I also tell her about Satomi, the smart psychology student who’d become my first and last girlfriend at university. I tell her how she died. And how hard it had been after that to visit my father in his office.
Before then, there had only been the bitter servants to contend with. And they’d left me alone after I learned to ignore them. I heard them conclude that my talent had disappeared with puberty. They’d been sad to lose a conduit to the outside world but not surprised.
However, Satomi knew my secret. She screamed at me every time I entered my father’s office. Cried and begged me to tell her family what had really happened to her. That she hadn’t merely disappeared, never to be heard from again.
Kristal says nothing as I tell her my long story, just nods and holds my hand.
I note that her eyes don’t change and become wary as Satomi’s did when I tell her the truth. There’s only compassion in her gaze as she allows me to talk without interruption.
“For a long time before her death, I thought I was truly crazy,” I confess to Kristal. “It wasn’t until….”
I stop, the memory choking off the story as I begin to fall into the past.
But Kristal squeezes my hand, bringing my mind back to the present. To her. And somehow that allows me to finish the original version of the story I had never told anyone.
“My mother’s death,” I answer. “My father had my mother murdered after he discovered that the Korean caretaker was my father. She died as Satomi did, but this time right in front of me. And even though I was on anti-psychotics, I could see her ghost roaming the veranda where she died in the days that followed. Satomi’s ghost also continued to haunt my father’s office, no matter how heavily medicated I remained. That was when I accepted that these people I kept seeing were ghosts. And eventually, I figured out how to avoid them. I try to never stay in hotels where someone has died. If that is impossible, I have Declan find a room unaffected by death. The same goes for office buildings. I’ve learned to live my life in such a way that I rarely encounter ghosts.”
Kristal nods. “I don’t blame you. All the other elves love Bacchanoel—that’s what we call our twelve days off. They go out and party and have all the fun and sex. But I’m always trying to avoid crowds so that I don’t have to draw portraits of their soon-to-be-departed. That’s why I liked staying here at the inn so much, in a place where it was just us—but I’m guessing from that look on your face and the way you’ve been acting, that we’re not exactly alone here.”
She gives me a wry grin, but then her expression becomes serious. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry you had to put up with that. Staying here must have been excruciating for you.”
Something inside me—the bound-up feeling I’ve been carrying around with me since I was a child—loosens at her words. I would never have guessed how good it would feel to be believed…to be understood. “This place is filled with ghosts. Mostly former guests who congregate downstairs.”
“Is that why the dining room’s always so cold?” Kristal asks. “Marian says that ghosts are cold. That’s why people get chills when they’re in parts of the workshop that used to be old-timey departments like Tin Soldiers and Wooden Figurines.”
I shake my head, still unable to fathom that there is another person out there like me. Then I remember. “Marian said there were over four hundred ghosts there before she arrived. But there weren’t that many at the party.”
“Oh no, like I said, Marian’s great at helping ghosts fade away.”
“Fade away…” At first, I’m confused, but then I remember. “My father was cut down by the daughter of one of his victims on the same veranda as my mother. My mother and a handful of the ghosts roaming around the factory house came to stand around him in an arc as he died. And as soon as he did, they faded away. It was as if they could pass on because their murders had been avenged. And when I oversaw the sale of my father’s city home in Tokyo, Satomi’s ghost was no longer in his office.”
“Exactly! Marian says a bad death is like a bad leg break. You can’t walk until your bone has been set right. Some people can’t truly pass on until their death-wound is healed—though, there are some exceptions. Some people just like it here and would rather be ghosts than re-enter the life cycle.”
“Aso…” I slip into Japanese, and I nod. It feels like I’m finally beginning to understand the ghosts I’ve avoided for so long.
