“Honestly,” said Edna, rolling her eyes, “do you ever stop talking?”
I think Stan made a retort that was interrupted, but I had tuned them out in favor of reading the questionnaire given to me by our group’s ‘leader.’ It started out simply enough: Name, address, date of birth. But after that, the inquest got a little suspicious. What do you call your ‘spirit’ or ‘ghost’? Do others see or ‘talk’ to your ghost? Have you ever been diagnosed with a mental illness or disorder? If yes, please describe in detail along with date of diagnosis and physician’s name. Are you currently taking any medications? If yes, please list along with name of prescribing physician. Please list any traumatic events in your life that might have led to the ‘appearance’ of the psychic phenomenon you are currently experiencing. Have you ever had any bouts with depression?
I supposed these were logical questions to ask a person who claimed to see ghosts, but the tone was too clinical for me and I noticed a definite lack of empathy. Others around the circle were looking for pens or already filling out the form. Not me. I wanted some answers of my own.
“Excuse me,” I said as Sandy returned to her seat. “Since I came in a little late, I completely missed your role here.”
She clasped her hands in her lap and spoke in a practiced and deliberate tone as though soothing a young child. “I’m sorry. I thought I introduced myself. I’m Sandy, the group counselor.”
“You did say that, but that term, group counselor, is a little vague. What is the purpose of this group, exactly?”
“Your friend didn’t tell you?”
“He did,” I said, “But I’m asking you.”
Her body tensed and what little smile she’d managed to maintain, faded. She rifled through some papers in her notebook and plucked one out. She read directly from the page as if she were a customer service person on the phone, dictating from one of her many scripts for handling grouchy patrons. “A Spirited Discussion is a support group for people sensitive to psychic phenomenon, particularly those visited regularly by the same ghost, spirit, demon, etc. Specifically, we will encourage interaction between human and non-human entities as well as facilitate the resolution of problems arising from such relationships.”
“That sounds very helpful,” I said. “As the counselor, then, you do the facilitating?”
“Very helpful indeed. And so far, this is a wonderful group. I look forward to making many inroads.”
The fact that she didn’t answer my question directly wasn’t lost on me. I played a hunch. “What is Marmi wearing?”
She blinked, once, twice, three times. “Pardon me?”
“What am I ‘wearing’?” Marmaduke made fun of Sandy’s finger quotes and if my guess was correct, she didn’t hear or see his sarcasm.
I motioned to the people and ghosts in the circle. “How can you facilitate any resolution between these couples if you can’t see half of them?”
Sandy blinked more rapidly, evidently not expecting a challenge. “Resolution between couples?” she finally managed to sputter.
Dr. Callahan extracted his tablet from a case and started typing. “What did you say your credentials were again?”
Relief eased the lines on her face. “Dr. Sandra J. Barnes, MD, PhD. My degrees are from Harvard, Princeton, and Cornell.”
He clicked away on his tablet while I pressed onward, since I didn’t hear any mention of real-life experience with ghosts. “Have you ever talked to a ghost yourself?”
“I’m not sure how that is relevant...”
“It’s entirely relevant,” I said. “How can you help me with my ghost problems if you’ve never talked to one yourself?”
Marmaduke seemed hurt. “We have problems?”
“No,” I said. “We don’t, but these people do.”
“Dr. Sandra J. Barnes,” Dr. Callahan read out loud from his tablet. “Psychiatrist specializing in the narcissistic and personality disorder theory of patients exhibiting manifestations of imagined paranormal or psychic activity.”
“Narcissistic?” complained red-freckled man.
“Imagined?” howled Stan.
Dr. Sandra Barnes was visibly shaken. “I don’t think we should focus on those words specifically...”
“The woman is a ‘fake,’ an ‘imposter,’ and a ‘swindler,’” Marmi was having a grand old time finger-quoting his many biting synonyms. “How do you like them words, Madame PhD?”
“She can’t hear you, Marmi,” I reminded him.
“Shall we leave this establishment, Sophie?” he asked.
“I am so sorry,” Dr. Callahan whispered in my ear. “I should have checked this out better before recommending it to you.”
Without thinking, I placed a comforting hand on his. “Don’t worry about it,” I said, while noticing again the pleasant smell of him.
The room was abuzz with chatter between humans and their ghosts, as well as between human and human and ghost and ghost. None of them were talking to ‘Sandy’, who looked desperate to figure out just where she’d lost control.
Older red-freckled ghost stood and pointed to Marmaduke. “I’m with the pompous British guy, let’s get out of here before we wind up in one of her ‘studies.’ I’m not imagined and my son isn’t crazy!”
People and ghosts murmured in agreement while making a mass exodus to the lobby. There, pioneer lady ghost stopped, a sense of despair on her face. “I had such high hopes,” she said.
“Me too,” said Edna.
Red-freckled son looked a little sad too. “I just wanted to be with people like me—people who understood me.”
Dr. Callahan patted him on the back. “Know what you mean. Know what you mean.”
“Maybe we could form our own group—you know, informal like,” offered the woman with Pioneer Lady. “Meet at a coffee shop once a week or something.”
“I don’t like coffee,” said Stan.
“That won’t be a problem since you can’t drink it then, will it?” sniffed Edna. “Don’t listen to him, we’ll be there. Just say where.”
The idea was a good one, but meeting in a public place like a coffee shop presented what I considered to be some undesirable complications. The first time Stan and Edna went at it, the surrounding coffee-drinkers would only hear and see Edna yelling at an empty chair. I voiced this concern and the group agreed—coffee shop out.
“How about my office?” Dr. Callahan asked, turning to me. “After hours?”
“You’re asking me? It’s your office.”
“Would you stick around? Next Tuesday night?”
I shrugged. Committing myself to weekly romps with a group of misfits and their spectral buddies wasn’t really on the agenda, although, with few friends in town, my agenda was pretty non-existent anyway. “Sure. I can do that.” I threw Marmaduke a questioning glance. “You, Marmi?”
“Do I have anywhere else to be, pray tell?”
Apparently everyone loved the idea of continuing the support group at Dr. Callahan’s office, so he called out the address while people scribbled on whatever they had available. He gave them the office phone number as well.
“So, seven o’clock next Tuesday night, right?” he asked a final time. Everyone nodded, gave their thanks, and left the building far happier than they were when they exited Room 210 minutes earlier.
Stepping from the crisp, cooled air of the Stephens City Community Center to the steamy environment outside was almost as unsettling as that sneaky psychiatrist wanting to study me like a lab rat and label me mentally disordered.
“That was an... interesting evening,” I said to Dr. Callahan. “Thank you for inviting me.” I threw him a wave and began walking toward my car parked three rows back. “See you tomorrow.”
The doctor followed me with Moonflower hovering right behind him. “Again—sorry for not doing my homework first.”
“That’s okay,” I said feeling the awkwardness of the moment as I tried to say goodbye, despite the fact that we were both walking i
n the same direction. “Where are you parked?”
He pointed. “Over there. Silver Chevy.”
I laughed, relieved. “I parked right next to you.”
“Isn’t that convenient?” mumbled Moonflower. The air was already thick with humidity, but I swear I felt a surge of electricity zip through my nerves immediately after her snide comment.
When we reached our cars, he stopped. He held his tablet at his side in his left hand and jiggled a set of keys in his right. He’d changed from his business attire into a nicely pressed pair of khakis and blue polo shirt. The look was a little preppy, but I liked it. “So,” he said, seeming like he’d prefer to hang around. “What a day, huh?”
“Yeah, what a day,” I nodded, leaning against my car. I didn’t want to be rude. If he wanted to talk for a few minutes before parting ways, I’d oblige.
“So, I have to know,” he said, jingling his keys and grinning slightly. “How exactly do you meet a ghost in a bar? Was he trying to pick you up?”
I laughed. “I think he felt sorry for me. It was... well, it was a bad night for me.”
“I’m sorry. Forget I asked. I didn’t mean to be nosy.”
“No, don’t be sorry. I understand. It’s not every day that someone says they met a ghost in a bar.”
“It’s not every day that someone says they met a ghost at all.”
“True enough.” I laughed. “It was...” I took a moment to count back. “I guess about seven months ago. I was supposed to meet my boyfriend there. We were going to get a drink then head out to the movies. He never showed. I couldn’t reach him on his cell phone. He’d stood me up before and blamed it on the job—he’s a cop—but since I also worked at the station, I knew better. So, to make a long story longer, after two beers and many tears, Marmi was there in the chair next to me.”
“And you knew he was a ghost right away?”
“Are you kidding me? I thought he was a lonely Brit with really bad fashion sense. The next morning though, when he appeared out of thin air while I was eating my cereal—that’s when I knew I’d been adopted by a ghost. I wouldn’t say my... acceptance of the fact was exactly smooth. There was some screaming first.” I wrinkled my nose. “Quite a bit of screaming. Before the epiphany.”
He laughed. “You’re funny.” He jingled his keys some more. “So why you? Have you ever asked him why he went home with you?”
Marmi materialized, his arms crossed. “She was special.” He was very matter-of-fact and used less words than usual.
Dr. Callahan tipped his head and smiled. He responded to Marmaduke, but held my gaze. “I think you’re right. Very special.”
Blue. His eyes shone so much bluer against that turquoise shirt. Like a Caribbean ocean. And the lines that sprung up around them when he smiled. My stomach squeezed. I quickly grabbed hold of my senses and tore my eyes away from his. Can’t fall for my boss. Can’t do it. I fanned myself with my hand. “Man, it’s hot out here.” I dug into my purse looking for my keys. “I need to, you know, get home. Out of the heat. Where are those keys?”
I felt something wiggle on my hip.
“You mean these keys?” asked Dr. Callahan.
Mental head slap. Of course, I had clipped them onto a belt loop of my shorts—like I usually did. I blushed and as I moved my hand to unclip them, brushed his. The moment of contact was brief, but enough to cause my blush to deepen and my skin to tingle. In a good way. In a really, really good way.
“Thanks,” I said. “That was silly of me.”
He nodded and jiggled his keys around more briskly. “Right. I mean, no, not silly at all. I’ll see you tomorrow, right?”
I scooted to my car door and unlocked it fast to escape more gawky bumbling. I was behaving like a crushing high school girl. “Right. In the morning. Have a good night.”
“Hey!” He called across the car, catching my attention. “For the record, I think that boyfriend of yours was an idiot.”
Suddenly, that electrical surge I had felt before returned, but this time easily, ten times stronger. I looked up in time to see Moonflower glowering behind Dr. Callahan like an angry cat ready to pounce. The hair on my arms stood on end and I was about to ask if he felt the current when a loud, deep pop shook me and caused me to flinch. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a flash of light and when I turned to the noise, saw that the streetlight behind us had blown, showering sparks onto the cars below.
“Whoa!” shouted Dr. Callahan. “What caused that?”
My hair fell and the electric sensation passed. That was my cue to get the heck out of there. I threw open my door. “Storm is coming, maybe?” I asked. “See you tomorrow!” Once safely in my car with the engine running, I questioned Marmaduke. “That was Moonflower, wasn’t it?”
“That was most definitely the work of your good doctor’s friend.”
“Can you do that?”
“I will admit that I do not know. Would you like me to try?”
“No, no! I’ve had enough surprises for one day.”
“Well, could I bother you with one more strange item?”
“Strange?”
“Look in your rearview mirror.”
I did what he said.
“Tell me what you see,” he continued.
“Cars.”
“Besides the auto cars.”
Behind two rows of cars was a row of hedges. In front of the hedges, a man. Well, not a man, he was probably nineteen or twenty. “You mean the guy standing in front of that hedge?” Dr. Callahan’s car backed up and pulled away. My attention went from the rearview mirror to his car and I had to smile as I saw him give me a final wave as his tail lights moved off.
“Rear view mirror, Sophie, rear view mirror.”
My eyes snapped back and caught sight of the teen who I suddenly recognized as the one I had collided with in the community center lobby. His hair was blondish and a little long, hanging in his eyes a bit, his clothes standard summer apparel—gray shorts and an orange t-shirt. Nothing about him seemed suspicious, except that his eyes were glued to Dr. Callahan’s car as it motored out of the parking lot.
“Why am I watching this guy, Marmi?”
“I saw that young man earlier today.”
“Yeah. Me too. In the lobby.”
Marmaduke shook his head. “Earlier than that.”
Uh oh. “You tried to warn me at the message board, didn’t you?”
“Would you like to hear what I have to say at this time, or shall you once more smash my attempt to communicate the way a batsman tonks a lollipop?”
I suppressed an eye roll and pressed my temples to fend off an impending headache. “Translate, please?”
“In the game of cricket. When the man at bat wallops an easy toss by the bowler.”
Cricket. Of course. Marmi loved the game. He also loved to throw me off with cricket analogies, using terms I could never understand. Presently, I sensed he was doing so as retribution for dismissing him earlier. Fair enough. Probably not a nice way to treat a ghost who thinks I’m special. “Okay,” I surrendered. “I’m sorry for tonking your lollipop. Without further ado, would you tell me where you saw him earlier?” I asked the question, but the kid’s attention on Dr. Callahan’s car gave me a good idea.
“Outside your doctor’s office. He meandered along the cement walk three or four times, glancing through the windows with each pass.”
“You think he’s following Dr. Callahan?”
“It would appear that way.”
CHAPTER SIX
DESPITE THE FACT THAT MY apartment building supposedly had air conditioning, it never seemed to function well enough to keep my unit comfortably cool. At best, when running, it fended off most of the humidity. For some reason, the heat bothered me even more that night—sleeping became a toss and turn affair. Lots of pillow plumping, frustrated sighing, and brief interludes of light, restless dreaming. By five a.m., I gave up the ghost, pun intended, and started my day with a shower and a giant glass of
ice cold, caffeine-laced soda.
My hours, per our agreement, were nine-thirty to six-fifteen, but I decided to arrive an hour early since I was awake and had nothing better to do. I figured I could spend the extra time educating myself on Dr. Callahan’s brand of optometry so I could sound semi-intelligent on the phone when people called to inquire.
When I arrived, I was surprised to see an unmarked police car in the lot and a uniformed man cupping his hand against the glass panes of Dr. Callahan’s front door, peeking inside. Even from the side, the policeman’s dark, wavy hair and macho-confident stance were unmistakable. Our lawman visitor was my ex-boyfriend, Shane Daniels. My bad night was transforming into a tragic day. Half of me considered sneaking slowly and stealthily back into my car, and then tearing off frantically in search of a large supply of chocolate and a dark room to gorge myself. The other half of me thought that was a good idea as well. Thank goodness for Marmaduke. He had better sense than either of my halves.
“Don’t you dare run away from that brute, Sophie,” he said, appearing at my side and reading my mind all at the same time. “He doesn’t deserve to walk on the same ground as you, much less have the power to scare you away. Don’t grant him the satisfaction.”
“But if he doesn’t see me, he won’t know he was satisfied.”
“Are you a coward or a hero in your own life?”
“Since when did you take up motivational speaking?”
“I’m not sure I understand your meaning.”
“Never mind.” I took a deep breath. “You’re right. I can do this.” I took a second deep breath. “Let me center myself...” I closed my eyes and while taking a third, deep (probably too deep) cleansing breath, Shane must have caught sight of me.
“Sophie?”
I opened my eyes and felt the ground sway. Too many deep breaths had made me dizzy. “Shane. Hey.” I giggled nervously which made me furious with myself. Immediately, I took a more serious tone. “Is there a reason you’re spying on my place of employment?”
He took several steps in my direction. “I’m on duty, Soph. It’s hardly spying.” He pointed back to the office. “You work there now?”
Keep Me Ghosted (Sophie Rhodes Romantic Comedy #1) Page 5