by E. C. Bell
Jesus. The shit show was all ready to start, and there wasn’t a thing I could do to stop it. Not a thing.
“I understand that you had a fling with Arnie a while ago. Did you know he was going out with me at the same time?” She smiled and pulled the receiver away from her ear, and I could hear Marie yelling. Yelling was never good.
“I understand,” Rosalie said. “But that’s not what I’m calling you about. I have a question for you.”
She twisted a lock of her thin brown hair with her finger, and I realized I could see a thick line of red under her fingernail. It was blood. I thought she’d been wearing rubber gloves. But her next question pulled my attention away from the blood under her fingernails and to her face.
“You and your mom can see ghosts, can’t you?” Rosalie asked.
I couldn’t hear Marie’s answer, but she didn’t sound happy. Hoped she’d just hang up, but like I said, my luck? Mostly bad.
“I heard around town. Didn’t know if I believed in ghosts, not until now. I’d sure love to pick your brain. Think you can come over?”
Marie talked some more and Rosalie yawned, as if she didn’t give a shit what Marie was saying one way or the other.
“Sounds great,” Rosalie answered, when Marie quite yakking. “Do you know where I live?”
Marie obviously said no, and Rosalie rattled off her address, checking twice to make sure Marie had written it down correctly.
“See you in fifteen,” Rosalie said, and hung up the phone. Then she picked up her rubber gloves and headed down the hallway to the bedroom.
“I’m finally going to meet the person who caused my Arnie so much heartache and despair,” she said as she started scrubbing at the blood on the mattress. “Isn’t that nice?”
No, there was nothing nice about this at all. This, in fact, was a bad idea. It really was.
Marie:
Visiting Rosalie Jacoby
I HAVE TO tell you, that short telephone conversation shook me to the core.
“Don’t slam the phone around like that,” my mother said when my conversation was over. “You’ll break it.”
“But she claimed that she’s Arnie’s girlfriend,” I said. “And she had the gall to say that he was going out with her at the same time he was going out with me.” I stared down at the phone. “She called me a fling.”
“So?” Mom said. “You were finished with him a long time ago. Why would you care?”
“Well, because,” I started, then frowned, and stopped. She was right. Why would I care?
“Bit of ego getting in the way, girl?”
I snorted humourlessly. “Sounds about right,” I said. “God, why would I care? Why can’t I just let it all go?”
“I don’t know,” my mother replied. “But you better figure it out.”
“She asked me about seeing ghosts, too,” I said. “Why didn’t I just say no and hang up?”
“I’m glad you didn’t,” Mom said.
“Why?”
“Maybe she has a ghost problem,” Mom said.
“I don’t want to meet one of Arnie’s old girlfriends,” I said. “Even if she is having a ghost problem. Especially if she’s having a ghost problem—”
“Marie, more than likely the ghost she’s having a problem with is Arnie,” Mom said gently. “Do you know where Arnie died?”
“No.”
“With any luck, he’ll be there, if not close by,” Mom said. “This is good.”
“No it’s not!”
“Yes,” Mom said, her voice hard. “It is. Go see her, and while you’re there, check out her place. If Arnie’s spirit is there, you can begin the process. Just remember to protect yourself, so he doesn’t attach to you.”
“I need to practice more! It didn’t work the last time . . .”
“You’ll be fine. Think of the wings, and you’ll be fine,” Mom said. “Maybe you can even give the poor girl some comfort. She’s probably devastated.”
“She didn’t sound devastated,” I said.
“Take her some flowers. That’d be nice.”
“Mom! I’m not taking her flowers!”
“Fine. No flowers. But you are going to see if she has a ghost problem, and if it is Arnie. Aren’t you?”
I sighed. “Yes. I will.”
MOM WAS RIGHT. I had to see this Rosalie person, face to face. Because, even if she didn’t have an Arnie ghost problem, I suspected she would be able to tell me something about Arnie’s last living night on earth.
I grabbed the car keys and headed for the door. Stopped, and glanced at my mother.
“Are we all right?” I asked.
“If you don’t lie to me, we will be,” she said shortly.
“How about this,” I said. “I won’t lie, and you don’t keep things from me.”
“Hmm,” Mom said, and the beginnings of a smile touched her wasted face. “Are you suggesting we both act like adults around one another?”
“We could try it,” I said. “See if we can make it work.”
“I think we can,” she said, and then pointed at the door. “Good luck with Rosalie.”
I PRACTICED THINKING about wings of steel on the drive to Rosalie’s place and parked in the only visitor spot open in the back parking lot. I glanced around and was disconcerted when I saw how close it was to the little cemetery James, Mom, and I had visited when we were looking for Laurel’s husband, Roy.
I looked down at the address I’d scribbled on a scrap of paper. Her apartment was 203. I looked at the building, saw the balconies, and sighed.
This explained so much. If Arnie was in Rosalie’s apartment, he easily could have seen us from that vantage point. That was how he knew I was in town. That was how he knew where to find me.
I got out of the car, walked to the door, pressed the intercom button for Rosalie’s apartment, and waited for her to answer.
The seconds ticked by like they were stuck in glue.
“Wings of steel, wings of steel, wings of steel,” I mumbled as I waited. I was starting to feel a sick anticipation, because I wasn’t just going to meet Arnie’s girlfriend. I was pretty sure I was going to see how Arnie responded to me meeting her.
He would be up there. It was, after all, where he died. I’d bet money on it.
“GLAD YOU COULD make it,” Rosalie said with her little girl voice, as she ushered me into her tidy little apartment. “Don’t mind the mess.”
Arnie wasn’t anywhere I could see, but I quit looking for him when the smell of old blood and death that permeated the place smacked me in the face, shaking me to my very core. How could she stand being in this?
“What—what’s that smell?” I asked, even though I knew very well what it was.
“Oh, this is where Arnie died,” Rosalie said. She pointed to the small hallway at the rear of the apartment and smiled. “He was sleeping there in my bed, when it happened.” She sighed, but didn’t sound sad. Not at all. “He was with me to the end. The very end.”
“You should open a window,” I said. “The smell—it’s pretty strong.”
“Oh, sorry,” she said. “I don’t notice it anymore. I almost have it cleaned up, but—”
“You didn’t hire somebody?” I asked. “There are companies that will do this. Aren’t there?”
“It’s too expensive,” she said. “Want some tea?”
I didn’t think I’d be able to keep even tea down, in the stench. “No thanks.”
“Well, just whistle when you want some,” she said. “Want me to take your coat? You know, to hang up?”
“No,” I said, clinging to the zippered front of my hoodie like I was suddenly afraid she wanted to steal it. “I can’t stay long. You said you had some information for me.”
“Right,” she said. “I remember.”
She smiled, but didn’t move and didn’t invite me further into her apartment that smelled of death. She simply stared at me with an intensity that surprised me. “You were telling me the truth, weren
’t you?”
“About what?”
“That your mother can see ghosts?”
“Yes,” I said. “She can.”
“And you can too. Right?”
I stared at her. I’d already answered all these questions. Maybe Mom was right. Maybe she had a ghost problem.
“Why your interest in the afterlife, Rosalie?”
“Oh, just curious,” she replied. “Is it true that sometimes the spirit of someone who was murdered is stuck? You know, where they died?”
Oh.
“Sometimes,” I said.
“And you’d be able to see them.”
“Yes.”
She smiled at me. “Even Arnie?” she asked.
“I guess.”
“Can you see him here?” She waved her arms. “Is his spirit trapped here?”
I made a show of looking around her small apartment, which I could see most of, from the entryway. “I don’t think so,” I said. “Sorry.”
“Oh, that’s okay,” she said, and her vacuous smile clicked on again like she’d hit a switch. “Just thought maybe he’d be here. You know, on account of the murder and all. If you see him, you’ll let me know. Right?”
“Sure,” I said, faintly. There was no way in the world that I was telling her anything, even if Arnie did show up.
Rosalie walked through the apartment proper and to a small hallway that led to two closed doors. She gestured for me to follow her. “Hope you don’t mind, but I have to finish tidying. It’s still a bit of mess, you know.”
Man, I did not want to walk into that room at the end of that hallway, because I was certain that was where Arnie died. However, if he was anywhere in this place, it would probably be there.
She pushed open the door, then looked at me over her shoulder. “You going to be okay?” she asked. “You look green.”
“Can’t we sit in the living room?” I said.
“Sorry,” she said, her little girl voice taking on the faintest hint of steel. “I got guys coming to haul the garbage away this evening. I have to get this done. Want a mask or something?”
“No,” I said. “I’ll be fine.”
I wasn’t fine, and I felt just about a tonne worse when I walked into that bedroom.
It wasn’t just the blood and brains, which were everywhere and horrible. There were roses and unicorns. Masses of them, all over the room. And the room was pink. Everywhere.
This was the room of a seven-year-old.
“You like unicorns,” I said, pointing to the dresser tops and the walls and the floor. Like I said, they were everywhere.
“I do,” she said. “They make me feel safe.”
She climbed onto the bed, which had been stripped of bedding. She picked up a scrub brush and resumed scrubbing the huge blood stain on the mattress near the head of the bed.
“You’re not going to keep the mattress, are you?” I asked, feeing massively horrified, to say the least.
“Oh, it’s not that bad,” she said. “Once I get the worst of the mess off, I can flip it, and it’ll be good as new.” She glanced at me. “Maybe you can help?”
“Clean the mattress?”
“And then flip it. Yes.”
I shuddered. “I don’t think I’ll be here that long.”
“Oh,” she said, sounding disappointed. “I was hoping you’d stay for a while. So we could talk. You know, about Arnie.”
Arnie. Right. I was supposed to be asking her about Arnie. I glanced around, wondering where he was. He should’ve been here. After all, this was obviously where he’d died.
“What can you tell me?” I asked.
“About what?” She slopped the scrub brush into a pail filled with soapy water by the bed, and I watched the bubbles turn pink.
“About Arnie,” I said. “Didn’t you just say you wanted to talk about him?”
“Yes,” she said, and resumed scrubbing. “Yes, I guess I did say that.” She worked at the bloodstained mattress for a few seconds more, then stopped and leaned on her haunches, staring at the blood-soaked pink roses on the wallpaper above the head of her bed.
“I might have to replace that,” she said softly. “It’s hard to clean bloodstains out of wallpaper.”
“Yeah,” I said, and for a second, I wished Arnie would show up, so I could deal with someone less creepy than this woman. “I guess it would be.”
“That’ll be so much work,” she sighed. “Maybe I could use pictures. You know, of roses, to cover the worst of it,” she sighed again, and reached for the scrub brush. “I’ll come up with something. I’m fairly crafty.”
“I’m sure you are,” I said. “But maybe you could stop cleaning for a just a second and have a quick conversation with me?”
“Oh, would you like that tea now?” she asked. Before I could say no, she dropped the scrub brush in the bucket and jumped off the bed.
“Come on,” she said, grabbing my arm with her wet hand. “I think I have cookies, too. We’ll have a tea party. It’ll be fun.”
Jesus, I had to get out of this place.
“No thanks,” I said, as firmly as I could. I pulled my arm from her hand and wiped the wet foamy pink streaks on my jeans. Watched them soak in. “Maybe I should come back another time. You seem—busy.”
“Oh, I’m being rude,” she said, and batted her eyes at me. “You wanted to ask me about Arnie. About what happened to Arnie. Right?”
“Right,” I said, heaving a sigh of relief that could probably be heard all the way down to Franklin Avenue.
“Didn’t that bastard James Lavall kill him?” she asked, and batted her eyes at me again. “The cops picked him up. That’s what I heard, anyhow.” She smiled. “Maybe I can get him to pay for cleaning my place. Since he made the mess and all.”
“James didn’t kill Arnie!” I said, a lot more sharply than I intended. “For heaven’s sake, Arnie had enemies in this town. Why would anyone think James did it?”
“Everybody loved Arnie,” Rosalie said. Her smile left her face, and her eyes turned cold. “Except for you, of course.” Then the dopey sweet smile returned. Click. “And your lover, James Lavall.”
“He’s not my lover!” I snapped.
“Oh, everybody says he is,” Rosalie said. “They saw you two, thick as thieves, at Ms. B’s. And he’s staying at your mom’s, isn’t he?”
I sighed. Rumour and gossip. The lifeblood of a little town.
“Just tell me who Arnie hung around with,” I said. “Who he went drinking with the night he got back to town.”
“I don’t know who he was with,” she said. “I had work.”
“I know, but—”
“I said I had work,” she said. Her sweet demeanour was gone, and all that was left was a blankness that was scary to behold. “But maybe Ralph and Myrtle know.”
“Who?”
“Ralph and Myrtle Stillwell. Arnie’s parents.” She looked at me with her blank brown eyes. “You must have met them. Didn’t you?”
“No,” I said. He’d never taken me to his parents’ place. Hadn’t even talked about them.
“Want to come with?” Rosalie asked, and smiled that sweet, dopey, creepy smile of hers. “I was thinking of dropping by. It’ll be fun going with you, and finally getting to meet them. Don’t you think?”
“Say no.” Arnie’s voice popped into my head, and I glanced around the room. He was standing by the patio doors, looking horrified. “I can explain everything, and I will, but under no circumstances can you go there. Not there.”
I honestly couldn’t think of a worse way to spend an afternoon than hanging around with Rosalie and Arnie’s parents. But when a ghost tells you no . . .
“Yes,” I said, smiling at Rosalie for all I was worth. “I’d love to go with you to visit Arnie’s parents.”
“I said no!” Arnie screeched.
“When do you want to go?” I asked, over his noise.
“Why not now?” she asked. “Just let me wash up.”
/> “All right,” I said.
I didn’t think Arnie’s parents would have any information that would be helpful, but if it upset Arnie, then I was all for it. He had dropped in on my mom without getting my okay first.
Turnabout was fair play, after all.
Arnie:
From Bad to Worse
ALL RIGHT, SO things had officially spun right out of control. Those two, in Rosalie’s apartment, talking about me, and then deciding to go visit my parents. My parents!
I tried to grab Rosalie, but she slipped through my fingers, of course. Before I could pull myself together enough to try the light string thing on her, she’d pulled on her coat and walked out into the hallway.
So, I grabbed for Marie.
She looked me right in the eye and mouthed, “No,” before walking out after Rosalie. Then the door slammed shut, and I was alone. I threw myself at the walls, screaming for them both to come back! Come back right now! But, of course, they didn’t.
Rosalie didn’t because she couldn’t hear me, stupid cow. And Marie didn’t because she was pissed.
I couldn’t really blame her. I’d have to figure out a way to get to her mother’s place and wait for her. So I could tell her my side of the story.
And if she wouldn’t listen? Well, I’d have to figure out a way to make her mother listen to me. All I had to do was figure out how to hang on, tight, and it would be easy.
Damn that Rosalie for making this so hard. And damn Marie for going along with her.
Marie:
Meeting Arnie’s Parents
I WAS SHAKING like a leaf as Rosalie and I walked down to the parking lot. Arnie had grabbed for me—and I’d stopped him. Thought of those wings, told him no, and he stopped.
I stopped him.
“Want me to drive?” Rosalie said. “My car’s just over there.” She pointed, but I shook my head and walked to the Volvo. I was willing to have her with me, but I didn’t trust her enough to get into her car.
She shrugged, said something about saving gas, and hopped in the front seat, securely fastening her seatbelt as I pulled out of the parking lot of her building. Then she played with the radio and sang along with every vapid love song she could find as we drove. I didn’t like that kind of music, but it seemed to make her happy, so I left her alone. At least I didn’t have to talk to her.