My encounter ... with a ghost

Monday, 6^th February

My meeting this morning was at 11am, with a Mr Granat. I had sent them my CV, luckily I had done one for the agency a few months before.

Ben was helping me get dressed, we could not decide if a tie was too formal, or was it appropriate?

Ben suggested we phone Ingrid, she would know. Luckily she was not doing a class, she said definitively a tie. I had planned to go by train, then we decided Ben would drive me. I suggested he can do some shopping at a local hypermarket, and I could phone him when I am finished.

The meeting was running late, so when I finally came out and phoned Ben, his phone was ringing not far from me, he had gone to the toilet in the lobby. In the car I told him about the meeting.

They have offered me a very part time job, with the view of teaching more, lecturing anaesthesia.

I have to do a course to get a teaching qualification, which is mostly online, and then 3 assessed teaching sessions. I had already done a qualification to teach students at the hospital, that was to my advantage. The feedback from the students about my talks on the open days had been positive, so when their current lecturer had been offered a job in the USA, I was the obvious choice. My lessons would not start until May, and then it was only a few weeks. It would be like that all academic year, just a few weeks every few months, unless they could offer me other subjects. This suited me fine, I could still do locum work, or have enough time to do other things. The pay was good, I would get paid by the hour, of course my preparation time was not paid.

The boy said to me: so, of course you said yes to it. No, I haven't, I want to think about it. I will say yes, but I like to mull it over, look at the timetable, and the course I need to do first.

Ben suggested we go to the house, he had bought some cleaning materials which were on offer, and wanted to unload them.

While he carried them in, I checked the mail. He did not come back, so I went in. He was clearing the dishwasher, which we had put on the day before. He could not leave it.

I suddenly felt very cold, I checked, I had closed the door. I am sure I had closed all the windows and doors yesterday. I asked Ben if he could feel the draft, the boy said he felt fine. Then he said: you probably felt the ghost. Really? I thought we got rid of that! He said, no Arne is here. Now, with any other person, one would have said, haha, very funny, or don't be stupid. When the boy said it I believed him. How long had Arne been at the house? Ben said he had picked something up Friday evening, but it was really strong just now. He told me Arne was sitting on the sofa, he liked it. I involuntarily looked over to the sofa, which made the boy laugh, he said how funny people are, as if to expect to actually see something!

He explained that Arne was here as there was an anniversary between him and me. I remembered it was around this time of year that we had met. Apparently Arne wanted to tell me he is happy how my life is going and what we are doing with the club. He likes Ben and wishes us well. With that Ben walked to the garden, he said he needed to put some bird food out. He had gone out and closed the terrace door, when I suddenly felt this cold again, and then it was gone. Ben came back in, looked at me and said: ready to go? And that was it. My encounter with a ghost.