Cherry Hill

by James A. Moore

  “Well, this day probably hasn’t turned out the way you wanted it to, Ms. Dunlow. I’m sorry for that.”

  She granted him a small smile that made his heart skip a beat. “Oh, it’s really not that unusual for me.”

  “Being locked in an asylum is just par for the course?” He flashed her his best grin to show he was joking.

  “Believe me, when Jonathan Crowley is involved in my life, things tend to get strange.”

  “Who is he to you?”

  “He’s a family friend.” She shrugged and suddenly found the inside of her coffee cup absolutely fascinating. “He’s also, well, he’s sort of like my godfather.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what you can about him?”

  “Because Jonathan doesn’t like it when people talk about him.”

  “I promise I won’t tell him.”

  She looked at him again, her brow knitting in concern. “Believe me, Detective Branaugh, he’d find out anyway.”

  “Can you at least tell me what made him change?”

  “Oh, yes,” she nodded her head and took a sip of coffee. “He changed because you asked him for help, Detective.”

  “How could my asking a man for help make him grow younger?”

  “Jonathan Crowley has certain responsibilities. I don’t really understand it myself, not completely at least. He turned his back on his duties because he wanted to have a normal life.” She shook her head, at a loss for how to explain what she wanted to say. “Think about it this way; when you are on duty you carry your badge and your police equipment, right?”

  “Sure.”

  “Jonathan is granted abilities as a result of his position. Those abilities are his badge and weapon.”

  “Can you clarify that anymore?”

  “No. I think it would be best if you asked Jonathan about the rest of it. Like I said, he doesn’t like it when people talk about him.”

  Branaugh sat and contemplated what he’d just heard. Her claims were nonsense, of course. They had to be. He might be willing to accept the notion of ghosts, but Amelia was making the man out to be some sort of guardian of the universe and the idea was preposterous.

  Except for the super human strength it took for an old man to snap the restraints that had locked him to the ground and the way he’d grown younger and regenerated a leg, it was all absolute shit.

  “Can Crowley really see ghosts?”

  Amelia nodded her head, a worried expression creeping over her features like a shadow. “Yes. He can see ghosts and other things too.”

  Amelia Dunlow stopped talking and Carl joined her in silence, uncertain what to say or how to react to what she had already told him.

  ***

  The guards were still chuckling when Crowley walked away from their locker room. He was chuckling too, but only because he was now wearing one of their spare uniforms. Sooner or later, he might get lucky and Amelia might actually get around to finding him decent civvies but in the meantime the dark blue outfit beat all hell out of the surgical scrubs for comfort and fashion.

  “There’s nothing like a little mind screwing to put me in a happy place.” The guards would recover, and when they did they’d very likely come after him seeking retaliation. That was fine, too, because aside from a little magic to confuse them, he normally preferred a chance to break a few bones when people got bitchy.

  It didn’t take him long to find one of the secured doors between levels, and as he now had a set of keys it was easy enough to go about examining the entire facility.

  But once he was in the stairwell, he settled against the wall instead of moving on. The memories of his previous life weren’t assaulting him as heavily anymore, but they were still crashing through his senses from time to time and he needed a moment to recover. His hands were clean, but they still felt bloodied. It wasn’t a comfortable sensation.

  None of his past was comfortable, really. Even the best parts had been sullied and the more he thought about his wife and children, the more the memories of their deaths fueled his desire to destroy everything around him.

  Mostly, he wanted to destroy Amelia for convincing him to come back. With that in mind, he changed course and headed for the central building again. Let the guards come if they wanted to; they were irrelevant in the long run. He’d likely be alive long after each of them was dead, and in the meantime they might prove useful.

  He walked through the lowest level of the North Wing and looked into each and every door as he traveled. Most of the cells were occupied by patients who were either too far gone to notice the world around them, or so overly medicated that by the time they spotted someone looking through the small window that person had been gone for several minutes.

  He wasn’t really interested in the patients just then. He was busy studying the dead around them. The ghosts went about their own business, but he found one woman sitting in her cell with several specters talking to her at the same time. She noticed them despite her attempts not to. The woman was too skinny from not eating enough and her muscle tone was shot to hell from inactivity. She’d probably been pretty enough once, but neglect had taken any looks she’d had and tossed them out the window. Now she was a mousy woman with dull red hair and a face that sagged earlier in her life than it should have.

  There were no papers or files anywhere around the cell that might tell him who she was. Instead of hunting them up, he just unlocked the door and beckoned to the woman with one hand.

  She saw him and got up, automatically placing her hands in front of her, waiting for the cuffs that would restrain her. He hadn’t thought to grab any of those while he was stealing the outfit, so he shook his head. “No need, cupcake. We’re going for a walk today and I’m going to trust you not to get sassy with me.”

  “Cupcake?” She looked around as if trying to spot someone else he might be talking to.

  “It’s a pet name. I don’t know what your real name is.” He was patient with her; he had to be. Losing his temper with a mental patient wasn’t on his agenda.

  “I’m Robin.”

  “Well, Robin, tell me something?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you see ghosts or hear voices?”

  She cringed as she nodded and Crowley forced himself to be pleasant. It was time to make a few people around this place understand the facts of the afterlife.

  “Would you like me to make them go away?”

  Misery made her beautiful. She blinked her light brown eyes and nodded slowly, as her eyes began to water. “Please?”

  Crowley put an arm around her shoulders and nodded. “Okay, Robin, I need you to do two things for me.”

  Her entire body shivered and her voice trembled: “What do I need to do?” The way she spoke said volumes about what she might have done in the past to escape the dead. He could imagine too easily what people might have asked of her and was filled with disgust.

  “I need you to ask me to get rid of them, and I need you to be patient for a few minutes, okay?”

  “Alright.” She spoke at a whisper and shook, the tears spilling down her face as they walked toward the center of the complex.

  “Will you ask me now?”

  “Can you help me? Can you make the ghosts go away?”

  Jonathan Crowley smiled at her, and her tears came faster, stronger as she looked at him. The difference was that the tears falling now were not of sorrow, but of hope and joy.

  “Yes, Robin. I’ll help you. I promise.”

  It didn’t take long to find a nurse in the corridor as they walked and Crowley calmly got her attention. “Miss?”

  The woman looked at him and then at his unrestrained charge and frowned. “Shouldn’t you be using restraints?”

  “Not now.” He smiled and the nurse flinched a bit. “If I need them later, I’ll rustle some up. In the meantime…” He looked at her nameplate, “Kimberly, could you be a doll and tell Doctors Finney and Harrington that Jonathan Crowley would like to see them in the break room?”


  If his name meant anything at all to her she didn’t let it show. “I’ll see if I can find them for you.” Her smile was pleasant and professional, but she moved a little faster after he’d nodded his thanks and started down the final stretch of hallway to the makeshift cafeteria.

  “Robin?”

  “Yeah?” She sniffed and wiped the tears from her face.

  “Did you tell your doctors you could see ghosts?”

  “Yeah. They didn’t believe me.”

  Crowley smiled again. “Really? Tell you what, you and me, we’re going to have a little fun and then I promise you the ghosts will go away. Does that sound like a deal?”

  She nodded her head and leaned into him, trying to hug his body. He let her despite his immediate desire to shove her back. It had nothing to do with her, but after all he’d been through he wasn’t feeling very sociable. Still, she was hurting and probably hadn’t had simple human contact in a very long time.

  He found the room without any trouble—actually reading the signs this time—and moved into the conference room with his new friend. Three of the staff were there, people he hadn’t met and didn’t much care to, as well as Amelia and Detective Branaugh. The latter two looked guiltily in his direction and Amelia jumped a little in her seat when he entered.

  All three staff members got out of their seats, but only one was dumb enough to head in his direction. “What is the meaning of this?” The man was two inches taller than Crowley and as thin as a reed.

  “What’s the meaning of what?”

  “You can’t bring a patient in here.” The man looked positively constipated at the very idea.

  “Well, she’s hungry. I mean, look at her, she’s skin and bones. I’m on the hungry side myself, so I figured what the heck, we’d get a bite to eat.”

  “It’s against policy to bring an unrestrained patient out of her cell and walk her through the asylum.” Oh yes, the man was getting angrier by the second. Crowley smiled for him.

  “It’s against policy for who to take a patient through the asylum without proper security measures.”

  “For any employee of Cherry Hill. Now get this woman out of here!”

  “You’re screaming. You might upset someone.” Most of the people in the room were looking at them now. The only exception was Amelia, who had slid quietly out of her seat and was backing away.

  The man jabbed a finger into Crowley’s chest. “Listen, I want comedy I’ll go to the movies. Get her out of here and then why don’t you come back here and we can discuss the disciplinary hearing I see in your future?”

  “Touch me again, sunshine, and I’ll break your finger.” The man stared, furious, and very deliberately jabbed Crowley in the chest a second time.

  “Jonathan! Don’t!” Amelia moved from her hiding place at exactly the same time Crowley wrapped his right hand around the offending digit and forced it back, the smile never leaving his face.

  The good doctor was not smiling. The angered expression on his face paled as his index finger bent back until the joint snapped with an audible crunch. He tried to pull away, but Crowley squeezed down even harder and the man fell to his knees, whining.

  Crowley kept his hand on the dislocated finger for three seconds and then let it go. Without bothering to look at the man again, he moved further into the break room with Robin in tow.

  Branaugh gave him a hard look and then moved over to check on the doctor with the bad attitude and wounded hand.

  John was a perfect gentleman; he even pulled out the seat for Robin. By the time he was seated himself, the other two strangers in the room were taking over for Branaugh and trying to tend to Dr. Pissy.

  The detective sat down facing him and shook his head. “You know I can arrest you for that.”

  Crowley nodded. “You can, but you won’t.”

  Pissy pointed with his undamaged hand and started bellowing. “The hell he won’t! I want that man arrested! I want to press charges!”

  Robin was looking at each person who spoke, her eyes wide and frightened. Amelia walked past the table and looked the man in his eyes. The expression on his face changed almost instantly, and she leaned in closer, whispering into his ear. Crowley shook his head in disgust: he knew where this was going.

  Sure enough, when she was done talking Dr. Pissy was calm and without another word he left the area to get his hand properly tended to. He looked like he could use it; the finger was swollen to twice its normal size and rapidly darkening in color.

  Other voices were coming closer and Crowley recognized both Finney and Harrington before they actually entered the room. The older man was shaking his head and Harrington was scowling so hard Crowley feared his face might stick that way.

  “John, I really am trying to work with you here, but you’ve gone and injured one of my doctors.” Finney came closer. He spoke to Crowley but his eyes were on Robin the entire time. “And it really is against policy to bring patients out of their cells without proper restraints. How are you today, Robin?”

  The woman nodded her head meekly and looked at the table. “I’m fine, sir.”

  “Well, Robin and I had a little talk about her therapy and the way it was going and we decided it was time to get everything out on the table.”

  He stood up from his chair and moved toward the row of tables set up with cold cuts and other supplies for making sandwiches. It probably wasn’t as exciting as the fare the doctors were used to, but with the lockdown in effect there were limits on how quickly the cafeteria staff could get everything together that they needed. When he found the condiments he grabbed a handful of salt packages and carried them back to the table, carefully tearing each one and pouring out the contents. In a perfect world he would have had better supplies to work with, but he was the first to say the way things were running left plenty of room for improvement.

  “Over the course of the last few days, I’ve had all three of you gentlemen ask me whether or not I believe in ghosts, and how it is that I can see them when you can’t.” He took the salt he’d poured and started moving it around on the table, spreading it out as he talked. “Well, I couldn’t give you any real answers that would satisfy you, because I wasn’t all there in the memory department.”

  “Jonathan, you’ve had an extremely busy day. Don’t you think you’d feel better if you got some rest?” Harrington was trying to placate him.

  “Don’t interrupt me, Doc. It’s rude. No, I’m not tired and I don’t feel like sleeping anymore.” He paused and let his hands clench. “I’ve had enough rest and besides, that option was taken away from me.”

  He finished making his patterns in the salt and everyone but Amelia looked to see if they could decipher what he had done.

  “At any rate, I’m going to give you the answers to your questions, but first, humor me for a minute or so. When I’m done, if you still want me to rest, I’ll go back to my little cell and get some shuteye. Believe me, it won’t bother me at all.” He looked to Finney. “Sound like a deal, Roger?”

  “All right, John. I’m game. If you can prove the existence of ghosts to all three of us, you can have your free reign in the asylum provided you check in every hour or so and you don’t try to leave the premises.”

  Harrington looked like his eyes were going to drop right out of his head.

  Crowley nodded.

  “Okay, so first question is, are you Robin’s doctor?”

  “Yes, I am.” Finney crossed his arms and waited for the next part.

  Crowley didn’t keep him waiting. “Well, currently she is surrounded by six ghosts that I can see.”

  “That hardly proves anything.”

  John tapped the table in front of him and watched as the salt blackened. He listened to the sharp intakes of breath from his audience and smiled. “The proof is in the pudding.”

  ***

  Roger Finney backed up a step. He’d thought Crowley was just playing games with the salt, a little something to distract himself. Now he wasn’t
nearly as sure.

  “What did you do?”

  The man smiled and shrugged. “A little something I learned when I was much younger. I haven’t actually had to do this in a long time, but I don’t quite trust all of my abilities just yet.” Without another word his hand lashed out and scooped the dark dusty substance into the air. Whatever he had done, it wasn’t salt that hit Roger in the face. Salt wouldn’t have made it far enough into the air to do anything at all before it settled to the ground. The black powder struck Roger and he stepped back, breathing in without intending to and wondering whether or not he’d just allowed himself to be poisoned. He couldn’t see, but he could hear the sharp intakes of breath from the two men standing near him and knew they’d been hit as well.

  Roger was fine right up until the moment the black substance hit his eyes. It didn’t burn or sting and he barely felt it make contact, but the second it did, the air around him grew black.

  He couldn’t see Crowley for a moment, but he heard him. “I’m sorry, gentlemen, but sometimes it’s easier to show you than to tell you. You’ll be blind for a few seconds, but don’t panic. Nothing here will hurt you. No one gets in here or out of here until this is done.”

  “Fuck! I’m BLIND!” Branaugh’s voice was thunderous and panicked.

  “What did I just say, Detective? Remain calm and give it a few seconds.”

  True to Crowley’s word, Roger saw light again though it was weaker than he expected. The room seemed filled with a thick gray smoke that seethed, pushed by unfelt currents in the air.

  “Here’s the secret you wanted to know. Perception is everything. I’ll keep this simple, gentlemen. There are different levels of reality. I won’t get into theological discussions with you, but believe me when I say that not everyone out there ever makes it to Heaven or Hell. A lot of people get lost along the way, and finding their way again gets harder and harder, because after a while they are consumed by their pasts, buried in memories they either can’t get away from or don’t want to let go.”