Psst...here's a note

Psst…I heard a voice say. I looked but there was no one there.

Psst…there it was again and again, no one.  True, it was soft and had the soft tones of a woman or maybe a young girl but I distinctly heard it

Yes that was it. It was the voice a young girl…the voice of my grade school sweetheart. I could see her face, smell her enticing lilac perfume as she said softly in my ear while passing me a note…"psst..note coming"…

I remembered the excitement I felt as I opened and read the note…one whole page of X's and 0's…I remembered that we were in love…going to be married…but that was the sixth grade. She moved away that summer and I never saw her again.

Strange, I thought. This underground city is really creepy and now I'm hearing things. The tour group had gone on ahead of me and I moved to catch up.

Psst…I heard it again…"JoAnn?...Is that you?  Where are you?"

"You can't see me. I can't believe you still recognize me or my voice. It's been so long."

"This is crazy. I have to be dreaming. I haven't seen or talked to you in twenty years. Why are you hiding?"

"I'm not hiding. I'm a Sylph."

"A Sylph? …What is a Sylph?"

"A person without a body."

"That's impossible.  How can you be a person without a body? This had to be a joke."

"No, when I was sixteen I acquired some kind of somatic nerve disease and I passed away."

"So you're a ghost or a spirit…right?"

"No, I'm a Sylph. When I departed your world I was naked and ended up in a seamless void."

"What does naked have to do with it and what is a seamless voice?  Is this a Joke?"

"No, it's true. My mother brought me to Seattle to some kind of faith healer. She told us that to be cured we had to pray in this underground city.  They tethered my naked body to a pole and danced around me shaking some kind of potions all over me.  Then they left me tethered to the pole until first light. They said that during the full moon the demons that controlled my body would leave and I would be cured."

I didn't know what to say.  She was there talking to me or rather her voice was there but I couldn't see her. I was sure it was some kind of joke being played by someone from the underground tour. But, how did they know about JoAnn and her voice?…it was her voice.

I stammered, "That must have been awful, I'm sorry."

"You needn't be sorry. You didn't do it to me…they did."

She pointed to a dark area in the back of the tunnel we were in and I could see four bodies hanging from a rafter.  Their faces were grotesque and bloated. I gagged and began to wretch.

"That's what I wanted to tell you. I got away and when they came back, I killed them all. Now, every night I dance around them and poke them with sticks and throw their own potions on them."

I could only mutter…"That's horrible!"

"I know," she said…as the ax hit my head.

                                                                                                       gs batty/for mindlovemisery