Then again, he had no idea how to tell her without seeming like he was trying to scare her. Besides, what if he told her and nothing happened? Then he would have scared her for nothing. No, it was probably better just to keep all of that “curse” business quiet for now.
Of course if the last six months were any indication, Kate and Gavin Avery might have had a curse of their own.
Once they finished eating, they decided to tackle the trailer that was hooked up to the back of Kate’s Land Rover. Inside the trailer, Kate and Gavin had stashed their bed frames, mattresses, a few small tables, and a couch.
They decided to start with Kate’s bed. It was the smallest and the easiest to maneuver out of the packed trailer. They didn’t have too much trouble getting the frame or the twin mattress up the stairs and into her room. Gavin’s bed proved to be a little more of a challenge. It took all three of them to haul the full-sized mattress up the stairs. Once they made it to the living room, Michael and Kate shoved it through the apartment while Gavin ran into his room to clear a pathway through his scattered belongings.
“Oh, it feels good in here,” Kate remarked, noting the sudden drop in temperature inside Gavin’s room. “Gav, where do you want this?”
“Just set it against the wall for now,” Gavin answered. Michael barely heard him. His attention had fallen on the man standing in the corner of the room, clenching his fists, and staring at Gavin with murderous eyes.
Eyes that had long since looked their last.
Chapter 2
He’d seen them for as long as he could remember.
They’d never scared him, really. When he was younger, he hadn’t known that there was anything different about them. By the time he was old enough to figure out that no one else could see them, he was also old enough to realize that being dead didn’t turn people into monsters. It just meant that most of them were lonely.
This guy scared him.
He was tall, almost as tall as Michael, who towered above most people at 6’2, and muscular, something that Michael couldn’t boast. His dark hair was buzzed short, like an army crew cut, and he wore dark navy jeans, a gray T-shirt, and an old black jacket. As intimidating has his physical appearance seemed, however, nothing compared to the fury and repulsion with which he stared at Gavin Avery.
“Michael?” Kate’s voice snapped Michael out of his stupor. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, fine.” He wasn’t fine though. His voice had gone hoarse, the same way it always did whenever he tried to choke out a lie. He cleared his throat and assisted Kate and Gavin setting the mattress against the wall. No matter how he tried to convince himself otherwise, he could feel the stranger’s eyes boring into the back of his neck. Although he didn’t think the ghost had noticed him staring, he didn’t want to draw any sort of attention to himself.
This was the reason he never complained about the strange noises or feelings of discontent that plagued the other residents of Building 17. He’d always been a terrible liar, and anyone observing him too carefully would realize that when he said he had no explanation for the weird things that happened, he wasn’t telling the truth.
Once ghosts figured out he could see them, they followed him home. Over the years, he’d gotten better at ignoring them, tuning them out, but there was always the occasional slip-up. He’d respond to an otherwise unheard voice, or accidentally make eye contact with someone who’d grown accustomed to being invisible. That was when the trouble started.
Michael had learned the hard way that nothing good came from interfering in the affairs of the afterlife. He’d always been careful not to let anyone know what he could see, but everyone, from his classmates to his own mother knew there was something wrong with him. Their suspicions were somewhat confirmed after he was arrested as a suspect in a murder investigation at the beginning of his senior year of high school. The charges were quickly dropped, but still, the damage had been done.
Now, whenever spirits followed him home, he ignored them. This was frustrating for all parties involved, but especially for the ghosts. They knew he could see them, but when he didn’t acknowledge them again, they grew agitated. Some of them went crazy, throwing pots and pans around or heaving books off of shelves, in desperate attempts to get his attention. They usually gave up and moved out after a week or so of being ignored. But some of them, the more annoying ones, tended to linger. Some acted out of spite, some out of boredom. Some flat out refused to move on for reasons that Michael could never figure out. Maybe they were waiting for someone, or maybe they were scared of crossing over. Michael could accept that. Still, he would have preferred they not make his apartment building their halfway house.
Thinking back to everything Kate had told him about Gavin, his mysterious ailment, even the break-in, Michael knew he should have realized that those were the products of a haunting. He’d experienced the same symptoms of dizziness and exhaustion on multiple occasions. Spirits thrived on energy. It was how they moved heavy objects, or manifested themselves to those who otherwise wouldn’t be able to see them. They took this energy from any source they could find; electricity, radio waves, even the living. Especially the living. Michael had always been particularly susceptible to their attacks. He had a theory that since his mind was already so open to the spirits, it made it easier for them to drain his energy.
He wasn’t sure if that was what was happening or if all the physical exertion was finally catching up with him, but all of a sudden, he felt dizzy and lightheaded. He broke into a cold sweat and without warning, the ground begin to tilt.
“I need to go,” he announced abruptly. He concentrated all that remained of his energy on not falling over as he stumbled out of the room.
“What’s wrong?” Kate asked, eyeing him with obvious concern.
“I’m sorry Kate, I’m just - I - ” He took a deep breath and willed himself to stay conscious. “I really don’t feel well, and I need to go. I’m so sorry.” He turned to leave, and in doing so, brought on such an intense wave of vertigo that he tripped over the leg of one of the bedside tables he’d helped to carry up. Everything blurred as he toppled to the ground.
“Michael!” Kate shrieked. “Oh my God, are you alright?”
“I’m fine. I’m sorry I – I just need to go.” He stood much faster than he should have. Tiny white stars exploded in front of his eyes and he’d definitely twisted an ankle, but all he wanted was to get out of that apartment.
“Well, thank you for all your help!” Kate called as Michael half hobbled, half sprinted out onto the landing. As soon as he closed the door behind him, the dizziness began to subside. He leaned against the wall and took several deep breaths.
That was close.
No. That wasn’t close. That wasn’t even remotely close. Close would have been making it out of the apartment before a malevolent spirit drained him to the point of semi-consciousness. No, what had just happened had been a near bona-fide disaster. Kate and Gavin must have thought he was a complete basket-case. He was just lucky that his ankle had been the only casualty of his undignified departure.
He didn’t have to wonder why the ghost had drained him so quickly. He’d obviously been thriving off of Gavin’s waning energy for months. So why didn’t he take Kate’s energy? From what Michael could tell, she was as healthy and energetic as anyone he’d ever met. Even ghosts with a vengeance usually didn’t discriminate over whose energy they used. Maybe this one had a chivalrous streak.
It wasn’t unusual for ghosts to attach themselves to a specific person, either, especially if they’d known that person in life, or if their unfinished business concerned that person. Whoever this guy was, he’d known Gavin. And judging by his hostile looks, it hadn’t been a pleasant parting.
Out of all the ghosts Michael had met in the last twenty-seven years, only about a quarter of them were unaware of their passing. He had a few theories for this. Those who died of natural causes, such as disease or old age, usually had a fairly good idea that death w
as coming for them. That gave them time to prepare, to make peace with everything that might hold them to this realm or world or whatever, so that by the time they did die, they were able to pass from one life to the next without any sort of delay.
The ones who stuck around were usually the ones whom death had claimed unexpectedly. Brink, for example. One moment he was skateboarding around the parking lot of his school, the next he was gone. Unfortunately, the ones who’d lost their lives in traumatic experiences, like Brink and his skateboarding accident, were the ones who looked death square in the eye. They knew what had happened. They couldn’t forget. They couldn’t move on. So they stayed, until something - or someone - could bring them peace.
The remaining few seemed oblivious to their own passing. They were the ones Michael pitied the most; those who hadn’t seen death coming at all. Perhaps death had come in the form of a heart attack or maybe they’d gone to bed one night and had simply left their body behind the next morning. Whatever the reason, they were left alone, confused, and in denial. Michael often cursed himself for ignoring them, for being such a coward. But he wouldn’t, he couldn’t do anything that might make history repeat itself.
With a heavy sigh, he walked back to his own apartment and flopped down onto the couch. Brink appeared almost instantly.
“Well you were gone a long time,” he remarked as he took a seat, cross-legged, on the coffee-table.
“Yeah,” Michael replied shortly. Eighteen-year-old Eugene Brinkley, otherwise known as “Brink,” was the only ghost besides his grandmother with whom Michael willingly communicated. They’d met while Michael was still in high school. Of course, Brink was already dead by then. It had been too depressing for him to hang around his house, and since he’d vowed to keep an eye on his younger siblings, both of whom attended the same high school, he spent most of his time there. After they graduated, he’d somewhat moved in with Michael.
Brink had died in the early 90s, and his appearance reflected it. His blond hair fell in messy bangs across his forehead and he wore baggy jeans and an unbuttoned plaid shirt that hung loosely to reveal a white undershirt.
“So what are they like?” Brink asked.
“From what I can tell, cursed.” Briefly, Michael told him all about Kate, Gavin, and their seemingly relentless streak of bad luck, including their ghostly visitor.
“Wow. For the first time, you’re not going to be responsible for all the crap that happens in this building.”
“That’s what you got out of all of this?”
“What else is there? So they’re haunted. Aren’t a lot of people haunted?”
“Not like this. This guy looked like he wanted to kill Gavin.”
“So what, you think Gavin murdered him?”
Michael didn’t want to go that far. Gavin didn’t seem like the kind. Of course, that didn’t necessarily mean he wasn’t capable. In fact, Michael had learned in one of his psychology classes that psychopaths often taught themselves to mimic emotion and feign charisma in order to gain trust. But Michael had spent several hours with Gavin, and although he was sociable enough, he wasn’t off-the-charts charismatic.
“Whatever he did, I don’t think it was good,” Michael answered.
“What if he did it out of self defense?” Brink asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you said this guy looked like bad news, right? What if he attacked Gavin first? Or Kate?” It made sense, although the more Michael thought about it, the more he realized it was only one of countless possible scenarios. The guy could have been a stalker. He could have been a former friend. Maybe Gavin stole something from him, like a girlfriend. Maybe his death was accidental and Gavin had somehow been at fault.
And where did Kate fit in? She seemed to care immensely about her brother. She obviously worried about his health. Did she have any idea he was connected to this dark spirit? Would she recognize the man if she saw a picture of him? Would the ghost eventually hurt her to get to Gavin? It was all too much to figure out in one sitting.
“I don’t know,” Michael finally answered. “I guess anything’s possible.”
Chapter 3
“So how do you like your new apartment?” Valerie asked as she and Kate carried an intricate, antique-styled rug into the house they were helping to renovate.
“I love it,” Kate replied. It really was a great apartment. Along with being incredibly spacious, it included a fireplace, a washer and dryer, and a balcony that overlooked one of the nicest pools she’d ever seen in an apartment complex. “It’s very light, very open, and I get a work out every time I run up or down the stairs.”
“Like you need to work out.” At only twenty-nine, Valerie Banks was one of the most popular interior decorators in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex. A bright, spunky African American woman with a flair for both fashion and interior decorating, Valerie had the incredible gift of looking at a room once and knowing exactly what to do in order to make it beautiful, romantic, festive, or whatever her client had in mind. Of all the people who’d helped her after her accident, Val had been amongst the most supportive and understanding. “And how’s Gavin liking it?”
“You know him. He never tells me how he feels about anything. But I think he’s pretty happy with it.” Truthfully, Kate had no idea how Gavin felt about their new apartment. After they finally finished moving in, he went straight to bed and had slept away most of Sunday. He’d awakened in time to help her finish setting everything up, but that wore him out as well. After a quick dinner, he crashed again and was still unconscious by the time she left for work that morning.
This was ridiculous. There had to be something wrong with him. Maybe the doctors had screwed up his blood test, or gotten his results mixed up with someone else’s. Maybe they should seek a second opinion. If Gavin didn’t get better within the next couple of weeks, Kate was going to consult a specialist.
“Have you met any of your neighbors?” Val asked as they situated the rug across the living room’s fancy tigerwood floor.
“Just one. He helped us move.”
“Ooh, how gallant! What’s he like? Is he cute?”
Kate laughed. Although she’d pretended not to notice, Michael was really cute. He was tall and a little lanky, but his shoulders were broad and strong. Along with big dark eyes, dark wavy hair, and a great smile, he was definitely attractive.
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“’You guess so?’ Girl, you never guess about anything. Especially cute guys.”
“Yes, he’s cute,” Kate grinned. “Really sweet, too.”
“So what are you waiting for? Go get him!” Unlike Gavin and her parents, who worried dating might be too stressful for her after everything that had happened, Valerie was always encouraging her to be more social.
“We just met. Besides, the way my life’s been going lately, he’ll probably turn out to be a Gremlin or something.”
“A Gremlin?”
“It was on ABC last night.”
“You watch way too much television,” Val said, rising to her feet.
“That’s what Gavin always says…” Kate remarked lightly. It was true though. She was hooked on so many television shows, she couldn’t keep up with them all. From Once Upon a Time to Criminal Minds to The Big Bang Theory, she had a different show for every night of the week. Monday night was Cemetery Tours night, which meant Gavin would not be watching with her. He mocked her relentlessly for her addiction to the popular paranormal investigation series which he called “the largest accumulation of bullshit to ever disgrace primetime,” but Kate found it fascinating. She’d always believed in ghosts and a lot of the evidence they captured on the show was enough to send chills down her spine. Not to mention Luke Rainer, the lead investigator, was one of the most beautiful men ever pixilated on a television screen.
But mostly, she watched it for the ghosts.
“Well I think you should give this guy a chance. When was the last time you had a real date?” V
alerie had a point. Since her accident, Kate had only been on two dates, both of which were total disasters. The first guy, whom she’d met through mutual friends, loved to listen to himself talk so much that she barely got two words in. The second guy, Gavin’s friend Alex, had thought it charming to spend a good portion of the night setting items in front of Kate and asking her what color they were. Fortunately, she’d managed to convince him that the tears of humiliation welling in her eyes were just allergies.
Come to think of it, she didn’t have much luck with guys even before her accident. She’d only had one real boyfriend, Jeff, whom she’d dated for nine months in college. Jeff was a sweet guy, but he was clingy. He made Kate feel more like a security blanket than a person. In the end, it was more than she could handle. None of the other guys she’d dated had been more than casual flings.
“If by ‘real’ you mean ‘enjoyable,’ oh, probably seventh grade when the cutest boy in class took me out for a Blizzard at Dairy Queen.”
“You really are that pathetic, aren’t you?”
“Oh yeah.”
~*~
Pulling into her driveway that evening, Kate noticed a familiar figure unloading groceries from his car. Thinking fast, she grabbed her lip gloss out of her purse and dabbed a little on her lips. Then, she ran her fingers through her hair and checked her reflection in the rear-view mirror before climbing out of her car.
“Hey,” she called casually over to Michael. He glanced over his shoulder and smiled.
“Oh, hi,” he replied. “How are you?”
“I’m great. How about you? Do you need some help?”
“I think I’ve got it. But thanks,” he replied, slamming his car door shut with his free hand.
“No problem,” she answered. It looked like he’d recovered from whatever was ailing him on Saturday. “Are you feeling better?”
Cemetery Tours Page 2