“Psst.”

“Psssst!”

Agent Dimanche sat up suddenly, looking around the room frantically. Where was he? This wasn’t the PHSE barracks, or his cosy apartment.

“Pssssssst! Hey!”

It was the triple locked door, alarmed tripwire, and creepy artwork that reminded him. “Ooohhh…” He sighed. He was still at that bar. Mary Moe wanted him to check out rumours of supernatural occurrences on his way home. His superior had lost her mind, honestly. Despite the strange clientele, the only monsters the bartender entertained were those in the frankly ultra-surrealist paintings.

“Hey, wake up!”

His head shot to the left. The cupboard door was open a crack, and a pale white hand curled around the edge. It had a fuzzy quality, like a photo that hadn’t been developed properly.

“Are you awake?”

Agent Dimanche rubbed his eyes. Pinched his arm. Pulled out his gun and shot the horrific painting opposite. Nope, the hand was still there. Absentmindedly, he blinked five times in quick succession. The camera located in his contact lens activated.

“Uh, yeah, I’m awake.”

The face of a young boy, pale, drawn and slightly blurry, came out from behind the door. Its eyes, unlike the rest of him, were clearly glowing a bright green. It was the same boy as in the painting he just shot.

It smiled. “Oh good! This is my first ever haunting, so….” Twisting a little on one slightly transparent foot, the ghost looked up sheepishly. “I-I’m just gonna go ahead. Okay?”

This had to be a dream. Agent Dimanche nodded absentmindedly. A ghost. A ghost wants to practise it’s haunting on him. A ghost pulling an amazing Porky Pig ‘oh shucks’ impression wanted to practise it’s haunting on him.

“Okay!” The ghost cleared its non-existent throat and pulled out a pair of chains from nowhere.

“Ooooooooooo!” It moaned, rattling the chains creepily. The ends of the chains hit the walls, causing little dents in the plaster. Hope I don’t have to pay for that… If any of this is even real…

Seeing the lack of fear, the ghost decided to up the ante. “OOOOOOoooooOOOOO” It shook the chains harder, until they were whipping the ceiling. Dust fell from the gouges that revealed the rafters.

Even that didn’t faze the agent. Who thought he was still trapped in a dream. Or hallucination.

“OooooooooooooOOOOOOO!” The ghost disappeared briefly before crawling out of the painting, hair suddenly growing longer to hang over glowing eyes. Ectoplasm dripped down the walls. Agent Dimanche just blinked.

“OoooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooOOOOOOOOoooooo!” Moaned the ghost, who began to sound like a firetruck. Flipping itself over, it scrambled up the wall to the ceiling like a less creepy version of the girl from the Exorcist. It reached the opposite fall, before falling onto the suitcase below. The ghost rummaged through the Agent’s belongings, tearing pages out of the single book he bought, throwing clothes around the room, emptying toothpaste all over the windows.

Agent Dimanche wondered when this dream would end. Honestly, this was just getting absurd. The paranoia in his mission briefing must have gotten to him.

The ghost had one last thing to try.

“OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!” It screeched, the force blowing back the agent’s very not regulation haircut.

“So,” The ghost asked once it got its breath back. The agent tried not to think about the logistics of a ghost, a dead person, needing to catch its breath.“How’d I do?”

“Uh…. You mean, out of ten or something?”

“Yeah!”

“Um… 3? Or 4? It was all very cliché, really. Do ghosts watch horror movies?”

“Cliché? Cliché!?” The ghost was furious. “I’ll show you cliché!!”

Agent Dimanche lost his sheets. And his pants. The ghost’s fury was almost palpable, tearing apart the walls and smashing the windows. It wasn’t until he collided with the remnants of the far wall that Agent Dimanche realised he wasn’t dreaming. The pain in his back was too real.

“Aaarrggghhhh!!”

Scrambling for the handle, he wrenched the door open and bolted down the stairs, screaming all the way. No secret agent training prepares you for a haunting. And Agent Dimanche specialised in werewolves and vampires, not intangible kid-ghosts! On the way he passed the bartender, who looked supremely unruffled considering the destruction to the upper levels of his bar.

“Everything okay sir? Is the bed not to your liking?” The man asked in his crisp British accent.

The agent froze, looking at the man like he was insane. “Your building is haunted! A ghost attacked me! He looked like the boy in the painting but he was a ghost!”

“A little boy?” The bartender frowned. “Oh you have quite the overactive imagination sir. The boy in the painting is all grown up now. Enjoying some time off with his family in the Bahamas.”

“But he was there!” The agent said desperately. “He tore apart the room, he-he climbed out of his frame, he even, he even put my toothpaste all over the windows!”

“Toothpaste? Over the windows? Are you feeling well sir?” The bartender looked quite concerned, but behind him on the stairs, pale feet began to descend.

“He’s behind you!” The agent screamed, turning around and running straight into the wall.

“Sir, please, calm down! Everything is fine, I assure you.”

“Nooooooo!!!” Agent Dimanche turned and ran to the far window, not even stopping to open it before he hurled himself through the glass. As he ran away screaming, the bartender turned to the contrite little boy behind him.

“Did you really have to destroy his room?”

“Weeellll….” The ghost drew out the word. “He didn’t think I was scary enough, and I got a little… angry…”

Sighing, the bartender lifted the ghost and carried him upstairs. “Next time you decide to haunt someone, please let me know beforehand. And don’t destroy the room.”

The ghost grinned unrepentantly. “No promises!”

Another sigh. “I think I need a drink.”