you didn’t,” said a teenage girl sitting next to her.
“But I didn’t,” the old woman acknowledged.
“Good for you, Beatrice,” the girl pat Beatrice on the shoulder.
“Very good, Signora,” Saint Andrew said.
The ghost of a man wearing a wetsuit – just the top, though, as he was missing the lower half of his body due to a shark attack – raised his hand.
“Signore Splash,” Saint Andrew called on him.
“Thanks, bra,” Splash said. “My name is Splash.”
“Hello Splash.”
“Uh, I kinda fell off the no-scare wagon this week. Some of you might know the 15th was the 25th anniversary of that great white chomping me just before I caught the most perfect wave ever. I, uh, dude, it was bad this year. I went to Odie’s Grill right there on the beach and just started drinking. That right there scared them seeing the beer taps open and close on their own, but I got so hammered. I went full poltergeist on that joint. Throwing mugs everywhere, tossing bottles, knocking people off of chairs… It was ugly, yo.”
“That was you?!” A skinny Hispanic man said. “I was haunting the Beach Bumz tourist shop next door. They really thought it was a poltergeist.”
“No, man,” Splash hung his head in shame. “I was wasted.”
“Signore Splash, acknowledging your mistake is important. We move forward.”
“Yeah, bra. Yeah…”
A heavy-set balding man in business casual clothes and a furrowed brow raised his hand.
“Signore Alan, I believe.”
“How do you know my name?” Alan asked.
“Signore, I’m an angel. You cannot begin to understand the breadth of what I know. Please, Signore, introduce yourself.”
“Oh, yeah, fine. My name is Alan.”
“Hello Alan.”
“Yeah, thanks. Look, this is my first meeting. I only came because this lady friend of mine thought it might help me, you know, control my emotions. But, I gotta say,” he looked around, “I’m pretty disgusted with everyone here. I mean, we’re ghosts. We scare. That’s literally the only thing we can do. If you take that away from us then you take away our ghost-hood.”
“Man, I was where you were when I started here,” the black man started.
“Yeah, but now look at you. I bet you couldn’t scare your way out of a paper bag! You’re probably afraid of your own shadow. Look, I’m just saying…”
The black man moved in an instant and transformed from his button-down short-sleeve shirt and jeans into a towering hairy beast at least seven feet tall with bulging red eyes and fangs dripping with drool. Bent down to Alan’s level, the beast’s mouth could have swallowed Alan’s head whole. A deep, resonant voice spoke slowly, “Do not mistake my restraint for inability to scare.” Alan involuntarily squeaked and scooted back several feet knocking his chair over and falling on his butt.
“Signore Paul, please,” Saint Andrew said calmly.
Paul blurred from his monster form back to his regular human form in button-down and jeans and said, palms up, “Yo, my bad. I’m sorry, I’m sorry… Alan?” he held out a hand to help Alan up. Alan skittered backwards away from the proffered hand. “That’s cool, man. I’m sorry,” Alan said moving backwards to his seat. “I’m sorry, everyone. I lost my cool. I shouldn’t have reacted that way.”
“It’s cool, Paul-dude,” Splash said, patting him on the back as he sat down. “We all fail. It’s all good, yo.”
Alan got to his feet shakily and failed once trying to right his folding chair before finally getting it upright and sitting in it heavily.
“Signore Alan, your criticism of Scaraholics Anonymous is natural. You are right in a sense – you are a ghost, and while you were alive you were taught ghosts scare people, no?
“Yeah, yeah,” Alan nodded.
“Saint Andrew?” a middle-aged Hispanic man asked. “May I?”
“Signore Javier, please.”
“As many of you know, I died five years ago in a car accident with my family. Big rig ran a light,” he clapped his hands, “Boom. Me, my wife,” he gestured just ahead of him in the circle and a faint image of a smiling woman appeared, “and my three kids,” the faint image of three children appeared next to their mother, “gone. And I’m here but, not them,” the images vanished. “I don’t know why. It makes me real angry. I lashed out a lot. I drove a man insane. Like certified, man. I have to live with that. Well, die with that? I don’t know. The point is I miss my Elena, my little Cristobal, Rosalina, and Javier Jr. and I know that if I go around scaring the living I won’t find the peace I need to move on to wherever they are. And I want that more than anything. I think you can understand that, yeah?”
Alan nodded. He said, sadly, “I understand that. I do.”
Javier stood, crossed the circle, and held out his hand to Alan. Alan took it and Javier pulled him into a hug. “You’re among friends, man.” The group clapped. Alan and Javier sat back down.
“Grazie, Signore Javier, grazie,” Saint Andrew said. “Signore Alan, perhaps you would like to start again?”
Alan looked around at the other ghosts of people of various colors, ages, historical dress, disfigurements, and saw the welcoming light in the eyes looking back at him. For the first time since his recent death, the hopelessness in his heart receded a little bit. “Uh…,” he stammered. “Uh, my name is Alan…”
“Hi Alan,” the group said in unison again.
“It’s, uh, been, a few days I guess since I last scared anyone…”
