A Haunting of Ghosts

by Edward Kendrick

  “Exactly what we’ve been looking for and at a decent price. Call the realtor to find out if we can see it and the other house this weekend.”

  House hunting had been at the back of their minds since before Gene and Van had been murdered. They’d put it on hold when that happened and had only recently decided it definitely was time to move to a place where they could have a real yard, not the few feet of grass in front of the townhouse and tiny back yard that was barely large enough for a couple of lawn chairs and a grill.

  As they began looking at homes online, Sage saw one that gave him an idea. The first step was convincing Mike it could work.

  “No way in hell,” had been Mike’s initial reaction. “Can you imagine what it would be like?”

  “Not much different than the way things are now. They seem to be spending a lot of their time here during the day when we’re at work, now that Van and Gene’s laptops are in our office.”

  “Yeah, but…”

  “Look at it this way. If they were homeless guys living on the streets you’d want to help them, right?”

  Mike thought about it. “True. But I wouldn’t invite them into my home as permanent guests. Besides, they aren’t homeless.”

  “The way they’re living they might as well be.”

  “I suppose so. Still…”

  “I saw a house while we were on the website. Come on, I’ll show you.” Sage headed to the office, knowing Mike would follow. He brought up the home he’d put in the realty save area. “See. It could work and no one would be any the wiser,” he said, going to the third image.

  Mike frowned. “If you mean this.” He tapped the screen. “That’s a garage.”

  “It’s a carriage house with an apartment on the upper floor. I’ve seen some where people have turned the downstairs into part of the living quarters, too.”

  Sage knew he’d won when Mike said, “If we found a decent house where they’d already done that. Yeah, it would work. Of course we don’t know if the ghostie boys would be willing to move.”

  “Come on, Mike. If you were them, wouldn’t you want to?”

  * * * *

  Sunday morning, Brody got a text, with an address, asking him and the others to meet Mike and Sage there.

  “Any clue why?” Jon asked when Brody told him about it.

  “Not ace-deuce. Guess we’re going to find out. Let’s gather the troops.”

  Since the ‘troops’ were all in the loft, getting them together only took a few seconds. Brody gave them the address and five minutes later they arrived in front of an older house with a ‘For Sale’ sign in the large front yard. Mike and Sage were already there, standing by their car.

  “Let me guess. You two are house hunting and wanted our approval,” Brody said to Sage.

  Sage grinned, letting Mike know the ghosts had arrived. “You could say that.”

  “Why?” Kurt asked. “What’s wrong with your townhouse?”

  “Nothing,” Mike replied after Sage let him know what the ghosts were saying. “Except, it doesn’t have a yard worth talking about, for starters.”

  “For starters?”

  “Yes. No yard,” Sage said. “It’s pretty cookie-cutter since it looks like every other one, and it doesn’t have…Well, come on. We’ll show you.” He and Mike walked up the driveway by the side of the house with the ghosts right behind them. “It doesn’t have that,” he said, pointing.

  “A garage? What’s the big deal about that?” Jon asked.

  Sage repeated what Jon had said to Mike, who grinned. “It’s not a garage. It’s a carriage house. The people who owned the house did some remodeling so they could rent it out, according to the realtor.”

  Gene got it immediately. “The second floor was probably for servants, way back when, right?”

  “Yep,” Mike replied when Sage relayed Gene’s question. “As I said, the present owners redid what had been the garage to turn the whole thing into a small house. There are three rooms upstairs and two on the ground floor.”

  “It’s small,” Sage said, “but a lot bigger than the hayloft.”

  “Hang on a second. Are you suggesting what I think you are?” Brody asked, hope coloring his words.

  “We could live here?” Tonio said excitedly.

  Van looked dubious. “You’d really want us this close to you?”

  When Sage repeated everything, Mike replied, “Why not? Hell, at this point you spend half your time at the townhouse.”

  “Yeah, but that’s because you have Wi-Fi and TV,” Brody quipped, waiting for Sage to relay his words.

  “I know that,” Mike told him, chuckling. “Now, you’ll have it where you’re living. That is if all of you are interested.”

  “We know it’ll be a big change,” Sage said. “Maybe not so much so for Gene and Van, because they had a house until recently. For the rest of you, it’s been a while.”

  “Seven years for me, I think,” Brody replied wryly. “I’ve sort of lost track.”

  “It’s part of being a ghost, from what I know about it,” Sage said after telling Mike what Brody had said. “You don’t have to worry about when you have to do…whatever, so time is somewhat meaningless.”

  “I guess that makes sense. Can we see what it looks like inside?”

  Sage grinned. “Go for it. You don’t even need the keys.”

  Seconds later the ghosts were looking around the ground floor, which consisted of one large empty room with a door opening onto the kitchen, and stairs leading to the second floor.

  Kurt and Tonio took the fast way upstairs, through the ceiling. Gene joined them, walking up the stairs, and they checked out the three bedrooms, and the bathroom—”Which we won’t need,” Gene pointed out.

  “Unless we have a human guest overnight,” Kurt said.

  “As if,” Tonio replied, laughing.

  By then, Jon, Brody, and Van had come up as well.

  “This beats the hell out of our bedroom at the barn,” Van said to Gene when they went into one of them. “It has real walls.”

  “So what do you think?” Brody asked. “If they buy the house do we want to move in here?”

  Tonio and Kurt immediately voted yes. Gene was a bit less hasty in his response. “It has potential. We’ll need more furniture, which could be a problem. We can’t expect Sage and Mike to keep paying for everything. It’s not fair to them.”

  “If we’d been smarter, we’d have taken more stuff from our place while we had the chance,” Van said.

  “Too late, now.” Jon tapped his lips thoughtfully. “There’s always alleys, especially in neighborhoods like this. People get something new, like a table, and put the old one out by the dumpster to be picked up instead of lugging it to a near-new shop.”

  “Not a bad idea,” Brody agreed. “Back to my original question. Do we want to take Mike and Sage up on their offer? I know I do, and so do Tonio and Kurt.”

  “I’m in, of course,” Jon replied.

  Gene glanced at Van, one eyebrow arched in question.

  “It’s better than where we are, now,” Van said. He chuckled. “But then almost anywhere would be.”

  Brody looked at him in feigned dismay. “You don’t like the barn? And here we did everything possible to make it homey.”

  “And you did a good job, for what you were working with,” Van retorted. “Personally, while the ambiance there is…interesting…I think this will be much nicer.”

  “Then we’re in agreement,” Brody said. “Let’s tell Mike and Sage and hope they get the house.”

  * * * *

  With the ghosts having voiced their approval, Mike and Sage put in their bid on the house. It was accepted, much to their relief. Of course it seemed to take forever before closing happened and they could finally occupy their new home.

  Being smart men, as Mike termed it, they hired a moving company rather than renting a truck to do it themselves. It still required a great deal of work on their part to pack up everything—then
unpack it all when it was delivered to their new home—but they managed it without too many ‘discussions’ about what they should leave behind.

  Once they recovered, they did rent a truck to bring what Brody and company wanted from the barn—which turned out to be everything.

  “It’s not like we have a lot to begin with,” Brody pointed out, gesturing toward the beds which he and the others had taken apart in preparation for the move.

  “At least not until we start combing alleys,” Jon added.

  “Something to look forward to,” Van said sardonically, getting laughs from everyone—including Mike when Sage relayed the conversation.

  It was dark by the time they got everything into the truck—and well after midnight when they finished moving the furniture into the carriage house. Thanks to Sage, there were heavy curtains on all windows so they could turn on the lights to put everything in place.

  “A real home at last,” Jon said when they finished, flopping down on the sofa. “We owe you guys big time.”

  “Bull,” Mike replied succinctly when Sage told him what Jon had said.

  “Mike’s right,” Sage said. “We don’t want anything other than your friendship.”

  “But you’ve done so much for us,” Tonio protested.

  “We wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you and Mike,” Brody added. Then he chuckled. “Okay, we would be, because we’d still be trying to prove who killed us.”

  Van nodded. “You helped us realize that it’s possible to live even though we’re dead.”

  “No,” Sage replied. “You did that for each other. The six of you have formed a bond that I believe will last forever.”

  “Eight of us,” Brody said. “You and Mike are part of this, too.” He circled a finger to encompass everyone. “I’d be willing to bet when you die you’ll stick around, too, because it’s who you are—our good friends.”

  Sage had been relaying what was being said to Mike, who replied, smiling, “We probably will, and then we’ll need you to teach us the ropes.”

  “Then,” Kurt said with a grin, “we can form a ghostly investigation agency to help others who have been stuck here.”

  “Why not? We’ll have two ex-cops,” Brody pointed to Mike and himself, “two investigators in Van and Gene, and three flunkies to do the leg-work.” He grinned at Jon, Kurt, and Tonio.

  “Where will I fit in?” Sage asked after telling Mike what Brody and Kurt had said.

  “You, my dear man, are the glue that holds us together,” Mike said softly. “You have been since day one.”

  “I can live with that,” Sage replied, hugging him.

  “We even have a name for our new business.” Tonio grinned. “A Haunting of Ghosts Private Investigation Agency.”

  Whether that would happen, none of them could say, but for the time being life looked good for the six ghosts and the two men who had changed their lives, or deaths, forever.

  THE END

  ABOUT EDWARD KENDRICK

  Born and bred in Cleveland, I earned a degree in technical theater, later switched to costuming, and headed to NYC. Finally seeing the futility of trying to become rich and famous in the Big Apple, I joined VISTA—Volunteers in Service to America—ending up in Chicago for three years. Then it was on to Denver where I put down roots and worked as a costume designer until I retired in 2007.

  I began writing a few years ago after joining an online fanfic group. Two friends and I then started a group for writers, where they could post any story they wished no matter the genre or content. Since then, for the last five years, I’ve been writing for publication—my first book came out in February of 2011. Most, but not all, of my work is M/M, either mildly erotic or purely ‘romantic.’ More often than not it involves a mystery or action/adventure, and is sometimes paranormal to boot.

  For more information, visit edwardkendrick.blogspot.com.

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