by J. L. Murray
“Beatrice?” I said, straightening.
“You know her?” Roo said with a dry laugh. “Listen, I don't know who the fuck you are, but if you know something, you'd better tell us now. Because we don't know what to do.” Her bottom lip trembled. “One of the dead is my brother. There's no way a car wreck did that to him. His truck was barely crunched and he was in fucking pieces, okay? Pieces.” Tears were falling down her cheeks, her eyes taking on a haunted look. The flirty charm was gone and I saw her mask slip. I saw it because I knew how heavy the mask got when all you wanted to do was scream. “Can you help us?”
Julia was watching me, her eyes wrinkled at the corners, with a hard stare. I looked from one woman to the other, trying to decide what to do. I couldn't lie, not anymore, not in this place. I pulled out another cigarette and lit it, raising my eyes to the women.
“Ever hear of the Mourning family?”
Roo shook her head, but Julia took a step back, looking harder at me. She swallowed before she said, “The Reverend ran a church up by the quarry.” Her voice was strained, as if it pained her to recall. “He died, didn't he?”
“He did,” I said, looking away. “They say he was trampled by his own horses.”
Julia and Roo looked at each other.
“When was this?” said Roo.
“Decade ago, wasn't it?” said Julia. “The daughter went crazy. Said the mother and sister killed him. Said they...”
“Now she's getting it,” I said, smiling coldly at the look of realization on Julia's face.
“She went to prison,” said Julia slowly, staring at me in a different way now. Horror and fear and uncertainty passed over her features. “The daughter. Set her own sister on fire.” She watched me smoke for a long moment. “She was executed last year.”
“January eighth, actually.”
“What's happening?” said Roo. “I'm not seeing it.”
I looked at Roo. “My name's not Gina.”
“Okay,” she said slowly.
“It's not possible,” said Julia, her lips barely moving. “It can't be.”
“Let me to spell it out for you,” I said. I dropped my cigarette and watched it bounce on the ground, dropping sparks as it rolled. My hands were at my chest, unbuttoning my shirt.
“What the fuck is going on?” Roo said.
I opened my shirt just as the moon came out from behind a wispy cloud. I looked down to see my autopsy scar practically glowing in the moonlight.
“What is that?” said Roo. She couldn't take her eyes away. Julia crossed herself. Roo tore her gaze from my chest to look at my eyes.
“My name is Frankie Mourning,” I said. “I died on January 8th. And I woke up three days later.”
“What?” said Roo. “No, stop. This is fucking insane.” She put her hands on either side of her face, smooshing her hair. “You're saying you were the sister? You're saying you're dead? This is crazy.”
“I remember you,” said Julia, almost reverently.
“I guess I left town with a bang.”
Roo was shivering, even though she was wearing a thick jacket. I didn't try to comfort her. They wanted to know. Now they knew.
“Why are you here?” said Julia.
“I don't know,” I said. “I don't ask a lot of questions. They tell me where the bad people are and I go there.”
“God brought you here,” said Julia.
I laughed. “Wasn't God that brought me back to life.”
“Who then?” said Julia.
“I don't know,” I admitted. “But it wasn't Jesus, I can tell you that.”
“This is fucked up,” said Roo.
Julia looked slowly away from me to look at Roo. “I knew that family,” said Julia. “Not very well, but I remember them. They were strange, but good people. Like any of us. It was such a tragedy when Frank died. No one close to him was ever the same after that.” She turned to me. “It wasn't an accident, then?”
“No,” I said. “Not an accident.”
“It was your sister.”
I looked up at the stars again.
“Button up your shirt,” said Roo, after a long silence. “It's freezing out here.”
“I don't really get cold,” I said, but buttoned up, nonetheless.
“So, you're saying you're dead,” said Roo.
“I'm saying I was dead.”
“Jesus.”
“It's a miracle,” said Julia, “you being here.”
“Fuck miracles,” said Roo. “Miracles don't wear leather jackets and show up where people are getting killed. How do we know you're not the one killing people?”
“Oh, I am killing people,” I said, smiling. “It's just that the people I'm killing have it coming.” The truth was like a drug and I was inhaling it. After being so secretive, so cautious all these months, something had snapped in me. All this truth was going to catch up to me and I knew it, but damn if it didn’t feel good.
“Let's go somewhere warm and talk about this,” said Julia.
“Tomorrow,” I said. Exhaustion was hitting me. I was going to fall over if I didn't get to a bed soon.
“How can you sleep when someone just got killed?” said Roo. “If you're here to save us, do it.” She looked at Julia guiltily. “Who was it?”
“Alyssa Kroger.”
“Fuck me, she was so nice. Are you sure?”
“Saw her body with my own eyes.”
“No one came into the bar,” said Roo. “Someone would have said.”
“People are scared, Roo,” said Julia. “Why do you think only the drunks were out tonight? How long has it been since half of Helmsville hasn't been in that bar this summer?”
“Fuck!” Roo looked at me again. “Prove it.”
“Prove what?” I said. “You saw the scar.”
“Prove you can help us,” she said.
I nodded. “Okay. But I need sleep first.”
“Someone just died.” Roo’s voice was taking on a panicked tone.
“And the cops are going to say it's an accident,” I said. “Right?”
“That's the pattern,” said Julia. “They found her floating in a pond behind the house.”
“So?” said Roo.
“You seen that pond?” said Julia. “It's two feet deep. But the cops will say it's an accident, just like the others.”
Roo was shaking hard now, and I could tell it was more than the cold that was getting to her.
I was weaving on my feet. My throat hurt from so many cigarettes, my brain felt like jelly from so many hours on the road and too many fake smiles. I rubbed my eyes, forcing myself not to yawn. Roo was staring me down, her mouth turned down in an angry frown. I met her eyes and shrugged.
“It takes one to know one.”
“What does that mean?” said Roo.
I looked up at the stars. “It takes a killer to kill a killer. And that's what I'm here to do. I'm going to find the bastards who killed your brother, Roo. And I'm going to cut them into pieces just like they did to him. Do you understand now?” I looked slowly down and met her wide eyes. “It wasn't God who brought me here. It was something else, and I don't want to know what. Because whatever brought me back to life, it wasn't a miracle. This is what I do. I find the bad guys and I do bad things to them. And you know what, Roo?”
“What?” she whispered.
I leaned forward and smiled at her. “I like it.”
One of the ravens screeched and flapped its wings, coming to land on my shoulder, gripping my jacket with its strong talons. I reached a hand up and let it peck at my fingers. Roo's eyes were so wide I thought they might pop out of her head. Julia crossed herself again and the raven flew away, the other bird following it into the night.
I left the two women in the parking lot, watching them stare after me in the rear view mirror. Two shivering women, small in a parking lot built for semis. I knew I was going to do my best to keep them safe. Not like I had any choice in the matter.
In my sleep-deprived mind, withou
t even knowing the facts, every victim was my father. All I could see was my mother’s face, laughing as she and my sister killed him. My belly filled with hate and I knew this wasn’t going to end well.
Just like before.
chapter five
I
knew the Kroger place and thought about just forgoing sleep. But no good would come of me poking around with the cops there. I pulled into Lucy’s Campground, weaving the car around the gravel path that ran through the dozen or so tiny log cabins, and parked in front of the big house. I figured I'd have to wake someone up, but when I got out of the car, I could hear a horse whinnying in the dark. A flashlight bobbed along the path from the fenced-in area and I shielded my eyes as it was aimed at my face.
“Who are you?” said an older woman's low voice.
“Looking for a bed,” I said. “Heard you might have some vacancies.”
The flashlight clicked off and a tall, thin woman approached me. The porch light flashed on and a man stepped out in a tee shirt and boxers, seeming unfazed by the cold.
“Go inside, I got this,” said the woman. She had long hair that hung loose and by the light I could see it was mostly gray. She was wearing a cowboy hat and what looked like Wrangler jeans pulled over boots. Her shirt was a plain white tee, tucked in, but I would bet that during the day it was a button up cowgirl shirt complete with mother of pearl snaps.
The man eyed me suspiciously, but turned to go inside, letting the screen door slam behind him.
“You woke him up,” said the woman. “Who sent you here?”
“Roo.”
“Oh, that girl. She told you I was going out of business, didn't she?”
I shrugged. “Yeah.”
“I don't take partiers,” she said, shifting her weight, giving the impression she'd been on her feet for a while.
“I'm quiet,” I said. “And I have cash, so it's like I'm not even here.”
She gave me a long, hard look. “I don't break the law.”
“Good,” I said. “Keeps you out of trouble.”
“You look like Trouble’s your middle name.”
“It's Abigail, actually.” I smiled at her. She watched me by the porch light for a long time, crickets filling the silence, punctuated by the horses, still nervous.
“You got a first name?” she said.
“Gina,” I said.
“Gina Abigail?”
“So?”
“I'm Lucy. Seventy a night.”
“The sign says forty.”
“Yeah, well, you pay seventy,” she said.
“That's reasonable,” I said. “I'll pay three days in advance, does that work?”
“Yeah, that works,” she said, looking over her shoulder towards the horses as I fished for the bills.
“What were you doing out there?” I said. When she narrowed her eyes at me, I added, “If you don't mind me asking.”
She took the offered money and sighed. “They're restless, that’s all. The horses.” She sounded tired. Stuffing the cash in her jeans pocket, she rolled her shoulders like her back was aching. I remembered what Roo said about her being sick. Brain cancer. “We get kids sometimes, bored or wanting to do some mischief. Maybe cougars are out, maybe one of them got stung by a wasp, who knows? Wasn't anything there.”
“You sure?” I said, squinting into the darkness. “Bad people out, from what I hear.”
“You should stop listening to Roo,” said Lucy. “She gets damn chatty sometimes. I'll get your key.”
She pointed out the cabin and instructed me to park my car behind the building. It was in a back corner, and when I got close saw that it was older than the others. It was probably already there when they bought the property.
I saw movement out of the corner of my eye when I turned off the ignition, and for a moment thought it was a wraith, back to chide me for choosing sleep over murder. I got out of the car and frowned into the darkness, completely still for a full minute. After a time, I heard the familiar flap of wings.
“Nice of you to show up,” I said.
The raven shrieked.
I grabbed my satchel and took it inside, flicking on a light. There was a bunk bed set against the wall, an old black and white television, and a small counter with a tiny sink, miniature coffeemaker, and microwave. Off in the corner was a door leading to the smallest bathroom I'd ever seen.
I'd stayed in worse. The bunk bed seemed weird, but as I fell on the bottom bunk, I stopped caring about just about everything. The mattress was firm, the pillow was soft, and I hadn't been this tired in a long time.
I was just starting to dream, when I was jolted awake by the smell of smoke. Not campfire smoke, but the smoke that comes with burning houses, furniture, photographs, people.
The light of almost-dawn was filtering through the dusty curtains, casting shadows in the small room. After a moment, the shadow from the television moved. I took a step back as a shape emerged, the backs of my knees knocking against the frame of the bottom bunk, and I sat down hard on the mattress.
Squinting into the shadow as it became solid, I suddenly and vividly thought of the last time I'd seen a wraith, behind the Starlight Motel. I had a cold pang in my chest as I remembered Thomas Dekker's soft snores as I crept out of the room with his keys.
“What do you want?” I said. “I need sleep. I can't find anyone when I'm passing out from exhaustion.”
The wraith stood up and I almost thought I could see it breathing. It stood there in front of me, darkness staring right back where a face should be.
“What the fuck do you want?” I said.
“Frankie,” came the soft reply. It was in my head, like it usually was, but there was something familiar about the way the wraith said my name.
“What is this?” I said, narrowing my eyes. “You're acting weird. You're not like the others.”
The wraith moved forward in their odd way, moving as smooth as a shadow, almost imperceptible. But this one seemed tentative. I frowned, watching it, and it froze again, just staring back at me.
“This is creepy,” I said.
“I'm sorry.”
“What?” I wasn't sure I'd heard it correctly.
The wraith moved back, nearly completely in shadow now.
“Wait,” I said. “What are you sorry for? Is something going to happen?”
“Already happened,” said the wraith. “Already, already. Gone, gone, gone.”
“What's gone?” I said. “What the fuck is even happening here?”
The wraith stared.
“Jesus Christ,” I said. “Just say something.”
“Mirrors,” said the wraith.
“What? Mirrors? Is that code for something?”
“Sorry,” the voice in my head whispered. And then it was gone, melting into the corners and the dark places in the room, leaving nothing but ordinary shadows.
After tossing and turning for an hour, I decided to just get up. I showered, wriggling into the last of my clean underwear and vowing to buy something new. With some effort, I lifted my eyes to look at my own face.
What about the mirrors? The whole encounter was unsettling, and, still exhausted, I was inclined to believe it had all been a dream. I watched my face in the mirror, moving my head from side to side.
“Jesus, I've gone crazy,” I said, reaching up to flatten my hair down, two strange-looking bumps of curls on either side of my head. But when I reached up, I couldn't feel them. I slicked my hair down with my hands anyway.
“I really need to get some sleep,” I muttered.
A loud knock came from outside, and I walked out of the minuscule bathroom and opened the front door. Before I could even register who it was, a giant paper cup of coffee was thrust in my face, accompanied by a million-watt grin.
“Morning, Frankie!” said Roo, walking in as I took the drink. “Nice digs.”
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Figured the coffee was shit here,” she said, sitting
on the bottom bunk and bouncing a little. “Stopped at that stand in St. Thomas. Might be a little cool by now, but it's strong. You're not lactose-intolerant, are you?”
“No,” I said slowly.
“Great! It's just a plain latte, hope that's okay. I didn't figure you for a sweet drink kind of gal.”
“Look,” I said, “I didn't get a lot of sleep. Were we supposed to meet today?”
“No,” she said, smiling again. “But I figured you needed some company. And I can help. I know things. Gossip and stuff people only say when they're wasted. Drinking is basically everyone's hobby here, even the ones who say they never touch the stuff. I'm valuable, Frankie.”
I watched her, looking at me so earnestly. I could see she was in pain, even if she didn't let anyone else see it.
“Please?” she said finally.
“Fine,” I said, taking a drink of the lukewarm coffee. “But I don't usually drink fancy coffee. And you should call me Gina when there are people around.”
“The coffee's the best if you're tired,” said Roo, the smile back on her face. “There's four shots of espresso in that.”
“That's a lot, right?” I said, taking a second drink. It wasn't bad. A bit milky.
“Yeah,” she said, laughing. “It'll wake you up. Gina.”
We took her truck as I figured it would draw the least attention. Plus, it was a four wheel drive. We parked at the bottom of the Krogers’ hill.
“Why can't we just drive up?” said Roo.
“We can't just show up and start asking about their dead relative,” I said. “They'd pull a shotgun on us.”
“You sound like you know this from experience.”
“We need a plan.” I felt something lumpy in the satchel on my lap. I reached in and my hand touched leather. “Oh.”
“What?”
“I have a plan,” I said.
“That was fast,” she said.
I started shrugging off my leather jacket. “No matter what I say, I need you to back me up.”
“Why?” she said, narrowing her eyes. “What are you going to say?”
“Something that's not quite the truth,” I said. “Just drive up the hill and try not to look scandalized.”
“It takes a lot to scandalize me,” she said, winking.