by Tim McGregor
“What is it?”
“There’s an art opening tonight,” Jen said. “This woman who comes by the shop. She invited me to her show. I just got a message that it’s been cancelled.”
“That’s too bad.” Kaitlin rose from the bench and teetered to the door. “I have to go.”
“I thought we were getting something to eat later?”
“We are,” Kaitlin said, ringing the bell over the door again as she left. “I just to need to tear someone a new asshole first.”
~
“I’m not going,” she said. “I can’t! I won’t!”
Mockler stood in the doorway to the studio, flowers in one hand. A bouquet of pink and white roses. He looked down at the mess splattered across the floor. “You have to go,” he said. “It’s your show.”
“I don’t care.” Christina stood in the middle of her studio. Her hair was done but she wasn’t dressed, clad only in her natty bathrobe. Her easel, the big one she always used, lay flat on the floor from where it had been toppled like some fallen soldier. The painting she had been working on had been flung to the far corner. “You go. Have a good time.”
“It’s just nerves,” he said. “You’ll be fine the minute you walk through the door.”
“What was I thinking?” Christina paced the floor back and again, stepping over the easel. “I must have been crazy to think I could have a show. Look at this shit! I’m no artist. I’m a hack!”
“Stop it.” He watched her pace. The glass of wine in her hand wasn’t a good sign but from it he could piece together what had went down in the hours leading up to now. Already a tight ball of anxiety over the looming opening of her first show in two years, Christina had opened the wine to settle her frayed nerves. She should have mixed a highball or something instead. Although she loved red wine, it tended to pull her moods downward and if Christina wasn’t careful, it could kickstart her self-loathing. Once started, it was hard to stop the cycle.
The paper wrapping on the flowers crinkled as he set the bouquet onto the table. He caught hold of her arms and made her stand still. “This is just nerves. It happens to everybody. But you’re running out of time.”
“Don’t condescend.” She tried to pull away but his grip was locked. “You have no idea what this is like.”
“You’re right. I don’t. But you have to push all that negative crap away right now. One step at a time. Go get dressed. Dry your eyes. Then we’ll get in the car.”
Christina shuddered, as if to shake it all off. She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly through pursed lips like a woman in labour. “Okay. Okay. Take this.”
She handed him the glass and marched for the stairs. He listened to her run up the creaky steps and then leaned back against the table. He set the glass down, grateful that he had the wherewithal to handle what he had come home to. His brain was shattered and left in pieces back at the parking lot after what Billie had said to him. Her words were plain, the meaning clear but he still couldn’t fathom a word of it. It didn’t make sense. And, if he was honest with himself, it scared the living daylights out of him.
He looked at the flowers on the table, unopened and unseen, and wondered what the hell he was going to do. Then the stairs creaked again and Christina appeared in the doorway. She looked stunning. A simple black cocktail dress and her hair gathered high on top and held in place with a red flower.
“Are my eyes puffy?” she asked.
“You look fantastic.”
“Well let’s go. Before I lose my nerve again.”
“You sure he said seven-thirty?” Mockler slowed as he turned the car onto Locke Street and gunned it through an amber light. “I though it started at seven.”
“It did start at seven,” Christina said, checking her eyes in the mirror under the sun visor. “Carlos suggested I arrive half an hour after that. Something about making a grand entrance once the party is in swing.”
“Oh,” he said. “Carlos thinks of everything, doesn’t he?”
“He’s the expert. There’s a spot.”
He swung the car into the vacant space she pointed at. Climbing out, Christina adjusted the dress and took a deep breath. Mockler held the door open with a flourish for her grand entrance.
Christina’s heels clicked smartly against the floor and echoed through the space. It was the only sound in the room.
Mockler looked around. “Where is everyone?”
The gallery looked perfect. Christina’s work was framed and hung against spotless white walls, the lighting overhead pristine. There was a table at the entrance with an arrangement of flowers and a leather-bound book for guests to sign. And that was all. The gallery was empty, not a soul save for the newly arrived artist herself and her date.
“Something must have gone wrong,” Christina said. “The wrong date went out? The wrong time?”
There was a stack of printed brochures and flyers on the table. Mockler checked them both. There was no misprint or error on either.
“Carlos!” Christina strode further into the salon, looking to the office in the back.
The gallery owner appeared, a weak smile on his face as he saw her. “Christina. I don’t know what to say.”
“What happened? Where is everyone?”
Carlos shook his head. “I don’t know. I had a full guest list. I had more people calling this afternoon, wanting to get in. But now…” He waved his hand across the empty gallery.
“And what?” Mockler said, drawing alongside Christina. “Everyone bailed?”
“I don’t know,” Carlos replied.
“Was there a mistake?” Christina asked. Her hands were trembling. “Was the time wrong on the invitation or the website?”
“No,” the gallery owner said. “This has never happened before.”
“This doesn’t make sense.” Mockler scanned the room a second time, as if invited guests were hiding behind the potted ferns. “Not a single person showed?”
Carlos rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know what to say.”
A murmur of street noise rushed in as the front door opened. Everyone turned to the entrance. A single guest stepped inside and looked over the framed pictures.
Carlos rushed up to greet the sole patron. “Mr. Napier, welcome!”
All the blood drained from Mockler’s face. He took a step back, lightheaded.
“Wow. One guest,” Christina said, her voice little more than a sneer as she turned to Mockler. Then she saw her date’s face. “Hey. Are you all right?”
“Stay here,” he said, moving toward the foyer of the gallery.
Aaron Napier studied the paintings on the wall as Carlos spoke quietly to him, his hand gesturing at other pieces in the gallery. Napier looked up at the man approaching him and had the gall to smile.
“Ah, Detective Mockler,” he said. “What a surprise.”
Mockler felt his pulse thumping in his eardrums. “What did you do?”
“You two have met?” Carlos asked. “Mr. Napier is one of the gallery’s patrons.”
“I never miss an opening,” Napier said. “Looks like I got here before the rush, huh?”
Mockler moved in, almost stepping on the man’s toes. “How did you know? How did you get everyone to stay away?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about, Detective.”
Sensing trouble, the gallery owner stepped between the two men. “You really should see the rest of the work, Mr. Napier. The artist’s best pieces are in the main room.”
Napier leaned in to look at the nearest painting. “No thank you. Not my cup of tea, really.”
The man straightened up and smiled at Mockler. Then he said goodnight and went out the door.
31
THE HEADQUARTERS OF the Paranormal Trackers was a garage that backed onto an alley in the Normanhurst area. It belonged to Owen’s mother but, Justin insisted, it was merely temporary. Once their YouTube channel took off, they’d be getting fancier digs.
Kai
tlin marched up the dark alleyway, uneasy at being alone on such a desolate strip, looking for the H.Q. but every garage looked the same. Quickening her pace, she hunted down the door she had visited twice before. Marked with a bio-hazard sign, it was halfway up the alley. She pounded on it, rattling the door in its frame.
The noise on the other side, low music and the murmur of voices, stopped instantly. Kaitlin pounded again. “Open up! It’s Kaitlin!”
More silence, then a dull crash as if something within had been knocked over.
“I can hear you in there!” she hollered. “Open the goddamn door!”
A latch was turned and the door opened a few inches. A shadow silhouetted in the gap. “Go away.”
“Open the door, Owen.”
“We’re busy,” he hissed. “Call first next time.”
When the gap started to close again, Kaitlin hurled her shoulder against it as hard as she could. The door popped open, banging off Owen. He startled back, clutching his face. “Ow!”
Kaitlin slipped inside and slammed the door behind her. Across the room, Justin shot to his feet. “What the hell, Kaitlin? Get out!”
“You two assholes,” Kaitlin said, pointing a finger at both, “owe me an explanation.”
The interior of the garage looked like something out of a B-movie, refurnished and decked out somewhere between a laboratory and a Halloween party. Two separate work stations held laptops and wires and piles of gear. Band posters plastered the walls, death metal bands that Kaitlin had never heard of. A plastic skeleton dangled from the rafters on a hangman’s noose.
“Get lost, Kaitlin,” Justin groused. “We’re busy.”
“How stupid are you two?” Kaitlin barked. “You posted what I told you about Billie on your website? Why did you do that?”
“It was news,” Owen said, clutching his cheek where the door had smacked him.
“It’s not! I told you that in private. It’s all over the news now. The real news.”
Justin shook his head and settled onto his chair again. “The public has a right to know. Especially if it involves the police.”
“Bullshit,” Kaitlin said. “You’re just trying to get traffic to your site.”
“Is that so bad?” Owen folded his arms, as if chilled.
“It does if it blows back on my friend. She’s got some reporter hounding her because of you idiots.”
“In case you missed it, Kaitlin, the name on the door is Paranormal Trackers,” Justin said. He turned his back on the intruder, returning to the desk. “It’s what we do.”
Owen continued to shiver. He glanced at his partner. “It’s getting cold again.”
“Shut up,” Justin ordered.
“What is wrong with you two?” she said.
“Nothing. Goodbye and fuck off, Kaitlin.”
Kaitlin looked from Justin to Owen and back again, realizing what looked so odd about them. Both were bundled up with heavy sweaters and toques as if ready for winter. The air inside the garage felt like a meat locker. “Why is it so cold in here?”
Owen hugged his ribs. “Because we pissed something off.”
“Owen, shut your mouth.”
“Fuck you,” Owen barked back.
Kaitlin looked the pair over. Both men were shivering and pale, dark rings under their eyes as if they hadn’t slept. “You two look like shit. What happened?”
“I think,” Owen whispered, “we pissed something off—”
“Owen!” Justin barked. “I swear to God.”
“Just tell her. What does it matter? She was there too.”
Kaitlin looked at both of them. “What are you talking about? What did you piss off?”
“I don’t know what it is,” Owen said. “But I think it’s from the other night. At the Murder House.”
Kaitlin studied the young man. It was more than the temperature that was making him shiver. There was real fear in his eyes. “Take it slow, Owen. What’s going on?”
“Both of us are freezing all the time,” he said. “Like a cold spot that follows us around. And then there’s the nightmares. Neither of us has slept more than a few hours since we were at that place.”
“What kind of nightmares?”
“This woman. She’s freaky as all get-out. She looks beautiful one minute, then she gets real close and whispers in my ear. Awful shit. But when I look at her, she’s dead and rotting. Like worms in her mouth and shit. She’s there every time I close my eyes.”
Kaitlin shuddered, then looked at Justin. “You’re having the same nightmare?”
Justin rotated his head to look at her but he said nothing and turned back to the laptop before him.
“He won’t say,” Owen said. “But I know it’s the same.”
The cold crept in and Kaitlin shuddered as it fingered up her backbone. “This woman. Does she look like she’s from another era? Like a flapper from the twenties?”
His eyes widened. “Yeah. Short hair and that skinny dress? You’ve seen her too?”
“Maybe,” Kaitlin said. Owen had described the woman in her own nightmares but she was suddenly reluctant to confirm it. “You think she’s from the Murder House?”
“Don’t you?”
Kaitlin didn’t answer. She wanted to leave.
A high-pitched noise squelched from across the room. Justin shot out of his chair and snatched up the small device from Owen’s desk, the source of the annoying sound.
“What is it?” Owen asked.
Justin watched the needle bounce on the device. “The EMF. It’s going crazy.”
Another sound pinged and then another, more devices going off all around the room.
Kaitlin took a step back. “What does that mean?”
“It means you brought something with you,” Justin spat. “Something followed you here.”
“Oh God,” Owen moaned. Reaching under the collar of his shirt, he drew out a small cross on a chain and clutched it tightly in his fingers. “She’s back...”
“Get in the game, dummy!” Justin gathered up a small sound recorder and held it in the air. “Turn the camera on.”
Owen snatched up a video camera and fumbled the controls with quaking hands. Hitting the record button, he swept the lens over the garage in a slow arc.
Kaitlin took another step back as the two men moved through the room with their gear, trying to capture evidence of something otherworldly. Another sound clawed at her ear and when she turned around, she saw the vintage spirit board on the table behind her. The fragile looking planchette piece moved slowly across the board, its spindly legs squeaking against the veneer surface. The sharp point touched the letter ‘K’ then crawled left to the first letter of the alphabet before scraping back towards the ninth letter. When it spindled south towards the ‘T’, Kaitlin’s hand shot out fast to stop it. The brittle wooden piece tugged gently of its own volition until it snapped under her hand.
The racket from the electro-magnetic field readers went silent. The cold snap in the air was already lifting.
Justin tapped at one of the readers, as if it was malfunctioning. “It’s gone,” he declared.
Kaitlin remained still but her heart clanged inside her ribcage. She gathered up the broken planchette in her hand and then, almost as an afterthought, snatched up the strange board itself. Without uttering a word, she spun about and threw open the door.
“Kaitlin,” Owen said. “Are you all right?”
She didn’t even look back as she marched out of the headquarters of the Paranormal Trackers.
“Hey!” Justin hollered after her. “That’s my board!”
Owen ducked out the door and ran after her but Kaitlin was gone, the alleyway as quiet as dawn.
32
IT WAS FOR the best, Billie reminded herself as she clomped up the steps of her building. Telling Mockler the truth about why she couldn’t be around him any longer. He’d stay away for sure now. She almost convinced herself that it was true.
She needed distraction. Maybe
Nick would want to hang out again? See another band? Or better yet, she thought, maybe she could just get the hell out of town. A few days at Long Point with Aunt Maggie might do her some good, if for no other reason than the fact that Maggie would let her work through it without prying.
By the time she made the third floor landing, she’d decided on the trip home but a noise inside the apartment stopped her. A crashing sound like something breaking. Was Half-Boy smashing things or was someone in her flat? Gripping the knob, she pushed the door in.
A tall figure stood in the living room. He ducked as something flew past his head and shattered against the wall. Her guard dropped when she saw who it was.
“What are you doing here?”
Gantry glanced up at her quickly before turning back to the kitchen where the missiles were coming from. “Haven’t you housebroken this creepy little shit yet?”
Billie closed the door behind her. “He guards the place for me. And he doesn’t like assholes.”
“What? I’m one of the good guys, for Chrissakes!”
“Tell that to him,” she said, looping her bag onto the coat tree near the door.
Another plate sailed through the air and Gantry spun and ducked but he was too slow. The dish bounced off his skull and clattered to the floor. The Englishman winced and snarled. “I’m gonna kill that little bastard!”
Billie looked over the broken shards of china on the floor. “Hey! That’s enough.”
The Half-Boy appeared at the top of the kitchen doorway. He cowed at Billie’s bark but the hatred returned to his small eyes when he looked at the man in the room.
“Look at this mess,” she said. “Did you spare any of the dishes?”
The diminutive ghost lowered his head and crawled away across the ceiling to the back bedroom.
“You better run, you piece of shit ghost.” Gantry shook a fist at the ghost and then prodded his hairline. His fingers came away bloodied. “Look at this.”
Billie took up the broom and handed it to him as she crossed into the kitchen. “Here. Clean up the mess.”