The Haunting of Riley Watson

by Alexandria Clarke

  When my teeth began to chatter, I went inside and made myself a cup of coffee. I almost felt human again. The cold had cleared my head and made it easier to manage my energy. It was easier if I pictured my psychic ability as a balance scale. My mental health sat on one side while my wild energy sat on the other. The more I tended to my mental health, the more the scales evened out, but if I neglected my emotions and let frustration get the best of me, my energy would grow heavier and begin to tip the scale in that direction. The imagery soothed me. As I sipped my coffee and warmed up on the couch, I closed my eyes and imagined evening out the two sides of the scales. Slowly but surely, my stomach calmed down and my headache began to fade. I felt human again.

  Since the cold’s effect was so automatically calming, I didn’t want to give it up so easily. I donned several layers—from warming, sweat-wicking leggings to a heavy sweater to my fluffiest snow jacket and hard-wearing boots—and joined the excited guests in the White Oak lobby who were all ready for a day on the mountain. Near the Slopes Café, I rented another pair of hiking poles and traction pads to strap onto my boots. Then, with an air of great determination, I headed up the path to the bird watching platform, this time prepared with a backpack full of water, snacks, and several hand warmers. I huffed and puffed as I climbed the mountain, this time taking the “intermediate” route. I was by no means an intermediate hiker, but in that moment I was after a better challenge. The path acted as a life-sized puzzle. I learned where to put my feet to get the best traction and how to engage each muscle group to pull me up the steepest parts of the mountain. If I got stuck, I stood back and waited for other hikers to pass through. As they did so, I studied their methods and mimicked them. One hiker gave me a boost up a particularly steep hill then showed me how to use a pick axe. He even gifted me with a small axe to keep for myself, claiming he had too many already. I used it to scale the last obstacle before the bird-watching platform. When I cleared the hill and stepped onto the platform to catch my breath, it was the first time I’d felt truly accomplished in several years. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been so proud of myself. It must have been when Madame Lucia’s Parlour started gaining attention, but that pride was always tainted by the fact that I deceived and exploited my viewers on a regular basis.

  The bird platform was quiet. I sat down on the edge of it like I’d done with Gina the first day I met her and dangled my legs over the gushing waterfall. A rainbow arced through the spray, sending dazzling multi-colored diamonds into the air. I ate a protein bar and washed it down with a few swigs of water as I enjoyed the noise of the rushing water and the wind rustling through the trees. For the second time, I wished I could stay there forever, without any other people, living or dead, to wreck the silence. I lost track of how long I sat there, but surely an hour or two must have passed because the cold began to creep into my limbs and stiffen them. I shook my legs and arms out, stood up, and started the trip back.

  Down the mountain a ways, parents crowded a larger viewing platform that overlooked a few of the busier riding trails. It was a place for those who preferred to stay off the mountain but still wanted to feel involved in the activities. There was even an outdoor bar and several café tables for everyone to enjoy. I ordered a hot toddy to warm myself up and picked a seat near the edge of the balcony with a good view of the mountain. As I sipped my drink, I scanned the snow for a glimpse of Riley. She hadn’t been in the room that morning, which usually meant she was already out on the slopes. I imagined skiing was to Riley what hiking had become for me. It helped to clear her head. It had been that way since before I’d met her. I probably should’ve taken a leaf out of her book sooner.

  After a few minutes, I caught sight of Riley’s familiar figure and neon yellow jacket and grinned as I watched her ski in and out of the others with a cocky confidence. She looked more at home on the slopes than both the tourists and the locals. As she approached the part of the mountain that passed beneath the balcony, she glanced up and made eye contact with me as if she instinctively knew my exact position without having to search for me. It was if an invisible string connected the two of us, but as soon as her eyes locked on mine, my head began to swim. My vision went fuzzy, blurring the colorful skiers together into one rainbow blob against the white mountain. When I blacked out, yellow eyes and a mouthful of teeth laughed at me in the darkness.

  I came to on the floor of the balcony, my head resting on a stranger’s knee. A crowd of guests stood around me, but one woman in a teal jacket and white earmuffs kept them a safe distance away. She knelt beside me and fanned me with a cloth napkin.

  “Oh, you’re awake!” she said when she noticed I’d opened my eyes. “Thank goodness.”

  I pushed myself off the stranger’s knee. He was a nice-looking man whose jacket matched the woman’s. They wore matching rings as well. I rubbed my aching head.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “You fainted and fell off your chair,” the woman said. Someone passed her a glass of water, and she offered it to me. “Here, drink this. Are you okay?”

  I took a sip. “I think so. How long was I out?”

  “Only a couple of minutes,” said the man. “You seemed alarmed about something right before. Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Alarmed? I—oh my God. Riley!”

  I sprang up from the floor, swaying as I tried to figure out how to balance again. The married couple jumped into action to keep me upright, each of them taking one of my arms and helping me walk to the balcony’s edge. Immediately, I noticed Riley’s yellow jacket. She was sprawled in the snow, her right arm twisted at a gross angle. She tucked in the broken arm and rolled to the side of the path with a garbled yell of pain.

  “Riley!” I yelled, panic rising in my throat. I pushed at the couple trying to help me. “She’s hurt. I have to get down there.”

  “You shouldn’t be up and about,” the woman said.

  “She’s my kid,” I said without hesitation. “What I should or shouldn’t do doesn’t matter.”

  She took in my expression and nodded. “Okay then. At least let us help you get to her.”

  The couple accompanied me down the slippery steps and the rest of the way to the slopes, flanking my either side like my own personal security guards.

  “I’m Daphne, by the way,” the woman said. “And this is my husband, Dash. We’re both nurse practitioners. We can help you and your daughter.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “I just want to get to her first.”

  I spotted Riley in the snow. Other skiers crowded around her, blocking most of her from view. I couldn’t tell how badly she was hurt through the throng.

  “Get out of the way!” Dash ordered, his voice booming through the crowd. “Move, people! Her mom’s coming through.”

  The crowd parted for us, murmuring and whispering in worried undertones. When I saw Riley, I understood why. Her broken arm was much worse than it had looked from the balcony thirty feet above and she was bleeding from a large gash in her forehead. I tore myself away from Dash and Daphne and threw myself into the snow next to Riley.

  “Riley!” I refrained from throwing my arms around her like I wanted to do, unsure if she had any injuries that I couldn’t see. “What happened? You were fine one second, and then the next—”

  “I passed out,” she said, teeth clenched as she cradled her broken arm close to her chest. She was in a lot of pain, but she was also a trooper who didn’t like to show weakness. She gestured to the injury. “So I don’t remember how this happened.”

  “Some idiot ran over you,” said a teenaged boy who carried his snowboard under his arm. “I was right behind him. I saw you crash, and I tried to warn him, but he just kept going. He nailed your head and your arm in one go.”

  “Call the paramedics,” I urged Daphne as Dash took Riley’s arm and gingerly felt the bones.

  “No need,” Daphne said, nodding toward the resort where a four-man team of White Oak’s medical staff carried
a portable stretcher toward us. “They’re already here.”

  “I called them,” said the snowboarder boy.

  “Thank you,” I told him.

  “No worries.” He grinned down at Riley. “That dive was gnarly. You should get a trophy for that. I definitely won’t be forgetting it anytime soon.”

  Riley couldn’t help but return the smile. “Don’t know if it was worth the grief though.”

  “Oh, it totally was.” He bumped his fist against her uninjured hand. “I’m Aaron. Look me up when you get out of the war zone. Girls who shred are awesome.”

  “Move along, Aaron,” I said in a gruff voice.

  The paramedics set the stretcher next to Riley and prepared to transfer her onto it. As they did so, Daphne and Dash helped me to my feet again. In all the hubbub, the paramedics didn’t realize that two people were sick on the slopes.

  “We should get you a wheelchair,” Dash offered.

  “I’m feeling better,” I said truthfully. “I just need your help getting to the clinic with Riley. I can’t leave her.”

  “No problem,” said Daphne.

  We followed the paramedics as they carried Riley inside, forming a short but noticeable parade. People stared unabashedly, first at Riley and her twisted arm, then at me purely because I was Madame Lucia. I tried to ignore them, but their eyes burned like firework embers against my skin. I felt my cheeks grow hot and kept my eyes on the back of Riley’s head all the way to the clinic. It was a relief to reach the cool, mint-colored walls of the office. They wheeled Riley into the emergency unit, a small but fully equipped room, and one of the paramedics stopped me at the door.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Family only.”

  “I’m—”

  Nothing. I wasn’t anything to Riley. I’d only met her three weeks ago, and despite all the terrible things that had happened between now and then, we still weren’t anything but a pair of strangers with the same psychic ability.

  “She’s my legal guardian,” Riley called from the stretcher.

  My heart bloomed like one of those rare flowers that only bloomed once every hundred years. The paramedic glanced at Riley then back at me.

  “Oh,” he said. “Okay then. I guess we should have a look at you as well. What happened?”

  “She fainted,” Daphne said as she and Dash handed me over to the medical team. “Probably dehydrated.”

  I thanked the couple, and they took their leave. Then I slipped in between the team of paramedics to sit by Riley’s side and hold her good hand.

  “We have to take X-Rays,” said the grumpy paramedic. “So you can’t stay there.”

  Riley patted my arm. “Let them make sure you’re okay.”

  So for a few minutes, I let the White Oak medical staff poke and prod me as they took my temperature and blood pressure and asked me questions about my time outside before the fainting spell. I hardly paid any attention to them, giving them answers that would satisfy the dehydration story. I had a hankering why I’d fainted outside—and why Riley had too—and it didn’t have a single thing to do with dehydration. When they finally finished drilling me and Riley’s arm had been X-rayed and cast, the staff left us alone in a recovery room.

  Riley knocked the purple plaster cast against the plastic bed frame experimentally. It made a loud thunking noise. I grabbed her arm before she could do it again.

  “Are you crazy?” I said. “They just set that. Quit it.”

  “I can’t feel anything,” she said, her eyes glazing over. “Weird.”

  “That would be the heavy-duty painkillers they gave you,” I reminded her. “Don’t get used to it. It’s simple ibuprofen from here on out.”

  She thrust her arm at me. “Sign it.”

  “Your cast?”

  “Yeah. Sign it from Madame Lucia.”

  “I don’t have a marker.”

  She gave a gusty sigh. “Fine then.”

  “Hey.” I squeezed her good hand. “I’ll sign it later, okay?”

  She tipped her head on the pillow to look up at me. “You promise?”

  “I promise,” I said, moving her sweat-encrusted hair away from her face. The skin under her eyes was swollen. She looked so tired and sad. “I’m so sorry, Riley. I hate everything that’s happening to you right now.”

  “Because you know what it’s like?”

  “I don’t though,” I said. “I haven’t lost my whole family.”

  Riley tapped my nose with the tip of her finger. “But you kind of have. Are you finally going to tell me what happened?”

  A chill stole through my body from the top of my head all the way down to my toes. “No,” I said. “I don’t think so.”

  Riley sighed again. All hopped up on painkillers, sighing seemed to be her main form of communication. “Listen, Lucia. We’re not stupid, right? I like to think you and me are both pretty intelligent individuals.”

  I chuckled. “Yeah, I would agree.”

  “Then why are we playing stupid?” Riley asked. “We both know we didn’t faint at the same time for no reason. It’s got something to do with King and Queens. Did Stella tell you anything new?”

  I pulled back. “How did you know Stella was still around?”

  “Because she follows me too,” Riley replied. “I’m the one who’s haunted.”

  “Then why does she keep telling me to confront my past?” I asked.

  “Because you’re the stronger psychic,” she said. “Your energy is outrageous. Can’t you feel it?”

  I rested my head on the edge of Riley’s bed. “Right now, I don’t feel energetic at all.”

  Riley petted my hair absentmindedly. “Tell me.”

  “Tell you what?”

  “What you need to tell me,” she said. “Whatever you’ve been bottling up all these years. It’s about time you come clean. Tell me about your family.”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m drugged. I probably won’t remember in an hour. Lay it on me.”

  I took a deep breath. “Okay. Do you remember why you got mad at me in the first place?”

  “Stella said you killed your father,” Riley muttered. “And you didn’t deny it.”

  “You had every right to be upset,” I said. “I kept something so big from you, but you should know the whole story. My father wasn’t a good person.”

  “Like my dad?”

  “Worse,” I assured her. “Because my father wasn’t just mean to his employees. He was mean to me and my mother. He was a recovering addict, like Detective Daniel, but he wasn’t very good at the whole ‘recovering’ part.”

  “Start at the beginning,” Riley said.

  “My father was an artist,” I explained. “And he bought into that dumb concept that artists had to be tortured and wounded. He also believed that he produced his best work when he was high, so he got addicted to pain pills.”

  “That’s stupid,” Riley said. “Everyone says the same thing about Van Gogh, but he painted most of his best pieces while under the care of a psychiatric hospital.”

  “My father wasn’t much into Cubism,” I replied. “Anyway, my guess is that my dad was bipolar because when he wasn’t on a ‘creative streak,’ he was pretty much the best dad I could ask for. He was attentive and loving. He’d take me to art galleries and museums. He loved my mother more than anyone else.” I trailed off, staring blankly at the bare wall of the recovery room. “Sometimes, I think that made it worse. I wish he had been terrible all the time because then it would’ve been easier to hate him. And I wouldn’t have felt so guilty about what happened.”

  “Which was what?” Riley said. Her eyelids had begun to drift shut, but she was still listening to me.

  “Each night was a game of chance,” I said. “We never knew which version of my father would be coming home from the art studio. Half the time, he was bitter and violent, but my mom was supposedly so in love with him that she wouldn’t leave him. I watched him hurt her over and ove
r again, and when I got a little older, I couldn’t understand why she let him do that.”

  When I stopped short, Riley rubbed my head again. “And then what?”

  “One time, my mother was away with her friends,” I said. “I was thirteen, old enough to be left on my own. My father came home drunk and high. He tried to hit me because my mother wasn’t home. I ran and hid in a closet. I must’ve been in there for three or four hours, terrified to come out. He fell asleep on the sofa in the living room, so I went into his bathroom and grabbed a bottle of pills.” My voice cracked. I bowed my head over Riley’s bed and spoke into the blankets. “I woke him up and dared him to take the pills. I don’t know what I was thinking. I never thought he would actually do it, but he looked me right in the eye and emptied the bottle into his mouth and swallowed everything with a huge mouthful of vodka.”

  “Whoa,” said Riley, her eyes widening to the size of tea saucers. “That’s heavy.”

  “I was too scared to call 911,” I admitted as tears burned in the corners of my eyes. “The cops had been at my house so often for domestic disturbances, but this time I knew it was my fault. I put my dad in the shower, hoping to wake him up. I stuck my finger down his throat. It didn’t work. He didn’t wake up, so I just sat there in the shower with him until my mom came home. That’s why she hates me, you know. It’s because she found me with my dead father.”

  Riley kissed my forehead, mothering me in an unexpectedly comforting way. “Everything’s going to be okay, Lucia.”

  I felt lighter now that I had finally told someone the entire truth. My headache was almost completely gone, as was the brain fog that had been plaguing me since our first morning at White Oak.