15- Gustavo, and the "Weird Coincidences"
Hello and Welcome, my ghost story lovers! This is Beyond the Veil Paranormal Tales, and I'm your host, Becca. You can also find us in podcast form, at http://BeyondTheVeilParanormalTales.com, if you'd like me to read to you instead, or if you’d like to read along.
Join me here as I sit in the cool evening air, watching the sun dip behind Pike’s Peak, in the distance, and seeing how that paints the fluffy clouds in shades of orange and pink, tonight. Soon, the stars will pop out in the inky darkness, to bathe us in their distant light. Listen in as I tell you some real people's paranormal stories, told in their own words. Some of these spooky stories may contain adult language. Listeners, be advised.
If you are new to the blog and podcast, while you should generally be able to pop in and enjoy any individual episode on its own, I do explain some things that make me different as I go along here. So, you might want to pop back to Episode 1, and start there, but as always, follow your heart.
This week’s episode could easily stand on its own, but it’s also the second half of a visit with friends of mine, who shared some of their stories with me. If you haven’t listened to Episode 14 yet, you might want to hop back to that one for the introduction to this week’s storytellers.
Names of the affected parties and some personal details have been changed, to protect the privacy of the storytellers. But, you have my word: All stories told here are real, to the best of my knowledge.
So! Grab yourself a drink from the fridge, find a fuzzy blanket, and settle in with me, as we take a peek at the world that lies... Beyond the Veil.
Tonight is Episode 15, Gustavo, and the “Weird Coincidences”
This week’s episode could be considered part two of last week’s story, with Isabelle. We pick right up where we left off, hanging out at the colorful table in my friend’s house. I sat across from my friend, my oldest kid, Tony, to my left. Tony’s ex-turned-friend, Miguel, sat across the table from Tony, between his mom and his mom’s partner, Gustavo.
Gus had been very quiet so far that day, while Isa and Miguel detailed things that happened to them, but as their stories drew to a close, and the conversation petered out, I glanced his way, hoping to include him in our conversation, or change it if he needed a change of pace.
I turned to Gus with a grin and asked, “Do you have any weird stories? Or any ghosty…” I trailed off as he nodded deeply.
He continued nodding, and said simply, “I have several.”
Isa gasped, “You have several?”
He thought for a second, and nodded quickly, “Oh yeah.”
Eyebrows raised, I grinned and glanced between them, watching the interaction play out, “Oooh…” It’s always fun learning something new about your partner, especially if you think you know everything there is to know, already.
She scowled at him, “You, Mr. I-Don't-Believe-In-That-Stuff.”
He shook his head at her, scowling in reply, “I didn't say that-”
The teenagers exchanged a glance, then quietly snuck away from the table, and back to the living room, where the pile of puppies sat, waiting for pets. Tony and Miguel happily obliged them, and returned to their whispered gossip as the adults chatted away at the table.
Isa nodded deeply, eyes wide, “Yes you did, you told me when we came home from Evelyn's house, and I was telling you about my cards? And you were like, I don't believe in any of that stuff. And you dismissed everything I had to say about Mattie…” She shook her head at him.
Gus leaned her way and shook his head at her, “Yeah, but a Supernatural experience is not necessarily the same as reading cards,” He glanced at me, to clarify, “Which can be fun, which can be useful, but I'm not- It's a different type of thing.” He shook his head.
I’ve done readings for the two of them in the past, and I think Gus might have been worried I was offended by his comments about Tarot cards. I wasn’t at all. Tarot cards are kinda like horoscopes in some ways. You get out of it what you put into it.
So, depending on the person and situation, Tarot readings can be just for fun, or they can be deeply meaningful. The cards read differently in different situations. Each reading is very different from the last, even if similar cards come up.
It’s fascinating to me, since I do readings, but he’s the type of guy to just do the cards for fun. He doesn’t use them as a spiritual tool, the way I do. And there’s nothing wrong with his approach.
Isa squinted at him as he spoke, then shrugged and nodded, “Okay… I sage you anyway.” She grabbed a trio of sprigs, of freshly-cut desert sage, off to the table, and waved them in his direction, with a grin.
I laughed, repeating myself from earlier in our conversation, “Sage yoself!”
Gus nodded seriously, “You can sage.”
I nodded at him, “I sage all the time. My husband thinks it smells like armpits,” I laughed, and shook my head.
Isa wrinkled up her face, “Smells like armpits??” She sniffed at her sage, and shook her head.
I laughed and nodded, “That's what he thinks.”. I glanced over and Gus looked confused, so I clarified, “Sage. When I do the sage.”
Gus bobbed his head back and forth, considering. He admitted, “It has a particular smell…”.
Isa gasped, offended, “I think it smells pretty!”
I looked to her and nodded, “I think it smells nice! But he's yeah, he's weird,” I shrugged.
Gus shrugged deeply, “But it is a.. a very polarizing smell. First time, I can see that.”
I nodded at him, “It's like a love it or hate it.”
Gus nodded once, “Right. It's like... what's that herb?”
Isa wrinkled her face up, “Patchouli?”
Gus laughed and shook his head, “NO, no, no.”
Isa tried again, “Frankincense? Rosemary?”
Gus thought, then brightened, ”Cilantro!”
Isa lit up with understanding, “Oh!”
Gus looked to me, “You either love it or you hate it.” I nodded deeply.
Isa shook her head, “But that's... it's a physiological thing, the cilantro. So what happens is there's people who have receptors where when they taste it…”
Gus wrinkled up his face, “It tastes like soap.”
Isa nodded and clarified, “It has components that taste like soap. Yup, so it's just a physiological thing, completely.”
Gus sighed, “Well... I love Cilantro.” He spoke, for the record, then continued his story, “Well, one of my earliest memories... I remember sitting in my parents' bedroom and at the time it was also my bedroom, cause I was very young... um, we were watching tv. I don't know what I was watching. I don't remember. But, I remember seeing a guy, a man, in the doorway. One I'd never seen before.” He looked my way, eyes wide with meaning.
I nodded slowly, sighing, “Mmmm... Mmmhmm,” as an image began forming in my mind. I squinted at him and asked, “What did he look like?”
Gus grinned knowingly and held a finger up, in answer to my question, and said, “I saw him, and being a kid, being a baby, and being surprised by this gentleman in the doorway, I started screaming, like, baby scream.”
I nodded, brow furrowed, “Mmhmm.”
Isa sat up in her chair, surprised, “Wait, you were a baby??”
Gus nodded at her, explaining, “This is one of my earliest memories. And I turned around- no, no. Okay. He turned away from me. And put his hands in his face,” he buried his face in his hands, then continued, “And while he was doing that, he faded into nothing, and disappeared.”
He held his hands before him as he spoke, palms facing away. He clenched his hands into fists, then opened, lifted, and separated them, miming a puff of smoke vanishing into thin air. He paused for effect, looking around the table at our shocked faces, then he said simply, “Which then made me stop, and scream some more.”
I grinned at his delivery, and nodded, “Of course.”
He waited for the reactions to die down, and said, “The more and more I look in the mirror, the more I look like that guy in the doorway.”
I nodded deeply, grin expanding, “Uh-huh! Uh-huh!”
Gus grinned back at me, “So, there's that... and um, I've got a lot of weird ‘coincidences,’ in air quotes, especially after the deaths of my parents. And they died within... the same year, the same calendar year. And certain things like, oh, things happen around their death day, or their birthday.”
Isa nodded sadly, “Uh-huh. What happened this year? There was something that happened around-“ She looked at him, unsure, “Was it your mom's birthday? Your Dad's birthday! What was your Dad's birthday? What happened then?”
He shook his head, firmly, “I'm not gonna put that in the recording.” I smiled at him, reassuringly. It’s absolutely his call what is shared about his experiences.
Isa looked to Gus, brow furrowed, “What about October? Something happened in October, right?”
Gus shook his head, “I know that the day after the death anniversary of my mother, I felt the baby for the first time, in Isa's belly. And, it was really early to feel anything. It was like,” he paused and tapped lightly on the table, four times. He smiled and nodded to Isa, continuing, “And she said, ‘Did you feel that?’ She felt it... But that's different.”
Isa nodded, then looked confused, “Yeah, but she passed away, right?”
Gus nodded, “She passed in February. And he was what? 3 months old? In you? 3 months?”
Isa looked up into the ceiling, thinking, “Yeah, 3.”
I nodded, “Yeah that's pretty early for outside feels.” An expecting parent feeling little movements at that time isn’t unusual, but for an outside party to feel it is a little surprising.
Isa shrugged, “Yeah he's my 4th baby, so everything's all thinned out.” She gestured at her midsection, dismissively.
Gus scowled at her playfully, “Don't try to make sense out of it.”
She shook her head, defensively, “No no no, but, there's people that haven't been able to feel their baby moving, even when they're really far along in the pregnancy, because the babies sleep, all the time.”
He reached over and patted her hand reassuringly, with a loving smile, then sat up suddenly, remembering what he wanted to say earlier, “So, oh! So I was rehearsing a play. A Shakespeare play. I was Orlando in As You Like It. And the play opens with a monologue by Orlando.
“So the director was one I'd worked with several times, for many years. Many years, many different projects.”
I grinned, nodding, “Mmmhmm.” It’s awesome knowing these truly talented creative people!
Gus continued, setting the stage, “He was working with me, one on one. And he likes to push you to go to a certain place emotionally. But he's only going to push you as far as he knows he can bring you back, safely. That's very important to him.
“Anyway. He started playing some percussion music. Very, like, drums, like, conga.. very like, what they would call ‘tribal’. You know, music, whatever,” he waved his hand around as if to wave a thought away.
I nodded, listening, “Yeah.”
Gus thought about this old director, and waved the methods off, explaining, “He's just a different tribe. But still, they play their music. I left the rehearsal. Before I left the rehearsal, I went to the bathroom, and I just broke down in tears. And I was like, ‘That's a really good rehearsal, I got to a certain place.’
I nodded, understanding, “Yeah,” Good, deep-digging creative work takes a lot out of a person.
Gus continued, “I went home. The next morning, I found out my father died.”
I sighed heavily at that. I haven’t lost either of my parents, and I can’t even imagine how hard that must be to deal with. I nodded sadly, listening, “Mmmm.”
Gus sighed heavily, “Fell asleep and never woke up.” He took a deep breath, and continued, “Now, my director who's known me for years and knows me really well, said, ‘I was scared doing this rehearsal, because you didn't sound like you. You didn't look like you. I didn't recognize you.’ And was like, ‘I gotta get you to do certain things, to try to bring you back.’”
He looked back and forth between Isa and I, and raised his eyebrows as he said, “Based on the autopsy, it is estimated that my father died during that rehearsal. And they may have been going through me, to say goodbye. By the way, the opening monologue of As You Like It?” He looked at me and paused for effect, “Orlando is lamenting the recent passing of his father.
I nodded deeply, “Mmm, mmmhmmm.”
Isa squinted at him, “You have told me this.”
He smiled at her, “So yeah, there's- so. And it was just like, ‘Hoooo…’” He shuddered.
Isa shuddered in reply and held up her arm, declaring, “Ooh! Goosies!”
Gus grinned, “Yeah... you know, things like, for example, I acted in a short film, and then they entered it into a short film festival,” he bobbed his head back and forth for each option.
He continued, “And they were, like, telling me to go to the closing ceremony, and I'm like, ‘Ehhhh,’” He shrugged, “But I'm like, ‘Fine, I'll represent the film.’ I didn't want to go, but I said I'll go.”
He paused and looked back and forth between Isa and I, and grinned, “We wound up winning a lot of awards.” He paused as we applauded him quietly, bowing silently in reply, “And I won an award for best supporting actor in the film. And one for best short film, which is great.” He paused for effect again, then said, “It happened on the one year anniversary of my father's passing. And it was like-”
Isa squinted at him, “Isn't he the one person who never saw you perform?”
Gus furrowed his brow in thought, “He never,” He broke off, thinking, shaking his head, “He saw me do poetry. But he never saw me act.”
Isa nodded, repeating, “He never saw you act.”
He nodded simply, then gasped, “Oh! By the way, that play, As You Like It? It opened on my birthday.”
Isa squinted at him, then gasped, “Wait a minute- we were dating!”
He smiled sweetly at her, “Yeah! It opened on my birthday, and the next day, my uncle, my father's brother and his wife and daughter came to see me, and that was the first time they had seen me perform. And I could see him, and in silhouette, they look the same, so, there was a lot…” He trailed off, sighing softly.
She asked, “It was on your birthday?”
Gus nodded, “The first performance was the day before my birthday. The second performance was when they came. And they brought cake.”
Isa grinned, “Oh yeah, that's right. He's a big teddy bear, you can just squish him.”
Gus smiled, “So there's a bunch of those kind of things. And I'm still- I just go, ‘I see you. I see you,’ those kinds of things.”
I nodded, listening, “Yeah, yeah.”
He nodded, conceding, “I get it. You know, if I want to go into Science, energy can't be created, nor destroyed. It can only be transformed.”
I nodded deeply at that, “Yessss.”
He continued, “So, if some other realm that we know nothing about, or heard very little about, um, their energy is there. And their energy's around them. So sometimes I'll speak about my late parents in the present tense,” he paused for a sip of his drink.
I nodded softly, “Yeah.”
Gus shrugged, “Because why not? Um, and so, there's... Oh, I remember one time. This was great. My aunt had passed away. It was the first time I'd dealt with any type of loss. I was a teenager at the time. And I was tired, and scared and grief-stricken, all those things. I decided to take a bath. And I had the radio playing. Not in the bathtub, because that would be dangerous.” He looked at me pointedly.
I nodded, seriously, “YES.”
He conceded, “But it was in the bathroom.” I laughed at that.
Isa grinned, “And the funny thing about that is there isn't shit hooked up to anything anymore, because it's wireless.”
Gus nodded once, “Right. It was in that era where you had to plug things in.” He rolled his eyes dramatically and we all laughed.
I laughed, “The olden times. The long long ago.”
Gus grinned, “Right!”
Isa squinted at me, “How old are you?”
I squinted off into the ceiling, having to think about it. It was 2019, and I was born in the fall of 1980. I hesitated, then answered, “I am... 39.”
She squinted at me harder, “When did you turn 39?”
I replied automatically, “The 5th of November,” and a line from V for Vendetta went running through my head, unbidden.
Isa hesitated, then gasped, “Wait, are you a Scorpio?”
I nodded, and before we could go on a tirade about that, Gus cleared his throat, and broke back in to finish his story, “And so I was in the bathtub, and I hadn't turned on the radio yet. And I was trying to calm down, because I was all stressed out, anxious, as I was like, ‘Let me think of some things’ and two songs came to my head. And I felt like they weren't remotely appropriate for grief.”
I feel like that’s a matter of opinion, person to person. This being his story, I nodded, sighing, “Yeah.”
Gus bobbed his head back and forth, explaining, “And I felt guilty about that, because, you know, I was raised Catholic. Anyway,” he shrugged.
I nodded, knowing Catholicism and guilt can often go hand in hand. I said, “Of course.”
Gus continued, “But I was like, ’Yes,’ And it was two songs that were old then, like, they weren't... I think one had been playing on the radio, but the other, it had been years since it had been played on the radio.”
I nodded, “Mmhmm.”
Gus paused for a moment before continuing, “And they were, ‘All Around the World,’ by Lisa Stansfield, and ’Father Figure,’ by George Michael.”
He stared across the table at me, eyes wide, eyebrows raised, “Turned on the radio to calm me... From beginning to end, ‘All Around the World’ by Lisa Stansfield. I changed the station, trying to be like, ’No, that's just weird.’ From beginning to end, ‘Father Figure,’ George Michael. And I was just like,” He broke off, eyes still wide, mouth agape.
He shook his head in shock, “‘What just happened...?’ And I got out of the bathroom really quickly. But that was the first time that I realized there are things we don't know, or don't understand much... but that doesn't mean they don't exist. It doesn't mean, just because I don't understand it…” He trailed off, composing his thoughts.
Gus took a deep breath before continuing, “But we are, as a race, a human race, cocky enough, because even, that's the thing. If I don't know it, it doesn't exist. But real scientists go, ‘No, there are things we don't know.’”
I nodded, “Yeah.”
He continued, emphasizing his point, “There's like, dark matter. We know it sort-of exists, but we don't know how to- They just took a picture, sort of, of a black hole, which is really just the event horizon of the black hole, this last year or this year?” He squinted at me.
I nodded in reply, ”Yep.”
He nodded, eyebrows raised, “And that was the first time ever. That was the first photographic proof of it, but they had theorized it.”
Isa nodded, “Yeah, it was last year or the year before? And yeah, it was through X-Rays?”
Gus nodded, “They theorized it, so they could- they know that there are things that you can't see, but they exist.”
I nodded, following, “Mmmhmm, yes.”
Gus continued, “There are things you can't hear, but exist. You know? Things like that, and so... Why is that not surprising, you know?”
I nodded deeply, “There's a lot more out there that we don't know than that we do know.”
Gus pressed on, “And I think it's cocky, and folly, you know? It's just awful to think that, ‘Oh, well you know, because I've never seen it, it doesn't exist,’ you know? ‘The earth is flat,’ well, if the earth was flat, there'd be a cat, just knocking things off the edge of it.” He looked at me, perfectly serious.
I nodded, scoffing, “Well yeah- Because they don't belong up there on the table- Gosh.”
He grinned at me. “But yeah, so I've seen a lot of things like that, and love the,” his eyes bulged, and he gasped to explain, “the reaction I always get, because... And it just, is what it is, and when my parents died in the following year, I went through a lot of death. And I was invited to 12 funerals in 24 months.”
I shook my head, sadly, “Dear God.”
He nodded sadly, “After 11, I was like, “I can't... I just can't do it...” he threw up his hands, in surrender.
I nodded, “Mmhmm.”
Gus sighed, “But work was in the way, and I was like, ‘No, I can't do it.’”
Isa asked softly, “You remember what I was telling you though? That's the life of an extrovert.” She looked to me and added, ”Him and I know so many people that it's every couple of months that we hear somebody new died.”
Gus shook his head, “And the older you get, the more it happens. But you just go,” he blew out a big puff of air, visibly deflating. He shook it off, then said, “Okay. This ‘weird coincidence,’ in air quotes, may not be, you know? I'm not saying there's not such a thing as a coincidence. But I'm saying not everything is a coincidence.”
I nodded once, agreeing, “Yes.”
Gus continued, “Probability states that everything can be a coincidence, and so yeah, there is that. And hooo, yeah, it's... It just tells me to value life.”
I nodded, “Yeah. We don't know how long we've got.”
Gus sighed, “I just recently lost another friend, just- just a couple weeks ago?”
Isa squinted, “Who?”
He gasped at her, shocked she’d forgotten, “Angelo!” He knew Angelo Lozada, back in New York, and was saddened by the sudden loss of yet another friend of his.
She still looked confused, shaking her head, and Isa said, “That was less than a week ago. That was Wednesday.”
Gus deflated again, “But it feels like years have passed... and it's a lot of mourning.” He laughed mirthlessly.
I nodded deeply, “Uh-huh.” These things add up, and take their toll on a person.
Gus sighed, “And he was a funny guy, he was a stand up comic, and an actor, and I feel like, and I was telling other people, ‘Fame is fickle.’ And you know, he was on the verge of the mainstream fame. Like, he was the opening act for Trevor Noah, and he was the warm up comedian for the Daily Show. But, fame is fickle. Fame is…”
He paused, shaking his head. “Mmmm. But, can you reach someone? Can you touch someone? Can you... love and be loved?”
I nodded deeply at that, “Mmmhmm.”
He pressed on, insistent, “THAT seems to be more important than any kind of fame that can be fleeting. And if you look at social media, he was so loved. He IS so loved, and it was a big, big….”
Isa nodded deeply, “You can scroll and scroll and scroll and scroll... Even to this day, people are posting RIP, RIP, RIP…”
Gus nodded, “And little videos that he'd done, and little clips, stand up clips, and it's like, ‘He's funny, he's funny,’ you know... And it's, you know, what... what have you done with your life? What will you do with your life? For the length of your life, for the duration of your life, on this planet?” He shook his head in bewilderment.
I nodded, “Mmhmm.”
He pressed on, “Nobody knows what happens to us before, nobody knows what happens to us after... But what are you doing right now?”
I nodded, “We're all guessing.”
He nodded, but continued, “Right, you can guess, but what are you doing now? Because that's all we have. That's all we have.”
I nodded, his words sinking in, slowly.
It really is about what you do with the time that you have. What kind of a difference will I make, in my time here? Whose lives will I touch? Am I making enough time for the things that matter to me? Good things to think about, always.
As Gus’ story ended, Isa glanced at the clock and realized it was about time to start dinner. I gathered my things up and we began the long goodbye process.
Isa sighed and hugged me before I left, “You're really calming, dude. I woke up in such a state.” She stepped back from the hug and shook off that old energy from earlier in the day. “Heightened, anxious, and I feel like,” She shook it away and sighed, “Just, calming.” She looked over to her partner, and sighed, “I need to have Becca over more often.” He nodded and came over to say goodbye for the day, too.
As I headed back to my car and got a fresh podcast set up for the drive home, I saw Isabelle’s ex drive up with their girls in his car. They clambered out of the car, and ran into the house, squealing with pleasure over things they’d done that day with their dad.
I could only imagine Isa’s sighing over the loss of her calm space, while also smiling at whatever her daughters found amusing. I grinned to myself about it, as I drove myself home.
As I wrap up this final episode for Season 1 of this Podcast, I look back over the last year since I decided to start sharing stories with you all. I look back now, and see how much the world as we know it has changed.
I never expected a wave of sickness to sweep through the country. I expected to be doing house cleansings, and doing interviews in coffee houses.
I didn’t expect the schools to close and the restaurants to follow them. I didn’t expect to live in a world where I need to learn how to sew cloth masks and make batches of them for my kids to return to school…. I did kinda expect them to cancel in-person school again just after I finished those masks and was, unfortunately, correct.
But, expected or not, this is the world we are living in. As I sign off for a time, I’d like to remind you to make the most of every moment. Every day, dress in an outfit you wouldn’t mind wearing for eternity. Love those in your life with your whole heart. We never know how much longer we may have with them. Let’s make every moment count.
As we say goodbye, again, don’t worry, I shall return again! In the meantime, if you need a little something more from the mind behind this podcast, I’ve added a “More by Becca” section to the Links page on the website. There, you can find links to a spooky short story I wrote a few years back, and I’ve also got a collection of poetry, if you like the way I paint the world with my words, and you want more. There’s some hilariously bad poetry in there, for fun, too!
Also, I’d like to start a “Recommended” section for other interesting things to watch or listen to, that fit this spooky vein! If you have anything to add, please do let me know! Hit me up with your recommendations, on social media, or through the contact page, at http://BeyondTheVeilParanormalTales.com!
And a reminder that this is a temporary break! I can be found online and am still taking stories in, to share! In the meantime, hang in there, and keep being spooky! Will catch you all on the other side.
Thank you all so much for joining me! If you have a paranormal story of your own to share, perhaps your radio decides what you should be listening to, or you have channeled a passed-on loved one, for a time, like our friend Gus? If so, send me your stories, and I'll read them here! They can be spooky or sweet! Any stories will do!
Send your stories to: BeyondTheVeilParanormalTales@gmail.com . Or, email me to schedule a social distance interview, if you prefer! All stories will be anonymous, as always, for your protection.
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I think that about wraps it up for tonight! You stay cozy beneath that blanket there, and watch the stars shift across the night sky, for a time. When you’re ready to head on in, say goodnight to anyone who might have been hanging out and listening alongside you. Send them on their way for the night, and you head on in for a good night’s rest.
Until next time, this has been Beyond the Veil Paranormal Tales, with Becca! Sleep tight...
*Some names in this story have been changed, to protect privacy. All other details of the stories remain true to fact.