In lieu of an intro, I have a question for you, gentle readers: How does one go about stopping intrusive thoughts? I try to close my mind to the incessant gush of memories, dreams, memor-dreams, regrets, judgments, assumptions, and yet my mind blazes on, unfazed.

My sister meditates. She said that stopped her innerspeak. When I did that, a ghost boy named Jarvis tapped me on the shoulder and told me where to find his baseball cards.

Okay. That first question was a ruse. I’m not looking for how to get rid of intrusive thoughts. Moreso, it’s the queue of restless spirits that is currently creating the wrinkle in my otherwise uneventful life. I just want, for a moment, my troubles to be relatable.

She has trouble shutting down her mind? I have trouble shutting down my mind! I shall commence following her quest for a solution to this age-old quandary.

Let’s be honest, would you really sign on to my whole h a u n t e d deal? I get it. It is a lot to take on. Let me break it down for you with a one-off FAQ.

Q: Yikes, you get ethereal check-ins on the regular! Has the life been sucked from your (eyes, soul, cheeks, life)?

A: Great question. Yeah, I guess it’s sort of emotionally taxing, in a grandparents expecting one to take them to visit the country relatives every other Saturday kind of way. I should also say that a glimpse at the cover art of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark is more traumatic than any of my spectral social calls. Mostly they just take up a lot of time, money, and gas.

Take Jarvis as an example. He was not, like, the past inhabitant of my apartment wanting to share a little Babe Ruth rookie gold with me. Nope, not at all how it ever works out. Jarvis wanted me to drive him two counties over to his mom’s house, so he could prevent her from selling the house to his brother, Abel (I know…right?), who would then unknowingly become the legal owner of his worthless collection. And I mean worthless. This kid Jarvis had a terrible instinct when it came to predicting players of note (turns out, he also had a terrible instinct when it came to the deadliness of fire ants). But whatever, these matters were not what concerned him. Conveniently, I was not working a shift that day, so I kindly agreed to make the drive. After an hour of awkward drive conversation (Ants. His mom, Shirley, is selling the house to Abel so she can retire from Office Depot. Abel never visited his grave.), we show up to the house. Abel answers the door, as his mom is visiting her sister in Springfield, Illinois. Jarvis does not want me mentioning anything about the cards to Abel (who seemed like a decent guy, but brother stuff I guess), so I improvise a story about Shirley being my old manager at Office Depot (Thanks, Jarv) and how I’m looking for a reference for an upcoming interview. I ask for a number to contact her, and Abel gets weird about her needing quiet time away. So I thank him and walk back to the car, with Jarvis in my ear the whole time about how the cards are under a loose floor board in the linen closet in the bathroom (terrible instinct), and how we’re so close. So I turn around and run back to the door and ask to use the bathroom. Abel is still pretty hedgy, so I add that I’m two months pregnant, and that’s why I need a new job, and also the increased bladder pressure, so he softens and directs me to the bathroom, even though I’m already beelining that way with Jarvis practically stepping into my Allstars. We get to the bathroom, and it seems that good hiding places for things is not requisite in Jarvis’ family, as the cards are exactly where he left them. I deftly remove the Converse shoebox (now I see why Jarvis entrusted me) and drop it out the bathroom window. I fake flush, wash my hands for good measure, and call goodbye to Abel as I head out the door. I discreetly snag the goods from a patch of daffodils on the side of the house and return to the car. Jarvis is waiting for me, because spirits always want a ride back to their original point of contact. Hooray, more awkward road tripping! Luckily he does not ask me to deliver the cards to his mom, so I’m now the proud owner of a bunch of mildewy cardboard squares.

Needless to say, I have a growing collection of random stuff phantoms don’t want falling into the wrong hands. A lot of people are weird about their possessions, and I guess the undead are people, too. I have already scoped out the storage locker situation to avoid my roommates speculating about my irregular junk-collecting jaunts. As I’m writing this, a hand-wringing dude wearing a tweed suit, pince-nez, and a bowler hat is pacing at the front stoop of my building. Either he’s going to a Poirot convention, or I’m about to get #visited.

I’ll let you know how it goes.