Haunting Refrain

by Mary Marvella

  She pursed her lips, then gnawed the bottom one. “I think I knew how to ride the horse because I rode one in a past life.” She looked over his shoulder and frowned. “And I have two nosy guardian ghosts and this necklace is magic.”

  William stared at Sarah. Was she trying to shock him? Maybe she thought he didn’t take her seriously. Well, she had his attention now.

  Sarah hadn’t meant to mention Mattie and Eloise but they had materialized behind William and well, “in for a penny” as they say. Let’s see him fix all my problems and concerns.

  William looked like his brain had been sucked from his head. Sarah waited for the psychologist to speak. She waited for her friend to speak.

  “Well, professor? You asked.”

  The professor in him took over. He blinked, then looked over his glasses. He took them off and reached into his back pocket for a tissue to clean them and placed them back on his face. The professor left, and William the man drew in a long breath.

  He reached for Sarah and took her in his arms. “Okay, Princess, let’s talk about it all.

  Sarah hugged William. At least she could talk to him about her concerns again. He’d probably think she was crazy. No more hiding things from him. She still wasn’t ready to tell her parents everything or even anything. Still so many secrets.

  “Which came first, Princess, the ghosts, or the déjà vu things, or the journals?

  “Should we talk about this stuff here? My folks could come in at any time.”

  “We could go to my house,” William offered. No one would interrupt there.

  She looked over William’s shoulder and shrugged. “Well, what would you suggest?”

  “I just suggested my house.”

  “I’m not talking to you. Eloise is having a fit.”

  “Eloise?” William looked around

  “I am not!” Eloise stomped her foot. “I just don’t think you should go somewhere to talk about us. You haven’t even told us about what you read in the journals or about the X-rated dreams.”

  “Where is Eloise?” He faced toward Mattie and Eloise. “Is she saying anything?” William asked. “Should I see her?”

  “Well, should he?” Sarah looked at her ghosts.

  Mattie shrugged daintily. “I think not, my dear. So far you and Eloise are the only two people who have seen me. Of course we have only come to you because you need us.”

  Sarah turned toward William who looked expectant and thoroughly confused. “Mattie said that Eloise was the only person who has seen her as a ghost and I am the only person who has seen either one of them, as ghosts, that is.”

  “Mattie said that?” William asked.

  Eloise still pouted.

  “And what did Eloise, is it, what did she say earlier?

  “She said you have a great backside and she wants all the gory details about the diaries and the dreams, and what I was doing at your house before dawn this morning.”

  “Oh, she does, does she?” William grinned and turned red. “Are you gonna tell her?”

  Mattie shook her head and looked shocked while Eloise nodded hers and looked eager.

  “Professor, I’ll let you tell them about this morning.” She wrapped her arms abound his waist.

  William smiled at his woman. “Maybe later, when I know them better. For now why don’t we go to my house and get away from the distractions. It might help if we record what you say, like in a session. I won’t be able to digest everything at once, Princess.”

  “I know the feeling!”

  “You can bring the tapes back to share with your ghosts and then decide what to tell about us when I’m not here.”

  “Works for me,” Sarah said, giving William a quick kiss. “I’ll grab a couple of journals. Meet you at your house.”

  Once William had gone Sarah signaled her ghosts to join her on the sofa.

  “I realize you two are older than I am and you are here to help me. I don’t know what you do all day or night, but I can’t baby sit you or be your entertainment. I’ll share what I learn from the journals and I need to speak with you, Mattie, about what you might remember. Maybe we can put all our heads together and find the treasure.”

  Sarah bent to grab the journals she’d read. “And Eloise, I’ll share some of details, but not all of them.”

  She stood and gave Mattie and Eloise each a kiss which they returned. She could almost swear they were real.

  She‘d call from William’s to leave a message for her parents.

  ##

  William sat in his chair, the big, leather upholstered one, behind his mahogany, professor desk. He’d changed from shorts to jeans and traded his muscle shirt for a polo shirt. He’d spent many an hour wanting his father to invite him in here and talk to him. After his father’s death, it had become his office. He’d graded papers here and written the two books he’d published.

  He turned on the computer and unwrapped tapes for the session. He’d need some distance to deal logically with the news that the person he loved most in the world believed she was seeing ghosts and that she believed she-what?- that she was the reincarnation of the woman who had written the journals more than a hundred years ago. Where to start?

  Just this morning he had awakened to memories of making love to Sarah and now he waited to find out if she’d lost her sense of reality and how badly. Had she been herself when they made love or was she acting on her delusions.

  “Professor?” Sarah’s voice called. William smiled in spite of his concern.

  “In here,” he answered.

  Sarah stacked the old books on his desk.

  “Now,” she reached over his desk to the recorder and pressed the record button for him. “I am taking no mind altering drugs or medications with side effects.

  She barely paused long enough for a breath. “About Mattie and Eloise. If you will remember I told everyone about the two little girls who kept me company when my mother miscarried. Everyone called them my imaginary playmates and when no else saw them I believed it. They left when Mama got better and everyone had time for me again.”

  He hadn’t spoken a word. He dared not interrupt her.

  She smiled her teacher smile and asked. “Are you getting all this?” He nodded, studying her over his steepled fingers.

  He did remember her imaginary playmates, but many children had them.

  “Later when I was thirteen and had a very high fever for so long, two teenaged girls visited me when I was awake and kept me company. I dreamed they kept me from giving up and dying, but that memory was too vague. Everyone said they were hallucinations caused by fever and I couldn’t argue. When I was better they left. I didn’t need them anymore.”

  He remembered her telling him about her visitors. No teenaged girls had been in her house to visit her, her parents had assured him. But they hadn’t needed to. He’d spent every minute he could with her after school, reading to her and keeping her company.

  She paced in front of the desk but stayed close enough to the recorder. “Still with me?”

  William nodded again. He had no idea what to say.

  “About a week ago I woke up from a deep sleep. I thought I had heard music coming from the music room and got out of bed to investigate. The room was empty, my parents were quiet and I remembered the chocolate pie left from supper. While I ate it, I thought I heard music from the attic. I felt foolish, but I checked the stairs and the attic.”

  William wanted to ask a question, but Sarah’s frown stopped him.

  “The empty attic had been transformed into an old fashioned parlor and two women sat sipping tea from dainty cups. One wore clothes in the style of the forties - that’s Eloise - and the other looked like she belonged in a Civil War movie – Mattie.

  They looked about my age and with a few hints from them, I remembered Eloise and Mattie from the other times they’d helped me. They said no one else has ever seen them.”

  She sat in a chair across from William who hadn’t stirred from his overs
ized chair.

  “Why --? Uh, I mean which? How did you?” William felt so stupid but his Sarah looked so calm. She believed everything she had said.

  Sarah smiled. “It seems the connection is the Jackson family. Both Mattie and Eloise have faced danger of some kind from a Jackson family member. They believe I’m the next target. That’s why they appeared recently and they think they can help me.” She tapped her fingers on the chair arm.

  “The Jacksons believed our family had some kind of treasure that got us through the war in better shape than a lot of people. Mattie thinks her marriage to a Yankee after the war started the trouble with the Jackson family. Eloise hasn’t told me as much about her Jackson story, just that there was one and Mattie was there for her.

  “Any questions, professor?

  Chapter Seven

  Sarah intended to take her time so William could digest all the complications, but when she had opened her mouth to speak, the last few days of confusion had overwhelmed her. The words erupted from her some place deep in her soul, where she knew the truth of her words.

  Her best friend and lover sat across from her. Would he decide he didn’t want a delusional woman for a lover or even a friend? His elbows rested on his desk, his fingers steepled, and he looked paler than usual.

  “Well, aren’t you going to say I’m crazy? Gonna call the men with the butterfly nets and straightjackets?” She’d tried to make a joke, but part of her wondered if she had gone off the deep end. Part of her needed for William to say she was sane. She waited.

  “Sarah, Princess, I think we should take one concern at a time. I can accept your belief in the visits from the so-called ghosts in the past when you were a kid or when you were so sick. However, I am having a difficult time with your belief that ghosts are visiting you now.”

  “You’re having a hard time?” she snapped. “How would you like to live knowing people could pop up near you at any time? People you can’t even see if they don’t want you to?”

  He wore his patient expression again. She knew her response had nothing to do with he’d meant. The words had popped out and it felt good to speak freely.

  “I need time to do some “ghost-sighting” research so we can prove you’ve brought their memories here for a reason.”

  His voice was so calm and professor-like she wanted to strangle an emotional response from him.

  “No shit!” She couldn’t believe she’d said that, but dammit, she was frustrated as hell.

  “What?”

  “They think they’re here because of Peter Jackson, like he’s a threat to me instead of a nice man. I think they just got bored doing the quiet ghost thing, whatever that is.” She crossed and then re-crossed her legs. “William, why would I bring two ghosts here? Why would I imagine them, especially those two? How could I imagine them?”

  “We’ll get to that in good time,” he answered. She hated his know-it-all professor manner. “Maybe the diaries...”

  “No, the ghosts came first. Well, after the sexy dreams about you.” She felt the heat rise to her face as she said the words aloud. She could never tell him just how erotic the dreams had been.

  “Maybe if we talk about the diaries and what they made you think about ...”

  “Whatever.” She stood to grab one diary, then thought better of the idea. “I’m tired, I’ll just leave them for you to read.”

  She started for the door. “I think I hear Mama calling.”

  “I don’t hear anything,” William’s thick sexy eyebrows met over his nose.

  “Well, I do.” Sarah moved out the door and was in her own yard by the time William made it to his back door. “See you after you finish your reading,” she called back.

  Sarah’s mood plummeted. Maybe she’d go away alone for the week. She’d escape William, and the ghosts, and the journals, and Peter Jackson. How could she have thought William could help her? He couldn’t work miracles and he had never believed in magic, as far as she knew.

  She stalked into her house. The sight that greeted her in the kitchen brought her up short.

  Peter stood in all his preppy, blond glory, wearing one of her mother’s aprons and stirring the contents of a large pot on her stove.

  “Peter?”

  “Oh, hi, Sarah.” He smiled his perfect, dazzling white smile. “I’m helping your lovely mother cook supper.”

  “Really? Why?”

  “Did you forget, Sugar? I waited for your answer to my note this mornin’. Hope you liked the flowers. When you didn’t call back, my little absent-minded professor, I decided to take matters into my own hands and come get you.”

  He looked like a smug little boy. And she had forgotten to call him.

  “When I arrived at your door your gracious mama invited me to dinner. She was makin’ clam sauce. Since that is one of my specialties, I’m stirring for her and adding my secret spices.”

  Sarah’s mother bustled into the room. “Hi, Sweetie. Look who I found on our doorstep.”

  “Did it follow you home?” Sarah let her annoyance bite. “You can’t keep strays, Mama.”

  “Dear, Peter had planned to take you to dinner. Since I had already started ours, I asked him to join us. Your father will be home soon and he’d like to meet your young man.”

  “My young man?”

  “Why don’t your run change for dinner?”

  She glanced from her comfortable clothes to her mother’s fresh slacks and blouse. She knew without even looking that Peter’s immaculate slacks would have a knife-edge crease and his shirt would have a designer label. He always dressed like he modeled for GQ

  “Fine.” She stalked to her room. Now, she definitely wanted to run away from home.

  She closed her door with a satisfactory near-slam. On the way to her chifforobe, she stumbled when a hoop skirt brushed against her ankles.

  “Ladies, I didn’t invite him and ..!”

  “I know you didn’t, my dear.” Mattie paced past Sarah. “The weasel just barged right in.”

  “Yes,” Eloise said. “He charmed your mother into inviting him to stay for supper. He probably didn’t want to spend any money anyway.”

  “That’s not fair. He’s been sending flowers, and he’s not a cheapskate.” Sarah wasn’t sure why she was defending him. Hell, her ghosts barged in on her all the time. Her shirt landed in a pile on the floor. She shimmied out of her pants, then grabbed a sundress and fresh undies. On her way to the shower she glanced back at her ghosts.

  Mattie scooped up the discarded clothes as smoothly as … No way.

  “Mattie, what did you just do?”

  “Sarah, your really are too careless with your clothes, such as they are.” Her disdain for modern clothes was clear.

  Eloise shrugged. “She’s so neat I’ve often wanted to strew things around just to annoy her.”

  “But…”

  Both Eloise and Mattie stared at Sarah.

  “Mattie picked up my clothes, she picked up solid objects.”

  “Of course,” they chimed.

  If William saw that, he’d believe in her ghosts.

  “I’m taking a shower,” she called as she closed the door.

  Gathering her hair into a clip, she stepped into the shower. A quick soap-up and lots of muttering took her a minute. The rinse-off took a bit longer.

  Sarah toweled off, wondering if her ghostly company would be waiting in her room. How had her life deteriorated to such chaos?

  For a second she remembered waking in William’s arms. Or was that her imagination too?

  When she left the bathroom she was cooler and dressed for dinner. She ran a brush through her hair and secured it with a tortoise shell clip. “So, what are your plans for supper?”

  “Why, to join you,” Mattie answered.

  “That wasn’t really a question,” Sarah said, “it was rhetorical.”

  “We don’t plan to eat, just keep a watch on the Jackson cad,” Mattie said.

  “Oh, yes.” Eloise grinned
. “We’ll make sure he doesn’t steal the silver.”

  “Oh, God,” Sarah slid her sandals on. “Spare me from interfering ghosts.”

  She could do this. She could sit down to a civilized supper with her parents, and her ghost pests, and the nice boring man her ghosts hated. She planned to dump him gently, as soon as possible. Piece of cake. She waltzed into the dinning room. Ah, rats! Not him, too.

  “Who let you in, professor?”

  William aligned the knife edge of the place setting in front of him. He placed another setting on the festive table.

  How much blood could she draw with a silver dinner-knife? She closed her eyes, hoping against hope that William wasn’t really here. When his warm, moist lips caressed her neck she knew better. “Hmmm.”

  “Hmmm?” Sarah felt the hum all the way to her toes.

  She hadn’t added William’s presence to list of things she could handle at the impromptu dinner party. She snatched back her sanity and opened her eyes.

  “Don’t do that!”

  “And why not?” he asked, all innocence.

  “Because we’re not alone.”

  “Princess, your parents expect me to be affectionate. They just don’t know how affectionate we’ve been lately.”