by Tim McGregor
The anger was already bubbling up his gullet like molten lava ready to spew. Her words were gasoline poured over the embers of the earlier part of his day. Keep your mouth shut, he told himself. Let her get it out. Let her say it and just listen. Whatever you do, do not say anything.
“You have nothing to say?” she spat. “After everything I’ve told you, you have nothing to say? Are you even listening to me?”
In his heart of hearts, he had meant to say it gently. He had meant to be open and honest and forthcoming but when he opened his mouth to speak, it came out as lethal as a blade. He had meant it to hurt.
“There’s someone else,” he said.
35
SHE DIDN’T THINK it was possible to completely let oneself go in two days but she was getting close. Looking at the reflection in the mirror, Billie almost spooked herself at the sight of the individual looking back at her. Haggard and pale, with shadowy rings under her puffy eyes and bedhead of Bride-of-Frankenstein proportion. Stains dotted the T-shirt she wore. It was ripe after two straight days but she could care less.
The sentiment carried on into the apartment itself, the space a true reflection of its occupant. A shambled miasma of apathy and neglect. Just looking at it flattened her mood even more, trapping her on this repeating loop of despair. It was time to step off the train wreck.
“Clean yourself up,” she said to her reflection. “You had your cry. Now clean up the mess. Close the chapter and move on.”
Oh God, she thought. I’m uttering clichéd life-affirmations. An unfortunate by-product of too much daytime TV.
Fetching a garbage bag from under the sink, she cleared the coffee table of take-out cartons, beer cans and trashy magazines that had been her diet during this crash-and-burn session. She decided to start with the apartment first before cleaning herself up. A couple hours of hard scrubbing capped with a scalding hot shower might be enough to burn away the dark cloud hanging over everything.
A plant on the window sill upended and hit the floor, scattering dirt across the tile. The Half-Boy scurried past in his odd crawling motion, as if determined to maintain the mess. He had been acting up the last two days, rambunctious and clumsy like a cat kept inside too long. She wondered if her own mood had affected him too somehow or if Gantry’s visit had unsettled him. She snapped at him to cut it out. He looked at her like she was some stranger and then scuttled away across the ceiling in his curious legless hobble.
Her phone rang. It was Kaitlin. “Are you coming tonight?”
Dinner with the ladies. Tammy had texted earlier but she hadn’t responded. “I was gonna skip it.”
“You okay?”
“Yeah,” Billie said. “Just one of those days, ya know?”
“Sure.” There was a pause and then Kaitlin said, “I need to talk to you.”
Billie stopped clearing the coffee table. “Sounds serious.”
“It just something that’s been eating at me. But I don’t want to discuss it at the table with the ladies. Let me buy you a cup of coffee, okay?”
Kaitlin was buying so Kaitlin chose the place. Radius was an upscale cafe where Billie felt out of place among the well-heeled.
“This is all my fault,” Kaitlin blurted out once they had settled into a table near the window. “I’m sorry.”
Billie leaned back. “What’s all your fault?”
“You being outed on the news. That stupid reporter jumping you. It’s all my fault.”
“That nosy bitch had nothing to do with you,” Billie said. “How could it?”
“Didn’t you wonder how she found out about you helping the police?”
“Sure, but…” Her voice trickled to nothing. “Wait, you didn’t tell them, did you?”
“I may as well have.” Kaitlin looked down into the steam of her teacup, as if some answer was waiting there. “Remember the ghost hunter guys I told you about?”
“Yeah. The Paranormal something or other.”
“Trackers,” Kaitlin corrected. “I told them. And those two idiots posted it on their website. That’s how it got out.”
“Oh.” It was all Billie could think of to say.
“The reporter must have found it there. And then bam, you’re publicly outed as a psychic. I’m sorry. I should have kept my mouth shut.”
“You didn’t know they’d do that?”
“God no,” Kaitlin said. “I never would have said anything if I knew they were such blabbermouths. They’d do anything to drive traffic to their site. I should have seen it coming.”
Billie watched the young woman stare into her tea, unable to return her gaze. They came from different worlds and sometimes Kaitlin’s air of entitlement rubbed Billie the wrong way. But not today. The woman across the table was genuinely remorseful for her mistake and Billie reminded herself that she was in no position to judge anyone. Most of Billie’s life seemed to be one mistake after another. At least Kaitlin had the decency to fess up to it.
“Hey.” She reached out and took hold of Kaitlin’s hand. “It’s okay. It’s not your fault either, so don’t torment yourself over it.”
“I am sorry it happened,” Kaitlin said. “Is that awful reporter still hounding you?”
“I don’t know. I barricaded myself inside the last two days.”
“To avoid her?”
“No,” Billie said. She wrapped her hands back around her mug to warm them. “I messed up too.”
“How?”
“Helping that detective. It was a doozy of a screw-up.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Billie shrugged. “I just want to forget the whole thing.”
A wailing siren dragged their gaze to the window and they watched an ambulance speed past.
“Are you working with those paranormal guys?” Billie asked.
“No. I tore them a new asshole over what they did. They weren’t even sorry.” Kaitlin looked back out the window, drumming her fingernails along the table top.
“What is it?”
Kaitlin sighed. “I dunno. Something weird happened. A ghost thing, you know? It freaked me out.”
Billie’s neck tensed up. Kaitlin’s fascination with the paranormal often set Billie’s teeth on edge but the woman across the table seemed troubled. She was reluctant to ask but did anyway. “What happened?”
“I was at their place. They call it their headquarters but it’s just a garage. The guys were already on edge, then the lights went all screwy. They have these devices that read energy. Electro something or other.”
“Electro magnetic readers,” Billie said.
“They all went crazy at the same time. Then the Ouija board started moving all on its own. Scared the hell out of me.”
Billie stirred the spoon around her mug. “What do you think it was?”
“The guys said something had followed us home. From the Murder House.”
“The what?”
Kaitlin nodded her chin in the direction of the escarpment. “That old place halfway up the mountain. It’s supposed to be haunted. You know the one.”
Billie mulled it over. Hamilton had no shortage of haunted houses or abandoned properties, all of them part of a web of urban legend and whispered folklore, but that one? This was the second mention of it in within a week. “You went there?”
“We just looked at the place. I’m dying to see inside it.”
“Probably nothing to see.”
Kaitlin leaned in. “Billie, do you think you could be drawn to a place and not know why?”
“Maybe. Why?”
Kaitlin tilted her head to one side, trying to wrap words around the experience of watching the planchette move on its own. She couldn’t get the grating sound of it out of her mind. “Well, it’s just—”
“Excuse me?”
The voice came from behind them. Both turned to see a woman approaching their table. A blonde-haired woman with expensive shoes and flawless nails.
“Yes?” said Kaitlin, annoyed at the
interruption.
The woman focused her attention on Billie and Billie alone. “You’re that woman from the news the other night, aren’t you?”
Billie gritted her teeth. “No. Sorry.”
“I’m sure it was you,” the woman insisted. “You’re the psychic, yes? I knew it. They say you can speak to the other side.”
“No. The news got it wrong.”
The woman pulled up a chair. Billie looked at Kaitlin then back to the stranger.
“Oh, there’s no need to be modest,” the woman gushed. “I’ve been to plenty of mediums before and I hear you’re the real McCoy. I need to talk to my sister. She passed in oh-eight, you see. It’s very important.”
“We were just leaving.” Billie dug a few bills from her pocket and left them on the table. She looked at Kaitlin. “Let’s go.”
The woman clutched Billie’s wrist. “You don’t understand. I have to talk to her. Her passing was so awful. I did everything I could to help her but there was nothing we could do. I need her to know that.”
“Get off of me!”
Kaitlin startled at the outburst. The woman was already crying. Billie winced at the look of shock on her friend’s face at her coldness to this woman.
“She knows you did everything you could,” Billie said to the woman. “She’s fine where she is now. She said you need to forgive yourself now.”
The woman’s expression fell. Billie yanked her arm free and marched for the door.
36
SITTING BEHIND THE wheel of an ugly European import, Billie beat a hasty retreat from her adopted city. From a man she couldn’t be with and a monster who got away with murder and the lost souls of murdered women who wept and gnashed their teeth in impotent rage.
She was running away in a borrowed Renault that smelled of musty vinyl and mothballs. It was all that Bruce had available to borrow.
“A Renault?” Billie had said when he handed her the keys. His garage was usually choked with exotic or vintage cars that she could borrow from time to time. In the back of the garage, near Bruce’s desk, was an old Citroen that she was dying to drive but Bruce forbade anyone but himself to touch.
“It’s this,” Bruce said, nodding to the tiny vehicle. “Or you could hitchhike to your aunt’s. Your choice.”
Billie sighed as she took the keys. The boxy little thing was possibly the ugliest car she had ever seen. “Thanks. But if this toy blows away in the wind, don’t blame me.”
The tension in her neck eased up with every mile she put between herself and the city. Propping her elbow out the window, she felt calmer the closer she got to Lake Erie. Rumbling onto the causeway that led into the sandy finger of Long Point, she took in the houses on the strip and beyond that, the beach. The summer tourists had gone, the property owners moved back in or in the process of shutting their cottages down for winter. October was already here and as she neared Maggie’s house, Billie wondered if her aunt had anything planned for Thanksgiving.
The Renault’s small wheels crunched over a carpet of dry pine needles in the driveway. The clapboard siding was a faded blue enmeshed in the cobwebs that were the bane of home-ownership everywhere on the spit. The dried husks of insects quivered in the webbing, rattled by the ever present wind. She was hauling her bag out of the backseat when she heard the familiar screech of the screen door.
“I thought I heard someone pull up,” said Maggie as she stepped onto the porch. “I was starting to wonder where you were.”
“Hi!” Billie ran up the steps and wrapped her arms around her aunt. “It’s good to see you.”
The embrace lingered. Her aunt pulled back and looked at her. “Was the traffic bad?”
“No. My ride was slow. It rattled hard if I pushed it past ninety.”
Maggie looked at the angular little car ticking and cooling in her driveway. “It’s a Matchbox car.”
“Drives like one too,” Billie said.
“Is Bruce getting stingy with the cars he lets you borrow?”
“Maybe. I think I stripped the gears on the last one I had.”
Aunt Maggie held open the door and shooed her niece inside. “Well you made it. That’s the important thing.”
The inside of the house was warm and it smelled of onions and spices, a large pot of something warming on the stove. They chitchatted as Billie set the table and Maggie ladled the chili into bowls.
“How are the ladies doing?” Maggie asked as they settled in.
“They’re great. Tammy’s busier than ever with photo gigs. Which is good. If she’s busy, she stays out of trouble. Jen practically lives at the shop. Kaitlin’s good too. But busy with work.” Billie blew on the first spoonful before tasting it. “Mmm. This is good.”
“Is Jen’s shop doing well? What’s it called?”
“Doll House. She’s doing okay. I mean, it’s still a new business but I think she’ll do well. God though, she does fret about it.”
“Can’t be easy. Does her boyfriend help her out?”
“When he can. He’s a sweetheart.”
“One of these days,” Maggie said, “I’ll have to meet this young man. He almost feels like family now.”
“You’d like him. I can’t believe I couldn’t drag the ladies out here once this summer.”
“You had a difficult summer, what with that awful hospital stay.” Maggie physically shuddered. “I hate even thinking about it.”
Billie reached for her water glass. “It was a strange summer.”
“How is all that?” Maggie gave a slight nod, as if the subject was too delicate to name. “Are you coping with it?”
“I’m managing,” Billie said. Her aunt knew of her abilities. She had, in fact, tried to suppress them when Billie was a child. If it hadn’t been for the accident and subsequent coma, her gift might have remained dormant forever.
“You look a bit thin, honey. Are you looking after yourself?”
“Yeah.” Why does everyone keep saying that?
Her aunt cocked an eyebrow at her. “You’re not partying too much with the ladies?”
“I wish. My social life is very quiet these days.” Billie shook a little more hot sauce into her bowl. The inevitable enquiry into her dating life was sure to come next. Hoping to dodge it, she nodded at the huge pot cooling on the stove. “The chili’s really good. How come you made so much?”
“I made extra to bring to Dean across the road.”
“Who?”
“Mister Cooper,” Maggie said. “Didn’t I tell you about Barb?”
Billie lowered her spoon. “No. She’s gotten worse?”
“She passed. Tuesday before last.” Maggie pushed her bowl away. “The poor man’s been a wreck ever since.”
The Coopers lived three doors down in a small two bedroom bungalow with a nice view of the beach. Dean used to work as an accountant, Barb was a retired teacher. Old friends to Maggie. Barb had been fighting cancer for the last year.
“I’m sorry,” Billie said. “I thought Barb was doing better?”
“She was. She was doing great, in fact. But then it came back about a month ago. Aggressively. It was awful.”
Billie set her own bowl aside. “They have a son, don’t they? Has he been around?”
“He lives out east. He was here for the funeral.”
“So you’re looking out for Mister Cooper?” Billie asked. “Making sure he eats.”
“I’m trying. The poor man just seems lost now.” Maggie rose and gathered up the plates. “Maybe you can bring him some chili tomorrow, now that you’re here. You might cheer him up.”
“Sure.”
After dinner they took their tea to the sofa and watched television. A rerun of Law & Order. Her aunt began nodding off at the end. Maggie rose and kissed the top of Billie’s head, an affection she had done since the day her niece first came to live with her all those years ago.
“Goodnight sweetheart,” Maggie said. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“Goodnight, Mags.�
��
Billie watched her aunt toddle off to bed, noticing that the woman’s limp seemed worse. Turning back to the TV, she flipped through the channels and stopped at the Hamilton station and waited for the news. There was no mention of the investigation into the discovery at the Essex building, nor was there any sign of that hateful reporter that had accosted her outside of Jen’s shop. No sign of Mockler either, which was a relief.
She wondered how he was doing and if he was making any progress on the case and what he might be doing at this very moment. Then she killed the television, pushed the man out of her thoughts and went to bed.
37
THE SKY WAS overcast, the morning grey. Billie stood in the sand at the tide line, the sole occupant on an immense beach, looking out at a lake the colour of lead, a sky the colour of smoke. She opened her senses up by a degree, then two. Just enough to let a drip-drip of the otherworld into her sightline. Ships appeared on the horizon, ghost vessels all with tall masts, their sails rippling in the wind. Steamships and freighters plied the water, cutting too close to the extended sandspit hidden beneath the waves. The ships buckling hard and listing badly before going down. A thousand vessels on the water and Billie a mute witness to their final moments before going under, the crews scrambling into dinghies or tumbling into the icy water.
It took her breath away, the after-image of all these shipwrecks. The scope her second-sight allowed was stunning and she had barely opened up more than a notch. With no more effort than the batting of an eye, she closed off her senses and the ghost ships shimmered like mirages and vanished. A lone gull traipsed through the sand on her left and when Billie turned and trudged back up the dune, the bird took flight.
When the breakfast dishes were cleared, Maggie drove into town to run errands and Billie took the tub of chili from the fridge to deliver to the Coopers three doors down. The tub was heavy, Maggie having prepared enough to feed the widower for a week. She knocked on the door of the little cottage and waited. The curtains were drawn and she was about to give up when the door opened.