by A. L. Jambor
Mari leaned her head on the wall. As a kid, she'd been a tomboy, but she'd always had a romantic streak and the idea of dressing up and riding in a carriage appealed to her. She smiled as she remembered winning tickets playing skeeball on the boardwalk and choosing a doll dressed in an old-fashioned dress with a "Made in China" sticker on her foot.
Her mother was surprised by her choice, and took it as an omen that her daughter was finally embracing her feminine side, but Mari had been drawn to the doll's face, which was painted with a crooked smile, and was fascinated by the tiny lace trim on the hem of the doll's skirt. How did they sew something so tiny? She had put the doll on a shelf in her room and now it was in that big box in Cassie's garage.
She turned more pages and stopped when she came to a photo of the accused murderess -- Celia Morton. Celia had been placed in the insane asylum in Oceanville where she hanged herself in a closet two years after her incarceration. Mari's heart raced as she looked at Celia's photo -- it was the dark-eyed lady.
A knock on the door made her jump.
"Yeah," she shouted.
"It's me," Cassie said.
Cassie opened the door, came in, and sat on the loveseat. She leaned forward, clasped her hands between her knees, and then she saw the box.
"What's that?"
"I picked it up from the B&B. It's my stuff."
"Did you go inside?" Cassie looked for signs of distress on Mari's face.
Mari nodded. "Harry's sister is cleaning it out. She's selling it, and Constance told me to go over there and get the books."
"Oh," Cassie waved her hand, "her and her books. Well, she'll be happy." Cassie tilted her head. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be."
Except for the murderess following me all over town.
Cassie was fidgety, moving her hands, brushing lint off the sofa, and Mari knew she had something on her mind. After a minute or so, Cassie sat back and clasped her hands on her lap.
"Joey has a little spring thing at his school next week," she said. "He'd like you to come."
"I'd love to." Cassie smiled and glanced around the room. "That's not all you came up here for."
Cassie sighed. "Someone called my house looking for you."
A thrill went up Mari's spine. Was it the job she'd applied for? Did someone want her?
"Who?"
Cassie hesitated. "It was the guy, you know, the other driver."
"Oh, him."
"He wants to meet with you."
Harry appeared in her mind and Mari began to cry. Cassie got up, sat beside Mari on the bed, and took her hand.
"I think the guy just wants to connect with you because you shared something."
"I don't want to see him."
"Come on, Mari. Can you imagine how he feels?"
"I don't care how he feels."
"Please, think about it. The guy is hurting, too. He lost his job, his house, and all he wants is to talk to you for a few minutes."
Mari sighed. She didn't want to forgive him. She wanted to keep the anger toward him for just a while longer, just until she could stop blaming herself, too.
"He sounds like a nice man," Cassie said. "He was very polite." Cassie squeezed Mari's hand. "You read the report, right? He saw someone in the road. He was just trying to avoid hitting them. It was terrible, but it was no one's fault."
Mari looked into her eyes. "And you think I should talk to him."
"Yes, I think you should."
Mari leaned her head on Cassie's shoulder. "And you said he sounds nice."
"Yes. He sounds nice."
Mari began to cry again and Cassie put her arm around Mari's shoulders. Mari's tears felt good this time, like a cork had popped and all the painful things Mari had been feeling were rising like the bubbles in a glass of champagne and evaporating in the air.
"It's gonna be okay," Cassie said. She patted Mari's shoulder. "Feel better?"
Mari nodded. "I do feel better."
"Good. You want to eat with us tonight?"
Mari nodded again. "I do."
They got up and Mari followed Cassie to her kitchen where Joey sat waiting for his dinner. He smiled when he saw Mari, and Mari, feeling lighter than she had in months, ran to him, tickled his waist, and the boy giggled, got out of the chair, and ran to the living room with Mari following close behind.
Philip
Philip Curry's cell phone rang as he walked toward his mailbox at the end of his driveway. It was that nice woman he'd talked to about Marigold Burnside.
"Hello," he said.
They exchanged pleasantries as he pulled some catalogs from the mailbox, and then she got down to business.
"I talked to Mari and I think she's willing, but you might have to give her a little more time."
"I see."
"Don't get discouraged. Her head is still healing and..."
"You don't have to explain. Thank you for asking her."
"I'm not giving up yet. I'll talk to her again in a couple of days."
"Okay."
He turned off the phone and looked at his house. He'd bought it ten years ago, putting every penny he'd saved into the down payment, and he loved his little house. Now, he was losing it, and all because he stayed late at work when he should have left early.
His supervisor had told him to go home. It was a freak December blizzard, and Oceanville was at the center of its heart. He was the IT guy for Oceanville General Hospital and his job was to keep the computers online. His desk was in the basement next to the morgue, and this was fine with Phil because it meant people resisted coming to find him when something went wrong with their computers. They'd have to call, and he would schedule them, adding them to one of his ubiquitous lists.
He'd navigated the parkway without a hitch, but when he got off at exit 19, the curve was covered in a foot of snow, and he felt the wheels of his car slipping toward the edge and the ditch below. He'd slowed down and kept his speed at twenty until he reached town, where the snow was falling in larger flakes but he could still see patches of road. A false sense of security caused him to increase his speed. He rode past the hardware store and stopped at the grocery. No one was on the road but Phil.
He got to the grocery just as Max's wife was putting up the closed sign. She let him in to buy his milk and butter. He thanked her and returned to his car, which was covered with snow. He looked at the road and the patches were gone.
Phil eased onto the road and headed home. His mortgage payments had been increased and a balloon payment was due. He'd spent the previous night trying to figure out how to refinance his home. He'd gone to bed well past midnight and woke up with a "money" hangover. His desk was covered in lists that he'd go over again when he got home, but he couldn't resist thinking about some of the companies he'd read about as he drove down Main Street.
His headlights caught her as he rode past the hardware store -- a lonely figure standing stock still in the center of his lane. He didn't notice the car coming in the opposite direction, nor did he think about the three inches of wet snow on black ice when he slammed on his brakes and swerved to avoid her. When his car hit Mari's, she was trying to move out of his way, and he hit her, killing her passenger, and throwing her into the windshield of her car.
By some miracle, Phil had suffered no great physical damage, but the emotional scars were deep. He had killed a man, and despite the police reports that cleared him of any wrongdoing, he couldn't forgive himself.
Now, five months later, he was jobless and would soon be homeless. The house was in foreclosure, he had no car, and his cell phone was due to be shut off in a few days. But these were minor problems. His major problem -- the thing that consumed him -- was the specter in the road that had caused the whole thing to begin with -- Celia Morton. Her daily visits were making him a nervous wreck.
She was standing across the street when he came to the mailbox, had watched him talking to Cassie, and was still there when h
e walked back to his house. She just stared at him, her eyes dark, and her expression sad. He knew who she was; he'd looked up pictures of her on the internet.
At first, he had thought he'd hit his head and was seeing things, but the doctor assured him that he hadn't suffered any head injury. It could be the trauma of taking another person's life, so he went to a shrink a few times, but that didn't stop Celia from tormenting him. He had to find out who she was and why she was making his life miserable.
With no idea where to start, he went to see Constance Penny. He asked her about Cape Alden's history, and if any women had died under mysterious circumstances. She immediately thought of Charlotte, and asked Phil what had sparked his interest. He hesitated for several seconds before telling her he'd been seeing a ghost.
"What did she look like?" Constance asked.
He was sitting across from her at her desk. She didn't seem to find his sighting odd, and she didn't make him feel foolish. He described the woman and Constance nodded.
"That sounds like Celia Morton. She's been seen before."
"Really?" he said.
"A writer came here several years ago to write a book about Charlotte Johnson's murder, and Celia haunted her on a daily basis." Constance had looked Phil in the eye. "If you were to ask me, I'd say Celia didn't kill Charlotte. That's why she keeps showing up. She wants you to find out who did so she can rest in peace."
Phil didn't want to find out who killed Charlotte. He didn't care if Celia rested in peace. He just wanted his life back.
Phil shivered even as he glared at her before going inside his house.
"I'm not going to help you," he said. "Please go away."
He'd studied her after his conversation with Constance. He knew everything there was to know about her and had written it all down in a notebook he carried with him where he also jotted down every sighting. Over the past few weeks, she'd appeared at least twenty times. He hated her. He couldn't tell anyone about her, and the burden of keeping it secret was beginning to wear him down.
His phone rang again and he looked at the caller ID. It was his mother. He had to be nice and answer her calls because he might have to move in with her soon.
"Hi, Mom."
"How are you feeling?"
"The same."
"Oh, Phil, well, things will get better."
"I might have to bring some of my stuff over there this week."
She paused. He imagined her looking up toward heaven, searching for a miracle that would keep him from moving in.
"I will have to borrow your car, too," he said. She sighed.
"I cleaned out the garage so you'd have room for it," she said.
"That's good," he said, failing to hide the weariness in his voice.
"You'll have to put the bed together and we'll get a mattress when you are sure you won't have another place."
She sounded hopeful, like the prospect of another place was imminent. It made him feel sad.
"Okay. Sounds good."
"Do you have food?" she asked.
"Yes. I'm eating."
"Good. I don't want you getting sick."
Or you'll have to pay for that, too.
She sighed. "Okay. I have to get back to work. You have the key if you want to move stuff."
She hung up and he stared at the phone. He hadn't told her they were turning it off. He'd get a no-contract phone soon, and he hoped he could keep his number so he wouldn't have to explain it to her.
His unemployment was running out. He had tried going back to work after the accident, but he was too distracted, and soon they laid him off with a month's severance.
His job had been perfect for him -- he'd worked alone. He'd been there ten years and had one friend, a guy named Jerry, who worked in the cafeteria. Friday nights they would go to a local tavern and pretend to pick up girls, but if one of the ladies had spoken to either of them, they would have died of a heart attack. He hadn't seen Jerry since leaving work. He couldn't afford to buy a beer anyway, so Jerry had found another friend.
His living room was full of boxes he'd collected from the supermarket. He didn't have many possessions; just the usual assortment of books and knickknacks his mother had given him to make the place "look like someone lived there." He had a computer, but no internet now, and a 32" flat-screen he'd bought himself for his fortieth birthday. It was paid for.
He had DVD's, but his DVD player had died and he'd been watching them on the computer. When he put the dead DVD player in one of the boxes, he'd stared at it as though if he did it long enough, the tiny box would be resurrected, giving him a reason to hold onto it other than a sense of a responsibility to recycle. He hated tossing dead electronics. It meant a trip to the recycling yard, and with no car...He put the DVD player in the keep box.
Phil thought about Marigold Burnside as he packed his things. He'd wanted to talk to her, to find out if she'd seen Celia Morton, and to tell her how sorry he was. Until he did, he couldn't move on. It wasn't her forgiveness he sought; he just wanted to ease his own burden. It was selfish, he knew, but that's how people get when they live alone. They forget how to empathize with others. They see the world through a tiny prism; at least Philip Curry had for the last ten years.
He had imagined meeting Marigold on the street, or in a coffee shop, or the supermarket, where he could stop her and tell her how sorry he was, but when he did see her on the street, his chest would tighten and he couldn't talk. Now, the aggravation of seeing Celia was greater than his fear of talking to Marigold, and that's why he decided to call Cassie.
As he packed, the depression he lived with overwhelmed him and he had to stop and sit. During his gloomy episodes, Phil wouldn't turn the lights on; he would just sit in the dark and embrace his loneliness. Now, though, he didn't have time to bond with his gloomy friend. He had to get this place cleaned out.
He forced himself go outside and walked toward the beach. The wind on his face felt good, and the smell of the sea was good for his soul.
Enjoy it, he thought. Let yourself enjoy it.
But then Celia Morton appeared like a harpy, taunting him, and making him face his guilt, which forced him to turn around and go home. He took out his notebook and jotted down the date and time of the last two appearances. He felt like a prisoner. He couldn't go anywhere that she didn't follow him. His notebooks lay on the desk next to the computer. He opened one and began reading about Celia Morton. Maybe he would see something he hadn't seen before.
Cassie
The children were standing in a line on stage and Joey stood so straight and tall as he sang that it made Cassie's heart soar. When the song was over, he smiled broadly. Cassie took Mari's hand and squeezed it hard.
"Look at him. He's so proud of himself." Cassie clutched Mari's hand to her chest. "I'm gonna cry. He looks so grown-up."
"And they sounded good, too."
Cassie looked at Mari and grinned. "I know! Come on. Let's go get him."
They got up and Mari followed Cassie to Joey's classroom where other parents had already congregated at the door. Everyone talked about how well the children had performed, and all were looking forward to the end of the school year. When Joey saw Cassie, he smiled, and ran to her, and she knelt down and embraced him.
"Did you hear me?" he asked.
"You sang so good," she said as she hugged him.
"Can we get ice cream?"
"We can get ice cream," she said.
Joey looked at Mari.
"Did you hear me sing?"
"You were great."
He smiled again, and hugged Cassie's neck.
They were going through a warm spell, and business at the ice cream store was brisk. All the tables were occupied, so they got cones and went outside. They ate while they walked, but Joey couldn't eat fast enough, and by the time they got home, he wore more vanilla ice cream than he'd eaten.
"Take off that shirt and wash your face and hands," Cassie said.
"I don't know if I could
be so patient," Mari said as she shivered. "Those sticky hands."
"Oh, you'd be fine. I saw you when he smiled at you."
"I'm fine when it's someone else's child."
Cassie shook her head.
"You make me laugh. You think you're all tough and what, but inside, you're jelly."
Mari smiled. "Well, I doubt I'll ever find out."
"You're young enough. You still have time."
"I'm thirty-five. Believe me. I don't want a young kid when I'm forty. I'll leave that to you all."
Cassie shook her head and smiled. "I guess I should make something for dinner." She looked in the refrigerator and sighed. "I should have stopped at the supermarket."
"Are you hungry after ice cream?"
"Not really, but Joey should have something."
"Is he hungry after ice cream?"
Cassie shook her head. "Probably not. I can always make him a sandwich. Is that what a good mother would do?"
"I had a good mother," Mari said. "And she would have done that."
Cassie sat at the kitchen table with Mari.
"What was your mom like?" Cassie asked.
"She was good at stuff like making clothes out of other clothes, you know, so she could save money. She also knew how to cook well, but I didn't inherit that from her. She was kind, too."
"My mom is my best friend," Cassie said. "Not when we were kids, though. Then she was hard. She wanted us to be something, and she made us know that no one was gonna take care of us." Cassie sighed. "I think she was disappointed when she found out I was pregnant, but she never said it. She's been there for me the whole time."
"My mom would have done that, too. She would have loved a grandchild."
Cassie sat back in her chair.
"I talked to that man again."
"What man?"
"Philip Curry, the man from the accident."
"Oh, him."
"He just wants to apologize, Mari."