by Tegan Maher
He smirked and tilted his head to the side. “Do you really want to do this in front of your children?”
My mother’s voice was in my ear again, “Send the kids to their rooms.”
“No,” Camila started, “I don’t want to go to my room.”
Sometimes, I forgot she could see and hear my mother.
I couldn’t see my mother, so I followed Camila’s gaze. She stared at the front door. “Please, go upstairs. I’ll take care of this.”
Jonah didn’t know about our abilities. His brows furrowed. “Should I still call the police?”
I took a deep breath and shook my head. “No, our friend is on his way out.” I jabbed the rolling pin at his face. “Aren’t you, friend?”
The man sauntered past us and into the living room to sit on the sofa. “Not until you agree to help me.”
I glanced at Jonah and Camila. The color had drained from their faces. “No. I asked you to leave. That wasn’t a suggestion. I meant it. Get out.”
He stood and rubbed his hands together. “How is the mayor this evening?”
My husband, Rob, was at an event at the hospital. He wouldn’t come home for another couple of hours.
“Simon,” the man started, “My name is Simon. Simon Higginbottom and you and I need to talk.”
Chapter Two
“I can’t just leave to travel back in time to an era I know nothing about,” I protested. “It’s Christmas Eve. What about my kids, Dad, Rob, and all our guests?” I’d long given up pleading with Simon to leave after he threatened my family.
“It’s one job. How long could it possibly take?” my mother asked. “Go in. Solve the case. That’s it. The only problem I foresee is the same one you always have.”
“Which is?” I thought I knew the answer.
“Screwing it up,” she said. “Don’t deny it either. It never fails. If there’s a way to mess something up, you’ll find it.”
I didn’t have the energy to argue with her about that. It simply wasn’t true, and she knew it. While, yes, occasionally things went awry, that didn’t mean they always did.
“Listen to your mother,” Simon said. “She might actually know what she’s talking about. It is one job. An important one.”
When Simon first appeared at the door, I thought nothing of his disheveled appearance. All young people looked disheveled these days. Apparently, that was a thing. The more homeless you looked, the better. Not until he’d run through me did I realize his appearance wasn’t a fashion choice. It was the remnants of a bygone era-one I had no memory of inhabiting. I was only a few months old in late-December 1970. If my mother’s memory is correct, I had chickenpox that Christmas.
“Shut your mouth,” I snapped.
He threw his head back as he laughed. “I thought we weren’t on speaking terms.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “So, all of this is funny to you? You attacked my security detail. You threatened my family. You commandeered our holiday celebration. You forced me to lie to my children. And now you expect me to jump at your command.” I shook my head. “That’s not how this works. I don’t work for you. I don’t work for anyone. I’m a wife and mother. That’s two full-time jobs. I don’t know who sent you or why, but it doesn’t matter. It’s not happening. Goodbye.” I pointed to the front entry. “This game is over.”
He leaned forward, elbows on the kitchen island. “I didn’t attack anyone. The officers got scared. That’s all. I guess, they don’t like dead people.”
I didn’t get him. His presence made no sense. When I worked as a cold case investigator for the Agency of Paranormal Peculiarities, they handed out assignments in grand fashion. I knew when they meant business. They never sent a ghost, or whatever Simon was. Besides, I’d retired twice now, so why drag me back in again?
He held his head in his hands. “Funny thing.”
I arched a brow.
“I never got headaches until after I came back.”
“Came back from where?” I glanced at the clock. I had a little less than an hour to finish the dinner preparations and tidy up the mess. This ghost-man was in my way. “Forget it. I don’t want to know. I don’t care.”
He chuckled. “You don’t care? That doesn’t sound like the utterances of a woman in the holiday spirit.”
“Don’t say it,” my mother warned. “He’s just trying to get you riled.”
“Well, he’s succeeded,” I said.
Simon twisted on his heels, nearly knocking over my seven-quart Crockpot.
“Watch it!” I pulled it out of his reach. “What do you need help with?”
He turned to face me. “I need help to solve an attempted murder case.”
“What murder?” I asked.
He wagged a finger in the air. “Ah, ah, ah. That’s for you to tell me. You’re the expert investigator.”
I didn’t like him. To be honest, I didn’t like many people, but I especially didn’t like rude ghosts.
“If you’re dead, how come my son can see you?”
He pinched his chin. “Because I’m stuck in the in-between.”
“Say that again? You’re either dead or not dead.” I’d never encountered an apparition who could both be in human and ghost form. They didn’t teach me that in my training.
He smiled. “No, that’s wrong. Some of us go to the space between life and death. It’s taken a while, but I figured out how to navigate through both. I guess all those years of hiking in Europe and living free in the wilderness taught me some stealth moves.”
A light shone in the kitchen window.
“What’s that?” I walked to the back-slider doors. “The officers?”
“Uh-oh,” my mother said. “I bet I know what that is.”
It didn’t register with me until the lights were at my eye level. “What? Did they get stuck in an imaginary snowstorm?”
“Don’t mock the agency. You don’t want to get on their bad side. They’ll sic another degenerate on you, if you’re not careful,” my mother said.
“I’m not a degenerate,” Simon said. “I’m a desperate man on a desperate mission to get justice.”
“For who?” I asked.
He sighed. “If I tell you, will you do it?”
I glanced outside again. “Hold that thought. Let me see what the agency dropped off.” I went outside for some much-needed fresh air. It didn’t matter that it was a little less than twenty degrees outside. At least, I was away from Simon.
Outside my back door, on the deck, sat a large brown box.
“Not again,” I groaned. “I don’t work for you anymore.” I raised my fists to the sky. “Get this man out of my house.”
“Too late for that,” my mother said. “He’s here. Deal with him. Besides, no one will even know you’re gone.”
That was true. Time stood still when I was on a case, but that’s the thing. I wasn’t on a case. I hadn’t volunteered. No one asked me to take a case.
“Open it, Mariana,” my mother said. “Don’t you want to know what the catch is?”
I kicked the box. “I know what the catch is. They want to ruin my holiday. Nothing stops Christmas. That’s a rule in this family. A rule you wrote, by the way.”
Simon appeared in front of me. “Don’t you want to open the box?”
“No!” I turned my back on him, then he appeared on the other side of me. “Choose a side. You can’t be dead and not dead. One or the other.”
He scratched his head. “If I had to choose,” he started then raised his voice, “do you think I would’ve chosen death? It’s not like this is any fun for me.”
He had a point. Who would choose death?
I opened the box with tentative fingers, because who knew what else the agency had planned for me?
Inside, there was a large manila folder—probably the case file—and a photo frame. I pulled the frame out first and flipped it over. I couldn’t speak.
“Cat got your tongue?” Simon asked.
�
��What is this?” I shoved the picture frame back in the box. “How is that possible?” I took a deep breath. “That’s my mother.” I looked around, even though I couldn’t see her, I knew she was here. “Mama? I don’t understand.”
“Say the spell. I’ll meet you in 1970,” she said.
I had no other choice. I had to do it.
“Crimes are unpunished
The world’s not right
Cosmos guide me
Into the time-travel light
To the past, I’ll travel
Absent of any time ripple
1970 is my time
To solve the heinous crime.”
Chapter Three
“Merry Christmas to me.” I looked good behind the wheel of a cherry red 1970 Oldsmobile Cutlass 442. I’d only seen cars like this in movies. “I hope this is my consolation prize for missing Christmas with my family.” Christmas was the only time the whole family came together with no squabbles at the dinner table. That’s was saying something for a house full of kids and a husband who had to oversee everything in town. That’s not to mention my siblings and their families, my father, my dead mother, and the constant stream of dead people who always found me at the most inopportune times.
“Don’t count on it,” a man’s voice murmured in my ear.
I screamed loud enough for the parking lot full of Zayre’s shoppers could hear me.
Heads turned. Women gasped. Children jumped. All eyes locked on me in my fancy new car.
“I’d tell you not to draw attention to yourself, but it looks like it’s too late.”
I locked eyes with him in the rearview mirror. “Simon?” It looked like him, only less creepy. “You’re here too?”
He slapped the back of my seat. “Yeah, what did you think? I’d let you come alone. Get out of here. That would’ve been a sucker bet, and I’m no sucker.”
“Great.” I hope my tone didn’t betray how I felt about him. “So, now what? I get to drive this fancy car and what? Do I get a get out of jail free card? Can I go home and finish prepping dinner, and, oh, I don’t know. Maybe get and give a few gifts in the wee hours of the morning, after my kids have spent the entire night begging to open just one.”
He leaned back on the seat. “You do what I tell you to do and don’t ask questions and things will work out just fine.”
“No. I’ll tell you what I think we should do. You dragged me from my life with no explanation and a photo of my mother from the year I was born. No, sir, you don’t get to make the rules.”
He threw his head back as he laughed.
I glanced around. If there was a Zayre store, that meant we had to be somewhere in the Midwest. That made sense, because I was born in the Midwest and grew up on a diet of Zayre’s sales and Slurpees from five and dime stores in my old neighborhood.
“We need to move. Tell me where we are first,” I said.
Simon didn’t respond.
“Did you hear me?” I turned my head, but Simon wasn’t there.
“Perfect. Thanks for nothing,” I groaned.
The package the agency had dropped for me was on the passenger seat. “I suppose I should read the file but not here.” People hadn’t stopped staring at me since I screamed like a maniac.
The keys for the car were on the dashboard. “Time to take this baby for a ride. Off to find the wizard.” I cracked myself up.
I drove three blocks through town. It looked like every other small town in the country. Small mom and pop shops and diners lined the streets. Full-service gas stations sat on every corner with attendants at the ready to pump gas. Yippee! People on the street turned their heads to watch me as I passed them. Some waved. Others nodded. Several pointed.
I must’ve stuck out like a sore thumb. This car didn’t exactly fit the incognito vibe I’d hoped to perfect.
I peeked at my outfit. Apron, black yoga pants, and a comfy oversized sweater with thick socks and a pair of reindeer head slippers on my feet wasn’t a good look outside of the house. I hadn’t taken time to get dressed for dinner yet, because I wasn’t done making dinner.
“The oven!” The last thing I did before the rude interruption was baste the turkey. What if it burned?
“It won’t burn,” my mother said. “It can’t. When you get back, everything will be the same.” She sighed. “I hope.”
“What does that mean?” I asked. “Do you know something? Is my family in danger?”
She made a tsk-tsk sound.
“Mama? Talk to me. What’s going on? Why is there a picture of you in the case file?”
She made the sound again.
“Tell me.”
She chuckled. “It’s nothing.”
I looked around at the unfamiliar town, full of people in outfits I’d only seen in old news footage. “It must be something, because I’m here.”
She chuckled again.
I noticed a library up ahead. I slowed down and pulled into the parking lot. “Fine. Don’t tell. It’s not like my life isn’t in danger or anything.”
She gasped. “I did nothing to put you or any of my children’s lives in danger. Never. If it wasn’t for me, none of you would be here.”
I laughed. She was born with the gift of stating the obvious. “Of course, we wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you. I wouldn’t be in this situation if it wasn’t for you.”
I pulled into a spot, nearest the door, shut the car off, checked my reflection in the mirror, gasped, because the trip hadn’t removed the spray of baking products from it, and frantically tried to pull myself together before reading the file. “I suppose I should read this since you won’t tell me anything.”
Either she didn’t care enough to tell me, or she cared too much. Both options terrified me. Had someone tried to kill my mother? Obviously, it didn’t work, because she’d lived a long—not long enough in my opinion—life. So, why was I here?
“You’re here because I need your help,” she said.
Her matter-of-fact tone never shook me in any other context, but in this context, it chilled me to the bone.
I took a couple of deep breaths before I asked another question. Patrons walked in and out of the library. None of them looked familiar. I wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad sign.
A woman in a bright yellow pantsuit and knee-high boots stopped in front of the car and smiled.
“Hello.” I nodded at her, hoping she’d go away.
The woman loosened the scarf around her neck, then pulled it off and threw it over her shoulder.
“What is up with her?” I whispered.
“You’ll find out,” my mother said.
The woman placed her hands on her hips and marched to the driver’s side door. “Roll the window down. We need to talk, Mariana.”
I gasped.
She stooped down to my eye level. “Now, Mariana.”
“How do you know my name?”
She pulled the door handle. “Unlock the door and I’ll tell you.”
Chapter Four
“What? How is that possible?” I leaned my arm on the lock. “I know every member of my family. You aren’t one of them. My mother would’ve mentioned you.” I pointed to the backseat, where I assumed my mother was.
“Don’t open that door,” my mother whispered. “I have something to tell you.” She sighed.
“What is it?” I checked the other door to make sure that door was locked too.
“You’ve always been so high-strung. One of these days, you’ll give yourself a heart attack, if you’re not careful.”
“Mama.” I couldn’t believe I still had to redirect her all these years after her death. She couldn’t keep one train of thought if I paid her.
The woman, who had asked me to call her Auntie Barbara, continued to tug on the door handle. “So help me, if you don’t do as I tell you, I’ll tell your mother.”
I shook my head. No way was I opening that window for her. “Oh, you want to tell on me? Go right ahead. I’ll wait.” I r
ifled through the file, looking for anything that would tell me why this woman thought she was my aunt. I came from a large family. I had five siblings and over a dozen nieces and nephews. My mother was the first of fourteen children. My father had seven siblings. I knew all of them and their children. This woman wasn’t one of them.
She tapped on the window. “You won’t find anything about me in that little file, girlie. I’m what you call a trade secret.”
“She’s a liar and a thief,” Mama said. “What you need to do is throw this car in reverse and get out of here.”
“And go where?” I asked.
Auntie Barbara tapped on the window. “Don’t listen to her. She’s always been paranoid.”
A car pulled into the spot next to me. The driver jumped out, ran around to the passenger side, and walked through my fake aunt.
“Hey! Watch out, buddy! You trying to kill me?” Auntie Barbara said.
“You’re already dead,” my mother groaned. “Mariana, listen and listen good. Barb isn’t your aunt. You need to get out of here now.”
“I heard that,” Auntie Barbara said. “Don’t fill the girl’s head with lies.”
I threw the case file on the seat next to me and put the car in reverse. “Where to?”
“Don’t you dare leave me here!” Auntie Barbara warned.
She and I locked eyes.
“What do you want with me?” I asked.
The man grabbed a stack of books off the passenger seat of his car, nodded at me as he closed his door, and walked through Auntie Barbara to get to the library door.
“I can’t believe he did it again,” Auntie Barbara said. “Did you see that, Diana? He walked through me like I wasn’t even here.” She stared at the passenger seat as she spoke to my mother. “Some people have a lot of nerve, don’t they?”
“If by some people, you mean you, then, yes, some people have a lot of nerve,” Mama said.
Auntie Barbara sneered.