Not Quite Gone

by Lyla Payne

  Vera collapses on a small wicker love seat on the sun porch, probably because she’s wearing four-inch espadrilles in the house. They remind me of Hadley Renee the day she led me into her beauty salon with every intention of keeping me there for what she’d hoped was the short remainder of my life, and I swallow hard, forcing away the bone-chilling memory. Leo had been the one to be there for me that day, too.

  “What do you want to know?” she asks, still curt as she examines her fingernails.

  Leo and I sit on the opposite-facing love seat while I gather my thoughts. “I want to know about Nan Robbins, anything you’ve got, but mostly whether she and Brick Drayton were friendly.”

  She thinks for a minute, then picks up a drink that looks like a Bloody Mary. I suspect it’s not her first one of the day. Woman after my own heart.

  “I don’t know much about Nan. No one did. She wasn’t like the rest of us—she knew it, we knew it. It wasn’t like the kids today, with the daily bullying and mean-girl shit—honestly, most of us had better things to do with our time—but she didn’t have any friends.” Vera shrugs. “It never seemed to bother her.”

  I swallow my revulsion at the offhand dismissal. Nan must have felt so out of place and then to have not a single person reach out? If she had killed herself, I’d understand why. Leo tenses at my side, his disgust almost palpable. I don’t like sitting here with this specimen any more than he does, but pissing her off isn’t going to get us anywhere.

  “What about Brick?” I ask.

  “Brick Drayton.” She cocks her head to the side, like a dog trying to make sense of the English language. “I’ve seen him around at some charity events and at the club. It’s hard to believe he’s the same person I went to high school with—at least back when Nan was around.”

  “How so?” I can hear the shortness in my tone. There’s no way to control it. I just want to get out of here.

  “He was nothing like his older brother. Nothing like his sister, either, who’s less than a year older than him. Brick was a weirdo, no doubt. Quiet. Awkward. Depressed.” She squints, as though trying to see into the past. “I think that’s why he and Nan ended up getting so close. Odd ducks, both of them.”

  I sit up straighter at the same time Leo uncrosses his legs. “So they were friends?”

  “I mean, none of us knew the nature of their relationship but they were always together. Whispering at lunch, cutting class, huddled up in detention because they were always ignoring directions. Thick as thieves.” She knocks back the rest of her drink and then chomps on an olive. “He was seeing a therapist. His mom forced him after he downed a whole bottle of her happy pills in sixth grade.”

  The revelation, though obviously no big thing to Vera, knocks the wind out of me. It wipes my mind completely blank, save one thought: how bad must it have been at home for an eleven-or twelve-year-old boy to want to die? What’s the real reason my boyfriend decided that crossing an ocean to finish school was the best option? How did Brick go from that hopeless kid to the cocky asshole I know and don’t love?

  “How do you know?” Leo jumps in, likely realizing I’m at a loss.

  “About him trying to kill himself? Charleston’s a small town and the prep school a microcosm of that. Everyone knew.”

  Vera using the word microcosm has only confused me further.

  Leo keeps going. “No, about him seeing a therapist.”

  “Oh, that. We saw the same one.” She rolls her eyes. “My mother caught me masturbating the summer before seventh grade and freaked out. Some of her idiot country club friends fed her some crap about me being too young, that I’d probably been molested by someone, so she made me go to therapy until I could tell her who had done it.”

  “That’s fucked up.” The words dump out of my mouth onto my lap before I can stop them. It’s rude, maybe, but I stand by the assessment.

  “Oh for sure. I was never molested and got sent to a shrink. And all those poor girls who do get touched by uncles or whoever, and no one believes them.” She eats her last olive and frowns into her empty glass. “That’s my mother for you.”

  My phone rings, trying to distract me from this conversation that has gone in a most unexpected and bizarre direction. A glance reveals a phone number that’s not in my contacts list but looks familiar. I elbow Leo. “I think it’s Reynolds. I’m going to take it.”

  He nods, opening his mouth to ask Vera another question that will hopefully keep her butt on that love seat—although I’m not sure anything but another Bloody Mary could get her up—and I wander off the sun porch and back into the kitchen, catching the call on the fourth ring.

  “Hello?”

  “Is this Graciela Harper?”

  “Yes. Reynolds?”

  There’s a pause that goes on so long I hold my breath, thinking she must have hung up. “Yes. I got your message.”

  “Oh.” I swallow, unsure why she’s not saying anything else. “Well, I was wondering if I could come and talk to you about your sister.”

  “Why?”

  The thought of telling her about the ghost thing over the phone sends me looking for a chair. There’s a barstool on one side of a small island that does the trick, but even with my feet off the floor, the words don’t come. “I’ve been working as an archivist out at Drayton Hall and just…some questions have come up regarding her death and whether or not it was really a suicide. I wanted your thoughts.”

  It’s not a good answer. I realize that and she probably does, too. My palm sweats against my phone while I wait on her response.

  “I don’t know what her death has to do with Drayton. It took place there but it’s not like Nan had anything to do with the family. It’s just the spot she chose.” Her response is automatic. Timed.

  “Do you know why?” The question pops into my head and straight out of my mouth.

  “Why she chose that tree? No.”

  I don’t know why I think she’s lying, but I do. There must be a reason, and who would know better than Nan’s sister? Except maybe Brick Drayton, apparently.

  There’s noise in the background over the line; a door slams and a girl’s voice calls out, her words demanding but unintelligible.

  “Look, I have to go. If you want to come by Monday morning, after eight, we can talk for a few minutes.” She hangs up in my ear, but she agreed to see me. Us, if Leo’s free.

  And I didn’t even have to tell her about seeing Nan’s ghost. Not yet.

  I will tell her. All my ghosts have been primarily concerned with one thing—family. That they’re taken care of, that they know they’re not forgotten, or in Anne’s case, that they’re warned. Nan hasn’t been able to tell me exactly what her intention is in hanging around this world, but my gut and my growing experience says it could have to do with Reynolds Young. And she’s going to help me figure out what it is whether she likes it or not.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I’m on her porch at 8:15 the following Monday, having immensely enjoyed my relaxing weekend that consisted mostly of too much sun down on the docks with my boyfriend and pizzas with Amelia. Leo had to take Marcella to school this morning because Lindsay was opening the restaurant so he’s not here, but that’s okay. As nice as it is to have support, sometimes it’s still easier to talk about all this stuff with strangers instead of people who know me.

  Reynolds answers the door after a couple of tense moments. The sight of her face, similar in structure and coloring to Nan’s, knocks me for a bit of a loop. They’ve got the same color hair and eyes, the same sturdy stature.

  It takes me a moment but I manage to untie my tongue. “Hi, I’m Graciela. Harper.”

  Reynolds stares at my outstretched hand as though it’s coated in Ebola and not an accepted form of human greeting for several seconds before deciding to shake it. Her grip is dry and firm, with a tremble that betrays some sort of nerves. “Reynolds Young.”

  “Nice to meet you.”

  Her lips curl down in response, but she step
s aside to let me in to her very nice home in the suburb of Mount Pleasant. Just across the bridge from Charleston and as old, if not as distinguished as the historic downtown, her neighborhood certainly isn’t somewhere I could afford to live. Nor could I afford her house, a restored old two-story with original oak hardwoods, fancy trimmings, and furniture that looks too expensive to sit on.

  Whatever Reynolds has been doing with herself since Nan died, it’s a far cry from the girl working two jobs to put herself through community college.

  I follow her footsteps into the sitting room to the left of the front door. It’s formal, with Oriental rugs and claw-footed furniture, a long mantel decorated with photographs and a grand piano underneath the bay windows looking out onto the street.

  “Would you like some coffee?” The offer is stilted, maybe disingenuous.

  I shake my head even though I got up at an ungodly hour to be here this early. I’d rather ask my questions and get the hell out before one of us actually dies of discomfort. “No, thanks.”

  She hasn’t asked me to sit and she remains standing, leaning against the arm of one of the claw-footed couches. I feel awkward but shuffle toward the fireplace, studying the photographs on the mantel. I’m surprised to find they’re all of Reynolds and a girl who looks enough like her and Nan to assume it’s her daughter. The latest picture shows the girl in high school, at least.

  Reynolds clears her throat behind me, stealing my attention but not my train of thought. “How can I help you?

  “Is this your daughter?”

  An emotion, too complex to name, skitters across her dusky features before she hides it away. “Yes.”

  “How old is she?”

  “She just turned fifteen.”

  My brain counts backward, but it’s easy enough math. She was born late in 2000, the year after Nan died. Would Reynolds have been pregnant at the time? Maybe, or maybe soon after. It doesn’t mean anything, but my mind tries hard to connect dots that aren’t there. Too many nights spent playing Nancy Drew and not enough drinking on the patio with my boyfriend are to blame.

  The stare she gives me says the topic is off-limits, and this time my gut insists if we say another thing about it, she’ll be shutting down this conversation completely. It’s probably best to move on to what brought me out here.

  “I read the police file on your sister’s case and learned that there were two officers and an assistant coroner who weren’t keen on closing her case as a suicide, for several reasons. When they interviewed you, you agreed—said that you two had planned a life together and that she was looking forward to the future again.”

  “That’s what I thought. At the time.”

  I go still. “At the time? You feel differently now?”

  “I was young. I was upset, because if Nan killed herself it had to be because I did a shitty job as her guardian.” She bites her lip, determination lighting her bright eyes. “Now, I can see it. Nan was a troubled girl before I met her. She had no friends, major social issues, and had even stopped caring about her schoolwork. I guess I didn’t do enough back then, but I’ve forgiven myself. I was a dumb kid at the time, too. Hadn’t learned to see the world the way it was instead of how I wanted it to be.”

  The words sound good, the explanation makes sense, but something about the way she’s spouting it sounds rehearsed, the way it had on the phone yesterday. As though she sat and memorized the correct things to say to get the pushy stranger from Heron Creek to leave her alone.

  “And now you’re an adult, with a daughter of your own.” I try a sympathetic smile, one that’s met with suspicion. “What do you do, if I might ask?”

  “I’m a writer,” she replies, not meeting my gaze.

  I glance around, trying to keep my observation off my face—which is that, if she’s a writer, she must sell damn well. And I’ve never heard of her.

  It’s clear that we’re getting nowhere. She’s claiming she believes Nan’s death was a suicide, which isn’t going to help my case at all, whether she’s telling the truth or not.

  Movement on the piano bench catches my eye and I twist around, surprised to see Nan sitting there, fingers hovering over the keys. She catches my eye and her hands go to her braid. There’s such sadness about her as her gaze turns to her half sister that my heart aches. Everything aches, sorrow sinking down into the pits of my bones and making them feel brittle, ready to snap.

  I swivel back to Reynolds, who’s watching me. She doesn’t see a ghost sitting at the piano. If I could read her mind, it would probably tell me she doesn’t see anything but a woman annoying the crap out of her who’s about to get tossed out on her ass.

  I check for Nan again. Still there. Tears run down her face now and that’s the final straw—the thing that stops me from caring about my own image and reminds me why I’m here to begin with. For her.

  A deep breath settles what’s left of my nerve, and I face Reynolds, no longer intimidated. I’m going to say what I came here to say and then she can kick me out. Not before.

  “I’m going to say something that might sound crazy to you, but it’s one hundred percent the truth. I’m not a liar and I’m not a fraud. There’s nothing I need from you aside from the truth.”

  “You’re either about to sell me on Jesus Christ or try to get me to buy a real awesome vacuum cleaner.”

  It’s the first glimpse she’s given me of a personality, and it makes me smile. And, given Vera’s similar complaint, wonder just how many evangelists live in the area.

  “Neither. Here goes.” Deep breath. “I see ghosts sometimes. They show up, they ask me to do something or find something or tell someone something, and once I figure out what they need and do it, they go away. My first day at Drayton Hall, I saw Nan.”

  All the color drains from her face. “You saw Nan.”

  I nod. “She had a rope tied around her neck and showed up smack under that tree out front, so it didn’t take much research to figure out who she was.”

  Reynolds reaches out and grabs the back of the sofa, and when that isn’t enough support, she sinks onto it. “What does she want you to do? Something to do with me?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

  “They don’t speak to me. I have to sort of figure it out other ways, but she’s not giving me much direction.” I cut a glance at the piano. Nan nods at me encouragingly, which is the most help she’s given me yet. “She did communicate, in no uncertain terms, that she didn’t kill herself.”

  Reynolds’s eyes close. She and I breathe in and out in the same space. It seems like it goes on forever, and there’s no way for me to guess what’s rolling through her mind. Usually, I have a fairly easy time reading people—though I’m not as good at it as Amelia is—but Reynolds is a complete mystery. She lives in a very nice house in an established, ritzy neighborhood. She’s got a daughter born shortly after her sister died and makes a living as a writer. I know it’s the twenty-first century and all, but it’s hard for me to imagine that she makes the kind of money necessary for a lifestyle like this. It’s even harder to imagine since I’ve never heard of her—nothing about books or newspapers or blogs or anything came up in my searches at the library.

  When she opens her eyes again, the pain in them is as intense as it was coming off Nan a moment ago. Beyond that, there’s hatred, self-loathing. It’s too much to bear and I look away, unwilling to stare at a woman exposed down to her blood vessels.

  “Get out.”

  I want to be surprised. I want to ask her why she’s lying about thinking Nan killed herself or all kinds of questions about her house and her daughter and her life since that awful Christmas break, but I don’t. I can’t. Right now, she’s not a woman obstructing my pursuit of knowledge or killing my chances to help Nan rest. She’s a woman who just had her worst fears confirmed, and if it were me, I’d need to be alone so I could cry. Curse. Throw things.

  It’s impossible to say what she’s t
hinking or what she’ll do, but I see myself to the door and close it behind me, allowing her the space to figure it out for herself.

  I’m knee-deep in files out at Drayton Hall later that afternoon, but progress has been steady. Cordelia Drayton thought it wouldn’t take me more than a month to go through the boxes, organize them, ensure they were preserved, and put together the documents that would be of the most interest to either a historical society or to the public, but it’s not going to take that long. I’ve been working here a week, now, and it’s not going to take me more than another.

  It’s all so interesting. Fascinating, really. There are centuries of not only family history but documents outlining the Drayton and Middleton influence on local, state, and federal politics. With the sheer number of judges each family has sat on various benches, they’ve helped shape a nation. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse, but I will say that they’ve always been quick to align with the winning side. I’ve got letters, both personal and political, dissents, property evaluations, and diaries. Enough to fill a room or rooms for the family to display on the grounds or in the house, if they can figure out how to manage it while not updating anything—and another stack that I think would be of interest to the South Carolina state and federal archives.

  The air-conditioning and weather stripping got fixed the day after I sent that e-mail explaining why it’s beneficial to old documents, regardless of the fact that Beau was in the hospital during those twenty-four hours. The AC is keeping me from sweating, and the daily cleaning crew makes sure there’s not a speck of dust anywhere on the files or me. It’s nice, but I keep experiencing a major out-of-place sensation whenever I move between the office and the grounds. It’s like stepping back two hundred years and a hundred degrees simultaneously.

  Despite the fact that I’ve wandered the grounds numerous times, even back to the spot where Beau and I had our picnic, I haven’t seen the black woman again. Nan’s been pretty absent, too, popping in and out, watching me but not pointing me in any direction. It’s unnerving, as though she thinks I’ve got all the necessary information but am too dumb to put it together in the right way.