Who knew a dead woman's grip could be so strong?
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEeG4ZXSvqH
The scent of death loomed over Cyrus, in that cold sterile room he had spent far too many months in, as he attempted every trick he could think of to get the damn book out of the woman's hand. He didn't know who the woman was, and what life she experienced in those now blank eyes. All he knew was that she was long since dead and most likely from unidentified kidney failure from how pudgy her skin felt. However, those facts didn't explain why her fingers held the leather-bound pages so close to a heart that stopped beating. It took many tugs, and even placing his foot on the table, to free the book but not before falling over to meet with the marble ground.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIBN52JqLGJ
At that moment, an arm reached down and he foolishly believed it was the woman's, his pulse quickening, but luckily it was only Dr. Grimshaw. "I see you finally got the book."
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIH9EDD37pj
"Yes." Cyrus, embarrassed, quickly handed over the book, partly because he admired the gangly man too much to refuse his open hand, and partly because the book seared against his own as if to say 'I don't belong to you.'
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqpGq4IDSz1
Dr. Grimshaw ran his finger along its edges and Cyrus couldn't help but ask, "Are you going to read it?"
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzmwM3ivdRL
The doctor gave him a grave expression, "You shouldn't delve into a dead man's secrets" and then with a smile, "especially someone with that grip."
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡh3mwuGjlrf
Cyrs smiled back.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡo1lgLkp9Kw
Yes, this was all very peculiar but not to Dr. Grimshaw and certainly not to Cryus.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQEVAS6Z1p1
°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW8HlBuSH5L
The Black family had taken residence in the manor with a cemetery as a backyard, ever since Cyrus's grandfather died. In the years he spent there, Cryus remembers hearing his sister complaining and sometimes even crying on account of the haunting feeling she claimed the cemetery offered, to which their father would reply with curt responses about honoring their grandfather's life. Cyrus, however, liked this new life as opposed to the bustling streets of New York, because at least now he found friends, even if they were dead.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8BFpdnJ4LJ
He liked all the floating bodies of different transparencies surrounding and listening to him attentively as he told them his every waking thought.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6GcNYfQ2PP
His mother was concerned, his sister disgusted and the kids in his 7th-grade class treating him like an infectious disease but his father brushed it off as "boy behavior".
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL7IAgqE7uW
At some point, he stopped explaining and kept his energy for the dead until one day, a man with an umbrella on a wonderfully sunny day who was clearly alive, said "Come in, have a seat."
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3wNToVeXhA
They sat in the pavilion boarding of the cemetery, when Edward whispered, "I see them too."
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡggIJ1UrY1l
And from there began their unpatterned meetups. Perhaps he should have turned away from the stranger but he couldn't help himself. He became addicted to the thrill of speaking to a real person so much so that he took on a 2-year mortuary science degree and pulled every string to become an apprentice at the Willbrook Funeral home where Edward Grimshaw was the head mortician.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJIE5GnIrge
°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb72xLhcQkR
When Dr. Grimshaw left with the book, and Cyrus had started to scrub on to start the embalming, Dr. Morris walked in with pliers and an attendant. "Where's the book?" she said.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhQndkGutw5
"Oh, I gave it to Dr. Grimshaw," Cyrus received the look all people harbored for him.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwvdqzLGPDd
"Again Cyrus, you cannot give such things to Dr. Grimshaw. This isn't his job anymore. He works in identification now and we work in embalming. All objects and clothes go to us or the families. Got it? I don't want to remind you anymore. Now go get the book."
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmAPUgFryZj
Cyrus left, but the stench of the dead body didn't leave him. Behind the door, he hears Dr. Morris and the attendant say, "This stuff again?" "I know, I need to speak to those two. We can't have more missing all because of their little fetish."
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOehiORGHoH
He balled his hands to a fist and moved away.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuoEWPIxTuv
Dr. Grimshaw's office is empty, but, well-lit, and lying across the table was the book. He knew he shouldn't look into it, less for the dead women and more because a look of anger or disappointment on Grimshaw's face would break him. But the book was sitting there so perfectly and so he picked it up and discovered it was a diary.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSUbfpcc5Ax
The entries followed a young girl growing up in the 50s with her loving father, and then the painful grief that followed when he eventually passed. To Cyrus's astonishment, he saw the words,
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZe407hJHCq
But I wasn't really sad, papa came back but as a ghost. With lots of ghost friends.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXTCigJGawi
And then proceeding that astonishment was horror at the face of Dr. Grimshaw in a memorial card stating he died in 1957.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnnEcndVmX6
"No," Cyrus said but his voice came out hoarse. "He's alive. A warm human body..."
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhMtPrD5y8Q
"Did I not tell you not to delve into a dead man's secrets?" Dr. Grimshaw stood there not in his youthful beauty but as a decaying body, with sagging eyes, rotted limbs, and dirt-stained funeral clothes.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlepVwuAkjc
"Cyrus!" Dr. Morris yelled down the hall.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡv1i9Ml3zom
Dr. Grimshaw came closer with his festering hands out.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡo1jPPsKKTi
"Cyrus!" Dr. Morris sounded more annoyed now.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNjoOPr5GbO
"No, please-." His words were cut off by the hands of the doctor wrapping around his neck.
175Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTsclKcdEpC
Who knew a dead man's grip could be so strong?
ns3.12.34.113da2
