Spirit Talk: (Book One of The Fiona Series)

by Colleen McManus Hein

  “What about the other participants? What are they like?” Fiona was anxious about this. She didn’t want to spend a month trapped in a mansion with unpleasant companions.

  “They change, obviously. Some stay for four weeks and some stay multiple months. Right now, we have a man in his sixties, a woman in her late forties, a man in his late twenties, and a young woman in her early twenties,” he said.

  She stared down again at the color photo of the mansion. “I just can’t believe it,” she whispered. “It’s like I’ve been there. It’s so odd.”

  “I think it’s a sign, don’t you?” Martin inquired.

  She didn’t reply. She knew it was significant that she recognized the facility. She needed to go home and read the contract, ask her grandmothers for guidance, and convince her mother before she gave Martin an answer. “I’d better go,” Fiona said. “My mother thinks I just ran to the store.” She picked up the contract and held the photos out to Martin. “Can I hang onto these to show my mother?”

  “I’m afraid not.” He took the photos from her hand. “My bosses don’t want the location of the facility to become public knowledge. If your mother comes tomorrow, I can show her then." Martin pulled a five-dollar bill and three ones from a black leather wallet and placed them neatly on the table.

  “Okay,” Fiona said. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then, I guess. I’ll let you know my decision.” She took her coat off the hook and put it on. She nodded to Greta, who called out, “Bye, darlin’.”

  “I’ll see you here at nine, but I think I already know your answer.” Martin put on his heavy black coat and gestured for Fiona to exit the restaurant ahead of him.

  Chapter 29

  Outside, Martin walked toward the hotel. Fiona stood a moment, feeling dazed, before she remembered that she still needed to run to the Golden Goose. She wandered through the store in a fog, still stunned by the photos. She wanted to go there, she realized. She decided to tell her mother the news right away and get it over with. If she was going to pursue her dream of being a professional medium and psychic, she needed to strengthen her abilities in any way she could. And even more importantly, she needed money. If she had to pretend to her mother that it was money for college, so be it.

  As she exited the Golden Goose with tampons and maxi pads in a bag, she noticed a pickup truck parked directly in front of Mary’s Sewing Bee that said: “Fireside Public Works” on its driver’s side door. Fiona felt a tug on her memory. Why was that familiar to her? Then, she remembered: that was where Kevin Moran worked. It appeared that her mother might be entertaining. Fiona tried to think of somewhere else she could go to avoid running into Kevin’s reunion with Theresa, but she urgently needed to get to a bathroom. She didn’t want to go back into the Maple Moose and endure more of Greta’s curious questions. She would have to go home.

  Fiona entered the shop as noisily as she could, making the bells on the door jingle. She walked slowly through the shop then heavily up the stairs. When she got to the top, she called out “Mom! I’m home!” It was not something she would normally do, but she did not want to see her mother and Kevin doing anything other than sharing a cup of tea.

  She was relieved when she saw that the living room, which looked ramshackle and bare already, was unoccupied. She hurried into the bathroom with her bag.

  “Hi, dear,” her mother called from the kitchen.

  “I’ll be right there,” Fiona called back, closing the bathroom door. When she finally entered the kitchen, it was just her mother sitting at the table. Had Kevin snuck out while Fiona was in the bathroom? She laughed to herself at the role reversal: her mother was sneaking a male guest out of the apartment and Fiona was playing along.

  “Where were you for so long?” Theresa asked. “I made us sandwiches, but I got so hungry I ate mine without you.”

  “I’m sorry.” Fiona looked carefully at her mother. Her cheeks were suspiciously pink, and she looked radiant. “I ran into someone I did a reading for once,” she began nervously. “It was actually one of the first readings I did with Grandma. Did you know, Mom, that Grandma taught me to read the cards and palms?”

  Theresa smiled. “Not until I got here. People were talking about it at the wake. If your sister knew, she never mentioned it. But I kind of figured you would learn. You and your grandmother were a lot alike. It makes sense that she taught you.” Theresa looked unusually calm and relaxed.

  Thank you, Kevin Moran, Fiona thought.

  Fiona put down her sandwich. She was dreading telling her mother about Martin Bankston, the facility, and her decision, which was suddenly very clear in her mind. She wanted to give it a try for four weeks. “It turns out I’m really good at it. At the psychic stuff,” she added. She told Theresa about Grandma Mary’s lessons, and her notebook, and her palmistry studies. She even told her mother about the spirit’s voices.

  “I’m not surprised,” Theresa mused. “When you were a little girl, you were always telling me and your father things that you couldn’t possibly know.”

  “I was?” Fiona asked. She had assumed she’d successfully hidden her “gift.”

  “Yes, and it scared your father very badly. He associated anything like that with the Devil. He was terrified when you predicted things that came true. I was used to that kind of thing growing up with my mother, but your poor father found it very disturbing.”

  “Like what?” Fiona asked. “I don’t remember predicting anything.”

  “Oh, it happened a number of times. Once, we were supposed to go to Sag Harbor for a wedding. The day before our flight you told us we weren't going. Your dad tried to get you to explain, but you just shrugged and repeated, ‘We’re not going.’ Well, the next day, when we got to the airport, it turned out there’d been terrible storms in New York and all the flights were canceled. By the time the airline resumed flights, it was too late. We’d missed the wedding.”

  Fiona shook her head, mystified. “I don’t remember that.”

  “Oh, and one time, you told us that Mrs. Ziegler next door was going to die. You were so sad and so serious when you announced it at dinner one night. Your father was furious with you and sent you to your room for saying such a terrible thing. Then, in the middle of the night, we woke up to red ambulance lights shining into the bedroom. Your dad ran outside, and when he came back, I could guess what had happened just from the look on his face. But I wanted him to say it. I wanted to hear him say, ‘Mrs. Zeigler is dead, and Fiona was not lying.’”

  “I don’t remember that,” Fiona said weakly. “God, Mom, I wish I’d known that you knew. I always felt like I had to keep all those things, all those times I knew stuff, a secret.”

  “You did,” Theresa said, looking suddenly sad. “You did have to keep it a secret because your father couldn’t handle it. He wouldn’t have tolerated it. I was afraid for you and I discouraged you from talking about it. I was protecting you.” She looked steadily at Fiona. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry if it was the wrong thing to do, but I didn’t think I had a choice. I didn’t want your father to be afraid of you.”

  Fiona was shocked. All those years when she thought she’d been alone with her voices and visions, and here her mother had known all along.

  “I’m glad you got time with my mother,” Theresa said. “I’m glad she taught you. I’m sure it meant a lot to her, to pass it along.”

  Fiona and her mother sat in silence for a few moments. Fiona was struggling to comprehend this new view of her life history. She thought she could feel Mary’s presence in the kitchen with them and she wondered if her mother felt it, too.

  “Part of me was angry that I didn’t inherit my mother’s abilities,” Theresa mused, “and part of me was relieved.”

  The thought of her mother wanting to have the gift was another complicated notion. “I think Nula got it,” Fiona blurted out.

  “Really?” her mother asked, sitting up straight and looking at Fiona with interest. “What makes you think so?”

  �
�I was playing with her in her room. I heard a spirit say something, and Nula repeated it. She heard it, too.”

  “Wow,” Theresa said. “Does Ann know?”

  “I was nervous to tell her,” Fiona admitted.

  “You have to tell her,” Theresa stated emphatically. “Enough with the secrets.”

  “Mom,” she said softly, “you’re different. You’ve changed since Dad died.”

  “I have.” Theresa smiled, nodding her head. “Your father was a wonderful husband and father, so loving and generous. He meant everything to me and when he died, I thought, at first, that I would die, too. But then,” Theresa sighed, “I didn’t. I didn’t die. Life went on, and I’ve discovered that there are things I like to do that I never did before. I go out with my friends as often as I can. I go to the movies. I even go into the city to see plays!”

  “I know.” Fiona smiled. “Ann told me. She said she would lie awake at night and worry until she heard you come home.”

  At this, mother and daughter laughed together. “That’s why I was so anxious to get my own place!” Theresa exclaimed. “You’re going to love the new apartment. I’ve decorated it really cute and girly. Your dad would not approve,” she commented wryly.

  “Mom,” Fiona began, seeing her opportunity, “there’s something I need to tell you.” She stood and retrieved the contract from the coffee table in the living room.

  Chapter 30

  It had gone better than Fiona could have wished for. Not only had her mother not forbidden her, Theresa had actually joined Fiona in her excitement and pride at being asked to the facility. Her mother listened with shining eyes as Fiona described the mansion, and how she’d dreamt of it for months prior to seeing the photographs. Theresa was just as shocked and pleased as Fiona about the generous compensation, too.

  “It will be so nice for you to have all that money of your own. I’m able to help some with your college tuition, but it turns out your dad...left some debt behind.”

  Fiona saw the pain in her mother’s eyes as she relayed this information. “We’ll be okay, Mom,” Fiona said, hugging Theresa. Then, she remembered her grandmother’s cookie tin in the freezer. “Speaking of money,” she said, jumping up from her chair and pulling the freezer door open, “Grandma had a secret stash!”

  Fiona placed the cookie tin, covered in a thin layer of frost, on the kitchen table. “Open it,” she instructed her mother.

  “No, you open it,” Theresa insisted.

  Fiona sat down and solemnly lifted off the lid. Inside, there were fat rolls of bills, each bundled neatly and secured with a rubber band. If the bills were fifties or hundreds, it would be a significant sum of money.

  She took one roll and struggled to undo the frozen rubber band. When it finally stretched enough to release the bills, Fiona fanned them out dramatically. The motion reminded her of shuffling the cards.

  The bills in the first bundle were mostly ones, sprinkled intermittently with a few fives and tens. Same with all the other rolls. Fiona and her mother released the wads of bills one by one, always holding their breath that this would be the one with twenties, fifties, and hundreds, but each was the same: mostly ones with a few fives and tens.

  “It’s still a decent amount of money,” Theresa pointed out. “I’ll put it in your college savings account at the bank when I get home.”

  “No, don’t,” Fiona interrupted. “Open a new savings account, just for a vacation. When we have enough money, we’ll take a trip to Ireland like we’ve always wanted. You, me, Ann, Rick, and Nula.” Fiona wanted to add, “And maybe Kevin Moran,” but she didn’t dare. She didn’t want to upset her mother by teasing her. And maybe Henry and Ryan, she added in her head.

  After they put all the money back in the cookie tin, Fiona’s mother went over the contract that Martin had given her and could not find anything wrong with it. “I do insist on one thing, however,” Theresa proclaimed after she took off her reading glasses. “I want to go with you tomorrow when you meet with this Mr. Bankston. I want to meet him myself and make sure I have a way to contact you while you’re there. That’s non-negotiable.”

  “Okay,” Fiona agreed. “Just remember that he’s big on secrecy. He seems afraid that we’re going to call Time or People and tell the world about the facility.”

  “Okay.” Theresa grinned. “I’ll wear sunglasses and a trench coat.”

  *****

  That night in bed, Fiona asked softly of the darkness, “Should I go to the facility with Martin Bankston?” She then stared up at her black ceiling and visualized her two grandmothers staring down at her. As she waited for an answer, she felt herself drifting off to sleep. She was exhausted and she couldn’t stay awake another moment.

  The dream was the kind where Fiona knew it was important even though she was asleep. Both Grandma Kate and Grandma Mary were seated across a table from her. A man sat to Grandma Mary’s right and Fiona knew immediately that the man was her Grandpa Pete. He was smiling at her with such naked love that Fiona felt herself begin to cry.

  Grandma Mary had a deck of cards in front of her. Looking straight at Fiona instead of down at the deck, Mary turned over the top card. It was the Ten of Spades. “You have to go,” Mary said, “because you have to stop them.” She then turned over the next card, and again it was the Ten of Spades. “You have to go because you have to stop them,” she repeated. Grandma Kate and Grandpa Pete continued to smile lovingly at Fiona. Mary turned over the next card and it was the Ten of Spades. “You have to go because you have to stop them,” Mary intoned. When Fiona opened her mouth to ask her grandmother to explain, she couldn’t speak. The words were in her head but would not come out of her mouth. She swallowed and tried again as Grandma Mary turned over yet another Ten of Spades.

  When she woke in the morning, the dream hung in Fiona’s mind like the dull, achy beginnings of a cold. Her brain felt heavy in her skull. She very badly wanted to walk into the kitchen and discuss the dream over a pot of tea with Grandma Mary. Instead, she showered, dressed and walked with her mother across the street to the Maple Moose, where they sat with Martin over coffee.

  The first thing Martin did was give Theresa the phone number at the facility and promised that she could call anytime, within reason, and speak with her daughter. Theresa had a list of questions, and Martin answered them, one by one. Greta watched from the cash register. The moose watched from the wall. Fiona felt relieved to have Theresa speak on her behalf. She sleepily sipped her coffee, feeling like a child at a parent-teacher meeting.

  After half an hour of Theresa’s questions and Martin’s answers, Fiona signed the contract under her mother’s watchful eye, promising to spend four weeks at the mansion in Deer Grove, Minnesota, to have her psychic abilities studied and measured. She would leave that very day.

  Back at the apartment, Fiona quickly packed her clothes, her toiletries, the crazy quilt, her notebook, her cards, Grandma Mary’s cards, and the crystal ball. She realized that she was getting proficient at narrowing down her possessions to the essentials and packing them up. She hoped there would come a day when she would stay in one place for a long, long time.

  She removed all of her mother’s photos from the walls and cork board and put them in a large envelope. She tried to put together in her head a reasonable explanation to Henry of why she was leaving without revealing too much and breaking the contract. Then, she finally sat at the desk and wrote to Henry:

  Dear Henry-

  I’m not going back to Illinois with my mother. I’m actually leaving today for a job I’ve taken in Minnesota. I’ll be in Deer Grove, which, I believe, is the town where you grew up. It’s such a long story and hard to explain how it came about, but I’ll write to you and tell you more when I can. It’s just for four weeks to start. Depending on how it goes, I’ll either sign on for another four weeks or go back to Illinois. Either way, though, I want to come back for the summer in Fireside.

  I apologize for being mysterious, but my employers h
ave made me sign a contract promising that I won’t talk to anyone about what I’ll be doing. I know this is going to seem crazy to you, but it will make sense when I can see you next and explain. There’s a good reason for this decision. My mother has approved of the job, so you can rest assured that I’ll be safe.

  I thought I would see you and Ryan again before I left, but things progressed quickly and I leave momentarily. I want you to know, though, that I am already looking forward to next summer. I hope I can work at the Maple Moose like you suggested. Thank you for helping me in so many ways while I’ve been living here in Fireside.

  Take care. I will be thinking of you and Ryan.

  Fondly,

  Fiona

  She folded the letter, kissed it ceremoniously, sealed it in an envelope, and wrote Henry’s address on the front. Before they left the apartment, Fiona asked her mother to deliver the letter to Henry. “You can just leave it in his mailbox,” she said.

  Theresa had nodded solemnly and took the envelope from Fiona. “Of course,” she said. “I’ll walk over there today. I know how important Henry and Ryan are to you.”

  “They really are,” Fiona sighed. “I can’t believe how quickly they grew on me.”

  “It happens that way sometimes,” Theresa agreed as they passed through the Sewing Bee and out onto the street. “Don’t worry. I will make sure Henry gets your letter.” They stood and watched as Martin’s car pulled up to the curb. Martin got out of the driver’s side and opened the trunk, then looked expectantly at Fiona and Theresa. His face in the bright light was chalky white.

  After piling her sparse possessions into the trunk of Martin’s blue sedan, Fiona hugged her mother goodbye. She inhaled her mother’s tea rose scent and closed her eyes for a moment. They would not be together at Christmas, a fact that Fiona, in spite of all the unbelievable things that were happening to her, had the most trouble with.

  “Don’t forget to put the angel on top of the tree,” Fiona said through tears. That had been their final tree-trimming ritual, and Fiona, as the youngest, always got the honor. When she’d been small, her father had lifted her so she could reach the very top branch and gently lower the angel. When she’d grown too big to be lifted, she’d stood on a dining room chair. After dark, Fiona, Ann, and her parents, and then eventually just Fiona and her parents, had sat and listened to Christmas music on the stereo, sipped hot cider, and admired the lights glimmering from beneath the numerous ornaments on the tree. Theresa collected Christmas ornaments year-round and the family Christmas tree was always spectacular. It was Fiona’s favorite holiday of the year.