***
Stepping into Leroy and Clara’s house seemed like stepping into the 1950s. Everything from the vintage brocade drapes to the velvet wine-colored four-seater sofa was an heirloom. I loved it. Their house was an antique collector’s dream.
The layout was identical to mine, but not only that, it needed refurbishing, too. I imagined the house of a carpenter freshly painted with unchipped moldings and shiny floors. It amazed me, just as a hair stylist’s unkempt, needing-a-dye-job hair amazed me.
Benjamin walked ahead of me with his hands looped around the navy suspenders he insisted on wearing. He looked every bit a half-pint lumberjack in jeans, red and blue plaid flannel shirt and tan hiker boots.
I wanted Leroy to tell me everything he knew about my house, its previous owners and the ghost. Benjamin joining me complicated that. I would need to censor my questions. How could I learn the truth if I couldn't make direct inquiries? Leroy and Clara were his new best friends. How could I refuse him a visit? I hoped that somehow Leroy and I would have a chance to talk privately.
Leroy ushered us to the sofa in the living room. “I knew you would come to see me.”
I was right. He expected me to come calling. Maybe not at that precise moment, but at some time.
The aroma of freshly baked cookies wafted into the room, making my mouth water.
His wife emerged from the kitchen. “Leroy, did I hear the doorbell?” She stopped abruptly when she saw me. Apparently, she hadn't expected that I'd come calling.
“We have company, dear.”
“I’m deaf, Leroy, not blind.”
Leroy introduced us.
Clara August was a spry eighty-year-old, judging by her fast step. She wore her long, white hair braided. Her bright blue eyes twinkled when she welcomed us into her home.
“You have beautiful furniture, Mrs. August.” I raised my voice, remembering her hearing impairment.
She wiped her hands on her apron and sat beside me. “I’m not really hard of hearing, dear,” she whispered. “I just want Leroy to think I am. He rambles on sometimes. You know how it is.”
True, I did. But I hadn't pretended deafness. I blocked my husband out. It wasn’t effective, though. Jonathan had often called me dimwitted with the attention span of a gnat. He said it teasingly, but I knew he meant the insult. My husband wouldn't get away with today what he got away with when we were married. I was a different woman now.
“And how are you, young man?” Clara smiled at Benjamin.
“Fine, thank you.”
She turned back to me. “Can I get you anything? I just made a fresh pot of tea.”
“I’d love a cup. Thank you.”
Benjamin spotted the birdcage sitting on a corner table. “Wow. I didn’t know you had a bird, Mr. August.” In two jumps he was kneeling on the floor in front of the cage. He squeezed his fingers through the bars. “Nice birdie. Cheep, cheep. Here, birdie.” The parrot turned its beady eyes on him. “What’s his name, Mr. August?”
“Pedro.”
“Pedro?” His eyebrows formed an inverted V. “That’s a funny name for a bird. Does he talk?”
The parrot cocked his head. “Leroy's a pain. Leroy's a pain. Be bop the hip hop.”
Benjamin giggled into his hand. He turned and looked at us. “Pedro's bad.”
Leroy chuckled while Clara appeared flustered, playing with the hem of her apron.
A bell rang in the kitchen.
“Clara, your cookies are ready,” Leroy said.
“You don’t have to yell, Leroy. I heard the bell.” Clara stood and looked at Benjamin. “Would you like to help me take the cookies out of the oven?”
Benjamin jumped up and grabbed her hand. “Can I have a cookie?”
“If it’s okay with your mother,” Clara said.
Two pair of blue eyes turned to me.
“It’s ‘may I’ and yes, you can have one. But only one.”
“Aw, Maw-um.”
“Okay, two.” After what he was just put through, I couldn’t say no.
“Awright.” He dashed off behind Clara.
I studied Leroy a moment. His expression told me he knew the reason behind my visit.
"You expected me," I said, realizing the senselessness of pretense. Leroy struck me as a man who appreciated directness.
“Sooner or later, yes.” He stared intently at me. “You believe me now ... about the ghost?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you.”
He came forward in his chair and rested his forearms on his thighs. “Has he showed himself to you?”
“Yes.”
"Tell me."
Leroy listened raptly, seemingly hanging on my every word as I related what happened moments ago. The appearance of my mother’s spirit was too personal for me to tell a virtual stranger. Besides, Leroy didn’t need to know.
“Anything else?”
God, wasn’t that enough? “Now and then I feel a presence around me. And there’s a stench in the house, and sometimes my hair flutters on my neck. These things could have logical explanations, though.”
“Vince and Bridget had logical explanations for everything that happened in that house, too … in the beginning.”
“The people who owned the house before me?”
He nodded.
“What should I do?”
“Leave.”
I stood. “That’s not an option. I will not be forced out of my home.” Not again. I folded too many times in the last sixteen years. I would never be that woman again. The thought of losing didn't sit well with me either. I watched him assess me and knew he was wondering if I was strong enough to win this fight.
When Leroy turned his gaze from mine, I sat back down, took a calming breath and asked, “Any other suggestions?”
“Taking a stand is good, but you have to know when to fold.”
“I can’t fold.” I shook my head. “I won’t.”
“If you stay, you’ll be fighting something you have no experience with, something not of this world. How can you expect to win?”
I sighed. That wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I wanted a solution, and thought Leroy might help me find it. “I appreciate your advice, but I’m not going anywhere. If I knew something about the ghost, I might have a chance. Will you tell me what you know? Please, Leroy. I really need your help.”
He stared into space, pondering my plea perhaps, or perhaps deciding whether I could accept the truth. After several seconds, he huffed a breath and asked, “Are you sure you want to know?”
I responded vehemently and without hesitation. “Yes.” Judging from his expression, Leroy seemed pleased with my answer. I said no more. He wasted no time getting started.
“For awhile, Clara and I suspected something sinister was happening in that house, but it wasn’t until I went over to invite Vince to a hockey game one night that I knew for sure.” He removed his glasses and cleaned them on his shirttail.
“What happened?”
“I saw the creature.”
I could see the pain dredging up this memory caused him and hated myself for asking him questions that would make him relive that period in his life. “What did you do?”
“I went to see Father Murphy and told him what happened, then suggested an exorcism.”
He chuckled. “I’m sure you can imagine his reaction.”
I could and nodded.
“Nevertheless, I coaxed and pleaded with him until he agreed to visit with them. He didn’t find anything unusual in the house or with the Simsons, though. Or so he said.”
“You think he did?”
Leroy shrugged. “If he did, he took it to his grave.”
“He died?”
“Yes. A couple of weeks later. He accidentally fell from his second-story bedroom window.”
It took a moment for that to sink in. “He accidentally fell.... God.” A chill sped up my sp
ine. Leroy was right. I had no idea what I contended with. "But there wasn't any proof of foul play?"
"No." He glanced toward the dining room and leaned in closer to me.
I met him half way.
“Vince told me the ghost was having sex with Clara,” he whispered.
My heart leapt into my throat. “Sex?” I squeaked, remembering last night in the bathtub.
Oh God. I wanted it to be a dream. Why couldn't it have been a dream?
He nodded. “Uh-huh. Sex.”
Irwin’s image flashed in my mind... it couldn’t be true. It had to be a dream. “My apparition is a child. Maybe what Vince and Clara saw is not what I’m seeing.” Not so long ago, I didn’t believe ghosts existed and now I made it seem they roamed the earth freely and plentifully, many of them apparently taking up residence in my house. Obviously, I would take any answer to explain away my bathtub experience of last night.
“Do you think souls don’t age in Heaven? Do you think those souls who have aged on earth spend an eternity as their earthly selves? Speaking for myself, I’d like to think once I pass over to my final resting place, I’ll be able to do all the things in life I enjoyed before I became too old to do them.”
I never gave that much thought, if at all, but he might be right and told him so.
Leroy smiled, like he'd won round one, then sat back until his head rested against the chair and closed his eyes.
There was more, but he'd told me all he intended for one day, so I took that as my cue to leave and called to my son in the kitchen. Benjamin insisted on staying with Leroy and Clara a bit longer. I didn't have a problem with that. I needed alone time to deal with what I'd learned from Leroy.
Sickened by the thought I had sex with a ghost, the moment I entered my house, my temper got the better of me. “Goddamnit.” I sped into the living room and kicked an unpacked box marked ‘China.’ “I am not leaving this house.” I spun in a slow circle, looking upward. “Did you hear me? I. Am. Not. Leaving. This. House. And. I. Am. Not. Having. Sex. Again. With. You.”
I used the sleeve of my sweater to wipe the tears from my cheeks.
“Show yourself, you bastard.” I waited. The only sound was the tick-tock of the pendulum clock on the mantle of the fireplace.
“Oh, I get it. You only show yourself when it’s to your advantage. Well, I know you’re here. I feel your presence, so listen up, chicken shit.” The room suddenly turned ten degrees cooler. Irwin wouldn't frighten me ever again. “Good. I have your attention. It’s time to lay down some rules. One: Leave my children and me alone and that means no more sex with me, free or otherwise.”
A fierce wind picked up in my living room, blowing my hair in every direction.
“Don’t like that rule? Well, too bad. Get used to it, if you want to stay here.” The air settled.
“Two: No more games." Just then, it occurred to me that Irwin had caused Jonathan's discomfort the other night. As much as I enjoyed seeing him jump around in pain, I couldn't let Irwin think I abided his actions. "Three: You will not hurt anyone who comes into this house and that includes Jonathan.”
I cleared my throat and took a deep breath. “Follow those rules and you won’t have any problems. Break one and, as God is my witness, I’ll make you suffer. Comprende? I’ll give new meaning to the old saying ‘hell hath no fury.’ You’ve been warned.” I looked around the room again. Everything was as it should be. “Good boy.”
I doubted my threats frightened him, but I needed time to plot a course of action, whatever that might be. I had no intention of sharing my house with a ghost. First thing tomorrow after the salesman from the building supply store left, I intended to get a copy of my lawyer’s property search notes and check the library for back issues of newspapers for any information about my house and the previous owners, as Leroy suggested. If I learned the reason for Irwin’s presence and told him, maybe he would cross over. How I sounded like someone who knew what they talked about.
I meant business and kicked the box to drive home my point. Irwin needed to know that.
“Geez, take a fit, Mother, why don’t you?”
Startled, I turned and stared at Katie standing in the archway. I forgot about her being upstairs. “You probably think I’ve gone crazy.”
“You said it, not me.”
“I lost my temper, but I’m all right now.”
“If I did that, you’d be all over me.”
“Maybe.” Maybe not.
“Did it feel good?”
I stepped aside. “Try it for yourself.”
Katie crossed the living room and hit the box with the side of her foot. “Hey, imagine that. Nothing broke.” She kicked it again. And again.
I wondered what part of her life she was trying to annihilate. Or maybe she envisioned my face on the box. Whatever the case, she appeared to get as much satisfaction in kicking it as I had. It was good for her to vent her frustrations. “Be careful. You’ll hurt your foot doing it that way. Take a long swing like this, just like you would a soccer ball.” I showed her how it was done. She joined me, pounding, kicking and grunting until we gasped for breath from the exertion. I dropped to the floor and Katie followed seconds later. In that moment, I felt close to my daughter, closer than I had in a long, long time.
“Do you think we broke anything?” she asked.
Not the way I packed. I should be telling her there were more intellectual ways to deal with anger. Truthfully, I didn’t feel one iota of guilt. “Maybe. But, you know what, I don’t care. It was worth it. I feel great. How about you?”
Katie edged closer to me. I breathed in the fresh fragrance of her shampoo and closed my eyes, committing this moment to memory. Moments like these came around so rarely lately. We would share the closeness we shared before, I promised myself.
The front door slammed.
“Mom, I’m home.”
“We’re in the living room.”
He ran over to us. “Is it time for supper?”
Katie nudged her brother’s foot with the toe of her sneaker. “You’re always hungry.”
“Am not.”
“Are, too.” She hauled him down on the floor and tickled him mercilessly.
I stood and smiled. This was what it was like before. And that was what it would be like again some day. Amid Benjamin’s giggles and pleas for mercy, I looked upward. Irwin didn't show himself, but I felt his presence. I wanted him to know who was boss in this house. I gave him the finger.
Restless Souls Page 13
