Papa didn't die

Mama said that papa was gone.

Said he went away shortly after I was born. I didn’t know what she meant when I was little will littler back when I could barely talk and I would stumble a lot more as I walked. (At least that’s what mama said.)

Papa hasn’t been here since I was born, but mama and I still do small things to remember him. She would place his photo on the table and give him meals whenever it’s his birthday or Father’s Day. Mama said that papa ghost comes to visit them.

I never saw papa ghost. He never ate his meals and was very wasteful the meals sat there going cold. All the other kids at school had papas sometimes two and then there was me and just mama. I would ask why and she would tell me because papa is gone.

Then the mean kids at school would call me nasty names. Take my lunch, pull my hair and push me down in the mud when mama just washed my clothes. I would go home crying to her and when asked why the mean kids did such a thing, I told her the truth.

“They said because my papa a deadbeat.”

I didn’t ask her what deadbeat meant I just cried into her arms, sobbing big tear drops and wishing my papa was here to make the mean kids go away.

I didn’t want to go to school the next day, but mama said I had to she told me to just avoid the other girls and never walk into places alone stay where the public can see me. I did what mama said standing in the open where all the other kids played around me as I sat under the tree.

“Did you hear?” one person asked.

“Hear what?”

“Some girls are taking the day off because their house burnt down.”

“What? Really?”

“Yeah, they keep saying a ghost burnt down the house. Their grounding for lying though.”

Mama said papa was a ghost.

That’s why he couldn’t be around like other, papa could. It’s why he couldn’t read me bed time stories it’s why he wasn’t there to pick me up, or walk me home. It’s why he wasn’t there at all. He didn’t leave because he wanted to, he left because he had no choice.

Mama always said that papa ghost watched over us.

Could it be possible his ghost was the reason behind the house?

Shaking my head, I carried on with my day. I didn’t have any friends sticking to my drawings and doing what I could in school.

Mama was there to take me home as always and later on that night I had dreams. I had dreams of my papa standing there and playing tea, reading me books he told awful jokes and then he said something to me that I will remember forever.

“They weren’t very nice girls. Don’t worry though their family the richest in the state. The mansion that was burnt to the ground was only one of the homes they owned.”

I held back the giggle because I know I shouldn’t laugh, but the idea seemed silly. It was as if papa ghost was real and mama was right about him always being around them. That couldn’t be possible could it? All the other adults said that ghost didn’t exist.

After waking up I started to see papa around the house, but mama didn’t see him. Papa would wave at me as I walked down the hall, he would tell me to eat my yucky greens. He was around me at school and would always make sure I was alright. He would throw things at people who we’re mean to me and all the other kids would freak out because all they saw was floating object aimed at them.

I didn’t ask papa to do such a thing. He just did.

Papa looked after me when mama couldn’t. I would tell other teachers this, but they all gave me worried looks and try to tell me papa wasn’t real that’s he has gone off to a realm that I can’t see him. I would always point only to huff in anger because none of them noticed papa like I did. They even called mama.

Mama nodded her heads as they talked like I wasn’t here.

“It’s alright,” mama said when we got home. “They just can’t see him like you can.”

“What is it mama? Am I crazy?”

“No, off course not just different.”

“But nobody else can see him.”

“Nobody else that you know can see him,” she corrected.

“Listen to your mother,” papa said.

“Your different and that’s okay. You have something I had when I was your age, but mine went away.”

“What is it?” I asked wondering what to call it.

“A gift. A gift that God has given to you to remind you that life doesn’t end after the body is gone.”

“I don’t think I understand.”

Mama giggled and kissed me on the forehead.

“You will.”

It would only be years later when I have children of my own did, I start to understand my mama words.

This is the writer first time writing first person.