Ghost In You

The Ghost In You

I had that dream again.
The one where I find myself sitting in a darkened theater , watching a movie that I have no prior knowledge of it’s content.No trailer spoilers here.

Tonight’s story involved a widowed Father and his seven year old son

The Wife has only recently passed away. She and the Father were High School sweethearts who have known each other since they were even younger. Inseparable. Best of friends.
Her passing has struck him hard. And in his sadness he begins to neglect his adult responsibilities. From general appearance to being attentive to his child, he begins to avoid them all as he withdraws into his grief. Eventually, he must take a leave of absence from work.

At the insistence of the man's own Mother, he returns to his childhood home to begin the healing process. His Mother is a widow as well. Her husband having passed almost eight years ago, she knows all too well what her son is now going through.

The Mother still lives in the country home where her son was raised. The spacious back yard is surrounded by a forest. A deep and often dark expanse that becomes more dangerous the further you go inside.Jagged rocks and hidden holes in the ground.

A pond rests near the end of the yard between the woods and the house. As a child the Father would spend entire afternoons playing in the backyard alone. Like many kids, he had an imaginary friend to keep him company and the two would often get lost in the woods as they explored  The nearest neighbors were several blocks away and none of them had children. Till a young girl his age moved into a house down the street.

Needless to say, these two became fast and furious friends. They bonded over summers of fun playing as they created and acted out stories in the big backyard. Growing up together in each others imagination.

At first the Imaginary Friend was included in the inventive play. He had a clever trick of being able to change shape to fit the needs of the story at play. The girl would play along with the Imaginary Friend as if he was really someone she could actually see. This made the young boy like her even more. But as the summers passed the young boy began to distance himself from this childhood creation. Sometimes due to simple  forgetfulness and than later because of the strange change in tone the Imaginary Friend had started to take on whenever the girl was included in on their adventures. As the boy grew up , the Imaginary Friend faded into the background and became just a voice in his head and than a struggling whisper. The young man would leave home for college, marry the girl and never think of his childhood fantasy friend again.Barely remembering the last adventure they shared in the dark of the woods.

Until he returned home to stay years later.


As the weeks passed into months, the Fathers grief began to subside in the comfort of his childhood home. But his mind was still in turmoil and he eventually would make plans to move home permanently. Unable to function for more than several days at a time as the smallest memory would send him spiraling back into the sadness. Though his home is a safe haven, it was filled with many happy memories of times he shared with his future wife and Mother to his son. Sometimes just looking into his sons eyes was enough to set him off. The boy had his Mother's eyes.

All alone in this new house and empty yard, far away from any other kids his age, the boy looked to fill his lonliness with whatever he could come up with.... And he found someone...or rather, this someone found him.

Upon meeting, the two developed a bond over the way that this strange new friend told the boy stories about his now distant Dad. Things that the son never knew about his Father, couldn’t know. Adventures the Dad had played out in the backyard. The two now shared....Trouble his Father got into as a kid, they now indulged. Magical things, like where the Dad had buried hidden treasures in the woods as a kid. The boy can’t contain his curiosity and shares his new found knowledge with his Father. But the reaction he receives is  not with excitement as the stories the boy talks of are connected to memories that cause the Father pain. The memories the boy speaks of involved another person,his Mother.

And as the son confirms the secrets said to him about his Dad, who he wishes would talk to him more instead of being sad all the time, he grows to like his new Imaginary Friend even more. To the young boy, the Friend appears to be a few years older than himself, like the big brother he never had.. As a trust is developed between the two, the Friend starts to ask questions about the Father, and what happened to him since he “went away”.

The Grandmother doesn’t give this new development of the boys Imaginary Friend much concern. Considering the situation at hand, it’s not surprising. Even when she notices similarities between adventures the Grandson engages in and her memories of the play her own son had acted out, she finds it cute that the two could share something like this in common. Maybe her son had told the Grandson stories of his own youth. The boy often never leaves the play time even while at the dinner table. Asking that a place be set for his “Friend”
However , her curiosity is raised, as more and more similarities emerge. Too many to be just chance. She starts to see things out of the corner of her eye. Eventually the boy says something that makes the Grandmother shudder : The last words her own Husband spoke to her on his deathbed.

 The Grandmother talks with her son and recalls the things he did with his Imaginary Friend  that got him into trouble. The occasional strange thing that happened around the house back when he was a child, and the crazy things she found her self thinking and seeing at times.

As the Boys Imaginary Friend takes hold, it makes him start to act out, disobey. Small things at first. Not coming when called. Than stealing.
One afternoon, the Father discovers something ,an accident set up and waiting to happen. Something that the son could not possibly have left because he was away from the house.
The Father begins to hear voices , but thinks its just his grief stricken mind playing tricks on him. He hears his son talking to someone and hears that someone respond but there’s no one there. Still. there is something oddly familiar about the “other “ voice
 
Accidents keep happening around the house: Dangerous things occur while the Dad is repairing the house up on a ladder. Things left on stairwells that would trip others if not spotted. Jewelry and other significant items go missing. No one believes the boy that it wasn’t him. He withdraws further into his imagination as his Friend is the only one who listens, who “understands”.
The Dad tries to be a parent, despite his condition. The boy gets punished for misbehaving, yet the disobeying only becomes worse. Even dangerous as the Imaginary Friend drags him deeper into the dark woods.   
 
One Night, the boy runs away in anger. He goes missing for days in the woods.
The Father must follow.
 In the dark of the forest the Father discovers who his son has created as his best friend. Someone he has not thought of in a long time. Someone he thought was never real.
And this someone is very angry that the Father forgot about him and abandoned him so many years ago in the woods. A soul Darkened by the  horrors of being trapped in a  limbo alone, forgotten ,yet still remembering for all those years they were separated
And how do you fight a creature that is fueled by your own imagination? That knows you inside and out, your fears? And now has the ability to become those fears in the flesh?