Tuesday's Intro and Teaser

FFT is hosted by Diane of Bibliophile By the Sea where we share the opening paragraph of our current read to see if others would read the book based on that first paragraph.  Please feel free to join in, First Chapter~First Paragraph~Tuesday Intros.

I was nine when I saw my first ghost.

My father and I were raking leaves in the cemetery where he’d worked for years as the caretaker. It was early autumn, not yet cool enough for a sweater, but on that particular afternoon there was a noticeable bite in the air as the sun dipped toward the horizon. A mild breeze carried the scent of wood smoke and pine needles, and as the wind picked up, a flock of black birds took flight from the treetops and glided like a storm cloud across the pale blue sky.

I put a hand to my eyes as I watched them. When my gaze finally dropped, I saw him in the distance. He stood beneath the drooping branches of a live oak, and the green gold light that glimmered down through the Spanish moss cast a preternatural glow on the space around him. But he was in shadows, so much so that I wondered for a moment if he was only a mirage.