The Queen and I

by Russell Andresen

  “That makes no sense at all!” she exploded. “Why would I submit one of your projects when I don’t want anyone knowing about us?”

  “I don’t know. He sounded legitimate, and I let him in. Everything was going fine until I said something about Barbra Streisand being a liberal douche, and he went crazy.” He put his bruised hand to his head and continued. “Before I knew it, I was on the ground and he was stomping on me, throwing furniture, and shouting something about learning the Way. I was only able to get him off of me when he threw me into the kitchen and I grabbed a knife.”

  “You stabbed him?” she asked, amazed at his bravery.

  “Not exactly. He ripped it out of my hands and slid it across his tongue and spit his blood at me. He said I was being baptized and my sacrifice would come when he had you.”

  Rachel dropped her glass in shock and Saul listened intently as the events that had unfolded in Kearney’s apartment were laid out before him. The person who had left behind the presence that Saul was sensing was obviously the man who tried to kill Kearney. He would most likely be coming for Rachel next, and Saul had to do something to stop it. He was impressed that Kearney had not divulged Rachel’s whereabouts.

  He had hoped that when he revealed himself to Rachel it would be while she was alone, but in light of what Kearney had just told her, he was certain he had no choice in the matter and had to reveal himself to both of them. Time was of the essence, and Saul knew they were running out of it. She had to leave her apartment as soon as possible because the man who had done this was probably on his way right now, if not already outside.

  Saul took a deep breath and thought about the implications of what he was about to do. He did not trust Kearney to keep his mouth shut, or Rachel to take his sudden appearance well, but he had no choice. The only thing worse for Jeffrey than learning the truth about the love of his life would be to find out that she had been murdered and not to know why or by whom.

  The lights in her apartment suddenly dimmed slightly and the air grew colder. Rachel and Kearney exchanged concerned looks, and she immediately ran to the door to bolt it. Richard tried to get up from the sofa, but his legs would not respond to the command.

  Rachel quickly joined Richard and tried to get him to his feet, but she could not lift what was essentially dead weight. The two of them looked around the room nervously as the lights went darker and a strange phosphorescent glow surrounded them. She let out a yelp and quickly caught hold of herself, and Richard began trembling uncontrollably.

  Saul was actually taking some small form of pleasure in revealing himself this way, because the two little mamzers deserved whatever he did to them. A good scare was the least he could do, and the dramatic entrance leant itself to the theater performer in him. He also figured that it would help his case in trying to convince them that he was, in fact, a ghost.

  They watched as Saul slowly materialized before them. He was decked out in black leggings, a loose-fitting pink blouse, and heels that seemed too high for a man of his size to be able to walk around in. His makeup was done tastefully, considering it was over the top for most women, or in his case, men. He slowly turned around and examined the room to be sure he did not cause any damage from his sudden appearance, as this was sometimes a problem that he could not control. He was satisfied that everything was as it should be, and he turned to Richard and Rachel. Slowly, in that low, raspy voice, he said to them, “We need to talk, you little mamzers.”

  * * *

  Louis Grecko sat atop his perch on the roof of the building across the street from Rachel Benjamin’s apartment and did a double take into his binoculars when he saw what he just did. The phenomenon was unlike anything he had ever seen or heard of before, and he was excited and terrified at the same time.

  The feeling of being terrified was a new sensation for Louis, and he liked the way it made him feel. He could not believe what was happening over there. Unless he was wrong, and he doubted that very much, he had just witnessed the appearance of an actual ghost in her apartment. And as he watched through his binoculars, he could see that the three of them were now engaged in some kind of conversation. What they were talking about he was uncertain of, but by the body language of Rothstein’s girlfriend and the man who Louis had just baptized, they were hearing information that was not sitting well with either one of them.

  A sudden sense of paranoia washed over Louis as he began to wonder if, perhaps, this spirit had been sent by the enemy of the music to combat him and protect the girl and Rothstein. This ghost was obviously not a friend of Louis’s or it would have shown itself to him instead.

  What did it know about him, and why was it sharing that information with these two? Had it already warned Rothstein? How did it know about Louis?

  All of these questions left Louis feeling very uncertain, and he was of a mind to go over to the apartment now, face the demon head on, and kill the Kearney fellow and the woman who he had hoped to make his own, but he decided it would serve him better to find out what he could about this entity and why it had decided to show itself now.

  He would track the spirit, a conclusion that excited him more than he anticipated. He had tracked many men and women over the years, but never once had he tracked a ghost. The prospects of this game were intoxicating to him, and something that even his beloved mother could not have imagined.

  Louis thought of his mother at that moment and decided he was not going to tell her about this new target. The ghost was his and his alone, and Louis would stop at nothing to find out what it wanted and why it was here.

  He smiled to himself and slowly left his perch, retreating to the stairwell that led him to the rooftop where he now stood.

  The ghost would be his. The possibilities were limitless.

  * * *

  “I think I’m going to throw up,” Rachel said.

  “That would be an understandable reaction, but not very ladylike,” Saul said.

  Richard’s eyes were still transfixed on Saul, and he could think of nothing else. Saul turned his attention to him and said, “Don’t act like you’re so surprised, Richard. Who do you think was singing all of those songs when you were in Zion, sweet prince?”

  Kearney’s eyes went wide at the recognition of that phrase. “I … I thought I was hallucinating.”

  Saul smiled and answered, “Morning, sunshine.” Rachel struggled to light a cigarette, and Saul immediately added, “Oh, please don’t light that. I have allergies.” She looked at him in stunned astonishment, and he continued, “Only kidding, dear. Light up if you want.”

  Saul walked to the love seat sitting directly across from the sofa and said, “The two of you need to do two things.” He waited to see that they were listening. “One, I want you both to get out of here as fast as you can and tell no one where you are going. Two, you have to tell Jeffrey what has been going on and pray that he forgives you, even though it will be my recommendation that he throw you to the curb.”

  “Where exactly are we supposed to go?” Kearney asked.

  Saul thought about it for a moment and answered, “Zion.”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven: Dinner for Two

  Jeffrey sat in his living room and wondered where Saul had gotten off to. He had gone back into Zion and found Melissa, but if she knew where the ghost was, she was not talking. It all seemed quite clear that Saul had taken some kind of offense to the situation that had occurred a few nights before while Rachel was visiting and that he must have decided that it was time to move on. But that wasn’t Saul’s style. It was not like him to give up on a project because of personal or creative differences.

  He walked out to his back porch and watched as the boats and water-skiers made their waves on the otherwise peaceful lake as they took advantage of the unseasonably warm October sun. He wondered if he could write this script without the input of his new friend.

  The thought of that took a moment to set in. Saul was a ghost, but he was also Jeffrey’s friend, and he missed not having
him around. The house did not seem as lively without the dead man in it, and there was not that same feeling of hominess that he had grown so accustomed to in the last month or so.

  What Jeffrey desperately wanted was for his life to get back to normal, and he was not even thinking so much about how it was before Schultz and Fujikawa had attacked him; he was thinking about how his life had been in the time since he’d known Saul. The ghost had opened up a new world for him, one of understanding those things that most people brushed aside as imaginary or the stuffof horror films, and Jeffrey wanted it back.

  Saul was real, and Jeffrey knew that even if Saul did not return his life would never be the same again, and he was both happy and crushed by that knowledge. How could he ever expect to return to his normal life, knowing what he now did about the fact that there was indeed an afterlife? From this point on, whenever he heard a sound in his apartment that he could not place, whenever he saw a person trip on the street and fall to the ground, wherever he was where a loud noise or flicker of the lights occurred, he would immediately think of Saul, or perhaps one of his supernatural friends being up to no good, creating mischief wherever they went. Perhaps he would write a play about that one of these days.

  He went back inside, and to his immediate delight, he saw Saul standing in front of him with some freshly picked flowers from the woods outside. He was smiling sheepishly and had the look of someone who hadn’t slept much in the last forty-eight hours. Saul was good at what he did. The ghost never had to sleep, but he was capable of changing his facial expressions and characteristics to match whatever situation he found himself in.

  Jeffrey smiled back and said, “Welcome home, my friend.”

  “Good to be back,” Saul replied.

  There was an awkward silence, and finally Jeffrey continued, “Are those for me?”

  Saul looked at the flowers in his hand and answered, “I figured you would have neglected the floral arrangements while I was gone.”

  Jeffrey laughed and agreed, “I certainly do not have your flair for color.”

  “We all have our crosses to bear. Mine is being so fabulous that I have had to fill two worlds with my gift, mortal and what you see before you.” He turned slightly to the left and ran his hand down his side, showing offhis figure.

  Saul walked away and into the kitchen to find a vase for his flowers and yelled out, “What have you got planned for dinner?”

  Jeffrey smiled to himself in anticipation of the response when he answered, “I was thinking the two of us could dine together tonight. I’ll make dinner. You go and get dressed up in something fancy.”

  “Oy gevalt!” Saul exclaimed. “Listen to Mr. Romance now.”

  “Slow down there, big fellow. I just thought it would be nice to have no distractions while we started work on the script.”

  Saul’s eyes went wide, and he asked, “Are you serious? Are we really going to start tonight? Because I have some great new material that we can add; you’re never going to believe what I found out.”

  Jeffrey was intrigued by this statement and simply replied, “I look forward to it. Now go get changed.”

  He watched as Saul ran up the stairs giggling, and broke into the song “I Enjoy Being a Girl” from The Flower Drum Song. Jeffrey went into the kitchen to prepare his dinner and put some music on so that he and his new collaborator could enjoy the evening together.

  * * *

  “Screw you, Sean. I ain’t going in there if you ain’t,” Carl Thomas said while lighting a cigarette. He and Sean had pulled into the woods about four hundred yards from Jeffrey’s cabin so that they could not be spotted, and were discussing their plan for breaking in and getting back at Jeffrey for what was obviously a prank that he had played on Sean and Abby.

  Carl had been skeptical about the tale, and was beginning to wonder what he was doing there when Sean said, “Listen to me, you old drunk. That son of a bitch made me out to be a fool the other night, and I mean to get back at him. You coming or not?”

  Carl thought about it and answered, “I ain’t old. I’m just a couple of years older than you, you prick.”

  “You coming with me?

  Carl thought about it for a moment and answered, “Let me get my gun.”

  The day was turning dark and the sky was an eerie shade of purple mixed with red, and Carl was obviously concerned about what they were doing. If Sean had been telling the truth, then that meant this Rothstein fellow knew how to defend himself. If Sean had been ignorant as to what he had actually seen, then that meant there might be an actual ghost living in the cabin, and not all of the bullets or stun guns in the world were going to help them.

  They slowly crept through the woods and saw the cabin begin to emerge in the half-light of twilight. It appeared to be quiet except for the fact that the porch light and a few of the interior lights were shining. They exchanged glances and Sean whispered, “Whatever you do, when we get inside, don’t shoot me.”

  Carl replied, “I’m not stupid, Sean.” He looked at the cabin. “Besides, what if you’re wrong and there really is a ghost in there?”

  “There ain’t no such thing as ghosts, stupid!”

  “Then you tell me what the hell was floating around in front of you. You said that shit was flying all over the place.”

  “I was drunk. I must have been seeing stuff.” He looked at Carl angrily and continued, “Now shut up and follow me.”

  Quietly, they made their way up the steps of the porch and looked for a window that was not blocked so they could see inside. They found one on the side facing the lake and watched as Jeffrey set the table. He pulled out crystal wear and china, lit candles, and turned on the stereo; he poured wine and adjusted the silverware. Sean and Carl looked at each other dumbfounded as to why this man was making such a big fuss over a dinner he would be eating alone.

  “Maybe he has company?” Carl asked.

  Sean shook his head and answered, “Why did he only put out one place setting then?”

  Carl thought hard and continued, “Maybe he’s one of those guys who hears voices.”

  “And the voices told him to act all fruity?”

  “At least I have an idea,” Carl shot back.

  “You have nothing! Now shut up and watch.”

  They sat there for what felt like an hour, waiting for Jeffrey to get on with whatever it was that he was doing, when the two of them saw something that almost made them jump out of their skin. Coming down the steps in a pink chiffon dress was the largest woman either of them had ever seen, and what was even odder was that she was translucent. They could not see completely through her, but were still able to make out the outlines of objects behind her.

  She walked to Jeffrey, and he took her by the hand and escorted her to the table he had just set. He changed the music to Streisand, and the two of them began speaking in ways that alluded to familiarity. Whoever this strange being was, it was definitely a friend of Jeffrey’s, and he was quite comfortable dealing with it.

  Carl looked at Sean and said, “Okay, what the hell is that?”

  Sean shook his head and answered, “I think it’s a ghost.”

  “You said there were no such things as ghosts! You said that it was all a prank by that city bastard over there.”

  Sean turned on Carl and covered his mouth with his hand and said, “Keep your voice down, you fool! Do you want him to hear us?”

  The two of them turned their gaze toward the living room and watched as the ghost and the man who they had come to do harm to sat back and shared stories with each other. They were so familiar with one another that they could have passed off as old friends or relatives. What they were talking about was beyond anything the two of them could imagine, but whatever it was, it was making them laugh, and Jeffrey even got up to grab a pad and a pen so he could take notes.

  * * *

  “He did what to his cat?” Jeffrey asked incredulously.

  “I swear to you, Jeffrey, I felt dirty just watching it.”
Saul was fanning himself with his hand. “It reminded me of my uncle Eli, the butcher. Oy gevalt, what that man was rumored to be doing with his meat was not kosher.”

  Jeffrey smiled and continued to write. “This is good stuff, though. I can see us putting a lot of it into the script. The only thing that might be tricky will be to let the audience members know who we are talking about without naming names.”

  Saul leaned forward and whispered to Jeffrey to keep others who might have been listening from hearing. “You know that we have visitors right now, right?”

  Jeffrey slowly nodded his head and replied, “I saw the two schmucks when I was setting the table. They probably are sore about what you did to Sean the other night and want to take it out on me.”

  Saul reached his hand across the table and grabbed Jeffrey’s. His touch was surprisingly warm, despite what he had always heard about ghosts being cold, unfeeling beings. “Jeffrey, my friend, as long as I am near you I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

  He smiled and Jeffrey took his hand in his own and said, “And as long as I am around, your secret is safe with me. That reminds me, are you invisible right now?”

  Saul’s eyes went wide, and he answered, “Oy gevalt.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight: Eyes Wide Open

  “So, should we do something about them?” Jeffrey asked. “I mean, we can’t just have everyone in town knowing that there is a ghost in their midst.”

  Saul leaned back and thought about it for a minute and answered, “I was thinking about that, actually. The way I see it, we are both going to be the talk of the town once this play comes out, so maybe it’s a good idea if I get comfortable with people knowing about me.”

  Jeffrey shook his head and continued, “I don’t know, Saul. It’s one thing for me and Melissa to know about you, but those two schmucks could cause hysteria if we’re not careful.”