Restless Spirits: Chapters 21 & 22
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Chapter Twenty-One
I returned to the house by way of the kitchen. It was late—the party had broken up at Chris’s place, and I’d waited until all of her guests had left to face the inevitable. To my relief, Joe wasn’t there, but all of the Bairds were. My relief was pretty short-lived. As soon as Ruth saw me, she started in.
“You’ve got some nerve, young lady! Coming and going as you please at all hours of the night, with no care for those of us left behind!”
“Ruth, hush!” said Max. “Ron wouldn’t come back if she didn’t care. Besides, nothing bad has happened. Maybe Sarah doesn’t mind that she can leave.”
“Or perhaps she’s merely biding her time. You watch and mark my words. The worst is still to come, all because of this one!” She pointed at me.
“Mama, hush!” said Lilly, which drew a sharp look from Ruth.
“What did you say to me, young lady?”
“Yeah, hi,” I interrupted before Ruth could go full-on Mommy Dearest. “Where’s Joe?”
“Where you won’t find him, if he’s as smart as I give him credit for.” Ruth was on a roll tonight.
“Mama!” Lilly jumped up from her chair and, ignoring Ruth’s sputters of indignation, came over to me. “He’s probably still waiting for you in the attic,” she said. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”
“Now’s not a good time,” I said, and started to fade out on her, but then I recognized the look on her face as she started to back away. It was the look of the girl who lost. The one trying desperately to be noble and avoid drama and pretend nothing’s wrong while her so-called best friend flounces around holding hands and indulging in gross PDAs with the boy of her dreams. Not that I was doing that with Joe, but I’d seen that look enough times on Chris’s face when she was in high school to know it for what it was. I also seemed to recall seeing it in the mirror a time or two. I halted my fade-out, and reached out to her.
“Lilly, I’m sorry. I’ve been meaning to talk to you, too. It’s just—”
“It’s okay,” she blurted. “I’m happy for you. Really. I knew it was never going to be me. I’m glad it’s you. Honest.” It sounded sweet, and sincere, and very rehearsed, and yet all of the apparent practice didn’t keep her voice from breaking on the last word, and my heart a little with it.
“Lilly, you don’t have to be okay with it. It’s okay if you get mad.”
“Of course it is,” declared Ruth from her seat at the table. “If not for her loose morals to tempt Joe, he’d have taken notice of what a lovely girl you are by now.”
“Ruth, that’s enough!” Max hissed as Lilly rolled her eyes.
“He’s had decades to notice me, Mama.”
I ignored their exchange and took Lilly’s hand. “I mean it. Don’t be nice for my sake.”
“I’m not,” she insisted, but her voice sounded less convinced than before.
“Oh, sweetie. I promise, we’ll have this talk. Just not now, okay? Things are really complicated, and right now, I have to talk to Joe.” Lilly nodded and let go of my hand. With a heavy sigh, I faded out of the kitchen…
…and coalesced on the second floor landing. Sarah rolled her ball over to me as I appeared. I closed my eyes. “Not now.”
“I didn’t say you could leave,” Sarah snotted. I opened my eyes and looked at her. It occurred to me that maybe Joe wasn’t the one I needed to talk to just yet. Slowly, not taking my eyes off of her, I reached down and picked up her ball. Her eyes bugged out a little as I did, and her nostrils flared. “That’s mine. Give it back.”
“After you talk to me,” I promised. “Sarah, did Joe hurt you? Is that why you’re here?”
“Give me back my ball!” she shouted. The house shook with her anger.
“Okay,” I said, setting it back on the floor as carefully as I’d picked it up. “Calm down. Sarah, I’m on your side. Whatever was done to you wasn’t right. Tell me how to fix it.”
“Nobody’s on my side,” she whined. The house shook harder. “Everybody hates me!”
“That’s not true, honey.” Somehow I said that with a straight face.
Suddenly, her eyes narrowed. “Did he talk to you? He’s not supposed to talk.”
“What? No. No, Joe didn’t—”
“He lies. He said I was bad, but he’s the bad one. Him, and her. Everybody loves her, and they hate me.” Some of the wind seemed to go out of her as she said it.
“Sweetie,” I ventured, “just tell me—”
“I’m not bad!” she screamed, and fixed her gaze on the ball at my feet. “I just want what’s mine.” She almost growled that last part, and I shuddered.
“Fine. Take it.”
She looked at me without lifting her head, and smiled. “I did.”
Again, the house shook, more violently than before, and Sarah, or whatever was posing as her, began to morph into something else. I barely had time to register my predicament before strong hands closed on my waist and the second floor shimmered out of view, replaced by the attic.
“Are you out of your ever-loving mind?” Joe yelled, spinning me around to face him. “What in all creation were you trying to accomplish, talking to her?”
“The truth,” I said, too tired to raise my voice to match his volume. “I talked to Chris. She had a lot of information.”
“Did she now?”
“She didn’t have a lot of answers, though, and now all I have are questions.” I looked past him to the spot where I’d seen the entrance to the third floor. “Questions like, why have you been showing me Clarice’s room?” He flinched at the sound of her name. “Why didn’t you tell me what happened to her? Or what happened to you? Why all the mystery, when you could’ve just talked to me, Joe?”
“I couldn’t,” he said through gritted teeth. “I can’t! Don’t you understand that?”
“No!” I shouted. He looked surprised at the rise in my voice, but not angered. More like he knew he had it coming. Still, I forced myself to calm down. “I don’t understand, Joe. They think—” I swallowed. “The sheriff thought you killed her.”
He looked at me like I’d just run over his dog and then backed up and shot it for good measure. “They thought I killed Clarice? My own daughter?” His eyes looked slightly wild as he rubbed his face. “Is that what you think?”
I shook my head. I honestly didn’t. But... “Sarah, Joe. He thought you killed Sarah.” His face darkened, and his hand dropped to his side. “Did you?” I asked. It came out in a whisper.
“I—” he began, then shook his head. “I can’t.”
“Gah! You are so—would you just this once be honest with me? I deserve the truth! And without it, Sarah’s never going to rest. Or let us rest!”
He ground his teeth again. “I can’t! Understand? If I talk about it, then maybe I get some peace, and she can’t have that. Oh, no. Joe has to keep his secrets, has to stay alone in his special Hell. Don’t you think I want— ” He stopped as his eyes began to bulge.
“Want what?” I asked. “Joe?” Only when his hands flew to his throat did I understand that he’d been rendered physically incapable of speech. “Joe! What’s happening?” I reached to help him, but he flew backwards off of his feet. “Joe!” I screamed as he was dragged out of the attic and through the wall by an invisible hand. I tried to follow but slammed into a solid wall.
Sarah. Finally, I understood. Joe wasn’t allowed to talk about whatever had happened between them. I was going to have to get him out of the house somehow. Either that, or find a way to make Sarah talk.
Another set of screams came from downstairs. I popped down there, without any interference this time, and followed the sound to the kitchen. I found Ruth and Lilly huddled together, backed up against the kitchen sink. The Sarah-beast stood on the table, snarling and ready to pounce. Max stood between her and his family, waving a kitchen chair at her like a lion tamer and shouting, “Keep away from them!”
I grabbed another chair and copied Max. “Sarah!” I shouted. “I’m the one you’re angry at! Face me!” She hesitated, looking back and forth between me and the Bairds as though she couldn’t make up her mind. “I’m going to end you, brat!” That got her attention. She turned toward me, her back feet clawing the table like a dog issuing a challenge. “Get them out of here, Max.”
Still wielding the chair, he shuffled backward toward his family. Sarah threw back her head and let out a hellish roar. I’d like to say that I stood my ground out of courage and pure stubbornness, but in truth, I was frozen with terror. She was going to eat me. She was going to swallow me up and I would never see Joe or Chris again, never see my Mom, never know if there was really a Heaven. Never know the truth about Joe. But the Bairds would be safe, and without me stirring things up, maybe they could all go back to the status quo. I closed my eyes and braced for the end.
Lilly screamed my name, and I opened my eyes. Everything after that happened in slow motion. Sarah had lunged at me. Lilly broke away from her parents and ran toward us, still screaming my name. Somehow, Sarah turned in mid-air and aimed herself at Lilly. Ruth let out an ear shattering wail as she shoved Max away and threw herself at Lilly, grabbing her arm at the same time Sarah’s massive jaws closed over Lilly’s head. Ruth pulled, but Sarah was stronger and faster. Before Max could recover, Lilly was gone, and Sarah’s maw had moved onto Ruth. I felt, more than heard, myself scream as Max threw the chair at Sarah. It passed harmlessly through her, and Sarah turned and bounded out of the room. Ruth and Lilly were gone.
I gathered my wits and tackled Max before he could go after Sarah. He shouted curses at me that I didn’t even know he knew, straining against me as I held him in place. He was strong, his rage and grief and fear allowing him to coalesce into a tangible force, and I couldn’t hold him long. I needed Joe. But for all I knew, Sarah had already done the same thing to him.
“Max!” I shouted, trying to get him to focus on me. “Listen! You can’t help them that way!” He didn’t show any signs of hearing me, but gradually, the fight went out of him, until all that was left was the grief. He broke down, sobbing, on the kitchen floor, calling their names. I knelt next to him and put a hand on his back. “We’ll get them,” I promised. “If there’s a way, we’ll get them back.”
He looked up at me, seeming to notice me for the first time. “You,” he snarled. “My Ruth was right. This is all your doing.”
I blinked. “What? No! I tried to—”
“I don’t care what you were trying to do! You made her angry, and now my wife and daughter are gone forever! We were fine before you came! You can leave, so why don’t you just go? Get out and leave us be!” He shoved at me as he started crying again. I staggered to my feet, not knowing what to do. He was right. I was the one who riled up Sarah. I was the one Lilly tried to protect. It was my fault she was punishing Joe, too. She was punishing all of them to punish me.
They were better off without me. Thanks to me, not even the kitchen was safe anymore. I never should have come back.
I ran. I heard Sarah giggling as I passed the stairs, but I kept running until I was out the front door, and then I was back at my sister’s place. She was already in bed. I didn’t wake her. I just sunk to my knees in the middle of her living room—the same spot, I realized, where my casket had been during the wake—and cried.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chris found me in the morning, curled up all fetus-like on her living room floor. “Ron?” she asked, kneeling beside me. “What happened?”
I told her. She listened, her expression growing more and more horrified as I explained what Sarah had done.
“Max is wrong,” she said when I finished. “It’s not your fault. You said that Sarah was picking them all off long before you got there. She would’ve gotten around to them eventually anyway.”
I wiped my nose, wondering idly if ectoplasm was really just ghost snot, and shook my head. “I was supposed to stop her before she got to them.” I closed my eyes. “Lilly...”
“I know she was your friend,” said Chris, her voice gentle. “But you shouldn’t blame yourself. If anyone, blame Sarah. And Joe.”
I shook my head. “No. I’m the one who got Joe to talk. If he’d stayed quiet—”
“She would’ve found another excuse.” Chris sighed as the mantle clock chimed. “I have to get ready. They want the family there early. I promise, after the funeral, we’ll sit down and figure this out. Okay?”
I nodded. She turned on her computer so I could write while she had breakfast and got dressed. I didn’t feel like it, but once I started, the words flowed freely, taking my mind to places that were much easier to bear. Before I knew it, she was back to shut it down. “Time to go,” she said. “Do you know where?”
“Next to Mom, right?”
She nodded.
“I’ll see you there.”
It was a nice day for a funeral. Sunshine bathed the cemetery. Come summer, the trees would form a thick canopy that shaded the area where they were laying me to rest, but this early in the spring, the little green buds forming on the branches did little to block it. Inappropriately cheerful daffodil beds were in full bloom, and the chatter of birdsong made for incongruous background music for the somber gathering at my graveside.
This service brought a smaller turnout than the wake did, and I was sure the lack of an open bar had nothing at all to do with that. I didn’t mind, though. I knew the people who showed up today were the ones who had genuinely cared. Except Dad. Guilt was most likely the only reason he was there.
It was a peaceful place. I had always enjoyed my time here whenever I used to visit Mom. It wasn’t a bad place to be laid to rest. If only rest were in the cards.
I kept my distance from the service. It was just too weird. The wake had been one thing, but this— seeing myself get buried—it was so final. From where I stood, I could hear just fine as the Anglican minister read scripture and said nice things about me that were only partially true.
My grandmother carried on with loud wailing while Grandpa and Aunt Judy did their best to comfort her. Dad stood with his arm around Chris, and I was glad that at least he was there for her. Gus also wiped a few tears from behind his sunglasses. My agent was there, appropriately sad-faced, or at least trying to be as she shifted from foot to foot to keep her stiletto heels from sinking into the soft ground.
Once the hymns started, I couldn’t take it anymore and went to explore the cemetery. If there was any chance I’d end up haunting this place, I figured I might as well get to know the layout. I was pretty familiar with the section around my plot already, so I made my way toward the back where the older graves were. It looked like I wasn’t the only ghost in that cemetery. It was hard at first to discern them from the visiting loved ones, but you could tell on account of everyone else being oblivious to them. Some of them even smiled and waved at me. Apparently, friendly ghosts were more than just an old Fleischer cartoon, even outside the house.
I followed a trail that meandered all the way back to the oldest part of the cemetery. Actually, the graves themselves weren’t that old, just the bodies they held and the headstones that went with them. They had been transplanted in the seventies to make way for a new shopping center. Ain’t that just the way? Sorry, dead folk. We’d love to let you rest in peace, but you’re resting in the way of our progress.
But it was pretty there, and peaceful, so I doubted any of the transplantees complained much. A sweet little pond covered with water lilies lay nearby, surrounded by giant oak trees. I was about to wander off the path to read some of the old grave markers when I noticed a little girl down by the pond. There was something odd about her. Her white cotton dress didn’t belong in this era, for one thing. The fact that she seemed to be beckoning me to follow her also seemed pretty unusual.
She didn’t say anything. She just stood there, waving insistently for me to come over to her. It took a moment for me to realize that I knew her, and a moment after that to get over the shock of seeing her out of context.
“Hi there, cutie,” I said as I approached. She didn’t answer. Illogically, I understood that I didn’t need to speak, either, even though there was no reason I could think that she should have any idea who I was, let alone what I wanted. But she held her hand out to me and waited, clearly expecting something. I looked back the way I had come and could see my funeral still carrying on in the distance. There was no hurry to get back.
I took her hand and was transported.
To where, I didn’t know at first. I was in what looked like a barnyard, with a big red barn full of horses and chickens strutting around all over the yard. Turning around to take it all in, I spotted a three-story Victorian farmhouse, and understood where I was. I had a rough idea of when, too.
Two little girls ran past me into the barn. The first couldn’t have been more than six, with blonde curls and wearing a white cotton dress. I looked down to where she’d been holding my hand seconds before, but she was gone. This new version laughed and screamed and carried a red ball. Behind her came a slightly older girl in red pigtails and overalls.
“Give me the ball!” Sarah Collier shouted as she chased Clarice Bentley into the barn.
“No, it’s mine!” said Clarice. “My daddy gave it to me!”
“Didn’t your daddy teach you to share?” asked Sarah.
“You already played with it, Sarah! You’ve been playing with it all day. Now it’s my turn!”
“I don’t care. I want it. Give it to me!” Sarah reached out and pinched Clarice hard on the arm, rousing a shrill scream of pain.
“I’m telling!” Clarice shouted, clutching her ball and running toward the house. A few yards from the barn, she lost her footing on a pile of chicken feed and fell, losing her grip on the ball in the process. It rolled several feet away.
“Oh no, my new dress!” she wailed. “Daddy’s gonna be so mad!” She seemed to forget all about the ball as she became intent on brushing dirt and mud off of her little white dress. So intent that she didn’t hear Sarah approaching from behind, didn’t see the axe she held.
“No!” I screamed. It was a reflex, my mouth opening and sound coming out before my mind could even comprehend what it was seeing. But even if they were able to hear me, it would have been too late. The axe was already in motion. Clarice never saw it coming. One blow to the head, and she was down.
My hand flew to my mouth. I watched in stunned disbelief, helpless to intervene, as Sarah threw the axe away. Her face was a creepy mask of smug satisfaction as she stepped over Clarice’s tiny, bloody body and went to pick up the ball. Smiling, she dusted it off. Then she frowned and wiped at a spot of blood splatter on her cheek. She bent to wipe her hand in the dirt, then went skipping off toward the back of the barn, singing a nursery rhyme to herself as she went.
I went to kneel beside Clarice. “Why are you showing me this?” I asked.
Before I could get any kind of answer, I heard Joe’s voice coming from the house. “Clarice!” he called. “Come on, Junebug, it’s time to go to church!” He was coming this way. “Clarice!” he called again. “You better not be dirtying up your pretty new dress! Mrs. Collier ain’t like to make you another one any time soon!” He got closer, and his steps faltered as he spotted her lying on the ground. “Clarice?” He broke into a run. “Clarice!”
He ran so fast his hat flew off. He reached the barnyard and skidded to a halt beside her. “Clarice?” he said, and the look on his face as he took in the reality of her blood-soaked dress and lifeless body almost killed me all over again. “No,” he said, his voice a whimper. “No, no no no no.” He dropped to his knees and turned her over, gathering her limp form into his arms and holding her close. “Clarice? Baby girl?” He smoothed her hair back from her face. “Come on, sweetness, wake up for Daddy.”
He shook her and shouted, “Wake up!” Realizing it was useless, he clutched her to him and started sobbing into her hair. I ached to put my arms around him. I didn’t know how much more of this I could take.
Others came running from the house, an older couple and a pair of teenage boys. They all came up short at the sight of Joe with Clarice. “Oh, sweet Lord Jesus…” said the woman, presumably Mrs. Collier, as her hands flew to her mouth. Mr. Collier and the boys all stood dumbfounded for a moment before he sprang into action and barked out orders.
“Daniel, go get the sheriff. Jacob, find your sister.” Both boys were too stunned to move until he shouted, “Go!” They snapped out of it and ran to do as they were told.
Mrs. Collier had closed her eyes, and her lips moved in a murmured prayer. Her husband approached Joe slowly and put a hand on his shoulder. “Come on, Joe. Let’s get her back to the house.”
Just then, Sarah came running up. “Mama,” she cried, “what’s wrong?” She had stripped off her bloody overalls and her hair and underclothes were soaking wet. She still held the ball.
Her mother grabbed her by the shoulders. “Sarah, what happened to you, girl?”
“Clarice’s ball went in the pond and I had to go in after it. I’m sorry, Mama, I know it’s church day.”
“Never mind. Did you see anyone in the yard? Anyone at all?”
She looked back and forth between both her parents and said, “I heard Clarice scream and...and I saw a man by the barn and I hid.”
“Why didn’t you come tell us?” asked her mother.
“I was scared, Mama!” She started to cry. It looked, for all the world, genuine.
“Sarah,” her mother said, shaking her, “you don’t ever do that again! You come tell us if you see any strangers in the yard!”
“I’m sorry, Mama! I’m sorry!” She clung to her mother’s skirt. She seemed like a normal kid then, so sincere that even I almost believed her. Sniffling, she looked over at Joe. “What’s wrong with Clarice?”
“Never mind that just now,” said her mother. “Let’s get back inside.”
“Wait,” said Joe. He looked up at Sarah, and his gaze fixated on the ball. “Where did you get that?”
She clutched the ball tighter and moved in closer to her mother who put a protective arm around her shoulders. “I told you. It was in the pond.”
“That’s Clarice’s ball. Did you take it from her?”
“Joe,” said Mr. Collier, “what’s this about?”
“Did you?” Joe demanded.
“I told you, it went in the pond! I was going to give it back to her!” She started crying again.
“Joe, you’re distraught,” said Mr. Collier. “Now, let’s get your girl inside.” He helped Joe get to his feet with Clarice still in his arms. Mrs. Collier ushered Sarah toward the house. Joe followed, his steely, angry glare fixed on Sarah, and I got the feeling that he knew. I didn’t know how, but he wasn’t fooled by her act.
The vision faded, and I found myself back in the cemetery. Clarice let go of my hand and just stood there, looking up at me.
“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry,” I told her as I wiped my useless ghost tears. I remembered everything I had learned about Joe the night before and tried to piece it all together. “Is that what you wanted to show me? Why your daddy killed Sarah?” I still didn’t want to believe it was true, but he certainly had a good motive. Clarice didn’t answer. “Can you talk, sweetie?”
Apparently, she couldn’t. Either that or she just didn’t want to. Instead, she turned and skipped away from me. I stood there and watched her go until she stopped and looked back at me. I got the impression I was supposed to follow.
She led me on a meandering path, through and around faded and moss-covered grave markers, all the way to the back of the cemetery. Finally, she stopped at a grave marked by a mourning angel, turned to look at me once more, then disappeared.
I went to the grave and knelt to read the head stone, but I already knew what it would tell me. This was Clarice’s grave. Why did she want me to know where she was buried? Was I supposed to go back and tell Joe? What good would this information do him?
What good did it do any of us?
I decided to talk it over with Chris before I did anything else. I went back to my own grave site, where my casket had already been lowered into the ground and the mourners were beginning to disperse. I spotted Chris talking to Dad. I caught her eye and waved, and she hugged Dad goodbye and followed me to a private spot away from prying ears. “Something happened to me just now,” I said as soon as she was close enough to hear. “I had some kind of vision.” She waited quietly while I described everything I’d seen.
“Oh, Ron,” she said once I finished. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. What do you think it all means?”
“I don’t know. Maybe she just wanted you to know Joe’s motivations. Or maybe she wanted you to know about Sarah?”
“I’m already well aware that Sarah’s a bad seed. I pretty much figured that out when she killed me.”
“True.” Chris rubbed the back of her neck as she gave the matter some more thought. “What if there’s something in her grave that could help you defeat Sarah?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Maybe Clarice herself?”
“How? Wouldn’t she need to be there first? How would we make that happen?”
Chris shrugged. “Short of digging up her bones and moving them there, I don’t know.”
“Ew.”
“Yeah, I know. Let’s try to think of something that doesn’t involve grave robbing.”
“No kidding,” I said. “Besides, Sarah’s so strong, and Clarice is just a sweet little kid. I don’t know what she could do to help us.”
“Don’t underestimate the power of child spirits.”
“Why not?”
“Haven’t you ever noticed how much more powerful the ghosts of children always are? Sarah’s not really exceptional in that regard.”
I guess I hadn’t noticed, but I would take her word for it. “Why do you think that is?”
“Well, it’s just a theory, but think about it. Children are little vessels of pure, unchecked emotion. You said yourself that strong emotion gives you your abilities. Think how much more a child could do, without years of socialization and practice keeping her emotions in check. Especially a kid who has plenty of reason to be full of rage.”
“Like Sarah. If she was murdered.... But I still don’t buy that theory.”
“I know. But if you can put aside your personal feelings for a minute, it makes sense. It also explains why Lilly can do things that the others can’t. It doesn’t get much more emotional than a sixteen-year-old girl. I guess that doesn’t really explain how you got to be so strong, though.”
It did if you took into account that I was in the throes of new love. I didn’t tell her that, though. Instead, I just shrugged and said, “Guess I just never really grew up.”
Chris smirked. “Sounds about right.”
Letting that remark slide, I said, “Okay, I need to ask a favor.”
“Of course. What else have I done since you contacted me?”
“Hey, that hurts. Would you prefer a silent grave for a sister?”
Chris sighed. “I’m not complaining. What do you need?”
“Keep working on this. Try to figure out the best way to get Clarice to that house, short of a physical transfer.” “What are you going to do?” she asked.
I frowned, really not looking forward to the task before me and having no idea how to do it without tipping Sarah off and incurring more of her wrath. “I’m going to get the truth from Joe.”
Chapters 23 and 24 coming Monday! Click here for the About and Navigation page.
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