The wounds of childhood can haunt us for decades.

The ghost of insecurity, the phantom of neglect.

We find them lurking behind every corner long after we're grown,

whispering to us, even amidst voices of love

and affirmation, it can be so difficult to eradicate them. Who has power over a spirit

world like that? This is a story about what it looks like to crave love.

About the fear and mistrust and calculation and relief and forgiveness and reconciliation

that mark any journey of relationship.

It's a story about what's worth fighting for and what happens when you don't give up. I'm Justin Gerhardt. Welcome to Holy Ghost Stories. I'm stories. Jacob stands still while his mother wraps the goat skin around the backs of his hands.

She ties leather cords around the hide and then around his palms, lashing the costume to her son.

There's no way this will work. He looks down at the goat hair, this hastily conceived

disguise. He does not look like his brother. But he certainly doesn't look like himself. His hands. His forearms are smooth,

soft to the touch. His mother has always loved that. Skin like steel water. That's the kind of

thing she'd say to him. Not like your brother. He looks like a wild game.

Jacob closes his eyes, the weight of his twin brother's stolen clothing heavy on his shoulders,

the smell of Esau's sweat wafting from the garments hanging in the air around him like

fog.

Now your neck, Rebecca says.

She reaches around him, draping more hide from the young goat around the nape of her

favorite son's neck to make it more like the nape of her husband's favorite son.

Nervous beads of sweat form next to the skin of the dead kid.

Jacob's heart beats fast as he imagines this all going horribly wrong.

...