Well, Herb, our heroine is tied up to the train tracks right now. Tied down and squirming for her life. Except… Well, that’s weird, Herb.
What’s weird, Barb?
Herb, look there. The ropes are just hanging over her, not tied at all. She could leave at any time, but she’s going to let the train run over her body, chopping and mashing her into cherry soaked banana chunks.
“Girl’s gotta take a chance sometimes, Barb, or we’d never leave our houses,” I muttered.
“What?” Bobby asked without looking at me. “You talking to yourself? Crazy bitch.”
I flipped him off, and he swatted my butt. I giggled.
“You know how to pick them,” his friend said.
Something hard grabbed my shoulder, I looked down and nothing was there, though I still felt it. Like hands on my shoulders. A second later, it disappeared, and I spun around just as Nathan glanced up with an impassive expression.
Ken appeared in front of me.
“Officer Barbie,” Bobby said with sarcastic respect. Ken didn’t acknowledge him.
Jordan had joined Nathan, and the brothers stared at me. I looked down at my broken flip-flop, a few bandages from the bartender holding it all together, and a thin smear of blood across my foot by the strap.
Ken put out his hand towards me. “Meg, you want a ride back with us?”
“I’m giving her a ride, get your own—” Bobby started.
“Do you think you’re making a good choice?” Ken asked, and the nightly news music faded out, and in came the after school special music. I looked up, pinned between running off with my cop in shining armor or going to get laid. No, not a good choice, but did I ever make good choices? “You don’t exactly know who Robert is anymore.”
“Robert?” I snorted. Bobby wasn’t a Robert. Roberts worked at credit unions and had golden retrievers. Bobby had been born Bobby. “You’re right, I don’t know him. And I don’t know you from the next blond, bottled tan, gym obsessed pervert.”
He seemed unaffected by my words, probably accused of being much worse as a police office. “Jordan would—”
“I don’t know him either. His opinions don’t count.” I smacked the roof of the car we stood next to. “Or maybe I do, and I’ll pick the lesser evil. I lived with Bobby, I know what I’ll get when I leave here.” Bobby’s arm snaked around my waist, and I flinched, remembering the invisible hand on my shoulder a few minutes ago. “I’d say he’s my best choice.”
Oh god, oh god. I didn’t want to go with Bobby. Everything coming out of my mouth was a lie. Bobby was predictable, but pain waited there. Pain waited with Jordan too, but a family pain that you have to work through one day. I wanted to go with them. I wanted to go with the people who looked like they were worried about me.
But why were they worried? Come to think of it, they didn’t know me any more than I knew them. I’d been gone for ten years, I could be a drug peddling dendraphiliac with a collection of dead sapling babies under my bed.
I took Bobby’s hand and we walked to his friend’s car. At first, I walked defiantly, practically on air. However, the further we walked from the crowd, the heavier each footstep grew. My feet felt like they were cased in concrete, solidifying what an idiot I was being. Too late to turn back; I had committed.
If I turned around, I’d just look like some stupid girl who didn’t know what she wanted, or how to take care of herself.
We reached Greg’s car and Bobby sat down in the front seat. I would have to cram between the three drunken guys in the back. Two of who looked like there might be serious questions to the legality of them being at a bar.
“Uh, Bobby,” I whispered, bending down to his window. “Maybe Gary could drive us to your place. He has more room in his truck.”
“C’mon, babe,” he said, taking my hand. The term sounded so familiar and cozy coming from his lips. I looked at the guys in the backseat again, imagining squeezing between drunk young hormones on that hot night. The guy closest to the window stared at the edge of my shorts, like he could see more than I showed in my cutoffs.
The hand pressed hard on my shoulder again, and I looked down to nothing but the strap of my tank top. What I had done with my Pearl Jam t-shirt I started the night with? I began to run out of air. The invisible hand squeezed, and I saw warning signs flash over the roof of the car. And not in the metaphorical sense.
I gaped at letters, then turned and looked over my shoulder to see if anyone else noticed the two-foot-tall neon sign standing above the car. Cecelia and Gary were gone. A van with a deeply dented hood and the words California Dreaming Taxi Co down the side pulled beside Ken. The driver rolled down the passenger window and called Jordan over, Ken and Nathan followed close behind.
I turned back to Bobby. “I’m leaving.”
“What?” Bobby asked. “You’re going with those douche bags?”
“I’m just going to take the taxi,” I said, his grip on my hand going from sexy to tight.
“Let go of me,” I said, practically growling. He grabbed my upper arm with his other hand, taking me off guard when he yanked me towards him. Drunk and clumsy, he struggled to pull me into the front seat with him and I sobered instantly. I fought against his grip, and my face smacked the roof of the car.
“Fuck.” Stars flooded my vision and he let go of my arms.
A guy in the backseat said, “Dude.”
I backed up, not paying attention and backed into a body. More people around me, voices talking. All female. Safety. Relief.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, just—” I opened my eyes, but no one was there. The voices gone. I lowered my hand from my nose and saw blood on my palm. I closed my eyes again, but the voices didn’t come back that time. Bobby spoke to Greg in a hushed tone, and I bent down to inspect my face in the side view mirror.
No blood. I patted my eyes and nose. No pain. My hands turned in the lamplight, skin clear of blood. Like it had never happened.
“What the...” I touched my nose again, then backed away from the mirror. Another step backwards, further from the car. Out of reach. The last two minutes hadn’t happened.
“Are you coming?” Bobby asked. The guy in the backseat still leered at the hemline of my cutoffs, and I tugged at them. He smiled. I felt naked and exposed, even in my shorts and tank top and wanted my Pearl Jam shirt back.
“No, I’m taking the taxi.”
“What taxi?”
“That one.” I pointed over my shoulder.
“You can’t get a taxi when the bars close,” Bobby said, opening his door. The warning sign might have disappeared, but it left an imprint above his head. “C’mon, don’t be stupid.”
I turned, a sick twisting pit moved deep in my stomach. Something wasn’t right. Something more than almost going home with a drunk ex-boyfriend and his sleazy friends. In the same second I realized the taxi was gone, another one pulled in to take its place. I breathed a sigh of relief. Bobby slowed to a stop, likely aware of Jordan and friends looking our way again.
I walked faster as the driver leaned over the passenger seat and spoke to the guys, just as the last one had done. I paused, staring at the words California Taxi Co, and taking in the dented hood. It was the same van I saw in my mind seconds earlier.
“Meg!” Bobby called, not moving from his spot. “C’mon. Come with me. You know you want to. I’ll even let you sit in my lap.” The sounds of laughter and a zipper fed fuel into my steps as I walked around the back of the taxi.
“Need a ride?” the driver asked through the rolled down window, and I climbed into the only available seat in the back row without answering.
That night I dreamt of Mama.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
West Virginia, 1970
Geraldine, 9 years old
“You’re too fat!” Dee called out. “You can’t come with us.”
“I am not,” Ruby cried, in between sobs. She took a deep breath and yelled again. “Wait a darn second.�
�
Dee and I laughed, running and leaving her behind. No, round Ruby wouldn’t catch up. We called her Full Moon Ruby sometimes, as round and pale as the great goddess in the sky three days a month. And just like the moon, she took forever to show up everywhere. Not to mention she had the same effect on people as the full moon; drawing out the crazy.
Dee and I hiked our skirts up to our hips and crawled over a fence. Ruby’s hand reached over for me, as if for me to give her a boost. I was sure I’d take it, but like a reflex my tongue stuck out instead. She cried as if the tears had been waiting behind a curtain she dropped.
“Go tell Mama then, you ol’ cow!” I shouted.
Dee and I shot off, wind in our faces and laughter in our throats. It felt like a mile we ran, free as runaways, empty from the burdens of school, chores, and Ruby. We ran ‘til we were outside the hut, almost buried from sight by big trees. Granny Darling waited outside, holding twigs out for us and smiling without her teeth. She ain’t really Dee’s gran, but she’s the one who cared for her after she was abandoned as a baby. We all got to call her Granny Darling since they got here two years ago.
No. That’s not my memory.
“This is West Virginia,” I said, but it came out more like a question.
Granny Darling smacked me upside the head. I’m Geraldine again. Not the lady from far away.
“Was she in there?” Granny Darling asked, and I nodded. “You ask her what she wants?”
“She pushed her way to the front and started talking,” I said, tying six spinney weeds around the stick.
Granny looked at me, her eyes growing real big, while her mouth pulled in. If she had teeth, her lips wouldn’t disappear like that, but they’re about all gone. She’s just a flat face with a thin line. “Talking? She do that before?”
I shook my head no, and Dee dropped more long weeds on my lap. “No. Er, I don’t think so. She usually screams and runs to the corners of my head so fast it hurts. I want to grab something and poke it in my ear and get her out; like this stick.”
I swung the stick that Granny Darling helped us decorate when school started this year. She’d taught us how to carve the symbols and words we didn’t know yet, and how to use some flowers for changing the color.
She grabbed it out of my hand. “Now, don’t do that. That’s your gallop stick. You do that, you won’t be having those fast legs no more.”
“I’ll poke her out with something else,” I said. Dee pulled my hair. “Ow.”
“You had a bug,” she said, rolling a tiny black beetle between her fingers till it popped. She rubbed it on the bottom of her shoe and winked. “Good luck for me now.”
Granny Darling looked like I got something wrong with me. Maybe something’s wrong with her. She had her hand up on her nose, sideways like she’s blocking one of the Three Stooges from poking her in the eyes.
“Huh.” She said. She looked at me with one eye closed, then the other. She made a clucking sound, and abruptly jumped back, looking over my shoulder. I turned back to look, but no one’s there. “What’dya know, little one? There might be more to that blood o’yours than your mama wanta admit.”
Granny picked up her guitar and strummed a quiet melody, and a crash came from behind me in the woods. Ruby came up, huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf. Granny smiled at her too. Granny liked all the children, even the ones Dee didn’t like. She ain’t a good Gran like that.
My head grew real heavy, like it did sometimes before that lady screamed. No surprise, felt like I’d been more her than me lately.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Two days passed while I hid at home, no visitors except for Cecelia and her gift of gossip. Stories about her friends I met at the bar. Facts and rumors I couldn’t attach to faces. But, while she told me about who was hooking up with who in the broom closet, and who came to work drunk more mornings than anyone else, she cleaned. So she got to stay.
On the second night, I woke up so fast and sudden, I knew it wasn’t natural. Usually, I could wake myself from a nightmare, realizing it was only a dream. Zombies were not real. Vampires. Werewolves. Ax wielding moles taller than my house. All fiction and rationalized away into a waking moment. I would wake fine and even go back to sleep most times. Something else woke with me that night, something that moved at the edge of my mattress.
I unplugged the lamp with the faulty clapper switch a few days ago. A small flashlight lay next to the mattress on the floor. My hand passed through something thick and wet on the search for it, like being in the walk-in freezer at Happy Taco when it had the air leak. Fog filled my room.
A mucus-like film wrapped around the flashlight’s handle. The beam of light sliced the room in half, leaving the darkness blacker than ever. My eyes focused on the hidden corners of the room as the flashlight cut back and forth through the fog. Lighthouse Meg and the Thing in the Dark.
“Meg.” An ethereal voice floated through the air, coming from every direction. “Meg, my love.”
The voice was throaty, thirsty and empty of gender. A dream. I just didn’t recognize it as fast as usual. That’s all. Dreaming.
“Wake up.” I closed my eyes tight and screamed. The same thing I had done to wake myself up from countless nightmares since I was a child.
Nothing changed. I didn’t wake up. The room grew colder. Gathering what little I had been granted for courage, I stood and sprinted into the hallway, running over carpet soft and soggy like a sponge. I shivered
“Meg.”
“You’re not here,” I said, pushing conviction and strength into my voice that I didn’t actually own. A muddle settled in my brain, like experiencing deep déjà vu. “This isn’t real, this is a dream.”
My hand glided across the wall in the hallway for the light switch, the light had been on out here when I went to bed that night. Had the bulb gone out? Did I lose power again? I kept the flashlight trained on the bedroom while I searched. The hall should have flooded with light when I flipped the switch, but instead, the walls fell away, replaced with a moonlit clearing in the woods. A small muddy pond lay where my bed had been only seconds beforehand.
If there had been any question about this being a dream, well...okay, the question still sat waiting for an answer. A new idea popped up. “I’ve completely lost my mind.”
A large shape darted between the trees, and I inched forward, the flashlight pointing into the trees. Only, instead of my flashlight, I held a small stick wrapped in blades of grass. The only light came from the round moon above. The shape moved again, not getting closer, nor farther, but circling me in the clearing.
“Hello?” I said, my voice heavy in my throat. Nothing could hurt me in a dream. I was safe, only frightened. The figure seemed scared too, because when I spoke, it leapt behind a large tree. “Hello? Where am I?”
The figure peered around the side of the tree, then stepped into the moonlit clearing. Her again. Aunt Dee’s eyes, like two candle flames, sparked in the gloom.
This time I wouldn’t scream and run, I promised myself. Dreams couldn’t hurt me. And if this wasn’t a dream? A vision, hallucination, whatever, it couldn’t hurt me either. I touched my face and thought of the vision I had in the parking lot. Bobby hadn’t really hurt me. Well, it hurt in the vision, but then it went away. A drunken delusion.
Why was I working so hard to convince myself of that?
“Meg,” Aunt Dee whispered, though her mouth did not move. “My darling little, Meg. Why did you come back?”
After two false starts where the words formed too big to squeeze out, I answered. “Daddy died.”
“I know.” Skin pulsated around a rotting hole in her throat. “You still shouldn’t have returned.”
“I didn’t have a choice. Someone had to clear out the house.”
She stared at me with her flaming eyes.
“You know? We have to sell it, and no one else wanted to come back and—” I stopped. I didn’t need to explain the ups and downs of home ownership t
o a dead woman.
She began to slink back into the woods, and to my surprise, my feet propelled me closer to her.
“You shouldn’t have come. Not after everything your mama gave up for you.”
“She didn’t give anything up for me. She gave up on me.” My voice rose in anger, waving the ratty stick that had formerly been my flashlight. “Don’t you remember? She left us.”
“No.” As though her words were made from the ground itself, no rumbled through the dirt and into my feet with each step. She shot up in the air and landed on the branch of a tree, drawn by an invisible rope. When she spoke again, the words came not only from the ground, but from the trees. “Stop falling in behind the lies.”
“I’m not.” But I knew as I spoke, somewhere sat the lie. Camouflaged, like it was not my deception to find. “What’s going on?”
My body shook from fear and damp cold. Aunt Dee looked back at me from her perch on a nearby tree branch. Something moved behind me and I turned around but saw nothing. When I faced Dee again, she had returned to stand inches away. I dropped the stick in surprise.
Her smiled cracked through her cheeks, splitting her skin all the way to her ears. “You won’t be safe until you’re home.”
“You just said I shouldn’t be home.”
“You’re not home.”
“It’s the closest thing I’ve got. Tell me what to do.” I reached out, overwhelmed with a need for her to take me into her arms and play with my hair like when I was a child. I didn’t care that parts of her skin dripped off, and a worm moved from one side of her neck to the other. She needed to tell me everything would be all right. I needed. My voice came out as childlike as I felt. “I want to go with you.”
“When it is time,” she answered, taking my hand in hers.
I forced myself to stay still, not flinch at the feeling of chicken skin stretched over cold raw bone. Afraid until now to look into her eyes, I pushed through the fear. From a distance earlier, I thought her eyes were filled with fire, but closer they caught my reflection like two tiny mirrors.
Going Home (Cedar Valley Hauntings Book 1) Page 11