The Skinwalker Conspiracies - 02

by Jim Bernheimer

  Wishing Amos, or more specifically, the ghost knife at my buddy’s side, was here, I still made decent time undoing all those knots. I helped Isaiah Nixon to his feet and he stumbled a bit, which was funny for a ghost.

  “Well, if you help me outside to the well, I can get me a drink and get on out of here afore Eunice gets back.”

  I shrugged. Without her husband to vent her anger on, she’d likely run out of steam and maybe I could talk her into leaving. It sounded like a good plan, which was obviously why it was doomed to failure.

  “Crazy” Eunice was standing right by that well outside, waiting for us, phantom switch in hand. “You ain’t getting one single drop out of this well! You hear me?”

  Her aura was definitely stronger than his, but nothing I couldn’t handle if need be.

  “Get outta the way, you fool woman. I’m done. I’m sick and tired of you! Boy, help me get by her and get some water!”

  “Why don’t we all take a moment and calm down?” I offered.

  “You let him free, boy! I’ll deal with you after I take care of him.”

  Sparing a glance over my shoulder, I saw the Olsens staring out the broken window at me and listening to me talk to no one. I wondered what mom’s favorite daytime guru would say. “Alright, let’s talk it out. Isaiah says getting some water will allow him to leave. I think it’s time to let him go.”

  “Let him go!” the woman howled. “That water makes him stronger. He ain’t nothing but a big old liar … been one since the day he was born.”

  I wasn’t in mom’s favorite show. I was in the ones where the guys in the black “security” shirts hold back the two parties yelling and screaming at each other. Great. Just great.

  “She’s lying,” Isaiah said. “It happens every time her lips move!”

  “How dare you!” Eunice exclaimed. “After all you did to me. You wrecked my life!”

  “You up and killed me!”

  “You sucked the life right out of me long before that!”

  The accusations were tossed back and forth, faster than a pro tennis match and I had to ask myself if this was really worth all this nonsense. I kept them from directly attacking one another, but I’m no psychologist. My background as a therapist comes from being forced to sit across from the military ones, and a single community college class in abnormal psychology. Though they definitely qualified as abnormal, I wasn’t any good at that kind of stuff.

  “Shut up, both of you!” I’d had enough. “You’re both dead. Get over yourselves. What’s the phrase? Do you want to be happy or do you want to be right?”

  They both stopped and stared at me with blank looks. “No. Crap! It’s the other way around, but you know what I’m saying.”

  I took my hand off of Isaiah’s flannel shirt and said, “Did you forget to tell me some things while I was untying you? I don’t care how powerful that well water can make you; it might be plenty for her, but it won’t help you against me. I don’t like being lied to.”

  Mr. Nixon looked suitably cowed by my threat as I turned my attention to his “slightly” better half and said, “Alright, I heard his story. Let’s hear yours.”

  “He made my life a living hell after he was dead. I knew he was there. I don’t know how many times he’d push me down the steps, or trip me. I stopped using the stove after he tried to burn the house down. For the last six months I was alive, I lived on canned soup that I couldn’t even heat up!” She’d turned on the tear pumps and I don’t know if her husband felt anything, but I could tell this was a classic lose-lose situation.

  “You both are a pair of idiots,” I concluded. “I’m guessing neither of you wants to move on and you just want to terrorize the other. Am I getting warm? Don’t bother answering. Go ahead, Isaiah, take a swig from the well. If it’s all that’s keeping you from moving on into the afterlife, I won’t stand between you and whatever comes next.” He hesitated. “So you were lying to me? Alright then, what’s it going to take to get you two to move on? Why don’t you go your separate ways?”

  “We can’t leave the property,” Eunice answered. “We’re tied to it.”

  To hell with the daytime talk show people. I really should have brought Silas. Fortunately, I had the hotel’s number on a card in my pocket. “Stay right there and don’t do anything. I’ve got to make a phone call.”

  Ten minutes later, I approached and saw the truce was still in effect. “Alright, my friend and I talked things over and here’s what we think. You’ve got to go together and that means getting rid of all the hate.”

  “And how do you suppose we do that?” Eunice demanded.

  “Well, you can start by getting him a drink of water.”

  “What?”

  “Silas thinks it was his way of controlling you all these years. That’s why it gave him power over you. If you do it voluntarily, he’s not the boss of you anymore. Once he’s got his power back, he returns the favor and the two of you walk hand in hand off the property and set yourselves free.”

  “What if that don’t work?” Isaiah said.

  I answered, thinking back to my time with a naked school marm and the spirits trapped inside an iron-ringed barrier in Pennsylvania, “Well, I’m here too and I’ve had some success at breaking through barriers holding ghosts in.”

  The old rusty crank on the well worked, and I lowered the bucket down, fetching a pail of some of the nastiest looking muck I’d ever seen. Eunice dipped her hands in it and let her husband drink it in. I saw his aura flare and strengthen.

  “Your turn,” I said.

  He hesitated, but it only took a stern glare from me for him to comply. Eunice’s glow matched his and I ran back inside to let the Olsens know I was walking them down the dirt road to the edge of the property. The Olsens were looking at their digital camera and debating if they really saw some water floating in the air or not.

  It took about twenty minutes to walk down the poorly maintained path. Navigating my way, I held them up. The husband said, “Here’s as far as we’ve ever been able to get. There’s a wall here and it’s still stopping me.”

  Stepping around them, I walked to the gravel road right next to the rusted-out, old mailbox and held out my hands. “You two hold hands and give me your free ones. I’ll pull you through.”

  They both looked at each other like they’d rather grab live snakes. Eunice huffed and grasped his hand before holding the other out to me. Not to be outdone, her husband grabbed my other hand. The barrier resisted and for a moment, I thought the two weren’t going to make it, but like a champagne cork popping out the bottle, they came through to the other side and we fell onto the ground in a heap of stupidity.

  If powers such as fate and destiny actually existed, they probably meant for the two of them to stay there until they forgave each other or some kind of crap like that. Forgiveness wouldn’t have happened any time in the near future, so I didn’t have any remorse about speeding up the process. Sometimes people need to go their own way. Isaiah nodded his thanks and faded from existence. His wife started down the gravel road in the direction of civilization.

  “Aren’t you going over to the other side?”

  “No young man, I always wanted to travel. He didn’t. I’ll go on eventually, but first I’m going to see Paris.”

  “Ghost free?” Gae Olsen asked. Hank was looking up at the roof and wondering aloud how much it would cost to replace it.

  “As far as I can tell,” I answered and explained how the Nixons had been there playing this angry little tug of war with each other. She said it reminded her of some Michael Douglas movie. “We can bring the deacon I’m traveling with out here, and he can bless the grounds. It might help get rid of any negative energy left behind. But if you want my advice – bulldoze the house and start over even if you decide to do the bed and breakfast thing.”

  She gave me a genuine smile and said, “Thank you ever so much. Is there anything we can do for you, Mr. Ross?”

  I immediately revised my
opinion of the “deep south.” Not too many people ask me that after I’ve helped them out with a sticky situation. They usually try to brush the whole experience off and go back to their “normal” life, but the Olsens were genuinely impressed. So in return for Brother Silas coming out to the property for a blessing, Hank called the hotel and had the lion’s share of our stay shifted to his department, which greatly eased my immediate financial burden. He also granted me one final request.

  As the long arm of the law grabbed hold of Amy, she tried to pin this thing back on me, saying that a man in a Caddy broke into her house and stole her baby. Her attempt was pretty feeble, what with half her house already boxed up and her telling her neighbors the baby was already living with some relatives. Still, I didn’t like that and wanted a little payback of my own. It was definitely against the rules, but it’s nice when “the man” looks the other way.

  “You!” Amy said sitting down across the thick plexiglass and grabbing the phone. I wonder who she was expecting – maybe her public defender.

  “Sorry. I almost didn’t recognize you without the wig on.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I’ll make this quick, Aldridge. Your boyfriend’s ghost told me what you were up to. He’s here right now. You can believe it or not, but in about five seconds; the lights in this room are going to flicker. That’ll be him.”

  I glanced at Hector, who jabbed his hand into the light switch on the wall. Sure enough things got darker, and the guard - along with the others - stared around.

  “You’re lying!” she said, but there was a hint of fear in her voice. I actually would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy that on some level.

  “Now, he’s going to do it again in three … two … one ….”

  While everyone murmured, I smiled, leaned forward, and said, “Hector will spend most of his time looking out for little DJ, but I think he’ll have time to visit you every now and then. When the lights do that, you’ll know he’s around. Have a nice life, Amy. I hope you get everything you deserve.”

  With that slick line, my business in Mississippi was concluded. Sometimes living with these powers was a pain in the ass. Counting the late paranormal investigator and distant relative Darren Porter, every Ferryman I’ve heard about died early. Edgar Allen Poe just barely made it into his forties. Darren was in his early thirties and William Poe shuffled off the mortal coil when he was my age. So, miserable pay aside, the life expectancy was downright discouraging. Even so, there were times that doing something good, like saving Daniel Jesús Aldridge, made me feel a little bit better. I wasn’t sure what to think about the Nixons, but on some level, that felt like a win too. Either way, I had a few more dollars in my pocket than I originally thought I was going to have, and I slept well that night.

  That was about all I could hope for.

  Episode 16: Old Flames and Mushrooms

  There’ve been times in my life I dreaded ringing someone’s doorbell. Back in my early teens, there was that day Jimmy Wilkes fell out of a tree and broke his wrist and I had to go get his mom. I’m fairly certain she still blames me.

  Perhaps “dreaded” was the wrong word in this case. The door opening didn’t frighten me and the woman behind didn’t either. What she stood for did. Heather happened to be my last successful relationship. Sadly, it was only “successful” in comparison to my recent adventures in that arena.

  “I’m coming!” A rushed voice called from inside the small ranch-style house. Considering that the last time I’d seen Heather, she’d been living in a trailer with a couple of other dancers, this was an upgrade. Luckily, one of those girls still lived there and told me where to find Heather.

  The door finally opened. The woman in the doorframe took a good look at me. “Mike Ross? What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Hey Heather, I was back in the neighborhood and wanted to stop by and say hi. How are you doing?” My old flame actually looked better than when I was dating her. As a dancer, she was really skinny, didn’t eat enough, and compensated for that by drinking too much. Being a stay at home mom and not straddling a pole six nights a week had resulted in some additional “meat” on her frame, but it made her look healthier and, at least to me, more attractive.

  “I’m married now, Mike.” She stated, holding her ring up for inspection. There was a hint of caution in her voice. We’d called it quits a few weeks before I deployed to Iraq for the last time. She had been searching for a meal ticket and I didn’t fit the bill. Rumor has it that by the time I was humping my gear onto a transport plane, she was already humping … well dating … someone else. Like I said, it was only successful in relative terms. Apparently, Heather thought I was here for some kind of hook up.

  “Yeah, I’d heard,” I answered and tried to look as casual as possible. “I actually wanted to visit Don’s grave and then look up Sonya to see how she’s doing. I was hoping you might know where she is these days.”

  Oddly enough, Don Hodge’s ghost was the one that told me Heather had finally latched on to someone who would marry her. Shortly after that, Don betrayed me, possessed me, and then finally begged for his un-life before I gave Colonel Strong Vincent the go ahead to finish my former friend. Visiting the graveyard was on my list, but it sure wasn’t to pay my respects to old Donnie.

  “Oh,” Heather said, somewhat put off by the fact that I wasn’t begging her to take me back. “It’s not something to talk about on the porch. C’mon in. Want something to drink? I’ve got lemonade and iced tea. Probably too early for a beer and I’m not sure if we have any. Sorry, I wasn’t expecting any guests.”

  “No worries, water will be fine.” Killeen was sweltering in the early summer. I hadn’t really missed it. Too bad my mom and others talked me out of coming down here in the spring, when the heat wasn’t so suffocating.

  “What have you been up to, Mike? I see you’re walking fairly well.”

  “Yeah, I’m still a bit hard of hearing in my right ear and every now and then my eye gives me fits,” I said, enjoying the inside joke that she wouldn’t get. “I finished my first year of college. Better late than never, I guess.”

  Mom had this crazy notion about me finishing my freshman year instead of immediately leaving to track down the Skinwalker possessing my dad. Somehow, despite everything that got in the way, I had. In a way, that simple accomplishment made me proud. It was a hint of normalcy in my otherwise chaotic life. That was me, David Michael Ross, Junior - “B” student at Montgomery Community College by day and Ferryman to the dead at night.

  “Good for you,” she said gesturing to the couch before heading into the kitchen. She stopped and blew kisses at her baby. Given the pink outfit, I guessed a girl.

  I looked around the living room, which consisted of mismatched furniture, a small flat panel TV mounted to the wall, and a playpen complete with a wide-eyed ankle biter giving me the once over.

  Could’ve been my life, if I’d wanted it.

  “Cute kid.” I glanced around for signs of her older boy. “Where’s Dominic? How’s the little squirt doing?”

  The grinding of the ice dispenser made it difficult to hear Heather. “He’s great, going into second grade in the fall. Right now, he’s up visiting his grandparents for a couple of weeks. I’ll have to tell him you stopped by. Kaitlin here is a handful already. When she starts walking, I’m in so much trouble.”

  Dominic always called me “Unca Mike.” He was a good kid whose mere presence managed to scare the willies out of me. I definitely wasn’t ready to be a stand-in father to some other guy’s kid.

  “Is she sleeping through the night?” It’s a popular question whenever parents with toddlers gather. Since we were still doing small talk, I figured it was appropriate and it got me away from long-buried thoughts associated with being Dominic’s stepdad.

  “No, she’ll sleep about three or four hours at a stretch. Just long enough for me to get the house clean and catch a nap. My parents come down every other week and give
me a hand, but I’ll be grateful as can be when Sam comes back from Afghanistan.”

  “How long has he got left on his tour?”

  “Four months. He says things are pretty shitty there right now. It’s funny. When you were going over to Iraq, things were okay in Afghanistan and hittin’ the fan in Iraq. Now, it’s just the opposite.”

  “What’s his MOS?” I asked, hoping the guy didn’t spend his days in the line of fire.

  “He’s a welder in the motor pool, keeping the Hummers humming and all that jazz. Long days in a welder’s kit repairing vehicles, but thankfully no fighting.”

  The sad thing was, it sounded like she’d traded up. Sam was smart enough to have a skill that meant something in the real world, which was more than I could say about my time in the service. I haven’t seen too many classifieds asking for machine gunners.