The Haunted Meeting

The Haunted Meeting

         “Could you please explain to me why you possessed the neighbors cat?” Dad said to me with a glare. This was a bad time for me to make him mad. I could tell from way he stood that he had a bad day at work. He always slumped when he had a bad day at work. He was in his best suit so he must have been in an important meeting. I hoped that the company stock hadn't dropped again, that would have meant he was in the worst of moods.

        “I, um, well,” I twiddled my ghostly thumbs. I floated mid-air. Perhaps if I had human feet like him they would be shaking. I really had no reasonable explanation for possessing the neighbors cat except for the fact it was really fun. Being a cat was fun, climbing on the walls, playing with the yarn, chasing the mice.

         “The neighbor's cat is not a toy!” Dad yelled. “Nor is any other animal!”

          “Yes Dad.” I responded with a frown.

           “You shouldn't just go possessing anything you feel like. You should possess things wisely Jessica. You remember Fred the ghost fireman you admire so much? He possesses things wisely. He possesses unconscious people in burning buildings to help them escape. Now Jessica, I've had a pretty bad day so I'm going out. Stay in your room while I'm gone.”

            I was stunned as he walked back out the door. He didn't ground me? He just sent me to my room. Ever since he adopted me as a human father from the ghost orphanage he has never just sent me to my room. He was a punctual man and always set a specific amount of time, down to the minute. I knew something was wrong so I followed him.

          He got into his car and drove. I flew as fast as my ghostly body would let me to keep up with him. I recognized the streets leading back to his office building. I thought he must have been going back to it. Then he drove past it to the bar. Then he went in the bar. I remembered this little “Ten Years Sober” Medal on his work desk on home. I knew he was an alcholic from this, but I never asked him about it. This made me rush right after him into the bar. He ordered a drink and as he held it he said, “I can't believe they fired me. But truly there's nothing I can do about it is there?”

         And right before he brought it to his lips and drank I flew into his body and possessed him. I didn't believe I did it at first, and I knew I'd be in a mountain of trouble. People were still completely aware when they were possessed. Dad, or rather I put down the drink and paid the barkeep then left.

         I then marched over to Dad's or my work place, or ex-work place because I, or rather Dad just got fired. Thank goodness his work had plenty of bring your child to work days otherwise I wouldn't have known my way around and known everyone's name. I marched right up to meet my, or rather Dad's boss and give him a stern talking to. He was in the middle of a big corporate meeting with the biggest executives in the company, but I didn't care I marched right in.

         “What the hell are you doing in here Samson?”

          “Don't speak to me like that young lady!” I yelled at him with my best Dad impression. It took me half a second to realize I called him a young lady. Mostly I realized it because I saw several of the executives snickering.

           “What did you just say?” Dad's boss, or rather ex-boss growled.

          “When you act like a child I will treat you like a child, to use that kind of language in front of your bosses is very unprofessional.” I puffed out my chest trying to act very business-like. Whenever I whined to Dad about treated like a kid he always said to me “when you act like a child I will treat you like a child”, though in a much nicer tone then how I used it here. I was kinda shuffling around phrases I got from Dad over the years. I could see several of the executive faces growing red as they resisted bursting out laughing.

          “I just fired you. Do I need to call the police?” the boss snarled. He started to pull out his cellphone.

          “No he can stay, lets hear what he has to say.” the big boss of the company said with a giggle. I never actually interacted with the big boss of the company, the only reason I knew what he looked like was because I had seen his sagging, but still friendly face plastered on signs everywhere all over the office building.

         “I say that I should still be working here because you should be the one fired!” I pointed at him with an accusing finger. “You fired me as a scapegoat to compensate for your failings that made the stocks in the company fall!” Honestly I had no idea why Dad was fired. He could have even taken all his clothes off and ran through the halls naked for all knew. I was so glad that I payed attention enough in class to remember our vocabulary lessons, if not I wouldn't have known that the word scapegoat meant. I also knew that whenever something bad happened the company stocks fell.

        “He's lying!” Dad's ex-boss flinched, “I did no such thing! I did nothing wrong! I'm not hiding anything!” the boss's knees were shaking. Holy crud cakes on a beef sandwich in summer I guessed right!? He blamed Dad for something! All the executives in the room looked at the boss suspiciously.

        “If your not hiding something then what happened during last quarter! With how things were um, moved!” I was doing my best to interrogate my, or rather Dad's boss, but since I really didn't know what my questions meant I was having difficulty. I knew that things in the company happened in quarters and Dad worked with how things were moved.

         “I had nothing to do with the problems with distribution! The problems in filing had nothing to do with me!” the sweat on the boss's face start pouring in buckets and his suit became soaked from his armpits.

         “Oh, and who had access to those files?” I remembered this one detective murder mystery show where he figured out who did the crime by who could have “access” to the crime scene. I almost imitated the detective character's voice when I said that, but I already had enough difficulty copying Dad.

         “Wait a minute! You're the one responsible for the problems in distribution!?” the big boss of the company stood up and roared. “We fired TWO HUNDRED EMPLOYEES and lost TWENTY MILLION DOLLARS over that debacle and IT WAS YOU!?” the big boss took a deep breath to regain his composure before speaking again. “Well, sir, as of now you are fired and now we must apologize to several hundred good, honest, hard working employees as we compensate for our losses and gain back their favor as we hope that none of them sue us over this. Speaking of lawsuits. You WILL be hearing from our lawyers soon. Now clear up your office and leave immediately.” the big boss then turned to me, “As for you, Mr. Samson was it? I want to see you in my office at 9:00 A.M. in my office tomorrow. I would like to promote you to a different position for fixing this.”

I was then launched out of Dad's body. There was only so much time a ghost could stay in a body, especially one of my age. Though quite frankly, I was glad to be out.

        “Thank you very much Sir.” Dad said now back in control of his body. “Now if you excuse me, I need to go back home to see my daughter, I'm very proud of her and need to speak to her. She should be in her room when I get there.”