The effort of making the sound is what raised me up out of the dream. Or nightmare, to be exact. I opened my eyes, gasping for air, and blinking through the darkness, the leftover yell still buzzing in my throat.
Just a dream, I told myself, sitting up in bed. But my pounding heart needed a bit more convincing. It wasn’t until I switched on my bedside lamp that I realized my sheets were soaked with water. And the skin on my arms and chest was shining with sweat. But was it sweat? I wasn’t hot at all. In fact, I was shivering from the cold night breeze that was blowing in through my window.
What’s going on? I don’t remember going to sleep with it open.
But the weirdest part of all was the smell that was coming off my wet skin. It was dank and raw and earthy … like a mix of worms and frogs. I smelled more like an old swamp than a sweaty guy. In fact, the stink was so overpowering I disgusted myself. Throwing off the covers, I stumbled out of my room and into the shower. I needed to wash the smell away and hopefully the memory of the nightmare would go down the drain along with it.
By the time I was clean and dried off, it was too late to go back to sleep. But it was too early to go to school. So I grabbed a piece of toast and my backpack and went for a walk. I needed to clear my head and getting outside into the fresh autumn air was the best way to do that. Walking up and down the early morning streets offered me a view of this town I hadn’t seen before. I watched the bright orange sun peek over the rooftops as it climbed in the sky to start the new day. I watched the houses wake up, bathrobed men and women collect their newspapers, dogs sniff around on their morning walks, frantic adults rush into their cars, and bouncy children jump through the leaves as they headed off to school. I walked and walked and walked some more, trying as hard as I could to keep my feet away from 10 Colborne Street.
It was Wednesday again. I didn’t want to go back there today, especially since I’d caught hell from my parents for ditching the past couple of Wednesday-morning classes. But after last night’s dream I was aching to see Caroline and make sure she was all right. And could I even stay away if I tried? She’s the only one who could really see me around here. But the agonizing part was that she only saw me as a friend. I still didn’t know if I could handle that.
Giving in, I finally let my feet guide me back to the little white house on Colborne Street. It was almost as if there were a pair of hands pushing me to go faster as I marched up the driveway toward the garden path. The library wasn’t open yet; it was still too early. I glanced down at my watch and took a seat on the bench at the back of the garden to wait for her. After a couple of minutes, a small, brown rabbit hopped across the path, nose twitching as it searched for some breakfast. It quickly discovered a small patch of clover beside the picket fence and stopped to munch for a while. My stomach growled as I watched the rabbit eat, wishing I’d grabbed more than a thin slice of toast from home. I thought about running over to Yonge Street and picking up a cup of coffee, but I wanted to catch Caroline before she went into the library. So I just stayed put and ignored the grumbles from my gut.
About twenty minutes later she came strolling up the path, wearing the exact same sweater she’d been wearing in my dream last night. That freaked me out more than a little bit, but I tried not to let it show on my face. When she spotted me sitting at the back of the garden she stopped in shock, keys frozen in her outstretched hand.
“Max! God, you scared me. What are you doing here? We’re not even open yet.”
“I … I was up early this morning,” I said, getting to my feet. I couldn’t explain it, but suddenly I had an overwhelming need to get her away from this place and all its history and ghosts … and grandmothers. “Hey, do you need to get right to work? I thought we could go for a walk or something?”
She pulled up her sleeve to check her watch. “Well, I guess I can go for a little bit. Nana will probably be here soon and she can open up the library today.”
I flung my backpack over my shoulder and strode toward her. “Great … let’s go.”
Together, we walked up the tree-lined road away from the screeching river of traffic coursing up and down Yonge Street. I was being careful to keep a safe, wide bubble of space between the two of us, nervous about the moronic things I might say or do if we got too close.
“So, do you feel any closer to making your decision?” I asked, hoping to get the conversation going. I usually didn’t mind sharing a good silence with a friend, but with Caroline it felt better having something to say. I knew the words were going to help me maintain that bubble.
She turned to look at me, confusion creasing her pretty face. “What decision?”
“You know … the decision about what the hell you want to do with your life next year?”
I thought that would prompt a smile, but she frowned instead. “Oh, yeah … that.”
And then silence. I rushed in to fill it … maybe a little too fast.
“You know, my mom keeps telling me about all the great schools they have out here on this side of the country. Not that we don’t have great schools out west, but I guess there’s more of them over here. So, have you been looking into any of the programs?”
“Um … no, not really. I don’t think I’m ready to start thinking about university yet,” she replied, her voice far away. That’s when I noticed her fingers. They were twisting and pulling the sleeves of her sweater into tight little knots. Suddenly, I had the sinking feeling that I’d said something wrong. If only I knew what. Man, why was this girl so freaking mysterious?
This time when the silence came back, I left it alone to do its thing. Seconds stretched out between us. At least the sound of our shoes crunching through the carpet of dried leaves made it a bit less unbearable.
“Hey, have you ever noticed some of the other historic homes on this street, Max?” she asked after a long moment, pointing to the sagging red house on our left. “Here’s one that’s even older than the library.”
Yeah, she was definitely trying to change the subject.
“Um … no, I guess not,” I replied, going along with it. I was just happy to have something safe to talk about. Following the direction of her finger, I saw that this house had a plaque, too. It read: William Lane; cooper, 1846.
“There are lots of them along here,” she continued, a trace of pride rounding out her words. “Nana once told me that Colborne is probably the best-preserved historic street in all of Ontario. Look, there’s another one right there.”
I looked over to see a plump, motherly looking woman raking a pile of yellow leaves in her driveway. She glanced up from her rake and smiled as we passed her house. My eyes skipped up to search for the plaque … yup, there it was to the right of the front door. Job Trott; mason, 1851.
“I don’t get it,” I said, shaking my head. “Regular people are allowed to live in these houses? I thought they were historic buildings.”
Caroline nodded. “They are … but they’re also homes. Of course, the owners have to conserve the outside of the buildings as best as they can. But they were built to be lived in.”
Honestly, this had to be the most surreal street I’d ever seen. It was almost like I’d left the real world and been transported to the film set of a historical movie. I spotted another old house on the opposite side of the road and went to take a closer look. Thomas Hamill; carpenter, 1850. Too bad my parents hadn’t known about this street when they were house-hunting in Thornhill. It might have been cool to live in one of these old cottages. I wanted to ask Caroline if any of them were haunted like the library. But I decided to ask a different question instead.
“So, are you all out of ghost stories … or are there any more you’ve been holding back?”
She nibbled on her lower lip while she thought about the question. My eyes dropped so I wouldn’t have to watch. I studied the frayed ends of my shoelaces while I waited for my pulse to slow back down. A
fter a moment, she came up with an answer.
“Once or twice I thought I heard the sound of books being pulled off the shelves and the pages flipping. It happened when I was there alone in the morning. And sometimes Nana or I will be searching for a particular book for hours and we’ll decide that it’s gone missing … then there it is on the shelf the very next day, right where it should have been all along.”
This time it was totally impossible to keep the skepticism out of my voice. “That doesn’t make any sense, Caroline — if they were really ghosts, how on earth could they move the books?”
The familiar Mona Lisa smile tugged at her lips. “Do some research into it, Max. You’ll see that ghosts can have a physical presence if they want to.”
I was about to change the subject when something weird suddenly occurred to me. “Okay, so you’ve smelled and heard strange things in the library … but you’ve never actually seen anything yourself?”
“Well, no.”
I shook my head and sighed. “I just don’t get it. If you haven’t seen anything, then how can you believe so strongly in the ghost?”
To my surprise, Caroline just laughed at that. “I guess there’re lots of things I’ve never seen that I still believe in.”
“Like what? Santa Claus?” I asked, slightly irritated. I didn’t enjoy being such a constant source of amusement to her.
She looked at me and flashed her gap-toothed smile. “Well, I’ve never seen love. But I still believe in it.”
Suddenly, I didn’t want that safe bubble of space between us anymore. In fact, I wanted to take her hand so badly my fingers were itching with desperation. But I didn’t. I kept them tucked away inside my jean pockets instead. I had already embarrassed myself enough around this girl without making a move like that. She was smart, sweet, beautiful … and two years older. I knew that there was no way in hell she would ever be interested in a kid like me.
We walked in silence for a full minute before she spoke again.
“I’ve never told anyone this, Max,” she said, her voice barely louder than a whisper, “I haven’t even told Nana. But I really want to tell you. I did see something happen … just once. It was back in the middle of September, a few days before you and I met.”
“Okay, what was it?” I asked. We’d just turned a corner and were walking south along a narrow road.
“It only happened once, when I was there on my own. It was late in the evening and I was cleaning up, getting ready to close the library. I looked up at the clock … you know the one in the entryway with the toy mouse climbing up the front?”
I nodded. “Yeah, I know it.”
“Well, I was checking to see if it was time to turn the sign in the window from ‘open’ to ‘closed.’ That’s when I saw …”
I stopped walking and waited for her to finish.
“Saw what?”
She stopped, too. I watched her shoulders rise as she took a slow, deep breath. “The second hand was turning the wrong way. You know … like, backwards. And then the hour and minute hands started to turn and spin backwards, too.”
Now this was getting interesting. “Okay … and then what happened?”
Her blue eyes met mine. “I didn’t wait around to find out. I was so scared, I closed up and ran out of there.”
“And so nobody else saw this? You don’t have a witness?”
She shrugged and started walking again. “Nope. Sorry, no proof on this one, either.”
I raked my fingers back and forth through my hair, trying to come up with a rational explanation for this. I knew for sure there was always a rational explanation if you looked hard enough.
Wasn’t there?
“Well, couldn’t it just have been a battery malfunction? Or something faulty with the gears of the clock?”
She tilted her steps slightly away, widening the space between us. “Look, I guess it could have been but I highly doubt it,” her words were sharp, like I’d touched on a raw nerve. “I have a feeling that it means something important. Like whoever is haunting the library is wishing they could turn back time — you know, go back and fix something they didn’t have a chance to when they were alive. Right a wrong from the past …”
This was all a bit too much for me. I don’t think I’d ever heard such a far-fetched theory in my life. “You actually think ghosts have regrets?”
“Yeah, I definitely do.”
I was about to reply when suddenly Caroline stopped walking and pointed to the left. “Okay, so we’re here. Want to go in for a little bit?”
I hadn’t been watching where we were going since we’d left the library. So I was shocked to find myself standing at the entrance to a graveyard. A bronze sign facing the road read: Thornhill Cemetery. Without waiting for my reply, Caroline walked straight in through the black iron gates, like there was nothing unusual about the place at all. When she realized that I wasn’t keeping up, she stopped and spun around to face me.
“Hey, aren’t you coming?” she asked, waving me over.
I was still standing back by the entrance. “Um … are you sure we’re allowed to be in there?”
“Of course, we’re allowed; it’s public property. Cemeteries are actually nice places to visit — I come whenever I can. And I thought you might want to see where so many of the original inhabitants of Thornhill were buried.”
“Um … okay,” I said. But my feet refused to move. This didn’t feel right to me at all. Cemeteries weren’t places you could just wander into for a stroll, were they? This would only be the second time in my life I’d ever been to a cemetery. The first time, of course, was at Papa’s funeral last year. I shuffled my feet on the pavement, trying to decide what to do.
Caroline’s lips twisted with amusement while she waited for me to start moving. “Wow, you’re not afraid of this place, are you? Don’t worry … I’ll protect you.”
That did it! “No! Of course I’m not afraid!” I barked, forcing my feet toward the collection of gravestones. Keeping slightly ahead, Caroline led the way through the cemetery while I followed behind. We were the only people there, as it was still very early on a Wednesday morning. It was quiet and surprisingly peaceful. There were trees all around, their swaying branches filled with chirping birds. The path was paved with a mosaic of flickering sunlight that shone down through the sparse leaves still remaining overhead. Every now and then, a little black squirrel would leap out from behind a gravestone and scurry across the path, as if playing a game of hide-and-seek. It was so calm and quiet that after a while I was almost able to forget that we were walking over a field of dead bodies.
Almost, but not quite. Because each stone called out its owner’s name as we passed by.
Arnold, Bowes, Ramsden, Ness, Chapman — men, women, and children whose lives were cut off a long time ago, but whose names lived on in this quiet corner of town. Believe it or not, it was a strangely comforting place to be. Like a small corner of the world where immortality existed.
It took us about fifteen minutes to walk down the length of the path and back again. When we found ourselves back at the iron gateway, Caroline shook her head and sighed.
“I should probably get to work now. Nana will be wondering where I am.”
I didn’t want her to go. But I couldn’t think of anything I could say to stop her. So I just nodded.
“Okay … I’ll walk you back.”
Just then, a sudden breeze blew through the graveyard, pulling leaves from the trees and scattering them through the air like confetti. A fiery orange one landed near the top of Caroline’s head, sticking at a funny angle out of her hair. I don’t know what kind of tree it was from, but it was shaped like a large, round teardrop. I had a sudden urge to reach out and pluck it from her hair, but I held back. I knew if I did that, I probably wouldn’t be able to stop myself fro
m wanting to smooth her hair down. And then I would want to touch her skin … and lean close to smell her. And then, of course, I’d want to kiss her lips, her neck, the hollow of her throat … and somehow I had a feeling that wouldn’t go over so well.
Get a freaking hold of yourself, Max! I clenched my hands into fists, letting my fingernails dig into the skin of my palms while I tried to pull back my runaway thoughts. Was I some kind of twisted sicko for wanting to kiss a girl so badly in the middle of a cemetery?
So instead, I just pretended that the leaf wasn’t there at all as I walked her back to 10 Colborne Street. Trust me, it was just easier that way.
11 - John
It was the summer of 1888 and Thornhill was growing at a fast clip. The first telephone in the village was installed that year over at the Lindsay-Francis Store on Yonge Street. For a small sum of money, a person could conduct a long-distance telephone conversation with another person as far south as the city of York. It was a miraculous invention. I must admit, I was secretly envious for I’d always wanted to invent a machine just as miraculous in my lifetime. Something like a flying ship. Or a train that could travel underwater. But the long days in the forge didn’t allow much time for inventions. Of course, for my father, the arrival of the telephone was just another fine excuse to grumble about machines and the disastrous advances of science. That man could find the smallest spot in even the rosiest of apples.
That summer, I was fourteen and William was sixteen — both of us growing bigger by the hour. Certainly, we weren’t children anymore, but we weren’t quite adults, either. The purgatory of adolescence was upon us. And yet, because we were still so young and naive, neither of us had any idea that we were both careening toward the edge of a precipice. If only we’d been able to see it coming, things might have worked out differently. But of course, most mortals just aren’t equipped with that kind of extraordinary foresight.
I find it quite ironic that I only came to possess that gift in the spirit realm, where it can’t do me any good.
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