by Alex A King
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Not really in the mood for food poisoning tonight.”
“Free weight loss,” Jimmy said, not even remotely helpfully.
“Awww, he’s the size of a butt plug,” Choker said. She and Bleeder dissolved in a pool of high-pitched giggles.
The date was over. These boots were useless now. One at a time I tugged them off my feet until I was in socks.
Leo looked at my cotton-clad toes, lips lifting slightly at the edges, as though being tugged upwards with a flimsy string. “Bare feet?”
“They’re not bare. I’m wearing socks.”
“If anyone sees you you’ll never hear the end of it.”
True story. On my deathbed I’d be hearing about that one time I ran downstairs in my socks. They’d be jawing about it at my funeral. My shoeless feet would be my legacy. Not Finders Keepers. Not the husband and children I would maybe one day have. Nobody would mention the time I found that one thing they coveted more than the fountain of youth itself.
Did that stop me?
No, it did not.
“I’ll hurry,” I said. I gave Leo one last longing glance and skidded down the hallway, boots in hand.
“Allie?”
I screeched to a silent stop, pausing at the top of the stairs. “What?”
A tiny romantic fragment of my soul reared its pink, lacy head. It wanted kissing, followed by a sprint to third base.
“Let me know if you find out anything about Roger Wilson that I can use. Something real and solid.”
Romance schmomance.
Crying wasn’t my thing. I could cry—and did—but random tear-ups were infrequent. Tonight though? Different story. The sudden heat in my tear ducts meant a quick cry was in my future if I didn’t distract myself. Time to drown myself in work. It’s hard to cry when you’re on the hunt.
I nodded once, then scurried down the stairs to do damage control before anyone witnessed my social faux pas.
My phone rang.
“Why are you running around barefoot?” my sister asked.
“I’m wearing socks! Wait—how did you know? Are you spying on me?”
“One of your neighbors was peeping out their peephole and saw you.”
My outrage was palpable. “I’m in my own apartment building!”
“That doesn’t matter to these people,” Toula said darkly. Most of the time I thought she’d gone completely to the Greek side, but occasionally I got glimpses of the Toula who grew up in the USA, same as me.
My sister made me promise to find slippers before bringing shame upon our family, then ended the call before I could make fun of her for caring about our social standing.
On the second floor it was just me and Lydia, and given her fashion tastes I didn’t think my socks would rate highly on her scandal meter. I let myself into my apartment, then, eyes closed, pressed my back against the door, willing the tears to scram. Crying over a failed date was silly. But then it wasn’t just one date, was it? It was all of them. And the part where he used to be Toula’s high school sweetheart. So I guess I was crying for the lost potential. In a different world Leo and I would be dating. No obstacles. No weird dinners that morphed into horror shows. Also his cousin wouldn’t be the world’s smallest couch-dweller.
The smell of scorched coffee and garbage hit my nose. My eyes popped open. Immediately my hand flew up to cover my nose and mouth. I didn’t gag but that was all down to my self-control.
I flicked on the light. If I was a real Greek I would have opened the light instead.
On my living room wall someone had written VANQUISH WILSON in garbage. Coffee grounds. Old napkins. Crushed cups from Merope’s Best. Bits of uneaten cake smushed against the paint. A mosaic of ick and ew.
Twin thunderbolts struck me at the same time.
Someone or something really wanted Wilson if they were willing to dig through Merope’s Best’s garbage. The coffee shop’s products were one step up from hot crap when the day was just starting. Second thing: The vandal could see ghosts—or at least they knew Roger Wilson was wafting around the island, dispensing his charm.
Vanquish Wilson? Was that even possible?
For someone who’d been seeing ghosts forever, my knowledge base contained gaps the size of the Sahara.
Dead Cat materialized by the wall. He stared up at the smelly message. To my surprise he rubbed his flank along the painted surface, the air vibrating with his train-like purr.
“No,” I said. “No purring. This is vandalism. We don’t validate vandals.”
A shudder started in my tailbone, radiating up and out until my body was one big shiver. Whoever had done this meant business. They’d worked fast while I was upstairs saying no to Crusty Dimitri’s, and they knew more than me about the dead.
How did they get in?
The windows were locked. The door had been, too. Yet Jimmy had managed to shimmy into my apartment somehow, too, so there was still a chance the garbage artist exploited the same loophole.
I messaged Leo.
Put your interrogation skills to good use and find out how your garden gnome got into my apartment.
The reply came back a moment later: Okay.
I sat in the same spot for what felt like forever, until a fist rapped on the door, shooting me out of my skin. I jumped up, pressed my eye to the peep hole.
Toula.
My sister is me but with a prim, proper personality and a wardrobe to match. Her bra size is bigger, too, which she used to crow about. Then she had two kids and now she’s put the boasting on ice. My nephew and niece were with her tonight. Milos—eight—and Patra—six—were having a dance off in the hall. Patra was performing moves that normally went with poles and glitter. Milos was dabbing, which is dancing for the uncoordinated and unmotivated.
Not sure what I’d been expecting on the other side of the door, I let my breath out with a whoosh and yanked the door open. The kids instantly spotted Dead Cat still rubbing against the wall and darted under my arm to get to him. Milos and Patra share my ability—a recent development—much to their mother’s chagrin.
“I didn’t realize you were coming over. Didn’t we just talk?”
She gave me funny look. “An hour ago.”
Had I been sitting there that long? “It’s not that I don’t love Milos and Patra, but isn’t it a school night?”
“Kostas broke his thumb. I have to take him to the hospital because he’s in the van, crying like a little girl. Can you watch them for a while?”
Could I? “Um …”
Her gaze slid past me, landing on the living room wall’s garbage art. “Redecorating?”
“Message from an intruder.”
“An intruder,” she said weakly. “Milos, Patra … time to go.”
“No, no,” I said, “it’s okay. Trash Banksy expressed himself all over my wall while I was scurrying home from dinner in my socks, and now he’s gone.”
Her gaze was on the move again. This time it latched onto the boots in my hand, then dipped to my socked feet. “Why are you shoes still off? What if somebody sees you?”
I clutched my chest in a performance worthy of an Ancient Greek melodrama. “Our reputation!”
Her focus shifted. “Wait—dinner? In high heels?
“They’re just boots.”
She raised an eyebrow until it was as sharp as a razor blade, a trick she’d inherited from our mother.
“It wasn’t a date,” I said.
“Who?”
I said nothing.
“Was it Leo?”
“It wasn’t dinner—just mezedes. And besides—”
“Mama, Thea Allie, look!”
Patra and Milos were laughing at my television, which was levitating around the living room. Dead Cat got in on the action. The oversized and very dead feline jumped onto my sofa, then pounced on the flat screen. Toula’s kids collapsed in a pile of giggles.
“I’m not seeing this,” Toula said. “This is not happening
.”
I scooped up my niece, grabbed my nephew, and all but tossed them out the door. Behind me, the television kissed the marble floor. There was a sickening snap as the screen cracked. I winced.
“I’d love to take them,” I said, “but maybe now isn’t a good time.”
“A good time for what?” came a male voice in the hallway.
Toula’s face flushed the color of measles. “Leo,” she said.
Virgin Mary. This night had no place to go but up. Instead, it hopped on the elevator and punched DOWN.
I stuck my head out the door. “Perfect timing. Got a bit of vandalism happening here.”
“Was it Jimmy?”
“Not unless he can be in two places at once.” There was barely enough of the sawn-off twerp to be in one place.
“I don’t think he can do that,” Leo said. “But I did finally figure out how he got in.” He dangled a set of lock picks from one finger. “He said he was practicing for a scene in one of his, uh, movies.”
“Jimmy? Your cousin Jimmy? The …” Toula’s voice trailed off. Someone was hunting for the polite word for nanos. “…the short, blond one?”
Nicely done, Toula. Very diplomatic.
“You remember him?” Leo said.
She nodded. “I remember he wanted to be an actor. Did he make it?”
Leo grinned. “Something like that.”
Toula shot me a questioning look.
Great. Fabulous. Leave me the dirty work. “Jimmy is the star of such films as Little Men, Big Tools; Little Men, Big Tools 2; Little Men, Big Tools 3; and …”
My sensible, uptight sister closed her eyes. “Stop talking,” she said. “Please stop talking.”
“I know that movie,” Patra said.
Our heads all swiveled toward the tiny girl with the big mouth.
“What?” Toula said faintly.
“Baba was watching it in the bathroom.”
Color drained out of Toula’s face. “When was this?”
“The other day.” Patra shrugged. “I don’t think he liked it much because he was sad when I came in. It’s because of his naked mole rat. It was dying, I think, and he was trying to rub it alive. I told him I could make him a magic potion to bring it back to life but he told me to get out.” She looked up at her mother. “Mama, why doesn’t Baba let us play with his naked mole rat? We wouldn’t hurt it.”
My eye twitched, but overall I thought I was holding it together well. Probably because I knew Toula would decapitate me if even a sliver of laughter squeaked out.
“Naked mole rat,” Leo murmured.
“She means Baba’s poutsa,” Milos said helpfully. “I’ve got one of those but it’s not as big as naked mole rat yet.”
My sister found the wall. She leaned against it for support—mental as much as physical. “Somebody take my children. Please. Take them.” She closed her eyes. “Except you, Allie. You’ve got enough problems.”
Leo shot me a questioning look.
“Vandal,” I told him.
He peered in at my wall. “Vandal,” he agreed. “So much has happened since you first mentioned it a minute ago.” His gaze cut to Toula.“Why does someone need to take your children?”
“Toula’s husband broke his thumb,” I said.
Something told me Toula was going to break more than Kostas’ thumb. There was a strong chance she’d tell the doctor not to administer any pain relief.
“They can come with me,” he said.
Toula’s nostrils flared. She was this close to a thank you but no thank you.
“Perfect,” I said before she had a chance to reply.
Leo took another gander at the mess on the wall. “I’ll take them upstairs and call Pappas. He’ll check out your, uh, vandal situation.”
“Run along,” I told Toula. “Take care of Kostas. If you’re good he might let you pet his naked mole rat.”
“I hate you,” she said.
I blew her a kiss and winked at my niece and nephew, who were busy making fart noises on their arms. Patra was winning. For a tiny thing she was a master of fake flatulence.
Toula left. Leo left. I stood in the hallway waiting for Pappas to show, which he did about ten minutes later.
“I was on a date,” he said. The rookie cop was dressed down in gray sweat pants, sneakers, and a leather jacket over his white T-shirt.
“With who? Yourself?”
He hung his head. “My mama.”
“Close family.”
“She wants me to leave Merope to go back to school. She wants me to do something safe.”
“Like what?”
“The Church.”
“Then you’d be Pappas Pappas.”
Pappas is one of several words that means father. Greek Orthodox priests were all Pappas Whoever.
He rubbed his hand over his shaved head. “Can I look through your underwear drawer?”
“No.”
“It was worth a try. What is the problem? It’s not a murder, is it?”
“No murder. More like a bad piece of art that really doesn’t work with my paint scheme.”
He took a look at the wall. “It needs more coffee, fewer used diapers.” Using his phone, he snapped pictures. “Any idea who did this?” The stench of garbage didn’t appear to faze him. Only death made him yak.
“No.”
He indicated to the wall’s message. “Wilson? That is the one who died this morning, yes? The xenos?”
Xenos means other or foreigner, which is what you are if you weren’t born and raised on this tourist-a-rific chunk of Greek rock.
“I guess so. There aren’t any other Wilsons around here.”
“Vanquish him. Very strange. He already vanquished himself this morning. The coroner said it was a heart attack.”
There was no point correcting him. He didn’t know about my woo-woo ability to see ghosts. Greeks can be an enigmatic bundle of contradictions. On one hand, their minds are wide open to the possibility of otherworldly weirdness. On the other, the devil is cunning.
Vanquish Wilson.
What did that mean? It seemed to me like death was the last station on the train tracks, and there was nowhere for him to be vanquished to except the Afterlife. I couldn’t do diddly squat about that. The Afterlife was inaccessible to pulse-havers. I couldn’t even give the guy directions beyond “Go toward the light, Carole Ann”.
It struck me once again that Roger Wilson was a murder victim, which meant someone on this island had done the dastardly deed. Was the vandal Wilson’s killer, taunting me? Boy, he or she must have really hated the Englishman. Wasn’t enough to kill the man; now they wanted him permanently scrubbed from the mortal coil.
Maybe this vanquishing had put the wind up Wilson. Yes, he was jittery about things like soul-pooping and butt-stuff, but what if those were metaphors? The salt circles, the fear, could be they were all about the creep who’d decorated my apartment with garbage—a creep who wanted Roger Wilson permanently gone.
I had questions. I wanted answers—answers I couldn’t get while Pappas was wandering toward my bedroom, phone in hand.
My finger hooked the back of his leather jacket. “Stay away away from my underwear drawer, pervert.”
“How did you know?”
“You’re breathing.”
“Just a peek?”
“You can buy underwear on the internet. You can even buy used underwear on the internet.”
“It’s not the same,” he said. “Could you find me some?”
“Send me an email. We’ll discuss my fee.”
Once I steered Constable Pappas out of my apartment, I surveyed the damage. A new television was a must but not tonight. There was something else I wanted to do first.
No, not cleaning up. Part of me was hoping if I went out for a while the wall would clean itself. Naive, no. Deluded, most certainly.
The night was spiraling towards chilly. I shoved my feet into comfortable boots, shrugged into a medium weight jacket,
and grabbed my bag before jogging downstairs. It took me a couple of minutes to reach Merope’s main street, where old Vasilis Moustakas was crossing the road with his walker. He didn’t bother checking for traffic—no point. The old wiener waver died when a teenager hit him in her fancy car, so he had already exhausted the worst case scenario.
All the same, I winced as a moped drove straight through him.
“That tickled,” he said when he noticed me watching him.
I got off my bicycle and crouched down, faking a loose shoelace. Didn’t want anyone to spot me talking to someone who didn’t appear to be there.
“While you are down there, take a look at this …”
I looked up and came face to tip with Kyrios Moustakas’s wrinkled, crooked salami. Although it was futile, my hand tried to swat it away.
The old ghost wheezed.
“There are laws about that sort of thing,” I said.
“Not for me.” He had a point and I knew it. “What did you come to see an old man about, eh?”
Head down, I fiddled with my shoelace. “What scares you?”
“Questions.” He cackled. One of us thought he was a comedian.
“I’m serious. I need to know what scares … uh … ghosts.”
He stumped across the road with his walker. Why did the ghost cross the road? In this ghost’s case, so he could turn around and do it all over again. For whatever reason, this was the existence Kyrios Moustakas chose. To be fair, from the main road he could keep an eye on most of the island’s comings and goings. Not much escaped him. The only thing that gossiped harder than a Greek woman was a Greek man—the older the Greek, the more virulent the gossip.
“Kyrios Moustakas?”
He ignored me to take another trip across the road and back again.
“Kyrios Moustakas?”
“What do you want, eh? All you do is talk, talk, talk.”
This from a phantom blabbermouth. “What’s capable of scaring a ghost?”
“Why do you ask me these questions? I know nothing. All I want to do is walk across the road and watch the pretty women in summer.”
“There’s a ghost who wants my help. He’s scared of someone and I don’t understand why.” I crossed my fingers. “You’re my number one authority on ghost business.”