by Etta Faire
I wondered how my old friend was doing, if she was finally out of her "rough patch," which was what Mrs. Carmichael called her schizophrenia.
Hearing Brock's truck maneuvering its way over the rocks as he pulled out of the driveway sent a chill up my spine. I was alone again.
I picked up the cookbook that had fallen off the top shelf. A photo bookmarked one of the pages, so I opened to it. It was a picture of me and Jackson back when we were dating. I had flour on my face from my failed attempt at tossing pizza dough, and he was laughing at me. I ran my finger over the photo. We had some good times back before he turned into a controlling, drunken stripper-lover.
"He's not very bright, you know?"
It was my ex again. I slowly ran my hand down my face. "Who are you talking about, Jackson? Brock? Maybe he's just not very arrogant and stuck on himself so that's what's throwing you off."
"No, the man's a walking drool cup."
Just like when we were married, I ignored him and grabbed a Ziploc bag from a drawer and began putting pizza in it.
He leaned against the cabinet as he talked, like a ghost could get comfortable. "The guy feels the kitchen island hit him in the back, a cookbook flies off the shelf, and pizza is smeared on the front of his work shirt, and all he can do is grunt and say, 'Me go home?' Your knight in shining armor. Congratulations. He's a keeper."
"Shut up," I said. "You do not get to talk to me, at all. Ever. You know what? When you gave me this house, I thought, 'Maybe Jackson wasn't that bad after all, Carly. Sure, he cheated on you with Destiny and left you with nothing but bills and regret, but maybe there was some sort of kindness there.' I was wrong."
I chucked the bag of pizza across the room at him. It flew right through his stomach like nothing was there. I ran up the first flight of stairs, unclasping the stupid obsidian necklace as I ran. It obviously did nothing to ward off evil.
He hovered right behind me. "Like I was saying before we were interrupted by Sir Drools-a-lot back there, I need your help."
I ran up the second flight of stairs, my breath growing heavy as I did. This was going to be a lot of work, running away from my 50-something-year-old, immature ghost of an ex who no longer seemed to tire. "Why in the hell should I help you," I asked, trying not to sound out of breath.
"I will leave if you'll do me one favor."
I stopped and turned toward him, surprised by how lifelike and sad his eyes looked at the moment. "So you're saying you'll leave forever?"
He put his head down like he was hurt by that. "If you want."
"Yes, done. What is it?"
"I want you to solve my murder."
I rolled my eyes. "That is going to be very hard to do. I heard you died of a heart attack. Drinking and strippers will do that to a man in his fifties."
He patted the area that used to contain his heart, not that I thought he ever had one. "You looked up the cause of my death? You do care."
"Nope."
"Did it ever occur to you that it was ruled a heart attack because the coroner was in on it?"
I closed my eyes and tried to will him to leave. I opened my eyes again. He was still there. "Not everything has a conspiracy theory behind it. I seriously doubt your heart attack was made up by a diabolical coroner."
"Suspicious things started happening to me just before I died. Someone cut the brakes on my car. Another time, I spent all night in the emergency room. Hospital staff couldn't figure it out, but I knew I'd been poisoned. I even filled out a report with Caleb. At the time, I thought Destiny was involved. But after the police did nothing about it, I thought Caleb might've been. All I knew was the attempts on my life had to be tied to my will, so I cut a few key players out. My cousins, my uncle, my wife."
"And you gave the house to me."
"The one person who loved me for me and would actually take care of Rex."
"I'll look into your death, but you also have to promise to butt out of my personal life," I said. "No more throwing cookbooks or smearing pizzas. No more calling Brock Sir Drools-a-lot. Hopefully, you'll be seeing a lot of him."
"I can hardly wait. He's very charming. Drool and all. So, it's a deal?"
"Sure," I replied. "But what if I find out you died of natural causes?"
His voice was right up next to me now, whispering. "I didn't, but if that's your conclusion after what I deem to be a thorough investigation then, sure. I'll move on."
I wasn't really going to look into his death. My ex was crazy. The only person who wanted to see him dead was the person he was dumb enough to give his house to, or was dumb enough to take it. I wasn't sure which one of us was Sir Drools-a-lot yet.
"One other thing," I said before he faded away. "If you see anything suspicious..."
"You mean like a murderer?"
"Yes. Feel free to wake me up or scare them off.”
Now that I knew what was haunting this house, I wasn't afraid anymore, just pissed off I had to live with it.
I moved my stuff to the master bedroom as soon as I got upstairs, surprised by how easy it was to make the move, and how empowered I felt making it. I set my suitcase down on the large king-sized four-poster with the crisp white quilt and watched it sink into the lumpy mattress. The last time I'd been up here, more than four years ago, Jackson and Destiny were laying side by side in this very bed. They hadn't even bothered to lock the door. Jackson knew the precise moment I got home from the university every single day, too. Tuesdays was 7:46, right after I taught the 101 English class as a graduate assistant. He must've wanted me to find them.
Thinking back on how Rex had greeted me downstairs that night, I can see it was more like a warning the way he tugged on the hem of my favorite cigarette pants not allowing me to go up the stairs. I should've known something was up. Jackson had been acting differently for months, along with everyone else around me too. The hushed whispers of the other staff members at Landover University when they'd notice me walking by. Everyone knew Carly Mae's husband had been going to the strip clubs, drunk and disorderly, hanging over all the women.
But I blocked it out, dismissed it as a midlife crisis. I'd even checked out a book on how to help someone through such a weird part of their life. So he liked a little porn? A lot of men did. It wasn't like he was cheating on me.
I was carrying that stupid library book when I heard giggling coming from the other side of my bedroom door.
Funny how I remember the very outfit I was wearing and the book I was carrying. The book I should've thrown at them, and would have if I hadn’t remembered last second that it was a library book. I was never going to let myself forget even one painful moment or detail from that night because I knew in the back of my mind that remembering it was the only way I was never going to repeat it.
I had a backbone now. I was no longer sweet, stupid Carly Mae, the girl who was last to know about her husband's affair. I was Carly.
And this man was no longer welcome in my house. Not even dead.
Chapter 5
Bones to Pick
I could feel the small-town gossip already forming as I drove through town the next day. People noticing my car, elbowing the person they were walking with while mouthing the words, "That's her." They all knew so much about me, and Jackson, and Destiny, and the Bowmans — the main reason I left in the first place.
Today, with my shiny new lipgloss (thanks to Shelby) and my hot pink sundress that was probably about four inches too short for most people in town even though it was knee level, I waved back to them. "That's right. The girl who refuses to buy a truck even though she could probably use one isn't Carly Mae anymore," I said to the town as I passed them. "She's just Carly now... even if she hasn't been able to correct anyone on that name change yet."
The Purple Pony was a little shop crying out for attention, and it had no problems getting it in this beige town. A gigantic, glittery, wooden, purple and yellow unicorn smiled at patrons as they entered from the top of the door. I used to go here more often t
han I needed to (because who needs to go to a hippie shop that often) for the same reason everyone else did. Its owner, Rosalie Cooper. You weren't someone unless you had a crazy "Rosalie story" or two to swap around town.
When I entered, I wasn't the least bit surprised to find it empty. It was a 50-50 shot you'd get any customer service at the Purple Pony. Rosalie was usually in the back making jewelry or painting something colorful.
While the outside of the store was bright and loud, the inside was its equal in quiet and subdued, mostly earth tones, with brown Oriental rugs and plants interspersed among the racks of mostly tan, but beaded and adorned, shirts and skirts.
"I'm in the back," she yelled when she heard the wind chimes on the door. I walked through the maze of incense smells into the back room. Rosalie was behind a large easel, her thick bare arms moving in wild strokes like a mad woman as she dabbed on a brush of turquoise, a glob of silver. I hugged her from behind, avoiding the still-wet-looking blue paint streaks spiraling around a dreadlock, and thanked her for the necklace. She almost fell over.
"What do you think?" she asked, motioning toward the colorful lion in front of her. Her eyes, which were the same color as the paint in her hair, really stood out behind her almost nonexistent eyelashes. She never wore makeup and didn’t need to.
"It's going to fit in perfectly."
She leaned back and stared at it a second. "Needs more yellow."
"Lions tend to be yellow," I said.
She nodded, and reached her brush into the little glob of yellow on her palette, brushing it gingerly along the sides of its green mane. "You know, when I heard you were here, I told Brock he needed to go up there with that necklace. I tell you, Carly Mae, there's something evil about that house you inherited..."
"Yes," I told her. "My ex-husband."
She laughed like I was joking. Her long gray dread-locked ponytail bounced from one shoulder to the next.
I lowered my voice and told her everything that had happened yesterday, minus the part about how Jackson thought her nephew was dumb. Rosalie was the only person I could mention these things to, the only person who'd believe me if I told her I had a ghost.
She cocked her head to the side and her mouth fell open a little. "So, you're saying you had an actual, voices-heard conversation with your dead ex-husband?"
I nodded. Maybe I was wrong to think she'd believe me. "He thinks he was murdered, and he wants me to investigate it for him."
She went back to her painting. "I thought he had a heart attack?"
"He did. He was pretty delusional when he was alive, too."
She wiped her fingers on her smock and scooted her stool over to the sky blue and purple antique cabinet sitting along one of the back walls. "I think I know why you inherited that house," she said, yanking on a semi-stuck drawer. It finally opened and she pulled out a small heart-shaped plastic device that looked like it came out of a Ouija board game. "This is a planchette. It's how most people talk to the deceased. I don't use it, but a lot of mediums do. They ask the spirit-world questions and it uses their hands to write down answers. But you're saying you've got direct-voice mediumship."
"Yeah. But I could definitely see him too."
"Holy smokes. If I'd have known you had such a gift, I would've hired you to do seances with me."
"I never had anything like this happen to me before," I said, trying to think back in my life to make sure that was true. I used to have invisible friends back when I was little that seemed pretty real. But then, that was mostly because I was not a popular kid.
"It's like any gift. You have to practice it in order to get control over it. I wonder if that's why they left you the house," Rosalie said, nodding.
"They?"
"The Bowmans."
"The Bowmans?" I chuckled. "The Bowmans didn't leave me squat. Jackson Bowman did."
"I wasn't talking about the living Bowmans, dear. I was talking about the ones at Gate House. We should do a seance there."
I shook my head, "no." Something told me the house would hate that. It was probably written in blood somewhere in my 75-page contract. "I just want to get rid of my ex-husband, that's all," I said. "I can't get dressed, thinking he's watching me. I can hardly go to the bathroom. And he's crazy. He threw a cookbook at Brock last evening because, get this, I think he was jealous."
She fell right into my trap. She threw me a knowing smile. "He's single, you know, and handsome. But then I'm probably biased; 6 foot 3, blue eyes, single. Did I mention the single part?"
I blushed. "So he and Tina are through then? For good?"
"Yeah, they haven't been a couple for more than a year. He did all he could on that one, more than most. She has to be the one to take her pills and try to get better."
It sounded like Tina's schizophrenia was still getting the best of her after four years of treatment.
Rosalie pulled out a small, dark green, worn-out book from the same drawer as the planchette. The book was old and its pages seemed to crackle and stick together as she thumbed through them. She stopped somewhere in the middle and pointed to a passage. "Ah, here it is. Sometimes spirits may not realize their presence is inappropriate..."
"I'm pretty sure this one does," I said. "I think he's trying to be inappropriate."
"Even if he knows, there are still ways to encourage him to move on to a higher life."
"Or a lower one," I chuckled. "Whichever side will take him."
Rosalie ignored my joke and continued. "But in the case of that house, I think there might be a deeper disturbance going on there, maybe a curse," she said. "Or, at least, that's been the rumor for a while. I can come over and try a few things tomorrow morning before I open shop, if you want. I've been wanting a shot at Gate House since I was a little girl. It's a clairvoyant's dream."
"Well then let's do it. Bring that book, and try everything in it," I said.
The wind chimes on the door rang again. Another customer. Rosalie slid off her stool and wobbled over to the main part of the store. I could tell her hip was bothering her again. That stubborn woman refused to carry a cane.
"Rosalie, is that Carly Mae's car out front?" a voice asked. I recognized it. Caleb Bowman, Jackson's cousin.
I came up behind Rosalie, peeking out from the corner of her shapeless green dress to see Caleb grinning at me in full sheriff uniform.
He looked older than I thought he'd look. It had only been four years since I’d seen him last, but he looked like he’d aged 15. He was younger than Jackson, but his pale, weathered face and dark brown goatee made him look like a sad commercial for beard dye.
He walked up closer to me, fixing his beady eyes on mine, like his stare and his police uniform were going to intimidate me.
"Enjoying my family's house?" he asked.
"It's okay, I guess. Little old."
This made his neck veins throb, and his teeth clench.
Rosalie stepped in front of us, her thick hands on her hips. She wobbled a little from her hip being unsteady and I grabbed one of her arms to help her. "Caleb, leave her alone,” she said. “The only person you should be mad at is Jackson. Carly Mae had no idea your cousin was going to leave her that house. So why don't you go on down to the cemetery and spit on his grave or something useful like that."
He scratched at his bushy goatee with the back of his uniform-sleeved arm. "Come on, Rosalie. You know Jackson better than that. Would he have left his house to the ex-wife he obviously couldn't stand if he was in his right mind? That's gotta be a fake will or there's some nefarious reason. And I might know what that reason is. I just got done talking to my friends at the Landover police department. Everyone thinks it's weird how these murders and disappearances suddenly stopped the minute Jackson's heart did."
I looked at Rosalie then back at Caleb, trying not to look at my purse where I still had a suspicious bone in the compartment usually reserved for my cell phone.
Caleb went on. "You gonna pretend you don't know about the murders?"
>
"I was told when I came into town, but I don't know much."
"Well, go on down to the library and catch up on some local news." He looked at me about 10 seconds too long before leaving, as if not knowing enough about a murder somehow made you an accomplice to it. Potter Grove's finest, right there.
Rosalie turned to me. “It’s just a rumor that’s been making the rounds. You remember how small towns are.”
I nodded. I was all too familiar.
“Jackson died about four months ago, around the same time the last strippers went missing. And no one’s gone missing since. That’s all. People talking nonsense. It’s nothing.”
"Strippers?" I said. No wonder they were accusing my ex. He did have a thing for strippers. And there was that bone in his yard... nobody but me knew that last part, though.
I still didn't think the bone in my purse could possibly have belonged to one of the missing women, though. Sure, my ex-husband had changed a lot over the years, and he did have a penchant for boozing it up with strippers. But murdering them and burying them in his backyard? That seemed like an awful lot of work for a privileged man who probably didn't even know if he owned a shovel. Besides, the ladies were only missing for four months. Even if they died on the first day, they wouldn't have been reduced to a skeleton yet. And this bone was about as clean as they got. I'd quietly turn it into Justin later.
But first I needed to learn more about these murders.
Chapter 6
Strippers
Right as you walk into the Landover County Library, on the back wall just above the copiers, hangs a gigantic black-and-white photo of the building's ribbon-cutting ceremony taken sometime in the 50s. Mrs. Nebitt, the town librarian, is the one holding the gigantic scissors. She was scowling then too.
I nodded my hello to her, but she barely peered up from behind the humungous computer monitor that hid all but the tiny glare from her coke bottle glasses and a tuft of cottony hair. Still, I thought she'd be happy to see me. Not too many people came into this library on a regular basis, but I had always been one of them. I waved. "Hi, Mrs. Nebitt. Remember me? It's Carly." I almost said "Carly Mae," only remembering at the last second to leave the Mae part off. She grunted out an irritated shushing noise. Aww, she did remember me.