Page 53 of Jacinth

‘It’s a boredom erection, but also, we need to take a leak.’

‘Oh. Ohhhhhhhh... how is that going to work?’

‘Well, you’re going to have to take us to the toilet and have a piss.’

So that is how I found myself two minutes later, trying to direct a boner into a toilet bowl to relieve my mate’s bladder. Just as I let go of the flow, the unpredictable thing bounced up again. I let out a squeal.

“How do I get it in the bowl?!”

‘Just point it down!’

“I’m trying! It’s got a freaking mind of its own!”

‘Just point. It. Down!’

“It won’t stop leaking!”

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake.‘

I shrieked as I somehow pissed in my own eye and stumbled from the stall to wash our face off in the basin. A wide-eyed, strange man slowly backed out of the men’s room, resolutely keeping his eyes on the ceiling.

“What’s wrong? Haven’t you ever seen a half-naked man with pee in his eyes before?” I shouted after him.

‘Jace, I love you, but you are NEVER using my body again.’

CHAPTER 37

Skyler

The walkto Birdie’s house was not overly long, but anxiety over what I would find when I got there made every step stretch on forever. Over and over, I played in my head having to tell Jacinth something had happened to her sister.

The following year, or so it felt, I finally arrived at Birdie’s townhouse. Letting myself through the small cast iron gate, I brushed flakes of the old black paint on my jeans and wandered up the red brick walkway. I knew I was paying extra attention to detail to avoid all the ‘what comes next’ that wanted to play through my head. Up the two steps to the front door. Knocking was unnecessary because the thing stood slightly ajar.

“Birdie?” I called, pushing inside to see a whole lot of no one home.

I made my way into the kitchen and looked through the window, down onto a square of grass that might generously have been called a yard.

A whimper from the pantry made me jump. I swung open the door and a yellow ball of fur hit me at chest height, taking me down under a slobbery assault of doggie kisses.

“Dagny! I missed you too, buddy. Hey, where’s Birdie? Have you seen her, boy?”

Once the dog was satisfied that I knew how happy he was to see me, he began sniffing around.

I imagined myself finding a definitive clue—a hair, a priest’s collar—but in the end neither Dagny nor I turned up anything of note. Birdie wasn’t here, and it was likely not her choice to leave.

With nothing further to be done in the house, I found a leash for Dagny and locked up as best I could before leaving the premises.

We wandered back to the cemetery to wait for the others, and I pondered how the hell I was going to tell Jacinth I had less than no information to go on. Her door was open. I was no expert, but it didn’t look like there were any signs of forced entry—I mean, the thing was still on its hinges. No clues. It would have been nice for the bad guy to leave a ransom note, a list of demands, directions to his evil lair.

Damn it.

As soon as we passed through the cemetery gate, I let Dagny run. God knew how long he had been in that pantry, but the poor guy had a ton of energy as he ran laps around me all the way back to Jace’s grave. I sat down with my back against her headstone and thought.

Why take Birdie?

Where would he go?

What was his end game? It made no sense to randomly wake up one morning and decide to harness the energy of an entire town of ghosts to obliterate everything.

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