I knew what was going on with her. I mean, I understood why she’d gone off the deep end. That didn’t make it any better. Her response to our current situation made it worse. At least for me. I’d never seen anything shake her confidence or steal her joy. Gran felt guilty, plain and simple. But the truth was she couldn’t protect me. How can you protect anyone from the spirit world? Spirits have a mind—and agenda—of their own. They do their own thing and follow laws we can’t begin to understand. As much as it frightened me, I couldn’t put the genie back in the bottle. How do you unknow something?
“Hi!” I said, faking cheerfulness as I opened the door. Carrie Jo seemed relieved to see me. Juggling her son, diaper bag and purse like a pro, she hugged me and managed to hand me a bag of donuts from Ladd’s.
“So glad to see you, Rachel. It’s only been two days, but it feels like forever. I brought your check, and AJ here insisted that we bring you some donuts. I got crullers!”
“I’ll gladly accept both of those. Come on in, guys, and thank you, Baby Boy. They’re my favorites! I’ve got sodas in my mini-fridge. Let’s hang out in my room. I don’t think you’ve seen it yet. It’s more like an apartment. I love it! And I actually cleaned it up this morning.” Normally we’d chat in the living room or maybe the kitchen, but I didn’t want Gran overhearing what I had to say. She was stressed out enough.
We arranged a play area for Ashland Junior, then CJ and I sat at the little table I’d placed in the corner of my room. The baby was having a good time investigating all my stuffed animals. “You look good, Rachel. How are you doing? Be honest.”
“Me? I’m okay, but I think Gran’s gone crazy. She’s up in Mission Control right now. Watching the cameras, I guess. I’m surprised she hasn’t assigned us all passwords and installed a moat. I keep telling her that the danger isn’t here, it’s at Idlewood, but she won’t listen. That’s so weird too because I’ve never known her to be scared of anything. Mom is working double shifts again, probably so she doesn’t have to talk about what happened, and I keep having dreams of Idlewood.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. That doesn’t sound like your grandmother at all.”
I dug in the white bag from Ladd’s and arranged napkins on the table. I wasn’t going to eat three crullers, so I gave CJ one and put one on my napkin. It smelled delicious.
“You know I have to ask. What kind of dreams?” Carrie Jo’s green eyes studied mine.
“That’s the thing. It’s only pieces, but they are very vivid. I’m running through the woods, and I can feel the briars tugging at my skin. My feet are cold, and I hear the sound of dogs howling. They frighten me—I mean, the dream me. In real life I’m not afraid of dogs at all. I’m a huge dog lover, but in my dream it is a different story. It’s like I’m…well, I’m not even me.” I picked up one of the donuts and took a bite. Yep, this is what I needed to do—stress eat.
“Sounds like you’ve been dream catching. Or maybe you’re having those dreams because someone is trying to communicate with you. I’ve been reading up on sensitives and mediums. That’s a common experience for people who have that kind of gift. But then again, maybe you are just a late-blooming dream catcher.” She smiled and cracked open the soda bottle I offered her.
“Wouldn’t that be something?” After taking a few bites and wiping my face with a napkin I added, “I know who’s been crying in the house. It’s Aubrey.”
“How do you know it’s her? I thought perhaps it was Mrs. Ferguson. Or maybe Bridget.”
“I have no facts to present, but I believe it’s Aubrey. She’s so distraught, so heartbroken. Maybe I’m wrong. I think the more I learn the less I know.” Baby Boy squealed with delight when he realized one of my bears lit up and played a tune. I couldn’t help but smile. Such a happy baby. I hoped he’d have a happy life. You couldn’t predict that, though. Geesh, Rach. What a depressing thought! “It’s sad to think a person’s soul could be trapped in a place or in a time like that. Why do you think some people become ghosts and others don’t, even though they experience a comparable amount of heartache?”
She shook her head and said, “That’s definitely one of life’s mysteries. I wish I knew.”
We didn’t talk for a while but listened to Baby Boy talk to himself in his own sweet, baby language. Or maybe he was talking to Mr. Giraffe and Pinky Elephant, my two childhood favorites. Now it seemed like they were his too. I might as well let him take them home.
“I’ve been dreaming of Idlewood, Rachel. It’s been a few months since I dreamed of the house, but now it’s becoming clearer, there’s much more detail. I saw Aubrey, Percy and Michael. I know how it ends for her. At least I’m pretty sure. It’s not a fairy tale ending.”
“Tell me, what happened? I need to know.”
Carrie Jo paused for a moment and ran to AJ just in time to keep him from pulling the lamp off my nightstand. “I’m so sorry. I think he’s headed to the terrible twos, and he’s not even one yet.” We rearranged things, and although he wasn’t happy about it, he went back to playing with his pile of toys. Once his attention was averted, we went back to our conversation. I noticed CJ lowered her voice as if Baby Boy could understand what she was saying. I guess when you deal with the supernatural all the time, you have to be concerned about that sort of thing. She spilled her secrets and told me about Aubrey’s imprisonment and Michael’s cruelty. And Percy’s indifference. I could hardly believe it.
“Some might say she deserved it, but how could Aubrey have known what Tallulah would do? We saw the letter. Nowhere in there does it suggest that she do such a thing. No wonder Aubrey’s haunting the place. If she was trying to show me that, then why was I locked in a completely different room? I wasn’t locked in the cellar. I was in the second-floor trap, which I’d never heard of until this house. Have you heard about any others?”
“It’s an uncommon feature, for sure, but not unheard of. Especially during the Civil War, which would have been about ten years earlier. It could have been built in to hide soldiers or maybe even slaves. Can you tell me how you ended up there? Do you think it was a ghost?”
“No, I don’t.” My answer surprised her. “I went to the garconniere because I wanted to cleanse the place. I wanted Angus to be free, even though I was ticked off at him for trying to manipulate me. I went inside and lo and behold the lights weren’t working, again. That’s when I knew something was up. I was just about to leave when I heard a noise coming from upstairs. It was like a whisper, like two people talking to one another. I called out to warn them, but nobody answered.”
“You should have left and called the cops, Rachel!”
“Hindsight is twenty-twenty, isn’t it? I wasn’t thinking straight. I’d just got into this big blowout with Angus, and I was still ticked off. So I waited for a while and didn’t hear anything. I pretended to close the door but nothing. I went up to check it out. The bed was moved, the floor trap open. How could we have missed it? I could hardly believe what I saw. I swear I didn’t see anyone. I peeked inside, thinking that whoever was digging around up there was still inside. Next thing I know someone shoved me, and hard. I tried to get out, but before I could get my bearings they were gone and the bed was on top of me.”
“Oh my lord, Rachel. You could have been…I mean, what if we’d never found you?”
“Stop that, Carrie Jo. If you cry, I’m done. It’s bad enough Gran is losing it; you can’t go crazy too.”
She jumped out of her chair and hugged me before sitting back down. “You know, when Terrence Dale and Bette left us, I thought I would die. I can’t imagine what my life would be like without you in it. You are so sweet and special. Like the little sister I never had. Please be safe going forward. No more solo field trips. If you want to investigate anything, you call on one of us. I mean it.”
“I’m glad to hear you say that because I have to go back. I need to go back. If there is any possible way to help Aubrey rest, then I need to do it.”
“But what if it�
�s not Aubrey? Ashland seems to think it was a male spirit in the tower, not a female one. What if you make contact with the Shadow Man? Whoever or whatever that thing is. What then?”
I chewed the inside of my lip thoughtfully. “With Trinket we knew the letter was the key. Maybe it will work for Aubrey. If I could let her know we’d found it, that she was forgiven…”
“That’s just it, Rachel. We don’t know that Percy did forgive her. The last time I saw them, he’d basically turned his back on her and she was in Tallulah’s tree.”
“It’s not a science—and I’m probably grasping at straws here, but I’ve got to do something. I can’t sleep. I can’t stop thinking about her. It’s like an obsession.”
“You aren’t the first to feel that way.” She picked up AJ, who was now fussing and not smelling as sweet as he had when he arrived. “Tell you what. It’s probably not going to happen tonight; Ashland’s having a football party, and the Devecheauxs stay so busy that it’s not always easy to connect with them. Let me see if I can arrange for us all to be there tomorrow night. We work better when we are together, and it is always safer that way too. Also, that will give me some time to think up something to tell Mr. Taylor. If he rode by and saw all those cars there, he’d freak out.”
“That’s all I can ask for. In the meantime, I’ll do some research online, see what I can figure out about helping Aubrey. Henri gave me a tip on a great search engine that might come in handy.”
“Great! Well, I hate to do this to you, but my son has decided to make a mess. If I could change him before we head home? It’s almost nap time.”
“Sure, I’ll let you and Mr. Smellypants take care of business. Thanks for stopping by.”
“No problem. We love you, Rachel.”
“Love you too.” I exited the room and went in search of deodorizing spray and a grocery store bag. I loved that little guy, but he was not leaving his “present” in my room. By the time I dug out what I needed from the kitchen supply cabinet, Carrie Jo was walking in behind me.
“Thank you, Aunt Rachel. We’ll go home now. Say bye bye, AJ.”
After tidying up, I helped her to the car and added the stuffies to the back seat.
“You can’t give away your keepsakes. That’s above and beyond the call of duty.”
“It’s not a problem. I think it’s time to let a few things go. See you later. Call me when you know something!”
“You got it!” I watched them drive away and waved goodbye. I turned around and almost screamed my head off. Gran was standing right behind me.
“Good Lord, Gran. You scared the daylights out of me. Where did you get those ninja skills?” I laughed nervously.
“Don’t go back, Rachel-girl. There’s only sadness there. Please don’t go back.” She didn’t wait for me to answer or explain myself. With slumped shoulders and a tired expression, she left me to return to her security room.
I didn’t follow her.
Chapter Thirteen – Carrie Jo
The plan was to go home, put my son down for his usual afternoon nap, decorate for the party and help Doreen finish up the food. But Ashland James had other ideas. He wasn’t ready for a nap, and he didn’t have any intention of letting me put him down. I checked his forehead, and he wasn’t feverish, just fussy. After a quick phone call to Momma, who immediately offered to come over, I realized that it was probably teething issues. I rubbed my finger on his gums and was surprised to feel two sharp nubs poking out of his gum line. I told Momma not to worry but reminded her about today. Hey, since I’d forgotten about the shindig myself, I figured I needed to remind my family and friends.
It was the Alabama-LSU game, and the rivalry was in full swing in our neighborhood. Naturally, my huge Crimson Tide fan husband had an oversize Alabama flag hanging off the front porch. I didn’t make a fuss about it. Henri was an LSU fan all the way, and those two were certain to give each other a hard time about every play. It would be much-needed relief from the crazy world we often found ourselves in.
“It’s official. My kiddo has teeth! I wonder where Ashland is…he said he would be here to help.” I stole a few crackers off Doreen’s tray, and my son tried to take them from me.
“I have it under control, and my granddaughter Mattie promised to come by and help. You take care of that be-be. It’s okay, Mrs. Stuart.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, very sure. In fact, I might get more done without your help.” She grinned, bobbing her head at me.
“All right, then. I’ll take him up for some quiet time and see if I can’t talk him into a nap. He’s so cranky today.” I climbed the stairs with the wriggling handful, and we went into his room. I put him in pajamas and let him play on the floor for a few minutes while I put his clothes away. Doreen had brought them up for me, but I liked folding his things and tucking them away. At least I had the opportunity to do that for my son. My mother never had that with Chance.
Where are you, brother? I daydreamed about him as I slipped onesies and pajamas in their proper place. AJ began crying, and I picked him up, suddenly worried that something was seriously wrong with him. It wasn’t like him to fight sleep. Unlike some kids, my boy was always down for a nap. Even the ladies at Small Steps commented on how easy it was to get him to sleep. The problem was he didn’t always sleep too long.
“It’s okay, Baby Boy. It’s okay. Come sit with Momma. Let’s sit right here in our chair.” I sat in the padded rocker/glider that Ashland had surprised me with the night of our baby shower. It was the most comfortable chair in the house and believe me, I should know—I spent enough time in it. “Come on now. Let’s lie down here.” I rocked him back and forth and hummed whatever tunes I could think of. We started with “Hush, Little Baby” and ended up with “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.” He didn’t seem to mind that his mother was the world’s worst singer, that she couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket. That she frequently forgot the words and had to make up her own lyrics. Nope, he didn’t mind at all. After a few minutes of restlessness, he snuggled down and got still. I didn’t dare lay him down too soon. Ashland James was the reigning champion of “playing possum.” Just when you thought he was asleep, that blond head would pop up again. I kept humming and rocking, humming and rocking until soon, both of us were sleeping.
***
My chest burned, my feet were freezing. I’d managed to lose my shoes somewhere along the way, but I could not allow that to stop me. The sun hovered on the horizon and threatened to dip below the distant fence line and plunge me and the entire countryside into darkness. All I needed was a little more time, please God, a little more time to find my wife. To hold her, to keep her safe from the Devi—my brother. I’d followed Aubrey’s footsteps to the edge of the road, and there could be no doubt now she was returning to Idlewood. But for what purpose, I could not imagine. In spite of Michael’s warning, she was returning to him. And what choice did she have if I had abandoned her yet again? Oh yes, I was a supreme coward. Abandoning those I loved during their time of need was what I did best.
I do not know how long I lingered in the McFarlands’ cabin after Michael’s visit. I could not even say when Aubrey departed. Could it have been today? Yesterday? Time seemed unimportant to me now. At times in my world Tallulah still lived, my Dot haunted my every step—her serious, scolding eyes were always upon me—and now my Aubrey was in danger of falling into the darkness along with them.
I could hear my brother’s taunts in my mind even now. “Ah yes, Sir Percy, the Golden Son. You are a failure, my Golden Brother. You are not my father’s son or my brother.” Yes, there were far worse taunts than that, but I did not care to recall them now. I wanted to be rid of him forever. But now I had to find my Aubrey. Time would not stand still for us. Time was never on my side.
I paused at the fence, but only for a few seconds. I climbed each of the wooden slats carefully, and my nearly numb toes had a difficult time discerning where to step. I finally crested the fence, stepped over th
e side and fell to the ground. There were stickers here, tough viney ones, but I couldn’t slow down my pace. I rolled out of the briar patch, tearing my skin as I went. When I could finally stand I did. I scanned the horizon to get my bearings. I could see Idlewood in the distance. Purple shadows fell on the side of the house, and soon the gas lamps along the drive were lit by one of the house servants. The growing sense of urgency increased to levels that threatened to put my mind in an ill state again, back to the land of dark clouds and suffering. The catch in my side got worse as I scrambled up the hill, but I didn’t dare stop now.
A strange sound caught my attention. I had a choice, run for the house or turn to address this oddity. No, oddity was the wrong word. It was more like an omen.
It was late October now, or was it November? I could not remember, but it was getting colder by the minute. Yet that sound gnawed at me. I decided to circle back, not across the fence but to the old barn. The place where Tallulah and I witnessed the Bad Thing that we never spoke about to anyone, even one another. And now the place of the Bad Thing was calling me back. Maybe it believed that we had spoken, that we had told someone, but we had not. I would not forget her eyes as I pressed my hand over her mouth. Tallulah wanted to scream and so did I, but to do so would have meant certain death. Uncle Preston’s blood filled the floor of the barn as Father drove the ax into him again and again. He muttered a string of profanities as he delivered each blow, and many of the words I had never heard before.
Dreams of Idlewood Page 10
