Page 5 of Lake Hollow Curses

Confused I look between them. “What are you talking about?” Jumping down, Droolius runs to the front door with a little yip when he hears a knock on it. “What was wrong with the security system?”

“Spyware. Either the system was compromised with spyware when it was downloaded, or someone knew what they were doing and put a bug in it. It appeared to work, and maybe it had been, but the footage was going somewhere other than the online account your uncle has.” I forget sometimes that Wilder is a numbers guy, who likes to dabble in computer things. “It should be fine now. You should limit access to the account though. Who can get into it now?”

“It’s just the employees, the maintenance guy Carlotta contracted, Charlie, and Mitchell.” That means both Cal and Charlie could be behind the vandalism. The growing unease inside me is threatening to invoke a full-blown panic. Wilder said it could’ve been on the computer already. Just one more check mark next to suspicious.

Opening the door for Keenan, I put a hand over my mouth as he shoves a tabloid magazine into my other hand. The front-page features none other than Grady Marlow in a badly photoshopped picture from the boat on the Fourth of July, making it look like he was having a romantic get away with Charlie and Cal. “Oh, they’ll love this.” I can’t help giggling. Since he came out publicly… in not so many words, media rumors are all over the place.

Wilder grabs the magazine to look at it. “Who believes this garbage?”

Following us into the cabin, griping about how unfair it is that Grady is so close, but he chooses to keep to himself, Keenan stops short at the sight of the living space filled with pillow stuffing, Droolius, sitting proudly in the middle of the mess. “Wow. Was this Winifred?”

Really? “Keenan, I know he looks innocent, but this wasn’t our invisible friend.” Crossing my arms, I address my little imp, “Somebody got bored last night.”

“Nooo… he just found it that way. Look at him. He’d never.” Wilder winks at us. “Never.”

While I grab a banana from the left-over stock for Ceily’s baking expedition, Keenan smacks his head. “Mee-maw could not find her glasses after the Fourth of July. She baked the damn things into one of the loaves of banana bread the two of you made.”

That isn’t a surprise. She’s baked other artifacts from her kitchen into things when she gets busy talking about something. A potholder in a chicken pot pie, a serving spoon in a baked spaghetti.

Wilder starts to laugh. “I found a pair of her cheaters swimming in the chili she made me once.”

Talk of Ceily reminds me that I promised I’d help her this afternoon. “Are you coming with, to the boys and girls clubevent? She had promised Carlotta to help, now that she’s…” Gone. She’s gone now, but the words get caught in my throat. Admitting it out loud, even more than before, feels harsh. I now believe that Carlotta Marlow met the same fate as Katie. Father Lowe has put together a dunk tank, carnival games, and a basketball scrimmage between the kids and their parents. It was an event that Carlotta sponsored with her property management company annually.

“Who me?” Keenan points at his chest with his eyes wide. “No, thank you. It’s a church sanctioned event. If the Catholic church has things to say about the way I live my life, I will pass. That’s all you and mee-maw. I did come by to walk with you though, there’s something I want to discuss.”

“That took a dark turn.” I’m not familiar with what the Catholic church believes, but I have some questions I want to ask Father Lowe.

With the help of Wilder and Keenan we manage to rid the living room of all the fuzzy pillow filling and fabric. Then the little massacre artist makes his departure with my neighbor. Hell, Wilder is more than that, even if we’re not acting on it since the country club. My imagination goes there every night. He’s become one of my most trusted confidants. The nagging feeling that I should tell him about finding the missing pages is stifled only by the fact once I’ve told someone. Anyone. I have to accept it. I just can’t do that.

Determined to walk to St. James earlier than the event starts, I drag Keenan out the door while Uncle Skip is still bitching about Nat oversleeping. “Why do I get the feeling that what you’re about to drop on me isn’t going to make my head any less scrambled?”

He pulls my hand into his, tracing over the birds I drew in detail. “Shhh… let me admire this masterpiece. Then once we’re clear of this place…” He looks over his shoulder as wecut through the trees to a side street that leads up the hill to St. James church. “Okay, so listen up. I overheard Mee-maw on the phone with one of the detectives. He asked her about the necklace, and about Lakeside Park.”

“He? I thought Hemminger was investigating the Ross drowning?”

Trudging up the side of the hill, I kick at a pebble concentrating on the road in front of me while Keenan answers, “According to mee-maw, her husband investigated all the drownings the first time around. Carlotta met with him a couple of times, and he was going to talk with his wife. She grew up here and originally stayed out of it because she knows the Gibsons.”

It seems like everyone in Lake Hollow ‘knows’ the Gibson family. “Okay. But Ceily said she wasn’t sure where the necklace came from or how it ended up in Hidden Treasures, right?” We’re a couple blocks from the church and I can already hear the noise of the kids, piped in carnival music, and the muffled sound of a voice giving announcements on a loudspeaker. “But what’s up with Lakeside Park?”

“Hmm, girly pop, that is what I want to know. If Susanna Ross drowned in front of the Bends, why are the police interested in Lakeside Park?” The only thing I can be sure of anymore is that I have no idea what’s going on. Not with the direction the detectives are heading, not with the creepy things that have been happening, the threatening vandalism, not even with my warring heart over Cal and Charlie.

I’m lost. Drowning? I hate to make the analogy, but I’m in over my head. Growing up I was forced to become good at sussing out people with shady motives. Mom’s boyfriend, whose hand lingered a little too long on my lower back or leg, or the landlord that would key in and rifle through mom’s jewelry. As far back as I remember, I could pick up on the signs. But now I’mforced to admit that if Cal or Charlie have been playing me, I’ve been completely unaware.

We find Ceily engaged in a lively conversation with Father Lowe over Grady Marlow and the salacious ‘rumors’. That’s Keenan’s cue to cut out after a murmured ‘hello there’. My bestie is gone in a flash. I’m interested in the fact that Father Lowe doesn’t make disparaging comments about Grady.

“I’d welcome a conversation with him. I’ve known Grady since he was eight.” Father Lowe pivots to greet me. “Ah, the more hands the merrier.” He claps his hands together. I can’t help but notice as he shows me to the dunk tank where I’ll be facilitating people trying to hit the target and send him into the water, that everyone wants some of his time or attention.

We have half an hour before the carnival is under way, feeling pressed for answers, I start my inquiry, “Father Lowe, can I ask you something. Uh, as a priest?”

His congenial smile widens. “You can call me Father Chris, and yes, ask me anything you’d like.”

“Do you believe in ghosts?” I carefully set the roll of tickets down next to the large bucket of tennis balls. “I mean… do you think they exist?” I grimace slightly at the frog with a middle finger up, that I had drawn on the side of my hand. Should’ve considered the audience I’d have today. I discreetly spit on my hand and rub at it, smearing it enough to cover.

He sits back against the tank, folding his arms, “The Catholic Church urges extreme prudence before ascribing any phenomena to a supernatural force, warning that being too quick to attribute divine origin to explainable occurrences can damage faith and warp belief. However, this is one of the few times where the popular secular perception of something lines up with the accepted position of Catholic theologians and experts. The Catholic Church has no official doctrine regarding “ghosts,” so Catholics are free to have different opinions onthe questions, so long as their opinion is in line with Catholic doctrine on the body, soul, and what happens when we die. It is a matter of doctrine that when we die, our soul separates from our body and arrives in Hell, Heaven, or Purgatory. What is unclear is what God permits for souls, as far as appearing to the living, once a soul is in one of these three places. Sorry, that’s a lot… sometimes I get going.” He shakes his head. “Personally speaking, I do believe in spirits here on earth. I see it as a sign from God that more exists for our souls beyond our human forms. Belief in all that is visible and invisible is a tenet of our faith, and in the end, spirits are part of our holy tradition.”

I wasn’t expecting that. I’d figured he’d call it crazy talk, admonish me for such silly ideas, and I could play off everything that I’ve experienced at The Bends since being in Lake Hollow. I find myself almost speechless. My mouth opens and closes a couple of times before I say, “I think our cabin is haunted.” No. I know it is. Even when I told myself that I didn’t believe in ghosts or spirits, I couldn’t explain any of it away.

He raises an eyebrow. “Would you like me to visit and do a blessing? It’s been my experience that some souls linger because they feel a pull here. Tragic unnatural deaths can cause something like that. According to Catholic experts in this area, the way to distinguish between a soul that desires prayers and a demonic spirit, is that souls do not do things that are scary or destructive. While their presence may fill an area with a sense of sadness, they do not illicit fear, although seeing a soul may cause a very natural reaction of fright. Any activity a soul is causing will cease once prayers or Masses are offered for them.”

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