Laying a Ghost

by Jane Davitt

  Sandy turned his grin to Nick, reaching out a callused hand. “Nice to meet ye, lad.” Nick put his hand in Sandy’s. “It’s good to know the house won’t be empty ‑‑ always a shame when that happens. Why, I remember the day your uncle went off to the mainland, thinking ...”

  Whatever it was Sandy had been saying or planning to say trailed off at the expression on Nick’s face, one of slow dawning realization. Nick was trembling, his breath quick and unsteady as he stared at Sandy with his eyes slightly unfocused, as if it weren’t really Sandy he was looking at but something much further away.

  “It’s the kettle,” Nick gasped, his hand tightening on Sandy’s to the point where even John could see it.

  Sandy looked puzzled, but not yet concerned. “What, lad? Speak up.”

  “The kettle.” Nick’s voice was louder and held a hint of hysteria. “Something ... I can’t tell. You get ... and you’re ...” He dropped Sandy’s hand, backing away, and then bolted for the door before John could do anything to stop him.

  “What the hell ‑‑” Sandy exclaimed, looking bewildered and a little displeased. “Has he been at the whiskey, then? Fine way to behave!” He nursed his hand, giving John a severe look. “Well? Go after him, then! He looked like the devil was at his heels.”

  “I ‑‑ he’s tired, still. Jet lag and ‑‑” John gave up trying to explain, settling for giving Sandy’s shoulder a swift pat, and then turning to follow Nick, ignoring the looks he was getting from people who’d already stepped out of the way for Nick, pushing through them with little regard for courtesy. He caught his mother’s eye briefly, noting how pale she was, but he didn’t have time to go to her, not when Nick needed him, and Carson was by her side anyway, his face anxious and questioning.

  John found Nick in a narrow alleyway at the side of the building, sitting at the bottom of a short flight of stairs leading up to a storeroom. His head was buried in his hands and he didn’t look up as John approached him.

  “What did you see?” John sat beside him, putting his arm around Nick’s shoulders. “What was wrong?”

  “Don’t touch me!” Nick jumped to his feet, pacing a short distance before turning back toward John, who could barely react to the rejection in his desire to find out what Nick had seen. “Don’t touch ... God, I didn’t want to see that. I don’t want to know ...” He was weaving slightly and put his hands up over his face again, but removed them immediately, pulling at the neck of his shirt until the thread holding the top button gave up under the strain. “Can’t breathe.” Nick sounded panicked.

  “Yes, you can.” John kept his voice calm. He stood and went to Nick, standing just in front of him. “You can breathe just fine. All that fresh air, here, remember? On the mountain, blowing across your face, down on the beach, cold from the sea ‑‑” He took Nick’s hands, gripping them tightly when Nick tried to pull them away. “No. You can touch me. I’m safe.” He heard Nick’s words echo in his head and flashed on an image of Sandy and Nick’s hands meeting. “But Sandy isn’t? Is that it? Or was it a ghost you saw behind him?”

  “No. No. There was ... it was just like that little girl. The one who drowned.” Nick squeezed his eyes shut, swaying, and John guided him over to the steps, pushing him down to a sitting position when it seemed that Nick wouldn’t fight him.

  Nick lifted his face and looked at John, his eyes wild, terrified, his breathing too fast. Even in the dim light John could see the tinge of blue to Nick’s lips.

  “He can’t breathe.” Nick curled the fingers of his right hand into the front of John’s shirt where he crouched before him. “Everything will stop working, and there’s ... like a fist, here.” Nick’s hand pressed against John’s chest. “And they’ll find him the next day and he’ll be dead, oh God ...” Nick began to weep silently.

  “We can stop it,” John said urgently, desperately, clasping Nick’s hand and feeling the chill of it against his palm. Sandy, dead? He was old, yes, and it was well known on the island that he had a weak heart, but the man wasn’t done with living, not by a long way. “Now that we know, we can do something. Is it a short in the electric kettle? Something like that?” He brought his hand up to stroke roughly through Nick’s hair, pulling him close. Nick was wracked with shivers; his falling tears the only warmth his body had to offer. “Nick, love, don’t. I know it’s awful to see it like that but it doesn’t have to be that way.”

  Nick pressed himself closer, hands grabbing onto John where they could and holding tightly. “I don’t want to do this anymore,” he said brokenly. “What will ... when it’s people I know? People I ... care about?” He didn’t seem able to stop crying.

  There was nothing John could offer in comfort but his arms around Nick and a gentle flow of reassurances they both knew were meaningless.

  Because if Nick stayed in one place, then it would be the deaths of people he knew that he was foretelling, and it would be their ghosts he’d see walking towards him.

  And there was nothing to stop it happening. John wasn’t sure that Nick would want it to stop, not really. It was part of him, had been for years, and if it went, there was no way to know what the consequences might be.

  He sat there, with Nick in his arms, rocking him slightly back and forwards like a child, pressing kisses to his hair and forehead and waiting for Nick’s tears to stop. When they didn’t and the front of John’s shirt was damp with them, he pushed Nick away from him “Stop it now. You have to stop now, Nick. Cry later, if you must, but now you have to tell me. When will it happen, do you know? Soon? Tonight?”

  Nick swallowed and nodded. “I think tonight, or I ... wouldn’t have seen it.” He had to clear his throat before he could go on, fisting both hands into the front of John’s shirt. “I don’t know for sure, but I think so. Or maybe in the morning? Something about ... I don’t know. All I saw was the kettle, and then he was clutching at his chest, and he couldn’t breathe ...” Nick drew a shuddering breath, and the sounds of the party inside filtered through to John, who hadn’t been hearing them for some time. “We have to tell him. Will he listen to me? Or just think I’m crazy?”

  John thought about it, his mind busy with half a dozen ways of getting Sandy on his own and willing to listen to a stranger he thought was drunk. Reluctantly, he shook his head. “He won’t believe you. Stubborn as they come, and he’s been supping whiskey all night, which won’t help.” He stood up. “Wait here. Will you do that? Wait, and I’ll go back in and tell my mother you’re not feeling well and I’m taking you home.”

  “What about Sandy?” Nick objected..

  John gave him a reassuring smile. “Well, we won’t be breaking in, because he’s never locked his door that I can remember, but I wouldn’t care if we had to smash down the door under the circumstances. We’ll get over to his house and take a look around; see what we can find. Shouldn’t take long.”

  “Okay.” Nick didn’t let go of him, though, and they ended up getting to their feet together and walking as far as the corner of the building, where Nick seemed to run out of energy and leaned against the wall, reluctantly untangling the fingers of one hand from John’s shirt. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want this to happen. Especially tonight.”

  “Will you stop apologizing for things that aren’t your fault?” John felt exasperated. “I’d rather you’d have seen it than not, despite what it does to you. Wait here, all right? I’ll be back in a few minutes.” He had to uncurl Nick’s other hand, but it latched onto his as if it had a mind of its own, and before he could do anything else about it, Nick tugged him in close and kissed him.

  Nick’s lips were cold and salty, but John didn’t ‑‑ couldn’t ‑‑ let the kiss linger, as much as he might have wanted to. This wasn’t the place or time.

  He ran his hand down Nick’s face gently and then stepped back. “I won’t be long,” he promised.

  Nick nodded, something that looked a little like hope in his eyes.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Nick was shiveri
ng, and he felt very distinctly like he was going to throw up as John opened the door to Sandy’s house and they went inside. The hall was thick with dust and cobwebs, the air a bit stale and smelling faintly of mildew, and every few seconds, out of the corner of his eye, Nick could see something ...

  He shut his eyes and clutched the flashlight that John had thrust into his grip, and even though he was holding it tightly enough that the edges of the switch were cutting into his flesh it didn’t stop his hands from trembling. “You’re sure no one will be able to see us?”

  “Aye.” John reached back for Nick’s hand as they moved through the darkened house. “We’re far enough away, and more than half the island’s at Stella’s in any case.” They’d decided not to turn on any lights just to be on the safe side, which was why they were both holding flashlights.

  The hallway opened up into a wider room that was the kitchen, Nick saw after a few seconds. To his right, a thin gray spectre hovered, determined, and Nick stumbled and almost fell as he startled away from it. “Shit.” John turned and grabbed onto him, keeping him upright.

  “Are you all right?” John sounded concerned. “Do you want to sit down?” His hand didn’t move away, gripping Nick’s arm firmly, reminding him that they were here to fix this, make it right, so that the ghost he could see ‑‑ who wasn’t even that, just the echo of a possibility, no more ‑‑ would vanish.

  “No.” Nick shook his head. “I mean ... no, I don’t want to sit down.” Run out of there, maybe, but not sit down. He steadied himself and took a deep breath, looking around the darkened kitchen. “I keep seeing ... something. Not a ghost, not really, but ... something. We have to fix this.”

  “And we will.” John sent the beam from his flashlight over the countertops. “Right. You mentioned the kettle? I’ll start there.” He walked over to it and shook his head. “Christ, it belongs in a museum, so it does. Brown cloth flex! I haven’t seen anything wired with this for years.” He examined the flex cautiously, after unplugging the kettle, and frowned. “I can’t see anything wrong, mind you.” He turned to Nick. “I’m going to find the fuse box and see what sort of state that’s in. Will you be all right here?”

  “Yes.” But as soon as he said it, Nick knew it wasn’t true, and he was moving toward John before he could think. “No. I want to come with you.”

  There was no trace of impatience on John’s face. “Come here.” He put his arms around Nick and hugged him close. “It’s going to be fine.” John’s breath was warm against the side of Nick’s face, smelling faintly of whiskey. “I trust what you saw, and I’ll help you to make it right, I promise.” With his hand in Nick’s, he led them through the house to a cupboard under the stairs that housed what even Nick, who didn’t know much about such matters, could see was an antiquated fuse box.

  Leaning against the wall, Nick watched as John, muttering to himself under his breath, opened the fuse box and fiddled with the fuses inside. He took one out, looked at it carefully, shone the flashlight’s beam into the socket it had been removed from, and then put it back. While he continued to fiddle with fuses, Nick turned his head and saw a flitting, ghostly image in his peripheral vision. He closed his eyes again and waited.

  “This all looks fine.” John sounded puzzled rather than exasperated. “I don’t know where else to look ... if it’s the wiring itself, we don’t have time to check that.” He stepped out of the cupboard and closed the door. “Let’s take another look at the kettle. If needs be, we’ll just take the damn thing with us.”

  “Okay.” They made their way back to the kitchen, where John checked the wiring again but still didn’t manage to find anything suspicious. “Maybe it’s something inside?” Nick suggested, picking the kettle up in desperation. The handle wobbled and a small wave of room-temperature water splashed over him, wetting both hand and shirt. Before he could react, the vision he’d had earlier flashed through him again ‑‑ the searing burn as boiling water hit his skin, the sharp clench in his chest as his heart seized at the shock, the sensation of not being able to breathe, and then the darkness swallowing him up ...

  Nick let go of the kettle with a gasp and staggered back, reeling.

  “Nick!” John was there at once, supporting him, his hand reaching out to touch the spreading patch of damp on Nick’s shirt, tugging it away from his skin. “It’s not hot,” he discovered a moment later. “God, I thought somehow we’d switched the kettle on, or something.”

  He looked shaken, and Nick couldn’t blame him.

  “That’s how it happened.” Nick grabbed onto John’s hand and squeezed it to make sure the other man heard what he was saying. “Happens. How it happens. He gets burned, and I think ... I think he has a heart attack. Or a stroke or something. His chest, and ...” It was like someone crushing his heart, like a muscle cramp in the most vital part of the body, and it hurt so much that Nick was left speechless, holding onto John as tightly as he could.

  “Och, the poor man!” John said with a quick sympathy, his arms strong around Nick. “Aye, he would. It’s not six months since he had a heart attack, and something like that ‑‑” He shuddered, sending a matching shiver over Nick. “All alone,” he murmured, “and no one to help him, or know there was anything wrong. It’s a horrible way to ‑‑”

  There was a pause and then John began to chuckle. “I’m sorry,” he managed to say as Nick lifted his head and stared at him. “It’s just ‑‑ I was feeling awful sad there, and there’s no need, is there? If we can find a screwdriver, I’ll have that handle fixed in a minute, and it’s not going to happen. Do you hear me, Nick?” His hands came up to cup Nick’s face, his eyes shining. “It’s not going to happen,” he repeated. “You did it, love. You saved him.”

  For what felt like a very long moment, Nick just stood there staring at him uncomprehendingly, and then he felt his own lips curling into a smile. “I ... did?”

  “I don’t see anyone else in the room who has visions and a soggy shirt.” John was starting to look delighted. “I’m thinking you did, Mr. Dominic Kelley, and I’m thinking you should be proud of yourself.”

  Still stunned, Nick glanced around the room, looking for phantoms lurking in the shadows, and saw nothing. There wasn’t anything there in the house but the two of them, and John was going to repair the kettle and for once something wasn’t going to end in death. Nick wasn’t even sure how to feel about that, other than happy. He wasn’t sure he felt proud because it had never seemed as if his abilities were his as much as he belonged to them, as if he were some sort of tool and the world was using him, but he did feel relieved and grateful, and that, he thought, was probably enough.

  * * * * *

  Nick was so distracted by the time they left Sandy’s house that he didn’t notice that he wasn’t anxious about riding in the car until they’d pulled up at Rossneath. He and John had both been snickering under their breath as they left Sandy’s house, Nick’s relief turned to something giddy because he just couldn’t believe that they’d managed to avert disaster.

  He got out of the car and shut the door with more force than was necessary then trotted around the front and grabbed onto John with both hands, spinning them in what anyone watching would have thought an awkward whiskey-induced dance. “We did it.”

  “You did it,” John corrected, halting them and pulling Nick to him for a fierce, exuberant hug. “And for all that it hurt you to see that, you can’t be minding it now, can you?” He kissed Nick hard. “And God, I’ve been wanting to do this all night ‑‑”

  John’s mouth was eager against his, both of them still more than a little overwhelmed with all that they’d gone through, their reactions not quite normal now. Everything seemed heightened and exaggerated by the sure and certain knowledge that they’d saved a life in a way that most people would have said was impossible.

  Nick groaned and ran his hands over John where he could. “Do you have to go back?” he asked, kissing John again. “Will you feel guilty if you don’t?”r />
  “I told my mother I might, but you saw what it was like; she won’t miss me, and it’s nearly eleven o’clock now.” John’s lips dragged slowly over Nick’s throat, leaving his skin tingling. “And none of that matters, because I’m not leaving you tonight. Now can we go inside?” John’s breath was warm against Nick’s neck as he bit gently at the sensitive skin. “Want to show you how much I’ve missed you today ‑‑”

  Nick’s hands tightened involuntarily on John’s hips. “Inside’s good,” he gasped, tugging at John to get them moving in the right direction even though he’d have been happy to just stand there for as long as John wanted to continue to do what he was doing.

  Slowly, between and sometimes during kisses, they managed to make their way to the house and through the doorway. John kicked the door shut with his foot and pressed Nick up against the wall, his tongue exploring Nick’s mouth. Nick gave back as good as he got, practically vibrating with the knowledge that for once he’d been able to change things, to save someone.

  “You make me feel ‑‑” John’s voice trailed off as he started to undo Nick’s shirt, kissing each exposed inch of skin with an eager hunger that Nick shared. “God, Nick ‑‑ I want to tear every stitch off you and fuck you right here where we stand, but I want to take hours doing nothing but this as well.” He slid his hands inside Nick’s shirt, caressing his chest as he smiled at him. “I don’t think I’m making any sense, am I? And that’s your fault too.”

  “You don’t need to make sense.” Nick closed his eyes for a second or two and then opened them again so that he could look into John’s intensely blue ones. “Just don’t stop touching me. John ... I’ve never felt like this before. I was always ... being done to, trying to figure out how to get through it without going crazy, but now ... it feels like I could actually do something. Like ...” He trailed off as John’s lips and tongue found his nipple, teasing it until it contracted with a twitch of pleasure that sparked behind Nick’s again-closed eyelids and down to his cock.