by Etta Faire
When the waitress came to get our drink order, I tried to find out if she thought the light problems had been caused by paranormal activity without sounding like a crazy person. “That sure was weird with the lights and everything. Anything else weird happen here? Anything unexplainable or creepy?”
Justin raised an eyebrow at me.
“Nope,” she said. “Just the lights.”
“I heard this place used to be a pharmacy with a speakeasy in the basement.”
Her smile was wide and superficially white. “That is so interesting. I did not know that. But then, I’m new here”
“You’re all new here,” I said. “The restaurant just opened a couple months ago, right?”
“Today is actually my first day,” she said, bouncing away after Justin and I both ordered wine.
Great. Leave it to me to get the one waitress who wouldn’t be able to help me corroborate Feldman’s story.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a woman in black pants and a white blouse falling face first across the aisle in between tables. Her head smacked the hardwood floor hard while the tray she’d been carrying flew from her hands and crashed on an older man’s shoe.
Her face grew red. “That’s it!”
The manager came out from the kitchen, the same little bald man as before. “Emma, can I have a word with you?” he said in a hushed tone.
Emma was not catching on that his hushed tones were a hint for her to be quieter. “No.” She took her apron off and threw it on the floor next to the tray. “There’s something wrong here. Seriously wrong. I almost broke my neck that time. I quit!” She stormed off, past the gaping mouths of the patrons in the restaurant.
The manager rushed over to the man whose shoe was full of about a hundred-dollars worth of garlic sauce. “You know I don’t like to complain,” the man began. I realized it was Mayor Bowman, Jackson’s uncle. He was lying. He loved to complain.
“I’m so sorry,” the manager said, over and over.
The mayor stretched his leg out, groaning, scowling, and shaking his head, probably to let everyone know this inconvenience was so extreme it should probably warrant a discount or something.
A thin teenage boy in a similar black-and-white outfit approached our table. “Sorry for the wait,” he said, voice cracking a little. “I’m new. Do you know what you’d like?”
“Uh, I don’t think we’re your table. We’ve already been helped.”
“Sorry. Tonight’s my first night.” He smiled awkwardly with a mouth full of braces then hurried off at an abnormally fast pace, looking in all directions as he walked, like something was behind him, like he was being followed.
“He’s terrified,” Justin said, crossing his arms. The slats of his dark wooden chair creaked under his weight as he shifted to look around. “Is there a particular reason you chose this restaurant? Like a ghostly one?”
A smile escaped my lips. Maybe I was going to get to investigate things after all.
I tried to pay attention to the room to see who else was here with us, to see for myself if I felt it was dangerous.
The manager, who was still pretending to be very concerned with the mayor’s shoe even though three other employees were also cleaning the mess up, looked up and noticed me. He excused himself, tucked his rag into his pocket, and walked over. The mayor turned his head to see who could possibly be more important than his shoe. His face fell when he saw me.
“Excuse me,” the manager said when he reached our table. “Carly Mae Taylor?”
“It’s just Carly,” I said. I blinked at the man, recognizing him now. He’d been the manager at the Thriftway when I worked there in college. It had been a while. “Mr. Peters? You’re still managing?”
He nodded. “I own this place, regrettably.”
“Regrettably?”
Justin leaned over, and I remembered I should introduce them, even though they probably already knew each other. Potter Grove was a very small city, after all. “Mr. Peters was my old boss, way back when,” I explained to Justin as they shook hands.
“I just returned to Potter Grove,” he said. His receding hairline was drenched in sweat, and he dabbed at it with the same rag he’d just used to wipe the mayor’s shoe. His voice quivered as he told me how he lived in Illinois the last eight years while his wife struggled with cancer.
“She needed special treatments we couldn’t get in this small town.” He twisted the rag in his hand. “She passed away this last fall.”
I put my hand on his and told him how sorry I was even though I’d never met the woman, never even known he was married, or that he’d moved away. The only other conversations I’d ever had with this man started and ended with him handing me a broom and saying, “A time to lean, a time to clean.”
“After she died, I used the life insurance money to buy this restaurant, and…” He looked around, stopping himself mid-sentence. “Is it true, you’re a medium now?”
Justin looked at his phone, pretending not to care about the conversation I was having with my old boss. My boyfriend wasn’t really comfortable talking about my mediumship yet.
“Yes,” I said. I didn’t mention the part where I took on dead people’s cold cases, working for free because ghosts didn’t really have money, just secrets and memories they could share with me that might help me solve my own mysteries of life. “I heard this place used to have a speakeasy in the basement,” I said, hoping, once again, for confirmation of Feldman’s story.
“Yes. It’s still pretty much in tact down there. I’ve been wanting to restore it to its glory, but that’s when things started happening…”
Our waitress brought our wine. “I’ll be back later to get your order,” she said when she noticed the owner talking to us.
Mr. Peters stopped the waitress. “Whatever they want, it’s on the house.”
“Garlic shrimp,” I shouted at the poor girl. “Uh, whenever you’re ready to jot that down.”
Mr. Peters waited until the waitress left to continue. He leaned in and whispered, looking around as he spoke. “I wonder if I might have a word with you privately sometime soon about the situation I’m having. It’s… a paranormal one.”
“I’m not a Ghostbuster, Mr. Peters,” I whispered back. I laughed. He laughed. Justin downed his wine. “I can only communicate with ghosts. But yes, call me. I definitely want to help you with whatever it is you need. On the house, of course.”
“Thank you,” he said. His shoulders eased a little. He looked me straight in the eye. “Because every day it gets worse. I think there’s a demon here.”
And just like that, Feldman’s story checked out enough for me. He couldn’t haunt here because a dark force was already here, preventing him from doing it.
“Actually, why wait? As soon as we’re done eating dinner,” I said, downing some of my wine. “I’d like to see what you’re talking about.”
Chapter 5
Just Your Everyday Demon
It wasn’t going to be anything like the Exorcist. Or, at least that’s what I told myself because when you think your life is like a horror movie, the Exorcist is not the one you want to be the main character in.
Plus, according to Jackson, most people erroneously called the darker energies in life demons, poltergeists, or curses. But, in reality, they were just angry ghosts. And I could reason with an angry ghost. I’d done it many times before.
Still, projectile vomiting was all I could think about as I walked arm in arm with Justin, a very reluctant walker who dragged his feet and rolled his eyes whenever I looked over at him, while we followed Mr. Peters around the side of the building.
The cold air whipped my cheeks, making my nose run. I sniffed in the smell of garlic and meat sauce from the restaurant’s kitchen.
Now that the lights were back on, I could see the old pharmacy better. It was no longer the dilapidated building I remembered it being. Whoever fixed it up did a great job. It was now a beautiful, wooden two-story with a bal
cony on top and a large veranda-like porch on the bottom, more like a Cracker Barrel than an old bootlegging joint in need of an exorcism.
“I bought this place for the speakeasy. I wanted to have a piece of the town’s history, maybe put a club underneath the restaurant.” Mr. Peters walked fast as he spoke, motioning for us to follow him down a set of very dark stairs that seemed to lead to hell. “Back in the twenties, people would walk around to the back, just like we’re doing now,” Mr. Peters said. “But they’d have to have a password to get in.”
Justin and I walked slowly down the stairs. “You should put a light in,” Justin said.
“Tried,” Mr. Peters replied as he jammed the key into the lock like he’d done it a thousand times before and opened the door. A moldy, dank smell wafted over us as soon as the door creaked open along its hinges. “You sure you want to do this?”
“One-hundred percent,” I lied. It was closer to two percent.
Mr. Peters flicked on the light switch by the door then hustled across the room to turn on another lamp. It was still very dark. “After one of the original owners was murdered, the basement was used mostly as storage by the other businesses it turned into,” he said. “But the bar is still here. Most the lounge area too, under the cloths.” He motioned around at what looked like covered furniture off in one section. A large, empty, dusty bar stood pretty much right in front of us, kind of like if Walking Dead combined with Cheers for a weird episode I’d totally watch.
“So, what makes you think there’s a demon down here?”
“I don’t think. I know. And there’s at least one. There could be more,” he corrected me, and I cocked my head to the side.
Justin chuckled by the front door, then went back pretending to scroll on his phone.
Mr. Peters had always been a reasonable man, a little on edge and OCD-ish with his compulsive cleanliness philosophy, but nothing out of the ordinary. I was starting to worry about him now, though.
He stared at his feet as he talked, like he was afraid to look around. “The first time I came down here, I saw a dark figure out of the corner of my eye. Then another. Circling me. I couldn’t breathe right. I swear something was choking me. I told myself it was all in my head, until I saw this…” He pointed to the bricks along one of the back walls in the lounge area where an antique wood stove stood.
“I don’t see anything.”
“Get closer.”
It took a while for my eyes to adjust to the light. I scanned the brick wall and broken trim around the doorway, trying to guess what it was I was looking at. Chances were, I wasn’t going to be impressed or scared. I’d seen far too much over the almost full year I’d owned Gate House.
Still, I suddenly got the feeling I was being watched, studied almost. It was an all-encompassing uneasiness, and the strong smell of sulphur took over my senses. I looked straight at the spot Mr. Peters told me to. At first I only saw brick. But like one of those “magic eye” pictures, my sight began to focus on a pattern. A message. And a human head. Curly hair, an oval shaped face. 3D almost. I let out a very loud gasp. It was my face.
Justin stuffed his phone in his pocket and rushed over. “What is it?”
“Die,” I said, pointing. The words came into focus and I read them aloud as they seemed to hover just above the bricks. “Leave or die.”
“Leave or die,” Mr. Peters repeated. “It always says the same message. The face you see is always your own.” He looked nervously around. “We should go before it gets angry.”
Justin’s face dropped, but he didn’t say anything as he studied the patterns in the wall in front of us. I could tell he saw the images too.
One of the pieces of covered furniture moved violently across the room, noisily skidding along the wooden floor like it was on roller blades. I jumped out of the way just in time for it to narrowly miss me, sending it crashing hard into the back wall instead.
“It’s okay. I know you’re angry. I’m here to help. Show yourself and let’s talk,” I said to the angry ghost, like I was a ghost therapist all of the sudden.
Something wrapped itself around my throat as soon as I got the words out. I struggled to breathe. The light went dimmer or maybe that was me losing consciousness. Everything went black.
When my vision came back again, I was outside the door of the basement, wind blowing up my dress as Justin held me in his arms. “You okay?” he asked. “You passed out all of the sudden.”
“I did?” I felt my neck and took a deep breath. I was fine. I could breathe. I broke free of Justin’s grasp and assessed my injuries. “I’m okay,” I replied, moving my neck to make sure.
“Thank you so much for agreeing to help me,” my old boss said, making me realize I’d also agreed to do it on the house.
He dabbed at his hairline again. “That was more violent than I’ve ever seen it. It usually only sends old papers flying around or chucks a throw pillow or two,” he said, locking the basement door. My legs felt weak and wobbly as I made my way back up the basement steps, but I didn’t mention it to anyone. I felt Justin watching me as I walked, so I tried to make sure I was walking as normally as possible.
Mr. Peters was still talking. “It’s getting worse. It no longer just keeps to the basement. It attacks my staff. I can’t keep anyone. And tonight, I’m pretty sure it was the reason for the power outage.”
Once at the top of the stairs, I took one deep breath after another, hardly noticing the cold air now; it felt good along my face and hair. My neck still ached a little but the most painful part was knowing I’d agreed to help get rid of that thing — whatever that was — for free. Rosalie was going to kill me, if that thing didn’t kill me first.
I could tell it didn’t want me there.
I needed to be honest about what I could do for free. “This is going to take a lot of studying,” I said, massaging my shoulder as I talked. “And honestly, I’m not sure if I can even help you. I’ll ask my boss at the Purple Pony…”
Mr. Peters’ eyes grew large. “You work at the Purple Pony?”
I nodded.
“I didn’t know that.” He looked down, his shoes suddenly the most interesting part of the night again. “I know it’s a big job. I can pay you.” Mr. Peters’ hand shook as he dabbed at his baldness. “I’m not sure how. I’m losing money left and right.”
“Maybe we can work out a deal. Give me your number. I’ll ask my boss, Rosalie, about a discount.”
His face got whiter. “See what you can do,” he said. “But when I called her this morning, I could tell. That woman still hates me.”
That explained the Corn Nuts.
“Why on earth would Rosalie hate you. She doesn’t hate anyone.” I lied. She hated most people.
“You should really ask her,” he replied.
Chapter 6
For the Birds
Mrs. Nebitt prided herself on being an expert researcher. And usually I had a lot of confidence in that. But the next day, all the librarian could do was scrunch her face up at the research computer in front of her. Her thin, white curls bobbed gently along with the doubtful shaking of her head.
“One article,” she finally announced, scooting her chair back and scurrying over to the metal cabinets that held the microfilm.
“That’s it?” I asked.
Even though I was starting to get used to the lack of articles written about key pieces of history in Potter Grove, it was still upsetting that a murder would only get one write-up.
The Gazette was the local newspaper, and the people who ran it were questionable, now and in the past. They were also Jackson’s relatives.
She set up the microfilm, twisting and turning the knob, focusing in on the one article we apparently had about Feldman Winehouse’s murder.
I looked up at the screen. A very small, blurry photo of Feldman looked back.
“Joint” Discovered When Owner Found Dead
Feldman Theodore Winehouse, 41 years old from Potter Grove, was found
dead with his throat cut Sunday night in the basement of the pharmacy he owned on Ninth and Main. Locals say the basement was the location of a popular “speakeasy,” an establishment set up to hide illegal activity such as alcohol consumption and gambling.
My palms grew sweaty as I read. Having my throat cut did not at all sound like something I wanted to live through in a channeling. Not that any of the deaths with the ghosts of Landover had been a treat: near-drowned then struck by a boat. Shot in the heart. Drugged. I lived (and died) moment by moment in a channeling, feeling every punch, blow, and now apparently, slice. I read on.
Police have no leads. An anonymous caller reported the crime to the local police station.
“By the time we found out about it,” Sheriff Mulch said. “That basement had been wiped clean of any fingerprints or evidence.”
Anyone with information is encouraged to call…
A side article asked, Does Prohibition Actually Prohibit Anything? And another one: Is Lawlessness headed to Potter Grove?
I read them both. They didn’t say much. The police hadn’t even known who had been there that weekend. I went back over to the research computer and looked up Terry Winehouse, Feldman’s brother and the person he said may have done him in. Terry had known the guest list at the speakeasy that weekend and what had happened. Why hadn’t he told police? That seemed very suspicious, especially since he was Feldman’s brother, and he had probably inherited everything.
Two weddings and a funeral came up when I searched for him. He died in 1965 at the age of 77, survived by his second wife, Judy, and his nine unnamed kids and grandkids. I wondered if one of those kids was Shelby’s dad.
I printed every article out then left for work.
But on my way to the Purple Pony, I stopped at the Spoony River just to see if Shelby had started back like she was supposed to. I didn’t see her Cadillac, but Mrs. Carmichael was leaning against her bright blue Volkswagen, smoking a cigarette. I pulled up alongside her.