It might not have been a psychic connection, but Abby received an answer of sorts when the phone rang. She picked up quickly and found it was her mother.
“Abby? I didn’t wake you up, did I? I know it’s only eight, but you’ve always been an early bird.”
“No, Mom, I was just getting up.”
“You mean Bradley has left already?”
“Yes. He wants to be the first one in the office to impress everybody. He’s still the new kid.”
“But he’s enjoying his work?” Why was it everything her mother said came out as a question?
“Yes, he likes it fine.”
“And you like your new place?”
Abby tucked the handset of the phone between her chin and shoulder and wandered out to the kitchen to start her coffee. “Well, it’s not permanent, but it’ll do for now.”
“Have you had any luck finding a job?”
“No, Mom, I’ve been busy getting settled, and getting to know the area. I haven’t decided what I’m looking for, anyway.”
“I’m sure you’ll find something. You’re such a smart girl, and so talented.”
Yes, Mom, thank you. Nice that somebody believes in me.
Mom’s chirpy tones went on relentlessly. “And what have you been doing for fun?”
“Well, we eat out, and I’ve met some of Brad’s friends from work. Oh, and yesterday I took a tour of the Revolutionary battleground sites in Lexington and Concord. And Walden Pond.”
“Oh, that sounds lovely, dear. I know you always liked history.”
All right, Mom, why are you calling me now? “Mom, did you call for a reason?”
“Oh, well, yes. Well, it turns out your father has a meeting in New Jersey, and I thought I’d go along with him, so we decided to drive down. I wanted to drop something off at your place on the way, if you’re going to be around?”
“When, Mom?” As if she wouldn’t be around—where else would she be?
“Tomorrow? If we start real early, we could be there by mid-afternoon. Now, don’t you worry about feeding us or putting us up. I know you’re not settled yet. But I’d love to see you, and your father would too, and it seems like such a good opportunity . . .”
“Sure, Mom, I’ll be here. I’d love to see you too. Why don’t you let me cook you dinner? Give me a call when you know you’re getting close, and I can give you directions to get to our place from the highway.” If she could figure them out herself.
“That would be wonderful, sweetheart. We’ll do just that. Now, I’ll save all my other chitchat until we see you tomorrow. You take care now. Bye!” She rang off.
Abby heaved a sigh. She loved her mother, but she sometimes wondered about the vagaries of genetics. Her mother was short, round, and bristled with energy and good cheer. Abby was taller and more slender—no one had ever called her round. Or energetic and cheerful. She was more likely to be described as cautious, meticulous, and boring. More like her father, she supposed—but her father and mother had been together over thirty years and still they were very happy together. Oh, sometimes her father would get this glazed look in his eye, and Abby knew he was thinking about something entirely unrelated to what her mother was talking about—at great length. And then he’d catch Abby watching him, and wink at her.
When Rebecca and Marvin Kimball had first met Brad, he and Rebecca had hit it off marvelously. Brad took delight in teasing her, and she gave back as good as she got. Abby’s father, Marvin, had just sat back and watched them banter, as though they were both fractious children. Later, though, he had taken Abby aside and asked if she was happy. She had assured him she was, and he hadn’t pressed any further.
So now they’d be here—tomorrow. The place was clean, so that was no problem. She could cook them dinner, which meant she might need to shop . . . which would cut into her research time. But then she realized that this would be a perfect opportunity to ask her parents about their family histories. Maybe they wouldn’t know all the details, but at least she could get started, and at this point, any information would be a plus. And then maybe she could go back to the library, or look online, later in the week, if she found something she could follow up on. So maybe today she could focus on learning more about psychic phenomena involving dead people.
* * *
Her parents arrived right on schedule, late on Tuesday afternoon. Abby opened the door to their knock to find them juggling between them a strangely wrapped bundle that was nearly as big as one of them.
“Hi, darling,” her mother puffed. “We made it!”
“I can see that. And what on earth did you bring?”
“Here, Marvin, set it down in the living room. There.” Her mother surveyed the room. “Oh, this is sweet. Not real big, but it’s just the two of you. And I know you’ll be looking for a bigger place soon, right?”
“Sure, Mom—we just wanted to get to know the neighborhoods, what the commute is like, things like that, before we started looking. We’ve got a month-to-month lease.” She hugged each of her parents. Her mother, as always, felt like a bundle of energy, but Abby thought her father looked a little frailer, a little more stooped. “How are you, Daddy?”
“I’m fine, sweetie. I’m just happy to see my girl.”
She turned back to her mother. “Okay, Mom, what is that thing?” She pointed toward the bundle, which was wrapped round and round with bubble wrap, clear plastic, and tape.
“Well, I thought now that you and Brad have a place together, you might like something nice for it. So I brought you your grandmother’s rocking chair.”
Abby was touched. It was a piece of furniture she’d always loved as a child, a graceful wooden rocker made of mahogany. Her favorite part was the carved swan heads that formed the curve of each arm. “Oh, Mom, I love that chair! And it’s perfect for here—not too big, and a sort of timeless style. It’s wonderful! Thank you!” She hugged her mother again, much to her mother’s surprise.
“Well, I knew you loved it, and it’s only right that it should pass down through the family and go in your first real home.” Her mother took another visual tour of the room. “So, are you going to show me the rest of this place? And what smells so good? What time will Brad get home? You said he takes the train? Is that far?”
Abby let her mother’s relentless chatter wash over her as they walked through the small apartment, Abby’s father trailing quietly behind. They had just wrapped up the tour when Brad came in, and they had to go through the elaborate greeting rituals: Brad pumped Marvin’s hand several times, slapped him on the shoulder, and endeavored to look sincere when he inquired about Marvin’s health; then he grabbed Rebecca Kimball in a warm bear hug, and they beamed at each other, and everyone was happy. Then Brad offered to get everyone drinks, and Abby retreated to the kitchen to put the finishing touches on dinner.
Dinner was a cheery affair. Brad sincerely liked his prospective in-laws, which pleased Abby. Rebecca didn’t bring up whether they had managed to set a date yet for the wedding, and Marvin just smiled quietly at all of them. They had reached dessert—Brad having uncharacteristically volunteered to clear the dinner plates away—when Abby remembered what she wanted to ask her parents.
“Mom, Dad, what can you tell me about your family histories? We never talked much about your grandparents and their parents, where they came from, when I was growing up. But there’s so much of a sense of history around here, it makes me curious. Were any of them from Massachusetts?” There—she’d cast her nets.
Predictably, Rebecca spoke first. “Well, goodness, I don’t know that I’ve ever thought much about it. I know there’s a lot of popular interest in genealogy-type things, television shows and such, but I can’t tell you a whole lot about my side.” Her face darkened. “You know, I guess we didn’t talk about it much because of your great-grandpa. When he up and left my grandmother—your great-grandmother—it was like she erased him from the earth. She never would talk about him after that. So that left kind of a black ho
le on that side.”
“I’d forgotten about that whole story. Did he ever come back?”
“No, not in person. A long time later, Nana got a letter from somewhere out west saying that he was dead, but he didn’t leave much of anything. She just told whoever it was to go ahead and bury him out there, and that was the end of it. She might have gotten a death certificate—I think he was a veteran, and she wanted to collect his pension. But I have no earthly idea where any of that information might be.”
“Weren’t you ever curious?”
“Well, sure, but she was so closemouthed, she discouraged any interest. So I never found out anything, I guess.”
“Do you know his name? I know you said Nana took back her maiden name after he disappeared.”
Rebecca shook her head. “Can’t recall at the moment, but maybe it’ll come to me. He might have come from Massachusetts, but don’t quote me on that. Well, now, what about that dessert? We’ve got to get to the motel, ’cause we’re off early tomorrow.”
Refusing to be diverted, Abby turned to her father. “What about your side, Dad?”
He smiled fondly at her. “Nobody special, as far as I know. I think there’s a chart your aunt Elsie put together—maybe I can dig that up and have your mother send it to you.”
“Thanks, Dad.” Abby went to the kitchen to dish out apple pie and scoop ice cream, but her mind was somewhere else. She was troubled. Her mother hadn’t given her much to go on. There had to be more, somewhere. At least, she hoped so. Maybe she could try her mother again, after they got back from New Jersey. It would be kind of hard to find her mystery great-grandfather’s name, with so little to go on. She didn’t even know where her great-grandparents had been married. Ah, well, it didn’t have to be a dead end, and it certainly was a challenge.
The Kimballs left shortly after nine. Much as she loved them, Abby sighed with relief when the door closed behind them. It took a lot of energy to keep up with her mother. When she turned from the door, she found Brad industriously unwinding the wrappings from the chair.
“Hope you don’t mind, babe—tomorrow’s trash pickup day, and I wanted to get this stuff out.”
“No problem. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it, but I thought it was wonderful when I was growing up. Mom always made me be careful when I sat on it because it was old.”
Brad had the wrappings off in short order and bundled the scraps up, stuffing them into a plastic bag. Abby studied the chair, now revealed. It looked much as she remembered it, although maybe a bit smaller. Her mother had reupholstered the seat, but Abby recalled how proud her mother had been that she had preserved the original horsehair stuffing. And now it’s mine, Abby thought. It really was lovely, free from the excesses of High Victorian taste—simple and elegant. In fact, it made the functional Ikea furniture she and Brad had collected so proudly look tacky.
Brad emerged from the kitchen clutching several trash bags. “I’ll just go stick this in the Dumpster, okay? Hey, are you going to stand there all night admiring it, or are you going to sit in it?” He wrestled the bags out the door.
Abby walked up to the chair and reached down to pick it up and move it to a more convenient position. But when she touched the polished wood, she felt as though she had been slammed by a baseball bat. Fragmented images buffeted her. She snatched her hands away, and the images stopped. Abby stood transfixed, staring at the chair. She’d grown up with this chair, sat in it hundreds of times, and nothing like that had ever happened. What was going on?
Well, Abby, there’s one way to find out. She turned and carefully sat down on the seat and laid her hands on the arms of the chair.
Pain. Joy. There was a child in her arms. It was a rosy gurgling baby. No, it was still, straining to breathe, and then it stopped breathing. The same child? Two children? The images flashed back and forth, back and forth. Abby felt as though she was being torn in two as her emotions seesawed. Finally she couldn’t stand it anymore and lurched out of the chair. She stood in front of it, shaking, tears running down her cheeks.
“Abby? Abby! What’s the matter?” Brad had come back and she hadn’t even heard the door.
“I don’t know,” she whispered.
“Is something wrong? You’re crying.”
Abby wiped the tears from her cheeks. Part of her yearned to turn to Brad, have him enfold her in his strong arms and comfort her. Another part of her wanted to keep quiet until she had even a vague idea of what was happening. And she knew that Brad would not understand. She took a shaky breath.
“Oh, I’m just being silly. It was so nice to see my folks, and they were so sweet to bring me the chair, and they know I love it. I’m just happy, that’s all.”
Brad didn’t look convinced, but Abby knew that he wasn’t about to delve into that “emotional stuff” if he didn’t have to. “Look, I’ll finish cleaning up, all right?”
“Thanks, sweetie—I appreciate it. Oh, and could you move the chair over between the windows?” No way was Abby going to try to touch it again, not right now.
“Sure.” He picked it up easily and carried it across the room. “Here?” Apparently nothing happened when he touched it, as far as Abby could see. “Hey, this is a really nice piece. Wonder what it’s worth?” He rubbed his hand appreciatively over the smooth wood of one of the swan heads.
“That’s fine there. I think I’ll go take a shower now.” Abby wanted nothing more than to be alone, to try to sort out what had happened. And I’ll have to tell Ned about this. Tomorrow. And tomorrow she was damn well going to find out who her great-grandparents had been.
9
Abby slept without interruption—no visitations in the night, and no lingering aftermath of her confrontation with the chair. Wednesday morning she watched Brad pull on his working gear—shirt, tie, suit, lace-up shoes—and gave him a sleepy smile when he bent to kiss her good-bye.
“Have a good day, kid. I should be home early-ish.”
And he was gone, bustling with self-importance. Abby lay in bed for a while, thinking. I need to make two piles, she decided, one for things I know and one for things I don’t know. Even before she began, it was clear that the first one would be a lot smaller than the second one. All right, she would limit her immediate efforts to her family and let Ned deal with abstract paranormal questions. Any maybe what had happened with the chair the day before.
What did she know? Her own name, of course. Her father’s name, and her mother’s maiden name. Wait—wouldn’t their marriage license have their parents’ names on it? What about her mother’s birth certificate? There must have been a father listed, and her mother must have needed her own birth record at some point—passport? Driver’s license? No, that wouldn’t work, because her great-grandmother, when her husband left, had made every effort to erase his name from her life, including formally changing her daughter’s name to her own surname, Pendleton. She’d been very stubborn, and very thorough.
Well, at least Abby had the Pendleton name, and it was not as common as, say, Johnson or Williams. She had no idea where Ruth Pendleton had come from, but she was pretty sure it was somewhere in New England or the Mid-Atlantic states. Abby had known her great-grandmother for a few years, and she didn’t remember any accent that would suggest otherwise, or any hints of mountains, prairies, horses. So that narrowed her search, sort of. Now, where could she find marriage records?
She looked at the bedside clock: 7:30. Was it too early to call Ned and tell him about the chair incident? Maybe he could see something about it that escaped her. But was it fair to turn to him? She wavered, and then decided that it was a piece of information he should have. Energized by her decision, she got out of bed and went to search for Ned’s card in her purse. She dialed, and he answered on the second ring.
“Edward Newhall.” His voice was abrupt and businesslike.
“Ned?” Abby said tentatively, intimidated by his brusque tone.
“Oh, Abby, hi. Sorry I was so curt—I was just on my way
out the door.”
“I’m sorry. I won’t keep you long. But this strange thing happened last night, and I thought you should know about it—maybe it would make more sense to you than it does to me.”
“Uh—can we talk later? I’ve got a meeting at eight and I really need to get moving. Or, how about lunch? Can you find your way back to Lexington?”
“Sure. Just tell me where and when.” Abby felt a surge of relief. She hated carrying all this around inside. This was followed by a flash of guilt, since she kept dumping the problem on Ned, who really had no reason to help her, and here she was dragging him away from his work, just to make herself feel better.
“There’s a place in the middle of town, near the stoplight . . .” He proceeded to give her directions. “About twelve fifteen?”
“Great. See you then.”
He hung up. She hoped she wasn’t going to get him in any hot water, distracting him from his job. She promised herself that she would handle the next steps on her own—whatever they turned out to be.
She spent the morning roaming around the Internet to see what she could find about Pendletons, but there was such a bewildering array of sources that she couldn’t make sense of them. She arrived early at the restaurant, found a table, ordered a coffee and waited, fidgeting. Ned was late. She saw him as he came into the restaurant and looked around until he found her. He dropped into the chair opposite Abby’s.
“Sorry—back-to-back meetings, and they all ran late. Why these people can’t operate in something other than crisis mode, I really don’t know. I’m sorry—I’ll have to get back fast, but you sounded kind of spooked. Have you ordered?”
His words tumbled out in a rush, and Abby had no time to respond. Finally she shook her head. “No—a sandwich will be fine. I just wanted to fill you in on something that happened last night.”
Ned flagged a passing waitress and ordered two grilled chicken sandwiches, and coffee for himself. Then he turned back to Abby. “Okay—I’m all ears.”
Relatively Dead Page 7