It all began when our mother passed away.

A week later, Sonny showed up with a Ouija board.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“A phone to communicate with Mom,” he replied.

“With Mom? But she’s…”

Sonny grabbed the Ouija board and placed it on the dining room table.

“Tonight, we’ll speak with Mom.”

“You’re completely mad, brother,” I told him.

Mother never answered.

But Sonny never gave up.

***

Sonny embarked on a journey into the night and communication with souls.

One morning, he returned from work loaded with packages and boxes.

“What do you have there?” I asked.

He didn’t answer.

From that moment on, he would lock himself in his room.

He would emerge only for lunch and dinner. His time was devoted to mastering the intricacies of the Ouija board, aiming to “telephone” our mother.

A month passed, and then the office delivered a termination letter.

His boss had accused him of theft.

I continued with my routine.

I didn’t want to believe that my brother had gone mad due to our mother’s absence and the unanswered attempts to contact her. It pained me to see Sonny’s face wither during each meal.

His hair was unkempt, smelling mossy and damp. His hands trembled as he held the fork. He spoke little and in hushed tones. His voice grew hoarse and cracked. Sonny seemed to be transforming into what he sought to petition: a ghost.

I listened to him talk at night. Alone.

He spoke, spoke, and spoke.

Until one day, just before my birthday, he emerged from his room with a smile.

***

“I want to show you the solution to our social woes.”

“What social problems, Sonny?”

“This is our project, Lya. This will be a chance to leave the pain behind. How long have we been alone in this house? How many months have we gone from work to home, from home to work? You have no friends at the pharmacy. I despise my office colleagues.”

“But you don’t work anymore…”

“We’re adults; we’ve passed the age of marriage. No one wants our company. We are forgettable and forgotten. When was the last time you met someone new? We’re alone, Lya. We have each other but…”

“But,” I said…

The dining room light was off.

“Tomorrow is your birthday, sister. We’ll have a party.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

“A party?”

“With the best company…” he said.

And he turned on the lights.

On a wooden table, a Nespresso machine transformed into something dreadful with a mechanical stand guiding two Ouija boards with fake plastic hands.

My brother was happy with his invention.

“It works like this,” he said.

He pressed a button on the Nespresso, a white noise was heard, and the hands extended.

“Who do you want to talk to? We can bring two friends.”

“Two what?”

“You know…” he said.

“Sonny…”

I turned off the dining room light and went to my room.

“Lya…”

***

The next morning, I woke up dazed by music.

In the dining room, Sonny was dancing alone.

“What are you doing?

“Happy birthday!” he exclaimed, but his wasn’t the only voice heard.

“Is someone else here?”

Sonny hugged me and handed me a gift: a photograph of the two of us on a vacation in Florida.

“There’s cake…” he said.

“You are Lya. Happy birthday, girl,” I heard a voice coming from nowhere.

“Who’s speaking, Sonny?”

“I invited some friends…” he said, pointing to the Nespresso with its fake hands surrounded by five Ouija boards.

“For heaven’s sake, Sonny…”

“Hello Lya,” four voices chorused.

“Over there,” Sonny pointed.

In one corner of the wall, a speaker was connected, reproducing voices that, according to Sonny, emanated from the Ouijas.

“The wires…” he pointed. “We won’t be alone anymore, sister. Let’s eat cake.”

His face was radiant.

I could feel his joy, his hope.

“We won’t be alone anymore…”

That phrase still echoes in my head.

And from that day on, I decided to work twelve hour shifts. I was afraid to return home. If I could even call that place “home”.

***

Sonny underwent a profound transformation in his personality ever since he’d begun socializing with his new “friends.”

It became impossible for me to tolerate the idea of receiving Visitors at any time. Sonny would turn on the machine, and they would appear like sorrowful souls. Sometimes they were not the same souls as the day before. The process of summoning was random but extremely meaningful to my brother.

He talked about the NBA.

(Sonny never cared for sports. He was discriminated against for having one leg shorter than the other. Sonny limps and is too overweight to play basketball.)

I tried telling him that I was uncomfortable feeling his friends wandering around the house. I couldn’t sleep peacefully. I couldn’t shower without feeling their excited gazes.

“But you’re not alone…” he would tell me.

“No. I’m not. I have you.”

“And our friends.”

They are not my friends!” I had to yell at him.

“How dare you say that! They are our friends. They give us their time, their love, their affection. They know all our secrets and they are good. They are good, Lya,” he said, raising his voice.

“They are not my friends!” I repeated.

“They are listening to you,” he replied, twirling the index finger of his right hand.

“Did you turn on the Nespresso?” I asked.

“Lya, please. You can hear me,” came a voice from the speaker. “You are wrong to think that your brother is a fool. I know you think so.”

Sonny looked at me with furious eyes.

“Do you think I’m a fool?”

“Lya… don’t complicate our coexistence. You have a beautiful home.”

“That’s why you don’t get married, friend,” said a female voice. “I was married for twenty-two years until I murdered him.”

“For heaven’s sake, Sonny,” I whispered to my brother.

“He deserved it. He beat me…” the voice continued.

“Soon it will be the anniversary of…” another voice commented in a radio tone.

“Don’t anger our friends, Lya…” Sonny said.

“You don’t understand…”

“He told you not to make us angry, Lya. Don’t be stupid, and put on some music. We want to hear Elvis!” said a voice threateningly.

“Sonny… this isn’t right.”

“We want to hear Elvis,” the voices chorused like shattered glass from the speaker.

“I can’t stand it! Get out of my house!” I screamed.

And terror seized Sonny.

His face contorted into a look of panic.

“I told you not to anger us!” the voices shouted.

And in a burst of invisible violence, my body was dismembered by my brother’s friends.

***

Sonny couldn’t easily recover from my death.

The police didn’t believe his version of events. They locked him away for thirteen years.

The loneliness of prison isn’t the same as the loneliness we’d felt when we were together at home.

The loneliness of prison truly broke Sonny’s heart.

Upon him returning home… we started speaking again.

I care deeply for Sonny, and he has endured so much pain and sorrow.

“Do you talk to Mom?” he would ask every time we spoke.

“This place isn’t what it seems, little brother.”

“Have you spoken to Mom?”

“Sonny…” Sonny refused to listen each time I told him. “Mom isn’t here…”

It wasn’t easy to see Sonny crying from despair.

He had lost everything he had. And not being able to communicate with Mom affected him. He loved our mother. She, on the other hand…

***

Sonny was distant throughout the summer. We spoke little. Sometimes he would ramble. He found a job at a Lottery Club and was quickly promoted to manager.

He started smoking but quit soon after.

He changed the way he dressed.

“Hawaiian shirts, really, Sonny?”

He wore an eyepatch over his left eye and lost twenty kilos.

“You look different.”

I could barely get a word out of him, but he kept repeating the same question over and over.

“Have you spoken to Mom?”

“No, Sonny. And it’s very likely that I never will.”

He didn’t cry or throw a tantrum. Just a single tear.

“Mom isn’t…”

***

“This is the last time we’ll talk…” Sonny said in our final communication. “I’ve sold the house. I’ve fallen in love with a guy. We’re going to get married…”

“That’s great news, little brother,” I replied.

“I don’t need you anymore,” he said and grabbed a hammer.

And I lost the connection.

“Where is my brother? Do you know? Can you help me find him? I feel alone here. So very alone.”

Can you help me?

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We Build Our Loneliness So We Are Never Alone Again © 2025. Maximiliano Guzmán

[EN] Maximiliano Guzmán (1991) Born in Recreo – Catamarca – Argentina. Author of novella “Hamacas” (Zona Borde Publishing). He is an editor at the digital magazine “La Tuerca Andante” (Argentina). He has published stories in magazines in Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Perú, México, Uruguay, Cuba and the USA.

The short story We Build Our Loneliness So We Are Never Alone Again was originally published in the Morina kutija, no. 9 (kolovoz, 2025). You can download it for free from our site or Smashwords.

[HR] Maximiliano Guzmán (1991.) Rođen u Recreo – Catamarca – Argentina. Autor novele “Hamacas” u izdanju Zona Borde Publishing. Urednik za digitalni časopis “La Tuerca Andante” (Argentina). Objavio priče u časopisima u Argentini, Čileu, Ekvadoru, Perúu, Meksiku, Urugvaju, Kube i SAD-u.

Priča We Build Our Loneliness So We Are Never Alone Again objavljena je u online časopisu Morina kutija, br. 9 (kolovoz, 2025.). Časopis možete skinuti ovdje ili s platforme Smashwords.

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Urednički komentar: Ova nas je kratka priča o duhovima i teškoj usamljenosti osvojila svojom opipljivom melankoličnom atmosferom.

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Featured image: photo by Alina Vilchenko, Pexels