He huddled himself closer and walked a bit shakily against a strong gray wind. On the horizon above, roiling gray-blue clouds spat cold drops arrowing in. Ahead underfoot, lay a slick asphalt pocked and divided by a now dim painted line, wet almost icy, but not quite cold enough. He marched against the wind, sometimes gusting, sometimes falling still for a brief pause before again whipping up the edges of his coat.
Better here, he thought, than to be back in the city, so no cause for lamentation. He was lucky to be intact and strong enough to continue. Problem, was that he had no earthly destination, other than immediate escape. He knew that it made sense to rest, and so he watched to see what opportunity might appear. Even an old farm building half fallen would suffice, given enough roof left. This land had its share of those, though as of last few years, the old wooden structures were quickly becoming fewer and fewer as prefab steel became popular.
Sure enough, just across the grassy field, an old gray slat-wood structure half-leaning stood. Stumbling a little on ploughed soil, he made his way there, the wind pushing and pulling, feet awkward against the earthern lumps. Just past the heavy askew wooden door, he quickly found the nearby corner nearest the light to sit, piles of drifted leaves and stray hay as his company. Exhausted, without thinking on it, he soon fell asleep as he sat, head nodding forward. He did not hear the ghost as it wafted up to him. He did not see the most odd whispy light-thing, half only in this world, yet aware of this one too, that floated across from the very back of the barn to see what or who in a over twenty years was the first living man to dare or need to venture into this place. This relic and monument, a dead man's ex-life had been passed in so many ways with this old barn as a focus and meaning and purpose. Now he was dead, the grain long gone, his beloved wife and family all gone, he could not find them anymore, and so he hid in his quiet revery and penance in the dusty recesses and quiet, away from fearful nonunderstanding eyes and harrassments. He could not recall or even know he had died there alone decades ago, yet lived on as what we might call a ghost...
The weary traveller dozed fitfully on, a might wet but not overly cold due to his longcoat, and not overly comfortable, but at least out of the worst of the storm, able to rest and protect his life. He was grateful for that, and based upon this, he rested. The dead farmer looked upon him with sympathy. But by Grace of God, that could be me, he thought, and this made him vaguely uncomfortable, but he knew not exactly why, as time for him was a long thing of undefined remembrances and loss of reasons why he had lived or died or did what he did.
But he saw the man now, saw him wet and hungry and alone, and it reminded him of his life as a human being, and he wept ghostly tears for the man, bereft of his God, wandering the roads at night such as this, and felt grateful that God had afforded this child His shelter in the fallen barn, and in that moment he was granted salvation, and he passed into heaven.
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