Love and Gravestones

Story in One Sentence:

Ghost meets Topper in a dark romantic comedy. How long would you wait for love?

Story Synopsis

GWEN SIMONS is one lonely young woman. Her five year romance with the love of her life is over. She was hoping he'd be the one. But now Gwen has to leave her job. He's working there, of course.

Gwen's best friend MAZIE advises her to find a new job and find a new love. "The best way to get over somebody is to get under somebody," Mazie says. But that's not Gwen's style. She needs a clean break.

So Gwen quits her job and seeks new employment. But what should she do? Fate intervenes as she takes a position as a Development Director for the Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia. She quickly learns the ropes of her new job, which involves developing tours around the "residents" of Pennsylvania's most famous cemetery.

One late afternoon at twilight, she comes across a young man who is searching for something among the gravestones. He is a quiet fellow, who speaks softly and wears clothes that are a bit out of style, but they look good on him. Gwen is intrigued by the young man. "I haven't seem you around here before," he comments. "When were you born?"

She replies, "I was born in '85. That makes me..."

"Less than thirty," he responds. "And still not married?"

"No," she smiles wistfully. "And you?"

"I was born in... '82," the young man replies. Gwen smiles.

Over time, a relationship develops between the two of them. He agrees to meet her there every weekday evening at the same time.

Gwen comes to learn a lot about the cemetery, what with her constant research in the cemetery archives. And the young fellow seems to know a lot about the history of the residents of the cemetery. It's almost as if he had been there for the internments.

But Gwen's curiosity is aroused when the young man refuses to visit other areas of the cemetery with her. She wants to know why he won't go with her. As the night mist rolls in across the cemetery, he merely says, "I can't." He disappears into the foggy mist.

The next day a visitor asks Gwen to look up a record in the cemetery archives. She stumbles across an internment card with the young man's name and burial date. He was born in '82 all right. But in 1882, not 1982. He died in 1910 at the age of 28.

That's right. Gwen Simon's new boyfriend is a ghost.