It's a Ghost's Life

by Erin McCarthy

  “I really have no idea what their plans are.”

  We all left and I locked the door behind me.

  In the car, Grandma sighed. “This blows.”

  I cranked the heat. “I know. I’m sorry. ‘We only die once, and for such a long time.’” Probably not the wisest time to bust out that quote. I realized that instantly.

  “What kind of a smart-ass thing is that to say?” Grandma demanded as I backed out of the driveway.

  “It’s a quote from a French satirical writer, Molière. It’s meant to be funny.”

  “It’s stupid.”

  “Fair enough.” I wrinkled my nose, wishing I could stick my foot in my mouth.

  “I want ice cream,” Grandma said, sounding like a petulant toddler.

  There was a lot to be said against aging. Getting away with throwing tantrums wasn’t one of them. I figured you had a right to ask for whatever you wanted when all your friends were dying around you.

  “Me too.” I was never going to turn down a scoop of vanilla with caramel sauce drizzled over it. “But you have to promise not to tell Mom. She’ll kill me if I spoil your dinner.”

  Grandma moved her thumb and index finger over her lips to indicate they were zipped shut.

  I gave her a thumbs-up.

  “Ryan, I’m waiting,” I said as I eyed the spread over my coffee table.

  Fried chicken, biscuits, green beans, mashed potatoes, mac and cheese. The works.

  I didn’t even consider serving it in the kitchen. Ryan couldn’t even eat any of it and I needed to relax. That meant I was currently wearing giant fleece pajama pants and an oversized sweatshirt with a sports bra. I had thought about no bra all together but Ryan can be kind of a dirtbag. I don’t even know why I own a sports bra. It’s not like I work out but, apparently, I had bought it at some point in a moment of pure optimism. It wasn’t the level of total comfort I would have preferred but it would do. The fuzzy socks helped and I crossed my legs on the couch, leaning forward to inhale the scent of fried food.

  Snagging a bit of the breading off a piece of chicken, I wondered what wine paired best with KFC. There had to be an app for that. Waiting for Ryan I looked it up on my phone.

  “Champagne?” I said out loud, reading the suggested pairings. “Get out of here. Fresh, light and modern. Huh. Well, I can do that.” I had a reasonably well-stocked wine cabinet and I knew I had a bottle of champagne. I would just stick it in the freezer for ten minutes.

  I was closing the freezer door when I realized Ryan was standing on the other side of it. “Geez! I hate how you do that.”

  “You would think you’d be used to it by now.” He gestured to the freezer. “Champagne? Are we toasting my death or the complete disappearance of sexy, youthful Bailey?” He eyeballed my outfit. “I take it no hot date with Marner tonight?”

  “I’m relaxing. For your information, though, I don’t dress for men. I dress for myself.”

  He gave a snort. “Right. Stitch that on the sampler in your old-maid house with nine cats.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with a woman who chooses to remain single. Don’t be like that.” It was a future I wouldn’t mind, frankly, if that’s the way it played out. “But no, Jake isn’t coming over. He doesn’t know you are either. He’s not sold on one, you being a ghost. Two, our friendship.”

  “He’s jealous of me, even dead.” Ryan moved his hands up and down to indicate his body. “Who wouldn’t be?”

  “He’s not jealous.” Well. He was kind of jealous. He just didn’t understand that having Ryan reappear had brought me peace in knowing that he was okay. It wasn’t like I had feelings for Ryan now.

  “I’m telling you, he should be.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Come smell your fried chicken. I’m starving.”

  Ryan followed me into the living room and sat down with a huge flop. Then he leaned forward and sniffed deeply. “Nice spread. Thanks, Bai.”

  I picked up a chicken leg and bit it. “So what’s this meeting all about, other than fried chicken, friendship, and this day?”

  I was still scarred by what had happened exactly a year ago. Hearing that Ryan had committed suicide had been the hardest thing I’d ever dealt with in my entire life. I haven’t lost a lot of people and certainly not like that. So sudden and so tragic. Not to mention the fact that I had seen him that day. Oh, and I had tried to kiss him.

  The memory of that still made me wince.

  “We have an assignment.”

  Fabulous.

  “By the way, did you hear anything about Vera?” I asked. “I’m telling you, she was murdered.”

  “Can we focus on me for a minute? Is that too much to ask?” Ryan eyed me scooping mac and cheese into my mouth straight from the container. “Also, when was the last time you ate? You look like a contestant at a professional eating contest.”

  “You’re so good for my ego. Not.” I went for the green beans. “I skipped lunch today. I just had brunch.”

  “I’m going to talk and you’re going to listen because, seriously, that’s a mouthful you have going on there.” Ryan looked more amused than disgusted though.

  I opened my mouth and showed him my chewed-up food like we were twelve. Ryan brought out the childish in me.

  He laughed. “Nice. So here’s the deal. I need to tell you this before I get sucked back to purgatory. We have a quota starting February first.”

  Green beans got caught in my throat and I choked and coughed. I spit the beans into a napkin and looked at him in horror. “What? Why would I have a quota? I’m not on the purgatory payroll. I’m not an ethereal employee. Celestial staff. None of the above. No one has even been in contact with me, which come to think of it is kind of rude. Can I request a meeting? No? Then having a ‘quota’ can suck it.”

  “Are you done?” he asked, eyeing me mildly.

  Maybe. “And why all of a sudden? I mean, I go my entire life without seeing ghosts, then boom. I’m a medium. I feel like I should have been given a choice. Like, hey, are you feeling helping dead people or is that not your jam?”

  “Which would you have chosen?”

  “I would have agreed to help you. After that I would have probably opted out. I’m still not over Cesar singing Britney Spears to me at three in the morning.”

  “I don’t think it works that way.”

  “That’s the problem. Neither of us know how this works but now I’ve been slapped with a quota? On what, by the way?” It occurred to me I didn’t even know that.

  “Moving spirits on. Maybe you need a class or something,” he said. “You’re not very good at this.”

  Insulted, I reached for another piece of chicken. “Am I solving murders or moving people on? Can we get some clarification on that, please?”

  “I think they’re one and the same. You solve their murder, they move on.”

  “Which is why I need to solve Vera’s murder.” See what I did there? Full circle. Boom.

  Ryan rubbed his chin. “Maybe there is something to it. So what did you figure out today?”

  “The cleaning lady said nothing was stolen. This was on her kitchen table.” I pulled out my phone with my free hand and showed him the pictures. “Shoot. I just got chicken grease on my screen. I can’t say I really enjoy finger foods.” It went against my need for tidiness.

  “What kind of pills?” he asked.

  “Blood pressure, pain management, sleeping pills.”

  “So nothing unusual for a ninety-five-year-old. Were there plenty left in each bottle?”

  “That I could tell, yes. But look at this.” I showed him the picture of her back patio. “It looks like a huge area of snow was disturbed.”

  “Maybe she fell.”

  “Maybe she was pushed.”

  Why did no one believe me? It was seriously frustrating. “Humor me. If she was killed and she is our assignment, what should I do now to investigate? You’re the detective here, not me.”

  “I don’t know how a civili
an investigates. I would go through her phone and see what was going on right before she died. I would get the phone records to see any deleted texts and check for the GPS. I would see first off, who inherits her estate and how much it’s worth. I would check for surveillance cameras in her neighborhood.”

  “I should have gone through her phone when I was there this afternoon. I have the key now though so I’m going to have to go back and do that.” I tossed down my chicken bone and wiped my hands on a napkin. I was done with my fast-food feast. I might have over-bought, something I was known for doing. “I should go back there tonight, before family starts arriving.”

  “Take Marner with you,” he said. “Just in case.”

  That would go over like a lead balloon. “He’s playing poker tonight.”

  Ryan swore. “I miss poker. This sucks. I’m sick of just hanging around sniffing chicken.”

  He had never mentioned what had happened in the two months I didn’t see him or hear from him and I was too scared to ask. But I didn’t think he liked being back in a holding pattern.

  “Gambling is a bad habit,” I said, because I didn’t know what else to say. How do you console a dead person?

  He rolled his eyes and did his disappearing act. There one minute, vapor the next.

  Clearly he was not feeling great on his death anniversary and I didn’t blame him. I wasn’t feeling so great about it either. I felt restless and uncertain what to do.

  Life felt a little uncertain right now. My parents were on the rocks, my sister was due to have another baby, Jake was turning thirty, his lease on his apartment was up soon. Business was slow, like it always was in the winter, and my best friend, who I relied on to have a shit ton of confidence all the time, seemed down.

  It also occurred to me while cleaning up my dinner that part of the reason I was so devastated about Vera was because it reminded me it was possible it could happen to my grandmother. I wasn’t ready to deal with losing Grandma Burke. Not now. Probably not ever. But definitely not now.

  I have a commandment. Thou Shalt Not Leave the House in Pajamas.

  So despite how amazing my fleece pants felt, I changed into jeans and a thick sweater to drive back over to Vera’s, my bottle of champagne in tow, since I’d never gotten to open it with Ryan and my chicken. I felt like I owed Vera a private toast.

  Her townhouse was dark but I flicked a few lights on and looked around. I was kicking myself for not looking for her phone earlier. I went through the whole place and finally found it in her bedroom on the nightstand. It seemed like she had been in bed for the night. There was a water bottle on her nightstand next to her phone, and her covers were pulled back. The TV remote was on the pillow.

  I had brought my gloves that allow you to still swipe on a phone screen. Vera didn’t have her phone locked, which didn’t surprise me. My grandmother didn’t either because she didn’t have anything on it really. No apps, no credit card info, no bank accounts tied in.

  Vera used her phone way more than Grandma Burke. She had social media accounts where she followed fashion and Old Hollywood accounts. She had TMZ. Rent the Runway. Images of sexy men reading books. She had a reading app with hundreds of books on it, from classics to romance novels to modern literature like The Kite Runner.

  Her texts were from her friends and her niece, Eva. A man I assumed was her nephew. A couple of guys who were clearly flirting with her. I scrolled through the thread with the man named “Colin” and let out a startled yelp. Right there in their conversation going back and forth, was a dick pic. “Dang, Vera.” I quickly scrolled past it, then out of pure curiosity went back because it didn’t look like a selfie from a ninety-year-old man.

  They say that men don’t age there the way they do elsewhere but even so… the thighs appeared to be a man in his prime. I suddenly felt like a naughty schoolgirl. Vera might be a cougar, and that was all well and good, but I had a boyfriend.

  “Moving on, Bailey.” I closed that thread a heartbeat after I should have, and felt guilty as all get-out for that.

  Then I found a thread with a man named Stanley.

  It appeared he had come into town and had made plans to see her Friday night.

  So lovely to see you again, she’d written at midnight on Friday.

  Interesting. I wonder if he had any clue she had passed away?

  I needed to call him and ask some questions but I needed to work up the courage to do that.

  Dashing back downstairs I snagged a crystal flute from her dining room hutch, and using a towel from the kitchen, opened the champagne. I took the bottle and the glass upstairs and poured in Vera’s bedroom.

  “To you, Vera,” I said, glancing around her inner sanctuary. “You were a cool chick who lived life to the fullest. May you rest in peace, dahlin’.”

  I half-expected her to answer me. Maybe I was hoping she would. But the room remained silent. Vera had a record player on an etagere in the corner and I opened it to see what record was on it. Glenn Miller. I turned it on, not wanting to snoop in silence.

  Sipping champagne, I went through Vera’s closet, drooling over the vintage pieces nestled up against the modern designers. Nothing was cheap. There were classic, timeless pieces, then funky and fun accessories. She had mastered the art of dressing in well-made basics, then adding shoes, jewelry, a turban, or a funky shawl to change up her look.

  Her shoes were to die for.

  I gave a laugh of horror in the closet at that thought. To die for. Yikes.

  There were drawers lined with felt that had a drool-worthy collection of brooches, bracelets, rings, and necklaces. She even had hairpins that I suspected were from the 1930s. I did notice what looked like some odd empty spots in a few drawers and I wondered how closely Pam had inspected the collection. Or if Pam had swiped a few items on her way out.

  There were four stacks of hat boxes, which was glorious.

  Beside them were photo boxes. Inside I found newspaper clippings from seventy-five years earlier.

  Miss Vera Rosenbaum, 21, model with the House of Chanel, is engaged to legendary film star, Frank Torro, 37. Nuptials to be held at the private home of Humphrey Bogart in a simple ceremony, in accordance with wartime sacrifice.

  There was an engagement photo where Vera looked way older than she actually was at the time. Dressed in a suit with shoulder pads, she looked glamourous as hell. Her lips were dark, eyebrows dramatic, hair perfectly curled. Her fiancé was what I would call dapper but not particularly handsome. He was glancing affectionately down at her. On the other hand, she was staring boldly into the camera, sensual and full of life.

  “Age is a funny thing, Vera, isn’t it?” I said out loud in the closet, draining my glass.

  The box was full of old photos. Wedding photos of Vera at different ages. Photo shoots. A three-legged race on the lawn of a mansion, palm trees in the background. Runners laughing as they held on to each other.

  Man, I was having a melancholy day.

  There were love letters in the box too. Passionate notes from Vera’s third husband, things like “Even on the darkest day, you are the sun that warms my soul.”

  Now it’s all text messages.

  I would fall over if Marner wrote me a note.

  There was also a nasty note from a woman that Vera had kept, which I found fascinating.

  It was a woman named June calling Vera a homewrecking whore.

  “Why would you save this?” I murmured.

  And was June still alive? Had she gotten her final revenge on Vera? That seemed unlikely. She was probably ninety herself.

  The record playing cut off suddenly.

  I jumped, dropping the letter from angry June.

  My heart started racing.

  It didn’t sound like the record had ended on its own. It had cut off mid-song.

  Could Vera do that?

  Then I realized I heard footsteps.

  Shoot.

  Crawling on my belly, I reached the closet door and tried to ease it c
losed so as not to alert the intruder.

  It was too late. I was on my stomach, staring at Italian loafers.

  Four

  Given that the loafers were on the feet of a man who from my position looked enormous and terrifying, I let out a squeak and started scrambling backward. You can imagine how well that worked. I still had the glass flute in my hand, so I was crab walking backward on my wrists. My sweater bunched up to my rib cage and I wondered exactly where the hell I thought I was going. Vera had cashmere, not Kevlar.

  I pushed myself up on to my knees, prepared to throw the champagne glass at his chest.

  “Are you okay?” the man asked, frowning down at me.

  “Who the hell are you?” I demanded, going for offensive. I needed to get out of the closet if I had any chance at escape.

  Had I locked the front door behind me? I had to have locked it. I’m obsessed with locks.

  “I’m Stanley Robertson. Who are you?” He held a hand out as if to either shake my hand or maybe help me up.

  In either case, I ignored it and scrambled to my feet, very grateful I’d changed into jeans out of my pjs. I couldn’t die in fleece, that just would not be cool. Stanley had gone out with Vera on Friday night. They’d had a “lovely time.” Did he come back on Saturday and bump her off?

  “I’m a friend of Vera’s.” I got to my feet and gestured to the closet, hoping he would enter and I could step out. “Just toasting to her life and her fabulous taste.”

  “She did have both of those.” His voice was easy, his hair trim, overcoat expensive. He had a Burberry scarf on. “As a young gay man growing up in the seventies, she was a fabulous stepmother to have, let me tell you. Despite the quote unquote scandal of her marriage to my father.”

  Oooh, so this was the stepson Grandma Burke had mentioned. I also knew that one of Vera’s husbands had been married when they began a relationship, so clearly that was Stanley’s father. Maybe June was his mother of the nastygram. I could see now that he was in his fifties and had either a standing date with a tanning bed or he wasn’t a Cleveland resident. He had a deep tan.