Parrish

by Shannen Crane Camp

  Straight toward the empty pool.

  You know, the one he’d surely fall into and die?

  Yeah. That empty pool.

  I sprinted over and pulled him away from the edge. “What are you doing? Are you a complete lunatic?”

  “I thought I saw someone,” he answered.

  “Oh, did you now,” I shot back. “So you thought it would be a good idea to fall into an empty pool and die?”

  “I forgot the pool was there,” he said, though I didn’t understand how that could be true.

  He was just mental.

  “Do you know who sent us?” Jefferson suddenly called. “Can you tell us anything about our employer?”

  I forced myself to stop babysitting Jefferson and looked back down at the EMF reader, which had just inexplicably jumped up a few notches.

  “Point two,” I said.

  I wasn’t sure why, but the electromagnetic field in the room had just gone up. Had we been in a modern home or hotel where an air conditioner might have kicked on, I would have thought nothing of it. But standing in the dead spot that was the pool area, it gave me pause. There weren’t any electronic devices here to alter our EMF reading. There was a security camera I was sure, but even that wouldn’t have made the levels jump around.

  “Are you the one we’re supposed to be looking for?” Jefferson went on.

  “Point three.”

  I couldn’t hear any disembodied voices and I couldn’t feel a sudden chill in the air, but something was definitely happening.

  “Did you die here?” he asked.

  “Point four,” I whispered.

  I let my eyes wander from the EMF reader for a moment, scanning the room that suddenly felt much more interesting than it had only moments before.

  “We heard someone say yesterday that they were meeting a woman somewhere,” Jefferson said. “Are you the one he was meeting?”

  “Point three,” I said. “Try something else.”

  “Did you know the man we heard on B-deck yesterday?”

  “Point five,” I said, a grin beginning to form on my lips.

  “Is he the one we’re supposed to find?”

  “Point six.”

  We were both silent for a moment, listening to the still air around us with wide eyes.

  “Where can we find him?” Jefferson asked after a moment.

  “Point seven,” I whispered, trying to keep my voice low in case we caught a disembodied voice on our recording.

  Silence again.

  I could only hope we were catching something on our camera that we just weren’t hearing at the moment.

  “Point five,” I said, wondering why our friend was suddenly leaving us.

  “Can you tell us who the man is we’re trying to find?” Jefferson attempted.

  “Point four.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Point three.”

  “Why is it going away?” he asked me, somewhere between frustration and panic, his British accent much thicker than normal.

  There was no way he was going to lose such a unique opportunity.

  “Sadie, what do we do?” he asked, coming to stand by me so that he could watch the EMF reader.

  I wasn’t sure why he was asking my opinion. I was the one who had bolted from my room the last time I thought I’d encountered a ghost.

  “Do something,” he practically pleaded.

  “The man we’re looking for,” I began, not sure if this would work. “The one we heard on our recording last night . . . is he the one who turned on my bathroom light?”

  I heard a small sound of either excitement or shock from Jefferson as he nudged me with his elbow and gestured toward the EMF reader in my hand, whispering reverently, “Five point oh.”

  Chapter 8

  “Hello?” a panicked voice called as the lights in the pool room suddenly popped on, practically blinding Jefferson and me.

  I grabbed our cameras and quickly shoved them in my purse and pulled him into a hug, trying my best to look scared.

  Our tour guide rushed down the stairs, looking immensely relieved to see us while the rest of the group stood near the exit, craning their necks to see if either of us had fallen into the pool and died.

  “You guys walked away too fast,” I whimpered, looking as pathetic as possible and tightening my arms around Jefferson.

  He patted my back reassuringly and made soothing shushing noises.

  At least we were good actors, right?

  “It was so dark, and we couldn’t figure out where you’d gone,” I said, throwing a few well-placed sniffs in there for good measure. “It was so scary.”

  “It’s okay,” Jefferson said reassuringly. He turned to the tour guide. “How do we get out of here? I think I need to take her back to our room. She’s obviously upset.” He injected just enough unspoken blame to make the tour guide uncomfortable.

  “Of course. I’m so sorry miss,” he said, reaching out to touch my arm but thinking better of it when Jefferson gave him a chilling look. “If you’ll follow me, there’s an exit right over here.”

  “Thank you,” I said, sounding delicate.

  We followed our guide, Jefferson keeping his arm protectively around me, until we walked into the main part of the ship where I’d been investigating the night before.

  “Will you be all right?” the guide asked us.

  I didn’t answer him but nodded somberly, keeping my eyes locked on the ground.

  “Thank you for your help,” Jefferson said, indicating that the conversation was over.

  The tour guide looked between us once more, probably trying to figure out if he was about to be sued or not, before nodding once and turning back toward the rest of his group. We watched him go in silence, trying to keep our faces straight even though I could see Jefferson’s lips tugging up in one corner with every step the guide took away from us. When he finally closed the door behind him, I burst into a laughing fit, resting my head on Jefferson’s chest and trying to catch my breath.

  “You’re completely ridiculous,” he said between his own bouts of laughter. “You know that, right?”

  “At least I’m convincing! Can you imagine if I was a bad actress?”

  “We’d be thrown off the boat and possibly arrested,” he agreed with a nod, giving my side a squeeze before dropping his hand from me. “I may be ‘the weird creepy Parrish,’ but at least I’m good in a tight spot. Deacon would have pleaded guilty right then and there.”

  “Would you give it a rest and stop being so put out about that innocent little comment? Besides, who said being weird and creepy was a bad thing?”

  I arched an eyebrow at him before walking back toward Brighton’s room.

  “Oh I see,” he said, following close behind. “You meant ‘weird and creepy’ in a good way. Silly me.”

  “Anyway,” I said pointedly, drowning out any further complaining from him. “Can you believe what just happened? I mean, I’m a little creeped out about the ghost in my bathroom, but still. We actually made contact with a spirit! We talked to someone who’s died and we got actual responses from them.”

  “I wonder if we picked up any audio on the cameras,” he said hopefully.

  “There’s only one way to find out.”

  I pushed open the wedged-open door to Brighton’s hotel room with gusto, walking at full speed until I stopped in my tracks, causing Jefferson to crash into me from behind.

  “Oh hey!” Brighton said, much too happily, trying to scoot away from Deacon without being obvious about how close they had been when I’d first walked in the room.

  I couldn’t be sure of exactly what I’d seen, but the way they’d jumped apart when I pushed through the door was enough to make me suspicious. Deacon’s trying to discretely retract his hand from Brighton’s leg was even fishier. I’d have to wait until the boys left before pressing her for information, but something was definitely up with Brighto
n and Deacon.

  “Why did you stop so fast?” Jefferson complained. “You could have warned me at least.”

  “What have you guys been up to?” I asked accusatorially.

  Brighton widened her eyes and put on her brightest smile. “Just going over the evidence from last night again.”

  Liar.

  “Oh good. Do you have anything new to show us?” I was matching her too-happy tone, trying to make this as awkward for her as possible. It was just too fun to pick on her when I got the chance. It almost made up for the stupid costumes she let the boys dress me up in for our night investigations.

  “Didn’t really find much,” Deacon said, keeping his eyes trained on the ground.

  That confirmed my suspicions at least. There was definitely something going on between them.

  “Jefferson and I have some footage to show you guys . . . I mean . . . if you don’t have other things to be doing, that is.”

  “Let’s see it,” Brighton said too quickly, scooting over and making a spot for Jefferson and me to sit in between them.

  I rolled my eyes but sat on the bed with them, connecting the camera to Brighton’s computer.

  “It was pretty amazing,” Jefferson confirmed, squeezing in between Deacon and me and putting his arm around my shoulders. “Plus Sadie confessed her undying love for me and . . . well . . . we have an announcement,” he said with a fake catch in his throat, holding up his left hand to display his fake gold wedding ring.

  “I still can’t believe you brought props for your stupid plan.” I searched for our footage on the camera.

  “Okay, now you have to explain,” Brighton said with a giggle, looking at Jefferson’s ring. “No way! Is that real gold?”

  “Of course not,” I said to her, leaving the footage for a moment to look down at Jefferson’s hand. “Wait. Is it real?”

  “It was my dad’s,” he said with a shrug, removing his arm from around my shoulder and suddenly looking uncomfortable.

  “And you just carry it around with you?” I asked.

  I knew Jefferson’s dad had died when he was young and that his mom was some kind of rich widowed socialite back in England, but he never really talked about his parents much. The one or two times I had heard him mention his dad, though, he spoke about him with a reverent pride.

  “Did you find the footage?” he asked, his voice sounding off.

  “Not yet, but I’ll keep looking,” I said, swiveling back toward the screen and ignoring the awkward turn our conversation had just taken.

  “So what did you need the ring for?” Brighton asked.

  “Sadie and I pretended to be married and on our honeymoon for the tour,” Jefferson said, letting the smile return to his face, though it didn’t seem natural.

  “No,” I said. “Jefferson pretended we were married and used that as an excuse to assault me the whole time we were on that stupid tour.”

  “Assault?” Deacon asked, suddenly interested.

  “I may have been a convincing newlywed husband,” Jefferson elaborated with a wink.

  “Okay, you and I are definitely talking later,” Brighton said.

  “Yeah, we definitely are,” I said back to her meaningfully, shutting her up on the subject.

  “Well played, mate,” Deacon said to his cousin.

  I shook my head and tried to block out the conversation happening around me, pushing the playback button on the camera in my hand, anxious to see the evidence we’d caught.

  “Oh no,” I whispered.

  “What?” Jefferson asked darkly, already knowing the answer.

  “Our footage is gone.”

  “How is that even possible?” he asked, leaning over me to scan through the tape himself. “What happened? Did you record over it somehow?”

  “No!” I stated emphatically, knowing the last thing I needed was an angry Parrish on my case. “The camera was turned off when I pulled it out of my purse. The record button couldn’t have even been pushed by accident.”

  I took Jefferson’s camera from him and tried to bring up the video he’d caught, hoping we’d have at least some sort of evidence. But just like my camera, his was blank.

  “Did you push record when we started the investigation?” he asked.

  “You saw the red light on my camera. And besides, yours doesn’t have any footage either.”

  Not taking my word for it, he took the camera back from me and scanned through it, trying to find any hint of our investigation.

  “This can’t be happening,” he said, shaking his dark curls into his eyes and breathing deeply.

  “How could our footage have been erased?”

  “Didn’t you guys say you found something? Can a spirit do that? I know they can drain batteries, but can they completely erase camera footage?” Deacon asked.

  “I’ve heard of cases like this before, but honestly, I just always assumed those people didn’t know what they were doing so they made up some story about a ghost to cover their tracks.” Jefferson was still breathing deeply. He looked like he was two seconds from throwing a chair through a window. “I guess it is possible.”

  “That’s kind of good then, right?” Brighton offered, quickly going on when Jefferson gave her a death glare. “I mean, you can tell us what happened so we know, and now you have evidence that you really did make contact.”

  “Our lack of evidence is our evidence?” Jefferson asked.

  “Yeah,” she said, sounding less sure of herself now.

  Jefferson took a steadying breath before continuing, obviously trying to calm his temper. “Brighton, we had video evidence of the electromagnetic field fluctuating as we asked questions. Now all we have is a blank tape and our word that it happened. Which evidence do you think is better?”

  “This is just motivation to get an even better experience on tape tonight,” I said, trying to be the peacemaker.

  Jefferson was quickly falling into one of his moods and I knew he’d be absolutely impossible to work with if he pouted all night. I had to find a way to twist our current predicament so that it didn’t seem so dire to him.

  “Who cares about that EMF reading? I bet tonight we can get an actual EVP.”

  “You think we’re going to catch a voice?” he asked, still skeptical.

  “We already know where to look. We just have to figure out the right questions to ask.”

  “And where do we look?” he asked.

  He still didn’t want to accept that his life wasn’t ruined.

  “My bathroom.”

  Chapter 9

  “Not the most comfortable place to investigate, is it?” Deacon asked, readjusting his position on the edge of the bathtub.

  “I’m not sure all three of us really need to be in here,” I said. “And I don’t think I need to be dressed up for tonight’s investigation.”

  I knew it was futile to try to protest the costumes, but it was always worth a try.

  Tonight I wore a long powder pink satin dress with a shawl collar and sleeves. The hems of the skirt and the sleeves were trimmed with a ruffle and the entire dress had little flowers embroidered on it.

  Needless to say, it was not the type of thing I’d wear if I had a say in the matter, and I still didn’t understand why they made me wear the costumes when it was obvious they would all look better on Brighton and her perfect everything. No ghost was going to believe that a short Cuban girl with a pixie cut was actually someone who belonged in their time period.

  “You aren’t dressed up,” Jefferson said, tossing a dark wig at me. “Yet.”

  “You’re the worst.” I fixed the curly brown shoulder-length wig on top of my head, feeling a little less conspicuous now that my hair matched the time period. “How on earth are you even affording all of these wigs and costumes?”

  Jefferson looked down at the ground, tapped his finger against his knee, looked back up at me and said, “It’s better if you don’t know.”r />
  I don’t know why I’d expected a normal answer from him.

  “And how do you know my dress size?” I continued, determined not to be derailed by his cryptic answers.

  “Again, it’s probably better if you don’t know.”

  I looked up at Deacon, who gave me a “What can you do? He’s crazy” shrug, like we should all just keep indulging the obvious shadiness in the room. I mean, I wasn’t sure what else we could do. Jefferson was a riddle that was probably best left unsolved. It was like turning over a rock. You never found candy under the rock. Just creepy crawly things you didn’t want to know about.

  “And again I say, do all three of us really need to be in here? It’s a little cramped.” I thought a subject change was in order. Especially after my mind had started thinking of all the ways Jefferson could have gotten my dress size without me knowing.

  Each idea was worse than the last.

  “It’s not that bad,” Jefferson said, nearly knocking over one of our cameras with his elbow.

  We were completely surrounded by technology in the already tiny bathroom, and the various devices were all perched much too precariously. It didn’t seem like a good idea to balance an expensive EMF reader on the faucet of the sink.

  “Do we have everything we need?” Deacon asked.

  “You’ve got the EMF reader, two cameras, and an audio recorder for any possible EVP,” Brighton said over our earpieces. “I didn’t give you the shadow detector, laser grid, or the REM pod since I figured the space is too small for that anyway.”

  “It’s like you guys are speaking a different language,” Deacon said. “I’m just going to make up my own names for these things. From now on the EMF is the electronic measurement finder.”

  Brighton giggled. “That’s basically what it does, so feel free to call it that.”

  “This is definitely enough equipment.” I pulled on the overly frilly sleeves of my dress, trying not to shiver. My thin dress didn’t do much to protect me against the chill from the cold toilet seat lid I was sitting on, despite the fact that I’d kept my jeans on underneath it.