by Rose Pressey
Thank goodness the clearing finally came into view. I was glad to be out of there. After that eerie ghost sighting and now a missing person, this trip was starting to freak me out. What if something really had happened to him? How would I tell Brannon? I would have to tell him what had happened. He would know that I hadn’t been honest with him about doing the tour in the woods instead of my usual route in town. Not being honest really wasn’t a great for a relationship.
My dishonestly made me ashamed of myself. I should have known better. I promised myself I would never do that again. That thought had barely left my head when I tried to rationalize my actions as justified in making my friends feel better.
“I hope he is really out here,” Jenny said.
“I think he’s just playing a game with us,” Patrick said. “You know how he is.”
That was my thought too. And it seemed as if Patrick knew his friend was a prankster.
We all moved out from under the trees and over to the cars. They were all still parked there, but there was no sign of Jonathan.
“He’s not here,” Jenny said in an irritated singsong voice.
We stood there shining the flashlights all around, wondering if he was hiding. Was this guy playing a joke? If so I would be furious. I didn’t think this was funny in the slightest. I moved over to the cars, shining my light inside each one. There was no sign of Jonathan hiding in the cars either.
“Which car is his?” I asked.
Elizabeth pointed at the blue Mustang. “See, I knew he wouldn’t be here. This is freaking me out.”
“We need to call the police right away,” Jenny said.
I wasn’t sure we needed to do that quite yet, but it wouldn’t be long before I pulled out my phone and dialed Brannon’s number.
“Jonathan?” Patrick yelled.
His voice echoed across the night air. There was no answer. Everyone else started calling out Jonathan’s name as well.
With still no answer I was really starting to worry. Maybe Jonathan had walked off to play a trick on us and had gotten lost. It wasn’t that big of an area, so I was sure that he would eventually find his way back to the car.
“What if the ghost really got him?” Elizabeth asked as she rubbed her arms fighting off chill from her scary thought. “The ghost came after Jenny. It could have happened to him.”
“I don’t believe a ghost got him,” I said.
“You don’t believe so?” Elizabeth asked with her hands on her hips.
I had to admit there were times that I’d been attacked by ghosts and thought that I might not make it. The ghost coming after Jenny was troubling. What if Jonathan had been possessed by something and now didn’t want to be found? However, I didn’t want to put those thoughts into their heads right now.
“This was a bad idea,” Jenny said as she paced around the car. “Is this some kind of trick you’re playing on us?”
My eyes widened. “Absolutely not. You all contacted me. I didn’t ask you to come here.”
Patrick waved his hands. “All right, let’s not argue. I’m sure he’s just playing a trick on us and he’ll knock it off.”
“Do you have a cell phone to call him?” I asked.
“I think he left his phone in the car,” Elizabeth said.
“Oh, how convenient,” I said. “So that no one can call him. I don’t know what kind of trick you all are up to, but I’m not happy about this.”
“Hey, don’t blame us,” Elizabeth said as she pointed at me.
All right, clearly the situation was escalating and I didn’t want it to get any more out of control. I pulled out my phone. It was time to call Brannon.
“Who are you calling?” Jenny snapped.
“The police,” I said. “I think it’s better if we get them to handle this.”
“I think that’s a good idea,” she said with a smirk.
Brannon picked up right away, thank goodness.
“Are you finished with the tour already?” he asked.
“Not quite,” I said. “There’s a bit of a problem.”
My hands shook as I held the phone up to my ear and my voice trembled.
“Please don’t tell me that you’ve discovered another dead body,” he said with a chuckle.
He acted as if he was joking, but I knew in the back of his mind he wondered if that was truly the case.
“No, not a dead body,” I said.
“Is someone injured?” His voice shot up a bit.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Someone from my tour is missing.” I kept my eye on the group, wondering if there would be any funny business. They were talking amongst themselves now. Occasionally they glanced my way.
“What do you mean someone is missing?” he asked.
“Well, one of the tour-goers apparently took off on his own.”
“Maybe they just didn’t want to do the tour anymore,” Brannon said.
“That’s what I thought. Except the area we’re in might be a bit dangerous and I don’t think they’d just take off from here. And he’s not back in his car either.”
“Which building are you in?” Brannon asked.
I released a deep breath. “We’re not in any of the buildings.”
“So you’re at the graveyard?” he asked. “I’m close by. I can come over there.”
“I’m not at the graveyard,” I said.
“I’m confused,” he said.
“Well, you’re about to be even more confused,” I said. “I’m at the woods. The one I mentioned before.”
“What are you doing there?” His voice went up even more.
“The group wanted to come to the haunted woods, so I agreed.”
“Rip, that place has so many uneven spots and it’s dark,” Brannon said. “You could easily get hurt.”
“I know all the reasons why it’s dangerous, and we can talk about that later, but right now I think I have to find this guy. I think maybe he wandered off. He could be hurt somewhere.” I whispered into the phone. “Plus, this group with him aren’t so friendly anymore.”
“I’m on my way,” he said.
His unhappiness with me was evident in his voice, but I’d known that was coming. I headed closer to the car now. Talk about awkward. I was forced to stand there with this group when I knew they were upset with me. Maybe I could smooth things over so that it wouldn’t be so uncomfortable.
Chapter 6
Jenny made eye contact with me. I watched her too, but after a few seconds I decided to look away. Averting my attention only lasted a few seconds until I peeked her way again. The next thing I knew she was walking over to me. I hoped this wasn’t a bad confrontation.
“Can I talk to you for a second?”’ she asked.
At least she seemed a bit calmer now. That was good.
“Sure,” I said.
I was just glad that Brannon would be here soon. Jenny peeked over her shoulder to see if the others were watching us. They were still talking. It was almost as if they hadn’t even realized she wasn’t standing with them. She leaned closer. I figured she didn’t want them to hear our conversation.
“You seem like a nice person, so I wanted to apologize,” Jenny said.
I hadn’t expected that, but I was happy that she was willing to set the heightened emotions aside.
“It’s perfectly understandable. I apologize if I raised my voice with you as well,” I said.
“Because you seem like a nice person I feel as if I should be honest with you,” she said.
“Okay, I’m listening,” I said, crossing my arms in front of me.
Obviously, I was curious. This tour certainly hadn’t turned out as I’d expected.
“Well, we wanted to come here to see the haunted stuff, but that’s not the only reason we wanted to be here,” she said.
I wasn’t sure I liked the sound of this. “Go ahead,” I said.
She looked over her shoulder again. They still hadn’t noticed she was talking to me, or if they did they
didn’t seem to care. “Well, Jonathan is scared of the dark and we got this cockamamie idea that we could cure him of that by dragging him out here.”
I closed my eyes for a moment to let this sink again. When I opened them again, I said, “That’s a bad idea. Do you think this is a reason why he may have taken off?”
She sighed. “I’m not sure. I can’t understand why he wouldn’t take his car.”
“Maybe he was so freaked out that he just took off running. Fear can do crazy things to people,” I said.
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right. What’s done is done now,” she said with a wave of her hand. “Do you really think he’ll show back up?”
“Of course he will. He may just be mad at you and the others for bringing him out here.”
“Yeah, I guess I didn’t think about that,” she said.
A siren sounded in the distance.
“I guess the police are almost here,” I said.
“I hope they already found him. What if he had an accident walking on the road or something?” Jenny asked.
“Don’t think the worst,” I said.
The lights of the police car appeared in the distance. The group turned and watched the road as the police car neared. Thank goodness Brannon had arrived. After pulling up and parking, Brannon got out and headed over toward us. I met him halfway so that I could talk to him privately before he started asking questions of the group. When would he tell me how unhappy he was with me? I was sure he wouldn’t take long.
“Any change?” Brannon asked when I stepped up to him.
I shook my head. “No, he’s still nowhere around. He left his cell phone in the car, which makes me think maybe he did that on purpose. Everybody brings their phone with them, right?”
“I think so,” Brannon said. “That’s good work, Detective.”
I sighed. “This is serious. I don’t know where the guy is. Maybe he’s freaking out a little bit.”
“Why do you say that?” Brannon asked. “Did you see something scary out here?”
“One of the tour-goers told me they brought him out here because he’s afraid of the dark. They were trying to cure him or something.”
Brannon shook his head. “And you went along with this trip?”
“Well, not for that reason. I just thought it would be fun to add this as part of my tour. I had to start somewhere, right? I had no idea what they had planned.”
“Maybe you could’ve told me about this and we could’ve done this together.”
“That’s neither here nor there now,” I said. “So what are we going to do to find him?”
“To be honest with you, Rip, there’s not much we can do. If the guy wants to leave it’s perfectly within his rights.”
“I understand that, but it just seems weird. I feel like maybe he could be lost.”
“It’s not that hard to find the road or out onto old man Sanders’ farm. I think he could find his way out.”
“So we should just do nothing?” I asked.
More sirens sounded in the distance.
“Well, obviously, there are a few more officers on the way. Having a missing person right after a murder won’t look good for the Devil’s Moon Police Department, so if we can find him tonight that would be great.”
“You’re going to look for him?” I asked.
“We’ll give it a shot. Don’t worry, I think that he’s just playing a trick on you. Everything will be fine.”
I nodded. “If you say so.”
I tried to believe that and keep my positive thinking. Like Brannon said, they didn’t need a missing person and a murder in the same day.
“I’ll go talk to the group,” Brannon said.
“All right. Let me know if I can help with anything else. Oh, and I think they are mad at me. FYI.”
“Duly noted,” he said.
Brannon headed over to the group. I watched as the police cars pulled up. The other officers got out and within minutes went into the wooded area to look for Jonathan. I stood with the group by the cars, but we really didn’t say much to each other. I wasn’t sure what else there was to say. This had definitely not turned out as I had hoped. I supposed in some way I’d known something wasn’t right and I shouldn’t have even attempted the tour. But like I told Brannon it was neither here nor there now.
How could Jonathan have just walked away without us even realizing it? Maybe the sound of the other people walking had drowned out his footfalls. He had to come back sometime if he was just trying to trick us. He needed his car and cell phone. Would the police tow his car? It would serve him right if they towed it and we all drove away making him walk back to town.
It felt like forever that the police were back in the woods checking for Jonathan, but after a while they came out of the wooded area with no sign of him.
“Oh, my God,” Jenny yelled. “This is not happening.”
Patrick walked over to her. “You have to calm down, all right? Being upset won’t help anything. You have to be calm for Jonathan. He’s probably already back in town laughing that we’re out here looking for him.”
“You really think so?” Jenny asked around a sniffle.
“I’m sure of it, and when I get a hold of him, I’m going to let him have it,” Patrick said. He was really angry with him.
“Is there anything else you can do?” Jenny asked, looking at Brannon.
“We’ll be searching again in the morning,” Brannon said.
“In the morning? We can’t leave him out here,” Elizabeth said in a loud voice.
“I’m sorry, but it’s dark and before we have more information there’s not much we can do. You can come to the police station to file a missing person’s report,” Brannon said.
“That’s exactly what I’ll do,” Jenny said.
The group got in their cars without saying another word to me.
“Well, that ended well,” I said as Brannon stood beside me.
“Should I follow you to your house or are you going to make any more stops to haunted secluded areas tonight?” Brannon asked.
“Very funny,” I said. “It’s been a long day. I need to go home.”
“Yes, well, I wish you hadn’t done the tour at all tonight.”
“It’s over with now.” I headed for the car.
“I’ll follow you,” he called out.
I waved and climbed behind the steering wheel. Things felt really strange as I drove home. I kept thinking about Jonathan and wondering why all of this had happened. As I neared the road where I’d seen the ghosts I got nervous all over again thinking that they would pop out in front of the car. They could possibly cause an accident. Maybe that was why they’d done it in the first place.
I slowed down as I came to that intersection where the ghosts had been before. Momentary relief came over me when nothing happened. I released a deep breath and relaxed a bit. How long would that last though? With any luck they would stay away for good. I hoped I didn’t see them at the library tomorrow. Pulling up in front of my house I shut off the car. Brannon parked his car up behind mine. He got out and met me on the sidewalk.
“Would you like come in? I’ll make us something to eat if you’d like. I know you wanted pizza but…”
“I’ll take anything right now,” he said. “It’s been a long day.”
I hoped he was okay with peanut butter because I seriously needed to go grocery-shopping. As we walked up the path he didn’t say anything, but I knew the conversation would come soon enough. Brannon followed me through the front door. I tossed my bag on the table by the door and headed across the foyer into the living room.
Brannon followed me back to the kitchen.
I opened the refrigerator. “Turkey or peanut butter?”
He laughed. “I’ll take the peanut butter. I had turkey for lunch.”
“You got it,” I said as I grabbed the mostly empty bread bag from the pantry. “They have this great bread in the deli on Rowan. My mother wouldn’t stop talking
about it so I had to stop by and pick up a loaf and try it for myself.”
I was just stalling trying to make conversation so that he wouldn’t ask about the tour, but I knew he would eventually. Brannon would want details. Why had I decided to take them there? What happened leading up to this night? Etc., etc. But before he did that I had to tell him about the ghosts.
“Sounds delicious. Can’t wait to try it,” Brannon said.
I pulled out the slices. “The strangest thing happened today at the library.”
“Stranger than the murder?” he asked.
“Other than that,” I said. “Three ghosts appeared. I saw them right when we were standing there with Lucy Marcus. They just disappeared right before my eyes. They were dressed in period clothing. Like from the 1800s.”
“Anything else about them?” he asked.
I spread the peanut butter on the bread. “I saw one of them at the tavern and they followed me down the sidewalk home.”
“Really? What happened then?” he asked.
“They looked really angry. I started walking so fast to get away from them that I fell. Luckily, they didn’t grab me. After that they disappeared again. I got to the car and headed out for the woods.” I sliced the sandwich in two.
He scoffed.
“When I went through the intersection at Elm and Chestnut they were right in the middle of the road.”
Brannon’s eyes widened. I thought that might’ve been the first time I’d ever seen that expression on his face.
“Then what happened?” he asked.
I waved my hand. “They disappeared. I think it was because the headlights of another car flashed across them.”
“And you haven’t seen them since?” he asked.
“Thankfully no,” I said, placing the peanut butter sandwich down on the table in front of him. I grabbed the plate with my sandwich and sat across from him. “I hope they don’t come back. I get a feeling they might be hanging around the library tomorrow.”
“Any news about the cameras being installed?” Brannon took a bite of his sandwich.
“It’s scheduled for the day after tomorrow,” I said. “But maybe I can get it moved up.”
