Going Home (Cedar Valley Hauntings Book 1)

by Renee Bradshaw

  “Guess they figure they’ll keep us as far from them as possible, while still keeping us on their property so we won’t go drinking somewhere else.” Nathan dropped his pack into the front pocket of his flannel.

  “I can’t believe how everything has gone non-smoking,” I said, lighting my cigarette.

  “Yeah. California still smoker friendly?”

  “In the bigger cities, not really. Where I live it’s still normal.”

  “Yeah, it’s a drag,” Nathan said, smirking at his own cigarette joke. Dorky uncle humor; that’s what Tracy would call it. Nathan looked at the mountains in the distance, his hand in his jean pocket. I always thought he was so tall when I was a kid, but he was only maybe two inches taller than my five foot six. “We should probably do what everyone else is doing and quit.”

  “I quit sometimes,” I said. He raised his eyebrows. “When I run out of money. I should do it long term.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah.” We laughed. It felt good being outside with him, even in the sticky heat. We should have been further apart than we were when we sat down on the bench. It was one of those moments I thought about over and over again as a gangly tween; but he never would have considered anything like that at the time. Never seeing that I would become a woman.

  “How’s California?” he asked over the sound of a car as it drove down the street a few feet from us. There was a lull in traffic, but I knew it wouldn’t last. “All palm trees and movie stars?”

  “That’s TV California. Or LA California, I think. I was in the Mojave Desert. Desolate, dry and there are like, no trees.”

  “Why the hell did you even go there?”

  “Bobby.”

  “Bobby?”

  “Yeah, his dad lived in this little town and said we could stay with him after high school. Bobby’s mom was here, but she was having babies with her new husband. She was like fifteen or something when she had Bobby, so it was like her real adulthood or whatever. They didn’t want him and his brother around. My dad—” I covered the crack in my voice by taking a drag off my cigarette. Sadness again. Not because he was dead, but that stupid self-pitying thing that comes up from remembering my youth. “He didn’t want me around. He made that clear. It’s not like I wanted to stay. When I graduated, my brothers all spread across the country like dandelion seeds in the fucking wind and then Angela joined the Marines. I wasn’t staying here alone. All I had was Bobby.”

  “And Jordan.”

  “I didn’t have Jordan then. It was just me and Bobby.” We jumped as a car alarm went off, and we looked, but didn’t see anyone. We waited as the owner stumbled out of the bar and pushed his key fob, quieting the car. He waved his keys at us and chuckled before going back in.

  “When we got to his dad’s, he was making meth in the garage.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Nathan nod slowly. “I shit you not. We moved out, we broke up, I haven’t seen him in like nine years until the other night. I didn’t even know he moved back here, I thought maybe he OD’d or something.”

  “No such luck,” Nathan said, smiling at me. A feeling I wasn’t ready for hit my stomach. I looked away. “He came back here and started a whole new shit storm.”

  “Yeah, his poor wife.”

  “She got away. For now. They’re in one of those on again off again things. You almost left with him the other—” His phone buzzed, and he pulled it from his back pocket. “Speaking of wives, it’s my ex. I need to take this.”

  I nodded, almost dropping my cigarette at the word ex. And wife.

  “No, you’ll have to come by the garage then,” he said into his phone, standing up. “I can’t leave in the middle of the day like that, not on a Saturday. Because it’s our busiest day, you know that.”

  He pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at it for a second before moving it back again. I listened to his conversation without paying much attention, my mind moved back to whoever could have married Bobby.

  Nathan paced through the parking lot. His dad peaked through his voice as his anger climbed. He walked further away, then headed down the side of the pizza bar. Just as Nathan became encased by darkness, the door opened and Bobby stepped out.

  “Meg?” Bobby asked. I stepped out of the smoking pit to head back into the bar, but he jogged to me. Bobby put his hand on my arm. “Shit, Meg. I just wanted to ask what happened the other night.”

  “Nothing.” He looked good. He always looked good though, and that was why I dated him back in high school. I might have told myself it was true love, but really, it was just his abs and that sexy thing his bangs did that always reminded me of Johnny Depp.

  “You look good tonight.” He wrapped his arms around me for a hug, and I stiffened, afraid if I moved he might overpower me. He stuffed his face into the side of my ponytail and inhaled. My eyes didn’t want to work, only showing him slamming me into the car the other night, and then time moving backwards. A second chance, and I wouldn’t ruin it tonight by thinking with my hormones.

  The cars were too close, what if he threw me in front of one of them? Bobby was still talking. His speech slurred. “...skinnier. Every other chick I dated in high school got married and fat, but you keep getting better.”

  I pushed him off, and glanced down the side of the building where Nathan had wandered off, wanting him to reappear. Wanting to run inside. Bobby gripped my wrist.

  “You miss me, you know you do. You want me to do to you what I used to.” His cigarette holding hand ran down my shoulder and I shrugged it away. “You love how I made you feel.”

  “Yeah, that was before I grew up and met real men,” I said. I could have bit my tongue. Insulting his manhood in the same breath that I feared he was planning to throw me into traffic? Not the best way to keep my feet rooted to this side of the bench.

  “You got me, you got me there. I was dumb when I was nineteen. I’m so much better now. I was going to show you the other night before you ran off. Come home with me and I’ll show you now.”

  “Pft,” I said, turning away from him as footsteps slapped out of the alley towards us. Nathan’s set jaw showed more of Mr. Dieter in him.

  “Hey, it’s faggot senior,” Bobby said, pointing at Nathan with his cigarette.

  “C’mon, our beer’s getting warm,” Nathan said, putting his hand out for me. For a second, I didn’t think Bobby was going to let go of my wrist. He squeezed one more time, then let go. I took Nathan’s hand, letting him lead me out of the smoking spot. The small girl, forgotten inside of me, had wanted to hold his hand a million times. But right then, I had no small victory to relate to her. Not until we got away from Bobby.

  “Oh, you’d rather go home with him, I see. Once a skank always a skank.” Bobby laughed at his own stupid joke, and Nathan’s hand went from reassuring, to stiff, then gone as he turned around. “You ain’t gonna do nothing, Senior.”

  I looped my arm into Nathan’s. “Come on.”

  After a second’s hesitation, Nathan turned back towards the restaurant, dragging me alongside him. “You don’t know what he did to Jordan. Bobby and his friends. They started with writing stuff on our house, but they ended with putting Jordan in the hospital one night. You don’t know the half of the stuff Bobby’s done.”

  My stomach churned. “Trust me, I know the half you don’t know about.”

  The paint splotches all over the boys’ trailer; they were covering up the words of hate that had followed Jordan since childhood.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  My mind revolved around Bobby. Could I blame myself for what he had done to Jordan? It had been after our breakup, Bobby’s fault, but after I turned him in for theft at his job. My fault. I also remembered years’ worth of nasty things I said about Jordan when I was with Bobby. My fault. I drank more beer, and half-listened to Ken talk to one of Gary’s coworkers about a TV show.

  Ken turned to me. “You seem like a nine fan. I can spot everyone’s favorite doctor.”

  I hadn’t
been listening, but saw that Ken expected some kind of answer from me. “Yeah, that sounds right.”

  “He’s the great psychic of our time,” Jordan said.

  “What can I say? It’s a gift,” Ken said.

  Cecelia collapsed into the chair beside me.

  “I’m so sorry about the other night,” she half-yelled, the smell of beer thick between us. Was it my imagination, or was her accent thicker again? Maybe the country music brought that out in her. “I invited Bobby that night, I thought it would be good for you. But, I didn’t invite him tonight if you’re wondering. We always meet here on payday. He’s not ever here. Not ever.”

  “Yeah, it’s fine,” I said, hoping she would match my lowered tone.

  “No, I mean, never. He’s never, never here.” She gripped my upper arm like she was relaying something more important than anything she had ever said. “I don’t want you to think I would do anything to mess up our friendship.” Friendship? I barely accepted that she was a relative, I didn’t think I was ready to use the f-word to describe her. “You mean so much to me. Kin is just so darn important.”

  With that, she pulled me into her arms for another of her bone crushing hugs. Giving her two awkward pats on the back, I could do nothing more than wait for it to be over. Country music played on the dance floor. The twang reminded me of Dad. A headache formed between my temples. She pulled back, and I took in a deep breath.

  She grabbed my beaded necklace. “You have one too!”

  “My Aunt Dee made them.” Not sure why I added my.

  “Your daddy gave me one, said it keeps the bugs away.” She pulled me back to her again, mashing our beaded necklaces together in her hand. “I thought I was the old country one till he gave me her stash! She had stuff even I didn’t know about.”

  Stash? “He gave you Aunt Dee’s things? What things?”

  She continued on like I hadn’t asked the question. “I like the way it looks; but the energy’s a real kick, too. I don’t know how it works.”

  I pried my necklace from her fingers, pulled it up to my nose and took a big whiff. “The mosquitoes and ticks don’t like the smell of this wood; it’s about how my Aunt Dee cured it.”

  Again with my, but she didn’t notice. In fact, she looked as blank as she looked drunk, I was surprised she could form words, let alone innocently insinuate we were hicks. She also skipped my question.

  “Did my dad give you Aunt Dee’s things?” I thought Angela had come for most of it, but maybe there had been more, and Dad thought he could just give them to this stranger.

  She nodded, obviously not feeling a bit guilty about taking things from a woman she never even met. “He said you guys hadn’t come for anything; must not have wanted any of it. It wasn’t much that you’d miss, Meg. The one thing I would have liked to have were those angels, but he wasn’t ready to part with them.”

  I gritted my teeth and focused my glare on her. What could I say? She had a point. We hadn’t come for any of it.

  “Did you talk to Tristan?” Cecelia asked.

  “Huh?”

  “Gary’s friend. Tall, blond and beefy.”

  Of course, I noticed him. I wasn’t a nun. He stood at the end of the table now, his eyes on the dance floor. Why would I have talked to him? It must have been her weird attempt to change the conversation.

  “He’s super cute,” she said. “I thought he’d be a good way to make up for Bobby.”

  She turned back and waved to Tristan, who’d been standing at the end of our table for the last few minutes. That’s when I saw it. The bit of fading around her chin where her makeup has worn off. Peering through, her skin looked older than I’ve noticed before. Like she was wearing a peel-off mask.

  “Tristan, you should talk to Meg.” I wasn’t looking at him though, still at Cecelia. Her makeup repainted itself right in front of me, hiding the imperfection I had spotted only seconds earlier. I turned to Tristan who was oh so obviously hot with his muscles, blue eyes, shaggy blond hair, five o’clock shadow and sharp facial features. He was what we used to call Abercrombie hot; good on paper, but spent more time checking out his own reflection than talking to women. Guys like him weren’t worth my attention. Not because I was above the full of himself primate, but because I wasn’t worth their time. “I bet you guys would get along like a house on fire.”

  “Is that a good thing?” Tristan asked, his voice thick, loud and presenting an IQ of twelve by the sound of it. When he looked at me, his blank eyes reminded me of Gary. Where did she find these men? Mindless canvases, ready to be painted and uploaded with a personality. Cecelia pinched the back of his arm with her pointed fake nails. Like she pressed a button with that pinch, Tristan smiled broadly.

  “Meg, would you care to dance?” Tristan asked in a formal tone.

  My jaw dropped, and I turned to Jordan and Ken who both looked to be stifling laughter. Nathan had gone off to talk to a few other men almost as soon as we came back in from smoking, but I wanted to wait for him. I wanted to talk to him more. Not roid-voice Tristan.

  I shrugged. “I’m not really a great—”

  “Perfect,” Cecelia interrupted, and before I knew it I was on the cramped dance floor with Tristan.

  “I love Carrie Underwood, don’t you?” he asked, resting his hand on my hip. I groaned.

  We danced through a fast-paced country song where everyone on the floor gets in a line and knows what to do. Whoops, guess I missed rehearsal, but Tristan had too. We fumbled, turning in the wrong direction almost every time there was a change in the choreography.

  “I’m more of a slow dance person,” he said, pulling me close when the song changed. When he wasn’t talking, his large arms around me and hands on my hips made me feel like he might be worth spending time with. At least until I left town.

  “I’m not much of any dancing kind of person,” I admitted in what I hoped a flirtatious voice. “I prefer other ways of staying close.”

  He didn’t say anything (thankfully) but I wondered if my hint was heavy enough. Did I need to spell it out to him? I was ready to get out of there. Back to his place. Or hell, the backseat of his car would work fine. Slow dancing was the pathway to sex, and his body was built for sex if I ever saw one.

  He was probably only dancing with me since Cecelia asked him to. I could spot about four different women looking at him with curves and muscular leanness that I’m sure were more his type. My mind kept going back to my conversation with Nathan in the parking lot, especially after I spotted Nathan talking to a short woman with blue streaks in her spikey brown hair.

  When the song ended, I excused myself to get a drink. Donna sat at the table flirting with Gary’s other friend, and she shot me a daggered look when I sat down. Guess it wasn’t as fun for her with only one guy on her shoulder. I drained my beer.

  “Never took someone like Tristan for your type,” Jordan said.

  “What? All muscle? Yeah, just awful.” I rolled my eyes.

  “You should ask Nathan to dance.”

  I snorted, but my face warmed enough to fry an egg.

  “Knew it.”

  “When I was a kid. Not anymore.” I looked for a way to change the subject and settled on one thing I didn’t want to talk about. “Is Bobby gone?”

  Jordan shrugged. “I haven’t seen him since you and Tristan started dancing.”

  “Hmm, then maybe I should keep dancing if it keeps him away,” I said.

  Jordan laughed. “Yeah, that’s why.”

  I froze partway to the dance floor where Tristan stood speaking to a woman in tight jeans and spiked heels. It wasn’t them that made me stop in my tracks. Behind them, Cecelia stood in the window looking in from the buffet side of the bar; the side where more of the families went for cheap pizza than the pitchers of beer and dancing on this side of the wall. What was she doing over there? She smiled and looked at the people dancing. She looked at me and waved.

  I raised my hand to wave back, but that’s when I figure
d out what was wrong. She wasn’t standing in a window from the buffet room. The bar gleamed behind her as did the rest of the barroom. She stood in a mirror. Inside the mirror. Looking at me.

  The real Cecelia sat at the table, staring into her beer. The Cecelia in the mirror smiled and sent chills up my spine. My hands shook and my heart pounded against my ribcage. What was happening?

  “Meg?” The bodiless voice echoed, covered by a thick wall of water. “Megan? Are you okay?”

  I couldn’t take my eyes off the Cecelia in the mirror. The voice came in and out, and I struggled to place it. A hand appeared on my shoulder and the second Cecelia vanished. I followed the hand to its owner.

  “Nathan?”

  “Are you okay?” he asked. I noticed the girl with blue hair sat nearby, watching us.

  “Do you need to sit down?”

  “No, I need to...” I looked over at the mirror again, to make sure the second Cecelia was really gone. “Dance?”

  “Dance?”

  “Do you want to?” I asked, hardly believing the words coming from my mouth.

  “With you?” he asked, one eyebrow raised. Well, shit. What did that mean?

  “No. With yourself, I was curious, if you’d like to jump out there and do the Macarena by yourself.” I glanced at the mirror, ensuring it was only filled with people it should be filled with. “Maybe I should go sit down. Drink some water.”

  He didn’t hear me. Instead, he grabbed my hand and pulled me onto the floor. We found space in the thinning herd of drunk couples, swaying as Achy Breaky Heart came to an end. A guitar strummed through the speakers, and a soulful mix of a country rock singer crooned. Nathan pulled me against him, chest to chest.

  I didn’t speak, my eyes trained on the worn shoulder seam of his white t-shirt. By the first chorus I rested my head on that spot, and my heart fluttered when he laid his cheek on the top of my head. I let my eyes close and focused on the gentle vibrations coming from Nathan’s chest as he hummed along.

  I remembered Nathan on our porch, picking Jordan up after one spring break he’d spent at our house. Aunt Dee whispered to him. She looked at him the way she looked at the rest of us. That didn’t surprise me too much, she looked at Jordan like he was a beloved nephew, why not his brother? Nathan never said much to any of us at the house.