"A Ghost Story" by Maggie Pang
The first thing that occurred to me was that I had not vanished into oblivion.
The second was that I no longer felt the excruciating pain that had tortured me for the past eternity. Providence had thrown me one last insult in my last moments of life, giving me a long and painful death.
For a second, I looked down in shock at my bloody, disfigured body surrounded by broken glass and fragments of my car.
The crash occurred on the side of an empty and unfrequented road in the middle of the night, a notable distance from any civilization, and I had to appreciate the fact that although I was clearly not going to survive, the lady whose blue Honda Civic I had crashed into had called 911. But then again, of course she had. What else could she have done?
Now was the time for me to look down at my translucent figure in wonder, like in the movies, to realize that I was a ghost, I supposed. Except… I found, to my great disappointment, that I did not have any ghostly limbs, and that indeed, I did not have any physical traits at all—my heartbeat could no longer be felt, my brain was nonexistent, and although I could see, I had no eyes. I was quite pleased, however, to find that I could hear and smell just fine.
I was just a floating consciousness, closer to an idea than a human being, destined to be forever alone, my thoughts to be my only company for eternity, for I existed now as a person only to myself.
The fact of my death began to settle in. I died in a car crash, a nameless, struggling twenty-year-old who managed to put together enough money to buy a used 2006 Toyota Camry, which was in very good condition when I bought it and now lay in pieces. Since starting college, I failed to find a niche for myself, finding most conversations with my fellow students to be stunted and awkward. I studied finance knowing that I hated it, in hopes that it would be a lucrative career and that it would provide me with the means to pursue something more exciting and, in my eyes, likely to be of significant impact. Then I died.
News should be getting out of my death now. Police and emergency responders have arrived at the scene—fifteen minutes too late. Perhaps it is better off that way, seeing as I would have died a deeply unhappy person either way.
I wandered around the people I knew for a few days, looking for any sign that I mattered to them. There was quite a bit of talk about me, but it was mostly strangers commenting about how I was probably some irresponsible child texting while driving. The world went on quite easily without me.
The day of the funeral. I was buried. A few people attended. It was a somber affair, but very much tearless. Words about how much I meant to them. I was such a great person. Everyone was so lucky to know me. Sentiments just as fake as my relationships with any of the attendees.
I stayed through the whole ordeal, waiting and hoping desperately for a single hint that I was of consequence to someone, that I had made some mark on the world around me. But the funeral ended a mere courtesy, for someone they hardly knew.
It hurt very much to think that I, from that point onward, would be no more than a name engraved on a dirty and uncared-for tombstone in the corner of a despondent looking cemetery.
There could be no feeling more agonizing than to know that you died as if you had never lived at all.
Summary: Thoughts of a newdead.
