Beyond Dead

by Jordaina Sydney Robinson

  “Blessedly uneventful.” I picked up one of the baguettes she hadn’t managed to squish and smiled apologetically at the lady behind the counter. “Yours?”

  Sabrina shuffled the top layer of rolls out of the way to look beneath. “Bit of a drama, actually.”

  “There’s going to be a drama if you don’t stop fondling all my baguettes.” The dinner lady tapped Sabrina’s hand as she reached to squeeze another one.

  Sabrina pulled her hand back, slightly embarrassed. “They all look so amazing I just can’t decide.”

  The lady grabbed one at random and slapped it into Sabrina’s hand. “This one.”

  Sabrina eyed the baguette cautiously. “Thanks.”

  I nodded to the lady, who was already grumbling to her colleague, and herded Sabrina away from the queue and towards the doors. “So what was the drama?”

  Sabrina opened the wrapping of the baguette and sniffed it. “Some sort of problem with the files needed for the facilitator assignments.”

  “What kind of problem?” I whispered as we waded against the tide of people trying to get in through the narrow doorway.

  “I’m just a lowly trainee, I don’t get told anything.” We made it out into the empty corridor and Sabrina checked around us. Lowering her voice, she said, “However, I may have overheard something about information being incorrectly filed.”

  “Really? Incorrect filing counts as a drama?”

  “Not all of us can have jobs where we get to give attitude to slimy psychics.” Sabrina poked me in the ribs as we passed through the archway to the arrivals and departures area. “But yes, it counts as drama since the two sheets were incorrectly filed in the other person’s file.”

  “Sooooo …” I paused at the doorway while Sabrina picked a circle. “Someone just got a little confused with a handful of papers?”

  “Or,” Sabrina said, pointing at me with her baguette, “Someone removed the sheets and accidentally returned them to the wrong files.”

  “And they would do that because …?” I asked. Sabrina opened her mouth but closed it without speaking. “You know what your problem is? You see conspiracies in innocent mix-ups.”

  She pointed her baguette at me again. “Doesn’t mean I’m wrong.”

  “Fair enough.” I wasn’t going to win this one.

  Sabrina gestured to the departure circle next to her. When I didn’t move she folded her arms with a sigh. “What’s up?”

  “About this?” I whirled my finger around the room. “I’m kinda in trouble. Oz knows about last night. At breakfast this morning he announced he’s sending me to counselling because he thinks I have ‘adjustment issues’.”

  Sabrina frowned. “Why does he think that?”

  “I might have had a mini meltdown last night when he got all domineering.” I rubbed my forehead trying to wipe away the memory. “He gets all bossy and demanding and it puts me on the offensive.”

  “That’s not adjustment issues. That’s sexual tension.”

  “That’s not helpful.”

  Sabrina shrugged. “Doesn’t make me any less right. And he is hot.”

  “How do you deal with your parole officer?”

  “Well, mine’s an old dear who rules the roost with an iron fist. No ifs no buts, you just do what she says and she leaves you alone. Works for me. How’d he find out?”

  “Apparently, I panicked last night and he followed the link to physically find me.”

  “Oh. Wow. At least he cares. And that is handy if you get lost,” she said.

  I shook my head at her. I guess there really was always a bright side if you knew how to look. “How come yours didn’t catch you out?”

  “Nerves of steel.” She tapped her chest with her baguette. The woman had no real regard for food. “So are we going?”

  I pointed to myself. “Not allowed to investigate.”

  “We’re not investigating,” she said with an exasperated sigh. “We’re observing.”

  “I’m not sure Oz would appreciate the distinction.”

  “So don’t get stressed. He’s your guardian. He’ll never turn you in.” She pointed at the circle next to her. “Let’s go.”

  “You’re a bad influence.”

  She blinded me with her smile. “Thank you.”

  We landed with a loud crunch on the gravel drive of a mansion. Three stories high and twelve windows across. Despite the four-door garage to the left, a red convertible was sitting on the drive.

  “I would’ve murdered him for this too,” Sabrina breathed, wandering to the right of the house to get a better look at the huge cultivated gardens beyond.

  Ten-foot conifers almost hid an indoor pool extension. It seemed a little like overkill when there were no other houses in sight.

  Having taken in the view Sabrina wandered back to the front of the house and knelt down at the door.

  “Er, what are you doing?” I asked peering over Sabrina’s shoulder as she fiddled two long, thin pieces of metal into the door lock. Seconds later she pushed the front door open a crack to peer around it.

  “Getting us inside.” She wiped her feet on the welcome mat and darted inside, beckoning me to follow.

  I grabbed her elbow to pull her back. “What about alarms?”

  “We’re not going to get caught.” She grabbed my hand on her elbow and yanked me in. “We’re ghosts. The regular alive police can’t see us and” – Sabrina threw her hands in the air, gesturing the silence – “alarm’s not set.”

  The entrance was the size of all the rooms in my old house put together. The black and white tiles of the floor were laid in a checked pattern that made you dizzy if you looked at it too long. In the centre of the room stood a spiral staircase of ornate white marble. We crept up the steps and followed the murmur of voices.

  “Come on Porscha, ten more.”

  Sabrina inched the door open and we both peeked around. The room was a fully equipped gym. Treadmill, exercise bike, cross trainer, weight bench, anything you could need to stay fit. The right hand wall was a floor-to-ceiling mirror, I assumed to check your form, and in the far corner a large flat screen TV was mounted halfway up the wall so you could watch TV, exercise and check yourself out in the mirror. Nice.

  Porscha lay on the floor in the middle of the room, knees bent up and arms behind her head. Every bit the blonde bombshell she’d looked in the photo, even sweating her way through a set of sit-ups. The guy, who I assumed was her personal trainer, looked pretty much like every other gym trainer I’d seen: buff, tanned and extremely well groomed. The type of man who would take longer than his girlfriend to get ready in the morning.

  He wore shorter than necessary shorts and a skintight white racer-back vest to show off his physique, whereas Porscha was swamped in a sweat-drenched grey t-shirt worn over black leggings that hugged her long, slender legs.

  “Nine, and ten.” He counted off her sit-ups then offered her his hand and pulled her up, unnecessarily placing a hand on her waist to steady her. “That’s you all done.”

  “Thanks, Chad.” Porscha’s voice was deeper than I expected. Huskier. “I appreciate you changing your schedule.” She reached for a small pink towel to dab her face.

  He smiled and touched her arm. “No worries.”

  “I’ll just get your cheque.” She threw the towel on the exercise bike. “It’s in my bedroom.”

  “In her bedroom.” I shook my head. “Trollop.”

  Seeing Porscha head towards us, we scrambled backwards, tripping over ourselves to get out of the way. We scurried along the landing and ducked into an open room. Hearing Porscha’s light footsteps follow us, Sabrina dragged me into the wardrobe and closed the slatted doors just before Porscha walked into the room.

  “What are you doing?” I hissed, gesturing around us at the tiny space we were stuck in.

  Sabrina pressed her fingers to her lips then pointed out through the slats in response.

  Chad leaned against the door frame. “Nice room,” he s
aid.

  Everything in the room was white, from carpet to walls to duvet cover. There were white lilies in a vase on the nightstand next to a picture of Barry. Porscha flopped onto the bed and burst into tears.

  “I can’t sleep in our bedroom,” she choked out between huge sobs. “I just can’t.”

  Chad strutted over and sat down beside her. He rubbed her back. In response she wiped her snotty nose on his vest and settled against him for what looked like a long sobbing fest. I was pleased to see her upset after watching Barry’s face light up when he’d talked about her. Made it a little more tragic that he was dead, though.

  “Why are we hiding in the wardrobe?” I asked now all the drama had blown over.

  “Shhhh!” Sabrina gestured with her baguette to the couple on the other side of the doors.

  “We’re dead, remember? They can’t hear or see us.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Colour rushed into Sabrina’s cheeks. “Old habits.”

  “Okay, let’s just go. Do you think we can tunnel from inside here?” My stomach kept rumbling and the way Sabrina kept waving her lunch around was not helping to abate it.

  “What? No.” Sabrina looked scandalised. “We have to wait and see what happens.”

  “What happens? She’s covering him in tears and snot. I doubt she’s going to admit to killing Barry between sobs.”

  “I killed him, y’know?” Porscha choked out. “I killed him.”

  Sabrina turned to me, a smug smile stretched across her face. “And you wanted to leave.”

  “I’m not taking that confession as an admission of homicidal guilt.” I waved my hand in her direction and settled into the wardrobe for the long haul. “Just because she feels guilty doesn’t mean she killed him.”

  “Shhhh, now.” Chad patted her back, apparently unaffected by her murderous tendencies since he was still trying to cop a feel.

  “She just admitted it.” Sabrina waggled her baguette in the direction of the ignorant couple on the bed.

  “And what are you two up to?” A head, blood smeared all over her features, with her hair matted to her scalp and one eyeball hanging by a ligament, appeared through the back of the wardrobe inches from my face.

  I swallowed a yelp of surprise and tried to back away, but the only way to go was out. I fell through the doors with a thud. Sabrina landed on my legs, eyes glued to the horror, preventing me from getting to my feet and running for the front door.

  “Barry?” Porscha whispered in our direction, wiping her eyes.

  “Now, look what you’ve done now,” the grotesque head chastised.

  “It’s a faulty catch on the wardrobe door, that’s all,” soothed Chad, gently pushing her head back to his shoulder.

  “Say, you two are awfully jumpy.” The ghost lady materialised in front of us, her gruesome face slowly fading into a healthy, non-damaged face. Blocking our exit, hands on her hips and eyes narrowed on us, “Are you up to no good?”

  “No, no, we’re up to good,” Sabrina reassured her quickly, getting to her feet. “Definitely good.”

  The lady was late sixties, tall, slim and dressed in a classic black skirt suit with a white lily in her lapel. Her face, now fully returned to normal, was framed with thick dark hair swept into a perfect chignon and a fringe that had been cut slightly too short. She reminded me of Anjelica Huston.

  Noticing my attention she tugged at her fringe. “It was the idiots at the funeral home. They cut it so it would sit nicely on my dead face for the open casket. Didn’t give a thought to how I would live with it afterwards, the imbeciles.”

  “Well, since you were dead I’m guessing you ‘living with it’ never occurred to them,” I offered, climbing to my feet while keeping one eye on the still sobbing Porscha and one on the ghost lady.

  “Dead or alive, dear, you never mess with a woman’s hair,” she said.

  Looking at her hacked fringe and touching my own for reassurance, I nodded. “Fair point.”

  “Now.” She folded her hands in front of her, the image of politeness. “Would you ladies care to tell me what you’re doing here?”

  “We were conducting a study on the coping strategies of newly deceased’s loved ones.” Sabrina smiled pleasantly. “And why is it that you happen to be here?”

  She leaned forwards as if she were sharing a secret. “I heard the Queen would be stopping by for tea and scones so I thought I’d drop by and introduce myself.”

  “How did you make the blood go away?” I asked, noticing there was no sign of it at all, unlike with Fenton where it had stained his hairline.

  She glanced at Sabrina then back to me. “Are you a newbie?”

  “I’ve been dead less than a week, Sabrina nearly two.”

  “Oh, my darlings.” She covered her heart and smiled, showing so many teeth it reminded me of a shark, a mother shark. “You’ve come to the right place.”

  Sabrina shot me an unhappy glance. I shrugged and turned back to the lady to find her headless, dressed in a blood drenched white dress and carrying her severed head by the hair, arm extended out in front of her.

  “What do you think?” The detached head somehow managed to nod at me.

  “That’s gross.” Sabrina spoke for me since I was trying not to gag. “Can you please show us how to do that?”

  “Of course.” The head laughed. “They don’t teach you the good stuff in the GA meetings anymore. I would ask a favour in return.”

  Sabrina flipped from awe to suspicion in a blink. “And that favour would be?”

  “I would ask your help to find someone.”

  “Chad, no.” Porscha’s voice broke into our conversation. Until she spoke I’d been tuning her sobbing out. “It’s not right.”

  “You need comfort, Porscha,” Chad smarmed, wiping her tears with his thumb. “Let me give that to you.”

  The ghost lady reattached her head and faded back into her Anjelica Huston self. “Excuse me a moment, ladies.”

  She sat on the bed exactly where Porscha was, overlapping her. The effect was similar to seeing a 3D image without the glasses. When Chad stroked Porscha’s cheek again, the lady’s face changed into a gruesome, badly wrinkled old woman with weeping sores around her mouth. Chad leapt off the bed and stumbled backwards, banging into the doorframe and rubbing his eyes. The lady quickly moved into Chad’s vacated position on the bed, breathing heavily.

  “You’re right. You’re right.” He nodded, eyes wild, looking anywhere but at Porscha. “See you next week.” Chad fled through the door and left the house in a quick patter of footsteps.

  “You forgot your cheque,” a confused looking Porscha said to the sound of the front door slamming, wiping her tears with the back of her hand.

  The ghost lady cocked her head just as a familiar popping sound echoed from the landing.

  “Better get gone, ladies,” she said and disappeared.

  Sabrina grabbed my wrist and tunnelled us just as the footsteps reached the door. We landed on the grassy bank outside the fort.

  “Did they see us?” Sabrina spun in circles, like a dog chasing its tail, checking for any hint of the GBs.

  “Think we got out in time.”

  Sabrina turned to face me. “What the hell just happened?”

  ∞

  “Have you noticed we seem to be accruing more questions than answers?” I whispered to Sabrina, sitting at the back of the room at our GA meeting that night. Eleanor was late in starting the meeting as she’d been chatting to a small group at the front for the past ten minutes. I couldn’t tell if they were anxious or excited about something but there was a lot of gesticulating going on. And in my experience, excessive gesticulation never led to anything good.

  “That happens in the initial stages of investigations sometimes,” Sabrina reassured me, glancing at the group at the front, no doubt with her own suspicions.

  “In fact,” I said as I watched one of the group jump up and down clapping. That just did not bode well. “I don’t think we’
ve actually found any answers.”

  “Sure we have.” Sabrina scowled at the clapping woman. “I mean, not in the sense that we know who killed your predecessor or Fenton or Barry, but in a more general way.”

  “Give me one answer we’ve found.”

  Sabrina flipped up her forefinger to start a count. “Jim was undercover.”

  I folded her finger back down. “Suspicion, not fact. What else?”

  Sabrina flipped her forefinger up again. “That ghost lady this afternoon was Barry’s mum.”

  I folded her finger back down again. “Assumption, not fact. And neither answers any of our questions.”

  “Well … I think we need to take a more proactive approach. Maybe try shaking the tree, see what falls out.”

  I raised an eyebrow to that. “More proactive than hunting Barry down and spying on his fiancée?”

  “Yes.”

  “Dare I ask what’s more proactive than that?”

  “What do you think they’re talking about?” Sabrina nodded towards the small group at the front.

  “I refuse to worry about it until I have to. And I asked what you had in mind?” If she didn’t want to tell me, it wasn’t going to be good.

  “I thought we could snoop through Jim’s file.” She shrugged a little too casually. “Fenton’s too.”

  “I thought you’d checked Jim’s file?”

  She nodded. “I did. I looked through the file in my office.”

  “He has two files?” I blew out a breath and rubbed my temples.

  “There’s possibly a similar file in the office next door.”

  “Why do I sense there’s a catch here?”

  “No catch,” Sabrina said far too quickly. “The office is locked so you need a key to get in and I borrowed one today. You want to check it out after this?”

  “Borrowed? Or borrowed?”

  “I’ll pop it back in the cupboard tomorrow before they even notice it’s gone.”

  “I can’t. I have my counselling session, remember?” I said with a heavy look in her direction.

  “Oh, yeah.” Sabrina rolled her eyes. “After that?”

  “Everyone?” Eleanor tapped the front of the lectern before I could answer. “Tonight, we’ll be looking at traversing the living barriers, but first Alison and Debbie have just told me something very exciting.” Eleanor beamed at them. “Would you like to tell everyone?”