The Ghost Who Wanted A Name (eBook)

Casey N Toth (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
1011 Seiten
Publishdrive (Verlag)
978-0-00-112118-8 (ISBN)

Infos

Elias has always been more comfortable with melodies than with people. In his lonely apartment, he spends his nights crafting a song that refuses to be finished, each note echoing with longing. But when a haunting chord causes the lights to flicker and the air to turn cold, he realizes he's not alone. In the corner of his room appears a ghost-an ethereal young woman woven from static and sorrow, drawn to the music. She has no name, no voice, and no memory of who she was in life. Yet instead of fear, Elias feels an unexpected empathy for this lost soul whose yearning to be remembered mirrors his own silent grief.

Determined to help, Elias embarks on a quiet quest to uncover the ghost's past. Guided by fragments of memory that awaken with each melody, he follows a trail of subtle clues-a faded photograph in the attic, a lullaby hummed in the dark, a scent of lavender on a cold breeze-that slowly piece together the truth of her life and tragic death. With each revelation, the bond between the living and the dead deepens, and Elias finds himself facing the sorrows he's long buried. The

Ghost Who Wanted a Name is a haunting, lyrical tale of connection and redemption. In hushed, atmospheric prose, it explores how memory and music can bridge worlds, and how giving a name to the forgotten can illuminate even the darkest past.

Textauszug

Chapter 1 A Melody in the Dark

 

Elias pressed the worn strap of his guitar tighter around his shoulder, feeling the familiar weight settle against his ribs. The apartment was a narrow slice of brick and cracked plaster, the kind of place where the walls seemed to breathe in rhythm with the city outside. Outside, the night clung to the streets like a thin veil of fog, muffling traffic into a distant hum that barely penetrated the thin windows. Inside, the only light came from a single bare bulb that hung crookedly from the ceiling, its glow a soft amber that pooled over the scattered coffee mugs, the half-empty bottle of cheap whiskey, and the stack of yellowed sheet music on the coffee table.

He had been at it for hours, the same half-finished melody looping in his mind like a stubborn knot. The opening phrase was simple enough—a descending minor third that had once felt like a sigh. But somewhere after the third bar, his fingers stumbled, the notes refusing to resolve the way his heart wanted them to. He could feel the tension in his throat, the way his breath caught each time he tried to push the phrase forward. He was trying to stay quiet, not because he cared about the thin walls, but because he didn’t want to disturb Rowan, who lived next door and whose late-night radio chatter often served as a reminder that life continued beyond his own stagnant thoughts.

He strummed the first chord—a low, resonant D minor—letting it ring just long enough to fill the empty space. The sound seemed to hang, a dark cloud that lingered over the cheap carpet. He closed his eyes, letting the vibration travel through his fingertips, through his forearms, into the marrow of his bones. The melody rose again, tentative, an arpeggio that tried to climb out of the darkness. He could hear his own breath, shallow and uneven, matching the rhythm of the music. Each note felt like a question he could not yet phrase, each pause a silent plea for something he could not name.

A sudden flicker seized the bulb overhead. The amber light sputtered, dimming to a faint, wavering glow before snapping back to its steady hum. The brief darkness was enough for Elias to feel a shiver run down his spine, a cold ripple that seemed to sweep across the room as if the air itself had been brushed by an unseen hand. He stopped playing, the final note hanging in the air, unfinished, as the silence pressed in.

For a moment the apartment felt larger than its cramped walls, the space expanding with the echo of that cold breath. The temperature dropped a few degrees, and Elias could see his breath form a thin veil in front of his face. He pulled the guitar closer, as if its body could shield him from the sudden chill. The faint hum of the city outside seemed to grow louder, a low drone that blended with the lingering resonance of the chord he had just played.

He turned his head slowly, expecting the familiar creak of the floorboards, the soft sigh of the radiator. Instead, a sensation settled behind him—a pressure, a presence that made his skin prickle. He knew, with a certainty that bordered on instinct, that he was not alone. He could feel the weight of someone standing just a breath away, though the room was empty save for the battered furniture and his own nervous self.

His heart hammered against his ribs, each beat a drum of warning. He tried to rationalize the feeling, to tell himself it was the fatigue of too many sleepless nights, the lingering echo of the chord that had sent a tremor through the walls. He swallowed, the sound dry in his throat, and turned his body fully to face the space behind him.

The light from the window—thin slits of streetlamp spilling through the cracked glass—caught something in the corner of his eye. A shape, faint and wavering, seemed to coalesce near the sill. It was not a solid form, but a distortion of shadow and light, like heat shimmering above a summer road. The outline was vague, a blur that hovered just beyond the reach of his vision, yet it held a shape that suggested a human figure. The ghost—if that was what it was—was barely more than a ripple in the air, its edges dissolving into the darkness whenever he tried to focus.

She—or whatever it was—seemed to be trying to speak. A sound escaped, not a voice but a series of static-like whispers, like an old radio tuned to a dead frequency. The words were indecipherable, a garbled hiss that made his teeth clench. The ghost’s head tilted slightly, as if attempting to form a sentence, but the sounds remained fractured, each fragment cutting off before it could become meaning. Her eyes—if they could be called that—were dark pools that reflected nothing but the faint glow of the streetlight. There was fear in that gaze, a raw, trembling terror that seemed to pulse in time with his own heartbeat.

Elias felt a surge of something unexpected. He could have fled, could have bolted for the door, could have screamed into the night. Instead, a wave of compassion rose up, soft and insistent, pushing against the tide of fear. He remembered the nights when his own anxiety had been a living thing, a shadow that clung to his throat and refused to let him breathe. He saw that same desperation mirrored in the trembling figure before him.

He stayed still, his guitar still cradled in his arms, his fingers hovering over the strings as if waiting for a cue. The ghost’s whispers faded into a low, mournful sigh, the sound of wind through a cracked window. The cold that had settled in the room seemed to ease, the air warming just enough for the breath on his lips to become visible again.

Elias lifted his hand, his fingers finding the familiar positions on the fretboard. He chose a softer arpeggio, a gentle cascade of notes that rose and fell like a lullaby. The melody was simple—a sequence of notes that seemed to echo the ghost’s own fragmented whispers. He let the music flow, each note a careful step onto a path he did not yet understand. As the chords unfurled, the ghost’s shoulders relaxed fractionally, the tension in her translucent form easing as if the music was a balm for a wound she could not name.

Then, as he reached the fourth bar, he struck a chord he had been avoiding—a minor sixth that resonated with a bittersweet tension. The moment the strings vibrated, the ghost flinched. Her hand, pale and ethereal, shot forward as if drawn by an invisible thread. It passed through the guitar’s body, through the strings, and the air itself seemed to quiver at the point of contact. The sound that followed was not just the chord; it was a resonance that lingered, a harmonic overtone that vibrated in the space between them.

The ghost’s eyes widened, a flicker of recognition crossing the void. She reached again, this time more deliberately, her fingers brushing the air where the strings sang. The gesture was desperate, as if she were trying to grasp something long lost, a memory that lived in the vibration of the notes. The chord seemed to pull at her, tugging at a thread woven into the fabric of her being.

Elias watched, breath caught in his throat, as the ghost’s reaction grew more intense. The music he had been playing—once a source of his own frustration—had become a conduit, a bridge that linked his trembling heart to whatever lay behind her translucent veil. He realized, with a clarity that cut through his anxiety, that the melody was not just his own. It was a shared language, a key that could unlock the doors of her forgotten past.

He felt a responsibility settle over him, heavier than the guitar on his shoulder. The ghost’s presence was fragile, her whispers still broken, but the connection was undeniable. He could feel the faint pulse of her longing, a yearning to be named, to be remembered. The music he played could be the vessel that carried her back to herself.

The bulb above steadied, the flickering light now a steady amber that painted the room in a warm hue. The cold ripple that had swept through the apartment receded, leaving behind a lingering sense of being watched, of a presence that lingered just beyond the edge of sight. The ghost’s form began to dissolve, the edges of her silhouette blurring until she was nothing more than a sigh of wind through the cracked window.

Elias lowered his guitar, his fingers trembling as they rested on the strings. The final chord hung in the air, a lingering note that seemed to vibrate against the walls, refusing to fade completely. He sat there, heart pounding, the silence heavy but no longer oppressive. The room felt larger now, as if the space had been stretched to accommodate something unseen.

He reached for his phone, his hand shaking. The screen illuminated his face, casting a pale light over his tired eyes. He stared at the contact list, his thumb hovering over Rowan’s name. The thought of calling someone else, of breaking the solitude that had become his refuge, felt both terrifying and necessary. He imagined Rowan’s voice—steady, grounding—cutting through the fog of his own doubts. He imagined the way Rowan always seemed to know when to knock on his door, when to bring over a cup of tea, when to simply sit and listen without asking for anything in return.

Elias took a deep breath, the air filling his lungs with a sense of purpose he hadn’t felt in months. He pressed the call button, the phone ringing once, twice, before a familiar voice answered. “Hey, Elias? Is everything okay?” Rowan’s tone was gentle, the kind of concern that didn’t feel intrusive but rather like a hand placed lightly on a shoulder.

“I… I think I need to talk,” Elias said, his voice hoarse. “There’s… something here. I’m not sure what it is, but… I think I’m not alone.”

There was a pause,...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 4.12.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Fantasy / Science Fiction ► Fantasy
• ISBN-10: 0-00-112118-9 / 0001121189
• ISBN-13: 978-0-00-112118-8 / 9780001121188