“Exactly what I thought,” Missy agreed, walking over to the children’s story corner and flopping down on a tie-dyed couch. “What do you know that I don’t?”
The answer to the question was so absurd, I almost laughed.
“I saw a documentary on it recently,” I lied, hoping Missy wouldn’t notice.
She was very much aware that I was a crappy liar.
She paused for a long moment and waited for more. None came.
“Well, that must be it,” she replied.
I was fairly sure she didn’t believe me, but she didn’t push.
“Who else wanted the book?” I asked, hoping like hell I sounded casual.
“Tim the postman, June’s husband Charlie, and Clarence Smith.”
Tim and Charlie wanting the book didn’t surprise me. They must not have been alive during the Sumerian time period. The fact that Clarence Smith aka John Travolta aka Archangel Michael needed the book was so alarming, my head started to throb. If he didn’t already know the language, how was he supposed to translate the instructions for the freaking tribunal?
Shit. I needed to talk to Heather.
“Dude, you okay?” Missy asked, hopping up and leading me to the couch. “You just turned five shades of pale.”
“I’m… kind of okay,” I admitted without adding any of the damning facts. “Is anyone else working today?”
“Nope,” Missy said, sitting down and wrapping her arms around me. “Just me.”
I rested my head on her shoulder and fought back my desire to tell her the truth about the nightmare my life had become.
“Look, I liked him, but he’s an asshole,” she whispered as she hugged me tighter.
“Who’s an asshole?” I asked, so deep in my own thoughts, I had no clue to whom she was referring.
“Gideon,” she said, giving me an odd stare. “Gideon’s a player. You can do much better than a jerk like him.”
While talking about Gideon was like removing my fingernails with pliers, it was safer than the rest of the impossible crap that was happening.
And maybe talking it over with my lifelong best friend wasn’t such a bad idea.
“It was my fault,” I told her. “I told him to leave.”
Missy squinted at me. “And he did?”
“Umm… yes.”
She raised a brow and snorted in disgust. “Proves my point. No man who’s worth it would just up and leave.”
“Missy, no means no, and leave means leave,” I pointed out, defending Gideon.
“Agreed,” she conceded. “But a guy who had it as bad for you as he did wouldn’t just leave without fighting for you.”
“Maybe he didn’t have it that bad,” I said with a shrug to hide the fact I wanted to scream or cry. “I’m a big girl. I’ll be fine.”
“Fine?” Missy pressed.
“Eventually,” I said. “It didn’t work out. The end.”
“You’re sure?” Missy asked, searching my eyes for the truth.
I forced a smile. “Yes. I’m sure,” I lied. I was getting better at lying. Nothing to be proud of, but right now it was helpful. “Steve’s death was devastating. We’d spent a lifetime together. Gideon… he was only in my life for a little while. I’ll survive.”
Missy stared at me for what felt like an eternity, and then nodded her head. Clearly, she was satisfied with my answer. “I still say he’s an asshole for leaving. You’re drop-dead gorgeous on the outside and even more beautiful on the inside.”
“And you’re a bit biased,” I pointed out. I almost giggled at the drop-dead part but realized my sense of humor had become far too morbid and swallowed it back.
“Possibly,” she agreed with a grin. “But I’m also always right.”
“And don’t forget humble,” I added.
“That too,” she said with a giggle.
Her logic was wildly flawed. Missy had no clue that Gideon was the Grim Reaper. Nor was she aware that I saw the dead and helped them solve their problems so they could move on to whatever came next. My best friend had no idea that her former girlfriend, Heather, was around two thousand years old, or that I was probably going to mind dive into a woman whose picture was on a milk carton. She had no clue that my dead husband had come back to let me know he was gay and was now going to trial so he wasn’t sent to an afterlife he didn’t deserve. By the grace of God or whoever was in charge, Missy was blissfully ignorant.
“I’m forty,” I reminded her. “I’m a widow. I’m past childbearing years and I’ve started collecting dogs. I wouldn’t say I’m a great catch.”
I left out the part about gluing dead people’s parts back on.
“You are not past childbearing years, dude,” she said. “Women are having babies into their fifties.”
“Not my idea of a good time,” I said, scrunching my nose. “I can barely take care of my dogs.”
“I feel you,” she said with an arched brow. “My cats own me. I can’t even imagine what a child would be like.”
A long time ago, kids were something I’d wanted badly. Life didn’t always work out as planned. Right now, I was living in a world I barely recognized. I was thankful I’d never had kids. Especially since they’d be saddled with the very same gift I had.
“So, you’ll order the book for me?” I asked, abruptly changing the subject.
“Screw Gideon. And yes, I’ll order the book for you,” Missy promised. “Clarissa came in for the book on Sumerian as well. I escorted the bitch out of my shop and let her know her money and her presence were not welcome here. Told me she was leaving town for a bit and implied she was going to see Gideon. The man is a player and a loser.”
I was glad I was seated. The news Missy had just shared was almost more than I could take. The words were so sharp they felt like a bite.
“Had to sage the entire place after she left,” Missy said with a shudder. “So, like I said, Gideon is an ass and he deserves a skank like Clarissa.”
I couldn’t fake it anymore. My heart felt shredded in my chest. It was none of my business if Clarissa went to Gideon, wherever he was. It was none of my concern if they took up where they’d left off hundreds of years ago. I’d told him it was over and that I never wanted to see him again.
Nothing he did was my business ever again.
My reasoning had been fatally flawed. I’d assumed that he’d been the one who had made the decision to send Steve into the darkness. He was the Grim Reaper, for the love of everything unholy. That’s what Grim Reapers do.
Except it’s not.
It’s not even close.
“Oh my God, Daisy,” Missy said, grabbing me as my body crumpled forward and the tears I’d been holding back flowed freely. “I am so sorry. So damn sorry.”
It could have been ten minutes. It could have been ten hours. My mind raced and my heart thumped so loudly in my chest I could feel it through my whole body. Missy held me and let me lose my shit. Maybe if I hadn’t had this conversation, I wouldn’t have known Clarissa was making another play for Gideon. However, it was better to know than to be surprised if I ever saw them together.
My need to destroy the Angel of Mercy grew irrationally larger. While I had no right to be hurt if Gideon chose to be with her, I was human. I couldn’t help it. I was still in love with him.
“Daisy,” Missy whispered as she rocked me back and forth like a child. “It will be okay. I am so sorry.”
“Not your fault,” I said weakly and gave her a watery, lopsided smile. “My fault.”
“I don’t know why you ended it and I won’t ask,” she said, smoothing my wild dark curls away from my tear-stained face. “But things have a way of working out the way they’re supposed to. Miracles are possible when you believe.”
“Believe what?” I asked, glancing over at my best friend.
“In the impossible.”
I was sure my mouth hung open. I was so tempted to ask Missy if she was Immortal, but something stopped me. Heather would have told
me if Missy was like her. I was sure of it. Although, so much of what I’d been sure of had turned out to be wrong.
I’d simply ask Heather. If Missy was human, as I suspected, I didn’t need her worrying that I’d truly become unhinged.
“Do you believe in the impossible?” I whispered.
“All the time, my friend,” Missy said. “After the way I grew up, there’s no reason for me to be a semi-functioning adult. Yet, here I am.”
“You’re a miracle,” I told her, cupping her cheek in my hand.
“And you are too,” she replied, placing her hand over mine. “Do not forget that.”
I smiled. It was real. Missy was one of my miracles. She and I had been through so much together over the years. While I might not ever be able to tell her everything, she was still my rock and I would always be hers.
Missy was a miracle I could believe in.
“That’s not your arm,” I said for the fourth time to the squatter who floated in front of me holding an appendage that clearly didn’t belong to her. “I understand that you want an arm, but stealing someone else’s isn’t going to work.”
“Miiiiiiiuuune,” she insisted.
“Nope,” I said with an eye roll. “That arm belongs to a man about twice your size. I will not glue that onto your body.”
“Yausssss. Miiiiiiiuuune,” she repeated.
“No. Not yours. This is not my first day of dead squatter surgery,” I informed her, using my outdoor voice in case she was hard of hearing. “And I’m not blind. So, do not be a dick about it. Manners go a long way at my house—not that it’s nice to call you a dick. Sorry I called you a dick. That was rude. It’s been a long week, but that’s no excuse to be mean.”
My polite Southern DNA was so ingrained it was ridiculous.
The ghost hissed before she zipped away, and I was pretty sure she flipped me off. Fair enough. I had called her a dick. It was difficult to tell if she’d given me the bird since she was missing a few fingers. She was definitely not Southern.
“They’re like little kids,” Heather commented as she watched the gluing party with open-mouth awe.
“Profane little kids,” I added with a tired smile. “Most are sweet, but that gal was spicy.”
“And the superglue holds them together?” she asked.
“For a while,” I replied, quickly and efficiently reattaching a hand to a decomposing man who had patiently and politely waited his turn. “When they get too wild, heads fly. Literally.”
Heather’s laugh made me laugh too. The impossible absurdity of what was happening didn’t escape me. Although, I had to admit squatter surgery was far more satisfying with someone to witness my newfound skill.
Steve had been my observer for a while, but now that wasn’t possible. At least he was resting safely upstairs with my two dogs. Heather had watched television in our bedroom with him while I was gone. She was sure he enjoyed her company. I was sure of it too. Steve and Heather had been dear friends when he was alive.
“I’ve never seen anything like this.” She tilted her head to the side and took in the peculiar process.
“Welcome to my world,” I replied as I glued a foot back onto a large man who was missing an arm as well. “Find the spicy gal. Pretty sure she has your arm. She’ll probably flip you off, but I think she highjacked your body part.”
“Thaauanuak yooouah,” he said as he disappeared, looking determined to find the gal with the active middle finger.
“So, let me get this straight, Missy is not Immortal—or Imodium, as Gram likes to say?” I asked, opening another tube of glue and continuing my rounds.
“Imodium? Seriously?” Heather questioned with a grunt of laughter.
“She called Tim an Imodium back in the day and he didn’t deliver her mail for a month,” I replied.
“Priceless,” she said. “And no, Missy is not Imodium. Missy has a gift though. Her intuitiveness is unusual for a human.”
“She’s psychic?” I asked. I’d always thought Missy could see things.
“I suppose you could put it that way. She definitely has a sixth sense,” Heather said, reading the instructions on a tube of glue. “Can I help you glue on body parts?”
“No clue,” I said. “No one’s ever offered.”
“Can’t really see you getting many offers, dude,” she said with a chuckle, walking over to a specter and putting out her hand.
An older gentleman gave Heather his leg and it went right through her hand. She tried twice to pick it up off the ground and the same thing happened.
“Guess that answers the question,” she said, trying once more. “How odd. The ghosts seem almost corporeal but they’re not.”
“To me they are,” I told her, marveling at the bizarre fact. “I mean, I can see through parts of them, but when I touch them, they’re very real.”
“Daisy, you are a rarity,” Heather said. “An abnormal phenomenon.”
“Was that a compliment?” I asked with narrowed eyes and a half-smirk.
“Absolutely,” she replied. “Should have used the word miracle instead of phenomenon.”
“Then thank you… I guess,” I said. The word miracle had been thrown around like confetti on New Year’s Eve lately. However, a compliment was a compliment no matter the semantics. Again, my Southern gene required me to say thanks.
“Can I ask you something?” Heather inquired, sitting back down on the overstuffed couch and wrapping one of the afghans Gram had made around herself.
Heather fit in perfectly at my bed and breakfast for the dead—well, not breakfast, thank God. I’d be bankrupt in a week if the ghosts ate food.
My old farmhouse was lovely and warm—just like Heather. I’d done all the painting and some of the other manual labor things, but Steve had been the one with the great decorating skill. All of the furniture was overstuffed and in soothing patterns and faded florals. The floors were a lightly stained, pitted cherry and the walls were repossessed barn wood we’d bought at an estate sale years ago. It had always been my safe haven and was even more so now.
“Can I ask you something first?” I countered.
“Shoot.”
“Well, I have a couple of questions,” I said.
“And I have a lot of time,” Heather pointed out.
“As in an eternity?” I asked with a raised brow and a giggle.
“Your comedic skills are seriously lacking,” she said with a grin. “However, the attempt was appreciated. And yes, I have an eternity of time on my hands.”
“My comedic skills are not lacking,” I shot back and pointed to all of the laughing squatters. “They think I’m hilarious.”
Heather glanced around with amusement and sighed. “I’m outnumbered. You win. Ask away.”
“Why does Clarence Smith need a book on the Sumerian language if he’s John Travolta?”
Heather shook her head. “You do realize you’re going to call him John Travolta by accident if you keep that up.”
“Fine point. Well made,” I said, realizing she was correct. Clarence Smith had always been kind to me when I’d worked for his firm as a paralegal. He had a medium-rare sense of humor. He might laugh if I called him John Travolta. Then again, he might not. Whatever. I was going to get my jollies wherever I could at this point. “So why does John Travolta need a book on the language if he was alive during that time period?”
Heather laughed and let her head fall back on the couch. “John Travolta probably needs to brush up on Sumerian since it’s a dead language. I’d hazard a guess he hasn’t spoken it in several thousand years. And the particular book Missy stocked is very unusual.”
“That’s why you say she’s intuitive?”
“Yes,” Heather said. “It’s a good example. Anyhow, that’s why I think John Travolta wanted the book.”
Heather’s answer was logical.
“Why would Tim and Charlie need the book?”
“Tim is nosey,” Heather explained. “He’s been nosey for th
e thousand years I’ve known him. Charlie is just one of those thorough kind of people. He came into being right after the Sumerians were gone. I would think he could understand some of it possibly.”
“Tim is a thousand years old?” I asked, still trying to wrap my mind around the impossible.
“Not sure,” Heather said. “I’ve known him for around a thousand years. He could have been around much longer than that.”
“You think he’s been stealing mail for thousands of years?” I inquired with a naughty grin.
“I’d guarantee it,” Heather replied with a groan. “They don’t come any nosier than Tim. However, as nosey as he is, don’t discount him. The bizarre little man has been everywhere.”
“Do you realize how strange this conversation is?” I asked.
“No stranger than watching you glue body parts onto the dead,” Heather pointed out.
“True,” I agreed. “Clarissa wanted to buy the book as well.”
“Did Missy sell her one?” Heather asked in a tone that wasn’t light anymore.
“No, she only had three. She’s ordering one for me,” I said, growing uncomfortable.
Heather nodded and relaxed.
“Why is that a big deal?”
“The tribunal directions are in the book,” Heather said, sounding old and tired. “We were aware that Missy had the book. No one was to touch it unless the need arose.”
“Wait,” I said, sitting down and ignoring the ghosts who were still missing appendages. “The directions were in Missy’s shop? How?”
Heather shrugged. “When I told you that Missy was special, I wasn’t exaggerating.”
“Do you think she knows what’s in the book?”
“No. I don’t. But I think she was guided by her sixth sense to have stocked it. Why in the hell would anyone have a book on the Sumerian language in a tiny bookshop in the outskirts of Atlanta?”
Again. Logical.
Also, impossible…
Believe the impossible.
“The impossible is real,” I whispered.
“It always has been and always will be,” Heather said. “You just have to believe.”
I hoped to heck and back that I wouldn’t find believing—truly believing—impossible.
Whose Midlife Crisis Is It Anyway? : A Paranormal Women's Fiction Novel: Good To The Last Death Book Two Page 7