by T. L. Ingham
Chapter One
Priscilla? Her sister? I could not have been more stunned if Pia had suddenly stripped naked in the doorway and begun to dance a jig.
Allow me to explain.
My name is Reid Larson and recently I made the move to the Hamptons where I work at the Darcy-Stillwell Fine Art Gallery. I work for (and currently live with) Pia Darcy-Stillwell, who up until this moment I had always been led to believe was an only child, named Pia. Considering the odd woman (Pia's sister Frances) standing before me in full Gypsy regalia with shocking orange hair and lipstick to match, I could kind of understand that little white lie. Further, considering Pia's obsession with names (she hates mine- my full name is Sigreid), I could also understand why she would change hers from Priscilla to Pia. However, what I could not understand was what this strange woman was doing here, late at night, standing on Pia's doorstep.
Frances managed answering that question without my even asking it, as suddenly, up the walk came trundling an older man, carting what looked to be half a dozen suitcases and dragging another behind him. On his heels was a young man, roughly my age, or thereabouts, and a very large woman, also somewhere in her mid-twenties. Even further behind them were a passel of boys in a variety of ages. The eldest may have been eleven or so, and was dragging the youngest, somewhere in the neighborhood of two years old, while the third child, maybe four, brought up the rear, dragging the toes of his shoes along the sidewalk every step of the way.
I was already making plans for my escape when Pia said, (rather shakily, I might add), "Frances, now is not really a good time for a visit…"
"What?! You must be joking!" the other woman objected. "We've had this thing planned for ages, Prissy! Simply ages! You can't back out now! As if you would," the woman kind of chuckled to herself as if Pia's objections were nothing but a silly joke; all the while she shoved herself past me, through the doorway, and around Pia.
"Bring them in here for now, Freddie!" she called back to the man who was presumably her husband, whereupon Freddie, who looked as if he might pass out any second from the strain of having been turned into a pack mule, forced his suitcase muddled form through the doorway, taking a chunk or two of the frame with him as he went.
"No, Frances, you simply don't understand!" Pia tried again. "I already have guests. I don’t think I have the room to accommodate all of you."
"Nonsense! This house is big enough to accommodate half the British army, dear!" Then, turning to her husband, Frances snapped, "Put them down, Freddie, before you have an apoplectic fit."
"Right here, Frannie?" he asked, obviously befuddled.
"Isn't that what I just said? Need I constantly repeat myself?"
I think he might have shrugged, but the dead weight of all the suitcases prohibited the movement, and then he just let go of the cases and watched as they all crashed to the floor in an astounding helter-skelter manner.
One of them landed on my toe- the one part of my body that had not recently been damaged- and it was everything I could do not to overreact.
Another landed on Frances's toe and she was a little less gracious about it. "You blasted fool! Honestly, you don't have the sense God gave a turnip! You can't bounce the luggage about willy-nilly like that! Look at what you've done to my toe!"
We all looked at the offended appendage as she stuck a sock and sandal clad foot out from under her multi-colored floor length skirt.
This woman had some serious fashion issues. Knowing who her sister was, I wondered how that could possibly have happened. I've been on breaking and entering missions with Pia where she still insisted upon wearing stiletto heels. (By the way, that whole B&E thing, that's a long story that isn't as illegal as it sounds. Okay, maybe it is, but everything came out all right in the end, so that's all that matters. The ends justify the means and all that.)
"Frances," I could see Pia was gearing up for another one of her steamroller lectures, the type in which Pia always came out the winner. Pia could talk Donald Trump into giving away his entire fortune to the homeless, if she put her heart into it. "There is simply no way that I can accommodate you at this time, and honestly, you ought to have called me or at the very least sent me an e-mail letting me know that you were coming. How could you think I could possibly be prepared at the last minute like this?"
Frances crossed her arms over her chest in a firm manner. "Prissy, we have spent every Fourth with you since time and memoriam, why on earth would this year be any different? And besides, Freddie's and my thirtieth anniversary is only a few weeks away and you promised to throw us the party!"
Pia frowned, "Is it already the Fourth?"
"It's only five days away," Frances reminded Pia.
It took me a minute to understand that they were talking about Independence Day, which was in fact right around the corner.
And then as I looked around, 'right around the corner,' stretched into an endless eternity.
The rest of the gang had finally made it inside and we were packed into the foyer like a pound of sardines in a half-pound can, while the eleven-year-old swung his foot a little less than innocently and connected pretty solidly with his middle brother's leg.
Four times that I noticed.
Meanwhile the two-year-old was wiping the remnants of whatever it was that was coming out of his nose onto the wallpaper. Let's hope green and purple don't clash too much, because nearly everything in Pia's house is purple, and judging by the abundance of the mucus which was emanating from the baby's nose, it would soon be coated with green as well. The thought of spending the next five days (let alone- how many weeks did she say 'til her anniversary?) with these people made me cringe.
I ignored the banter still going on between Pia and her sister, while I considered my options. After all, I was merely a guest in this house since in all reality I lived in the guest house. I had begun renting it right after my move here, mostly because Pia was willing to forego the normal (extravagant) rent every other place in the Hamptons charges.
Then Pia had gotten a bee in her bonnet and decided to renovate the guest house, moving me temporarily into the main house during the 'active' construction phase- in other words, the digging and knocking down of walls. It didn't take much evaluation on my part to realize that I'd much rather live in a home with a gaping hole in the side, than stay here with Pia's family. Okay, so maybe there was a giant pit dug just outside the second bedroom of the guest house. And I have to admit it was the site of a recent murder. And, all right, it had led to the discovery of two more human skeletons. And yes, the police were still busy exhuming then. Still, given the choice between Pia's family and a pit filled with dead bodies, I'd go pit any day. Besides, how much racket could the cops possibly make exhuming the last of the bones?
I was willing to find out.
I tuned in just in time to hear Frances saying, "-thought that the kids could stay in the main house while Freddie and I stayed in the guest house, for privacy you know. After all, we are celebrating our anniversary."
I actually made a gagging noise. It wasn't a little one either.
Just then my mother and Gloria joined us, with Alex hot on their heels.
"What's going on here?" my mother asked. "I was beginning to wonder if something had happened to the two of you- Sigreid? Are you choking? But now I can see that you have company."
"Oh, God! Freakish Frannie and the wonder twins! Kill me now!" Gloria shrieked. "Oh, wait! I'm already dead!"
Oh, did I mention Gloria and Alex were ghosts?
Okay, so, long story short, when I first moved here there was this whole scandal at the art gallery and it didn't take long for me to find myself smack dab in the middle of it. Anyway, amongst other things, I got whacked on the head by a very heavy marble sculpture. Since that day I've been able to see and speak to ghosts. As it turns out, there are quite a few of them hanging out in the Hamptons.
"Why does this house suddenly feel too full?" Alex asked no one in particular, which was fine, since
aside from Gloria and me, no one else could hear him anyway.
Pia sighed and then began making introductions. "Frances, this is one of my employees," I wiggled my fingers at her in a semi-wave, "Reid Larson and her mother Judy. Ladies, this is my sister Frances, her husband Freddie, her daughter Frida, and their youngest son Freddie Jr."
Freddie smiled at us a bit wearily while Junior cast us a sullen look. Frida's expression never changed from one of discomfort. It almost looked as if she might be constipated, which, judging by her immense size, (though not nearly as big as one of Pia's closest friends, Olivia) was entirely possible.
Pia sighed again. "I'm sorry, dear, but I still have trouble with the boys' names."
I thought it might be at least a little bit rude that Pia didn't know her great-nephews' names, but only until Frida began to speak. "The oldest is Phoenyx, that's with a 'y' not an 'i,' and then the middle is Physhyr- spelled p-h-y-s-h-y-r, and then the last is Phrytz- p-h-r-y-t-z."
"Way to save money on those vowels. Pat Sajak would be so proud," Gloria intoned from where she was bobbing along the ceiling.
I didn't know which was odder, the fact that Frida had given them such bizarre names with an even more bizarre twist on the spellings, or the fact that she felt the need to point it out. I've never met a person and introduced myself by saying, "Hi, I'm Reid. That's r-e-i-d." Weird.
"Right, thanks," Pia said.
"Well, isn't it nice to meet you all," my mother smiled, ever the gracious hostess, even in someone else's home. "Shouldn't we invite them to sit down, Pia?" she prodded. "If you'll all come into the kitchen, Pia has some tea prepared and I think we can find some milk for the boys and maybe some cookies-"
"Hulk HUN-gry!" the middle child- Physhyr- suddenly grunted. "Hulk want COO-kies!"
My mother took him by the hand, "Well, if the Hulk can find his manners, then I'm certain the Hulk can have some cookies."
"Hulk want cookies NOW, or Hulk SMASH!" I heard him saying even as he followed my mother down the hall.
I couldn't help but think it might be pretty interesting to see how my mother handled the little demon- er- dear, so I followed after them.
I put on the breaks when I heard the discussion behind me returning back to the subject of the guest house.
"Freddie, why don't you take our bags down to the guest house and then you can take the children's up to their rooms?" Frances was saying. "You did get everything out of the car, didn't you, dear?"
I'm not sure who was paler. Me, at the prospect of losing my private home and possibly having to burn my bed when I finally returned to it, or Freddie, who no doubt wilted at the prospect of lifting all that heavy luggage again- which by the way- what was wrong with Junior? He looked pretty darn capable to me.
"Frances!" Pia's sharp voice stilled Freddie's movement even as he was lifting the last of the bags, "I've been trying to tell you! You can't possibly use the guest house, as I've rented it out. Someone else is already living there."
"What? Who?"
"If you must know, I've rented it to Reid."
"Your employee?" Frances frowned at this. "You rented an entire house to an employee?"
"Yes, I have." Pia's voice could not have been colder.
"You may as well have rented it out to the maid!" Frances scoffed. "Still- and it's an inconvenience to be sure, since it certainly won't afford us the privacy we were looking forward to- but still, the guest house does have two rooms, so we'll just have to stay in the other one."
Pia shook her head, "I'm afraid that's quite impossible. I'm in the middle of remodeling the second bedroom, building an artist's studio actually, and you can't possibly stay there."
"Well, why on earth not?" Frances was starting to get angry.
"For starters, the first misstep might have you plunging into a giant pit dug just outside the removed wall," Pia's sarcasm was hard to miss.
"Go get 'em, sister!" Gloria crowed. Of course no one could hear her but me.
"Well, that puts a damper on things, doesn't it?" Frances asked no one in particular.
"Frannie," Freddie was starting to groan under all the weight. "Can you please just decide something. My back is breaking."
"That's why I suggested a hotel," Pia reminded her.
Frances shook her head. "No. We can't possibly do that. We can't afford rooms for all of us, and besides, that would mean renting a car in order to travel back and forth, and that's just more wasted expense."
"How did you get here if you don't have a car?"
"Taxi. Now, there's nothing for it, we'll just all have to stay in the main house. How many rooms have you got?"
"Seven outside of mine and Bernard's," Pia spoke reluctantly.
"That will be just fine. Freddie and I will take one, Frida can have another, Freddie Jr. can finally have a room to himself, and the boys will need another two and you'll still have two left over. There, see? Brilliant! Just brilliant!"
Brilliant.