Ghost Tour

by Claryn Vaile

  “Well, I’m going to get another volunteer to work my shift at the hospital that afternoon. I just feel like someone from our family should be there.”

  Her mother had always been charmed by Bryce, having no clue about the way he treated her daughter in private. Those days seemed completely unreal now.

  “I’ll think about it,” Rebecca repeated. “I’ll let you know tomorrow what I decide to do.”

  She hung up the phone and scooped the anxiously attentive Willoughby into her arms. “I guess I should feel sad, shouldn’t I?” she asked the terrier. But taking stock of her post-news emotions, she found only disassociated interest.

  Bryce’s dreams of becoming a professional actor had never quite worked out. The last she’d heard, he’d been eking-out a living in dinner theatre productions, tending bar, and making TV commercials for local auto dealerships and furniture warehouse showrooms.

  Fifteen years earlier, her parents had encountered Bryce at his mother’s funeral. “He was fat with long frizzy hair and wore dark glasses the whole time,” Rebecca’s mother had reported. “He looked like an aging drug dealer.”

  He was an aging drug dealer

  In the end, it was curiosity that made Rebecca decide to attend Bryce’s memorial service that Friday afternoon. Who were the people in his life all these years after their marriage ended? What would they say about him and how would they remember him?

  Feeling like a hostile witness, Rebecca realized that her recollections of the man being eulogized were very different from those of the mourners surrounding her. If pressed to relate a happy memory of her time with Bryce, she found she could not come up with one. Not a single positive recollection. Odd. She’d known him for 10 years, had loved him enough to pledge her life to him at one time. Surely they’d shared countless joyous moments. Why else would the divorce have hurt so much? Over the years, repression of the good memories had been essential for her emotional recovery. Remembering the precious times, the passionate emotions, crippled and cut. Only now did she realize how thoroughly she’d sublimated them.

  Sitting in the same sanctuary where she and Bryce had been married was surreal. The dais was still decorated for Christmas, with three lit trees of graduated heights behind the pulpit. Large screens one either side of the central stationary cross displayed twin images of a Christmas star throughout the service. Rebecca had been hoping for a video retrospective. Couldn’t at least one of Bryce’s filmmaker friends have put one together? She wanted to see what he looked like in his later years. But there were no videos or even photos.

  As the mourners formally filed out after the service, pew by pew, she continued to search for familiar faces.

  “Do you want to go to the reception?” her mother asked in her overly solicitous tone.

  “Not sure,” Rebecca said, drifting to the back of the foyer. “Let’s just wait here a few minutes.”

  She still recognized no one, but someone recognized her.

  “Becky? Scott Dickerson,” he reminded her. “Bryce’s bud from high school.”

  Rebecca found herself smiling and clasping his hand. She’d always liked Scott.

  “Great to see you. Really great. You look terrific,” he said warmly. “So how about that eulogy? Great work of fiction, eh? Since when did Bryce become valedictorian of his class? Obviously this preacher didn’t know him at all. Bryce would have gotten a good laugh at that. He would have thought most of this was really bizarre.”

  “Except for the music, it didn’t seem much like him at all,” Rebecca agreed.

  “Probably his sister Pam’s doing. She was always a bit clueless. Can you believe her get-up? She still seems to think she’s Cher or a flower child or something.”

  Rebecca relaxed, loving the ease of reconnection with someone from the past who didn’t make her uncomfortable. She could go into the reception with Scott. It would be fine.

  “I think I’d like to mingle a little bit after all, Mom,” she said, “but you go on. I’ll come by the condo afterwards and we’ll visit.” Before her mother had a chance to respond, Rebecca was off to the fellowship hall on Scott’s arm.

  She regretted the decision almost immediately. Everyone was so somber and glum. Tables arrayed with casseroles and jello salads and a huge silver coffee percolater brought back memories of her own church upbringing.

  “Don’t miss them brownies,” a ponytailed man, who looked like he’d been in the mountains way too long, whispered conspiratorily to Scott. “They’ve got a little somethin’ special, if you know what I mean.”

  “Would you like to meet Marsha?” Scott asked, referring to the woman Bryce’s obituary had called his “life partner.” Rebecca let herself be led along and was soon facing a woman about 10 years younger than herself, with runny mascara-rimmed eyes. They looked at each other quizzically and attempted polite smiles.

  “Marsha, this is Becky Bridger – or are you Holcomb again? She was Bryce’s wife.”

  “Oh,” Marsha said, obviously taken aback. “Yeah, Bryce talked about you sometimes. Always remembered your birthday. Said you were really smart and had a good sense of humor.”

  “That was nice of him.” Rebecca didn’t quite know how else to respond. “I really don’t know what he was like after our divorce.”

  “He was wonderful,” Marsha said, dabbing her eyes with a wadded-up Kleenex. Scott put a sympathetic arm around her and she blew her nose. “How could you ever have left him?”

  Scott cast Rebecca an apologetic glance, knowing the real story and understanding how touchy the topic was.

  “I guess we just had different opinions about what it meant to be husband and wife,” she said. “Bryce liked the idea – and the practice – of ‘open marriage’ a lot more than I did. It just didn’t work out.”

  Marsha stared at her, uncomprehending at first, then nodded slowly as if she understood. “Well, thank you for coming. Weird how shit turns out, isn’t it?”

  And that was enough. More than enough. Rebecca excused herself and retreated to her trusty but rarely driven Volvo in the parking lot. On the drive home, she thought about Lochlan, how very different love was with him than with Bryce. She could trust him, relax with him, delight in him without fear. He had emboldened her to be vulnerable again.

  That night, working in the hotel archives, Rebecca was mildly surprised to see a man come through the bookcase wall. With shoulder-length wavy hair, he wore a chamois shirt and faded jeans. His blue eyes were alight, his arms outstretched. She flew easily into his embrace, recognizing him, but not recognizing him. Enfolded against the soft fabric and pressed close to his chest, she was suddenly overcome. A warm wave of tenderness and contentment engulfed her. Endearment, elation, enchantment – all comingled in an inexplicable rush.

  She sensed that this man had been special to her for a long time, but his features were unfamiliar as he smiled benevolently and said nothing.

  “Who are you?” she asked, struggling to understand.

  “You know who I am,” he replied softly, releasing her and gradually fading back into the wall.

  Rebecca awoke to the sharp barks of Willoughby, startled by the morning trash truck. The warm, ecstatic feeling lingered, as did her question from the dream. You know who I am. Tears filled her eyes for the first and only time since the news of her ex-husband’s death.

  He had come to say good-bye. He’d left her with assurance that he had always cared, in his own way.

  Their closure was complete. J. Bryce Bridger would haunt her no more.

  The demand for ghost tours of the hotel diminished greatly after the holidays, though never completely disappeared. When Rebecca previewed Room 864 in preparation for yet another private ghost tour in late January, she dropped the shades and doused the lights in the front room for spooky effect. Remembering the brain-damaged patients’ incident and Mo’s detection of a haughty resident spirit, she couldn't bring herself to go into the dimly lit bedroom.

  The four young women on the priva
te tour were excited at the prospect of encountering hotel ghosts. When they reached the showroom, Rebecca related the odd occurrences of October and the spirit “a talented local medium” had perceived in the suite.

  “Apparently this spirit doesn’t think any of today’s guests are good enough for the Keep’s high standards. She is increasingly angry at being disturbed by the visitors I’ve brought into her room. So I keep showing it intentionally, daring her to do something about it.”

  “Yeah, she’s dead. We’re not. Get over yourself, ghost!” one of the young women declared to the empty space.

  When it came time to move on, one of the guests wanted to stop and take a few photos of the bedroom space. She stepped into the doorway and aimed her camera-phone toward the supposedly haunted corner in hopes of capturing an orb. Then she turned to the space directly in front of her and snapped another flash photo.

  They all saw it. A flash within the flash. Brighter, more intense, and mor instantaneous than the artificial illumination. Unmistakeable. Bone chilling.

  “Ohmigod…” the young women exclaimed as one. “What was that?!”

  The photographer shot again. Again. This time the bright streak shot across the flashed space

  like horizontal lightning.

  A jolt surged through Rebecca as her knees gave out and she crumpled to the floor. In that fraction of a second, the entity imprinted itself on her mind. A woman, with wild hair flying in all directions. Flesh dripping from her face. Eyes like havoc - hateful, vengeful, dark with rage. Black holes sucking her in. The vision took her breath away.

  “Oh god, Rebecca! Are you OK?” one of the girls asked, offering a hand up and helping her back to her feet.

  “Did you see it?” the historian almost whispered, stricken and wobbly.

  “Yeah, we saw the flash – whatever it was. I’m shaking.”

  “But did you see the woman?”

  The tour guests shook their heads, startled and confused. “I didn’t have to see her to know she's really pissed," the photographer declared. "She wants us outta here."

  Rebecca practically shoved her awestruck tour guests from the suite. Flesh goosebumped up and down her arms, long after they'd slammed the door and scurried down the hallway to the elevators. The ghost tourers were thrilled, chattering noisily in titillation.

  “That was NOT a friendly ghost,” one girl declared, laughing nervously.

  “We just saw a real spirit on our ghost tour!” the girl with the camera announced to a bemused co-passenger when the group boarded the elevator.

  “She even saw it!” another young lady said, turning to indicate Rebecca. “And she’s the hotel historian!”

  “Really?” the passenger asked Rebecca directly, as if her confirmation would lend official credibility to the claim.

  Rebecca nodded. “I’m afraid so,” she admitted, employing exactly the right word to describe her reaction.

  She couldn’t process it yet. Had to wrap up the tour, get away by herself and calm down. Easier intended than done. The young women were so amped up that they could scarcely keep still.

  “That was so awesome!”

  “OMG – Cammie is gonna die for not coming with us.”

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you for showing us that room! Now you have a new story for your ghost tour.”

  Rebecca had much more than that, she realized as she finally bid them good-bye and reboarded the public elevator. Sharing the lift this time was a woman with frizzy dark hair and round glasses. She had just had her toenails painted in the Spa – purple – and was carrying her boots until the polish dried. She smiled at Rebecca as though she sensed her revelation.

  “I think I just saw an actual spirit here in the hotel,” Rebecca confessed to the stranger.

  At this, the woman’s smile became a beam. “I’m so happy for you!” she said.

  “Happy?” Rebecca repeated. “I don’t think happy is one of the emotions I’m feeling right now.”

  “It will be, when you get a chance to reflect upon what you just experienced. Embrace it, hon, don’t fear it. You’ve been given an opportunity for true wonder.”

  The elevator stopped at the fifth floor and the barefoot woman departed with boots in one hand and a cheery wave. “Isn’t the unknown wonderful? Keeps us from getting too cocky, imagining we understand it all. Mystery is marvelous!”

  Back at her desk after an extended bathroom break, Rebecca snatched the slip of paper with the protection blessing Mo had given her and read it out loud, three times in rapid succession. “’Almighty God, cleanse my body, mind and spirit and surround me with the white light of Your Love.’”

  She wasn’t sure she believed in the protection, but its recitation calmed her. The horripilation on her arms and neck subsided at last, and she collapsed in her office chair. Something other-worldly had been in the bedroom of 864. Rebecca had no doubt of it as she mentally replayed the incident and the horrible vision over and over. Only upon reflection did she realize that what she had seen had not been a whole woman, but only the head and torso from the waist up, hovering in midair.

  Though Rebecca had always been open-minded about the existence of spirits, today’s personal encounter took previously detached speculation to a new level. Rocked to the core by this fundamental shift in perception, skeptical underpinnings came unpinned. Accepting the possibility was one thing. Witnessing it firsthand -- quite another.

  Chapter 18

  “How do you take it so calmly, seeing spirits like you do?” she asked Maureen at home that night after describing her sighting. “It’s so… not normal.”

  “And hence the term paranormal,” Mo teased gently. “You’ve glimpsed beyond the veil.”

  For the first time, Rebecca felt as though she had peeked into a hidden realm. More than a revelation, she gradually began to accept this new vision as the affirmation of an alternate reality she had always suspected, deep down.

  “Listen, you have to remember I’ve been able to see this stuff since I was little,” Mo reminded her. “It’s never seemed that unusual to me. But I figured out pretty early that most other people were oblivious to the supernatural. Thought I was some kind of freak for a long time. But my grandmother understood. She assured me that my weird ability was nothing to be ashamed or afraid of. But when I told her about visitors or messages from the spirit world, she’d always whisper, ‘I believe you, darling. But let’s just keep these things to ourselves.’”

  The old friends shared a smile. “I get that,” Rebecca said. “Not sure I want to confess my new perception with anyone at work. I have a rational rep to maintain there.”

  “You’ll tell – eventually. A select few, at least. Lochlan, for sure. Those mediums you’ve been spending time with. This is too big to keep entirely to yourself.”

  They sipped their chamomile tea in companionable silence for several minutes, listening to windblown sleet on the kitchen windowpane.

  “The weirdest part is that I knew – I knew –beyond all reason or understanding, that whatever that entity was, it was malevolent. It intended harm. And for a split second, when we saw it streaking across the doorway – it shot right through me, right into me. The energy, the emotion, like a personal violation. I wish I could describe it better. I’m shivering again just remembering the sensation...and that horrible woman. My hairs really did stand on end.”

  “Wait -- What? You felt like it was inside you?”

  Rebecca nodded.

  “OK, so that’s significant. I’ve never experienced anything like that with spirits.”

  “Stop trying to freak me out, Mo. I’m already feeling creepy enough.”

  “Sorry, but I’m totally serious,” her friend insisted. “Obviously the ghost hunters and psychics prowling around The Keep lately have stirred up some sort of dormant phenomena. It may be time to dig out that ancient talisman of yours.

  ”The myotragous Balearicus horn? I don’t even know where it is anymore.”

  “Fin
d it. I mean it. Now that you’ve encountered one spirit at The Keep, I predict that you’re going to start seeing more of them. Some sort of door has been opened at the hotel with all the recent activity. There are spirits – a few unhappy spirits – who don’t like the attention and light shining on them, for whatever reason. And it might be a good idea to keep that little artifact with you from now on.”

  Jackhammers erupted on the mezzanine level, where former offices were being converted to meeting space. Rebecca had sometimes tried to imagine how disruptive the major remodel of the top two floors must have been in the 1930s. She had to imagine no more. The construction began at 9:00 every day and proceeded until 7:00. The Keep’s legendary ambiance was blasted by the sounds of power tools.

  Outside, the sandstone façade was being stripped of its last remaining decorative trim. The work was justified as “stabilization” to the landmark commission that approved the alterations to protect the public from falling bits of stone, rendered unstable by decades of freeze-and-thaw cycles. The work rattled windows and coated everything with fine dust.

  Assaults on the building were relentless, from without and within. Complaints spiked. Tensions rose. And the sanctuary-like atmosphere, for which the hotel had been so long renowned, dissipated. No one at The Keep was resting in peace these days.

  Rebecca arrived one morning to find one of the service elevators down.

  “Damnedest thing,” the repairmen explained. “Whole load of bedding tossed down the laundry chute somehow got tangled in the elevator mechanisms. These shafts have paralleled each other since the 30s. Never had a problem. But some kinda gap opened up between ‘em. Have a look.”

  Rebecca leaned in and peered up the elevator shaft from the ground floor. Slashed white sheets, as high as she could see, dangled from the cables above like a mass lynching of ghosts.

  “But how…?”

  The repairman shrugged. “All I know is it’s gonna take months to fix this mess – if we can even find parts for this dinosaur.”