Tamsyn Murray-My So-Called Haunting

by Tamsyn Murray

Her words had made me wonder why Nico didn’t talk about his family. I had a good reason for my silence; what was his?

  A man walked past the bench with a chocolate Labrador on a long lead. It bounded towards us, snuffling at Nico’s outstretched hand with enthusiastic snorts. The man tugged it away, apologising. Once they’d gone, I went on, ‘If you could talk to her, what would you say?’

  Shrugging, he said, ‘I’d tell her not to worry.’

  I blinked. I’d been expecting him to say something about missing her. ‘Why would she be worried?’

  He tensed again. ‘Something my dad said once. Forget it.’

  Chewing at a fingernail, I wondered what he meant. I supposed it was natural for a mother to worry about her son if she wasn’t there to care for him, but something about the way Nico had said it made me think he’d thought about it a lot. I also sensed it was a sensitive subject and one I’d better steer clear of for now. Besides, I had my own agenda. ‘Do you believe in life after death?’

  He didn’t answer straight away. ‘Like heaven and hell, you mean?’

  ‘Kind of,’ I said slowly. ‘Some people think their spirit lingers after they’ve died.’

  He looked straight into my eyes then. ‘You’re talking about ghosts.’

  My pulse sped up as I debated whether or not to carry on. If I stopped now, I could laugh it off, pretend I hadn’t meant ghosts at all. But I knew I wasn’t going to stop. ‘Yeah. Have you ever seen one?’

  I held my breath, waiting for the laughter. It didn’t come. Instead, Nico reached out a hand to stroke my cheek. ‘I haven’t, but I know people who have. According to them, there are ghosts everywhere.’

  My eyes widened as I stared back at him. ‘Maybe they’re right.’

  His dark eyes glittered in the rising moonlight. ‘How would you know? Unless you’ve seen one?’

  This was it; I stood on the edge of the cliff. If I stepped from safety, I’d be trusting him more than I’d ever trusted anyone. I couldn’t read anything in his expression. He was waiting for me to go on. Breathing in uneven gulps, I whispered, ‘I see them all the time.’

  For a few long seconds, he didn’t move. Then a faint smile crossed his face. ‘I thought so.’

  My jaw dropped. It wasn’t the reply I’d expected. ‘You thought so? What does that mean?’

  ‘It was the only explanation that made sense.’ Wrapping his arms more tightly around me, he planted a kiss on my nose. ‘You’re clearly not schizophrenic and I always knew you weren’t talking to yourself when I overheard you in the hall at school. So it was obvious you were talking to someone I couldn’t see.’

  My head was spinning. He’d known I was lying about the mental illness? ‘But how is that the obvious conclusion?’

  He looked away, his face pensive as though debating something. Then he gazed at me again. ‘I’ve never told anyone this, but my dad is psychic. Not in the same way that you are, but he can talk to the dead.’

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Psychic ability ran in families, so —

  ‘I’m not psychic,’ Nico said, reading my mind. ‘Not yet, anyway.’

  ‘Not yet?’ I echoed, perplexed. It was hardly something you went to college to become.

  He frowned slightly. ‘I can’t tell you much, but my dad has some . . . friends who can teach me how to do it.’

  Alarm bells rang. Pulling away, I fixed him with a hard look. ‘What kind of friends?’

  ‘Don’t worry, they’re not into anything bad. They just know how to contact the dead.’

  I’d heard about people who made claims like this before. In every single case, they’d been fraudsters. ‘Nico —’

  ‘Don’t worry, it’s cool,’ he soothed, drawing me close. ‘They’re practically my family, back in Romania. I’ve known them all my life.’

  I let him kiss me but it didn’t work its usual magic. Instead, his words whirled around my brain and I couldn’t shake a deep feeling of concern. Friends who claimed to speak to ghosts – what kind of family did Nico come from? Then again, I was hardly in a position to judge; I didn’t exactly come from a conventional background myself.

  Nico ended the kiss, leaning back so he could see me clearly. ‘There’s something else I have to tell you. I’m going away for a while, with my dad.’

  Dismayed, I bit my lip. ‘How long for?’

  ‘I don’t know. A week, maybe? He’s got something he needs to do back home and he needs my help.’

  Megan was right; I should be wondering what Nico’s dad did for a living but it didn’t seem like the right time to ask. ‘In Romania?’

  Nodding, he said, ‘Yeah, just a bit of business he needs to take care of. I’ll be back before you even miss me.’

  Somehow, I doubted that. I slipped my arms around him. ‘I wish you weren’t going.’

  He hugged me close, turning his face away to breathe in the cold night air. ‘I won’t be gone long and when I get back we might have something else in common.’

  Troubled, I didn’t reply. What if these so-called friends weren’t con-men but something more sinister? I’d never met anyone who dabbled in dark arts, but I knew they existed. Nico had no idea what he might be getting into.

  ‘Thank you for trusting me, Skye,’ he whispered into my hair. ‘I love you for it.’

  His lips found mine before I could speak. Confused, I tried to make sense of my feelings. Nico had just told me he loved me; I ought to be elated. Instead, I couldn’t shake off a chill as I wondered about the things he wasn’t telling me. Then his mouth became more insistent and I pushed my fears to one side. I’d shared my deepest secret with him and he didn’t think I was crazy. He’d trusted me too, and maybe I was overreacting; hadn’t he said his friends were like family? They’d have his welfare at heart, and surely his dad wouldn’t let anything bad happen. There was more to the story, but I didn’t push. Nico would tell me when he was ready. Closing my eyes, I returned the kiss hungrily. Nico and I were perfect together. Nothing could spoil that.

  ‘I think I’ve discovered the identity of our mystery jumper.’

  Since he’d found out he could see the suicide ghost from Hornsey Lane Bridge, Jeremy had been trying to work out who she was. Celestine had been mystified about why he could see some ghosts and not others, but Mary had claimed the clues were hidden in his past, which had earned blank looks all round. And now Jeremy was waving a sheet of paper in my face and looking pleased with himself.

  Letting out an annoyed grunt, I shifted sideways, my gaze fixed on the television. ‘You make her sound like a cardigan.’

  Undeterred by my grumpiness, he sat beside me and started to read. ‘Isobel Mitchell, aged thirty-seven, committed suicide by throwing herself off Hornsey Lane Bridge on 30th November 1998.’

  I wasn’t in the mood to congratulate him. ‘Why?’

  Jeremy scanned the paper again. ‘It doesn’t say. She didn’t leave a note.’ He placed the sheet on the coffee table in front of me. ‘But I imagine she was very depressed.’

  I exhaled loudly. ‘Do you think so, Sherlock?’

  My sarcasm was apparently wasted on him. ‘Yes, I do,’ he said. ‘So how are we going to help her?’

  I didn’t have the faintest idea. Since Nico had gone three days earlier, I’d found it hard to summon up the energy to care about anything. Megan had done her best to distract me and Dontay had called round a few times, but I hadn’t exactly been sparkling company, and on his last visit he’d said he was giving me some space. I knew Celestine was worried about me, but other than to gently ask if there was anything she could do to help, she’d left me alone. Jeremy, on the other hand, seemed to be constantly trying to take my mind off things and it was starting to get on my nerves. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘When I was helping Lucy, we tracked down someone else her killer had attacked,’ Jeremy said.

  And that was another thing about Jeremy, I decided as he droned on in the background: it felt like he went on about Lucy all the ti
me. I mean, I know she was the first ghost he’d seen – the only one he’d seen before Isobel – and she had obviously meant a lot to him, but did he have to mention her like twenty times a day?

  ‘Well, since the only person Isobel killed was herself, I don’t think it’s going to help in this case.’ My voice sounded petulant and childish, but I couldn’t stop. ‘Maybe if Lucy was still here she’d have some brilliant idea about what to do, but she isn’t, OK?’

  His gaze was steady. ‘I’m just trying to help, Skye.’

  ‘Don’t bother,’ I snapped and stood up. Anger coursed through me and sought the nearest available target. ‘There’s not much we can do, anyway.’

  I pushed past him and stamped up the stairs, slamming the door to my room and throwing myself on the bed. Hot, miserable tears spilled down my cheeks as my harsh words replayed themselves in my head. Great, now I felt mean as well as heartbroken. It hadn’t been fair to talk to Jeremy that way; he was only trying to help, and he didn’t really go on about Lucy that much.

  Celestine tapped on my door fifteen minutes later. ‘Skye? Can I come in?’

  Grabbing a tissue, I wiped the worst of the tears from my face and blew my nose. ‘Yeah,’ I called in a subdued tone, sounding like I had a peg on my nose.

  She pushed back the door and watched me for a moment. ‘Jeremy told me what happened. Is there something you want to talk about?’

  I shredded the soggy tissue between my fingernails. ‘Not really.’

  Picking her way across the piles of clothes on the floor, she came and sat on the edge of my unmade bed. ‘Did something happen at school? Have you fallen out with Nico?’

  Fresh tears pooled up in my eyes and suddenly it was all spilling out of me; how Nico didn’t think I was weird, what he’d told me on Parliament Hill about his trip to Romania and how I was worried that he might be involved with psychic charlatans or worse. Celestine didn’t say a word until I’d finished, then she sat back and studied me, concern written all over her face.

  ‘I’m not surprised you’re feeling terrible,’ she said finally. ‘You poor thing.’

  I sniffled, with more than a touch of self pity.

  ‘But that’s no excuse for taking it out on the rest of us,’ she went on. ‘We all have feelings, even ghosts. Especially the ghosts – poor Dontay asked me tonight if he’d done something to upset you.’

  Guilt squeezed at my stomach. My problems were nothing compared to his. ‘I’m sorry,’ I mumbled. ‘It’s all got so messed up.’

  ‘When is Nico back?’

  And that was another source of concern: I hadn’t heard from him since he’d gone. Pressing my lips together, I swallowed another wave of tears. ‘I don’t know. He’s not answering my texts.’

  Celestine gripped my hands in reassurance. ‘I’m sure he’ll be back soon.’

  She was right, of course, but it didn’t stop me missing him.

  ‘Do you think his friends are really psychic?’ I asked. Half of me hoped she’d laugh. She didn’t.

  ‘I don’t know. Romanian folklore has strong links with the supernatural, and there are some well-respected psychics from the Carpathian Mountains, but they don’t claim to be able to teach the ability to communicate with the dead. I doubt these friends are even really gifted, so let’s hope Nico’s dad is smart enough to avoid getting hustled.’

  Nico had sounded pretty convinced that it wasn’t a con. ‘Yeah, you’re probably right.’

  Standing up, Celestine glanced around at the mess before smiling down at me. ‘So, do you think you might owe Jeremy an apology?’

  I bit back a sigh; she had a point. ‘Yeah, in a minute.’

  ‘Good,’ she replied. ‘If you really wanted to help, you could go and see the ghost on the bridge with him.’

  I wanted to tell her that I had enough on my plate with Dontay, but I didn’t. ‘OK.’ Then something occurred to me. ‘Hey, does this mean I get a lift to school everyday?’

  Celestine’s eyes twinkled. ‘Do you know, I think it just might.’

  * * *

  I apologised to Dontay too, when I went to the Dearly D on Thursday evening. He shrugged it off, of course, and acted like he hadn’t even noticed my foul mood. I was grateful he understood; some of my old friends wouldn’t have.

  ‘It’s cool,’ he said, once we were sitting on the wall opposite the church. ‘And we don’t have to be around each other twenty-four seven. You got friends to see, I get that. Nigel or whatever his name is.’

  I shivered as a drop of icy rain squirmed down my neck. It was pouring down and my little umbrella was taking a serious pounding. ‘He’s gone away.’

  ‘How come?’

  I sighed. ‘Family stuff.’

  My misery must have been obvious because Dontay growled, ‘You need me to have a word when he gets back?’

  The thought might have made me giggle if it wasn’t for Nico’s belief he’d soon be talking to ghosts. Anxiety ran through me and I shivered. ‘Nah, it’s OK. How’s Nelson?’

  A heavy scowl creased Dontay’s face. ‘Him talking about Shank the other day worried me, so I decided to follow him.’ He shook his head in disgust. ‘It turns out he’s been missing training, going off to do stuff for the other gang members.’

  A gust of wind buffeted me sideways. ‘What kind of stuff?’

  Dontay’s scowl deepened. ‘It starts off with something small. “Just deliver this package” they’ll say, but you don’t know what’s under the paper and it’s worth more than your life to look. If you do a good job then they’ll trust you with something else.’ He paused. ‘It feels good at first, being part of it, but then they ask you to do something a bit shady, steaming probably, to prove your loyalty.’

  ‘Steaming?’ I repeated, wrinkling my nose in puzzlement. The only steaming I could think of was the kind you did with an iron and I didn’t think the London Fields Posse were running a laundry service.

  ‘It’s where a load of you run through a crowd, nicking people’s phones and wallets. Before you know it, you’re running from the law, and there’s no way out cos then the gang have got something on you.’

  ‘Oh.’ I stared at him. ‘Is that what happened to you?’

  He threw me a scornful look. ‘Nah. I didn’t do nothing illegal. Not much anyway. How could I when I had Nelson looking up to me?’ He sighed and gave a small shrug. ‘But I suppose I played the game a bit, stayed on the edges. I was too smart to get caught up in it.’

  ‘But Nelson isn’t that smart?’

  ‘I didn’t say that,’ he muttered, but I could tell that was exactly what he’d meant. ‘It’s complicated.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘He’s all messed up in here.’ He tapped the side of his head. ‘When I died, he changed. It’s like he stopped being my kid brother and turned into this person I don’t know. I think he wants revenge for my death.’

  A chill settled over me, and it wasn’t just from the rain trickling down my neck. ‘Do you think that’s why he’s joined the gang?’

  He nodded and I caught a flash of fear behind his eyes. ‘For sure. But he’s just a kid, he doesn’t get that Shank is using him, and my parents have no idea what he’s into. Shank has filled his head with the idea that he’s got to step up and avenge me. I’m scared he’ll end up in a really bad place – maybe even get himself killed.’

  His words stayed with me all the way home. The thought of Nelson getting in over his head and dying for something nobody wanted made me feel physically sick. My worries over Nico were tiny by comparison; Nelson’s future and maybe his life were hanging in the balance, for crying out loud. But as scared as Dontay had made me feel, I knew I’d do whatever I could to help. I’d just have to hope that when it came down to it, Dontay had my back. Because one thing was for sure: I couldn’t save his brother on my own.

  ‘Are you sure you want to do this?’

  It was Jeremy’s night off and we were sitting in the car, watching Hornsey Lane Bridge to see if I
sobel showed up. We’d seen her a couple more times on the way to school, but I’d always been late and we hadn’t stopped. Now we had plenty of time, but no ghost.

  Jeremy sighed. ‘I can think of several things I’d rather be doing, actually, but the thought of Isobel keeps nagging at me. She reminds me of Hep, Lucy’s friend.’

  I thought back to the conversation we’d had the day he first saw Isobel. ‘She killed herself too, right?’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t think she really meant to. The saddest thing about Hep was that if she’d had someone to talk to when she was still alive, her problems might have been sorted out.’

  ‘What happened to her?’

  He gazed out of the window. ‘Lucy and I helped her to make peace with her parents and she passed across. I wonder if we can do something similar for Isobel.’

  We sat in silence for a minute, watching the occasional pedestrian cross the bridge. Not for the first time, I considered how lucky it had been that Jeremy and my aunt had found each other. I could imagine how freaked out he’d been when he’d first seen Lucy and had no one he could talk to about it. For Celestine, it must help if your other half understood what you were going through. ‘You really cared about Lucy and Hep.’

  Smiling, he nodded. ‘If you’d asked me a year ago if I’d be hanging around a toilet with a copy of Heat so a girl no one else saw could read it, I’d have laughed. Actually, I’d have thought you were mad. But as soon I saw how lonely she was, I couldn’t walk away. I think Isobel might be the same.’

  A movement out of the corner of my eye caught my attention and I squinted through the windscreen. ‘Now’s your chance to find out – she’s over there. We’ll have to be quick, it looks like she’s getting ready to jump.’

  He was out of the car in seconds. ‘Isobel, wait!’

  She paused in the act of climbing on to the parapet and turned her head to listen. ‘Who’s there?’

  ‘My name’s Jeremy,’ he called. I slammed the car door and stood behind him. ‘This is Skye. We’re here to help you.’

  ‘You can’t,’ Isobel dismissed and resumed her climb. ‘I’m beyond help.’