'I was walkin' with a ghost ... I said please, please don't insist'

A man walked over to the table in the bar where my mom, stepdad and I sat, and I immediately waved and smiled.

"Hey, how are you!" I said, and I meant it. I liked this guy; I remembered all the nights he and his friends and I and my friends would hang out or drive around.

"Hey, Erin! Good, how are you?" he asked. He smiled, and I noticed he didn't have braces on his teeth anymore. He looked ... older? But good. He looked good.

"I'm doing fine ... What have you been up to?" I'd not seen him in five years.

"Oh, not much. Just working. Living around here. Where are you at now?" Here, being Columbus Grove, hometown of both Man and I.

"Wisconsin, working. Yeah ..." We did the polite head nod, and "Shook Me All Night Long" came over the jukebox.

"Well, good seeing you."

"You too!" and really, it was. I meant it. He's a great guy.

But his name. ... His name. What. Is. It.

I remembered jokes with him and his friends, and playing games in Jill's basement. I remembered that he was always nice, but not too nice. Nice for a guy, I would've said five years ago. Not mean like the others. He never threw my friend's car keys in a ditch at night.

But his name. ...

Then I remembered. Josh. Yes. Josh. Josh. I blushed even though he was back at the bar, turned away from me, and probably couldn't see me anymore.

Weird, I thought, how people who are stuck in the same part of their lives hang out together, then move on, and even though you're kinda good friends, you just don't remember all the details.

Ohio's filled with those ghosts for me. There's the Bed, Bath and Beyond this classmate of mine in college and I went to once. She had a perm. Not a bad one. But that's how she'll always be remembered to me. And that Taco Bell In Perrysburg? Ate there with a Miranda after an exam. Miranda who, I don't know.

And that guy, the one from English class sophomore year at college; my roommate and I went to his house, hung out with his friends. I only remember that his AIM name has a "wolf" in it.

Ghosts, man. Everywhere. Ghosts. It'd be kind of eerie, if I weren't, well, one of them to someone, I guess.