13 Ghost Stores in 13 Days

Lightbulb Moments

9 min readJun 24, 2021

Sean had finally almost sort of worked up the nerve to potentially talk to the girl in the green sweater, when the mysterious stranger beside him started choking on a maraschino cherry.

The stranger looked to him helplessly, his face turning first a deep crimson, then white, and finally the same green as the girl’s sweater. Sean’s Eagle Scout training kicked in and he administered the Heimlich maneuver. The cherry flew out and stuck to the mirror behind the bar. The bartender looked annoyed, but unsurprised, and grabbed her bar rag to clean it up.

“I am in your eternal debt,” the mysterious stranger wheezed.

“Yeah,” Sean said, looking for the girl in the green sweater. She had slipped out in the chaos.

“Allow me to grant you your deepest, darkest wish as a token of my gratitude,” the stranger said.

Sean had spent the previous hour trying to figure out if the girl in the green sweater was smiling at him or at the black-and-white movie playing on the TV behind him. He’d waited too long again, but at least he hadn’t made a fool of himself by talking to someone who wasn’t interested.

“Anything you desire,” the stranger said, staring deeply at Sean.

“What?” Sean said, still thinking about missed opportunities.

“Your deepest, darkest wish,” the man repeated. “Allow me to grant it.”

Sean laughed and looked at the mysterious stranger. He wore a dark black cloak and one of his eyes was blood red and cloudy. He wasn’t sure if the eye looked like that before the Heimlich maneuver. It was creeps like this that made it difficult to meet people at Devil’s Tavern.

“I wish there was a way to know instantly if a woman was interested in me or just trying to watch the TV behind my head,” Sean mumbled.

The man put a cold hand on top of Sean’s. Sean shivered.

“The light will guide you,” the mysterious stranger said. “Your wish is my command.”

“Whatever,” Sean said, pulling his hand away.

Suddenly, all the lights in the bar went out. The bartender lit a few candles. When Sean turned around, the mysterious stranger had vanished.

The bartender grabbed her bar rag and cleaned the spot where the mysterious stranger had been sitting.

“Guy never even paid for his Shirley Temple,” she said.

“Put it on my tab,” Sean said.

Hours later, the bar was nearly empty. Sean nursed his last beer while the bartender cleaned up. She turned the chair next to him upside down.

“Your drinks are on the house because you saved that guy’s life,” she said. “I don’t know if that’s our policy, but it should be.”

“I thought your policy was, Devil’s Tavern: People are DYING to try our shirley temples,” Sean said.

The bartender smiled and rolled her eyes.

“Are all your jokes that terrible?” she said.

“Yes,” he said. “But on the bright side, I also can’t dance.”

The bartender smiled again at him, more sincerely this time. Sean looked at her for a minute. Suddenly, a light bulb appeared suspended above her head. He rubbed his eyes. It didn’t go away. It was dimly lit, but it was undeniably a lightbulb. He thought of the mysterious stranger’s words.

“I’m Nancy, by the way,” she said.

“Do you believe in things you can’t understand?” he asked.

The lightbulb above Nancy’s head grew stronger.

“Do you wanna get out of here and go to a party with me?” she asked.

Later that night, he opened his eyes as she tiptoed around his bedroom looking for her clothes. The light above her head dimmed, then vanished completely as she pulled on her jeans.

“Morning,” he said.

“I gotta run,” she said. “Stuff to do. That was fun though. I’ll see you around.”

“Yeah,” Sean said.

He watched her leave in total darkness.

Two nights later, he was back at Devil’s Tavern. So was the mysterious stranger. Nancy smiled awkwardly at him from behind the bar. He ordered a beer, and looked carefully at the space above her head. No light. Around the room he could see a few other people, men and women, illuminated beneath varying levels of light.

“We’re good,” he said to Nancy, as she passed her drink. “I won’t make it weird.”

“Thank God,” Nancy said, motioning to the mysterious stranger. “Enough weirdness in here already.”

The mysterious stranger looked at Nancy, then pushed a finger hard into Sean’s chest.

“I said you could use the power I gave you on anyone except for my sister,” he slurred.

“What?” Sean said. “You didn’t say anything. Who’s your sister?”

He pointed a bony finger at Nancy the bartender.

Nancy rolled his eyes.

“He says that about everyone,” Nancy said. “Don’t listen to him. He’s a man with no past and he has no siblings.”

“Right,” Sean said, trying to get away from the mysterious stranger.

“A curse on you,” the mysterious stranger called out. “May your greatest wish become your most desperate burden.”

A cold wind fell across the bar. Nancy got up to shut the window. Then all the lights went off again.

Nancy lit some candles and the stranger vanished. Sean looked around the room. A woman sitting with some friends at a table looked back at him. A light bulb, brighter than Nancy’s had been, illuminated her features. He looked to Nancy, still shrouded in darkness

“I’m gonna call the power company,” Nancy said.

He talked to the woman at the table and got her phone number. They went on a few dates and eventually the lightbulb faded. He didn’t mind. He used his newfound abilities again and again. He dated across the spectrum. He fell in and out of love. He had good dates and bad dates and boring dates and frightening dates. His self-confidence grew. He got a promotion at work. He grew a beard and lost a little weight. He was finally living the life he always thought he should.

He saw the girl in the green sweater again, one dark October night. She was wearing a blue sweater this time. He watched her put his favorite Chumbwumba song on the jukebox. The lightbulb over her head shined brighter than any he’d seen before. Maybe she wasn’t staring a the TV all those months before. He ordered two drinks from Nancy and placed them both on the jukebox.

“I didn’t know whether you’d want a whiskey drink or a vodka drink,” he said, placing both drinks on the jukebox. “So I got both.”

She smiled at him. The light grew even brighter.

“I love this song,” she said.

“Me too.”

Her name was Veronica and she worked at a nonprofit that helped struggling veterans find homes. In her free time, she taught music at the orphanage. She owned sweaters in nearly every color. They dated for months and he watched as her light grew brighter and brighter, lighting up his world in hues he had never seen before. She introduced him to her dog, and her family and to Darren, best friend from work. After six months, they moved in together. One night at Devil’s Tavern he put Chumawumba on the jukebox, got down on one knee and proposed. Everyone applauded. Nancy gave them all a free round of shots. Veronica’s light illuminated the entire place.

***

They decided the marriage would be at the end of October, nearly two years to the night they met. One afternoon, after picking out the floral arrangements, they met up for drinks with her best friend from work Darren and some other well wishers. Veronica acted oddly. Later that night, Sean noticed her light fading, just a bit.

“Everything OK,” he asked.

“What’s that?” she said, lost in the thought. The light bulb above her head flickered.

“Excited about the wedding?” he asked.

She hesitated. The light went out, briefly, then lit back up.

“Of course,” she said.

“I love you,” Sean said.

“Right,” Veronica said. “Me too.”

The big day came and their families and friends gathered at the old church in the bad part of town. It was where Veronica always wanted to be married. Sean waited at the altar, next to his brother, who told wise cracks because he could not stand sincerity and did not believe in love.

“Some good looking women out there,” his brother said, scanning the crowd. “Shame you’re making a mistake. Just kidding.”

Sean looked out at his parents smiling, at Veronica’s college friend making eyes at his brother, at Nancy the bartender sitting alone in the back, and at Darren looking at his phone in one of the pews. He smiled, content not only to be marrying the woman he loved, but to be marrying a woman he had proof loved him unconditionally.

The first notes of a beautiful acoustic version of Chumbuwuma’s “Tubthumping” filled the church. Everyone stood to watch Veronica enter. The congregation gasped at how beautiful she was. Sean lost his breath for another reason.

A crown of flowers rested atop her head. Above the crown was nothing but thin air. Her light had vanished. He blinked and rubbed his eyes. He looked frantically around the room, a couple of her friends, the kinds who fall in love with any man willing to wear a tuxedo and commit to one woman, turned to him with dim light bulbs dangling above their heads. Her cousin Rob, who always sat a little too close to him at family dinners, looked wistfully at him with an even brighter bulb. But above Veronica’s head was darkness. For support, he looked to his brother, who was winking at one of the bride’s friends.

She walked slowly up the aisle, clinging tight to her father’s elbow. A distant cousin began to cry. He pleaded with any god willing to listen to turn her light back on. She stopped halfway down the aisle and looked at her work best friend, Darren. The light appeared above her head. She turned back to Sean and it vanished. Sean swallowed hard.

His brother nudged him and whispered, “Maybe the wrong time to say this, but I lost the rings. Kidding. Just trying to get you to relax. Still time to back out. Kidding again. Sort of.”

Veronica stopped halfway up the aisle. Sean opened his mouth to tell her he loved her. Nothing came out. She turned to Darren. The lightbulb appeared again. Brighter than before. She turned back to Sean and gave him a pitiful look. She looked back to Darren and addressed the whole church.

“I’m sorry,” she announced. “I can’t do this.”

Darren stood up and they looked at each other. He watched the bulbs above their heads grow and grow until they became intertwined. The light in the old church became blinding, then suddenly the bulbs exploded in a flash of sparks and broken glass. Sean shielded himself and collapsed onto the darkened altar.

He woke up surrounded by blackness. A voice asked if he was alright. His brother.

“She’s gone, bro,” his brother said. “I never liked her.”

He stood up and peered over the darkened church. His friends and family murmured quietly. He could see shadows, but did not know who was still out there. The mysterious stranger’s words echoed in his head, “May your greatest wish become your most desperate burden.” He clawed blindly in the darkness and stared into the abyss. .

A dim light flicked on from the back of the church.

The only rule of 13 Ghost Stories in 13 Days is that the story must be posted the same night I started writing it.

13 Ghost Stores in 13 Days

Lightbulb Moments

Written by Mark Macyk