Not Quite Free

by Lyla Payne

  Brian’s face slowly returns to a normal color as he sips his own drink. When he sets it down and meets my gaze, he almost looks like himself again—a smarmy know-it-all who wants to blame all of his problems on other people.

  “Almost nothing you know about Lavinia Fisher is true. We’re pretty sure.”

  “We?”

  “Yeah, we. Like, people who actually bother to read things like newspaper accounts and people’s recollections of events instead of just repeating stories the way they’re told over and over and over.” His eyes light up with a challenge. “What do you know about her?”

  I shrug. “What everyone’s heard. She and her husband owned a boarding house, and they were also part of a pretty mean gang of thieves. They would choose travelers who appeared to have no family to come asking after them. After killing them and burying them in the yard, they’d sell their wares for the cash. They got caught when someone’s brother came around looking. Then they were convicted of murder and hung.”

  “And the hanging?”

  I have to take another drink. My mouth is parched from the memory of what I witnessed this morning in my sleep. “According to the stories, he begged for mercy like a wimp. They had to drag him to the gallows. She wore her wedding gown and asked whether anyone had a message for the devil, since she was sure to meet him, then leapt from the platform and hung herself before the executioner could do it for her.”

  He smiles, a big one that reminds me of the Cheshire cat. I barely manage to restrain myself from smacking him.

  “Almost all false, according to the accounts of the day.”

  “They weren’t murderers?” I hear the skepticism in my own voice but don’t care. It’s a necessary trait for anyone working in academia. Which I still am, sort of. “No bodies were found at their house?”

  “Well…” he hedges. “Two skeletons were found on their property, but they were never identified.”

  “Normal people don’t have buried human remains in their backyard,” I point out.

  “Fair enough. And she never denied the charges, though her husband did.”

  “Maybe he didn’t know about it,” I suggest, my mind working overtime trying to figure out what’s true, what’s fiction, and what could possibly land somewhere in between.

  “Either way, they didn’t murder dozens of people, like some would have you believe. Or if they did, there’s no proof, and that’s what counts.” He purses his lips, staring longingly at the last tomato.

  I take pity on him and nudge it forward. “Anything else?”

  “She didn’t wear a wedding dress. They weren’t hung for murder—it was for highway robbery, which was still a hanging offense—and there’s no written account of her leaping from the platform.”

  “And the line about the devil?” I ask, struggling to make sense of the fact that Lavinia’s ghost showed me a totally fabricated death scene. Apparently.

  “It’s not recorded.” He shrugs. “But it sort of sounds like something she would say.”

  It’s a strange comment, to be sure—almost like he knows her. Then again, Brian talked the same way about Henry. As if he were an old friend.

  If Brian hadn’t tried to kill me, I would have told him it’s a trait that would serve him well as a historian.

  “So, we know what, exactly? Just that they were thieves who possibly killed a couple of people and paid with their lives in a totally normal fashion?”

  He nods, chewing the last of the tomato like it’s an elixir from heaven. Which, to be fair, it kind of is.

  I frown. “But if she and her husband were regular thieves, or even just part of some local gang, why did she become this great legend?”

  We hit pause again as the food arrives, and both of us dig in while we contemplate my last inquiry. It doesn’t make sense, not really. Sure, there was maybe only one woman executed in the United States prior to Lavinia, but that still doesn’t explain the sensationalism surrounding her death.

  I chew on my chicken, dipping a piece of cinnamon-y waffle into the syrup and letting my mind unravel the mystery. The most probable answer is that the story isn’t entirely false. Even if the newspaper reports don’t agree with the popular legend, perhaps parts of it are true.

  But if Lavinia did lie to me by showing me a false vision, why? What could she possibly hope to gain? I sure hope she doesn’t want me to, like, correct her story. Because at this point, after two hundred years of oral history and tradition, that’s impossible.

  “We’ll never know the truth,” Brian informs me after about ten minutes have passed without any sound beyond that from our busy jaws. “We have the newspaper and other firsthand accounts, and we have the stories. Nothing else.”

  “What about arrest reports, things like that?”

  He shakes his head. “Nothing survived. They weren’t even killed at the courthouse like people say. There was an older hanging grounds, but—”

  “I-17 is there now, I know,” I interrupt, still lost in thought. “And no contradicting accounts that you know of? The exaggerations haven’t been traced to a specific source?”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  “What do we know about Lavinia herself?”

  “Nothing firsthand, and they were both pretty much nobodies before all of this went down. They were part of the Six Mile House Gang, and there’s some scant information on their antics, but no definitive proof they ever committed murder.”

  It’s a place to start. There must be some record of her before her arrest. Or not. The early eighteen hundreds was a long time ago, after all. She might have to find a way to tell me herself why she’s reappeared after all this time.

  As we’re paying the bill, another slip of a memory flutters into my mind and snags. “Wasn’t there something about her burial that was strange? I feel like I heard another story about her in one of the graveyards. The Unitarian, maybe?”

  The Unitarian graveyard behind the Presbyterian church over on King Street is one of the creepiest in town. They lock it at night now, and I have a feeling that none of the tour guides are all that disappointed about having to stay out after dark.

  “Supposedly some good Christian souls dug her up out of Potter’s Field, feeling that it was wrong to leave a woman that way for all eternity. They buried her in an unmarked plot in the Unitarian graveyard, and people say they’ve seen her there.” He shrugs. “No documentation, though there are plenty of random bodies in every Charleston graveyard from earthquakes and floods.”

  “Huh.” There’s not much else to say, really. Sadly, the lack of documentation is a normal, everyday roadblock in a field like mine, and it gets harder the older the case.

  Luckily, I have access to the woman herself. Or at least, that’s one way to look at it.

  Chapter Six

  Amelia and Jack are both still awake when I get home, snuggled up on the couch in the living room. It’s not that late, really, just after seven. Brian had a tour to do, which freed me from the worry that he might pull some creepy shit. Again.

  Score one for me—I can tell Mel I took her advice, no effort required on my part.

  “Hi,” my cousin says softly, her gaze on her almost-asleep baby. “How was your meeting?”

  I’d texted her earlier so she wouldn’t worry, but now she’s going to demand answers about who I went to see and what’s going on with this ghost. That much is clear from the tightness around her mouth.

  “It was interesting.”

  Which is the truth. Every time I hear conflicting stories about historical events, it excites my curiosity and fills me with the need to research everything possible. I sit next to Amelia as gently as possible and smile down at Jack, whose eyes have slipped closed.

  “How’s my nephew today?”

  “We’re getting into a bit of a routine, which is nice.” She cuddles him closer, but the look on her face doesn’t match her words. It’s something like dread. “You got a letter today.”

  “A letter? Like an
actual one, in the mail?” I look around for the usual pile of junk and bills on the coffee table, but don’t spot it.

  “It’s from Beau, and it’s in the kitchen.” She pauses, biting her lower lip. “I wasn’t sure whether to tell you at all. I almost threw it away, but I figure it’s not my place. You don’t have to read it, Grace. You can toss it and keep looking forward.”

  I stand without answering her. Without even thinking about it, really. I wonder when she decided moving on was the right thing for me to do. Has she always secretly thought that things between Beau and me would never work out?

  No. She’s just loyal. On my side no matter what.

  Amelia regards me with resignation and sadness, then scoots to the edge of the couch. “Here, hold him for me while I get up.”

  Jack is warm and snuggly when she passes him over, and the weight of him in my arms, the smell of his newness and innocence, hurts my heart in the best possible way. He won’t stay this way for long, I know, but it’s a nice reminder that there is goodness in the world.

  I hand him back after she gets to her feet and straightens her PJs, then head into the kitchen as she walks toward the stairs. Millie doesn’t try to press me any more about the letter. We both know I’m going to read it, and she probably suspected she was wasting her breath before she suggested otherwise.

  The loss of Beau is too fresh for me to consider throwing away, unopened, a thing that he touched and saw and wrote.

  A single white envelope lies on the kitchen table. I can almost hear it calling my name…but what if it says something awful? What if it says he never loved me, and the moment he saw Lucy again he knew that she had been his soulmate all along?

  I make myself a cup of tea and nab a couple of fresh cookies from a baggie. Amelia and Jack must really be getting into a groove after four days alone if she found the time to bake, and I’m grateful for it. The sugary comfort is just what I need.

  My fingers tremble as they pick up the letter and pry loose the glue. A single sheet of thick, monogrammed stationery emerges, Beau’s tight, neat handwriting covering only the front side. It appears that whatever he has to say, it’s short.

  A slight, nostalgic smile touches my lips—that’s so Beau—before I take a deep breath, a drink of tea, and stuff another cookie in my face before gathering the courage to read the letter.

  Graciela,

  I miss you. For so many reasons, your face, your voice, your mind, and—of course—your body, cross my mind on a daily basis. Each time, I feel bereft all over again about how things ended between us.

  The fact that there is love for you in my heart, still, makes our parting so much harder.

  I hesitated in writing to you. Caution, and care for your feelings, stayed my hand all of these weeks because, as you probably know, nothing has changed. Lucy needs me, and though her recovery is going well, she’s not the woman she was when she left. How strange that the two women in my life are both haunted, though in different ways and by different ghosts. She’ll be okay, I think, with some hard work and help from the team of professionals who have been tending her. She won’t be the same, but perhaps none of us ever are, as the years pass.

  Long story short (too late, you’re thinking, you sweet smartass), I’d like to see you. I can come back to Heron Creek, or you can visit me, if you’d prefer. I want to see that you’re okay with my own two eyes, as I’m sure it will not surprise you that it’s not easy for me to be cast out of your life just when these legal troubles have reared their head.

  My brother, being the excellent attorney that he is, refuses to tell me much about what’s going on, so you should feel good about that, at least.

  Respond when you’re ready. Know that I will respect your answer and your wishes, but I couldn’t let you think I no longer care, or that I don’t miss you like there’s an actual hole inside of me.

  Those things are true, Gracie, even if I’m still not in a place to give myself completely to a romantic relationship. Believe me.

  Beau

  I’m not sure how long I sit at the table, contemplating his words and his request. Attempting to sort out my feelings on basically any of it. At least thirty minutes must pass, which is how long it typically takes Amelia to go through her nightly ritual with Jack, because suddenly she’s standing over me with an expectant hand on her hip.

  “Well?”

  “He wants to see me.”

  “What? Of all the nerve, Grace, I swear—”

  She falls silent when I hold up a hand, swallowing back tears and choking on confusion in the process. I want to see him. I want to see him so bad it’s a physical need, but I don’t see how it could do anything other than make all of this harder.

  “I’m not going to do it,” I whisper. “But he’s just being Beau. Not an asshole. He’s trying to be everything for everyone even when it’s not possible.”

  “You need a hug?” she asks after a moment.

  “Yeah.”

  My cousin envelops me in her arms and says nothing as I start to cry against her shoulder. It’s the first time I’ve let her see me break down over this whole thing, because of the baby and the arrest and everything else. I know she doesn’t care. She’s probably been waiting for it, and the release feels too good to blame myself for letting one stupid letter get to me.

  When all of the tears are gone, I pull back and let her swipe stray hairs from around my mouth and my wet cheeks, off my sweat-sticky forehead.

  “It’s going to be okay, Grace.”

  I nod, biting my lower lip. “I know. Just not today.”

  “No, not today.” She pats the table. “Have a seat. Do you want some more tea?”

  “Sure.” I sink into the chair, a headache already starting in my sinuses.

  “Now,” she says, sliding one mug toward me and keeping the other for herself as she sits in the chair next to mine. “Tell me about this new ghost.”

  I spend most of my Friday at work putting the finishing touches on my Henry Woodward article and poring over every academic piece I can find on Lavinia Fisher. There’s not that much lurking out there, surprisingly. She’s not that famous outside the Charleston ghost tour circuit, it would seem, since despite what some of the ghost tours claim, she’s not actually America’s first serial killer or first female execution. Which again makes me wonder—why her? Why the stories, and the lore, and the repeated retellings?

  By the time five p.m. rolls around, I’ve never been so ready for a night of pizza, beer, and eighties movies in my life. The cry-fest from last night left me lethargic and foggy-headed for much of the morning. Leo sounds like just the person to snap me out of my wallowing funk.

  Maybe better, especially if I can get the scoop on what happened between him and Victoria. And why he didn’t feel the need to tell me about it sooner.

  I pick up a pizza before heading over—pepperoni, of course—and when I get to Leo’s, he answers my knock before my arm drops to my side. The house seems abnormally silent as I step over the threshold lugging the pizza.

  “Where are the girls?”

  “Lindsay’s working and Marcella is spending the night at LeighAnn’s.”

  “Isn’t she a little young for that?”

  He shrugs. “I think so, but she was raring to go. I’m expecting a phone call to come and get her by bedtime, so we’d better get this party started.”

  I make a face. “You promised me a night of drinking way too much, Leo Boone. So you’d better have a backup plan.”

  “Oh, no. I promised a night of you drinking way too much. Those days are behind me.”

  “Hmm.” I follow him into the kitchen. “If it weren’t you, I’d be suspicious—getting rid of the kid, trying to get me drunk. Are you going to take advantage of me?”

  He gets a funny look on his face. “I would never do that.”

  His serious tone catches me off guard. I’d meant it as a joke, but perhaps my own tone had veered a little far toward flirtatious.

 
; “I know that,” I tell him quietly, trying to understand the sudden shift in the air between us. In a breath, I realize that perhaps it’s because, for the first time since I came back to town, neither one of us is attached to someone else.

  It didn’t even occur to me that things might be strange because of that. After all, it’s always been other people who comment about our friendship and how there must be something more to it. Not us.

  “Pizza smells good,” he says, interrupting the silence.

  “I know, I’m starving.”

  And just like that, everything between us feels normal again.

  Leo grabs us a couple of beers, and we head out onto the back porch. Even though it’s sort of our space, it also reminds me of the last time I saw Leo with Victoria, since they’d been planning to build her something similar in her new house.

  After the awkward pause in the kitchen, it feels as if it might be extra weird to bring up the breakup. I have no idea why, and even less inclination to figure it out. I need a relaxing evening, and for being with Leo to work its usual magic. Nothing else.

  “Any news about your case? How did drinks with Travis go?” Leo asks as he grabs a slice, pops the top on his beer, and puts his feet up on the coffee table.

  There’s no television out here, so I guess our movie fest is going to wait. Which is fine. We’d talk right through at least the first hour, anyway.

  “Okay. I’m not sure we have anything that’s going to break the case wide open, but we have enough to start asking questions.” I take a giant bite of pepperoni pie and work on my piece for several minutes of silence. “I did talk Travis into sort of circumventing the law.”

  “What?” His eyes widen in mock amazement. Or maybe it’s real. “I don’t believe it.”

  “I mean, he’s just going to pass along the name of a hacker so I can try to get Frank’s intake records from the times he was hospitalized. We’re not robbing a bank or anything.”