by Dale Mayer
“His wife.”
*
Jacob sat up and stretched. Damn, he felt good. He threw back the covers and hopped out of bed. He stood tall and arched his back, shifting and rolling his shoulders. What a great night’s sleep. He was grateful those bizarre nightmares seemed to have finally stopped. It had to have been caused by the drugs. Nasty things. Although they beat living with that horrific pain. He knew he’d been in an accident of some kind and vaguely remembered going to the bar with Celina, so he could only presume they’d been hit on the road. At least he felt decent now.
Raring to go, in fact. That weird brain fog was gone, and the air around him looked normal. For a long time he’d wondered if he’d ever be able to get out of that ghastly drugged state. If that’s what being in a coma felt like, his sympathies went to those currently in that situation. What a horrible way to live.
Just then a nurse walked into the room. There were four other beds in the room. He couldn’t see most of the other occupants because of the curtains surrounding them. Several curtains were open, but he didn’t want to pry by walking around and checking to see if he was alone. Most likely the room was full.
He smiled as a nurse entered and went to the first bed.
Maybe the doctor would be in soon and he could get out of this place.
The nurse walked to the second bed and he waited. When she left that bed and came toward him he grinned and said, “Good morning. I feel great today. When is the doctor available? I’d really like to go home.”
She had a tablet of some kind in her hand. He waited, wishing the nursing staff could actually dredge up a personality. It was one of the reasons he hated being in here. They were either cranky or run off their feet or super talkative, and you learned way too much about their boyfriend’s ex. He sighed and shifted. Her face twisted as she clicked through the screens.
Uh oh.
He couldn’t help it. He sidled closer and tried to peer into her screen. The angle was just that little bit off so he couldn’t read the text. It was his file though. Nice to see the medical system moving forward with technology. He glanced up at her face. “So what’s the verdict? Will I live?” he joked.
The nurse sighed. She tugged the open curtain over to hide his bed slightly. He frowned.
“Hey, what’s going on?” He turned to face his bed. And saw a body lying still on the bed.
His body.
Chapter 9
After returning from the museum Celina needed to connect to her own creativity. There was nothing like seeing passion in someone else’s work to inspire her own. She was blessed with the ability to play several instruments, the harp and violin being her favorites. Right now she wanted to feel her bow in her hand. She opened her father’s old violin case, picked up his and now her beloved instrument, and drew the bow across the strings. The moaning sound matched the fear and pain in her heart. Her life had swung out of control and she didn’t understand how or why. She wanted this asshole gone from her mind, her friends alive, and she wanted her old normal back again – the normal from before her accident.
She knew it was never going to happen, but that didn’t stop her from wanting more or wishing it could. Her bow stroked back and forth in a haunting melody as a warm up. A tune of woe and a tune of hope. A melody she’d written that serenaded her emotions, honoring them, while giving her a chance to release the pain and replenish her soul with joy.
Tears formed in her eyes as her fingers moved and her arm swung and dipped. She’d been through so much this last year. And she couldn’t see a way forward. She needed someone to help her deal with the craziness in her world. She’d have to let go of her fear and pride and talk to a counselor or a psychologist. She was terrified this voice was a part of herself. And she was desperate to assuage this fear that she’d hurt people somehow. That she was responsible. She didn’t know how she could have, but the dread persisted. A concrete, festering awareness that maybe there was something seriously wrong with her.
“What song is that?” asked a voice in the living room.
She frowned at the ghostly interruption but refused to stop playing. “It’s not really a song, I’m just jamming.” She smiled at the old phrase. She was playing for herself. That was all.
“It’s beautiful.”
“Thank you.”
She ignored the ghost, noticing a twinge of familiarity, and had to wonder if she was just getting more comfortable with so many of them. After all, she saw or sensed plenty of them on a day-to-day basis. And did her best to keep them at bay. She could only handle so much, and lately it was much less. She was surprised this one was here. It wasn’t like she’d left a psychological door open. The more she thought about it, the more it bothered here. “How did you get in here?”
There was a moment of startled surprise. Then he said in a soft voice, “Your music called to me.”
Her fingers faltered, and then she recovered. Her music had called to him? That was new. She didn’t know if she liked that idea or not. She said lightly, “I don’t think my music has ever done that before.”
“Oh, I’m sure it has,” he said. “Do you play other instruments?”
“Several.”
“Lovely for you.”
Her fingers continued to play as her mind dwelled on his words. And realized it was lovely to be able to do that. She moved from instrument to instrument as her soul required. Each instrument offered her something different at the moment. She loved the harp. Sometimes, like this concert that was supposed to start tonight, she was doing a special with her fiddle. It allowed her to stretch and grow as a musician. And that allowed her to stretch and grow as a person. “Who are you and why are you here?”
“I’m a friend, and I’m here to enjoy your music.”
Such ghost-like answers. So often they couldn’t even give their own names.
“Then enjoy,” she said, smiling. And closed her eyes. She let the emotion pour through her strings and let her heart soar. She played until the need in her had drained and the stress and tension had moved from her inner core out to her trembling arms. She lowered the instrument with a long sigh. Then she shook out her arms, straightened her back, and rolled her stiff neck.
“You play beautifully. Thank you.”
She started, having forgotten her visitor. “No problem.”
“Do you make those colors happen on purpose?” he asked.
She froze. And for the first time she opened her eyes. Her ghostly visitor was a pale blur to the left of her, his features indistinct, his glow faded, weak. “You can see them?” she asked.
“Yes.” He said it so simply, as if to say ‘of course, can’t you?’
Celina frowned. “Not many can.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. They are beautiful.” He shifted slightly. “Do you make the music and the colors are secondary, or do you paint first and the music is secondary?”
She laughed. “I have no idea. I had hoped that they worked together, and they do, but the pictures aren’t quite the way I’d want them to be.”
“Then maybe you should try to make the paintings in the air and see what music comes from that.”
She raised her eyebrow in surprise. “Interesting suggestion. Thank you.”
The smile in his voice couldn’t be missed. “No problem. I like art in all forms.”
She tilted her head, realizing her ghost was very subdued. He was also alone in her room. Often she could sense several ghosts at the same time. More often than not they couldn’t see each other. “Have you seen any other ghostly visitors here?”
“Not at the moment.”
She frowned. “Meaning you have before?”
“Once I stopped in and saw there were others and I left soon after.”
She nodded. Ghosts were just as contrary in death as they’d been alive. If he’d been a loner in life, chances were good he’d be a loner in death. That saddened her. Everyone needed someone.
“Then as you appear to enjoy my music, I h
ope it made you happy.”
“It did. Thank you.”
She returned her violin to her case and turned around to see Mimi in front of her. Mimi said, “That was lovely, dear.”
“Oh hi, I didn’t realize you were here.” She scanned the room but realized the pale ghost was gone.
“There’s been no one else here, my dear child. Are you feeling all right?”
Celina laughed. “So because you didn’t see or sense someone, I must be ill?” She shook her head. “The world does not revolve around you, Mimi. Sometimes other people see things you don’t.”
“Maybe,” Mimi said comfortably. “But my world revolves around me, and that’s all I’m concerned with.”
“Oh, the simple life of being a ghost.”
“It is simple,” Mimi laughed. “No cooking, no cleaning, no job, no bills to pay.”
“What a way to view death.” Celina shook her head. “What are the things you miss doing?” she asked curiously. The more she dealt with ghosts, the more she found their perspective to be a refreshing take on the life she often took for granted.
“Hugging a child. Making love. Being held by someone who cares. Family.” Her voice faded, as if the words were too hard to get out. She disappeared in front of Celina’s eyes. Or rather, from the back of Celina’s eyes.
Slowly Celina stood, thinking about Mimi’s words. Given that Celina had lost or hadn’t known most of her family to begin with, she already missed much of what Mimi did – and she hadn’t died yet. Sure, she had a few friends, but she was closest to her ghosts. How sad was that?
Sometimes it really bothered her. The artist she’d met at the gallery today came to mind. A man so in love with his wife, Shay, that she was his sole subject. She’d desperately wanted to see the huge paintings when the artist had stopped by unexpectedly. He’d been kind enough to sit down and described his work to her in great detail. For that moment he’d given her a stunning insight into what she’d once been able to see – art. He’d been blessed in so many ways. The other good thing to come out of that had been that he’d obviously known it.
And it made her life seem so much emptier.
Tired and depressed, she walked to her bedroom, wishing she had more friends. Wishing she had someone to join her for a bottle of wine tonight. She really didn’t want to be alone.
Her phone rang. She laughed. Good. Maybe someone heard her silent call.
Instead it was her eye specialist’s office.
“You had an appointment today. You didn’t show up. We’ve rearranged this appointment several times. Dr. Jorgensen needs to see you.”
Celina listened to the tirade in silence and winced. Jillian had even asked her about that appointment this morning and she hadn’t even triggered to today being the day. “I thought it was next week,” she admitted, massaging her temples.
“It was today – booked on a Saturday as he has another specialist here to see you. I left a message on your voicemail,” the reception said, vexed. “This doctor has some different techniques. She’s only here this weekend.”
Celina frowned. Damn. A different specialist? She didn’t know how she felt about that. “What time is it now?”
“It’s four-thirty. Why?”
“I just wondered if maybe I could catch a cab and come and see her.”
“Just a moment.” The receptionist held the phone away and there was muttering going on in the background. “They will be leaving soon. Can you come right away?”
Celina’s mind raced. Maybe the specialist would be the one to finally give her answers. She’d been remiss in not going back to Dr. Jorgensen, but after all she’d been through she didn’t need to listen to more frustration on his part. But he’d taken the next step. For her. How could she do any less?
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
*
Sitting cross-legged in the afternoon sun, Stefan opened up his senses and slipped free of his body, stretching for only a short moment before flying free. There were so many things on his to do list. He almost laughed. How many other people had lists like he did? As in first leave body, next float over to Celina and make sure she was doing okay, then check out the hospital.
Floating easily, he moved through Celina’s apartment. Celina’s empty apartment. He frowned as he zipped through the space. Where the hell was she? The question had no sooner filled his mind than he caught it back. He was not amused at his possessive reaction.
He checked out the energy of her apartment. Instinctively he sent out a wide band of questing energy, searching for anomalies. The energy was frazzled but calming. Nothing extreme, and no new upsets that he could see. There were yesterday’s multiple energies still clogging up the space. He shook his head. Celina might have a lot of experience with ghosts, but she had no idea how to handle foreign energies in her space. That was something he could do for her.
He spent a moment cleansing the apartment of all the strangers. When he was done the place would feel like home again. It took longer than he thought. He could feel the pull on his own energy resources as he mentally catalogued many of the strangers, seeing the signatures and their actions for what they were. The police doing their job. Then there were ghosts that were sliding through the different planes, touching base with her in and out of their existence. It was one of the mysteries of the ethers that everyone who died could create the space in which they existed to be what and where they wanted it to be. At the same time, they appeared to stay within the parameters they set.
Lissa, his friendly teenaged ghost, appeared unusual in that she was owning her space and expanding it. She stepped forward to greet other souls caught in this fractured existence on her own. Like a personal greeter.
He smiled. Lissa was a jewel, and there was no way death could dull her brilliance. She hadn’t had much chance at a physical life, but once she’d gained a foothold in the etheric world she’d taken charge of her existence and now lived it. Which sounded odd, because of all the things she was, alive wasn’t one of them.
He paused to survey the room and realized there were strains of something that had come and gone. An energy that frayed sparks with each movement instead of moving smoothly with control. A new spirit who’d just crossed over, or one newly connected to Celina. It looked similar to what he’d seen in the bathroom but it was different. And that difference concerned him. The bathroom had been overrun with strangers, and that could affect the look of the signature – he hadn’t been here soon enough after the event to identify the energy. Being the hunter he was, he understood this was connected to the incident.
He purged that trail from the apartment, leaving her space clean and renewed.
Then he shifted to the hospital. The energy buffeting against him shot his guards into place. Damn. He hated hospitals. He closed in his energy, zipped up his aura, and moved cautiously through the hallways. He floated above the moving throngs of people. This place was always busy. He wasn’t sure what the drive had been to come here, given that it was the last place he wanted to be. Yet he couldn’t shake the connection from the orchestra incident to the warning message in Celina’s apartment, and that meant checking out the driver of the truck that had slammed into the pub. He had hoped to speak with him, but as the man hadn’t survived the crash Stefan hoped to gain some insight from his corpse. Nice thought. Not. First he needed to see the surviving orchestra members.
He drifted through the various rooms, seeing the energy, the healing, the disease, the sickness, and the thick blanket of heavy emotion. Grief, sadness, and bright flashes of anger dominated.
All normal. All to be expected. He reached the floor where the injured orchestra members were and moved through the hallway, seeing the little bits of connecting energy between several rooms. They were there. He stopped at one doorway, recognizing the energy. Interesting. He sent a mental note to Brandt. Heard the other man’s shocked denial and then closed the mental door. He needed to concentrate here.
He popped into an
other room to find a woman sleeping, bandages on her head and her right arm in a cast. Nothing was amiss in her room or energy – at least in a negative way.
Going from room to room, Stefan was unable to shake the feeling that he was looking for something and would recognize it when he saw it. But he wasn’t finding it. Frustration rode him as he zipped through the massive building.
He closed his eyes and saw the morgue in his mind’s eye. When he opened them he found himself in the right place. Techs worked in systematic fashion in the large room with several full tables, autopsies in progress. He shifted his gaze to the large wall of cabinets at the end of the room. He drifted closer, searching for links to the orchestra. There were two here. At least two.
Stefan studied the energy coming from the cold, clinical room. Instead of it being empty of color and form, the place seethed. With anger, pain, loss, denial, grief, and most of all that sense of regret. Regret that they hadn’t had time to say goodbye, regret for all the loved ones left behind. Regret for the things they left unfinished. There were so many that they rolled in together, creating a morass of seething turbulence.
He had seen many a person pass on and just leave. Those were the easy cases. More often than not the ones he saw – and he’d admit it was his affinity for violence that likely kept the natural selection this way – were full of unresolved issues.
Many people couldn’t leave when death came to them. And that was too bad. No one was ever prepared for death when it was their time. Unless they’d been dying for a long time or had made peace with their death. He’d heard of people crossing the river that divided the two planes of existence and coming back, but he wasn’t one of them. He walked the gray area between those planes and could often speak with those that had crossed over and somehow came back, or those that had never left and were even now grabbing for a foothold into the craziness of life that they weren’t ready to leave.
He wished he could tell everyone to let go and let death be your friend. But he couldn’t. It wasn’t his place. Nor was it his truth. He hadn’t been there, so it couldn’t be. And he could only speak his truth.
