Regina Blunder, Ghost Hunter: a short story

by Phil Skaggs Jr.

strained and the pressure it was under was audible. It didn’t have long. The ghosts were gaining strength with each minute.

  “I need to activate them now.” Reggie bent down and flicked the bells in a melodic order that seemed to ring forever. The rope began to vibrate with the bells. The vibration moved up the rope zigzagging around until all the metal rods chimed in.

  The sounds the ghosts were making became a hellish shriek. The swirling blue forms began to darken and the rope surrounding them began to glow a bright neon yellow. The sound the spirits made sent chills even through Reggie. They watched the spirits being sucked into the elaborate rope maze that surrounded them. The glow grew brighter. Reggie and Sam held up their hands to their eyes and the ropes flashed in a bright whiten light that saturated the parking lot. Reggie covered her eyes. Sam put on her sunglasses. The light faded and the ropes began to disintegrate into smoking ash. The steel rods remained and pulsed with a color of blue for a moment then faded to their dull metal with a sizzle and a pop. The rods in the ground and the rods in the wall fell to the floor.

  “That..*cough* was pretty cool.” Sam cleared the smoke coming from the ashes of the rope with a wave of her hand. She squinted her eyes and blinked. She strained through the smoke and wiped the water out of her eyes to see better. She grabbed Reggie’s sleeve.

  “What is it, Samantha?” Reggie coughed and tried to move the smoke as far from her as possible.

  “Uh, check it out.” Sam pointed to the center of the parking lot. The smoke lifted slowly to reveal a figure in plasmic blue.

  “Oh come on.” Reggie wasn’t expecting this. And she didn’t want it. She hadn’t interacted with a ghost in some time. It was her parents’ job to communicate and chitchat and negotiate. Reggie wasn’t very good at talking to ghosts. She barely interacted with people. Living people. How was she supposed to relate to a ghost? She frowned. This is why she just set traps and waited.

  “What do we do?” Sam was holding on to Reggie’s arm for dear life. She’d never been in the presence of a ghost before. Usually a ghost hunt went down with relative ease. Set the trap. Wait. A small flash of light. Bingo. You have your ghosts.

  “I’ll have to go talk to him.” The smoke had finally cleared enough to make out the spirit’s features. He was lean and looked like a character out of Grease. He looked around with a puzzled look across his face.

  “Great. A teenager.” Reggie didn’t think it could get worse.

  “Teenager?” Sam raised an eyebrow. “What’s the big deal? Is that bad?”

  “Not really. I mean we’re teenagers. But not like him. He’s like an old-time teenager. When people wore skirts and played chicken for penny candy. And all that other weird stuff.” She poked her cheek and tried to look super naive. Then added. “Those guys were either lame or jerks.”

  “I don’t know.” Sam stood on her toes hoping it would help get a clear vision of the ghost. “He might not be so bad. He looks pretty cute.”

  “Yeah yeah yeah. Ghost boys are all cute.” She put her hands in her pocket and her business face on. “It helps when you get to look like you thought you did in life. I lot of people think they’re cuter than they actually were.”

  Reggie took a step forward. But was quickly pulled back by Sam. “Where are you going?” Sam asked.

  “I’m going to go talk to him.” Reggie said matter-of-factly.

  “Oh.” Sam thought for a minute. “I thought you’d have some kind of back up trap and just get him.”

  “Nope. I need to talk to him first then deal with crossing him over.” Reggie looked down at Sam. “Are you going to come along or what?”

  Sam looked at her hands and let go of Reggie’s arm. “Nah. I’m good. I’ll back you up from here.” She bent down and picked up the brick. And smiled. It crumbled in her hand. “Ha. I’ll Just stay her in case someone needs to run for help then.” She frowned and dusted the brick dust off of her hands.

  “I’ll be fine. Don’t worry.” Reggie smiled and headed for the ghost. “Hello.” She waved to the blue apparition.

  “Hey.” He grinned and pulled at his leather jacket. “How are you?”

  “Fine.” Reggie strained her mouth to keep smiling. The ghost boy stared at her with a smirk across his face. “So...” She continued. “Who are you?”

  “The name’s Jerry. Jerry Cornfell.” He stroked his hair. “Who are you?”

  “Reggie Blunder.”

  “Regina Blunder? I’ve heard of you.”

  “No. Not Regina. Reggie. Only she gets away with Regina.” She points back to Sam. Sam breaks into a cold sweat wondering what was going on. She just nodded and waved.

  “Alright. Reggie.” He was quick to smile again. “It’s fine. But I know about you.”

  “The Blunders are well known in the after life.” Reggie confirmed.

  “No. It’s not that. I know you.”

  Reggie twisted her face and asked, “Huh?”

  “Reggie Blunder is a much talked about subject around here. You should know that.” He shifted in his boots.

  “Oh, well. That makes sense. I’ve been coming around for a while.”

  “Who knew you were so cute in person.”

  Reggie’s face went red. She wanted to end this fast. “Uh yeah. Well, let me tell you how this works. We talk. Figure out what you need to do to crossover. It’s usually a mental block. Like you feel guilty about something in your life. Or you can’t let go of something. Something like that. The you overcome that. And we all go home happy.” She paused a moment waiting for the ghost to answer. Then continued. “But first I want some answers.”

  “Who said I needed any help? This was my parking lot and will be forever.” He held out his arms.

  “Well, we know what’s holding you back.” Reggie muttered to herself.

  “Everyone who comes through here pays a toll.” He smiled again his face uglier than before. “Even you.”

  “Oh yeah? What’s the toll?”

  He rubbed his chest. “Now let me think.”

  “While you’re thinking. Let me in on what happened here.” Reggie kicked at the ground.

  “What happened here? Oh.” He continued rubbing his chest. “Just a little flexing.”

  Reggie was about to ask what the hell he was trying to say but didn’t think it would get her anywhere. She let out a loud sigh. The ghost didn’t seem to notice or care.

  “Oh, that was just flexing?” She twirled her hair and pretended to be chewing gum. “That seemed like more than flexing.”

  The greasy ghost walked up to her and leaned in. “Oh no, baby. That was just the tip of the iceberg.”

  “Oh yeah?” She giggled again. She wondered what kind of iceberg he could be talking about.

  “I’m rolling with a bigger gang now. Bigger than ever before. And it gets bigger everyday.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “Things are changing around here.”

  So that explains it Reggie thought. A concentration of ectoplasm tends to build upon itself after a large amount accumulates. Like ghostly compound interest. When they all started materializing on the same spot and they found the trap blocking them it was like a river meeting a dam. Reggie looked at Jerry. He must be the original occupier of the parking lot. Which is why he was able to stick around and hold out till the trap was used up.

  “So what’s this about, Jerry?” Reggie leaned in.

  “Sorry, Reggie baby. I can’t tell you that. It’s top secret.” He leaned back and tugged on his jacket. “Now, about that toll.”

  “No toll till you tell me what I want to know.” Reggie crossed her arms.

  “That’s not how it works.” Jerry grabbed Reggie’s left wrist. His hand was ice cold.

  Reggie looked at her arm and back at Jerry. Grabbing the living wasn’t something that a ghost of his level should be able to do. She gritted her teeth. “You need to let go of me, Jerry. And tell me what I want to know.”

  “Oh. I don’t think so. Time to pay the toll.” He t
ightened his grip.

  Reggie reached into her pocket and pulled out a small yellow cube. She shoved her open palm into Jerry’s chest. She removed her hand and the cube remained. Jerry looked down and laughed. He grabbed her other arm. Reggie just looked at him and smiled. His laughter stopped short. It sounded like air rushing away from his mouth. The sound grew louder like a freight train. It was the sound of the cube pulling in every atom of Jerry. He would have screamed if he was capable of it. His blue face sunk in and collapsed and was followed by his body. The rushing air around Reggie finally stopped and the cube fell to the ground like a penny. Reggie just looked at it.

  Sam ran up to Reggie. “Are you okay? What happened?”

  Reggie smiled and broke out into a dance. And unfortunately a rap. “Oh so sorry, Jerry! But that’s why they call me Regina Blunder. The famous ghost hunter. There ain’t no other.” It trailed off from there. She looked at Sam who simply shook her head. Regina’s victory dances were getting worse. “I really need to start writing stuff down.” Reggie added.

  “Or you could just stop doing it every time you trap a ghost.” Sam looked at the cube. “They’re pretty bad.”

  “Well, that’s why I’m paid to be a ghost trapper.” Reggie picked up the cube and put it in her pocket. “And not some rapper.”

  “That rhymed.” Sam pointed out.

  “See. I need to write these down. Remember that one.” Reggie went around the parking lot and picked up the steel rods.

  “So what just happened?” Sam grabbed a few rods.

  “The guy pissed me off.” Reggie