Chapter 11
‘Esmerée’s a ghost?’ Poe said.
‘She is,’ Bradshaw replied.
‘Well, lucky for us we have Nigel the paranormal investigator in the next office. Shall I go and fetch him?’
‘I don’t mean a literal ghost, Poe. There is no afterlife.
The light at the end of the tunnel that people claim to see when they nearly die is nothing more than the loss of peripheral vision as the eyesight fades.
And the ecstatic experience they feel is easily explained.
The sympathetic nervous system – the system responsible for arousal and excitement – and the parasympathetic system, the system responsible for readying the body for sleep, are incompatible.
The turning-on of one shuts down the other.
But during death, neither system shuts down.
They both stay on. You are both excited and calm.
In other words, visions of an afterlife are likely chemical and neurological events that take place during death.
And although the collection of atoms of which we are all composed do get repurposed when we die, and will echo through space until the end of time, that is not the same as consciousness.
In other words, ghosts are a load of phoney-baloney. ’
‘You understand any of that, Poe?’ Esmerée asked after a beat.
‘I never do,’ Poe replied.
‘What I mean is, I am one of the most skilled people in the world at tracking down people on the internet, and I can find no trace whatsoever of Esmerée. She doesn’t exist. Therefore, she is a figurative ghost.’
‘I can assure you, Esmerée does exist, Tilly,’ Poe said. ‘Look, she’s scowling like a spider monkey.’
‘I’m sitting right next to you.’
‘I’m sorry, Esmerée, but your identity doesn’t exist,’ Bradshaw said. She paused. Looked uncomfortable. ‘And neither does your mother’s,’ she added.
‘But … but it must.’
Poe studied her. Could see no sign of deception.
‘If Tilly can’t find you on the internet, it means you aren’t on the internet,’ he said.
‘And that isn’t supposed to be possible.
Not in today’s surveillance-happy culture.
’ He thought it through. Esmerée Blue was an unusual name combination.
Distinctive. Océane Blue even more so. ‘I take it you’ve never gone by a different name? ’
Esmerée shook her head. Suddenly miserable. ‘I’ve always been me.’
‘Which means it’s your mother who has the ghost identity. When she had you, you were assimilated into her analogue world.’
‘Like the Borg,’ Bradshaw said.
‘Exactly like the Borg,’ Poe said, not having a clue what Bradshaw was on about.
‘Great, not only did my mother abandon me, now I don’t officially exist.’
Bradshaw reached over and patted Esmerée on the head. ‘Don’t worry, Esmerée; Poe will find out who you really are.’
‘How? If my mom doesn’t exist, there’s nothing to find.’
‘By doing what he usually does – upsetting people until they try to kill him.’
Poe nodded. He’d never intended it to work out that way, but he seemed to have a knack for provoking extreme responses. ‘Now if you’ll both excuse me, I have some porn to watch.’
‘Pervert,’ Esmerée said.