“Where is everyone? . . .”

     Homer walked down empty street after empty street. The glare of the sun . . . the empty streets . . . the vacant houses. Through their wide open doors he could see . . . empty hallways.

     So many brightly colored balloons wafted into the air. Red, blue, green, purple, orange, pink and yellow balloons rose through the air. They flew above the houses as if on a ghostly mission.

     “If only I could find someone to talk to about it. The ad said, ‘Room for Rent.’ The house at the address in the ad did not match the photo or description, but it was on a spacious corner lot,” Homer mused.

     A kite caught his eye. Higher than the rooftops, it seemed to be trying to fly itself. Homer looked toward the trees. Kites were tangled in many of the tree limbs. Something about them seemed . . . spectral.

     Homer passed by a playground. The swings moved back and forth, back and forth just like people were swinging in them. Homer didn’t see anyone. The swings weren’t curved with the weight of any people. Homer heard ghostly laughter.

     He heard a gate creaking. Was it the wind blowing it back and forth? He didn’t see any cows in the pasture, or birds in the trees.

     He thought he could hear music playing and whispering but he wasn’t sure where the sounds came from. Was it his imagination? He was getting kind of spooked.

     Bubbles seemed to mount into the sky on some heavenly jaunt. Bubbles and more bubbles cavorting in the breeze. Bubbles frolicking in a danse macabre.

     Curtains blew out through the windows. Grass was a foot high in the yards. Yet there was no sound. Homer didn’t hear any cars or any other sounds.

     Homer heard the sound of a piano. He walked in the direction of the sound. As he got closer he noticed the tune seemed like an old song. He came to the house the music seemed to be coming from and walked in the front door. A player piano was playing an old song. Homer called out and looked through the house but there was no one there but him.

     Vacant houses . . . empty rooms . . . weedy overgrown yards . . .

     “Who owned these houses?” Homer had an idea. He went into a house and walked over to a photo album. He picked it up and leafed through the pages. He was surprised to see . . . ghosts! Most of the human shapes in the photographs had a misty ghost like appearance. Their eerie smiles etched themselves on the pages. The photographs themselves seemed monochromatic though they were full color photographs.

     Homer dashed out the door and ran through the empty streets to the destination bus station. “Was anybody there . . .?”