Revenant

Lou’s mother had been a gifted harp player. From a young age she had trained him in the art as well. To no one’s surprise, he had taken to it like a fish to water. It never amounted to much though, just a hobby for him on the days he had nothing else to do. That didn’t mean he wasn’t spectacular at it, though; Lou playing the harp was one of the most beautiful things I had ever witnessed. I had always envied the way his fingers found just the right strings, and the way the notes echoed with such vivid emotions as they flowed together under his control. In life, I couldn’t recall anything I had taken to as Lou had to the harp. In death, I discovered I could pluck the strings his senses as easily as he did a harp—with a little practice.

Six months after my passing I had learned that it wasn’t only my voice that could reach him—and even that could be projected as more than just a phantom whisper as I had originally believed. He could feel me, he could hear me, hell, he could see me if I wanted him to. My haunting of Louis Petrelli stepped up a notch.

It started with footsteps that followed him through the halls of his little house. He would turn, curious and confused to see just what had left the sound of heels clapping on his old oak floors. I would stand unseen in his wake, silent and still until he continued along his path; only then would I move again, footsteps once again trailing him in his empty home.

I could see the cracks forming in his demeanor as I began my new assault, I watched his sanity wane as I learned to make myself visible—just for a second or two though—just long enough for him to question whether or not his eyes were playing tricks on him. I made sure it was always in the mirrors; I wanted him to catch a glimpse of me over his shoulder, while he was brushing his teeth, or shaving. The shock it gave him had resulted in multiple nicks with his old razor, and the crimson trickle would flow down his throat as his gaze was fixated on the spot he had seen me by the clear shower curtain in the mirror.

“If only that had been an inch over, Lou,” I would say in that whisper he could never be certain existed. “Just an inch, and maybe you’d be joining me on this side of things.”

He’d catch glances of shadows in the mirror at the head of his hall; a floor to ceiling thing that was undoubtedly an antique, lined in tarnished brass and intricate leaf patterns. Oh, the mirrors were my favorite; especially that one. Sometimes he would catch my image there, my fingers running along the hand-shaped marks on my neck. I would smile and he would whirl around, nothing there. But upon facing the mirror again I would be closer, just behind him with the same placid grin locked in place.

“This house is full of memories, and you’re going to stay here with them. You’re never going to forget.”

The brush of my fingers around his neck sent him tripping and spinning into his room, where he would lock the door and remain for the rest of the evening or day. His sobs could be heard through the walls and swayed my goals no more one way than the other. A simple plaster barrier wasn’t enough to put my image to rest. The glass fixture on his mother’s old dresser projected my image just as well as the one in the hall.

He smashed the mirror in his bedroom a month after I started appearing, after the footsteps chased him down the hall and the echoes of my voice resonated off alleyway walls on his way to the bar. The bits of glass were never swept up, just pushed under the dresser they had fallen from.

I watched his sanity begin to teeter as I plucked the strings of his fear with the same level of skill I had once envied in him. Death became me, and would hopefully soon become him as well.