This is the first story among others I have published in 2010 in English, Spanish, french and Arabic:
In a lost village among the hills, surrounded by the Rif Mountains in the north of Morocco, in the mid forties of the twentieth century, lived my grandparents. My mother was about four when she had one of her childhood worst experiences. She was playing with her straw toy one night. My grandfather was absent. My grandmother was praying. My uncle, only a baby of eight months, was sleeping by my mother. Suddenly a ghostly creature appeared. The baby was crying. My mother looked at the stranger strangling the baby, covered her eyes with her hands, and then, cried. The monster’s face was half black half white, night and day, evil and good, with wide-open eyes. My grandmother hurried to save her children. The ghost ascended leaving the baby dead. My mother could see the tree outside through the wall.
The next morning, when my grand father came back home, the baby had already been buried. He cried bitterly.
My mother often told me about ghosts, but this story was the only one I never forgot. Imagine what power could annul the wall presence to let the child see a tree she used to go out to see. Till the very day she died and whenever she lost consciousness my mother cited ghosts’ names and strange reminiscences. The most she feared was the one who killed her little brother. My grandmother never had boys!
All I can infer is that we are not but ghosts and remote past. Prepare yourself to the real life!
Perry Conners, Arizona tycoon and soon-to-be politician, can't sleep or make love anymore, and he's losing all sense of reality. Is it the Devil's fault?
