Ghost Town

by Cherie Claire

  I’ve used libraries in my work and their mission is to disseminate information, not hoard it. “That’s weird.”

  Elijah nods. “Got my curiosity up. I started researching the springs and the lake and have been adding to this over the years.”

  I peer into this box filled with letters, articles and brochures advertising the springs and its healing powers, then glance back at my employer. “What is it you want me to do?”

  Elijah pulls off the side of the road and heads back to town.

  “Read it.”

  I pull into my driveway as the sun sets behind the main house, still trying to make sense of the day. Elijah spent hours giving me a tour of the entire lake, introducing me to several people who had reported seeing ghosts. Again, these hauntings appear to be of those who have not died by water, but I recorded their stories on my tape recorder and made copious notes anyway.

  The auto shop worker had witnessed a bearded man in overalls carrying an ax with half an arm missing so we all assumed he had perished from a wood-chucking accident. Shirley, the teenage library intern, swore she saw a man in a Confederate uniform at the city park, a tall man with a large dark stain over his chest, his eyes glazed and confused. And my breakfast neighbor, the one with the haunted bedroom, a man named Jack Branford, was standing on the porch when we drove up as if he couldn’t wait to introduce us to his wife, Margie. I sensed her fear the minute I crossed the threshold.

  Margie’s nightmare began at two in the morning the Monday following Easter when she woke to crying from the corner of the room. She rose on her elbows and peered through the darkness to see what appeared to be a young woman staring at her, terrified.

  “This jolt of fear ran through me,” she told us. “I knew she wasn’t real but I felt her pain as if she were me, as if I were being tortured by someone.”

  This had stopped me cold. “Why do you think she was being tortured?”

  Elijah started shifting his feet then, and when I looked his way he gave me a hard, knowing stare. Meanwhile, Margie leaned in close to me as if the walls had ears.

  “There were rumors, you know, that the resort had prostitution in the back and the mob ran the place.”

  This was news. “But torture?”

  “During the Depression, women who came here were pretty desperate,” Jack piped in. “It’s been said that powerful men came from all over because of the unique services the women offered. Those who didn’t do the acts required of them were beaten or they simply disappeared.”

  I looked over at Elijah, wondering if this was what he dug up in his research, and he nodded. Still, it was another example of a death that didn’t concern water.

  “Where’s the room?” I asked.

  Jack led me down a long hallway that was creepy in and of itself and I couldn’t fathom why. He stopped at the threshold of the master bedroom but didn’t walk through.

  “Have you seen this woman?” I asked him.

  He shook his head and refused to move. “No, to me it just feels wrong. But if my wife says it’s a ghost or something evil happening here, then I believe her.”

  I walked into the room which appeared more like a guest room. Everything in its place. Bed nicely made. No items of use such as eyeglasses, reading materials or clothes off hangers anywhere. I assumed the Branfords had moved into another part of the house.

  I walked to every corner of the room. I peered into the closets. I checked the master bath. Nothing. I turned back toward the door to tell Jack as much but Elijah stood there waiting, gauging my reaction.

  “I don’t see anything, feel anything,” I whispered to Elijah.

  He nodded, then leaned closer and whispered back, “You need to come back when the sun goes down.”

  And that was where we left it. After several more interviews, I took the box that Elijah gave me and headed back to Lafayette. I’m totally confused as to what to do, thinking I can’t help these people if they died by gunshot, beatings, and assorted farm instruments. But then, I wonder. Have I developed my intuitive skills enough to see ghosts who have not died by water? Has this accidental meeting happened to prove to me that I can see beyond my SCANC abilities?

  A fire of hope burns in my belly. There was that girl at Blue Moon Bayou, now a town full of non-watery haunts. If I can see and address those who have not died by water, I might be finally able to reach Lillye, my precious angel on the other side.

  As I pull up the emergency brake on my Toyota — always worried the brakes will really fail and my car will slide into the massive drainage ditch outside my apartment — I spot TB’s pickup truck.

  “What the…?” I ask no one, grab the box and head down the walkway to my mother-in-law unit.

  I’m immediately greeted by Reece.

  “Hey.”

  I pull the box against my chest, feeling defensive. “Hey yourself.”

  He pulls back slightly, as if struck by my comment. I wonder if I sounded harsh.

  “I was checking to see how you are.”

  “I’m fine.”

  I can now hear the curtness in my voice.

  “Are you mad at me?”

  “How’s your wife?”

  My gorgeous, easy-going landlord who I’ve never seen angry or upset at anyone, deflates. I had vowed to be obtuse about my feelings regarding Reece, but I just spewed them all over the front of his shirt.

  “I’m sorry,” I quickly retract. “That came out wrong.”

  He smiles grimly. “No, it didn’t. Vi, I thought you understood….”

  “That you and your wife are staying together for the kids. Yeah, I got it. I didn’t expect you to look so happy at the Blue Moon rising, that’s all.”

  Reece rubs his hands on his thighs and looks away. “What did you want me to do in front of my kids, argue and be miserable?”

  I hadn’t really thought about that. Still, we were dating — sort of — and the next minute he’s off to resume marital bliss. “Of course, but not….”

  “You don’t know. Life gets complicated when you have kids.”

  This comment sails straight through my chest and I feel like I’ve been stabbed. In the grand scheme of things nothing is more complicated and painful than the death of a child.

  Reece instantly realizes his mistake. “Vi, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insinuate….”

  “It’s okay.” I pull the box closer to my chest and step back. Having lost my child I know how valuable time is with children, would understand more than most his desire to make things work. And yet his comment and instant dismissal of our relationship stings sharply. “Go back to your wife and do your duty,” I say a bit harshly.

  Behind me I hear the door opening to my apartment.

  “Oh hey, Vi. I thought I heard you out here.”

  Reece glances at TB and then back at me, waiting for me to make introductions but I’m dumbstruck, caught in a hypocrisy.

  “I’m TB,” my ex-husband finally says, stretching out his hand, which Reece shakes. “I’m Viola’s husband.”

  I cringe at the words, while Reece gives me a smug look. I dance a Michael Jackson moon walk backwards to the door and slip inside, wishing there was a big hole somewhere to swallow me up. TB lingers outside, however, and I hear the two men talking about carpentry and sports like old friends. What on earth is he doing here anyway?

  Stinky rubs up against me and I’m thankful for a friend. I throw the box on to the bed and plop on the floor so I can give Stinky some real attention. He purrs his approval of my massage techniques, then looks at me with a wink.

  “Why do you cats do that?” I ask, like he’s going to answer.

  Stinky sashays to the front door, which is still half open, and rubs his back against it like he did my leg. The door falls shut with barely a squeak and the sound of the men talking disappears. Stinky then returns to my magic hands, slipping an ear underneath to make sure I get the hint.

  “Thanks.” Did that cat just do me a favor?

  I shake off
the crazy thought and resume petting, although I reach over and grab the box, leaning against the bed to make myself comfortable. On top are the notes I took interviewing the residents of Lorelei Lake and it doesn’t take me long to see a pattern. First, most of the interviewees are women, although that’s not too surprising considering that women are more intuitive than men. Still. Second, for what I can assume, none of the ghosts have died by water.

  I grab my cell phone and call the one person who knows everything about SCANCs.

  “Hey darling,” Carmine answers on the first ring.

  It’s so good to hear a fellow travel writer and SCANCy ghost hunter that I almost burst out crying. “Hey Carmine.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  He also gets me like no one else.

  “What isn’t? I’m broke, my press trips have dried up, my family’s being a pain in the ass and my ex-husband is outside talking to a man I have sexual fantasies about.”

  Carmine laughs. “Is that all?”

  “Oh, and I got a job cleaning an entire town of ghosts and for what I understand none of them have died by water.”

  “Okay, back up and explain the last one.”

  Carmine is a SCANC like me, someone also prone to seeing the dead at an early age but who ignored it growing up, especially since his feminine traits caused him enough trouble around schoolmates. Why add ghosts to the mix? He was beaten close to death by a group of boys threatened by his lack of masculinity and now, Carmine sees ghosts who are gay. Granted, he’s not bothered as much as I am since apparitions batting for the other team lack numbers, but he did meet Oscar Wilde in Paris, an experience of which I’m eternally envious.

  I explain it all — the Blue Moon rising, the girl by the bayou, Matt the asshole and the weird ghost town with its juxtaposition of gorgeous lake and resort ruins.

  “Do you think this means I’m evolving? That I will see ghosts who have not died by water?”

  I’m so hopeful, waiting to hear my good friend and SCANC mentor insist that my time has come, that I’ve developed my intuitive gift, and that the heavens will open up and I’ll see my darling girl.

  Instead, he laughs. “Hardly. I’ve never known a SCANC to go beyond their specific abilities. That’s why it stands for ‘specific communication with apparitions, non-entities, and the comatose.’”

  “But you told me once that it’s possible that people can develop their intuition.”

  “Well, yeah, but what I meant was you can sense something that’s outside your specialty, like something amiss in a place or something bad about to happen. Psychic skills, not seeing other types of ghosts.”

  My heart plummets but my mind refuses to give up the ghost — this time, pun intended. It can’t be. It just can’t. I know this assignment has been given to me for a reason.

  “But what about the girl at the bayou?”

  “She probably died by water.”

  “She was so real, Carmine, down to the button on her overalls. She talked to me like a regular person.”

  “So did that masseuse in Eureka Springs.”

  The first time I realized I had this ability was on a press trip to Arkansas and it was Carmine who had explained it all. During that trip, I saw several ghosts there, two of which were intellectual hauntings, or those who could communicate to me in some way. But there was one person who kneaded the knots out of my back and I’ve never been sure if that person was real or not. Or how he died, if he was indeed a ghost.

  “Good point. I doubt that masseuse died by water,” I offer with hopeful optimism.

  I hear what sounds like Carmine drinking a glass of wine. “Darling, you have to stop getting your hopes up. I’ve met many SCANCs, even been to the SCANC convention — which is something you never want to do by the way — and I’ve never heard of anyone pushing past their specialties.”

  I still can’t give up, feel like reaching Lillye is the reason I got this crazy gift to begin with. But I let it go. For now.

  “I’m heading your way on Thursday,” and tell Carmine about the hotel job.

  “Courtyard is known for being cheap so don’t be shy about asking for a decent amount.”

  “Okay.” I’ve already agreed to their cheap price because I’m desperate but I don’t tell Carmine that.

  “Gotta run, sweetheart, dinner’s on.”

  “Wait, what’s wrong with the SCANC convention?”

  But Carmine’s hung up just as TB saunters in.

  “What a great guy,” he comments on my landlord.

  Would love to know how great Reece is, specifically in bed, but I don’t tell him that.

  “What are you doing here, TB?”

  He falls on to the bed and makes himself comfortable, resting his hand behind his head. “They called me back on the job. Turns out they need me for a few more days so I thought….”

  “That you could just waltz in here?”

  He leans up on one elbow so he can look at me. “Why are you on the floor?”

  “I’m looking through some notes. Don’t change the subject.”

  TB leans over the bed and gazes down into Elijah’s pile of articles, papers, and whatnots. “New job?”

  TB assisted me with a previous haunting, performing research that helped me solve the case. He keeps asking to help out again but thankfully the travel trips have been about travel and not apparitions wanting attention. Not to mention that his last foray into research was probably a fluke. TB never finished college and isn’t the brightest light in the chandelier.

  I place the lid on the box. “It’s pretty complicated.”

  TB looks like he’s been slapped and I wonder if my aggravation with the world is seeping out my mouth.

  “I’m not smart enough for it, is that it?”

  I don’t want to go there tonight. “Why are you here?”

  “Is it so bad that I am?”

  “We’re separated TB. Remember?”

  He’s closer now, running a lone finger up my arm. “Not for long if I can help it.”

  I rise and head for the kitchen, wishing I was normal like Carmine and drinking wine, sitting down to dinner with a gorgeous man who also pays the mortgage. What I find in my meager room is a sink chock-full of pots and pans, remnants of something leafy all over the countertop, and empty food boxes lying about. I rub my forehead at the scene before me. The last thing I want to do right now is clean up after my former husband.

  Instead, I turn, primed for action.

  “This is my house, TB. You can’t come in here every time you feel like it. Look at the mess you made.” He starts to talk but that train has left the station. “We’re separated. That means get your own place when you come to town.”

  The minute I’m done I regret both my words and my tone. Where is all this anger coming from? Of course, TB would think about staying here. We’re still friends, still legally married so I can keep my health benefits, not to mention we can’t afford a divorce. I exhale, then attempt a retreat, but I see the damage I’ve inflicted in the gaze he sends back.

  “I got a housing allowance. I can stay somewhere else.”

  There’s a but coming and I know what it is. Why stay in a strange hotel, have nothing to do for hours, when I’m here?

  “I thought instead of using the money I’d stay here and give the money to you.”

  Damn this man. He can make me feel so guilty.

  “TB, I didn’t mean….”

  “Don’t worry about it, Vi.” He stands and grabs his jacket and heads for the door. “I’ll see you around.”

  “TB,” I implore, but I can’t help it, want him to leave, want to be left alone digging through this box of possible reasons I’ll be able to see Lillye. But, within seconds, he’s gone.

  I lean back against the wall and sigh while Stinky rubs up against my legs again. He gives me a funny look. No wink this time, something more akin to a reprimand.

  “Whose side are you on?”

  It’s then that I notic
e the table.

  TB has cooked me dinner and displayed fried pork chops and heaping bowls of fresh vegetables — Brussel sprouts, my favorite, among them — next to fresh flowers and lighted candles.

  “Damn.”

  I rush out the door to catch him from driving away, but TB’s already halfway down Saint Francis. I stand there feeling a thousand shades of shame, watching a man who loves me hurt by my insensitivity yet again. Behind me I hear Reece cleaning the pool. And staring me straight in the face is my ailing Toyota.

  Some days you feel like the world surrounds you, screaming tirades of how worthless you are. Where once I felt hope at seeing Lillye again, my confidence has crashed big time. I’m broke, I have no idea how to help the Fontus Springs community, my dreams of being with my landlord are shot, and I sent away the one person who truly cares about me.

  I slink back to my potting shed and all that swag brought home from press trips reminds me that I own nothing of value, that I’m patching my broken life with Band-Aides that only I think are cute. In the middle of this mess lies a beautifully set table for two, a bottle of my favorite wine in its center.

  I sit down at this lovely feast and text my ex-husband.

  “Come back,” I write. “I’m sorry. It’s my frustration talking. Please come back.”

  I hope it works. For now, I sit at the delicious meal before me and wait.

  Stinky cries out and I look down to find him sprawled out on the box’s contents.

  “Read that and get back to me,” I say to relieve the emptiness that has descended upon the room.

  He cries once more but I’m too busy wallowing in guilt to reach over and pet him. Suddenly, Stinky takes his wallowing up a notch, really howls this time, which startles me to the core, like nails on a chalkboard.

  “What is it?” I ask, like he’s going to answer me in English.

  Stinky stands, does the back-arch thing, and walks through the mound of papers now scattered about the floor. But he pauses on a postcard, then pushes the card out of the pile towards me.