One Woman's Junk

by J. B. Lynn

  “Or Rena,” Winnie suggested.

  Beatrice glared at her but did not fall for the trap like her sister had.

  Winnie sighed and hugged Amanda. “It will be okay. We’ll just tell the very nice detective that we found it and hand it over.”

  “No!” Beatrice and Amanda said simultaneously.

  Winnie shrugged and walked back to her seat. “Can’t wait to hear why not.”

  “If we do that, the reputation of the store and Letty will be ruined,” Amanda argued.

  “If we do that,” Beatrice said, “we’ll never figure out why Letty had it in the first place. And we’ll never know if that’s why she died.”

  Bea knew they needed to solve this mystery themselves. She just wished she had a clue as to where to start.

  28

  “I told you, you should be nicer to the cop,” Rupert said, peering over Amanda’s shoulder.

  Startled by his arrival, she let out a cry and fell off the stool.

  “Are you okay?” Winnie ran back to her.

  Amanda scrambled to her feet. “I’m fine. I just lost my balance.” She shot Rupert a dirty look, but he just shrugged at her.

  “Okay,” Winnie said, returning to her velvet chair. “But for the record, you don’t seem fine.”

  Ignoring her sister’s assessment, Amanda climbed back onto her seat and frowned at Rupert, who was leaning over, staring longingly at her pizza. If ghosts could drool, she was pretty sure he would do it.

  “Why are you so convinced that there’s been foul play?” Winnie asked Beatrice.

  Amanda watched her youngest sister squirm uncomfortably in her seat. “You can tell us.” She tried to sound encouraging, despite the fact her stomach was in knots.

  “Because you reacted so well to the purse news?” Rupert mocked.

  “Will you shut up?” Amanda muttered under her breath.

  “What?” Winnie asked.

  “Nothing,” Amanda lied.

  Rupert chuckled.

  Amanda really wished that she could elbow him in the ribs. Instead, she shot him a dirty look.

  “What do you keep looking at,” Beatrice asked.

  Amanda wasn’t sure if it was a ruse to deflect attention from herself, or if she really was wondering. It wasn’t as though she could tell them that there was a well-dressed ghost standing around, offering an unwanted opinion about their sibling dynamics.

  “Nothing.”

  Beatrice shook her head and looked away.

  “We shouldn’t be fighting about this,” Amanda said. “We all loved Letty. None of us believe she was a thief.”

  “Except for the evidence,” Winnie reminded them.

  “I’m sure there’s a good reason she had it,” Amanda said. She looked at Rupert, wondering if he knew why she had it. He shook his head.

  A knock at the front door startled them all. “Did you forget to put out the closed sign?” Amanda asked Winnie.

  “Of course not,” Winnie said.

  Whoever was at the door, knocked again.

  Sighing, Winnie got to her feet and traveled to the front door. “I just want to point out that the dog,” who was still on Beatrice’s lap, “is the worst excuse for a watch dog I’ve ever seen.”

  The dog barked once, though it was impossible to discern whether he was agreeing or defending himself.

  Winnie pushed the closed sign aside and peered out. “Not again.”

  She let the sign fall back and stepped away.

  “Is it the cop?” Beatrice asked worriedly. “Is he here to search again?”

  Winnie shook her head. “It’s the crazy woman.”

  Amanda stood slowly. “There seem to be a lot of those around here. Which one, in particular, are you talking about?”

  “The woman who smells.”

  As though she knew she was being talked about, Harmony knocked on the door again.

  Amanda crossed her arms over her chest. “Don’t let her in.”

  “We have to let her in. She knows we’re here.”

  “No we don’t,” Amanda countered.

  “But we should let her in,” Winnie interjected. “Otherwise, people will think we’re acting suspiciously.”

  “Fine,” Amanda agreed grudgingly. “I don’t like it, but let her in.”

  “Wait!” Beatrice whispered. “First, hide the purse.”

  Nodding, Amanda stuffed it back into the denim bag, brought it back over to Beatrice’s cot, and put the bag under her pillow for good measure. “Okay?”

  Beatrice nodded.

  “I just want to say, I think letting her in is a bad idea,” Amanda grumbled.

  “Your opinion has been duly noted,” Winnie said. “But you’ve been overruled.” Sighing heavily, she opened the door and ushered Harmony inside.

  “Sage delivery.” Harmony trilled gaily as she glided inside, a bundle of fragrant sage in her fist. “Time to cleanse.”

  The Concordia sisters all stared at her.

  Harmony looked from one to the other. Then, she looked at the dog. Then, she looked all around the room. “The ghost is here.”

  Amanda glanced over at Rupert.

  “Excuse me?” Winnie asked.

  “The spirit is here,” Harmony explained. “I can always tell.”

  “Most people don’t believe in ghosts,” Winnie told her.

  “More people do than would admit,” Harmony snapped back. “Letty did. Letty always knew when the ghost was here.”

  “That’s true,” Rupert told Amanda. “She told me all about her day whenever I showed up.”

  Amanda scowled at him, wondering why he hadn’t told her that before. “Anyway, I brought you more sage,” Harmony said. “Letty was a big believer in smudging everything.”

  “Thank you,” Beatrice said.

  Harmony stared at her, then moved closer to the younger sister. “It’s really getting stronger for you,” Harmony murmured in a slightly dreamy voice.

  “What is?” Winnie asked, tilting her head at Beatrice.

  “The powers.” Harmony let the declaration hang in the air.

  The Concordia sisters looked at each other.

  Oblivious to the discomfort she was causing, Harmony asked, “How are they manifesting?”

  Beatrice shook her head.

  “Tell her,” Rupert told Amanda. “Tell her you can see and hear me.”

  She ignored him, focusing on the reactions of Bea and Winnie. Both scowled and crossed their arms over their chests in identical poses of resistance.

  Harmony smiled at them all. “Letty always believed you girls had latent powers. That’s why she collected the crystals over your lifetimes.”

  “The crystals?” Winnie asked.

  “The ones she left to you.”

  Instinctively, Amanda reached for her quartz earrings, taking comfort in them, and watched as Bea spun her agate ring and Winnie glanced down at the amethyst bracelet on her wrist.

  Harmony smiled. “Yes, those. She thought that they would help you channel your powers, but I suspect that when you got struck by lightning, they were supercharged.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Amanda said quickly.

  Winnie raised her eyebrows at her sister, signaling that the words had come out as too defensive to be believable.

  Amanda looked at Beatrice, who was just staring down at her ring, not saying anything.

  “They’re gifts,” Harmony told them. “The sooner you can accept your gifts, the better things will be.”

  With that, she put the sage on the counter and walked out of the shop.

  The Concordia sisters looked everywhere but at each other.

  It was Winnie who finally asked, “Is she right?”

  29

  “Now’s your chance,” Pim urged Beatrice.

  Beatrice shook her head almost imperceptibly. Her sisters had not accepted the news that Letty had a stolen purse in her possession or the theory that maybe something untoward had befallen their go
dmother. She had no idea how they would respond if they knew she was having visions.

  “She’s right about the ghost,” Amanda said.

  Beatrice jerked her head up to stare wide-eyed at her oldest sister.

  Winnie’s mouth dropped open. “What?”

  “She’s right about the ghost,” Amanda repeated, fingering her jewelry. “He is here.”

  “Are you saying that you can see ghosts?” Winnie asked, as though she couldn’t believe the words coming out of her sister’s mouth.

  Amanda shrugged. “I can see this ghost.”

  “Because of the earrings?” Winnie asked.

  Amanda shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe the lightning fried my brain.”

  “I’ve been worried about that, too,” Beatrice admitted. Taking a deep breath, she said, “I’ve been having visions.”

  Mouth slightly open, Winnie looked from Beatrice to Amanda and back again. “You guys actually believe Harmony?”

  Beatrice shook her head. “I believe what I’ve been experiencing.”

  “Me too,” Amanda said.

  Winnie shook her head. “I can’t believe this, I’m not hearing this. You’re both just under a lot of stress. We need to go to bed. Get some rest. You’ll be able to think straight in the morning.” With that, she ran up the stairs to the living quarters above the shop.

  Amanda and Beatrice shared a look.

  “Not a surprise that she’s the resistant one,” Amanda muttered.

  “Can you talk to the ghost?” Beatrice asked.

  “Yes,” Amanda replied.

  “Where is he?”

  Amanda pointed to a nearby bookshelf. “He’s leaning against that.”

  Beatrice nodded. Then smiled and waved at the bookshelf. “Hi.”

  Amanda sighed. “He says hello.”

  “Was he haunting Letty?” Beatrice asked.

  Amanda looked over at the bookshelf, as if waiting for an answer. “No,” she said. “He’s not haunting anybody.”

  “And yet, he’s here.”

  Amanda shrugged. “Apparently, I’m the only person who has been able to see and talk to him in a long time, so he enjoys my company.”

  “But Harmony just said Letty knew he was here.”

  The ghost must have said something, because Amanda looked over at the bookshelf and appeared to listen.

  Bea held her tongue, hoping the ghost wasn’t talking about her.

  “Letty sensed he was here and talked to him, but they couldn’t converse and she never actually saw him,” Amanda explained.

  “Is he cute?” Bea asked impulsively, wondering if he was more Patrick Swayze or Marley’s ghost.

  Amanda frowned. “He’s dead. Doesn’t that, by definition, make him not your type?” She glanced at the bookshelf and shook her head emphatically.

  Bea found herself dying to know what the ghost had said.

  “Tell me about your visions,” Amanda invited Beatrice.

  “Well, the first one I had was in PerC Up,” Beatrice said. “I didn’t see any people, like I did in all the others.”

  “What did you see?”

  “A waving skull and crossbones.”

  “Like a pirate flag? Gasparilla is big around here,” Amanda said.

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s held up in Tampa and is touted as being the third largest parade in the United States. Basically, it’s an excuse for people to get drunk and dress like pirates.”

  “Pirates?” Beatrice asked.

  “It’s based on the last of the Buccaneers, the pirate Jose Gaspar. Hence, Gasparilla.”

  “Huh,” Beatrice murmured. “Okay, that makes sense, but what about this?”

  She quickly conveyed the story of the vision attached to the jersey. Amanda had no explanation for that.

  Then Beatrice told her about the visions she’d had of Letty happy at the beach, and concerned at Red Bug Slough.

  Amanda nodded. “That explains your conviction that Letty was a victim of foul play.”

  “I’m not sure I’m totally convinced of it,” she said, “but it doesn’t sound like there was any type of investigation done. They found her, collapsed at the Red Bug Slough. They assumed she had just tripped over a root and then laid there in the sun.”

  Amanda nodded. “On the surface, it makes sense.”

  Beatrice nodded. “I agree.” She fiddled with her ring. “But if you could have felt how unhappy Letty was there, it just doesn’t make sense.”

  She considered telling Amanda about the memory card, but something held her back. It had already been two big revelations; she wasn’t sure how much more their sistership could withstand.

  “We still have to figure out what to do about the purse,” Amanda said.

  “I don’t suppose the ghost has any advice,” Beatrice joked.

  Amanda looked over at the bookshelf. She listened for a moment. “He thinks we should turn it over to the detective. I think that’s a terrible idea.”

  Beatrice nodded. “The detective didn’t know Letty,” she said slowly. “If he gets the wrong idea and follows clues down the wrong path…”

  “What clues?”

  Beatrice shrugged. “Look at what we’ve just found out in the last day or so. Letty had stolen goods; Letty had enemies. Letty went to a place where she was very uncomfortable.”

  “But there’s nothing we can do about any of that,” Amanda said.

  Beatrice shook her head. “Actually, there is.”

  “What?”

  “We can investigate.”

  Amanda actually laughed at her. “Investigate? Like detectives?”

  “Like people invested in finding out the truth,” Beatrice said defensively.

  “You and I aren’t Nancy Drew,” Amanda told her. “Maybe Winnie’s right. We probably all need some sleep.”

  Once Amanda double-checked to make sure the lock on the shop door was in place, she waved to Beatrice and went upstairs, leaving Beatrice and the dog alone in the store.

  Beatrice glanced over at the bookshelf. “I don’t suppose you can change her mind?”

  There was no response, of course.

  “Well, that went well,” Pim said.

  Beatrice took him out of her pocket and looked at his beaten-up countenance.

  “You and I have different definitions of things going well.”

  30

  Beatrice was too keyed up to try to go to sleep, so she busied herself straightening some of the housewares, wondering if Letty had ever expected to sell any of the half-dozen thimbles she had on display. Remembering the toy car Rena had dropped off earlier, she rolled over to her cot, put the black sheep on the pillow, and pulled it out of the pillowcase.

  “Not a good idea,” Pim warned. But she barely heard his words as she was transported into a vision.

  It was dark, except for the nearly full moon lighting up the sky. She could hear heavy breathing. A sense of terror enveloped her, and as she watched, she saw Rena huddling in an alley, her back pressed against a dumpster. She sat hugging her knees.

  “There’s no point in hiding,” a woman’s voice said. “You can’t get away from me.” She came into focus. The blonde with an old-fashioned beehive hairdo and mascara running down her face. She glared maliciously.

  Instinctively, Beatrice dropped the toy car.

  She rolled backwards, away from the cot, trying to put some distance between her and it, as her body adjusted to not being in the vision anymore.

  “What did you see?” Pim asked.

  “Danger,” Beatrice panted. “Rena’s in danger.”

  She snatched Pim off the pillow and pushed the chair toward the door.

  “Now? What makes you think it’s a present-time vision?” Pim asked. “All of your other visions have been in the past.”

  “This one feels different.”

  “Where are we going?” Pim asked.

  “We’re going to find her.” Letty had thought taking care of the girl was worthwhile, a
nd Beatrice wasn’t about to let anything happen to her on her watch.

  For a moment, she considered telling her sisters where she was going, but then decided they would just think she was crazy.

  She struggled to open the door and rolled herself outside. Even though he hadn’t been invited, the dog dashed ahead and waited for her expectantly.

  “Are you going to help find Rena?” Bea asked.

  He barked once.

  “If you were a girl, I’d call you Lassie.”

  For once, the sun wasn’t shining and she wasn’t overwhelmed by the heat. It was still uncomfortably warm, and very humid, but she didn’t have to shield her eyes. Instead, she blinked, letting her eyes adjust to the streetlights.

  “I think she’s on one of these little side roads,” Beatrice told Pim.

  “I don’t think this is the best idea,” Pim said. “Usually, I’m all for getting into trouble, but this…”

  Ignoring him, Beatrice wheeled herself down the ramp. She let the chair pick up speed as gravity did some of the work. It was exhilarating, almost, as she wobbled.

  “Rena?” Beatrice called out. “Rena, are you there?” She kept rolling, the dog trotting along ahead.

  No one answered her. No one was out at this hour. All the shops were closed and the street was deserted. She noticed that the only space that had any lights on was the baker’s. She thought that was odd, as the doors were never open for business during the day, but the lights were on at night. Still, she didn’t have time to worry about that. She had to find the girl.

  It occurred to her that if she fell here, nobody would notice that she was in the street all night. She could meet the same fate as Letty, lying helplessly for hours on the unforgiving ground. She kept pushing anyway, ignoring the pain in her injured hand, unable to shake the image of Rena being in danger.

  Every few storefronts, she called out the girl’s name, but never got a response.

  She pushed herself one block, then two, hoping she was heading in the right direction.

  Suddenly, the dog yipped excitedly and raced down a darkened, narrow street.

  “Rena?” Bea yelled at the top of her lungs.

  “Hello?” a tremulous voice answered from the shadows.

  “Rena, is that you? It’s me, Beatrice Concordia. Letty’s goddaughter. Where are you?”