When Chris reached the front patio, she found it occupied by Ron and a young man in a varsity jacket. “Is this her?” he asked.
“Yep,” said Ron. “Jimmy, Chris, and vice versa,” she said by way of introduction.
Chris smiled. “Hey, Jimmy.”
“Hey.” He looked at the ground and shuffled his feet. “This is a little weird for me. I haven’t talked to anyone since before . . . you know. And now, I’m having conversations with two people in one day.”
“That must have been so lonely for you,” said Chris.
Jimmy shrugged. “Gotta say, this doesn’t suck.”
“Well,” said Ron, “I’ll get out of here and let you guys talk.” She disappeared without another word.
Jimmy stared at the empty space where she’d been standing. “It’s so cool how she does stuff like that.”
“It sounds like she’s already taught you a lot,” said Chris.
“Yeah, it’s pretty awesome. I can actually touch things now, and make stuff move.” He looked around at the front yard, his face filled with wonder. “This is the first time I’ve been outside.” He pointed at the neglected flower beds. “Mom’d really hate the way he let those go.”
“This was your parents’ house?”
Jimmy nodded. “After my dad died . . . he wasn’t here when it happened, so I didn’t get to see him.” A shadow of sadness fell across his features but quickly dissipated. “Anyway, Mom moved away and gave the house to Derek.”
“Do you want to see your dad again?”
He seemed to think about this. Then he said, “Well, yeah. Of course. But Derek needs me.” He shook his head and began to pace the front patio. “You don’t know what it’s like for him. He’s obsessed with finding my killer. Sometimes, he stays up all night, going over his notes and files. He hasn’t even had a real girlfriend in years. He doesn’t let anyone get too close. I know it’s ‘cause he blames himself, but it wasn’t his fault.”
Chris frowned at the amount of sympathy she felt at the picture Jimmy had painted of Derek. She could relate, on more than one level. It was tempting to blame herself for Ron’s death. If she had been there on time, if she’d done a better job of getting through to Ron that it was dangerous to go to the Baird house alone . . . but Ron was Ron, and nothing Chris could’ve said or done would’ve stopped her from doing what she wanted.
Her rational mind knew that. But in that painful, grief-filled stretch of days between discovering Ron’s body and finally making contact with her spirit, there hadn’t been any room for rationality. There had only been wanting her sister back and wondering what she could’ve done differently.
And she didn’t even want to think about her own tendency to avoid romantic entanglements. Instead, she said, “Your brother came to see me this morning.”
Jimmy gave her a guilty look. “Yeah, Ron mentioned that. I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to scare him so badly. Or at all, really. I just wanted to get his attention.”
“It’s okay. It’s just that, somehow, he thinks I’m responsible, and he won’t listen to reason. I gave him your message about not blaming himself. But he didn’t believe me.”
“That doesn’t really surprise me. My kid brother’s grown up to be a pretty cynical guy. But at least you tried. Thanks, anyway.”
Chris couldn’t stand how defeated he looked. As much as she hated to prove Ron right, she couldn’t leave things like this. “We’ll keep trying. We’ll do what it takes to get through to him.”
His face lit up with something like hope. “Really?”
“I don’t know how, but we’ll find a way.” The conviction in her voice surprised her, but she went with it. “We’ll get him what he needs to heal, and you what you need to move on. Derek’s gonna be okay, and you’re gonna get to be with your dad. I promise.” She heard those last words come out of her mouth almost automatically, and it made her cringe inside. Too late to take it back.
Jimmy stared at her, unbelieving. Then a smile slowly spread across his lips. “Thank you. You don’t know what this means.”
“Don’t thank me yet. It’s not going to be easy. I’ve got my work cut out for me, and so do you. You need to keep working on him. Keep trying to get through. Don’t worry about scaring him. I already told him that it’s you, and on some level, he’s got to believe that.”
Jimmy nodded. “Okay. If you’re sure.”
“I am. And Ron will help you. And then, after he’s had a few days to cool down, maybe I can try—” She was interrupted by the sound of an engine revving in the street. She followed the sound and saw a green Mustang pulling into the driveway from the opposite direction than the one she’d driven. “Oh, no.”
“I thought Ron was supposed to be keeping lookout,” said Jimmy.
“She was.”
“He must’ve come in the back way.”
Chris looked at Jimmy. “A back way would’ve been helpful information to have.”
“Sorry. I kind of just remembered it.”
The car came to a halt in front of the garage door. The driver’s side door opened before the engine shut off, and Derek Brandt got out, his angry gaze boring into Chris. He slammed the car door. “Can I help you?”
Standing up straighter, she shoved her hands in her pockets and pasted on a grin. “Hi. I felt badly about the way w—”
“You felt badly?” he cut her off as he stormed up the front walk. “Well, it’s a relief to know you have a conscience, at least. What are you doing here? I thought I told you to stay away.”
Chris’s smile slumped along with her posture. “I’m trying to help.”
“I don’t need your help.”
“Not you,” she said, folding her arms. She jerked her head in the direction where Jimmy was standing. “Him.”
Derek looked right at Jimmy, not seeing, then back at Chris as though she’d lost her mind.
“Jimmy’s here,” she told him, and pointed. “He’s right there, and he’s desperate to talk to you. Will you just take five minutes and listen? And then I’ll be gone.”
Derek looked back at the spot, and for a second, Jimmy looked hopeful. But Derek’s face hardened, and he moved past Chris, pulling out a set of keys to unlock the front door. “You’ll be gone in one minute,” he said. “If you’re not, I’m calling the police.” He went inside and slammed the door.
She and Jimmy just stood in silence a moment, staring at the door. “I’m sorry,” he said after a moment. “I’m also a little embarrassed. I don’t know why he’s being such a jerk.”
Chris shrugged as nonchalantly as she could under the circumstances. “We’re threatening his whole worldview and daring him to hope. It’s kind of understandable. Anyway, I should go.”
“Yeah. Thanks for trying,” he said again as she started down the walk.
Chris stopped and looked back at him. “This doesn’t change anything. Keep after him. He’ll have to come around eventually.”
Jimmy nodded, then faded from view, presumably going inside with his brother.
Chris blew out a long sigh and headed down the driveway, then walked up the street to where her car was parked. She didn’t waste any time turning the car around and heading out of the neighborhood. She found Ron at the main entrance, perched on a sign that said Stoneygate Terrace, and stopped the car.
Ron looked surprised as she hopped off the sign and came over. “You guys done already?”
“He came in the back way.”
Ron’s jaw dropped. “There’s a back way in?”
“Apparently so. And he threatened to call the police.”
“I’m so sorry, Chris.”
“Yeah, well, at least Jimmy’s got some marching orders. Get in. Let’s go home.”
Ron hesitated. “Actually, I think I should check on Jimmy, see if I can be any help. Will you let Joe know?”
“Sure. Just don’t do anything that’s going to make that guy take out a restraining order against me, okay?”
R
on grinned, and Chris found it less than reassuring. “We’ll do our best.” And then she was gone. Chris blew out a long sigh and dug her sunglasses out of the storage compartment between the seats. The sun had risen high enough that she needed them to see. She sat there a moment longer, letting the car idle and feeling awful about the way things had gone with Derek. Then she remembered the news story he did and felt less awful.
She didn’t want to admit it, but part of her hoped they scared the pants off that guy.
Smiling at the thought in spite of herself, Chris put on her sunglasses, turned on the radio, and then pulled the car into traffic. Today might not turn out to be so terrible after all.
Concealed behind the curtains, Derek watched to make sure that woman actually left, debating whether to make good on his police threat if she didn’t. She started to go, but turned back and started talking to the empty patio. He watched in amazement. Was this all part of the show, or did she actually believe she was talking to his brother’s ghost? Was she a con artist, or was she crazy?
The thing that drove him crazy was that when he talked to her—when he stood near her and looked her in the eye—she didn’t really strike him as either. Not deep down in his gut.
But it wouldn’t be the first time his gut feeling, although usually reliable, had failed him. The last so-called medium who’d tried to relay a message from Jimmy had seemed sincere, too. These people would never get any sane person to believe them if they weren’t such good actors.
It wasn’t just her sincerity that bugged him, though. As they’d talked, he’d once again been struck by that feeling of familiarity. He could almost call it deja vu. He’d felt like they’d had that argument before, or one a lot like it.
Where did he know her from?
Finally, she turned and headed toward the street. Derek waited until she drove away before turning away from the window. He stood there a moment, wondering what to do. There was still the mess in the kitchen to deal with, but he didn’t know if he was ready for that yet. He still needed to run, but he felt exhausted. What he wanted most was to go back to bed and declare a do-over on this day.
He felt a cool breeze blow by him, and shivered. He glanced back at the door and window and saw that everything was closed up tight. On a whim, he closed his eyes, slowed his breath, and focused his senses. He listened carefully, trying to detect any sense of another presence in the house. Surely, if Jimmy were truly there, Derek would feel it.
After standing like that for about a minute, the only thing he felt was stupid. It reminded him of the time in college when he’d tagged along with the paranormal club on one of their haunted house investigations. In spite of his previous disastrous encounter with that con artist who claimed to speak for Jimmy, he’d tried to keep an open mind, even hoped deep down to encounter something that might give him hope that there was something out there beyond all of this.
But of course, nothing had happened. Nothing supernatural, anyway. A door that slammed on its own turned out to be hung crookedly. A cold spot was nothing more than a draft from a poorly insulated window. Some of the club members got excited about “orbs” in photos that could’ve easily been dust spots and tried to claim that barely-audible noises on their tape recorder were disembodied voices, but try as he might to make something out, all Derek could hear was static.
Only one member of the team had shown any sense, despite claiming to be extra-sensitive to the presence of spirits. This freshman girl had kept insisting that nothing was there.
Realization hit Derek like a punch to the gut, knocking the wind out of him.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he muttered.
That freshman girl—suddenly he could see her face like it had been yesterday since he’d seen it last. In fact, it had been less than five minutes ago. And they really had done this dance before.
Derek had tagged along on the Paranormal Club’s outing as an assignment for the school newspaper. They were getting ready to have a membership drive and he was supposed to do a fluff piece reporting on their activities for prospective new members. Instead, he’d turned in a scathing expose accusing them of being a waste of school funding. He’d almost gotten them shut down.
He remembered Christine Wilson, all right. He remembered how she’d confronted him outside the newspaper office, furious at what he’d written, demanding that he do a retraction. He remembered that same look of hurt and betrayal. Not all of their investigations amounted to anything, she’d told him. What he’d written wasn’t fair.
He only reported what he saw, he’d told her, and had no intention of retracting anything. She’d stormed off in a huff. A week later, the paper ran a letter she’d written in the Opinion column, denouncing his piece.
So she’d had it in for him a long time. Apparently, simply writing a letter to the editor was no longer adequate payback. She’d decided to hit him where he was most vulnerable.
“Nice try,” he said aloud, as though she could hear him. “But you didn’t fool me then, and you won’t fool me now.”
Shaking his head at the coincidence, and at her audacity, Derek headed for the kitchen, deciding to clean up the mess after all.
But he found it perfectly clean. No egg-soaked paper towels on the floor, no sign of his broken mug. The broom and dustpan were propped up in one corner, the only evidence that anything was different. That, and the absence of his favorite mug. He checked the garbage can and found the mug’s remains there.
“Unbelievable. She actually broke in.”
He went to the drawer where he kept electronics manuals and take-out menus and rummaged for the instructions for the security alarm. He carried it with him to the panel next to the front door. As he changed the security code, he made a mental note to have his locks changed, and debated whether he should call the police after all. What would he tell them? Hello, I’d like to report a break-in. No, nothing’s missing, Officer. A crazy woman apparently broke in and cleaned my kitchen while I was out having breakfast. That was likely to go over well. He was a crime reporter, for crying out loud. He needed the police to take him seriously, not make fun of him around the water cooler.
He finished changing the code and re-armed the alarm. As it beeped in confirmation, he became aware of a hissing sound coming from somewhere in the house. Tossing the manual on the entry table, he headed down the hall to investigate. He paused at the first door—the door to Jimmy’s old room.
Steeling himself—for what, he couldn’t say—he grabbed the knob and opened it. He relaxed as he found nothing out of the ordinary. The room looked the way Jimmy had left it, albeit a lot dustier. His parents had never had the heart to change it. Since taking ownership of the house, Derek had made plans for converting it to a home gym, or maybe an office, but somehow, he never seemed to get around to actually doing it.
The noise seemed to come from further down the hall. Derek closed the door on the time capsule of a bedroom and moved in that direction. He checked the guest bathroom and the guest room. Nothing. As he continued toward his own bedroom, the sound grew louder.
Once in his room, he recognized the sound and knew where it came from. The door to the master bathroom was shut, though he was sure he’d left it open. The noise came from inside. Derek opened the door, and a burst of steam puffed out.
Inside, he found both the sink and the shower running at full blast. It felt like a sauna as he made his way over to the sink and shut the water off. The mirror over the sink was coated with steam. He went over to the shower and turned that faucet off, too. When he turned back around, his stomach dropped and all the hair rose on the back of his neck.
Words began to appear on the mirror as if written in the steam by an invisible finger:
LISTEN TO HER.
Derek swallowed. He lifted a hand to comb his fingers through his hair and realized he was trembling.
This couldn’t be. It had to be a trick. She was still messing with him. She’d gotten into his head somehow. Was making him see
things.
Another word appeared: PLEASE.
Derek squeezed his eyes shut and took a deep breath to steady himself. When he opened them, the words were still there, though beginning to distort as beads of condensation trailed down the glass like tears. He grabbed a towel from the bar beside the shower and wiped down the mirror, wiping away the ghostly appeal.
He tossed the towel in the hamper and went to change into his workout clothes, doing his best to pretend that nothing had happened. He sang Aerosmith at the top of his lungs because he just felt like singing. Not because he was frightened. Not because he believed he might not be alone.
He tied his running shoes and headed out of the house, grabbing his keys off the table on the way. A run would clear his head and hopefully, provide him with some perspective.
And then he’d be ready to get to the bottom of this, once and for all.
Ron and Jimmy watched him go. “This isn’t working,” said Jimmy.
“Give it time,” Ron told him. “It’ll take a while to sink in.”
“I don’t know. Derek’s pretty stubborn. Always has been.”
“Kid, you don’t know stubborn until you’ve messed with me.” She gave him a smile that she hoped was reassuring. “What we need is a more concrete way for you to communicate with him. Something he won’t be able to ignore. He clearly needs irrefutable evidence. And it can’t look like my sister somehow rigged it. Although how she could’ve possibly rigged any of the stuff we’ve done so far is beyond me.”
“He’s pretty freaked out. I guess he’s grasping at straws.”
“Yeah.” Ron looked around, like their surroundings might give her an idea. “We need a game plan.” She spotted a laptop on the coffee table. “Can you type?”
“No. I was taking a keyboarding class when … anyway, I wasn’t very good at it. But I think I might have a better idea.”
Jimmy had a gleam in his eye that piqued Ron’s curiosity. She felt a smile spread across her lips and hoped it didn’t look as devious as she felt. “Do tell.”
He did. And it was perfect. “But we should probably do a trial run while he’s out,” he said. “Make sure I can actually pull it off.”
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