Death Theory

by John Mimms

  Debbie squeezed him tight. Then something happened resembling a psychic awakening. They both sat straight up with panic.

  “We have to be at work in the morning!” they said in almost perfect unison.

  They were both so caught up in the evening, real life had become an afterthought. It was ‘in the morning,’ Three o’clock on Monday morning to be exact. They both had to be at work in five hours.

  Jeff ended up driving home anyway. They both got a worthless two hours of sleep. They both dragged themselves to work, but they didn’t mind. They were both happy.

  Chapter 30

  THE WEEKS BETWEEN JEFF and Debbie’s shopping trip and Thanksgiving flew by in an instant. Even though they took a break from investigations for the holidays, they still had monthly meetings. This month was different, however, because Dr. Staples insisted on having the meeting in his guesthouse.

  “If it’s going to be a place to store our equipment and review evidence, we might as well have our meetings there as well,” he told Jeff.

  Jeff agreed. Besides, he was getting sick of pizza.

  The November meeting went fine, for the most part. They reviewed evidence from Pythian Castle, which included an EVP Elvis recorded. The EVP made hackles stand up on their necks because it sounded like a demonic growl.

  “That’s just a fart!” Pac proclaimed.

  The final analysis proved Pac not to be too far off. They decided the ‘demonic growl’ was no more than a hungry stomach.

  “Good catch,” Elvis told him, a little disappointed.

  “Thanks,” Pac said with a smirk. “I still say someone did a butt burner. I guarantee if you check the carbon monoxide detector in that room, it went off the chart then.”

  Elvis smiled and nodded. Considering Pac’s rare good humor towards him, he decided not to correct his scientific mistake. Farts are methane gas, not carbon monoxide. If they were carbon monoxide, there would be a lot of dead families on long road trips.

  Elvis and Jeff had not discussed the experiment from the mortuary since a couple of days after their Halloween investigation. Jeff listened to the EVP and was even more excited now, but Elvis still felt troubled. He was not worried about what Jeff thought. He was troubled because he was unsure of how long Pac had been standing there before they noticed him.

  The meeting would have been enjoyable if Pac had not turned his political rhetoric loose again. As they walked outside to leave, Pac noticed the “Vote Democrat” sticker in the back window of Dr. Staples’s car.

  “Roy, Roy, Roy ... as a doctor, I thought you would be smarter than to fall for that communist bull crap,” Pac said.

  Dr. Staples acted as if he had not heard the comment.

  Pac turned up the heat.

  “I mean you’re a doctor ... can’t you see what a waste of time and money this health care business is? It would take either a retard or commie to vote for it.”

  Dr. Staples’s face reddened. Jeff intervened by stepping between them and addressing the doctor.

  “So, how’s the orchard coming?”

  Dr. Staples seemed as if Jeff splashed him with ice water. The redness started to subside a little, and then he gave Jeff a proud smile.

  “Just planted another one this week!” he said pointing to the trees on the other side of Jeff’s truck. They walked to the fledgling orchard as Pac got in his car and peeled out. His Trump sticker was on full display.

  “Damn tea bagger fascist!” Dr. Staples mumbled.

  Jeff cracked a smile. He wasn’t a very political person; he considered himself middle of the aisle. Jeff grinned because the comment seemed out of place. Almost as if Gandhi raised his hands above his head, pointed his index and pinky fingers to the heavens, and screamed ‘Rock & Roll!’

  Jeff leaned against the rail fence to admire the trees.

  “Didn’t you have two trees the last time we were here?” Jeff asked.

  Dr. Staples frowned and then paused with his right palm opened upwards; he then started closing fingers one at a time as if he were counting.

  “That sounds about right,” he replied after a few moments.

  “What are the new ones for?”

  “More patient breakthroughs,” the doctor said.

  “Maybe Debbie will contribute a tree once y’all are finished,” Jeff whispered.

  Dr. Staples seemed startled. Debbie had told Jeff against his advice.

  “Perhaps,” the doctor whispered. “Perhaps.”

  Jeff wrapped his arm around Debbie’s shoulders when she approached.

  “Are you ready to go?” he asked.

  Elvis smiled with approval at the young couple. It reminded him it had been a few days since his last conversation with Vicky. His experiment using digital recorders in his last conversation had not yielded anything, but it was okay. He could hear her fine even if the stupid machine couldn’t.

  They thanked Dr. Staples for letting them use the house again, and bid Elvis a fond farewell. They drove back to Debbie’s for another exciting evening of Netflix and popcorn.

  When Thanksgiving arrived, Jeff enjoyed the best dinner he believed he had ever tasted. Grammy Lee and Debbie could cook like nobody’s business. It is often said - the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. Of course, Debbie had already gotten there.

  Jeff and Grammy Lee shared a mutual affection. He felt guilty about not having finished painting her house yet. He still had one side left to go.

  When they were out of earshot of Jeff, Grammy Lee whispered to Debbie.

  “You got yourself a keeper, little girl!” Then she broke into a knowing smile. “I assume if he is still around in the spring, I won’t feel so guilty about it?”

  Debbie frowned, confused.

  Grammy Lee held out her liver spotted left hand and raised the finger between her pinky and middle digit.

  “You’ll have a ring on your finger?”

  Debbie blushed and she gave Grammy Lee a playful slap on the arm.

  “Don’t rush things!” she pleaded in a hoarse whisper. “We’ve been taking it slow and it seems to be working fine so far!”

  Grammy Lee smiled and gave Debbie a soft peck on the forehead. She then thrust the pumpkin pie into her arms like a quarterback handing off to his fullback.

  “The game’s about to start!” Grammy Lee said loud enough for Jeff to hear. “You can’t watch football without dessert!”

  She then scooped up the apple pie and bustled through the door.

  “What time is kickoff, Jeff?”

  Jeff almost hit the floor when he discovered that the quilt rack was actually a stylish cover for a plasma screen TV. Grammy Lee turned the little roller handle on the side of the duvet display bar. The patchwork quilt rolled up until the full screen was revealed. Jeff estimated it to be at least fifty inches. Debbie gaped at Grammy Lee, unaware of her technical savvy.

  Jeff decided to play it cool and score points.

  “What a beautiful quilt,” he said. “My mom had an extensive collection of Amish quilts. Did you make it?”

  Grammy Lee smiled proudly and nodded.

  “It’s quite a work of craftsmanship. You are very talented.”

  Touchdown, Jeff. If she could have gotten away with it, Grammy Lee would have married him. Debbie gaped at him in disbelief. She wondered how any man could focus on a quilt when a huge TV displaying Thanksgiving Day football hung a few feet away. He was a sweet guy and kind to her family, even if it was only a family of one.

  All three of them had slipped into turkey-induced slumber by half time. They were happy. Jeff and Debbie the happiest they had been in their lives. The sad thing about life is ... no one has any guarantees of lasting happiness.

  The next day Jeff got an e-mail from a Mrs. Joyce Gage. She had a very similar story to tell as Mrs. Schwender, with shadow people stalking her and suffocating hands holding her down in bed. She sounded every bit as desperate, if not more so than Mrs. Schwender. Luckily or unluckily as the case may turn out for Mr
s. Gage, Jeff was a softy. He had vowed for SMS PAST to break until after the holidays. Nevertheless, he couldn’t let this old lady suffer, especially not during Christmas.

  Jeff set the investigation up for the following Saturday. Everyone agreed to come and meet at the old woman’s home at five o’clock. Mrs. Gage lived in a ranch style house on a fifteen-acre plot about five miles outside of town.

  SATURDAY BEGAN WITH a cold and steady drizzle, which was typical for early December. It is time of year when fall and winter are fighting their last battle for season supremacy. The forecast called for the same chilly drizzle until later. Then a warm front was supposed to move up from the south and cause a decent chance for strong thunderstorms.

  “Great,” Jeff thought, watching the morning news, “at least we will be indoors.”

  He didn’t relish the idea of carrying the expensive equipment in the rain, even though it was in weatherproof cases. In the end, this proved not to be an issue.

  Dr. Staples called Jeff shortly before five o’clock as he and Debbie were on route to Mrs. Gage’s house. He gave them the unfortunate news that he had an accident. As he left his house, the van hit a low spot in the dirt road causing him to slide into the ditch. It was now stuck in about a foot of mud.

  “I think I can walk back to the house and get the tractor to pull myself out, but I’ll be a mess afterwards. It might take a couple of hours all told between this and cleaning up.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Jeff said. “If this is anything like Mrs. Schwender’s, all the equipment would be overkill anyway. Do you want Debbie and me to come pick you up, and then we can get your van out tomorrow?”

  “No, I’d rather get it out tonight. I don’t feel comfortable about leaving all the equipment in it overnight.”

  “I understand,” Jeff said. “Call me if you need any help.”

  “Don’t worry about me, worry about helping the poor old woman tonight. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, Jeff.”

  Mrs. Gage was not what they had expected. She was old, at least eighty or so, but she was much nimbler than Mrs. Schwender. Her face had a minimal number of wrinkles for a person her age. Her petite frame, and impish nose reminded Jeff of a skinny, beardless garden gnome wearing a hairspray helmet rather than a pointy hat.

  She was a sweet, lonely old lady, who thrived on the attention of entertaining visitors in her home. Jeff thought it was her motivation for calling them, until he passed her laundry room. When he walked past the door, he jumped in surprise as the EMF meter started screeching like a demented parakeet. Coincidentally, her caged parakeets in the living room started complaining about this shrill newcomer.

  Jeff and Elvis investigated, while Debbie and Pac continued doing EVP sessions in the bedroom. They soon discovered that an unshielded breaker box was the cause for the interference. It was also the probable cause for her experiences. As fate would have it, Mrs. Gage’s bedroom was on the other side of the wall from the breaker box. The reading was dangerously high in her bedroom as well.

  Jeff was confident they had discovered the most likely source of her paranormal claims. Of course, unlike Mrs. Schwender’s phones, they couldn’t just unplug a breaker box. It would have to be replaced by an electrician. He decided they needed to stay at least another hour to make sure they had covered everything possible. When the hour was up, Elvis and Pac recorded data and made sure the equipment was rounded up while Jeff and Debbie talked to Mrs. Gage.

  They explained the effects high electromagnetic fields can have on perception. They told her they believed the breaker box was the reason for her troubles. She listened to them with sincere interest, but when they finished, they weren’t sure if they had gotten through to her.

  “You know ... my late husband, Walter, installed that breaker box before he passed,” Mrs. Gage said. She then leaned forward with an expression like she was about to divulge National Security secrets. “He wasn’t an electrician, but he said he could do it. He always was one for penny pinching.”

  They smiled and nodded in understanding.

  Mrs. Gage’s wry smile was gone in an instant when panic swept across her face. “You don’t think Walter did something with the wiring and that’s making his ghost come back, do you? I saw a movie the other night on one of them film channels about something like that....”

  Debbie reached out and gently grabbed her hand. “Mrs. Gage, I don’t think so. Why don’t you have the breaker box replaced and we’ll go from there.”

  Mrs. Gage’s expression relaxed somewhat and she said, “I sure appreciate you kids coming out like this. I’ll call an electric man first thing on Monday.”

  She walked to her cabinet, rustled about inside, and returned with four brown lunch sacks.

  “I want you kids to take home some of my peanut butter crisscross cookies.”

  They thanked her and bid farewell. Debbie lingered on the porch a few minutes, giving Mrs. Gage a few more words of support. She then ran through the cold drizzle and jumped into the comfort of Jeff’s warm truck.

  Debbie had Jeff pick her up at Grammy Lee’s since she and Grammy had been ‘Jeff’ shopping for Christmas, and she had not had time to go back home. They quietly pulled in the driveway, so as not to wake Grammy. Then they spent a few quality minutes of face time before Debbie got out to drive back home.

  Jeff waved and pulled away after watching Debbie get in her car. She paused for a moment and took a quick inventory of her equipment before going home. EMF meter, check. Camera, check. Camcorder, check. Digital recorder, ch.... wait a minute. “Where is my digital recorder?” she gasped.

  A quick self-pat down revealed it was nowhere on her person. When she thought back, she knew she had it when they left the house, so it had to be outside the house. Debbie soon realized she must have set it down while talking to Mrs. Gage on the porch. She checked her clock and saw it was almost one in the morning. They had been gone from Mrs. Gage’s a little over an hour, and it would take her twenty minutes to drive back out there.

  Oh well, what’s another forty minutes before going to bed. Besides, she wouldn’t wake Mrs. Gage up if she were very quiet. She wouldn’t have to knock on the door since it had been left outside. It was a $150 recorder. She didn’t want it getting rained on. The weather was supposed to take a turn for the worse in the next couple of hours.

  She drove the twenty minutes back to Mrs. Gage’s secluded ranch house. The approaching thunderhead flashed like an ominous lighthouse. ‘Go home, Debbie,’ it seemed to say. What did she have to fear from going to a sweet little old lady’s house in the middle of night? On most nights, the answer would have been nothing at all, but this was not most nights – not by a long shot.

  Chapter 31

  LIGHTNING PIERCED THE sky in the distance. The shadow of Mrs. Gage’s home flickered across the open fields. Debbie stopped as she approached the dirt crossroads. White sparks, like mini fireworks, swam in her vision. She rubbed her eyes with her index fingers, trying to shake off the effects of the lightning. The storm was still miles away, but it warned of its natural cruelty with each violent flash and gust of wind.

  The house sat in the middle of several fields that stretched for at least a mile in every direction. Cattle and horses ran for cover as the storm approached.

  Debbie brought her fingers away from her eyes and squinted. When she peered back towards Mrs. Gage’s house, she saw two uniform comet-like orbs move across her field of vision. She rubbed her eyes again, which should have done the trick, but they were still there and still moving in the same straight line. She squinted hard and focused. That was when she realized the two bright orbs weren’t phantom eye floaters at all, but a pair of headlights. The headlights traveled down the driveway and away from Mrs. Gage’s house.

  “What is Mrs. Gage doin’ leaving in the middle of the night?” she whispered.

  These questions swam through her mind in an instant, and then she thought aloud, “Maybe it’s the newspaper guy?”

  She checke
d her clock and changed her mind. It was a quarter after one. Newspaper delivery didn’t even start for another couple of hours.

  A strange unsettling sensation fluttered in her guts. Something didn’t feel right. She didn’t want to make too much out of it. For all she knew, Mrs. Gage had a male suitor who visited late at night. Whatever it was, she was sure it was none of her business and would have left it alone if not for Mrs. Schwender. Mrs. Schwender weighed heavy on her mind. She did not want a repeat of whatever it was that happened to the poor old lady. Debbie made up her mind to investigate the mystery vehicle, but keep her distance at the same time.

  The road was straight as an arrow once she made a left-hand turn onto the road passing Mrs. Gage’s driveway. The flashes of lightning were frequent enough that she felt navigation down the road with no headlights was possible. She switched them off.

  Debbie made the turn as the strange pair of headlights disappeared behind a row of trees lining the driveway. Once she was squared on the road, she began to creep forward. She didn’t have any reason to be paranoid other than it was late at night. It did make her feel kind of sly and underhanded, not to mention a little bit stupid to be sneaking around like this. She had no idea what she’d do if the car turned towards her. She hadn’t thought that far ahead. The sudden appearance of the vehicle had also made her forget her sole purpose for driving back out there.

  “I’ll guess I’ll have to turn my lights on if that happens,” she thought to herself. “It’s not like I can hide on this narrow road.”

  To Debbie’s relief, when the vehicle reached the end of the driveway, it turned right and away from her. She made the quick decision to follow as far as she could, navigating by the vehicle’s taillights. She followed for several minutes, trying to keep a minimum of a football field length between her and the strange vehicle. She at least wanted to follow long enough to get a description and a license number in case there did happen to be any trouble. Visions of Mrs. Schwender and Captain Dean spun through her head like a macabre shadow box. Her stomach twisted in nervous knots, compelling her to turn back and go home. She ignored her instinct with stubborn determination. For her own peace of mind, she had to know who this was.