by fox, angie
She tilted her head and watched me closely. "Most of the time, people can't see me," she said slowly.
Oh, how I missed those days. That time. An hour or two ago when I would have classified this as the stuff of nightmares.
But nooo. I'd explicitly requested to be open to this and to everything else that was happening in this godforsaken house.
"Let me see." Ha. I should have run from this place and never looked back.
"I don't like when people come into my house," she said grudgingly. "They come and they gawk, and I hear what they say about me. It's never kind."
She had a point. "I don't know why the gossips enjoy other people's pain. I don't think most people do it on purpose. If you haven't been on the receiving end, it's hard to understand." I certainly hadn't until it happened to me. "Why do you stay here if it bothers you so much?"
"My mother," she said simply. "She told me Jonathan was a bad choice. She wanted me to marry the man my father picked out for me. I refused. I thought I would prove them wrong. Then it happened." She turned her haunted gaze toward me. "She sent me to my room to think about what I did."
"For a hundred years?"
She nodded. "It's very lonely."
"I should think so." I almost offered to come back and visit, but this ghost-seeing was a one-time thing. I didn't want to make a promise I couldn't keep.
Josephine shrugged. "I'd like to leave, but I'm afraid of what might happen. Ma has a temper. She went poltergeist once and tore off the chimney."
Wait. "Poltergeist?" I didn't understand what she meant. The only thing I knew about poltergeists was not to put your hands on a TV around one, especially if you were a little blonde girl.
She kept her eyes on the door behind me. In the silence I could hear a faint scuffle from the kitchen downstairs. "I hope it doesn't happen tonight. Your friend provokes her. She doesn't like intruders; they make her feel unsafe."
I drew in a breath. "What's going on down there?"
Josephine gave a small smile and tamped down a giggle. "She is scaring him with my dog. I almost feel sorry for that insufferable man."
If she did, she was a better woman than I was. Still, he was my one connection to the other side. I needed to give Frankie a break. "Would you mind calling your dog back?"
She pressed her lips together and whistled. "Here, Fritz." I heard the clicking of dog claws on hardwood as the hound trotted straight through the locked wood door, tail wagging. Josephine reached down and stroked his head. "Fritzie has made my confinement bearable. He loves me."
He ate up the attention and appeared like a totally different animal than the one I'd met downstairs.
"Do you wish to pet him?" she asked. "He is quite friendly once he has been introduced."
Fritz lolled his head and gave me a serious hit of adorable-dog syndrome.
"No. That's okay," I said, resisting his charm. His body would be cold and wet and, "I don't want to make my skunk jealous."
Josephine raised an eyebrow at the mention of my skunk, but she nodded as if she understood. "All animals want to do is love us," she said, stroking Fritz's knobby head. "He has been more protective lately, ever since the last time a living person came up here." She winced at the memory. "A strange man barged into my room. He ripped up my floor right there," she said, pointing to the spot right underneath where she'd hung. "He didn't even care that I was here."
I stiffened. "Did he leave anything?"
She shook her head, her thoughts far away. "I'm not sure what you mean."
My stomach tingled. "I came here because a man hid money on your property a long time ago. I need it to save my house."
Her mouth formed a hard line. "I don't know what I'd do if I lost my house."
"It's a terrible feeling," I told her.
She gave a short nod as Fritz nosed her, trying to get her attention back. "If the money is there, you can have it."
The southern manners in me screamed to ask her if she was sure, but I knew better than that. "Thank you," I said quickly.
Before I lost my nerve, I stepped around the ghost and knelt down over the place where that poor girl had died. I held my flashlight between my teeth, aiming it at the floor, and ran my fingers over the rough wood planks. None of them were the same length. I traced the length of each of them, searching for a break that would indicate a hideaway of some sort underneath.
The beam of my flashlight shook, its light flickering over the old hardwood. There were four round marks where the legs of the chair had rested.
My skin prickled as I touched one of the marks. I glanced up at Josephine as my finger found purchase next to it, under a knothole that had long since rotted out. She was staring at the door, focused on whatever was going on downstairs. I thought I heard Frankie yelp.
One problem at a time.
The board groaned as I lifted it away from the others. Then I shone the flashlight inside.
A tangle of small white bones greeted me. "Oh my Lord." I reached in and knocked them away. A long wood box lay underneath, with an oak tree carved into the lid.
I let out a joyful, disbelieving snort. "This is it." I reached down, my fingers closing over the prize just as I felt a cold whoosh of air rush into the room.
Josephine let out a gasp. "Ma, no!"
A wall of energy slammed down onto me, stunning me. My ears tingled, my legs felt weak. I looked up and saw the disembodied face of a woman with stark red eyes and a vicious, angry sneer.
She swooped down on me. I grabbed the box and rolled to the side, looking for somewhere—anywhere—to run.
"Stop it, Ma!" Josephine stood between the specter and me.
The older woman's hair was pulled in a severe bun. Her nostrils flared and she vibrated with malice. "What did I tell you about letting people in?"
The door to the room flew open. Frankie stood on the other side, hat gone, suit rumpled. "You get it?" He asked, eyeing the box in my hand. "Let's go!"
I found my feet and dashed past all three ghosts, straight out into the hall.
Fritz barked like crazy, his nails scrabbling against the hardwood, but someone—most likely Josephine—held him back. "It was lovely to meet you," she called, "please do come again sometime!"
"She's a crazy woman," Frankie hollered, hot on my heels.
"She's getting us out of here," I countered. I clutched the box to my chest and about fell over making the corner around the landing without touching the banister.
Frankie zipped ahead of me. "Not Josephine. The other one."
I thundered down the stairs like the wood under my feet could open up and swallow me at any second.
For all I knew, it could.
I jumped the last three stairs and hurtled past the ghostly table and chairs. The only thing I cared about was the exit, straight ahead.
I swore if I made it, I'd never do this again. I was done with Frankie, and his money schemes, and ghosts, and all of it.
My fingers closed around the knob. It was ice cold. I twisted it hard, threw the door open, and ran straight into the blessed freedom outside.
A shotgun blast ripped through the side of the house next to me, peppering my back with shards of wood.
Holy—
"Stop!" I screamed, holding out a hand as I gripped the box under my other arm. Darkness surrounded me. I'd suddenly gone from the glow of the ghostly visions to pitch black, and my eyes needed to adjust. I couldn't see.
"Run!" Frankie screamed, dissolving into thin air.
I crouched and started back for the house, even as I felt the anger and the energy of Josephine's crazy mother radiating down to my very core.
A second shotgun blast tore into the ground in front of me, sending up a spray of plants and dirt. Sweet heaven. I dropped the cash box and kept going.
Rumbles echoed from inside the house. The dog barked like mad. A cold wall of air rose up, whipping my hair into my eyes, stinging my cheeks, and driving me back.
"I mean you no harm!" I scr
eamed at my attacker, at the ghosts, at anyone who would listen.
A sharp double-click echoed in my ears as my assailant cocked a gun.
"Then stay the hell off my property!"
Chapter Six
I froze. I knew that voice. It was cracklier than it had been. Sharpened with age. But I had no doubt who it was: Maisie Hatcher. Heart pounding half out of my chest, I stopped with my back to her and straightened.
Making sure to be slow, painfully restrained, I raised my arms up and away from my body. I didn't dare turn or speak.
Not yet.
In the moonlight, I could see the spray of small bullet holes torn into the wood next to the door. I gulped. That could have been me.
"Where are the rest?" she demanded. "I want to see every goddamned one of you hooligans."
My mouth and throat went as dry as the Sahara, while the rest of me sweated buckets. I was reluctant to speak, afraid of what might set her off. But I knew I had to say something. It was my only chance to calm her down.
"It's just me, Mrs. Hatcher. Verity," I began, voice shaking despite my efforts to sound soothing. "I'd like to turn around now."
"Trespassing delinquents," she mumbled under her breath. "Let's see your face."
I turned.
Mrs. Maisie Hatcher stalked toward me, her legs bent and wide. She held fire in her eyes and a shotgun aimed straight at my chest. A shabby tan bathrobe covered her high-necked blue nightgown. She'd aged twenty years in the ten since I'd last seen her.
Her eyes briefly widened when she saw me and I took that as a victory.
"You," she snarled, taking fresh aim. "Aren't you a little old for this malarkey?"
Definitely not the greeting I'd been hoping for.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Hatcher," I said, the words running together. Without conscious thought, I found myself reverting back to the tone I'd used when I spilled tea on her skirt during one of my grandmother's church group get-togethers. "I needed something. Badly. And I didn't want to bother you."
Her eyes narrowed. "What do I have that you want?"
Okay, yes. This was bound to be an uncomfortable situation.
I racked my brain for a way to tell her that I'd come onto her property in order to find the cash she'd desperately sought all these years. Sure, I'd been rather enthusiastic about dashing out of the house with it. But I really had planned to give it to her.
It sounded suspicious, even to me.
"Well?" She demanded, adjusting her aim.
Maybe she was just shocked, scared like I was. She'd been sleeping very hard, if the hair sticking straight out from her head in clumps was any indication. Last time I'd seen Maisie, her tresses were thin, teased straight up, and stained an unnaturally orangeish auburn that could only come from a bottle. It didn't quite work, but I had to give her credit for making an effort.
I knew I must look guilty. I felt guilty. And every moment I stood tongue-tied in front of Mrs. Hatcher no doubt made me look even worse. Only there was no plausible explanation for my presence on her property at this hour of the night.
So I set my goal lower. Maybe, just maybe, I could get her to stop aiming her shotgun at my chest.
It was a start. "Mrs. Hatcher, I…"
Right when I thought the entire sordid, unbelievable, damning story would come spilling out of me, I caught the glint of something out of the corner of my eye and found inspiration.
Josephine's locket.
It lay in the grass a few feet to my right, directly under the ghost's favorite window.
I took a deep breath. "I came here once on a dare," I said, the words spilling out of me as if they were true. "When I was a teenager, a young, dumb kid," I stressed that last part, ignoring the widow's huff of agreement, "I came here with some friends. While I was here, I lost my grandmother's locket."
She wasn't impressed. "I always got kids sniffing around my 'haunted' property." She frowned. "This is private property. It ain't for kids."
"I know," I said, raising my arms higher, even though they were starting to ache. It was time for the truth, at least the part that didn't involve a ghost named Frankie. I cleared my throat. "I'm not sure if you've heard, but I had some money troubles."
She snorted. "We all have."
Indeed. "I've had to sell most everything my grandmother gave to me." I swallowed hard. Maisie watched me carefully. At least I had her attention now. "That locket," I said, motioning with my eyes, "lying right over there… It's the last thing I have left of her." I shook my head. "I know coming here was dumb and wrong. And rude," I added, "but I was only trying to get it back."
She hesitated, relaxing her stance a fraction. "Then why were you inside?" she asked, tipping her gun toward the door of the house.
I slowly began bringing my hands down, relieved when she let me. "I left it in the upstairs bedroom." A sharp, chilling breeze whipped up her hair and chilled me to the bone. Goosebumps raced down my sweat-slicked skin.
"I never went up there," she said, her eyes darting to the side as she thought. "'Course, I've only been inside once." She eyed me carefully. "Once was enough."
She lowered her gun all the way. At least we were having a conversation now, and not a standoff. "I'm sorry," I said, quite honestly. "I shouldn't have come so late at night. But my house goes on sale tomorrow and I panicked."
"Had to find it, huh?" she asked, glancing at the upper bedroom window. She patted her hair down, or at least she tried. "I knew your grandmother pretty well, back in the day. We went to school together."
I hadn't realized, but it made sense. We only had one elementary. "I remember you from her ladies parties."
The corners of her mouth turned up and she coughed a little. "Now those were some pleasant afternoons. Your grandmother was a real nice lady."
"I know," I said simply. "Thank you."
I eased over toward the locket in the grass. And when Maisie didn't stop me, I reached down for it. Until that moment, I hadn't stopped to consider whether I could still touch a ghostly object. I hesitated for a split second before my fingers closed around the chilly metal. I'd take good care of it, I vowed, as I eased it into my pocket.
When the widow's brows furrowed, I realized what I'd done.
"The chain is broken," I explained quickly. I didn't feel right about wearing Josephine's necklace.
I'd polish it up and return it to her later.
Maisie paused. "I didn't see it until you had it there in your hand." She rubbed a hand down the side of her face. "I must be more tired than I thought."
"It is late," I agreed. We were both a little stressed. I should have realized she wouldn't be able to see the ghostly object. But then I'd touched it and brought it into her reality. Amazing.
I glanced up to Josephine's window. The ghost stood over us, watching. She caught my eye and gave me a small wave.
The widow clucked. "I don't know why anyone in their right mind would set foot in that house."
"It's not all bad," I said, surreptitiously returning Josephine's wave. I shivered as the necklace in my pocket went cold. I slipped my fingers over it and felt it melt away into nothing. Okay, so maybe I wouldn't need to go back.
Maisie frowned. "That place is more haunted than the Queen Mary."
"If there's a sprit lingering here, she's probably a little lonely." I glanced back at the house. The ghost still stood in the window. I was no expert on the paranormal, but, "Have you tried saying "Hi?"
I mean, who wouldn't want to be acknowledged?
Josephine had lived a hard life, a tragic one. And her afterlife was no picnic, either. It must be the worst feeling in the world to be feared, maligned—alone.
Maisie had to think about that one. She gestured toward the house, with a rolling motion of her wrist. "You think I should say 'hi' to Jilted Josephine? Like she's a person or something?"
"I'd call her by her Christian name only, for starters," I suggested. "But yes. When you walk your property—"
"Every day," sh
e interjected proudly.
Why was I not surprised? "Every day," I repeated, "wave and greet her like you would any neighbor." I paused, thinking of the stark isolation of that girl inside. "I'll bet things in that house might even calm down a bit if you do."
She let out a small huff. Then to my surprise, Mrs. Hatcher raised her hand—the one that wasn't holding the gun at her side—and gave a small gesture of greeting. "Well hello there, neighbor." She blew out a breath. "Not that I want her returning the favor and coming by my place with greetings, but I know what it's like to crave a visitor from time to time."
I didn't doubt it. Maisie didn't have a lot of people she could count on. There weren't many of her generation left.
And with that, I was reminded of my true reason for being there. "I have to tell you something," I said, retreating to search for the box I'd dropped. It lay on its side in a tangle of grass, half-bathed in moonlight. My hemp bag with Frankie's urn lay nearby. I shouldered the bag and then picked up the box. Hope flared in my chest. I'd done it. I'd solved both our money problems.
"I found this with my locket," I said, carrying it back to her, eager to see what it held. "I think it might be what you've been looking for."
She gasped when she saw the wooden box with the oak tree emblem.
She placed the gun on the ground. Shaking, she took the box from me with both hands. "It feels like I've been looking for this for half my life." She glanced up at me, wary, before her excitement got the better of her and she unlatched the metal clasp.
When she lifted the lid, we saw bundles and bundles of twenty dollar bills, neatly paper clipped together. My heart lifted.
She simply stared, her eyes welling with tears.
I grinned like mad.
"You—" she stammered, unable to find the words. She shook her head as she struggled to compose herself. "I—"
"Grandma told me stories of how your husband left money for you." He'd treated her poorly, but that was over now. She shouldn't have to struggle so hard, not at her age. And it seemed as if she had plenty extra. "This should be more than you need, right?"
A single tear fell, bypassing her cheek and falling into the box. "Thank you," she said, suddenly quite proper, and for a brief moment, I caught a glimpse of the woman she'd been twenty years ago.