The Mortician’s Daughter

by Nan Higgins

  I couldn’t understand why any reg would want to run around trying to chase ghosts if they didn’t have to. They could do whatever they wanted with their lives, unlike me, and they chose to hunt for stray spirits? Regs had no idea how lucky they were.

  “Other questions?” He scrawled some bullet points from our discussion on the chalkboard.

  “What do we do if a ghost comes to us when we’re not in training?” I asked.

  He frowned again, and this time, there were deep lines carved into his forehead. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean…now that we’ve had our quickening, ghosts might start approaching us, right? What are we supposed to do if that happens, say, when we’re alone?”

  Halfway through my question, he was shaking his head. “I think I know what you’re talking about, Aria, and you don’t have to worry about it. Mrs. Braverman, right?”

  How did he know? “Uh, yeah.”

  “The day she met you in the funeral home, your father and I were right outside the door, a few feet away. The only reason she was able to communicate with you directly was because two established interpreters were so near.”

  “Really? How close does an established interpreter have to be in order for there to be…contact?”

  “Very close, no farther than a room away or maybe twenty feet.”

  My father had definitely been farther than that when I was upstairs; he was all the way down in the kitchen, but I didn’t press it. I didn’t like the look of those lines on Nick’s forehead.

  “This is a good time to discuss what we’ll be doing tomorrow,” he said. “Since it will be the beginning of your hands-on training. We’ll be going to the other side of the basement tomorrow, taking the official tour.”

  “I knew there had to be more to this place than a conference room,” I said.

  “Indeed. There’s an entire area on the other side of Sally’s desk where priors are assigned a clerk and a field agent, the hearing room for judicial proceedings, and the transfer room. We’ll be touring the entire thing to give you a feel for the workings of AfterCorps.”

  “Do priors live here?” I paused when I realized my poor choice of wording. “I mean, is this where they stay?”

  “No, they come here for their meetings and appointments. Other than that, they’re free to wander as they see fit.”

  No kidding.

  “Nick, do all funeral homes have AfterCorps centers like this?” Sloane asked.

  He returned to the chalkboard. “Excellent question. Not all funeral homes are affiliated with AfterCorps. Sometimes, a funeral home is just a funeral home. And of all the affiliates, they all have centers for clerk and field agents, but only one mortuary in every state houses special divisions such as judiciary, transfers, CDU, etc.”

  “Is it always in the state capital?” she asked.

  “Yes. Very good.” He began making another list. “Things to remember for tomorrow: it seems counterintuitive, but you’ll be leaving your notebooks and pens at home. You’ll be observing, but we don’t want to be taking notes and making priors feel like science experiments. That’s not conducive to any of our processes. I’ll give you notes afterward that summarize what you should have seen and learned. Secondly, you’ll want to bring a jacket. The change in temperature is subtle when you’re dealing with one prior, but it’s significant when there are several of them, especially when you’re still getting used to it. Thirdly, you’ll have minimal interaction with priors. If they approach you, be polite, but don’t start or extend conversations. That’s not what tomorrow is for, and I’ll be there to intervene if they try to engage with you.”

  “Are we going to be seeing the CDU division tomorrow?” Sloane sounded eager.

  His face tightened. “No. CDU hearings are held here, but I made sure we weren’t going when one of those was on the docket. And the division itself is…elsewhere, for safety.”

  “Whose safety?” she asked.

  The clench in his jaw was unmistakable this time. “Everyone’s.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Hey, Aria, wait up!”

  I had hurried out of the classroom and half jogged to my car, and Sloane was running after me, out of breath by the time she reached my door.

  I let her catch her breath and didn’t say a word. Nick’s words about her sucking up to the boss’s daughter echoed through my thoughts. I felt foolish and embarrassed that I’d allowed myself to fall for what I’d thought had been her interest in me.

  “Did you want to study together some before you go home?” She pulled her phone out of her pocket and checked the time. “It’s only three o’clock.”

  “Nah, I should go.”

  She touched my elbow, and I hated the feeling of heat blooming on my cheeks. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing, I just…I just don’t want you to feel like you have to be super nice to me because of who my family is.”

  She laughed a little until I pulled away. “Aria, do you honestly think that’s why I’m spending time with you?”

  I shrugged. “I mean, I don’t know you that well. It might be.” I didn’t want her to see that I was hurt, so I kept my face carefully neutral.

  “Well, it’s not.”

  “Okay.” I wanted her to be telling the truth. “You tell me, then. What do you get out of tutoring someone who knows next to nothing about all of this when you have obviously made it a huge part of your life?”

  She leaned on my car in that casual way she had. So far, she’d looked comfortable and at home everywhere. “For one thing, you and I are starting our training together, which means we will be spending a lot of time together over the next three years. There’s a good chance our class size will always be two, and it would be nice if we could be study buddies who help each other get through it.”

  I wilted a little inside. Of course it was for practical reasons that she wanted to spend time together, and not because of any interest in me. She’d been ready to practice interpretership for so long that she’d probably take whatever study partner she could get. “Makes sense. And for another thing?”

  “For another thing,” she said, leaning forward and resting a hand on my waist. “I think you’re funny and interesting, and you have the greenest eyes I’ve ever seen. Is that a good enough reason to want to get to know you?”

  I tried to form words, but all I could do was nod. My heart, wilted in my chest just a moment earlier, now felt as if it was alive for the first time. The blood pulsated through my body with a force I hadn’t known before.

  “Good.” She smiled. “So do you want to study?”

  “I do, honestly, but I haven’t seen my best friend in days. I was going to invite her over for a while this afternoon so she doesn’t feel like I’ve abandoned her for ghosts. How about tomorrow, after our big tour?”

  “Does your father know you told a reg about the ghosts?” She arched an eyebrow.

  “No. And after all the ways he’s lied to me over the years, I don’t feel even remotely bad about it. Besides, I trust Macy. We’ve kept each other’s secrets since we were five, and I know she won’t breathe a word to anyone.”

  “Well, that’s good enough for me.” I loved the way her smile crept across her face so slowly, as if she never had a worry in the world.

  “Anyway, how about tomorrow?”

  “I’ll hold you to it.”

  * * *

  “Oh my God, tell it to me again!” Macy nearly shrieked.

  We were in the basement with a bowl of popcorn between us. Gingerdead Man was playing on TV, but Macy had muted it when I started telling her about Sloane.

  “The story isn’t going to change,” I told her, but I couldn’t help laughing.

  Macy had pulled up Sloane’s Instagram page and squealed at how adorable she was. “At least one of us has a love interest this summer,” she said and tossed a handful of popcorn in her mouth.

  “No cute guys at the pool?”

  Macy had gotten a position as
a lifeguard to hold her over until she found her first grown-up job. “More like toddlers in poopy swim diapers.”

  “Gross,” I said, but I couldn’t help laughing.

  “You know, I’ve really missed you. It’s weird spending all this time apart and not knowing what’s going on with you.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.”

  “So, new crush aside, how’s it all going?”

  I put a handful of popcorn in my mouth to give myself a moment to think. I didn’t know how much I should even share with Macy, a fact that made me uncomfortable since I’d always told her everything. If there were rules about how much or little to tell a reg, I hadn’t learned them yet, and my father had no one to blame but himself if I said something I shouldn’t. My initial reaction to spill everything had subsided, leaving me unsure how to proceed.

  “It’s nothing like I expected,” I said. “You and I have watched every horror film we could get our hands on, and none of this seems similar to when people talk to ghosts in movies.” I paused. “Except the whole feeling cold when there’s a ghost around.”

  “Have you seen more ghosts?” Her eyes were wide, and she gripped the edge of the popcorn bowl.

  “Yeah, one.”

  “What was it like?”

  “A little scary. She’s waiting for her final transfer, and there have been some complications with it. She’s understandably upset, but hopefully, it’ll all get worked out soon.” I decided not to tell her what Clara said about my father, mostly because I still didn’t know what to make of it.

  “Final transfer,” she screeched. “Is that what you call it?”

  I shrugged. I was ready to talk about something else. Not only had I just lied to her for the first time, I was becoming bothered by how fascinated she was with the novelty of all this and knew this was why there was so much secrecy surrounding AfterCorps and what they did. If things had been reversed, I’d want her to spill all the secrets about ghosts too. It was natural, but it made me uncomfortable, in large part because it made me confront how very little I knew about what was going on in my own life.

  “We have to call it something,” I replied.

  Macy knew me well. She stared at me for several seconds. “I’m sorry. This has to be hard enough without me freaking out about everything you tell me.”

  “It’s…” I felt as if I was going to cry. “It’s not what I had planned for my life.”

  “I know.”

  “And it’s scary, you know? These are scary things I’m dealing with, and I feel so unprotected. I can’t believe my parents let me be so vulnerable all this time and even now. Since my quickening, they’ve barely told me anything. I’m dealing with ghosts now, the time for secrecy is clearly over, but they still are keeping me in the dark.”

  “I can’t even imagine how hard that must be. There has to be a way to get them to open up to you about it.”

  “Yeah. I need to figure something out.” I grabbed the remote and turned the volume up on Gingerdead Man. “Enough about me. Let’s watch our movie. I’m dying to see what happens.”

  “Pun intended?” Macy grinned.

  “You know it.”

  * * *

  I walked upstairs after Macy left that night, and on the way to my bedroom, my dad called me in. He and Mom were sitting up in bed with books in their laps. She was reading Hem by Octavia Reese, and he was rereading Great Expectations for what had to be the two hundredth time.

  “Aria,” Dad said, taking his glasses off. “I wanted to talk to you a little bit about tomorrow.”

  “About the tour?”

  “Ah.” He cleared his throat and glanced at Mom. “No. I needed to talk to you about what’s happening after the tour.”

  “Okay…what’s happening?” I had an idea of what he was going to say, and dread, thick and dark, filled my lungs. I took shallow breaths to keep from choking on it.

  “We don’t usually worry about adding surface duties to training until after students have completed their first year, but since you are already trained in that area…”

  “You want me to sing at a funeral tomorrow?”

  “It was my idea,” my mom said. “I don’t want you to get rusty.”

  A squashed laugh escaped my mouth. This was the last thing I wanted to do. The inky dread threaded through my body and settled in my stomach. “What difference does it make if I get rusty? I’m not going to be a performer, not the kind I wanted to be. And I’ve heard enough singers at funerals to know the bar is set pretty low as far as quality goes.”

  “Aria!” Dad slammed his book closed. “I understand that this is a dramatic change for you, and we are going above and beyond to be sensitive about your feelings. But you need to recognize the tremendous honor and gift that has been afforded to you. The extraordinary life you had planned will one day pale in comparison to the opportunity you now have.”

  Mom slid her hand up and down Dad’s forearm, and his breathing slowed back to a normal rate. I crossed my arms and pinched my lips together, glaring. I couldn’t think of anything I’d rather do less than become a death singer. In that moment, I felt as if, given the choice between death singer and never singing again, I’d choose the latter.

  “Give it a chance, Aria,” my mom said quietly.

  “I don’t really have a choice, do I?”

  “Only in your attitude.” Mom let that hang in the air for a moment. “I’ll meet you at the funeral home at three o’clock tomorrow so we can practice. I’ll be playing the piano during the funeral, so I have the sheet music all set.”

  “What will I be singing?”

  “‘Amazing Grace,’” Dad said.

  “Fine,” I said. “Is that all?”

  They nodded, and I turned and left.

  Back in my own room, I stretched out on the bed, my mind racing and my heart pounding. I thought of all the times I’d wanted to run away since getting this news and wondered why I hadn’t looked into it beyond a lovely fantasy. I grabbed my phone from my nightstand and pulled up the Greyhound Bus website. There was a bus leaving for Los Angeles in three days. I clicked the field for a one-way ticket, and before I had time to change my mind, I hit purchase. I was done being a bystander in my own life and decided it was time for me to be in charge of what was happening to me. For the first time in weeks, I got a sound night’s sleep.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I knew I needed to keep going to ghost school until I made my getaway so as not to raise suspicion. It was funny how I didn’t mind driving to the funeral home that morning, knowing it would be one of three more days I’d have to do it. I even found myself humming along with the radio and was startled by the realization that I’d barely sung at all since my birthday.

  My first impression of the other offices in AfterCorps was that they were a lot more like the bureau of motor vehicles than I expected. Sloane and I stood near the entrance with Nick and looked around. Rows of hard, uncomfortable-looking chairs filled the center, and several bored-looking priors filled some of the chairs. A tall counter made an L-shape on one end of the room, and interpreters stood behind it. Above the counters a digital screen had a number on it, and each time the number went up, one of the interpreters called a new prior to the counter. Like my recent experience at the BMV when I renewed my driver’s license, it was freezing. I wrapped my cardigan tightly around me and tied the belt.

  “Number thirty-three,” called a woman whose curly blond hair was crunchy with gel. “Thirty-three to window two.”

  A beautiful young woman with a tall afro walked to the window, and the two began conversing over some paperwork.

  “This is the beginning stage for priors,” Nick said. “Here, they start the process of the transfer. That young lady is receiving information regarding her life data as well as her assignment to a field agent.”

  I noticed Sloane giving a quick wave to someone and saw her mom behind the counter at window five. Mrs. Dennison smiled and gave a short nod before turning back to the prior
at her station.

  “Clerks are our front-line people. They’re usually the first interpreter a prior meets, so they have to be great at making a strong first impression and putting them at ease, which is not always easy to do.”

  “How do the priors get here?” I asked. “After they die, I mean…how do they know to come to AfterCorps?”

  “That’s part of the reason funeral homes are the perfect location to house AfterCorps,” he said. “We’ll cover it more in our next class, but ghosts come to the site where the ceremony to acknowledge their death takes place. That’s why, in every culture, as far back as the beginning of time, there have been rituals to honor the dead.”

  “But not every person who dies gets a funeral,” Sloane said. “And not every funeral happens in a funeral home.”

  “You’re right. We have provisions for those situations. Let’s have that discussion in class tomorrow.”

  I had a moment of wishing I’d been able to bring my notebook before remembering I wouldn’t need to learn any of this stuff.

  “Let’s step over here.” He gestured to a wall opposite the counters, which had around a dozen doors. We went into a room so tiny, it felt stifling with three of us in it. It had a small desk with a chair on either side.

  “This is where priors have their first meetings with a field agent,” Nick said. “After they get the file from the clerk, they’re given their appointment time, and they return here. We have several safe zones where they can wait in the meantime, as they begin to formulate their personal goals for the end of their time on earth. They build their transfer plan with their agent and discuss what life items need to be completed and how best to do that.”

  “What kinds of life items are we talking about?” Sloane asked.

  “By and large, it’s stuff like making sure a will is carried out the way they’d like or getting messages to loved ones. We have to do this in ways that make their friends and family feel as if they’ve stumbled across the messages so they don’t discover our organization. If there have been any family estrangements, they often want to plant some seeds to reunify people, and we facilitate that as well.”