“No, no,” Eric said. “You’re white, and white always opens.”
“Oh, of course.” I frantically tried to remember all the rules. Joel had enjoyed the occasional game, but I’d never really got into chess. I moved the pawn in front of my left rook out two spaces, and waited for Eric to point out his move.
“Knight to C6.” he said.
“Huh?”
“I want you to move my knight to C6,” Eric repeated.
“Which square is C6?”
Eric explained to me the algebraic notations of the board. I knew then that I was doomed to lose. He sounded like he really knew how to play chess.
I was right. Not ten minutes later Eric swooped his bishop across the board and declared checkmate.
“Do you want to play again?” he asked. “I’ll go easy on you.”
“No you won’t,” I soaked up the last remnants of cheesy sauce with my garlic bread. “You enjoy winning too much. I would like to know how to play better, though.”
“I can teach you some things.” Eric waited while I reset the board and poured myself another drink. He started to talk about the different pieces, and explain the simple strategies of the game. I had no idea there was so many layers to chess. It wasn’t just random moves like I thought it was, there was some serious strategy involved. I was hooked. By the time I finished my drink, I was ready for another game.
“What was it like growing up here?” I asked, as I moved my bishop out from beside my queen, trying to dominate the centre of the board like Eric had shown me. “I mean, in this house, in this town?”
“It was hard,” said Eric. “But what child’s life isn’t really hard in some way? My mother was a harsh woman. My father was a violinist, too. He toured the world with different philharmonic orchestras, sometimes even performing as a soloist. He played in some remarkable places, but he was gone for months at a time, and he never made much money. What money he did make he spent on tour, on absinthe and women. One day, the orchestra finished a tour in Italy, and he simply never came home. I was twelve. The only thing he left my mother was this house, which was beginning to feel more and more like a prison to me.”
“Your mother was smart. I’m blown away by the way she built a fortune from nothing. There are brokers in London who don’t have the skill for picking stocks that she does.”
“Oh, yes. She had an incredible mind. But it was a mind twisted by jealousy and rage. She hated art, hated anything beautiful, because she could not create herself. She hated music most of all, because it reminded her of my father, and his failure as a provider and a husband. When he disappeared, she banned all music from the house. As if I didn’t already resent her enough for driving my father away.”
“Is that what happened?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never been able to ask him.” Eric said, his tone dark, as if he were somewhere far away. “But it looked like that to me. Whenever he came home, she would scream at him for hours about their lack of money, about his absence, his drinking, his failure. ‘Why don’t you get a real job?’ she’d ask him over and over. But he didn’t know how to do anything else. He would take me out to see concerts, or take lessons, and I would play for him, just to see him smile. He looked sad all the time, even when he played his violin. But when I played, his whole face lit up. After he left, my mother directed most of her anger toward me. I was the failure. I didn’t study hard enough. I’d never amount to anything. Finally, I couldn’t take it any more.”
“So you left.”
“As soon as I finished school, I took my father’s violin—that’s Isolde—from the attic, packed all my black clothes into a suitcase, and I left. I went to London, and worked at pubs, playing everywhere I could on weekends, trying to make a name for myself. But it wasn’t until I met Allan and we started to jam that the concept of using the violin in a traditional rock band occurred to me—”
“Allan?”
“Allan Lachlan. He’s the drummer in Ghost Symphony. Allan was a regular at one of the pubs I worked at. His band played rock covers there every Friday and Saturday night. The band sucked, but Allan was amazing. We started talking, and became pretty good mates, so I suggested we have a jam. He thought I was a guitarist. The look on his face when I showed up at his bedsit with my violin case was priceless. But then I started playing some of his band’s covers, and he just got it. Everything clicked. Suddenly, we had a sound. It was different. It was unique. We found Tom, our first guitarist, and a girl named Belinda on double bass, and we started playing at clubs down in Camden. At first it was just covers—classic pop and rock tunes redefined with our mix of classical and modern instrumentation. But soon I got heavily into writing music, and it was those first original songs that caught the attention of our record label. The rest is history.” Eric grinned. Talking about his band made his whole face light up. It clearly meant a lot to him.
“What did your mother think of your success? Surely she must’ve come around to the idea that your music was a viable career.”
Eric shook his head. “She never had the chance. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's around the time I left for my first European tour. I was still so angry with her—I didn’t return to Crookshollow for four years, and by that time it was too late. Her mind had gone back so far that she couldn’t even remember that I’d left in the first place. She still thought I was a boy, and that my father was coming home. She was a very different person, kind and sweet.” He laughed bitterly. “We actually grew quite close these last couple of years, as close as anyone can be to someone with dementia.”
“I’m so sorry, Eric.” I went to pat his hand, and then remembered what happened when I did that. Instead, I awkwardly switched to refilling my glass.
“It’s not your fault. Just pray you never have to watch someone die of that horrible disease. It robbed her of her mind—her most prized possession—long before it took her life. I’ve come back to visit as often as I could get away, but the tour schedule makes it hard. Duncan has been looking after her, arranging all her care and managing the estate. He’s been such a great help. He must be pretty upset over her death. Duncan was a friend of my father’s from his school days, and he remained close to my mother after my father left.”
“He didn’t seem too upset when I met him yesterday.”
“Oh, well, he had a pretty young thing to show around. Duncan can turn on the charm like a faucet. But enough about me.” The darkness faded from Eric’s eyes. “What about you, Miss Lawyer? I bet your parents are awful proud of you, with your fancy corporate suits and your impressive title.”
I snorted so hard bubbles from my rum and coke went up my nose. I clamped my hand over my mouth.
“I don’t think my parents know how to be proud,” I said. “That would imply they had some kind of capability for emotion.”
“Harsh.” Eric said. He gestured to the board. “I demand an explanation. And while you’re doing it, move my queen to C7.”
I leaned over and moved his piece, than took it with my rook. He grinned, pleased that I was learning. “My parents live for achievement. Nothing will ever be good enough for them. I made dux at one of the best public schools in London, and all my dad asked was why I’d missed two questions in the mathematics exam. I was top of my class at law school, and my mother tsked because I didn’t get a Rhodes scholarship. I landed my job and they were concerned that the firm wasn’t high-profile enough. I could make partner at the firm and it wouldn’t matter—my dad would still be pushing me to become a judge.”
“That sounds tough.”
I shrugged, suddenly feeling self-conscious. “They’re not bad people. They always wanted the best for me.”
“You are too nice. Don’t defend them. Let it all out. After all, who am I going to tell?” Eric grinned wickedly. I took another gulp of my drink, and grinned back.
“You asked for it. I was never allowed to be a kid. There was no Play-Doh in my house. No swing rides or Barbie dolls. The only games I had w
ere educational, and the only outings we went on were to museums or boring operas. I was shuffled from one expensive after-school program to another. At age four I could speak three languages and recite pi to 100 places. I was so desperate to please them that I never complained, but I was miserable. I had no friends, and I would eat because at least food tasted good and made me feel good. At least it was something I could control. And so I got chubby, and other kids were even more horrible to me, and so I would get sad and eat, and the cycle went on. Everything I loved I had to hide from my parents—chocolate bars I’d gobble down at the bus stop, gothic novels I snuck from the library and hid inside hollowed books, notebooks filled with my drawings stashed under my bed—”
“Your drawings?”
“Yeah.” My cheeks flushed an even deeper red. I stared down at the drink in my hand. “I like to draw. I am going to get a tattoo soon, and I’m trying to come up with a drawing that’s good enough to be worth the pain of etching it into my flesh. But my parents thought my interest in art was frivolous, so they tried to discourage me. They probably would have got on well with your mother.”
“Can you show me your work?”
“I … I’m not sure.”
“Go on.” Eric gestured to the board. “It looks as if you’re about to win this game. I’m in desperate need for a distraction.”
“I’ve never shown them to anyone before. I don’t think—”
“Please?”
I reached over to the desk and grabbed my sketchbook from my bag. I laid it out in front of Eric, and opened the page. My face burned as the page fell open on a sketch of a dragon. This wasn’t an eastern dragon, but a fiery European beast, the kind of dragon that unleashed fury upon unsuspecting Vikings. I’d even drawn some warriors being trampled beneath the dragon’s clawed feet. In the background, a village burned.
Eric pursed his lips. He nodded at me, and I turned another page. Here was a realistic rendering of a raven I’d copied from a Victorian wildlife engraving. A single, beady eye stared up at us. I gulped. I’d spent hours on that drawing.
“The head’s a bit crooked,” I croaked out, scrambling to turn the page. “And the eye isn’t right.”
“No,” Eric said. “It’s perfect. These are amazing, Elinor. You have a rare gift.” He studied the next drawing, a girl in a flowing gothic dress staring out of a window with a haunted expression on her face.
“They’re … they’re OK. I’ve never had any training or anything.”
“Which one are you getting as a tattoo?”
“I can’t decide. I like a lot of them, but nothing has jumped out as being perfect yet.”
“It will. Mine came to me in a dream. I saw the image in my mind and ran down to the parlour to get someone to render it as close as possible. I was lucky my artist was so patient, because I made her redraw it eight times before we got to the actual tattooing part. It was worth every agonising hour in that chair.”
“You have a tattoo?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know.” Eric gave me that mischievous, heart-melting grin.
We talked for hours, Eric shared more details about his crazy life as a touring musician, and after I finished a couple more drinks, I started to share more about mine. We played several games, and I even won a couple. Every time Eric smiled at me, and he smiled a lot—a deep, delicious smile—my whole body shuddered with excitement. Despite my resolve, I was still attracted to him. And what was worse, I was starting to fall for him.
It wasn’t until I dragged myself to bed in the early hours of the morning, my stomach fluttering and my mind swimming with visions of Eric’s smile, that I realised I had completely forgotten to call Cindy.
Elinor
I slept late the next morning. The sun was high in the sky, streaming through the flowered curtains that obscured the round stained-glass window, and creating a bright stripe across the bedspread. I sat up, rubbed the sleep out of my eyes, and grabbed my phone. The message icon was lit up. Cindy had sent me a message at some point in the early hours of the morning. I’d slept right through the alert. The time was 9:38 on a Sunday morning, Cindy was probably only just crashing into bed.
WHATUP BITCH? INTERESTING NIGHT. CALL ME TODAY AND I’LL FILL YOU IN.
I sent her back a smiley face and dropped my phone on top of my stack of books, sinking back into the pillows with a smile on my face. That makes two of us, I thought, thinking of my evening with Eric. It had been so much fun, just drinking and playing chess and talking about our lives. Eric was a good teacher, I was actually a somewhat decent player by the end of the evening. I even won the last game of the evening, which had Eric both grinning with pride and calling for a rematch.
The more I talked to Eric, the easier I found it to ignore the fluttering in my stomach. He wasn’t just some hot ghost, he was actually a pretty interesting person. And he’d had a hard childhood filled with parental disappointment, which I could definitely relate to. I could picture young Eric in my mind, his hair a mess of black curls and his gaze intense as he stood alone in the music suite at the tiny Crookshollow school, playing the violin for hours as if his life depended on every note. If our paths had crossed before now, I felt certain we’d have been friends.
See? Devil’s Advocate Elinor gloated. You just needed to get over your attraction to Eric. That was what was causing all your conflicting feelings. Now that you’re over it, and the two of you are just friends, you can focus on helping him solve the mystery of his death.
Speaking of which … the idiotic girl at the London theatre should have gotten back to me with the list of names by now. I flung back the sheets and bounced out of bed. My hand poised over my “lawyer” clothes—beige and brown skirts and jackets designed to help me fit in at my conservative law firm, clothes I was now so used to wearing that I barely even owned anything else. But today was different. Today I felt … vibrant. I pulled on a pair of jeans, and a black shirt that tied with a red ribbon that I particularly liked. I stood in the bathroom and admired myself in the mirror, swinging my hips as I brushed out my brown hair and slid my glasses up my nose. The red in the shirt made my green eyes sparkle. Humming to myself, I dabbed on my usual makeup, and headed downstairs.
Eric was in the kitchen, hovering over a chair and staring at the same coffee cup filled with water again. “Any luck so far?” I asked him.
“I saw a bubble appear about an hour ago,” he replied, not looking up.
I took the cup from him and dipped my finger inside. “It’s still cold,” I said. He sighed. I went over to fill up the kettle.
“You look gorgeous,” Eric growled. He wafted across the kitchen and came to stand behind me. “I miss the tight little skirt, though.”
My heart thudded against my chest. He wasn’t even touching me, but I could feel that same hot energy arcing through the air between us. I thought I was over this.
“Eric, I said we can’t do that.” My words came out harsher than I intended. A flicker of something crossed Eric’s face. Anger? Hurt? I couldn’t be sure. But in a moment it was gone, and Eric nodded and stepped away from me.
“That’s better. Now, if you let me eat my breakfast, we can get to work on your case.”
Eric’s eyes glinted. “Don’t you have to work today?”
“I’ll work this afternoon. You can even help me. It will go much quicker if you talk me through some of your mother’s files.”
“I can do that. In the meantime, we need to get that list of names from my manager,” said Eric. “Poor Heather. She must be devastated. She’s worked for me ever since my first record came out.”
The kettle boiled. I poured myself a cup of tea, set down a bowl of cereal, and chopped some banana on top. Eric watched me intensely as I crunched away.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I frowned at him as he leaned forward to peer at the contents of my spoon. “You’re making me feel all self-conscious.”
“Sorry, I can’t help it. You’re cute, and I miss food.” Eric�
�s lips parted slightly as he watched me scoop up the last of my cereal.
“Hey, look on the bright side,” I said, pushing the spoonful of milk-soaked kernels into my mouth. “At least you’re stuck with your killer body for all eternity. You won’t ever get fat like me.”
“Don’t say shit like that.”
“Like what?”
“That you’re fat. I don’t want to hear it. It’s self-deprecating and untrue and beneath you. You are clever and funny and hot as fuck, so don’t spend a moment of your life thinking that bullshit even matters, because life is too precious to waste feeling sorry for yourself.” Eric’s eyes burned into mine. “Take it from someone who knows.”
“I ...” My face burned. I didn’t know what to say. I was torn between feeling giddy over the “hot as fuck” comment, and wanting to argue with him. “I didn’t mean … it’s just that I am overweight. It’s a fact. It can’t be denied. I can’t seem to get it together to lose the weight. And every time I’m passed over for promotion, or one of my skinny friends gets the guy and not me, I can’t help but think it’s because of how I look. I feel the same way now that I do in high school—I’m just the hippo.”
“Elinor …” Eric leaned across the table. “You are so much more than what you realise. And if it’s the last thing I do before I depart this earth, I’m going to make you believe it.”
He placed his hand over mine. The energy leapt up my arm, pushing its warmth through my body. With his other hand, Eric reached across to the cup of water, and wrapped his hand around the ceramic mug. He lifted the mug off the table.
“Argh!” I cried out. “Eric, you did it!”
“No, I didn’t. You did it, Elinor. It’s all you.”
“Eric, I—” I stared into his eyes, losing myself in those intense orbs. I can’t do this. I can’t go through what I went through with Joel again. I’m not strong enough.
The Man in Black: A Gothic Romance (Crookshollow Ghosts) Page 10