Ghost Mortem

by ReGina Welling

  Uh oh.

  Jacy and I hit the porch, and my mother and David weren’t far behind.

  “We should have cleaned the vents before we turned on the furnace.” Mom brushed at her sleeve.

  "Um, I guess it's a good thing I brought lunch. We'll eat while the dust settles." Jacy looked for a good place to sit, and since the porch was bare, set the bags down and settled in with her back against the wall. "There's chicken and coleslaw. I'm glad I grabbed to-go packs so we have forks."

  She looked at David, who didn't seem certain whether the invitation extended to him. "Hey, before you sit down here, would you mind grabbing the cooler out of the back of my Jeep? I brought a bunch of soft drinks. Cleaning is thirsty work.” Just that easily, she put his mind at ease. The magic of Jacy.

  While we ate, talk inevitably turned to the tragedy of recent events. “Hudson’s wife lives right across the street,” Jacy pointed toward the house. “I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if she went back home once he’s laid to rest.”

  "I know. I met her the day I bought this place. I stopped in to look around, and she thought I was casing the joint, so she came over to warn me off. I feel bad for her." On so many levels. "She seemed nice, but she wasn't shy about checking out why I was here."

  David finished first and pushed to his feet, whether to get away from the gossip or because he had other things to do, he didn’t say. It wasn’t like anyone was stopping him from leaving, but after my less-than-stellar behavior so far, I kept that comment to myself.

  Flashing him a smile that would melt chocolate, Jacy said to him, “Would you be a dear and grab the vacuum cleaner from my front seat?” She dusted off her behind, then gathered up the empty food containers, stuffed them back in one of the bags, and put the empty cans in the other. “I brought a few cleaning supplies with me just in case. I know you said you’d take the weekend to settle in, but I’m offering my services to help things along.”

  I’d known Jacy since we were in diapers, and cleaning wasn’t one of her favorite things to do. Unless she’d undergone a massive personal transformation in the past few years, she was angling for something.

  "Tess called me right after I saw you this morning and asked if she could switch shifts with me, so I'm off until Sunday, which worked out fine since Brian's leaving this afternoon to go fishing with his dad for the weekend. I've got some free time—"

  There it was.

  “And you’re offering to help me clean so we can have a girl’s night in Spooky Manor.”

  “Didn’t you say we weren’t supposed to call it that anymore? But yeah, if you’re planning on staying, I thought I might keep you company. What do you say, Ev? Are you up for a sleepover? Just for tonight, or maybe tomorrow night, too.”

  I nodded, relieved she’d asked. “I guess we’d better get rid of a few layers of dust if we’re going to be spending the night here. Thanks, Jace, for making things easier.”

  Staying alone in the house didn’t bother me, but just in case the whole thing hadn’t been a hallucination, I didn’t think Hudson’s ghost would show up if I had company. With that in mind, I had no problem with buying a night or two of peace.

  CHAPTER 16

  The early afternoon passed in a flurry of activity and the constant whine of the vacuum. When my mother discovered the little rotary attachment for upholstery, she practically yanked the machine away from Jacy and went to town. Woe betide the speck of dust that got past her, and she made sure I knew what she wanted for Christmas. The woman was in love.

  I figured David would take off once we got started, and I was right. Except he wasn’t gone long and when he returned, I heard a lawn mower fire up. That’s another man thing, I think. The absolute conviction that knee-high grass must be tamed with a sharp blade. That he’d decided to mow shirtless was just icing on the cake. Not that I was interested, but he did make a pretty enough picture that Jacy sighed.

  “Hey, you’re a married woman.”

  “It’s like a museum,” she retorted. “You can visit and look at the art, but you don’t have to take it home.”

  On that note, I changed the subject.

  “Since you’re staying, would you mind helping me unload the van and then follow me over to drop it off? It’s not due back until Monday, but the closest drop off point is a garage that closes for the weekend, and I start my new job on Monday. I’m not sure what my hours are going to be like, so I’d rather just get it over with today.”

  I was going to miss having my own wheels but was tired of driving around in a freaking billboard that announced Here's Everly, her marriage is over, and she's moving home again. The news was out, obviously, but I didn't need to keep flying the banner.

  “What are you going to do for transportation?” Jacy asked. “It’s not like we’re overrun with Uber or Lyft drivers around here. You want me to keep an ear out for a deal? People come into the diner, they talk.”

  “That would be great.”

  I’d barely flipped open the van’s rear doors before David killed the mower motor and nudged us out of the way. “I’ll get this. You just tell me where you want them.” Normally, I’d have argued, but I’d already annoyed him once and he seemed determined.

  A moment dragged by while I considered. I hadn’t even seen all the rooms yet. “The front parlor. I think there’s room for all of it in there. I can unpack once I’ve sorted myself out a little more. Except for the wardrobe boxes. Those can go in that far bedroom for now.”

  By three, other than the insides of one set of kitchen cabinets and running the drapes through the fluff cycle of the dryer to get the last of the dust out of them, we had the main downstairs rooms in decent shape.

  "It's a lot of house for one person,” Jacy said, her gaze traveling around the room. “Much more than you really need. I feel bad for that poor old lady, having to keep up with it. She must have been lonely."

  While I agreed with Jacy’s sentiment, it surprised me to realize I didn’t feel overwhelmed. The welcoming feeling I’d experienced on the porch during my first visit had only increased since coming inside. I would be happy here. Alone or otherwise.

  "It would make a great B&B if the upstairs has decent plumbing. A place like this could turn a tidy profit. The Bide A Way might be deserted right now, but we're in that lull just before school lets out for the summer. You wait another week or two, and the place will be packed. Ever since they started that revitalization project up in Hackinaw, we’ve seen an increase in tourist traffic and revenue.”

  All of that was news to me.

  "I guess I haven't kept up on current events as much as I should. But Jace, doesn't that beg the question of why someone from town hadn't already bought this place? I mean, Mrs. Tipton said something about the house having to go through probate, and I think she mentioned something about the title process finishing early, but if this place has that kind of income potential, don't you think it’s a little odd no one else was standing in line ahead of me?"

  Jacy put her dust cloth down on the table and laid her hands on my shoulders. "Do you believe in fate? Because I do. If you were meant for this house, then don't you think fate would take matters into its own hands and put you on the right track?"

  There was an opening for telling her about Hudson's ghostly visit. I didn't take it, though. I did consider pointing out her resemblance to her mother at that moment.

  Before I could formulate an answer, she continued, “I’m sorry your husband turned out to be a no-good cheating jerk. Really, I am. But I’m not sorry you’re back. I’ve missed you, and if you want to make this place into something, I’m here to help. If you want to rattle around here by yourself, I’m down with that, too. Fate brought you back, and now you’ll figure out what to do. I have faith.”

  Picking up the cloth again, she went back to cleaning.

  Right now, I couldn’t conceive of anything I wanted less than to run a B&B, but there might be other possibilities to consider.

  “Van’s empty.
” David interrupted my thoughts. “I’m taking off. The lawn will need another pass in a day or two. I’ll come back and take care of it.”

  “You don’t have to—” I started to protest. He'd been nothing but helpful, and all I had done was act like a jerk. "I’m sorry. I haven't been very nice to you, and there’s no excuse. My parents trust you, and that should count for something.” I gave him a smile and tried to figure out why, every time my mother looked at him, I felt ridiculously jealous.

  “I’ll be back in a couple of days,” he said, holding up a hand. “Really, I don’t mind. Maybe then we’ll have time for that talk.” Turning on his heel, he stalked out of the kitchen. I yelled a thank you toward his retreating back, heard him call out a goodbye to my mother, and then he was gone.

  I took a deep breath and made a note to apologize again when I saw him. It wasn't his fault I'd had a crappy week, or that I could see a spark in my mother's eye every time we were in a room together.

  Besides, I really wanted to hear how such a capable man had ended up renting a single bedroom at my parents’ house.

  “He’s cute, but there’s obviously something going on with him,” Jacy said, echoing my thoughts. “You ready to go?”

  I nodded; she wasn’t wrong. "Let me just tell Mom we're leaving."

  I followed the sound of singing and found my mother wiping down the last windowsill in the living room. There was a streak of dust across the front of her jeans, and I picked a cobweb out of her hair. Come to think of it, I probably didn’t look much better.

  “I didn’t think we were going to end up spending the whole day cleaning,” I said. “That wasn’t why I asked you to come over, you know.”

  The smile she gave me was so bright it would have lit up a cavern.

  "You've come home. That's worth a day of cleaning. A week or two, even. Now, while you're gone, if you’ll give it to me, I'll go collect your things from the motel and return the key to Barb. It's probably better if I'm the one to go in case there are still reporters hanging around. I can go and be back before your father gets home from work."

  We'd made it through an entire day together with barely a harsh note. That was progress for us.

  "Thank you. I was dreading having to go back there. And thank you for today." A wealth of emotion from everything that had happened in the span of a few days came over me all at once, and my chest hitched as I pulled her into a hug. She returned the embrace fiercely, and I thought I saw the shine of tears in her eyes when I turned away.

  Yeah, things would be different between us this time.

  "I love you, Mom. I probably haven't said that enough."

  I might have said more, but the honking of Jacy's horn reminded me I had an errand to run.

  After dropping the van, we hit the grocery store so I could stock up on the necessities. For Jacy that meant a container of cookie dough ice cream. A perfect choice, she said, since it combined two of her favorite snacks in one. Logic like that was hard to argue, and I was looking forward to an evening of girl talk and ice cream—we’d certainly burned off enough calories to eat as much as we wanted—and spending the first night in my new home.

  I drew more than my share of curious looks as we made our way up and down the aisles, but no one approached me. That should have made me suspicious, but I was grateful. Not that I could blame anyone. I mean, what were people supposed to say? Welcome home, sorry you got dumped, and by the way, what about that dead body you found?

  Yeah, there are times when being a pariah of sorts is just what the doctor ordered.

  At the checkout, I kept my head down and didn’t notice the donation can until Jacy pointed it out.

  “Isn’t that the saddest thing?” Reaching past me, she jammed some ones into the hole cut out of the coffee can lid. “Sixteen and diagnosed with cancer. That’s Bobby Madison. He's Mabel’s sister’s neighbor’s boy.”

  "He's who?"

  "Mabel's sister's neighbor's boy," she repeated as if knowing such an odd set of statistics was nothing unusual.

  Fishing through my purse, I pulled out some bills and picked up the can to add my contribution to hers. “This says they think they caught it in time, but he still has to have brain surgery. I feel bad for his parents—they must be a mess right now.”

  My heart went out to the bright-eyed, smiling teen on the can. He was wearing a baseball uniform and leaning against a beat-up sedan that looked vaguely familiar for some reason.

  “The donations are to cover expenses so his parents, Patty and Daryll, can go to Boston and stay while he has the surgery next week.” Apparently, my willingness to chip in had bought some goodwill from the checkout clerk who looked familiar in that way that people do when they've had five years to grow up while you weren't around. I couldn't put a name to the face, but since she'd offered me a smile to go along with the explanation, I gave her one in return.

  Back a the house, my mother pulled in just behind us with my things from the motel. There wasn’t much, so it took very little time to unpack the groceries and get everything inside. Still, she spent an extra minute or two watering and trying to find the exact right spot for the poor little plant I’d basically ignored for most of the week.

  “Do you want to take it home with you?” I’d rather not have to look at the reminder of a job I’d enjoyed if I was honest. “Consider it a gift.” Then I felt bad because she seemed so pleased and I’d been thinking only of myself with the offer. At some point, and sooner rather than later, I needed to get hold of my swinging emotions.

  Once she was satisfied the plant would survive the few minutes it would take to get home, Mom went to put it back in the box.

  “Oh, there was some other stuff in here.” Along with my name plaque and the rest of the small things I’d used to personalize my desk, she pulled out a large mailing envelope. Everything ended up on the kitchen counter, and I forgot all about it while we followed her out to the car to say goodbye.

  “We’ll be over tomorrow to help a bit more. I’m warning you, though, your father will probably be up with the sun. I’ll hold him off for as long as I can, but I’m not making any promises.”

  That I had more in common with my dad than my mom had always been one of the problems with our relationship, but we did share a baffled response to his cheerful morning nature.

  Once she’d gone, Jacy and I rambled through the clean rooms and settled in the kitchen to put together a simple meal.

  Halfway through the cooking, I realized I’d been opening cabinets and drawers and pulling out pans and utensils without thinking, I said, “Is it weird that everything in here is right where I’d have put it anyway?”

  Jacy shrugged it off. “Great minds think alike.”

  “Maybe. It’s still weird.”

  We spent the rest of the evening catching up on local gossip while avoiding the topics of marriage, divorce, or sudden death. No ghosts showed up to disturb our sleep, and for that, I was grateful.

  CHAPTER 17

  My parents showed up at a respectable 8:30 the next morning, and dad talked a blue streak about the trim and something called the soffit as he paced back and forth in front of the house. I didn’t understand half the terms, but it seemed as if he thought mine were all in good shape.

  After the downstairs tour was over, he asked, “Where’s the key to the garage?”

  “I’m not sure which one it is, but probably one of those.” I pointed to the pile of flat keys David had set aside.

  “Well then.” He scooped up the lot. “Let’s go find out.” A kid in a candy shop was what he looked like.

  “You go on ahead, dear. Jacy can help me with the bedroom.” Because they were there, my mother had taken it upon herself to unpack my wardrobe boxes by swapping Mrs. Willowby’s clothes with mine. For that alone, she’d be getting that vacuum cleaner for Christmas.

  Moving into a fully furnished house might be a boon to my pocketbook, but living among someone else’s things was mildly weird. Going through a
n old lady’s underwear drawer felt all kinds of wrong.

  Outside, my father examined the garage door lock.

  "It's a Schlage," he announced as if that meant something important, and picked the right key on the first try.

  Windowless, the garage was as dark as night inside, and I hung back while dad found the light switch. I say that like it was a concession to his manly need to investigate, but it was for purely selfish reasons. You can't see spiderwebs in dark rooms.

  “The old lady was a fanatic.”

  I half jumped out of my skin and bit back a scream when Hudson’s voice sounded right next to my ear.

  Two deep breaths quieted my pulse except for the area that throbbed near my temple. So much for Hudson being a figment of my imagination, or for him not being able to find me once I’d moved.

  “Well, would you look at that!” With Hudson nattering in my ear, I barely heard my dad’s exclamation, but what was I supposed to do? I couldn’t tell a ghost to shut up or give him a poke with my elbow. All I could do was try to ignore the disembodied spirit.

  The That Dad was referring to turned out to be a whale of a car.

  Reverently, my father ran a hand over the fender, his eyes gleaming with car lust. “This is a 1979 Buick Regal. Two-door coupe.”

  That was what he said, but all I heard was blah blah blah, old-lady car. It was maroon, two-tone with a lighter red roof, but I supposed it could have been worse, given I had no transportation at all. I made agreeing noises.

  “I thought she sold it when she stopped driving.” He paused to think. “Must have been ten years before she passed. It’s a classic.”

  Hudson snorted in obvious disagreement. "It's a tank. She used to pay me to back this boat out of the garage, wash it, and drive her to the gas station to fill it up once a month. Picky, too, the old bat. It had to be spotless, or she'd short me on the money. Too bad she's gone, though. I could have used that money these last few months."