by A. J. Norris
“What’s wrong, Ellie?” the woman on the other end of the phone asked.
“No!” The large vehicle thundered toward her, eating up the distance. Just before the vehicle stopped, the same man who had gotten into Bowie’s pickup leapt out. “No!” She ran for her car except he was too fast and grabbed her around the waist.
“What are doing here, little girl?” he growled in her ear. She flinched.
“Lemme go!” she shouted, thrashing about. He ripped the cell from her hand and threw it onto the pavement. The OtterBox saved its life. “I called the police!”
Faint sirens resounded. The SUV circled around and headed straight for the perimeter fence. It rammed the chain link and went through the surrounding cornfield. His ride ditched him. He placed a cold blade across her throat, stilling her. Ellie shut her eyes, squeezing the tears out. Please God…no.
Chapter Three
The arms around Ellie released and she pitched onto her knees. “Get out of here!” someone yelled from behind. The police sirens wailed louder, partially drowning him out. She bolted upward on one foot and took a long stride away from her attacker then tripped, crashing onto the unforgiving pavement again. Her jeans tore at the knees and she scraped her palms. They stung. Tears blurred her vision. She scampered toward the front of her Mazda. Ellie hid crouched at her car’s front grille. She peered around the bumper at the sound of choking and grunting.
“Uh,” she gasped. Bowie wasn’t dead like she thought. His neck and shirt weren’t covered in blood. What the…He had a choke hold on the stranger. The man struggled against him although any move he made didn’t connect with Bowie. The guy’s elbow and legs passed through him. Ellie yelped yet remained frozen. The would-be killer stabbed the air with his knife. Bowie threw him to the cement.
“Ahhh!” The blade skidded away while the man went sprawling on his front. He crawled forward, his eyes wide with fear, not knowing where the attack came from. Bowie kicked him in the side. The man grunted. “What’s happening!”
Bowie picked up the knife and grabbed a chunk of hair, yanking her attacker’s head off the ground. With precision, he tore through the man’s carotids with the knife. He gasped and wheezed, clutching his neck. Bowie let the man’s head fall nose first into the cement.
Three police cruisers pulled up behind him. His green eyes met Ellie’s. Even though he’d killed a man, she wasn’t afraid. She gaped at him. He was dead. Wasn’t he? She covered her mouth with her hands. Several officers with their guns drawn came toward the scene. Bowie…oh, no. One walked through him, yet he appeared solid to her.
Bowie and Ellie stared at each other, the air around them electric. She always sensed a connection to him and now she knew it wasn’t only her imagination. Bowie felt it too. His spirit faded, and as he disappeared the link between them shattered. What was left behind was a broken-hearted girl and a mess to clean up that no one would believe.
“No!” she shouted and jumped out from behind her car. The closest cop grabbed and slammed her onto the hood of her sedan. He wrenched her hands together at the small of her back. She moaned while he cranked cuffs on her wrists. Her surroundings grew dim, wavering in and out of focus. “Oh God,” she whispered.
“What was that?” the cop asked, yanking her upright. The officer patted her down, however, she was too numbed out to feel anything.
Her head bobbled. “I called…”
“What’s your name?”
“Ellie, I’m the one who called you.” She wasn’t sure if anyone responded to what she’d said. Her head and stomach ached. Two cops sat her down on the ground in handcuffs. Her attacker lay twenty feet away, blood pooled beneath his head and rolled down the slightly slanted driveway. She looked away and kept her head down. Ellie had no idea how long she sat there. Nothing made sense and everything felt surreal.
A female officer squatted next to her. “Ellie, I’m Officer Stokes. You can call me Carla. Can you tell me what happened?”
Ellie shook her head. How could she explain that a ghost saved her life?
“Let’s get you moved.” Carla grasped her elbow and assisted her in standing. Ellie wavered on her feet. “Whoa, be careful. Maybe I ought to hang onto you, at least for a little bit.”
She nodded. The woman ushered her to a cop car, and asked her to have a seat in the back. Now that she’d calmed down, her cheek throbbed. Carla got in the driver’s seat and pivoted to face her. “They didn’t have to be so rough.” Ellie worked her jaw.
“What was that?”
“They didn’t have to throw me on my car.”
Carla pulled her head back. “I didn’t witness that.”
“Well it happened, believe it or not.” Ellie was vaguely aware that her tone may have been considered snotty. However, she hadn’t intended it that way.
“I believe you. But I might point out that you can understand their cautious approach.”
Ellie took a deep breath and blew it out. That was cautious? She hated to see what a reckless approach would entail.
“You can see how we’re a little confused. You’re out here alone, blood on your clothes with two mur—”
“I didn’t kill anyone. I was attacked by that guy on the ground. And then I dunno.”
“You don’t know?”
“I don’t remember.” Ellie stared out the side window. More vehicles had shown up and a few men took photos of her attacker and bagged up the knife.
“All right, we have to take you in,” Carla told her.
Ellie’s insides trembled. “Am I being arrested?”
“Not as of right now.”
For three hours, Ellie sat in a teeny interrogation room. A table took up most of the space. Claustrophobia made her sweat. More than once she considered confessing to a crime she didn’t commit just so she could get out of there. Finally, her parents came and got her. She was released after it was determined she wasn’t capable of attacking and slitting both the men’s throats based on her size and the angles. She was given a referral for a psychologist and strongly urged to make an appointment.
Her mother turned around and stared at her from the front seat of the car. “Ellie, can’t you tell us what happened?”
“You talked to the police, didn’t you? I already told them I don’t know.” She crossed her arms.
“How could you not know?” her dad asked, glancing at her in the rearview mirror. “You were there, weren’t you? And let me remind you this isn’t the first time you’ve ended up at the police station.”
Ellie’s chin quivered. “I can’t talk about it.”
“What can’t you talk about?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about it. All right?”
“Honey—” her mom started.
“Can’t you leave me alone? I don’t know what happened!” Ellie snapped.
Her mother cried and her father threw his hands up. “Your mother and I are making you an appointment with that doctor and you’re going to tell him. That’s what you’re going to do.”
“Why are you being like this? I told you I don’t know what happened. How is talking to a shrink going to help!”
“You’re going and it’s not up for discussion, young lady.”
Ellie sneered and mocked him inside her head.
They rode the rest of the way home in silence. Thank God. Ellie slinked upstairs to her bedroom without saying a word. She pictured her mother and father at the bottom with incredulous expressions. Too bad. She wanted to forget the whole night beginning with Doyle and Jenkins. Denkins, as she often referred to them, because they seemed to share the same brain.
Ellie went to sit on the edge of her bed but jumped up when she remembered her blood-stained clothing. After undressing, she perched on the mattress, wiping at the tears rolling down her cheeks. So many thoughts raced through her mind. Had Bowie killed the man the police called Trevor? Was Bowie a ghost, and if so, would she see him again? “Arghhh…get out of my head!”
She grabbed the remote and turned on the TV. She flipped the channels until a news reporter caught her eye. He and his crew stood in front of a sea of flashing lights, a white truck, an ambulance, and her car. “Shit!” How had she overlooked the camera crew? There was no mistaking her Mazda with the bright yellow Student Driver sticker on the back windshield, her dad’s idea of a joke. By now the entire student body knew about her involvement with Bowie’s death.
She crawled up toward the headboard, curled around a pillow, and sobbed.
Chapter Four
All Saint’s Day
One Year Later
No one at school, except for Si and Beth, talked to Ellie after the night she’d been taken into custody at Bowie’s murder scene. She spent her eighteenth birthday alone in her bedroom. It didn’t matter that she didn’t kill anyone. People believed what they wanted.
Halloween was on Sunday this year. Although technically the holiday had been yesterday, the principal at North Westbury High allowed students to wear costumes to school.
Ellie took her usual seat in third period English Lit, three rows from the front. Class hadn’t started yet. Some of the kids still mingled with one another and some had already taken their seats.
BANG!
Ellie swiveled in her chair toward the sound and looked at the floor. At the back of the classroom, Jenkins had pushed his textbook off the edge of his desk. What the hell did he do that for? His eyes darted to Doyle, who she sensed made faces behind her back. Turning around, she realized too late the reason for their antics. The straw came up too fast for her to react and she flinched as a spitball hit her under the left eye.
“She falls for it every time,” Doyle said, laughing.
“Yeah, I know, right.”
Some of the other students chortled.
Tears filled her eyes. She crossed her arms and shriveled in her chair, attempting to disappear. The makeup she’d worn to school as part of a sugar skull costume ran down her cheeks. Like every year in October, she’d hoped the disguise would somehow make her invisible to Denkins for the day. How stupid. Of course, they would still recognize her even with the black wig and crown of orange marigolds.
Their English teacher ignored the two idiots’ behavior because it was so common and instead eyed Ellie as if, somehow, she’d caused Doyle and Jenkins to act up. The class settled when the bell rang. A last-minute student snuck inside the room as the teacher shut the door. Breath caught in her throat. Bowie? Holy shit! Ellie clamped a hand over her mouth, stifling a gasp. She wiped her clammy palms on her dress. The teacher didn’t acknowledge his existence and he took a seat in the only empty chair, next to Doyle. Bowie glanced at her with a sheepish smile. His hair was ruffled but he looked the same as she remembered from before his murder. He had broad shoulders and an athlete’s build. He would’ve graduated at the end of last year had he not been murdered. The shrink her parents hired nearly convinced her that a third unidentified man killed Bowie and Trevor, as evident from the tire tracks and busted fence. Ellie thought the theory was thin and now she knew it wasn’t true. Bowie had saved her life.
“Psst…hey, freak,” Jenkins whispered his nickname for her. She ignored him. “Freak, I know you can hear me,” he taunted.
Ellie fought every part of her not to turn around. She squeezed her eyes shut.
He changed tactics. “Come on, seriously…just turn around.”
Ellie turned around and hated herself for giving into his change in tone. She immediately regretted it. Jenkins whispered so the teacher couldn’t hear him but the students around her could. “You do have a nice body and I’d fuck you. With a paper bag on your head.”
You already did that, without a bag, she thought. Bowie shot out of his chair and landed a punch in the center of Jenkins’s face. His head knocked back and he grunted. Blood flowed from his nose. He scanned the room, clutching his face. Even though Ellie was the only one who could see Bowie, she looked back to the front waiting for the room to erupt, but no teenagers screamed “Fight!” The teacher continued writing on the board as if nothing happened. Bowie winked, slinking past her on the way to his seat. She took a deep breath. The other students around Jenkins noticed the puddle of bright red on his desk and began murmuring.
“Quiet down,” the teacher said as she pivoted. “Uh!” She grabbed the box of tissues and rushed toward Jenkins. The seat next to Doyle was empty. Ellie smirked and faced toward the chalkboard again. Bowie had returned.
Chapter Five
Chaos erupted around Jenkins. A few girls turned their heads in disgust. Ellie hid a smile with her hand. The boys in the room used the situation as an excuse for getting out of their seats. “Everyone quiet down, it’s just a bloody nose,” the teacher said. Jenkins swiped some tissues from her and shoved them under his nose. He squeezed his eyes shut as if in pain. The bleeding continued, soaking through the Kleenex.
“I think it’s broken,” he said.
“How could it be broken?” the teacher asked.
“I dunno…God, it hurts.” Jenkins pulled the tissue away from his face and inspected it.
“The bleeding doesn’t seem to be stopping. Maybe you should go to the nurse’s office.”
Jenkins shrugged, stood, and took his backpack off the back of his chair. He glanced at Ellie with bloodshot eyes and left the room with the tissues clutched to his face.
After he was gone, the class settled down for the remainder of the hour. Ellie sat staring at the clock, anxiously waiting for the bell. She was the first one out of the room when it rang.
Bowie waited outside in the hallway with his arms folded across his chest and his legs crossed at the ankles, leaning against a bank of lockers. Light from overhead glinted off his pale green eyes. Her cheeks warmed and she looked away. “You’re welcome,” he said, grinning.
“Thanks.” She took small steps toward him. Did he exist? Of course he did—he’d just punched one-half of Denkins and sadly, the smarter half. She moved closer to him, wanting to make sure he was real. Her hand brushed his sleeve.
“Go ahead. Touch me, I’m real.”
“How?”
More classroom doors opened, and kids spilled out into the hallway. Someone bumped her from behind, pushing her into Bowie. He caught her by the shoulders and steadied her. “Hey…watch it, asshole!” Ellie turned, wondering if the person he’d shouted at had heard. No one looked in her direction, so she guessed not. “You all right?”
Ellie glanced up through her lashes at him. “Yeah, thanks.” She blushed. Bowie was nearly a foot taller than her and still gorgeous. Over his shoulder, he glared at the kid, Jacob, who’d run into her. He looked ready to go after the kid.
“Bowie, you can’t beat everyone—Bowie?”
He snapped his head down, focusing his attention on her again. “Do me a favor and don’t talk to me around other people. You look crazy.”
“Okay,” she said, splaying her hands. She hated when people called her that.
Bowie smirked. “You don’t listen well, do you?”
“Well, everyone already thinks I’m—”
He looked up at the ceiling. “Meet me at the baseball field bleachers after school.”
“Why?”
“Because I need help and you’re the only one who can help me.”
“Is that why you’re here?
“God, you ask a lot of questions. Will you stop talking…” His words faded as he did. Si approached her in the space he left behind.
“Who are you talking to?” Si asked.
“Bo—myself.” Oops, that was close. She couldn’t help it. She’d just had the longest conversation with Bowie in her life. He’d pissed her off, but still. Beth joined them and they all walked toward the cafeteria. Ellie glanced behind her, hoping he reappeared.
“Going with us to Herschel’s after school?” Beth asked.
“No. I got plans.”
“Well, can you drop us off anyway?”
Ellie shook her head. “Sorry.” S
he walked away to go buy her lunch.
Ellie could hardly believe Bowie had asked her to meet him after school. She wasn’t even sure if their encounter had happened. But here she was, sitting on the bottom row of the bleachers. She’d run home during her study hall hour, changed, and washed the sugar skull makeup off. She also removed the long-haired wig. If Bowie wanted to meet her at the baseball field, she wanted warmer clothes. The cold from the metal seeped through the seat of her jeans. Her pixie cut didn’t cover her ears; the wind made them ache. At first, she thought the odor she smelled was ammonia. She pulled the collar of her jacket over her nose and mouth. The scent got stronger.
She felt the presence of something beside her. “Are you Ellie?”
Ellie gasped and jumped. “Jesus…” She looked at a girl sitting on her right. Her clothes looked outdated: deep-rose corduroy pants and a velour long-sleeved V-neck with thin horizontal stripes. Even though it was the beginning of November, the girl wasn’t wearing a coat. Yet she didn’t shiver. She was small and a bit underweight. Her stringy hair hung around her face. The source of the odor became obvious in an instant. It was urine.
“Oh, God.” Ellie put her hands over her mouth, but this time not due to the smell. “Tina?” When she was in middle school, Tina had started at the school three weeks into the first semester and hadn’t finished out the school year, either. Ellie had been about the only person who talked to her the whole time she’d been a student there. What had happened to her, no one knew or even noticed she was gone, except Ellie. Tina still looked like she was in seventh grade. Maybe she was. “What happened to you? I mean, how are you?”
Tina stared at her with watery eyes for a moment before answering. “I died, Ellie.”
Ellie closed her eyes and breathed deeply. “I’m going to regret this, but when? How?”
“That doesn’t matter now, a while ago.”