Forgotten Spirits

by Barbara Deese

  “Good morning, beautiful!” he said when she answered. “How are you feeling today?” They talked for a bit. He asked how she was handling news of Sierra’s death, and she lied and said she was getting over the shock. Then he told her about his plans to drive to a place near Somerset, Wisconsin, later in the morning to pick up venison from his hunting buddy.

  Still not fully awake, she couldn’t figure out why he’d called to tell her that.

  “If you’re interested, I could stop by your apartment to give you some venison. Just tell me what you want—stew meat, ground venison, tenderloin . . .” He let his voice trail off when she didn’t immediately answer.

  “I’ve never cooked with venison before.” For some reason, it felt like some kind of test.

  “No problem. You use ground meat for chili, and cook up stew meat just like you would with beef. With venison steaks, the only trick is heating up the plates before serving.”

  Foxy hesitated. “I don’t know, Bill.” She wanted to tell him her place was haunted. The words were on the tip of her tongue. There was a long and awkward lull in the conversation as she thought about just what she did want to say.

  He took her silence as a rebuff. When he spoke again, he sounded rather formal. “Maybe you just want to meet me halfway for lunch. Hudson’s as good a place as any.”

  She peeked at the time, surprised it was already nine-thirty in the morning. She rarely had a chance to oversleep. She didn’t have to open her planner to know she had no clients on a Sunday, and no other definite plans, but she said, “Uh, give me a chance to wake up and check my schedule,” she told the sheriff. “I’ll call you back in a few minutes.”

  She padded into the bathroom, where Elvis was pawing at the baseboard in the corner. She saw nothing there that should captivate his attention, but then cats were funny that way. Either Elvis was entertaining himself with imaginary gremlins, or—she made a face at the thought—there might be a mouse trapped between the walls.

  She suddenly felt a sort of emotional vertigo, as if she were standing on shifting tectonic plates that represented different parts of herself. Sierra Brady was dead and Bill Harley wanted to meet for lunch—the two things could scarcely coexist in her mind, much less in her life. She felt a strong need to get away from there, but there was an equally strong desire to retreat into memories of another time, the time she and her friends were young and sparkly and full of hope. She thought about her box of old photos in the basement, and knew if she looked at them right now, she’d fall apart completely.

  The last time she’d looked at old pictures, she’d thrown away all of her wedding pictures, and then cried off and on for days. That left photos of her with her friends, including Sierra. Sierra’s death, Foxy thought as she wiped her fingers across her eyes, had dredged up memories she’d worked hard to quarantine.

  As she scuffed into the kitchen, she felt resolute that she needed, once and for all, to embrace the life she’d made for herself. She called Bill back to tell him she’d be happy to meet him for lunch. “I haven’t been out yet, but I’m sure it’s frigid out there,” she said, and immediately wished she hadn’t used that word. That’s probably exactly what he thought of her after she practically pushed him out the door two nights ago, saying that she needed to be alone.

  What was it about her, she wondered, that compelled her to suffer in silence? The news of a friend’s death might send other women into the arms of the men in their lives, but with Foxy, fear and grief had always made her want to wrap her own arms around herself and retreat. All things considered, she was surprised Bill had bothered to call her today at all.

  “Frigid, but sunny,” Bill replied, sounding a bit too sunny himself.

  Before agreeing to drive across the river into Wisconsin, she opened her living room blinds to see if more snow had fallen during the night. The roads were plowed and sanded. The sky was clear and glacial blue.

  “Sunny’s good, and you gotta eat anyway, right?” Bill cajoled her.

  She laughed. “Sunny is good. Eating is good.” They talked just long enough to arrange a rendezvous at a favorite restaurant in Wisconsin.

  Elvis, having finished his breakfast, now sat in front of the door, lashing his skinny black tail back and forth as Foxy fixed herself some tea. A low rumble came from the cat and his tail thrashed more vehemently. Foxy stepped over him to get close to the door.

  All was quiet. She held her breath and felt prickles of fear as she listened, convinced someone lurked in the hallway. Only a few heartbeats later, at the exact moment Elvis whacked his tail against her leg, she heard muffled footsteps and the creak of a floorboard. Only one floorboard creaked, and it was between her room and the top of the stairs. She stepped back, her heart thudding so hard she thought she might pass out.

  She looked around for a weapon. The only one she could think of was the shovel in the back entry. If the intruder weren’t in the blasted hallway, she could run down and get it. She eyed the knife rack, but the thought of slicing and dicing her stalker meant getting close enough for him to grab the knife away.

  Only then did she remember the motion detector she’d borrowed from Robin and placed at the top of the stairs, concealed by an African basket and an artificial plant. At that very moment, the device began to squeal.

  She didn’t scream. She didn’t dial 9-1-1. She didn’t call Bill back to tell him she was scared senseless, and to send the police. Any of those things would have been more intelligent than what she did. In that split second, fear and anger drove her to snatch up her big cast iron skillet and throw the door open. Wielding the skillet over her head, she rushed into the hallway with a battle cry that died in her throat.

  To her left, a man in black retreated down the hall. He was tall and skinny. The hood of a sweatshirt covered his head. Foxy noticed he walked with a slight limp, as if one knee didn’t straighten all the way. He slipped through the open door of the vacant apartment in the rear without turning around.

  She sucked in air as if she’d been held underwater and then let go. Her arms dropped impotently and her feet were glued to the floor. Any doubt she was being pursued had vanished. Staring at the closed door, she knew, even without seeing his face, who her stalker was.

  Chapter 8

  Big storm coming,” Millie said to the choir members as they trickled down the stairs to assemble in the church basement. The choir director was from Oklahoma and, although she remained calm in the face of tornadoes, almost any dusting of snow flung her into driving anxiety.

  Her comment devolved into general grumbling about the weather, as if Minnesota shouldn’t have to deal with snow yet another winter. As if God might finally hear their cries, take pity on them and dump all the snow on Florida or Hawaii instead.

  After sitting up with Cate until midnight, Robin resented Millie scheduling an extra rehearsal before church in preparation for the Christmas cantata.

  Coming up behind her, Grace said, “You outdid yourself yesterday. I wouldn’t have blamed you if you’d decided to sleep in.”

  “I’m really not at the top of my game this morning,” Robin admitted. “I was groggy when I grabbed what I thought was my prescription bottle, and realized later I’d taken the cat’s pills for diarrhea.”

  Grace guffawed, but then bit her lip. “Are you okay? Can that hurt you?”

  Robin shook her head. “I called the nurse hotline. I’m fine.”

  “No side effects?”

  “Well, I do have a crazy craving for tuna.”

  They laughed and went to the coffee cart to fill Styrofoam cups. Standing with their backs to the wall, they both commented on how sleep-deprived they were. “’Tis the season,” said Robin.

  Grace stifled another yawn. “Yeah, I haven’t been sleeping well lately. I’m so tired of being tired.”

  Robin, having noticed the dark circles under
her eyes yesterday, was glad Grace brought it up. “Are you feeling okay? Maybe you should tell your doctor.” Ever since her bout with cancer, Robin had been much more vigilant about her own health and that of her friends.

  “I don’t need to. I know exactly why I’m tired. It’s Fred’s snoring. It takes me forever to fall asleep and even when I do manage to, his dang snoring wakes me up again. It gets really bad around three or four in the morning.” She rummaged in her purse and pulled out an electronic device a little smaller than a cell phone. “I taped him,” she said.

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Nope. I’ve been telling him for months but he doesn’t believe how bad he is. Now I have evidence.” She grabbed Robin’s sleeve and tugged her around the corner into an unlit hallway behind the kitchen. Pressing a button, she held the device up for Robin to hear.

  Robin tilted her head and listened. Her eyes widened. “Oh, my God, Gracie! That’s terrible!”

  Grace’s head bobbed up and down. “Isn’t it? I wasn’t kidding, and I don’t even have it at full volume.”

  “No wonder you’re exhausted.”

  “Exactly! He snerks and snorks and whiffles and grunts the whole night long!”

  All Robin could do was shake her head.

  Looking vindicated, Grace said, “He claims I snore, too, but there’s just one person making noises on here, and I can assure you, it isn’t me.”

  Millie clapped her hands and called them all to line up. Grace dropped the recorder back into her purse.

  People continued to talk as they picked up music folders and tucked purses in the cubbies of a lockable cabinet. Grace leaned over and touched a finger to Robin’s face. “Hold still. You have something on your upper lip.” Robin saw her look of mischief before Grace said, “Never mind. It’s just a whisker.”

  Robin leveled a look at her.

  There were no risers in the basement but Millie always had them line up exactly the way they would upstairs. Robin and Grace took their places side-by-side in the alto section. Millie announced the first song, and people continued to converse as they leafed through their folders to find the appropriate sheet music.

  “Okay, let’s settle down,” Millie said. “Sing ah, ah, ah, ah, four beats to each note, C-major scale up and back down.” She started them on the note, and they vocalized to her beat as Millie’s hand chopped the air a little higher with each rising note.

  Suddenly Millie’s hand stopped moving, and her head spun to face the cabinet where they’d stashed their purses. The annoyance on her face was obvious as she sought the source of the ragged and grating noise.

  Robin burst out laughing, as Grace’s mouth opened wide and she made a mad dash to the cabinet, where she seized her purse and ripped it open. Soon the recorded snoring stopped, but Robin and Cate did not. Even if no one else had figured out what had happened, Robin had tears in her eyes from laughing.

  Millie’s lips were tight. “We have a Christmas program to put on, and we really don’t have time for your shenanigans. Honestly, you two!”

  It was not the first time Robin and Grace had gotten on Millie’s bad side, with such minor infractions as Robin’s Birkenstocks peeking out from under her choir robe, or Grace dropping her music folder on her way into the sanctuary, but this was surely the worst. Clenching her teeth together to control her laughter, Robin tried not to look at Grace when she stepped back in line.

  The rehearsal did not go well after that. Millie seemed to be convinced they’d played the recording just to mock her and occasionally scowled in their direction.

  After worship service Robin threw an arm over Grace’s shoulder and said, “Gracie, if I tell you something, promise you won’t be mad.”

  “Why would I get mad at you?”

  “Because that second time you played the recording, I’m pretty sure I heard more than one person snoring.” It was for her own health, Robin pointed out to her, to do everything she could to get a good night’s sleep.

  Grace sighed. “Yeah, I heard it too,” she finally admitted.

  “Not that there’s anything wrong with it,” Robin hastened to add.

  “I may snore, but during that last hymn I think I heard meowing coming from somewhere near where you were standing?”

  “Ha ha.”

  “Not that there’s anything wrong with it.”

  * * *

  Foxy Tripp stared at the closed door with her mouth agape. She could not have been mistaken. She knew that walk—a long stride with a slight limp that had been caused by a horrific beating. There was no one else it could have been. Knowing that did nothing to calm her frazzled nerves. In fact, it threw a zillion new complications into the mess. The frying pan dangled from one hand as she raised the other hand to her chest, sure her heart was about to explode.

  Within seconds, her fright began to turn to fury, and without pausing to consider the rashness of her decision, she marched down the hall. She was still scared out of her wits, but she was not about to let that stop her. Action was required. Pounding on the door, she yelled, “Vinnie, you weasel, open the door before I call the cops!”

  She heard scuffling on the other side, and the door opened a crack. Her ex-husband, Vinnie, stared out at her. His eyes widened when he saw the raised skillet, and he quickly slammed the door again.

  “I’m not going away!” she yelled. She figured if he was half as frightened as she was, he’d probably throw himself out the window into a snowbank.

  But soon the door opened again, just enough that she could see his face. “Is he with you?” he asked.

  “Is who with me?”

  “Him. Your lover.”

  “What? No!”

  He pushed his face through the opening and craned his neck around. Seeing no one else, he stepped back to let her in.

  Foxy did what she always did when frightened. She squared her jaw, put her hands on her hips and confronted him head on. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Let me explain.”

  Foxy was shocked to see his puffy eyes underscored by purplish smears. Either he hadn’t slept in a while, or he was ill. In any case, he’d aged. He took a step closer and she smelled the booze. Her stomach was one big knot.

  “What happened to the sheriff?”

  “Oh, God! You’re spying on me? Vinnie, what the hell?” She looked past him into the empty apartment. The only thing the former tenant had left behind was a broken chair. The seat and back cushions were lying end to end on the carpeted floor, as though he’d slept on them. A bottle lay on its side next to the cushions. She was relieved to see there was still plenty of liquid in it. The whole scene was so pathetic, her anger and fear started to dissipate, just a little. “For the love of God, Vinnie, what’re you doing here?”

  “I came to see you. I know this looks crazy.”

  “Damn straight!”

  “I’ve been thinking about you a lot lately, and I just wanted to talk to you face to face, you know? He ducked his head the way he used to do when he’d screwed up something. I waited for you outside, and—” He reached his arms out to her. “It’s a long story, Foxy. Please let me explain.”

  She was speechless.

  “Please,” he begged.

  She and Vinnie had loved and betrayed each other. They’d trusted and mistrusted and hurt each other again and again. And now, when she thought she was finally over him, he stood in front of her, appealing to her humanity and sense of fairness. “You broke into my house!”

  “I did, but—”

  “You broke into my house!” she said more forcefully.

  His Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed. “Yeah, that was dumb.”

  He was shivering, she noticed, and she remembered the landlady had turned the heat way down in the empty apartment, not cold enough for the pi
pes to freeze and burst, but cold enough to make for a miserable night, if he’d indeed spent the night here. The leather jacket he wore over a hooded sweatshirt would not have kept him warm enough.

  “Vinnie, you are an idiot!” She hadn’t seen her ex in years, and their last interactions had been distinctly unpleasant. But looking at his sorrowful expression, she couldn’t bring herself to hate him. She wanted to call the cops and have them haul his sorry ass off to jail, but ultimately curiosity won out. She wanted even more to know what had possessed him to break into her house and hide in the empty apartment. “It’s twenty degrees warmer in my apartment,” she said curtly. “Follow me. I’ll give you ten minutes to explain, and after that you’re out of here.”

  He dipped his head. “Thank you, Frances. That’d be nice.” Few people knew her given name, and fewer ever called her that. She’d always been Foxy, the nickname given to her by her father because of her red hair.

  “C’mon.” She turned on her heel and sensed Vinnie following her.

  Chapter 9

  When Sheriff Harley pulled up to the restaurant, he didn’t see Foxy’s car in the parking lot, but he was still early. Entering the building, he removed his sunglasses and let his eyes adjust to the darkened area around the bar. The hostess seated him at a table near the four-sided fireplace, facing the parking lot so he could watch for her. He ordered black coffee and waited.

  Pier 500 had become a favorite place of theirs since they’d begun dating. Bill and Foxy had spent some fine afternoons in the spring, summer, and fall, eating and then strolling along the St. Croix River near the Hudson Pier just across the street from the restaurant.

  After the second time the waitress filled his cup, she asked if he was ready to order. He checked his watch. Foxy was fourteen minutes late. Not like her at all. She’d left no phone or text messages either. Nada. He hated to bug her if she was running late. Even more, he hated the thought she might have been involved in an accident. Just last month he’d been on the scene of a car that spun off the road and into a pine tree. The driver was a seventeen-year-old girl on her way home from school. She’d died on the way to the hospital. Unbidden, the image came to his mind of the crashed car, with Foxy rather than the high school girl inside.