Black Wave

by Devon Glenn

  “Thank you,” she mouthed to him before turning around to follow Elerick to the bar.

  Elerick hadn’t expected to find Emily sitting in the lounge by herself, but he supposed it was normal behavior for someone who had grown up in an inn. “I’m glad I ran into you here,” he said, and he didn’t just mean the bar.

  “I’m glad and I’m not glad.” Emily was lost in thought, seemingly unaware that she was giving Elerick mixed signals.

  “Um…do you want me to go?”

  She turned to face him with a look that told him he should know better. “It’s not you. It’s this hotel. I can’t believe I’m still living with my parents.”

  “I thought you were in college. Why don’t you go live on campus? Get a change of scenery.”

  “It took me four years to get into a four-year college.” She frowned. “First my parents couldn’t help me pay for school because all their money was tied up in this hotel they couldn’t open, and just when I had earned enough credits at the community college to transfer on my own, my admission offer was rescinded.”

  “Rescinded?” Elerick cried. “When did this happen?”

  Emily put one elbow on the counter and rested her head on her hand before she spoke. “Right around the time you got here.”

  “So what did you do?” he asked incredulously. “Flunk your last semester?”

  “Please.”

  “Bounce your deposit check?”

  “If we were the sort of people who bounced checks, why would you work here?” she asked, and her irritation made Elerick turn red.

  “So what do you think happened?” Elerick studied Emily’s face.

  “Well, in my uneducated opinion,” Emily said indignantly, “if schools are anything like hotels, I’d say they were overbooked. I mean, think about it. Most people apply to more than one program, so the schools can always expect at least some of their offers to be rejected. I guess my school must have sent out too many acceptance letters. Even if I appealed the decision and they let me in, the dorms would all be full.”

  “Wow,” Elerick said. His heart sank. “I’m sorry.”

  “All I wanted was the full college experience, dorm rooms and all.”

  Elerick looked around the lounge. “You can have that here. You’re sharing a building with a whole bunch of people, and I’m guessing your parents are footing the bill. What else is there?”

  “You went to college. You tell me.”

  “Fair enough.” Elerick thought for a moment. “So you’re already living the dorm life. That leaves dealing with bureaucracy…”

  “Check.”

  “Making new friends.”

  “Do you count?”

  “I’m close enough.”

  “Then check.”

  “Experimenting with drugs…”

  Emily fingered the mystery pill in her pocket. “Check.”

  “Really?” Elerick raised his eyebrow. “How about drinking horrible fruity mixed drinks until you think I’m funny?”

  “What kind of horrible fruity mixed drinks did you have in mind?”

  “Rrrrrrumm!” bellowed a familiar voice. Emily looked up.

  “Finn!” she said, elbowing Elerick in the ribs. “Remember the pirate who used to haunt my parents’ old house? He’s here. Do you see him?”

  Elerick laughed when he saw the pirate holding up a bottle of rum and a coconut. “I take it you’re here to pour Emily a drink.” Elerick called the bartender over and repeated Finn’s recipe for a rum-based cocktail that sounded like a variation on a Dark and Stormy. The bartender happily obliged, but knowing Emily as well as he did, he poured slightly less alcohol than instructed.

  Elerick was surprised when Finn held his hand under the bottom of the bottle so that the mouth tipped forward and sent more liquid spilling into the cup. He had seen ghosts make the lights flicker or the pipes rattle, but to actually move a heavy glass bottle was something else entirely. The bartender, who was counting the seconds on his pour instead of measuring the liquid, didn’t even notice.

  “That was weird,” Emily said to Elerick after the bartender handed her the drink and walked away. “How did you do that, Finn?”

  Finn shrugged, and Elerick thought he looked a little guilty. “I have a little more wind in my sails today,” he said. “Drink up!”

  Elerick watched Emily take the tiniest of sips. Most girls he knew in the city could drink him under the table trying to escape the stress, the lights, and the hustle and bustle. Maybe the sea air was good for people.

  “This is fun,” she said. “What other college things should I do?”

  “Um, you can sneak boys into your dorm room.”

  “You know where the trapdoor is.”

  Elerick coughed. He had expected a laugh from her, not an invitation. Before his mind could fully process this unexpected turn of events, his mouth betrayed him by changing the subject. “That leaves the most important thing on your college to-do list,” he said, “finding yourself.”

  “Did you find yourself in college?” Emily asked. Elerick shook his head no. “So where were you then?”

  Elerick took Emily’s hands and started kneading her palms, gently tugging her fingers and letting them go. “I was in Brooklyn, working as an online customer service rep at In Lieu of Flowers. You know, the charity arm of Orbies. I know it was for a good cause, but I never felt like I was really connecting with anyone; I was just annoying them with prepopulated answers to their questions. And I was sick of sitting in a chair all day. It was hurting my eyes and killing my back. I knew I wanted to get out of ‘the cloud,’ so to speak, and back in the world.”

  Emily closed her eyes as Elerick continued to work on her hands.

  “I started taking courses in massage therapy. The part-time job was intended to be a backup until I settled on another career,” Elerick explained, “but it stuck. I knew I couldn’t afford to live in Brooklyn and give massages until I had saved up enough money to build my own business, so I started looking for jobs that would help me cut down on living expenses: first on a cruise ship and now at the Black Wave.” He looked at Emily, whose eyelids were drooping in relaxation while he stroked her fingers. “Do you feel anything different happening since I’ve been massaging your fingers?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “My hands feel warm.”

  “It’s like I can read people through their skin. I never had any formal training in Reiki or any type of shamanic healing, but I could tell what people needed just by touching them,” Elerick said. “And one day, I had this client come in who had AIDS. I don’t even know how to describe to you the kinds of physical problems he was having. His body was a mess.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Well, first I warned him that I couldn’t cure AIDS with my hands—no one is that powerful. But he said that if I could make the time he had left a little more bearable, it would be worth every penny. And somehow, when I was done, he said that I had done just that. I quit the nonprofit the very next day and started giving massages full-time.”

  “Why do you call yourself a massage therapist and not an energy healer?”

  “I don’t have my certification,” he said. “But it’s not a big deal. I reach more people this way because they don’t have to believe in what I do to receive the benefits of it.” He paused for a moment and took a breath. “And more importantly, they’re not deluded into thinking that they don’t need to see their doctor if they’re seriously ill.”

  Emily leaned her head on Elerick’s shoulder. “I feel the same way about being a medium,” she said. “Connecting, I mean. The people who come to my séances have all lost someone, and all they want is to be able to talk to that person one more time. But the thing is, most of them have already. The dead come to them in their dreams or they call their names or they leave mementos for them around the house. I feel l
ike part of my job is validating other people’s experiences.”

  “Do you like helping people through their grief?” Elerick asked, lifting Emily’s chin off his shoulder so he could look into her eyes.

  “Are you kidding me? The grief is the worst part of it,” she said. “I like the weird stories that dead people tell. Nothing they did while they were alive can hurt them anymore, so they can talk about their murders, their embarrassing habits, their underwear—whatever they want—like they’re discussing the weather. It must be so liberating.”

  “But isn’t it also liberating being alive?” Elerick argued. “Ghosts have already experienced everything that’s ever going to happen to them in their lifetime. We still have the element of surprise.”

  “I’ll drink to that.”

  Elerick and Emily drank slowly, watching the clouds pass over the moon through the window and talking in low voices until the other patrons had left the bar and the bartender had started sweeping the floor and closing out the cash register.

  Elerick took a long look at Emily, at the way her mind seemed to be going a mile a minute, even as she spoke to him, nodding, and touching his knee. He wondered if she would focus just on him, just for a moment, if he kissed her. He reached out to brush the hair out of her eyes to clear a path, but before he could lean in, her phone shook the bar in front of her with a grating, persistent buzz.

  “Oh! I think that’s for me,” Emily said joyfully. She looked down, and her face fell. “It’s just Sadie. My mom is holding her hostage tonight. I should have checked on her sooner. I’m a bad aunt.”

  Elerick sighed, but he waited patiently while she typed her reply. Her phone beeped again. And again. And several more times before Emily looked up at Elerick with alarm. “Is Sadie writing you a novel?” he asked.

  “No,” Emily said, her agitation creeping into her voice. “Remember when I was on Orbies the other night?”

  Why yes, Elerick did remember that Emily’s baggy sweatshirt was covering up too much of her chest area in the profile picture she had uploaded. But she might think he was a pervert if he said that out loud. “Sure,” he said instead. “Are they spamming you or something?”

  Emily nodded. “Somehow I ended up in some random conversation thread, and now they’re sending me updates every time someone adds to it. There have been hundreds of comments so far—I got a whole bunch of them just now. And I can’t seem to unsubscribe from the message group.”

  “Are the comments mean?”

  “Not mean,” Emily said slowly. “Just a little too enthusiastic, maybe? My name turns up in almost all of them. I’m afraid to read them now.”

  “Then don’t,” Elerick advised her, taking the phone out of her hands and placing it on the table in front of him.

  “Are you trying to limit my screen time, old man?”

  “I’m trying to limit my own screen time,” he answered honestly. “I’m a born-again Luddite. No more typing—only talking and listening.”

  “What about touching?” Emily smiled at him, placing her hand on his. Feeling an electric charge running all along his arm, Elerick leaned in for the second time that night. But he leaned back with a sigh when Emily’s phone buzzed once more. Emily glanced at the screen and saw a text message bubble up. “Oh, and here’s another one from Sadie,” she said. “She wants me to meet her upstairs in my room. I should go.”

  “That’s fine. We can do this again sometime,” Elerick said. “I’ll send you a message by carrier pigeon or something.”

  “You know my room number,” Emily reminded him. “And I know yours.”

  Maybe it was fate that Sadie had intervened. Elerick reminded himself that dating his employer’s daughter would likely end in disaster. But he had no idea how he was going to entertain himself for a whole night, much less a whole winter, with the memory of Emily’s hands, her lips, so close.

  CHAPTER 26

  A web video and an

  authentic chair

  Emily opened her hotel room door to find Sadie already sitting on her bed. “Where were you?” Sadie whispered, pulling Emily into the room and shutting the door as if an army of parents lurked in the hallways.

  “Calm down, there’s no one behind me,” Emily said. But even as she spoke, she felt a presence in the far corner of her bedroom, followed by a scratch on the ceiling.

  Emily jumped in her seat, clapping her hand over her mouth to stifle her own scream. Sadie clutched her arm, looking fearfully at every corner of the room. The closet door was slightly ajar—open just wide enough for the girls to see the outline of Emily’s coats, a few tossed-aside shoes, and a crumpled heap of discarded clothing that had missed the clothing hamper. The boxes in Emily’s room loomed large before them. Were they large enough to hide a person, and if so, who or what were they hiding?

  “Hello?” Emily said quietly to the room. The ceiling rustled in response, followed by a knock. “Um…do you want to come in?”

  There was a scraping sound, and soon a pair of feet dangled from the ceiling, followed by a pair of legs.

  “Ohmygodohmygodohmygod,” Sadie whisper-shrieked. She grabbed the darkened lamp from the nightstand and yanked the chord out of its socket, holding her weapon over her head, ready to attack the intruder.

  Emily just laughed. “Don’t move,” she said to the descending figure. “There aren’t any steps in this room like there are in yours. You’ll need a stepladder.” Emily rustled one from her closet and helped the intruder find his footing.

  “I thought this might be where the tunnel ends,” Elerick said as he lowered himself.

  Emily felt her cheeks grow hotter as her hands moved from Elerick’s knees to his waist to spot him on his way down. His shirt had come up, and her fingers pressed against the smoothness of his back.

  “Sorry if I scared you. I’m just trying to give you the full college experience,” Elerick announced.

  “Sneaking a boy into my room…check!” Emily said. “You’re just in time for the party.

  “Oh hey, Elerick,” Sadie said with relief. “You were smart to sneak in through the ceiling. Emily’s mother has been playing hall monitor all evening.”

  “Oh, calm down, Sadie,” Emily said in defense of Joan. “She just doesn’t want to lose her liquor license.”

  Sadie shook her head. “No, I think she honestly doesn’t realize that we are in college and she doesn’t need to babysit us anymore. You really need to get out of here, Emily.”

  Emily darkened. Easy for you to say.

  Elerick cleared his throat. “So, what are you two up to tonight?”

  Sadie was quick with an answer. “I thought I’d crack open a few beers, put on some music, and we can all enjoy the view,” she said on Emily’s behalf, flinging the curtains open to reveal the string of twinkle lights illuminating the stretch of land between the sky and sea.

  She could just take her beers to her own room, Emily thought as Sadie took the leftover beers from the mini fridge and handed them to Emily and Elerick. Way to set the mood while killing it at the same time.

  “Can I see your phone?” Sadie asked Emily, grabbing it before Emily could respond. She was shifting through Emily’s iTunes playlist when another round of messages fired into Emily’s inbox with a ping-ping-ping-ping-ping. “Do you want to check these?” she said, tossing the phone back. “Somebody wants you even more than Elerick does.”

  Emily gave Sadie the side-eye as she begrudgingly took her phone, dreading what she’d see when she checked her messages. “Sorry, guys, I guess I should just see what this is about.”

  She wasn’t prepared for what she found. She had opted to test pilot a new video feature for catching orbs and other kinds of paranormal phenomena. And several members had sent videos in response.

  Emily clicked the Play button on the first one she saw. It showed an empty room, with the shooter of the video mov
ing from left to right with a handheld camera before settling into the corner nearest the door. Emily thought she could see that area of the room turn to static, forming a human shape that seemingly ripped through the room from one end to the other. “Guys, look at this,” she said, motioning for Sadie and Elerick to come closer.

  The two hovered on either side of Emily to watch the video as she played it again. “A bunch of people are sending videos to me, asking who the ghost is. But all I’m seeing is static.”

  “It’s just like our video!” Sadie exclaimed. She stood up, walked across the room, and connected Emily’s tablet to the television set.

  “Oh no,” Emily groaned as Sadie grabbed the remote. She knew where this was going.

  Elerick looked intrigued. “What are you talking about?” he asked, settling onto Emily’s bed, kicking off his shoes, and leaning against the headboard. “Did you make a video, too?”

  “Not us; Emily’s dad. It’s her first séance,” Sadie explained with a nod to Emily, “the one where you shamed her for being too friendly with the Gray Man.”

  “The who?” Elerick looked genuinely confused.

  “Remember the shadowy ghost that was following Selena, the fake medium?”

  “Yeah, kind of.”

  “Well, he and every other ghost and spirit that came to the séance that night are visible on this video.”

  “He looks different from the others, though,” Sadie reminded her. “He’s all cracked and broken and fuzzy. Just like the videos that the Orbiters sent you.”

  They watched the old video again, fast-forwarding through the lulls in conversation to get to the paranormal activity. Elerick asked to see the Gray Man once more. “That’s not right,” he said when they watched the glitch in the tape mysteriously return to normal the minute the Gray Man left. “Ghosts don’t usually show up that well in a video unless they make the lights flicker or the door move or something like that, especially not on an old camcorder from the nineties.”

  “Exactly,” Emily agreed. “And if Finn looks like a juicy invisible man while my grandpa leaves traces of light, then why does this other ghost practically break the tape?”