The Ghost in Love (32 page)

The two men looked at each other but said nothing. Fantastic music surrounded them. Dancers surrounded them. Ben looked at the man and, although he had never seen him before today, was certain he knew something about him—but what? Long ago German had described her favorite teacher, but it was one of a thousand conversations the lovers had. How was Ben supposed to remember everything she said? German loved to talk and he loved that about her. However, sometimes he listened more closely to her than at others, and maybe Mr. Spilke was one of those other times. Still, he was sure he knew something important about this man in the green shirt.

He looked at Stanley, still standing up on the steps, and remembered the Angel of Death saying Ben himself had summoned all of the people in the car. He looked at the woman dancing with German. He looked at the other dancers.

Mr. Spilke looked at the small watch on his wrist. “You'd better hurry. They're coming soon.”

Glad the other man had spoken first, Ben asked, “I'm sorry, but do we know each other?”

“We do. I'm you.” Spilke pointed to each of the other passengers. “And he's you and she's you and, well, all of us are you.”

“You're
me
?”

“We are. We're the parts of Ben Gould that German loves. You're just seeing us today through her perception rather than your own. It's as if instead of using a mirror, you closed your eyes and asked German to describe what you look like. How she sees you is different from the way you see yourself.”

“So basically I'm talking to myself here?”

Spilke said, “Basically, yes. Look, you were spinning your wheels before when you tried explaining all of this to German with that Ferrari analogy. She didn't understand it and you saw that. So you
did a smart thing, whether it was conscious or not: you told your ego to be quiet and brought us here to explain it to her because she knows us.”

“And who are
you
?”

“I said it before: we're parts of Benjamin Gould that German Landis loves. The difference is that today you're seeing them from her perspective rather than your own.

“Why do people love us, Ben? We're always trying to figure that out, but only by using our own point of view. That's so limited. Sometimes they love us for things we don't even know about ourselves. For example, they love our hands. My hands? Why would anyone love my
hands
? But they've got their reasons. You must accept that and realize the Ben they know is different from the Ben you know.

“You don't remember it, but German once called you Mr. Spilke. That's me; I was her teacher in school. The reason she called you by my name was that something about you reminded her of me. Something special about me that she loved and saw in you too. That's true about every one of us in the car: all of us were in German's life at one time or another. There was something unique about each of us that she loved. She saw those same qualities in you too.”

“That's why she recognized you before but I didn't?”

“Yes.” Spilke looked at his watch again and tapped it once for emphasis.

Ben wasn't satisfied with the teacher's answer. “How could I call you to come here if I never knew you?”

“
You
didn't—German did. She knows us. She's trying to understand what's happening to you, but your explanation wasn't making sense to her. You saw that, so you let her choose the parts of Ben Gould that
could
explain it better to her. And she did.”

Both watched German and her dancing partner. They were standing close. The woman was talking fast and using her hands for constant emphasis. German kept nodding nodding nodding, as if trying to keep up with all the things she was hearing.

“That woman is me? But I've never seen her before!”

Spilke extended two flat palms and then slowly brought them together. “She's
not
you; she's someone German knew who has a certain quality that you do, too, Ben. Maybe it's generosity or compassion, maybe insight into a specific thing. You might not even be aware of possessing it, but German believes you have it and that's part of why she loves you. That woman can explain these things to German so that she understands it.”

Heatedly, Ben counted off on his fingers, “You, Ling, Stewart Parrish, the verzes, these people here—all of them are me?”

“In one form or another. Yes.” A new voice said this. Ben turned to his left and there was Stanley the angel. “We knew this would happen one day, but not when or how. Mankind would finally say,
I want to make my own decisions
. I want to control my own destiny. How I live, when I die, what I do with my life. No outside control or influence, no coaching from the sidelines, no deus ex machina interference, nothing.

“At last: mankind grows up and moves out of the parents' house. Frankly, after all these millennia, we didn't know if it would ever happen. But now it has and you're one of the first to do it, Ben.

“It began a decade ago in Peru with a baby, oddly enough. It was supposed to die at birth but didn't. Then there was a teenager in Albania who was washed out to sea and was there for three days during a winter storm but didn't drown. They were both scheduled to die, but they didn't. Since then, the number has been growing exponentially.
All over, human beings are reclaiming their lives, their fates, and their deaths. I say hallelujah, it's about time.”

“You lied to me!” Ben said, but it was Ling speaking from somewhere inside him, and for the moment Ben had no control over the voice. He felt like a ventriloquist's dummy.

The angel looked embarrassed. “I'm sorry, Ling, but it was necessary. I couldn't tell you the truth before because it wasn't the right time. Ben had to discover certain things on his own first. You can understand why.”

“No, I cannot! You said it was all because of a computer glitch. You said if I came back here and helped him—”

Stanley held up a hand to silence her. “I know what I told you, Ling, but the fib was necessary. Ben is the sum of his parts, like all human beings. He's more important than you because you are only one of his parts.”

Ling wasn't having it. “And you lied about that too! You said I was a ghost—”

“Damn it, Ling, you
are
a ghost. But that's only a fraction of Ben. Until recently, ghosts were there to clean up someone's unfinished business after they died. But if people choose not to die now until they finish that business themselves, there's no more need of ghosts.”

“Then you should at least have the guts or grace to admit you're a liar and that you used me.”

Stanley's eyes turned into giant fiery pinwheels again, just like the night in the movie theater when Ling rejected his popcorn offer. “Be careful what you say, ghost. Don't forget who I am.”

“I'm very well aware of who you are. But you don't scare me anymore. You're a liar and a fake, Stanley—a liar and a fake.”

Helplessly caught in the middle of their crossfire, Ben held up
both hands as if to say, Those are not my words, so don't blame me. Seeing Stanley's burning orange eyes the size of yo-yos proved pretty conclusively that the man was who he said he was. As a result, Ben Gould did
not
want to be on his bad side.

He punched Stanley in the head—a perfect shot, right in the middle of the temple, with enough force and fury behind it to send the angel staggering, staggering to the side; only at the last moment did he regain his balance. It was exactly like the punch Mr. Kyte had thrown at Stewart Parrish when he tried to get into the Kyte house.

Ben was horror-struck, because he had nothing to do with it. He had nothing to do with any of this. It was all Ling's fault. The ghost was using his body and its rage ruled. “Hey, I didn't—”

Stanley sprang at him. When the angel's hands touched his shoulders, Ben was flung backward like a golf ball driven off a tee and landed on his butt on the stone sidewalk. Pain knocked the wind out of him. But before he could even say Ow! he sprang to his feet and went right after the angel again.

Stanley tensed for the attack, but Ben/Ling went down low this time and bit him on the leg. The angel yowled and tried to push him off. But Ling wasn't finished and ghosts bite hard. Somewhere in his hijacked body, Ben was shouting No no no! but he could not stop the angry ghost inside from attacking the lying angel.

If he had been able to look around, Ben would have seen something incredible: the other people did not stop dancing. They saw the two men fighting frantically but not for an instant did they stop what they were doing. They danced and watched. Or they danced and ignored the fighters. Of course German saw the wrestlers, too, but her partner touched her side and said, “Don't worry about them,” so she didn't.

Stanley grabbed Ben around the midsection and tried to lift him
up but was unable to because he had the wrong leverage. In fact, now that they were fighting, Stanley didn't feel strong enough to even lift the other man at all. Stanley was an angel—the Angel of Death, no less—but all of a sudden he didn't know if he could pick this mortal up even if he had the right angle. So they wrestled around, straining and huffing, grunting and slipping, neither of them good at it but both determined to fight it out. The dancers fought gravity in the street to the zouk music while the wrestlers fumbled and scuffled up on the sidewalk.

Someone living in one of the surrounding houses looked out the window, saw what was going on, and called the cops. But the police didn't come, because something fundamental was happening here and the world was ordered to stay away until it was concluded.

“What . . . do . . . you . . . want . . . Ling?”
Stanley gasped from somewhere deep inside Benjamin Gould's left armpit, where he was held in a sort of accidental reverse headlock.

“Say you're a liar. Admit you used me.”

“What's the point? It's over now. You don't even exist anymore.”

Infuriated by the callousness of the angel and the fact that it was true, Ben/Ling lifted Stanley off the pavement and held him up in the air, rump high and dangling. “Say it! Say you're a liar!”

“Let him down, Ben. They're coming now; they're very close. And you'll need him when they get here,” Spilke said from a safe distance.

“
Who's
coming?” Ben asked, but Ling didn't care and planned on fighting Stanley a lot longer.

“Gandersby, Tweekrat, 1900 Silver, and a bunch of others. You know them all. You know the ones I'm talking about.”

On hearing those familiar names, Ben immediately tried to release the angel but Ling wouldn't budge. After trying again, Ben bellowed
at the ghost inside his body, “Let go, damn it! Let him go!” His voice was so enraged that Ling did as she was told. Stanley lurched away, coughing and rubbing his neck.

Looking as though he'd just learned he had cancer, Ben walked over to Mr. Spilke and asked him to repeat those names.

“Gandersby, Tweekrat, 1900 Silver, and there are others. A lot of others—a whole lifetime's worth.”

“I don't have a chance against them all.” Ben's shoulder sagged. He continued to stare at Spilke but the other man said nothing else.

The dancers stopped. One walked over and turned off the music in the car. German asked her partner what was going on. The woman said to ask the men.

“What are those names, Ben? Are they people?”

Ben nodded. “Me. All of them are me too. Or they came from me. Dominique once said her favorite novel was
The Great Gandersby
. . .”

“
Gandersby
? You mean
The Great Gatsby
?”

“Yes, but Dominique hadn't read the book. She was only trying to impress me. That's how she mispronounced the title. That goofy little slip became my weapon: if I ever wanted to make her feel bad or stupid, I'd say something about Gandersby. It worked every time.”

“Why would you do that, Ben? Why would you want to make her feel bad?”

“Because I'm cruel sometimes, you know that. Or because I was insecure. Sometimes I was angry for good reason and wanted to get back at her. We always have our reasons.

“Why do any of us do mean things to each other, German? Because the other person hurt us and we want to hurt them back. No one knows how to do that better than lovers because you know each other's weak spots and their Achilles' heel. The more intimate you
are, the more you trust each other. The more you trust each other, the more vulnerable you are.

“When you're really close, a stupid thing like
Gandersby
is no longer a word but a dart right into your lover's bull's-eye.”

German hated hearing these things but knew they were true. Sometimes you
do
want to hurt the other person. “What about those other names he said? Who were they?”

“They're all me. Just different names for Ben Gould at his worst.”

“They're coming.” Mr. Spilke said, pointing.

Far down the street a substantial crowd of people was walking toward them.

“There are a lot of them.”

“A lot more than I expected,” Spilke said.

German squinted to see the group better. “You know them, Ben? You know them all? How can you tell at this distance?”

“Don't give up, Ben. You're doing good. It took me a lot longer than you to recognize who they were.”

They had their backs turned and were so absorbed in what was going on down the street that none of them had noticed Danielle Voyles walking their way.

“Danielle, you're here! I thought you said—”

“Only for a little while, Ben. Then I'm going back in. I came to give you a hand if you need it.”

“You can help?” He gestured at the crowd. “How can you help me against
them
?”

“I can't, but I can tell you what I learned before when the same kind of thing happened to me. It just happened a different way—in a drugstore parking lot.”