by Kathy Reichs
“And how do we do that?” Ben asked.
We shouted the answer as one.
“Ghost tour!”
I UPENDED A bulging Hefty bag and disgorged the contents.
Crumpled clothes tumbled to the paving stones. My fifth heap so far. Once again, I began sorting mismatched garments into smaller piles.
Friday morning. Seven a.m. Saint Michael’s on Broad Street.
My cotillion group was providing manpower for a winter clothing drive, and I’d been tasked with organizing donated articles. A mountain of black plastic bags loomed on my right, proof that parishioners had heeded the call.
Community service is fundamental to the debutante system, providing cover for the excess and redefining snobbery as “charitable work.” We participated in at least one major project per month.
Not that I’m complaining. Charity is the upside to an otherwise vapid tradition. Helping the less fortunate is the only part of cotillion I actually enjoyed.
I tossed a musty flannel shirt onto a stack, nose wrinkling at the smells of sweat and moldy tobacco.
Okay, maybe not “enjoyed.” More like “appreciated.”
While my hands worked on autopilot, my head moved ahead to the evening. We Virals would be taking the Fletchers’ ghost tour that night. Since it was the weekend, Kit had relented and given me a pass until ten o’clock.
I’d almost forgotten to show up this morning. Yesterday’s craziness had driven the cotillion event from my mind. Whitney remembered, however, and had texted a reminder thirty minutes before I was due.
Which explained my current look: an Outward Bound T-shirt, running shorts, sandals, greasy ponytail, and a double layer of Lady Speed Stick.
I’d volunteered to work outside. Alone. No one had objected.
Saint Michael’s is the oldest church in Charleston. Its famous spire rose two hundred feet behind me, gleaming white, an eight-foot iron weathervane crowning its apex.
The courtyard was pleasantly cool. White brick buildings formed the sides, shading a grassy enclosure bordered by a trestle-covered cobblestone walk. In the center, flagstones paved a circular space set with four curved benches, each now serving as one of my garment sections.
I was subdividing clothing by gender, then separating youth sizes from adult. Grabbing a pair of raunchy bell-bottoms, I tossed them on the proper stack. A college kid might buy them for a seventies party. Or maybe the style would come back. Who knew?
Jason appeared, lugging three more trash bags.
“They found these in a crawl space under the rectory.” Dropping the newcomers with a grunt. “Enjoy.”
“Fabulous.”
“Any interesting styles? I bet you could craft a wicked retro look.”
There’s a Brett Favre Jets jersey,” I said. “XXL. That’s worth what, two, maybe three bucks?”
“I’ve got my eye on that kilt.”
“Shrewd.”
Jason finger tapped his temple. “Always thinking.” Then, after a pause, “How are you getting home? I could drive you. I don’t mind.”
“Thanks, but Ben is picking me up.”
“Ben.” Jason shook his head. “I guess you’re taking community service to heart,” he quipped.
“Out of bounds,” I warned. “Ben’s a good friend.”
“He’s a prince. Enchanting. Tell him I miss him.”
I let the dig slide. I couldn’t force people to like each other. No point trying.
“If you change your mind, my truck’s out front.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Now get back to work. God is watching.”
“Adios.”
I worked through two more Hefties, then turned to the first sack from the rectory basement. It was old and grimy, the plastic dried and brittle. Without Jason’s explanation, I’d have assumed the bag held actual garbage.
Great.
The first sack contained several dozen ragged and stained towels. The second held an assortment of moth-eaten ceremonial robes.
The third sack knocked me silly.
Cutting the tie unleashed a noxious stench. Whatever lurked within smelled like dirty diapers covered in mildew, or fetid meat left too long in the sun.
I dropped to a knee, certain I’d retch.
Instead, it happened.
SNAP.
Lightning struck. My blood boiled. Sweat pumped from my pores. My senses flickered, exploded. Colors, sounds, and smells slammed into my brain.
The flare traveled my veins and nerves, unbidden, unstable. For the second time that week, my powers had ignited without being called. Hair-trigger sensitive.
Reaching blindly, I found and jammed on my sunglasses.
Breathe. Relax. Breathe. Relax.
Calm returned. Slowly, my pulse descended.
I checked for spying eyes. The courtyard was empty. I slumped onto a bench and repeated a soothing mantra.
You’re okay. You’re okay. You’re okay.
Then my ears detected trouble.
Voices. Close by.
Ashley, Courtney, and Madison. The Tripod of Skank was coming my way.
FRICK!
A fourth voice joined the babble.
“You girls are angels for stuffing all those envelopes.” Adult. Tenor. “Our mailings are vital to keeping the soup kitchens running.”
“No,” Madison cooed, “thank you, Pastor Carroll. It’s an honor to assist with your selfless efforts. If only we could focus on the Lord’s work every day.”
“Amen!” Ashley gushed. “Praised be his name.”
“Charity is hard.” Courtney. Moron.
“God bless you!” Pride swelled Pastor Carroll’s voice. “Enjoy the sweet tea and shade in the courtyard.”
Double frick! Incoming.
A set of footsteps receded. Safely alone, the Tripod abandoned their pretenses.
“Thought he’d never leave,” Madison said. “I’m sick of wasting my mornings in crappy churches. I should be sleeping right now.”
“These hands weren’t made for office work,” Ashley griped. “My manicure is ruined. I should send the bill to Pastor Creepy Eyes.”
“Blech!” Courtney made a dramatic gagging sound. “This tea was made with real sugar!”
“Gross.” I heard three separate splashes on the pavement.
“Why can’t my driver do these events?” Ashley whined. “He could represent me. What’s the difference?”
Expensive perfume wafted around the building’s edge. I braced for impact, flare senses humming.
They saw me at once. Triplet smiles revealed sets of perfect teeth.
“Boat girl!” Madison noticed my carefully sorted piles. “Collecting new outfits?”
“She’s stealing clothes?” Courtney, wide-eyed. “They shouldn’t let her work unsupervised.”
“Nice sunglasses, Ray Charles.” A sneer twisted Ashley’s beautiful face. “And it’s rude to mock the poor by dressing like them. Shame.”
A three-pronged attack is impossible to defend. I was about to retreat when Jason appeared, his jaw clamped in determination.
“What’s going on?” Looking hard at the Tripod. “Everyone being pleasant?”
“Just chatting.” Madison’s half smile never wavered. “Tory was explaining her trash-sorting system.”
Suddenly, my nose took in something beneath the perfume, a layer lower. An odor was seeping from Madison, acrid and biting, like the sourness of dried sweat.
Anxiety. She was nervous. Very nervous.
I searched Madison’s face, found nothing. Outwardly, she was her usual smug, condescending self. As if to mock my observation, she yawned.
But my nose was sure. Her cool was an act. Jason’s appearance had ruffled her feathers.
Curious, I tried to catch Jason’s underscent. It was brittle, like ashes mixed with hot cement. Anger.
My apprehension began to subside. Why should these tramps intimidate me? They were spoiled princesses, nothing more. I had abilities they couldn’t fathom. Could bi
te back just as hard.
Time to test my instincts.
“Jason?” I smiled wide. “Does your offer still stand?”
“Huh?” Jason. Blank-faced.
“Can I still get a ride home?” I added quickly. If his answer was no, I was about to look like a jackass.
I needn’t have worried.
“Yeah, of course!” Jason’s face brightened. “Maybe we can grab lunch on the way?”
“I’d love that.” I batted my eyelashes. Wasted behind the shades.
The nervous scent poured from Madison, intertwined with sour ropes of anger. Then a thorny new aroma entered the mix. Harsh. Slimy. Like crushed poison ivy mixed with mud.
Envy. Madison reeked of jealousy.
But the façade never cracked. Madison cupped a hand to her mouth, whispered to Ashley, then giggled at her own wit.
Am I imagining these things? Is this how you go crazy, by thinking you can smell other people’s emotions?
I could feel my flare burning. Hidden behind dark lenses, I quickly tested my other hypersenses.
I could see a mistake in the cross-stitching of Courtney’s miniskirt, hear the tick of Jason’s wristwatch, feel grains of sand in my tennis shoes, taste molecules of grime floating from the trash bags.
Amazing. A vicious superbug might’ve mangled my chromosomes, but the side effects still blew me away.
And the powers never lied.
Trusting my instincts, I pushed forward with my ploy.
“I need to get these piles to the laundry,” I said to Jason, “but they’re way too heavy. I could use a little muscle.”
Jason straightened, masculinity at the ready. “No problem. We’ll knock this out in a flash.” He gathered a heap of pants. “Feel free to lend a hand, ladies.”
The Tripod stood frozen. Taking another deep whiff, I picked up new elements. Snow. Refrigerated orchids. Dead leaves.
Imperfect descriptions, but the emotions seemed clear.
Dismay. Disappointment.
The girls hated that Jason was helping me. Worse, he’d blown them off.
Tough luck.
Gathering a pile of sweatshirts, I moved toward the church without a backward glance. The Tripod ignored me, but the smell of disappointment cloaked them like a second skin.
Jason waited at the courtyard wall, a too-large bundle locked between his straining arms. Knowing he’d never make it, he wore a goofy grin.
“After you,” he panted.
SNUP.
Blood rushed to my head, nearly causing me to faint. My legs wobbled, but held. The world crashed back to its normal sensory backdrop. I instantly felt weakened. Diminished.
I pretended to struggle under the weight of my load, determined not to spoil a rare moment of triumph. Jason noticed my discomfort. “You okay? I can carry that pile next.”
“Fine. I just haven’t eaten in a while.”
“I’ll fix that.” Big smile. “Count on it.”
The Tripod didn’t bother with good-byes. Banking as one, they headed toward the chapel.
“Good-bye ladies!” I couldn’t help myself. “See you soon!”
BEN DIDN’T ANSWER my call.
I left a message, uneasy, feeling genuinely sorry. Ben could nurse a grudge. I knew my doghouse stay might be an extended one.
I’d texted him before leaving Saint Michael’s. Unfortunately, Ben had been halfway across the harbor, already on his way to pick me up. When informed that Jason would drive me home, he’d stopped responding.
Not good. Ben was clearly taking this personally.
What is it with those two?
Jason had insisted we eat at The Wreck of the Richard and Charlene, a ramshackle seafood joint overlooking Shem Creek. Mount Pleasant was the wrong direction from Morris Island, but Jason had been adamant.
And he’d been right. The restaurant was shabby-quaint, the food delicious. We’d gorged on fried shrimp and scallops. Two hours later, Jason finally dropped me at my townhouse.
With no afternoon plans, I decided to do some research. My newfound olfactory perception had somewhat unnerved me.
Could I really smell emotions? Motivations? I thought so, but wasn’t sure. Was such a thing possible, or was it the first sign of a brain tumor? Or dementia?
Google wasn’t immediately helpful. Dozens of articles linked smell and emotion, but none described anything similar to my experience.
Frustrated, I sought backup. With Ben pissed off, that left Hi and Shelton.
Hi arrived with his laptop in minutes.
I told him what happened at the church. Then, after a moment’s hesitation, about the yacht club episode a few days before.
“Stop it with the public flaring!” he snapped. “You’re gambling with all our lives. I’m not spending my teenage years on a hamster wheel, dancing for the Dharma Initiative.”
“They weren’t intentional. Lately my flares come too easily, out of nowhere.”
“You can’t let that happen,” Hi said. “Someone spots your eyes, just once, and you’re toast. We don’t know enough about the virus to take those kinds of risks.”
“Then help me get answers!”
His eyes narrowed. “The pawnshop. You were sniffing out Bates, weren’t you? Or was that flare an ‘accident’—” air quotes, “—too?”
“Well … no. I told you, we needed an edge.”
Dramatic sigh. “This is how it ends.”
I ignored him. “Let’s start with this emotional sensory thingy. It’s creeping me out, big time.”
Search after search led nowhere. Switching to more complicated strings, we added new terms and finally got some hits.
“Here.” I tapped the monitor. “A Rice University study found that certain couples can correctly identify their partner’s emotions by smell.”
“Gross.” Hi was sprawled on my bed. Naturally.
He tapped his laptop’s screen. “Some Ph.D. in San Diego claims that body odors can convey emotional states. Even to strangers.”
“So maybe I’m not crazy.”
“The guy works at Sea World.”
“Oh.”
Thirty minutes later, still nothing.
“I’m adding ‘canine’ to my searches,” I said. “And ‘instinct.’”
“Whatever. I’m adding ‘lunatic.’”
Suddenly, I hit pay dirt. An Alaskan study. On point.
“Here we go. Hi, check this out!”
He rolled from my bed and dropped into the chair beside me.
“This guy claims that Arctic wolves can detect changes in human emotion, using only their sense of smell.” Excitement rode my voice. “That must be it!”
“How can he prove that? Wolves can’t exactly fill out questionnaires.”
I shrugged. “This journal calls the evidence ‘compelling.’”
“He sounds like a crank,” Hi said.
Coop nosed into my room, yapped, and sat.
“Quiet, dog breath.” I scanned the article. “Olfactory receptors—that means your nose—connect to the limbic system, the primordial core of the human brain. That’s where emotions originate.”
Hi chortled. “So funky stank hits your primitive mind first?”
“Exactly,” I said. “Smells only get to the cerebral cortex—the cognitive center—after touring the deeper parts of the brain.”
Coop whined, danced a circle. I ignored him.
“By the time you can name a scent,” I said, “that odor has already activated the limbic system and triggered your deep-seated instincts.”
The wolfdog barked one last time, gave up, and rocketed down the stairs.
“Coop?”
“The limbic system,” Hi repeated. “Wait a sec. Remember what Dr. Karsten said about the virus?”
I thought back. Karsten believed that his mutated parvovirus rewrote our DNA, inserting canine snippets into our genetic blueprint.
“Karsten thought the changes might be rooted in the hypothalamus,” I said.
<
br /> Hi nodded. “The quarterback gland of the limbic system.”
I paused, trying to process. “Karsten thought that a flare triggered when our hormone production spiked, because our nervous and limbic systems had incorporated canine genetics.”
“Our senses become wolflike,” Hi agreed. “Maybe even sharper than wolves, who’s to say?”
“The point is,” I said, “our powers emerge when something stimulates the limbic portion of our brains. Stress. Emotion. Strong sensory input.”
“If the limbic system is the brain’s emotional seat,” Hi said, “and our noses are hardwired directly to it …”
I nodded rapidly. “Then my ability makes sense. An ultra-sensitive nose could conceivably detect emotions.”
Hi grinned. “And your schnoz is the king.”
“Thanks.”
I finished reading the article, found something near the bottom. “Pheromones?”
“I’ll run the term.”
“Interesting,” Hi said. “Pheromones are chemical factors secreted by the body to trigger social responses in members of the same species.”
“I know you’ll explain that.”
“They’re scents. Pheromones act outside the body of the secreting individual by impacting the behavior of the receiving individual.” He thought a moment. “Smell instructions. Bizarre.”
“What do they do?”
“There are alarm pheromones, sex pheromones, lots of others. Insects use them.”
“How so?”
“Here’s an example.” Hi clicked the mouse. “If an ant finds lunch, it secretes a smell trail for his bros to follow to the food source. When certain animals are looking to mate, they do the same.”
“Humans?”
“Not so much, unless you believe Axe Body Spray commercials.”
“Not so much.”
Hi checked his watch. “Snacky time?”
“Ugh, I’m still stuffed. But help yourself.”
We headed for the kitchen. Hi located a pair of Hot Pockets. Ham and cheddar.
“Awesome.” He popped them in the microwave. “We never have anything good in our kitchen.”
“Your mom would kill me for corrupting your diet. Consider this a bribe to keep quiet about my nose.”
Hi’s brows rose. “Even with Ben and Shelton?”
“For now.” I wasn’t sure why, but I didn’t want to share just yet.