by Wilson, Maer
When Thulu was in “Finder Mode,” he would close his eyes in concentration and get this stillness about him that seemed like the eye of a storm. Energy would pulse around him. It could last anywhere from a few seconds to several minutes. Usually it was over so quickly that I couldn’t tell if others sensed that energy. I asked Nana once and she said she could feel it, too, but Ally only shook her head when I described it.
Life went on and was pretty normal considering the ghosts and such. When we were thirteen, Ally brought home one of her people strays. The girl, Lynda-Jean, was fifteen, the same age as Ally. They met in P.E. class, where Linda-Jean's plumpness and clumsiness made her unpopular.
She preferred to be called LJ, but I called her by her full name. I took a perverse pleasure in her flashes of irritation when I called her that. There was just something about the girl I instantly disliked. I didn't know what it was, just that I sensed an inner “wrongness” about her. Thulu also sensed something. He gave me a look the first time she showed up, and on some level we both knew we didn't like her.
To be fair, she never said or did anything that was less than friendly, either to me or anyone else. She was always polite and laughed easily. The rest of the family seemed to like her well enough. I did my best to bury my feelings, since Ally seemed to really like her and I adored Ally. I never completely succeeded in burying my distrust, although with her continued inclusion into our family, I grew used to her and was able to get along with her. I never stopped calling her Linda-Jean, though.
That was around this same time that I became La Fi. I had volunteered to do a special kind of teriyaki burger for one of the family weekend barbeques. Blending some spices and other secret ingredients, I presented the marinated burgers to Erik, who was Grill King that weekend. I promptly named them “Burgers à la Fiona,” which became “Burgers à la Fi.” They were a big hit, by the way, and I frequently got requests for them and for my other creations as time went by. I always thought it was funny that I got named after food, but La Fi seemed to stick with the family.
It seemed like no time at all before Thulu and I were in high school. Always together in the same classes, we were inseparable. I'm not sure why, but we never argued. We didn't always agree on everything, but it never blew into arguments. When we found something we disagreed on, we talked it out until we came to a consensus. We had a strong respect for each other as people, even as kids. That just grew stronger as we got older.
All of the angst and drama that was present in so many of our classmates' lives— it just wasn't there for us. We already had our plan for after college, and that plan was our agency. We were on a mission and knew where we wanted to go with our lives.
Nana was a tremendous help on a couple of levels. She was able to help us from a practical standpoint. And being an empath gave her a direct pipeline into understanding what we might need emotionally. Plus, she knew what it was like to be different – set aside by special abilities.
By high school we were also starting to work a lot more. We even got paid often enough to start a savings account, which slowly grew as we did. While we never asked, we received tips, money and gifts from the living who were at the receiving end of our messages. Also, the dead would tell us where to find bits of long-forgotten money or small treasures. If there were living heirs, we passed it on. But if it didn't have clear ownership, it was ours. It added up over the years.
When we went to college, we didn't take every class together. Looking logically at the skills we needed, we spread our classes out to cover most of what we'd need for our agency. We divvied up business classes, psychology, accounting, anthropology, sociology, as well as general courses. We took a few legal courses and lessons in various self-defense methods. Thulu continued with his Karate, while I took a less orthodox, more street fighting approach. We both learned how to shoot and care for guns.
I tried Karate once while we were in college. Thulu always encouraged me to give it a go, so I decided what the hell and signed up for a beginning class. I had my little outfit on and stood there in my bare feet, watching the others in their opening moves.
When it was my turn, I moved to the front and stood across from my partner, a tall man a few years older than me. He bowed, and I moved. It really wasn’t my fault. I mean my instincts just kicked in. If an enemy is stupid enough to give me an opening, I’m going to take it. And that bent over figure was just too enticing to pass up. Besides, one never knows what someone could pick up and throw in the middle of a fight.
Yeah, I know. We were inside a dojo. It was a bow, a courtesy, but honestly, he was down on the ground and bleeding from a broken nose before I could even think. I felt awful afterward and paid for his doctor’s bills. I also made a generous donation to the dojo for a scholarship program for promising Karate students. The understanding was that I would never, ever set foot inside as a student again. Not that I wanted to anyway. I was grudgingly allowed in to watch Thulu, though.
To be honest, I think it’s a rather stupid way to fight. Thulu says I’m just too impatient to learn the discipline. He might even be right. Not that I’d give him the satisfaction of telling him so.
Finally we had graduated college, got our Private Investigator's licenses and found our office to set up shop. We made sure the word went out to the supernatural world that we were open for business. We even got a lot of cases fairly quickly. Business took off, and we were pretty pleased with ourselves, convinced we had everything under control and could handle any contingency - right up until the Jones case.
PART TWO
Chapter 4
Sometimes the dead can be really noisy. Especially when they realize I can see and hear them. Of course, if anyone else had been able to hear the racket, they'd probably run in the other direction – which was what I wanted to do. Fortunately, none of the living were around at that moment – well aside from me and Thulu.
Our office was a small, windowless building located in a shabby part of town. The front door was boarded up on the outside and padlocked on the inside. Most people wrote it off as another semi-abandoned building, decorated with graffiti. We kept it that way on purpose – less chance for the living to wander in. A tiny, featureless lobby connected the outside world to the locked door of our inner sanctum.
At that moment, it was far less sanctum and far more Babel than anything else. I was getting a headache.
It had started quietly enough: Thulu and I had come into the office through the back door, turning off the alarm. Our cleaning company had been in, and I gave a cursory look around to check on their work. The bathroom was in the back and the air there still smelled of cleaning solutions. A quick flip of the light showed everything was clean and shiny.
I gave a glance in the mirror and saw that my ponytail was slightly crooked. I pulled the band out, finger combed the blonde strands back into place and put the band back in. The freckles from childhood had faded, but time had made me look even more like Nana Fae, a thought that pleased me.
The rest of the building, except for the lobby, was our main office. Light from a series of skylights in the ceiling gleamed from recently polished surfaces. Our heavy wooden desks sat in the center of the room, with the keyboard trays tucked away. Comfy executive chairs sat behind the desks, and two padded chairs for visitors nestled in the V between them. State of the art gaming towers sat on the floor, and large monitors were placed precisely in the center of each desk.
Thick, plush carpet in bluish gray encouraged going barefoot and showed signs of recent vacuuming.
One corner held a dark blue sofa, matching chairs and end tables. Thulu's pinball machine and the Tiffany lamp above the antique pool table were turned off. The small kitchen area was sparkling, awaiting the next time my food muse came to visit. All was well at the Thulukan Agency.
Thulu booted up both computers and gave me a quick grin. We hadn't had much traffic for a couple of weeks. I grabbed sodas from the refrigerator and handed one to Thulu.
Thul
u had grown into a handsome man. Not the movie star kind, but he did get attention from the ladies. Somehow he was completely oblivious of this fact. His brown hair was still thick and still lightened with gold streaks in the sun, and his eyes were as warm as ever. His Karate kept him in great shape, and his muscles were defined without being too much. He was definitely easy on the eyes.
Since we didn't have any cases, we settled into our online game. We were busy fighting a virtual dragon, listening to a film soundtrack, when I felt the air change.
It was one of the dead. A sweet-looking, plump, coffee-skinned woman in her late fifties stood quietly in front of our desks. Her almost substantial form was dressed nicely in a soft lavender suit and plum colored blouse. Her plum purse and shoes matched her silk blouse. The dead seemed to make up for substance with smell, and she had brought a hint of lilac with her. She was one of those who had caught on that she could look any way she chose. And she chose style and grace. I liked that in the dead.
Her voice was soft-spoken and genteel as she addressed Thulu. “Have I found the Thulukan Agency?”
Thulu had gotten very good at lip reading and glanced in my direction. The dead woman quickly turned to me with a smile.
“Yes, this is the Thulukan Agency. I'm Fiona Thulukan, and this is my husband and partner, Erik Thulukan. Please feel free to call us Thulu and La Fi, though. Would you care to sit?” I pointed at one of the chairs in front of our desks, ignoring Thulu's raised eyebrow at my formal tone. Our visitor brought out the politeness in me. She nodded graciously and sat down. We moved our monitors to the far sides of our desks and pushed in our keyboard trays.
“So, how may we help you?”
“Before I - well – before, I had purchased a locket for my granddaughter.” She pulled a picture from her purse. If I looked a certain way I could see the locket in the picture. It was a gold, modern swirled design with a scattering of nice sized diamonds across the center. The entire locket was about an inch by an inch. Thulu leaned in to get a closer look.
“I had it engraved on the inside with a personal message: 'Congratulations Cara' and the caduceus below it. She was finally done with all her schooling and residency and has recently taken a job here in San Francisco as a doctor. This was to be her welcome home gift.” She paused, obviously gathering her thoughts.
“It's a beautiful locket,” I said to give her a moment. I began to suspect this wasn't a typical lost item. “May I ask your name?”
“Oh, yes, forgive my manners, I'm Jane Andrews.”
“Well, Mrs. Andrews –”
“Please call me Jane.”
“Thank you, Jane. So, please continue your story,” I invited her gently. I can be very pleasant when it suits me, and I liked this woman. Besides, there was more here than an untimely death and a lost locket. I could feel the energy.
“I had the box in my night stand in my bedroom.” She stopped and looked at me.
I could see the anguish in her soft brown eyes. Her lilac scent took on some vinegar. I leaned forward, although I knew I could never make physical contact. Sometimes just the gesture will help a client, though. Thulu rolled his chair over next to mine to better read her lips. I'd fill him in on the details he missed after I got her entire story.
She took a deep breath. Well, she didn't really, but old habits do die hard. “I fought, you know.” She looked at me expectantly.
“Good, I'm glad you did fight.” I exchanged a glance with Thulu. I felt the familiar excitement I get with a special case. I'd gotten good at telling those over the years. Thulu picked up that this was going to be “one of those cases.”
“I always thought I'd go peacefully in my sleep. Never did I imagine I'd be murdered in my own bed,” she confided with an air of embarrassment.
“It can happen to the best of us, Jane,” I sympathized, but I wasn't surprised. Something was still making my nerves tingle. “Did you know who they were?”
She nodded, “Yes, they were part of that gang my good-for-nothing grandson, Robin, belonged to before they killed him, too.”
And as simple as that, our quiet chat was interrupted.
“I was not good-for-nothing, Gran. That damned Tyler Jones double-crossed me!” shouted a young man from the door to our office. Hearing his name had effectively lured Robin in. He was about nineteen with the thin, slightly emaciated look of someone who definitely had partaken of drugs of the illegal kind. He was dressed in jeans, a green T-shirt and athletic shoes.
“Oh my god, Tyler Jones killed me too!” wailed a young Hispanic girl as she materialized inside the room. She was about eighteen and also dressed in jeans and a T-shirt.
Suddenly the air was filled with wails and shouts from more of Tyler Jones’s victims. Their individual scents collided in olfactory overload as their emotions soared. Flowers competed with the stench of the grave. I even caught a whiff of new-car smell. Thulu was also catching the scents, and he wrinkled his nose in distaste.
There had to be a dozen people at that point. Men and women, boys and girls, black, white, Hispanic and Asian. That Jones character certainly didn't discriminate in his victim choice.
Jane stared at me in alarm. I made a calming gesture to her with both hands. I fervently hoped there were no more victims, but decided not to take the chance on calling them in right then. Thulu raised an eyebrow in my direction. I shook my head and wrote Jones's name on a slip of paper for him to see.
“Apparently this guy has been a very bad boy.” I said quietly.
Raising my voice and pitching it to cut through the clamor, I said, “Okay, everyone settle down, please.”
There was a stunned silence for a few heartbeats – mine and Thulu's anyway.
A soft buzz began as they realized I could see and hear them. I opened my mouth to head off the coming storm, but it broke anyway as they decided to compete with each other for my attention. Jane simply sat in her chair, looking appalled at the chaos around us.
It was at that point my headache began, between the noise and overpowering smells. As tempting as it was to seek refuge in crankiness, I simply didn't have the heart to yell at these misplaced people. I closed my eyes and held my breath, rubbing my temples for a few seconds.
“Now all of you just be quiet. She can't hear with all this racket. And control your scents.” Jane's voice cut through the cacophony. I opened my eyes to see her stand and turn to them with a stern look. I saw the drill sergeant she could have been come to the fore.
There were a few lingering shouts, but they settled right down with a look from our Miss Jane, who I was growing to like more and more. Even the air became cleaner. She serenely sat back down and smiled at me.
“I seem to have started something.”
I nodded as I looked around at the ghosts in the room. Many had not discovered what Jane had about appearance; they were much as they had been at death. In some cases, it was pitiful. In others, horrific. In all, it was deplorable, as I realized that many had been murdered by Jones. I abandoned my slip of paper and pencil and pulled out my electronic tablet.
I opened a new document, named it ‘TJones’ and typed Jane's name at the top. With my most serious and professional expression, I looked up at Jane. I made eye contact with each of the visitors in sight before turning back to Jane. I'd learned that this technique somewhat countered our young age.
“Jane, how long ago did – your current condition begin?”
“July 13th. What is today's date?” she asked.
“July 21st.”
She thought for a moment, then repeated questioningly. , “July 21st?” She seemed surprised. “I didn't realize it had been over a week already.”
I nodded knowingly. “That happens.” I looked around the room again. “I'm going to need each of you to remember as much as you can, okay?”
There were nods and murmurs of agreement and a lot of thoughtful looks.
“Is anyone here not connected to this man?”
A young girl sheepishly r
aised her hand.
“What did you need help with?”
She shuffled her feet and looked at the floor. “Nothing, really. I just heard the noise and thought I'd see what was going on.”
Hiding my slight irritation, I said, “Well, you may want to come back later on, when I can devote more time to you, if you need help with anything. For now, I need only the people involved with this case.”
She nodded and gave a little wave as she disappeared.
“Anyone else?”
Another form came forward. It was Parker, a fourteen year old boy who had become friends with me and Thulu and whose story I had yet to unravel. Parker didn't remember what had happened to him, but again, I needed to concentrate on the case at hand. I motioned with my head to a corner where he promptly sat cross-legged mid-air over the pinball machine. It was his usual spot. His scents tended to vary; today, he was peanut butter.
Sometimes the delicate path just takes too long. “Was anyone here not killed by this man?”
Two more stepped forward. A tiny elderly Asian woman said, “He knocked me down going into a restaurant. I fell and broke my arm.” She paused. “But he paid for the doctors, and it healed.” She smiled a wide toothless smile.
“Okay, thank you. Is there anything else about this that you can shed light on?”
She shook her head thoughtfully. “But I think maybe I will come to see you another time.”
I gave her a nod. She nodded back and disappeared. I looked at the other person who had come forward. It was hard to tell his age. His hair and beard were wild tangled masses of dirty gray. His clothes were also filthy, hanging from his emaciated frame. A waft of sun kissed garbage made it to my nose – which should have been immune at that point.
“Devon Parrish, ma'am.” He had a distinct Southern drawl.
I caught the dull gleam of a medal on his chest – the Bronze Star. He caught my look and gave me a modest smile. His glance hit Jane in her distinguished suit. I could see his embarrassment at his own state.