by Mute80
“Jamie? Nick and I are in Miami right now. We should be home in a few hours. Is there somewhere you can go until then so that you’re safe—somewhere with a lot of people?”
“Uhh . . . yeah. We’ll find someplace. Call as soon as you get here.”
“I will. Be safe.”
We hung up and I explained to Peter what the plan was. I wasn’t sure exactly how to proceed with my morning rituals. Should I shower while he’s here? It might be weird—plus, I don’t want to go upstairs alone.
I decided instead to change into some clean clothes and do a quick freshen up in the bathroom. I washed my face and pulled my hair into a ponytail. I used deodorant and a little mascara, glad I didn’t have an acne problem because otherwise I wouldn’t be able to get away with so little makeup. Finally, I dabbed the smallest of drops of perfume on my wrists and neck and ran back down the stairs, looking over my shoulder the entire way. Peter was just coming out of the kitchen, his face shining as if he had just splashed water on it. Now that the sun was up, my house didn’t feel quite as scary. I reversed what I’d done the night before and went around opening curtains and shades. If our visitors were going to return, I wanted to see them coming.
It was still early—barely after six—and I wasn’t sure where we should go. Peter’s stomach was already growling so we made packets of instant oatmeal for breakfast, taking it to the front porch to eat. The morning was a little cool and the air smelled salty from the breeze rolling in off the ocean. Usually I loved those kinds of mornings. When we finished our meager breakfast we packed the letters mentioning Jeremiah and Elsa, the photo of the Goodwin family, and my notebook into a bag and left my house.
We walked to a nearby park, stopping at Peter’s house on the way so he could change into some clean clothes. A lot of people liked to go for morning runs on the park’s paths and we thought it would be a good place to wait until stores started opening for business. We’d decide then where to go next.
I spent the time in the park reading one of the books I’d checked out from the library more than a week before. I wanted to lose myself in the story so that my mind would stop replaying the events of the night before. I offered another book to Peter, but he opted to lie in the grass and take a nap instead.
At eight o’clock my phone rang again. That time it was my dad, checking in with me for the day.
“How was your night?”
“It was okay,” I lied.
“You sound tired. Are you still in bed?”
I decided I better tell him the truth since I ran the risk of him hearing background noise. “Actually, I’m at the park right now.”
“The park? What in heaven’s name are you doing at the park this early in the morning?”
“I thought it would be a good idea to get some exercise. A lot of people come here to run or walk.”
My dad’s side of the phone was quiet for a moment. “Is someone there with you?”
“Uhh . . . Peter met me here. He wanted to exercise, too.” I kicked Peter as he snickered beside me on the grass. It was a lame excuse and we were definitely not getting any exercise.
“Well, okay, I guess,” Dad said hesitantly. “How was your day yesterday? You mentioned looking into your family history. Did you end up doing that?”
“Yeah, I did. Mom told me where to find some letters written by some of my great-grandparents. They were kind of interesting. One of the letters mentioned a mysterious trunk that was locked and the person who owned it couldn’t open it. It read just like a mystery and you know I like that, Dad.”
He laughed. “That does sound like something right up your alley. Maybe it’s the mystery trunk your Mom inherited from her parents that wouldn’t fit into the attic.”
“Huh?”
“You know, the trunk in my den.”
“No, I don’t know.”
“You really don’t remember? When we moved into the house we tried to haul that big old trunk your mother inherited up to the attic with the rest of her leftovers, but it was too hard to maneuver it up the spiral staircase in your room and up into the attic. We put it in the closet in my den—behind the bookcases.”
“Do you know what’s in the trunk?” I asked, trying to sound nonchalant. Peter perked up and turned toward me with questioning eyes at the mention of the word “trunk.”
“Nope. Lillian just mentioned something about old family stuff. I don’t know that I’ve ever looked inside it.”
My heart raced. “Dad, would it be okay if I tried to open it? Mom told me I could go through her stuff.” I crossed my fingers and closed my eyes tight, hoping he would say yes, but knowing that if the answer was no I was going to open the trunk anyway.
“That’s fine with me and I’m sure your mom won’t care, either. It will give you something to do today, but please don’t make a mess of my den.”
“I won’t, Dad. I promise.” I grabbed Peter’s hand and squeezed it tight, nodding my head up and down as I did so. He could only hear my part of the conversation, but I think he’d gotten the gist of it.
“I better get going. It looks like I will make it home tomorrow rather than Saturday.”
“That’s great. I can’t wait to see you.”
I wasn’t sure if I was ready for Dad to come home or not. I didn’t like having to explain my odd behavior to him, but I liked the idea of not being alone at night. That night, Sophia and Nick would be back and then the next night Dad would be home.
“Did your dad just tell you that he knows where the trunk is?” Peter asked excitedly when I’d hung up.
“Yes,” I squealed. “I knew there was more to that part of the story. I had a strange feeling about it. The trunk in my dad’s den has to be the one that belonged to the Goodwins.”
“Want to go check right now?”
“No. I mean, yes, but we can’t. I promised Sophia we would stay in public view until she got here. Grrr, this is going to be a long day,” I groaned.
“We should probably tell Camille what’s going on.”
I looked at my watch. “You’re right, but I guarantee she’s not awake yet. Unless we want her to be a grouch all day, we better wait at least another hour until we call.”
“Fine, but now I’m anxious again. We need to do something to keep my mind busy.”
“We could actually exercise like I told my dad.”
“I don’t want to get all sweaty—and I’m in flip-flops.”
“I offered you a book to read.”
“Ha. Ha. Ha. Just what I hoped for,” he said sarcastically.
“Don’t you ever read?”
“Sure, whenever I have to in order to pass my classes at school.”
“Really, Peter? That’s just sad. You can learn so much from books. I thought you liked history.”
“I read the National Geographic. And honestly, I do read an occasional book for fun. I just don’t know how some people can read a book and, immediately upon finishing it and closing its cover, open up another one and begin to read again.”
“By ‘some people,’ you mean me.” It was a statement, not a question. I didn’t really take offense to it, though. It was pretty much the truth—until I met Sophia.
“There could be worse habits, I guess.”
I laughed. “Please don’t tell me you’re one of those guys who spends all his days playing video games.”
“I won’t lie. I do play video games, but I consider myself to be a well-rounded person. I already told you I read once in a while. I have a few favorite TV shows I watch. I get exercise when I’m hanging out with the guys . . . kicking a soccer ball around, hitting a baseball, throwing a Frisbee. Oh, and you know I’m great at going down slides.”
“How could I forget?” I laughed.
“Do you still like to play sports?”
“Honestly? Not that much anymore. I used to be somewhat of a tomboy. Whatever the guys were playing at recess, I was playing, too. The last few years I haven’t been as active, I guess. I pretty
much get all my exercise from riding my bike everywhere.”
“Maybe we should change that. You can exercise with me this summer.”
“We might have to get our exercise running from scary ghosts, you know.”
“I hope we don’t ever have to see the ‘scary’ ghosts again,” Peter said, using his fingers to make the shape of quotation marks.
“That would be nice, but Peter—the more I think about it the more I’m convinced that Jeremiah and Elsa are somehow part of Sophia and Nick’s unfinished business.”
“Really? You don’t think it has anything to do with the Mary Celeste?”
“Honestly, no. I don’t. Every lead we’ve tried to follow about that ship has ended in nothing. We’ve gone over all the known facts a million times and there’ve been no new revelations. I don’t know for sure yet, but Sophia most likely even saw the remains of the Mary Celeste and she’s still here. But, every time we found something concerning the Goodwins yesterday, I had the sensation that we were on the right path. What if her way of extrication is somehow connected to the ghosts who were her captors for most of her real life?”
“Have you told Sophia about your idea?”
“Not yet. I didn’t start thinking about it until after she left for Haiti.”
“What do you think the business might be? Oh wait—never mind. I bet you think there’s something in the trunk.” He smiled.
“Yep.”
“Okay. It’s been an hour. Can we call Camille now?”
“Go for it.”
CHAPTER 19
I called Camille and tried to explain everything to her, but by that point the events of the previous evening were such a blur that I felt like I was making up a story. She was shocked that the Goodwins had come to my house and told me she was relieved she’d gone home early. Nice. I hoped I never needed her in an emergency because I was sure she’d be the first one to turn around and run away.
Peter and I instructed her to meet us at a nearby fast food joint as soon as possible. We thought about meeting at Grandma’s Bakery and Café, but concluded that we should avoid the places we’d been seen with Sophia for the time being.
“I swear you have a curse, Jamie,” Camille said when we were all seated in a booth eating a late breakfast or early lunch, however you wanted to look at it. It had been hours since Peter and I had eaten our oatmeal and we were starving. Apparently anxiety made me burn calories faster. Who knew?
“Why do I have a curse?”
“I don’t know why. All I know is that there are an awful lot of ghosts following you lately.”
“Come on—you like most of the ghosts. If Sophia wasn’t in the picture, you’d have a secret crush on Nick. Admit it,” I teased.
“Jamie, take that back.” Camille blushed and pretended to be mad. I grinned. It was usually her making me blush.
Peter and I told Camille about the mystery trunk that was supposedly in the back of a closet somewhere in my dad’s den. She was excited to open it with us once we told her she wouldn’t have to go into the attic again. I couldn’t guarantee there weren’t spiders in the back of Dad’s den, though.
“I think we need to have a plan in case Jeremiah and Elsa come back,” Peter said seriously. “If they didn’t take the bait and head to Boston to look for Sophia, you can bet the first place they’ll go is back to Jamie’s.” He turned to me. “They’ll assume you lied and have something to hide. I doubt they’ll be very happy.”
“Probably not, but I don’t think they’d want to expose themselves as ghosts, so would they really do anything to me?”
“I don’t know. If they find out that you were lying for Sophia, they might guess that she also told you who and what she really is.”
“Can we do anything to ghosts that will affect them?” Camille asked.
“I’m not sure. When I first met Sophia, she told me that she could hurt me, but I couldn’t really hurt her. I don’t know if she meant there was absolutely, positively nothing I could do to her, or if she just doesn’t feel pain the same way as living humans do.”
“I think the most important thing we need to do as soon as Sophia and Nick get here is to find out how to protect ourselves against their kind,” Camille suggested. Peter and I agreed.
We spent the rest of the morning wandering around Marion. We browsed through some of the quaint specialty stores aimed at tourists that we didn’t usually frequent—including some I’d never been in—and then made a stop at the grocery store for snacks and a few things for dinner. Once Sophia and Nick arrived, we’d probably hole up in my house for a while, not wanting to be seen in public.
It was just after one when Sophia finally called to let us know they’d just gotten on the I-195 coming from Boston. That meant they were about five miles from town and I was ecstatic. I would feel a whole lot safer having someone who could see through walls by my side. Peter, Camille, and I immediately headed to my house and reached my driveway at the same time Sophia’s little white car pulled up to the curb. I was surprised at the lump that grew in my throat and the joy I felt from seeing her and Nick again. The whole soul saver thing really messed with my emotions. I didn’t want to seem like a baby so I didn’t rush to her side like I wanted to.
“Hey, everyone. We’re back.” Sophia beamed as she stepped out of the passenger door of her car and Nick emerged from the driver’s side.
“How was your trip?” It was kind of a dumb question. They’d gone there in hopes of finding answers to some really old questions and they hadn’t succeeded. It wasn’t exactly a pleasure trip. Of course, it had been over a hundred years since they’d seen each other . . .
“Well, it was definitely a culture shock. I’ve traveled quite a bit in my years on earth, but that was my first time in Haiti. It’s a poor country and it was sad to see the poverty there.”
“Did you see the Mary Celeste?” Camille asked, getting to the point.
“Yes . . . and no. We hired a man to take us out to the site by boat, and we did a little scuba diving, but with the guide there we couldn’t do any exploring invisibly. There’s only so much you can do in your human form. We did see some pieces of wreckage that were supposedly from the boat.”
“How did you feel?” I asked.
“Just fine. I didn’t feel any connection to it whatsoever. I expected to feel more passion than I did, knowing how much a part of my past the ship was, but I felt nothing.”
“The water was beautiful, though. We were in the Caribbean after all,” Nick joked.
“That’s true.” Sophia smiled as she gazed into his eyes. I guessed they’d done a lot of catching up while they were there.
There was a lull in the conversation for a second while we all watched the recently reunited lovebirds. I suggested we go inside instead of standing in the middle of my front yard.
“Umm . . . do you think you could check the house out for us first, though?” I asked.
“That’s probably a good idea. We’ll be right back.”
I sensed that Sophia was about to vanish and I quickly jumped in. “Wait. Go around back. You can slip in there and any neighbors who happen to be looking out their windows won’t see you disappear.”
“Oh wow. I can’t believe I almost did that. I’ve lived as a human for a long time, but these last few days I haven’t had to be so careful. Oops.”
We let ourselves through the gate and through the side yard to the back patio. Peter, Camille, and I sat on the patio stairs while we waited for the two ghosts to complete their inspection. Nick opened the glass patio door about ten minutes later.
“You guys can come in. We checked all the rooms and closets and didn’t see anything. I think we’re okay,” he said.
We trailed after Nick as we followed him to the dining room and sat down. I pulled the letters and photo of the Goodwins out of my bag and tucked them closely to my chest.
I took a deep breath. “Sophia, I’ve been thinking—a lot, and I don’t think your unfinished business h
as anything to do with the Mary Celeste. I think it has something to do with the Goodwins.”
Sophia and Nick didn’t look surprised like I’d expected them to. They exchanged glances and then Nick cleared his throat. “We’ve already come to that same conclusion. We think our extrication is somehow related to each other and to the Goodwins . . . and, as bad as it may sound, we think we’re here until we get some sort of revenge on them.”
“Revenge?” I couldn’t picture either of them exacting revenge on someone. “Huh . . . Okay. If we’re all on the same page maybe we can move forward, but first you need to know something. I don’t know how to tell the two of you this, but I’m afraid it was my family that had you both killed.”
“What are you talking about?” Nick was perplexed.
I unfolded my arms and began to read the letters. When I finished, I explained that they were from my ancestors and had been in my attic the whole time.
“I’m so sorry for what they did to you,” I blurted out.
“Jamie, don’t you dare think for one moment that because you are distantly related to these evil people that we would be upset. This is a good thing. Maybe we can find answers because of it. In fact, I’m sure this is why you’re our soul saver. You have a connection to our unfinished business,” Sophia insisted.
“We found this, too,” I said as I produced the picture of Sophia and the Goodwins that I’d kept tucked in my lap.
“Oh my goodness, look at this. I was so young.” Sophia gingerly touched the picture and traced the outline of her face. “I remember when we had this done. Jeremiah wanted a family photo for some con he was currently working. I can’t recall the details of the whole con, but I do remember seeing Jeremiah pickpocket the photographer and it embarrassed me. Elsa had given me one of her old dresses to wear for the picture, but at that time she was starting to plump up and it didn’t fit me very well.” She lifted the picture up and looked at it more closely. “That old thing is pinned on everywhere. I was so scared I was going to get jabbed with a needle that day.” She laughed and then sighed. “I think it might be the only photo we had taken together. I can’t believe you found this.”