“No, I admitted Katie to the mental institution because she attacked Petal. Johnson attributed the murders to her and that’s what kept her locked up. But I made that initial decision. Because that was what was best for all of my wards. And you need to understand the position you put me in when you keep darting out of the lines. My job is to make sure you’re following the rules. If you don’t follow the rules, then I’m not doing my job.”
“So what? You’ll put me in a mental institution too?”
Oz held my gaze for a long moment. His voice turned soft. “Bridget, you’ll give me no choice but to assign you to a reeducation programme.”
I stilled. “What?”
Oz sighed and rubbed his forehead. “I don’t know why you can’t see that. I’m trying to give you some freedom. I know this situation is difficult for you but think about someone other than yourself for a second. I can’t continue to cover for you. Some point soon, you’re going to step too far out of line and you’re going to force me to report that. You took Petal with you tonight. That places her in this situation with you—”
“I only took her because she was—”
“It doesn’t matter why. Only that you did. Do you think Leonard will care about her? I know about her friends. Not about the weapons, though, and you could have come to me with that. As her parole officer. As your parole officer you should’ve come to me with that. But you didn’t. You told Leonard. And you didn’t need to visit the nephew of the guy you found. I know you think that medium is your friend but she’s alive, and you’re not. And I don’t know why Leonard is encouraging you, but you have to see that being involved with the GBs isn’t good.”
“I’m not involved with them,” I said.
“Leonard sought you out. He arranged the shopping trip tonight so he could talk to you. So you could sneak off.” Oz stepped back and threw his arms up. “You either see this or you don’t. We’re going round in circles. We keep having the same arguments. Over and again and you’re not listening. You’re not learning—”
“I am.”
Oz shook his head. “Not fast enough, Bridget. This thing, whatever it is with Officer Leonard, it has to stop. I can petition the GBs to not speak to you without me present. We can file a motion that’s similar to a restraining order but you have to abide by it. Once it’s filed and approved you’ll get a credit card-sized laminated document. If they try to speak to you then you show them that and they’re not allowed to say anything to you until I’m present. All the information they need to contact me will be on it. So if they persist in speaking to you after you’ve shown them they’ll be breaking the law. But you have to agree to this. If you still speak to them after you’ve shown them the card, then you’ve broken the petition and waived your right to request my presence. Ever. They can question you, hold you, imprison you with impunity and there will be nothing I can do.”
I shook my head. “I’m not going to file a restraining order. I can take—”
“Care of yourself?” Oz finished. “See, that’s part of the problem. You can’t take care of yourself. You don’t understand this place well enough yet. And I know that you don’t seek trouble out but, when it finds you, you cling to it like a life raft.”
“That’s not—”
“No.” Oz held up his hand. “No more, Bridget. No more.”
“Right, you can speak but I can’t?”
“Yes, because nothing you say can change the fact that you’re breaking the rules, that you’re pulling your housemates along with you.” Oz paused and I knew I wasn’t going to like whatever came next. “And one more instance of rule breaking, whether encouraged by Leonard or not, I’m going to request you be placed with another parole officer and file a motion that you can no longer see your ex-housemates unsupervised.”
“What?”
Oz held his arms out to the side in a helpless gesture. “I’ve tried reason, I’ve tried bribing, I’ve tried asking nicely. I’ve got nothing left. You either want to stay here and be part of our family or getting mixed up in whatever trouble comes your way is more important. Decide.”
Oz turned and walked slowly toward the house. He left me standing in the garden alone. I stared at the open kitchen door. It felt like a metaphor. Oz had left it open for me but I’d have to make the decision to walk through it. I mean, technically, I’d have to walk through it since I lived there.
I hated that he’d threatened me. That he’d given me an ultimatum. It made me want to do the opposite just to spite him. And I hated that he’d made me care about my housemates. He’d forced them on me and then he was going to take them away. I couldn’t cave to that type of demand because then he could use it whenever he wanted to get whatever he wanted.
I needed to rant to someone about how unreasonable he was being. I couldn’t do that to my housemates because they were all inside. And, although I knew they’d be sympathetic, they wouldn’t really understand the depth of the problem because they all saw things the way Oz explained them. I could call Sabrina. She’d understand but that would mean going into the house to get the phone and walking through the door seemed like such a huge defeat.
So I did what I always did when I was in trouble, or sad, or needed help. When I needed someone to take my side, regardless of how unreasonable I was being.
I landed in the bright yellow hallway of my mam’s house. There was a breeze from the open patio doors and I wandered along the hallway through the kitchen. A couple of dirty pots were on the hob. My mam never cooked for herself so she must have company. I stepped outside through the open patio door into the garden. My parents were sitting on a swinging bench that had not been there the last time I’ve visited. And the patio portion of the garden had been decked. I was guessing it was my dad’s handiwork. It looked good.
They were sitting in silence, the swing seat moving gently, watching the sunset. My dad had left us when I’d been in my early teens but they seemed to have rekindled their relationship after my death. I’d thought I’d have been happy about it. And initially I had been because I didn’t want my mam to be on her own. But as time went on the happiness had faded into confusion. And now it made me feel a jumble of different things.
I sat on the step of the decking and watched the sunset with them. I felt oddly alone. I wanted to reach out for my mam. I wanted her to hug me and tell me that everything would be okay. That we would find a way over the problem like we found a way over every problem. That I shouldn’t worry because that didn’t help. That everything would be okay.
But I knew my fingers would move straight through her. I knew she wouldn’t see me. I felt the tears on my cheeks for what was in front of me but that I would never be able to touch again. I’d been there maybe half an hour before I felt someone come up behind me. I swiped my cheeks with my cuff as if he wouldn’t know. Oz sat next to me on the step without saying anything.
“You know, she could be so stubborn.” It was the first thing my mam had said since I’d gotten there. Almost as if she’d been waiting for Oz.
“I wonder where she got that from,” my dad murmured.
“Not long after you left she dyed the ends of her hair blue. The school sent her home, but she refused to wash it out. She didn’t wash her hair for nearly two months in case the colour accidentally came out. It was this awful matted mess at the end. I nearly took the garden hose to her.”
My dad laughed, but it was a sombre sound. “I wish I’d been around to see that.”
“You broke her heart when you left. You hurt me but you broke her.” There wasn’t accusation in my mam’s voice, only hurt. “That’s why she ended up with that scumbag from London. She was scared that if she loved someone they would leave. She pushed everyone away.”
“I can’t change what happened. If I could go back I would, but I can’t.”
My mam nodded. “I know but I wonder if she’d ever have grown out of it.”
“She would have.” My dad sounded so certain. My mam looked at him and he b
rushed a strand of her blonde hair out of her face. “She was stubborn, not stupid.”
“I miss her so much.”
“Me too.”
“I know we buried her, but it doesn’t feel like she’s gone. Not like she’s haunting us, but not like she’s watching over us either. I feel like she’s not at peace.”
I saw my dad’s sad smile. He didn’t say anything, which I took to mean he felt the same. He stood and offered her his hand. I noticed a shiny gold band on his wedding finger. My mam placed her hand in his and I saw a matching one on her finger. I was pretty sure they hadn’t been there last time I’d checked in on them. They’d gotten remarried. I’d been dead a month and their lives had moved on. So fast. My chest tightened and I tried to suffocate a fresh wave of tears. My dad pulled my mam after him and they danced slowly around the garden.
Oz and I watched as my dad twirled my mam around the garden one last time before heading inside. We sat in silence watching the sun slowly sink toward the horizon.
“He didn’t leave because of you.” Oz spoke quietly into the still night. “And he didn’t get back together with your mum because you weren’t there anymore. Don’t think that.”
It took several swallows before I could speak without my voice catching on a sob. “I don’t think that.”
“Bridget, he realised his mistake a long time ago but he didn’t know how to come back.”
“He knew where we lived.”
“That’s not what I mean and you know it. Don’t think that they broke up because of you and don’t think they got back together because you were gone. That’s not what’s happened.”
“Well, it looks a lot like what happened to me.” I felt heartbroken all over again. And betrayed. My dad had come back after I died. After I wasn’t in the way anymore.
Oz crouched in front of me. “That is not what happened. Don’t let yourself believe that. He didn’t know how to come back. Don’t make that mistake, Bridget. Don’t walk away because you don’t appreciate what you have. Don’t do that. Your dad came back but he was too late. Don’t let that be you.”
When I didn't say anything, Oz picked me up and settled me on the swinging seat, sitting next to me. He held my hand and I rested my head on his shoulder. We watched until the sun finally sank below the horizon. I knew Oz, though he might not want to, would hold true to his threat because he had other people to worry about. The afterlife was an eternity. I didn’t want to spend it alone. I felt the tension drain out of Oz’s shoulders.
“I thought you weren’t going to emotionally surveil me anymore,” I said.
“You’re hard to keep up with sometimes,” he said and it almost sounded like an apology. He wasn’t going to ask me what we were going to do. He was going to wait for me.
“Register that petition.”
Oz leaned back to look at me and I lifted my head off his shoulder. “Are you sure? Once it’s done we can’t retract it. It’s permanent.”
I nodded. “I don’t want to be on my own anymore.”
“You’re not on your own, Bridget. That’s what I keep trying to tell you. You have people that love you, that you’re unofficially responsible for.” Oz glanced over his shoulder back at the house. “Are you ready to go?”
I nodded again. “Take me home.”
“Before we go, I think we need to talk about this eyeliner.”
“I agreed to the petition so how about you give me some leeway on this. I love my eyeliner. I don’t want to give it up. I don’t see what the problem is.”
“That’s because you’re not looking at what I’m looking at.” Oz winced as he gestured to my face.
“Why?” I sat up straight and wiped at my eyes. My fingers came away streaked with black. “What’s wrong with my face?”
Chapter Fourteen
“Morning, Bridget,” Petal called from across the kitchen. She’d fully forgiven me for telling on her friends the night before.
“We’ve been waiting for you for ages,” Pam said.
“What took you so long?” Lucy asked. “You don’t even look all that pretty this morning.”
“Don’t be mean, hon,” Anna said. “Bridget is doing the best she can with what she’s got.”
“Thanks, Anna.” I felt I could be magnanimous since I’d decanted half a bottle of her hair conditioner into mine and topped hers up with water.
I noticed Oz carefully cataloguing my attire. He gave me a smile and a small nod, which I took as a thank you. I’d decided against my heels and returned to my flat pumps. Not because I’d wanted to but my feet were sore from the million barefoot activities of the previous day. And I’d not used my mascara as eyeliner again because it had been a nightmare to get off. And after the sobbing disaster I was not eager to look like I belonged in an eighties heavy metal band again if I could help it. I still had my mascara on, though, because there were limits.
“Are we going?” Petal asked as she shuffled toward the door.
“Going where?” Oz turned away from the hob, suddenly on high alert.
“We’re having breakfast in the canteen today,” Pam explained, although she didn’t take her eyes off the fry-up that Oz was cooking. For someone who was all about healthy food I thought it was weird. Although I guess a fry-up was still vegetables. Even if they were fried.
“Why?” Oz directed the question at me.
Lucy answered and pointed to Anna and Katie in turn. “Because no one there is rude and no one there has tried to kill Petal.”
“Okay.” Oz dropped the spatula in the frying pan and faced the kitchen with his hands raised. It looked like he was surrendering but I was pretty sure that wasn’t what was happening. “Tonight we’re going to talk this out. I can’t take any more of this sniping.”
“Well, that will only work if everyone speaks,” Pam said with a pointed look at Katie.
“Everyone will have a chance to have their say and we can get this all out in the open and move forward,” Oz said.
“I think that’s a great idea,” Anna said.
“Really?” I asked. “I don’t think getting people to explain why they don’t like other people ever works out well. It kind of drives the dislike home.”
“Do you have another suggestion?” Oz asked.
I shook my head. “Nope.”
“Then that’s what we’ll do,” Oz said and returned to his cooking.
“Now, can we go?” Petal asked.
I moved to the breakfast bar and sat down. Not too close to Katie in case she decided to stab me with her spoon for no reason and not too close to Anna because I didn’t want her hair in my food. “I think maybe we should eat here. Oz has already cooked, so it seems a waste not to.”
All five housemates stared at me. Even Katie. Though Katie looked more suspicious than surprised. It didn’t matter. If I went to the canteen and had breakfast there, Sabrina would fill me in on everything I missed at Madame Zorina’s last night and then we’d make a plan to investigate and Oz would kick me out. Yes, I could go and have breakfast with Sabrina and not make that plan, but I knew that wouldn’t happen. I was self-aware. And as a self-aware person I knew I had no self-control. So it was best not to put myself in harm’s way.
Oz placed his hand on my shoulder and gave it a light squeeze as he put a heaped plate of fried vegetables in front of me. I was pretty sure that was his way of acknowledging I was trying and saying thank you without actually saying it.
“Are you three staying?” Oz asked Lucy, Pam and Petal, who were hovering by the door as if waiting for me to jump back up and rush out.
“I guess so,” Lucy said and dropped into the seat opposite me. She peered into my heaped plate of fried vegetables. “I don’t want the carrots, though. Can I not have carrots?”
“Pick them out,” Oz said and placed a plate in front of Lucy.
“Are you okay?” Petal whispered, sitting between Anna and me. “Did Oz tell you off last night?”
I shook my head. “He helped me reorg
anise my priorities.”
“What’s top now?” Pam asked as she sat next to Lucy and scraped the small pile of carrots from Lucy’s plate onto her own. “It can’t be the eyeliner because you’re not wearing it. Or those awful shoes because you’re not wearing those either.”
“Your hair?” Lucy asked.
“It should be your hair, hon,” Anna agreed with a sympathetic nod. “Seeing as how you can’t do anything about your waistline.”
“I think it’s smiling,” said Petal. “Smiling should be everyone’s priority. And you’re so pretty when you smile.”
“So what is it?” Lucy looked up from digging more carrots out of her breakfast.
I shrugged. “Just, y’know, family and stuff.”
“Do you mean your mum?” Petal asked.
“She means all of you,” Oz said.
And then I found myself under a multi-pronged attack as three pairs of arms wrapped themselves around me and nearly pulled me off my stool.
“Okay. Enough,” I said, spitting strands of Petal’s candy floss hair out of my mouth. No one moved. “Oz? A little help?”
Oz eased Petal off me. “Come on, guys. Let her go. You know how grumpy she gets when she’s trying to eat. Or when you touch her. Or in general.”
Anna pointed her fork at my plate. “Food isn’t love, hon.”
“I know that, Anna, but I appreciate you taking the time and being invested enough in my emotional well-being to remind me.”
“You’re … welcome,” Anna drew the words out, trying to find the insult in my comeback.
∞
“Hey there, Bridget. I’m so glad you’re back,” Sean said when I arrived at Afterlife Arrivals. “We have such a jam-packed day today. I hope you had your Weetabix.”
“Actually, I had a fry-up but I feel that should’ve fortified me enough. It is technically a plate of vegetables.” I patted my full stomach. “What’s on the agenda today?”
“A little bit of filing before we can sign off the previous group and then we have a new group to induct. Yay.” Sean clapped against his clipboard and did a funny sort of half hop. “Yay?”
Dead and Buried: A Bridget Sway Novel (A Paranormal Ghost Cozy Mystery Series Book 4) Page 16