A Ghost of a Chance Read Online Free PDF Page A

to his feet.
    “You asked that already.”
    Keenan stumbled to the sink. Turning on the tap lighted only by Reggie’s ghostly glow, he put his head under the water and tried to drown himself in it.
    The cold made the ringing and the muddle go away, but his head still pounded like murder. Keenan grabbed the towel from the shower curtain rod and ran it violently over his head and face, hoping the weird sickness would saturate the towel instead of his brain.
    He felt dirty, violated, as if someone had pulled his pants down in front of cheerleaders. Yet, there was another part of him that wallowed in fulfillment, satisfied, satiated. It made him want to puke again.
    Keenan threw the towel through the specter, stomped into his bedroom, and then stopped with a jolt. Reggie almost ran “into” him.
    In the soft light from his window, he could see the bed. The mattress tilted sideways and touched the ground like a beached whale. Everything not otherwise tied down was on the floor. Three pictures looked like someone had pitched them against the wall. Worse, except for the window, there was not a single piece of glass in the room that had not been shattered including the screen to his rabbit-eared TV. The fragmented remnants covered everything.
    “I think you need a drink, my friend.” Reggie pirouetted across Keenan’s path and glided to the door, but Keenan only blinked at him.
    “What?”
    “A drink. You know…ice, booze, perhaps soda or a wedge of lime.”
    Keenan shook his head long enough to get the daze out of it then tip-toed through the minefield of glass to pull on his coat and step into his sneakers. He didn’t even bother to untie them. Miraculously, the shoes were glass-free and the coat was right side out, though, in his state, it probably didn’t matter.
    It dawned on Keenan as he followed Reggie out to the living room that the familiar disembodied noise was back. Arguments, low conversations, whispers, and even a little song flitted in and out of the air around him. It was reassuring.
    The group of visible ghosts was light: three screamers Keenan couldn’t see very clearly, a Hindi named Nihar who was standing on his head amongst fake flowers on the windowsill, and a crowd of loggers dancing on the kitchen table. Three of them were swilling pale mugs of beer. The stringent smell of faded incense and warm beer made Keenan’s eyes water.
    Keenan searched the room. “Constance?”
    Reggie spun around and gave him a ghostly wink. “Sorry, old chap. Not here tonight. Besides…” He floated over to the door and made a grand gesture with his arm. “…for this, you’ll need a gentleman’s perspective, I think.”
    “What do you—”
    “I’ll explain all of it after you’ve had a drink or two. Off we go.”
    Keenan’s head throbbed enough to make him not care where he was going. He lifted one numb leg after the other. When the front door slammed behind him, it sent a cartoon sound wave that should have caved in his skull. It must have been very cold outside…he could see his breath come out in solid clouds…but he was warm. Thank God for small favors.
    He stumbled after Reggie who was whistling a happy tune just to torture him.
    The haze around Keenan’s brain didn’t get any better the further down the block Reggie led him. He wondered what time it was; would the bar be open this late ?
    When they rounded the corner, the neon blue and red Taps blinked in and out, boring into the headache under Keenan’s right eyebrow. The white OPEN sign underneath looked misty in the late night fog. The heat that blasted his face when he opened the door smelled of cigarettes and humanity. It was one of his favorite sensations; nothing better in his mind than local color mixed with cold micro-brew. The flashing Terminator Stout signs always reminded him of happier days.
    Once inside, Patrick eyeballed him briefly without comment and went back to chatting with the drunk at the end of the bar. Patrick had been here