Page 41 of Giving Up The Ghost
It was nearly three when I caught myself dozing, chin to chest, at the desk.If Charlotte finds you in here, she’ll do worse than hit you with a spade.Jerking awake, I scooped up my phone and the few notes I’d scribbled on some scrap paper and made sure the binders were back where I’d found them, pausing to check that my phone had saved the notes before I closed it down. The one thing that stood out to me was Charlotte. Her birth year should put her at sixty-eight years old, but she didn’t look sixty-eight. She looked closer to my aunt’s age, mid-fifties at most. Then again, I’d witnessed Oscar, well past twenty-one, getting carded whenever he tried to buy wine, so it seemed the Fellowes had excellent genes when it came to aging.I wonder if Oscar will still look so much younger when he’s sixty? Or eighty? Maybe he’ll be mistaken for fifty and we’re sitting on a porch somewhere, grousing about kids these days…
The mental image hit me hard and swift and sweet right in the solar plexus: Oscar with crow’s feet, smiling at me as we curled up together on a couch, a book open on my lap and his computer balanced on his knee.I really want to see that in person.
A shuffle and click distracted me. Someone was moving around downstairs. That was my cue to get the hell out of dodge, making my way as quietly as I could up the stairs before Charlotte emerged from the kitchen. I headed for Ezra’s room, knocking softly and entering after he called for me to come in. Oscar was sprawled half on the bed, half on the chair with Ezra’s hand atop his head. “He snores,” Ezra murmured. “Always has, ever since we were kids. It’d be cute if it wasn’t so loud.”
“I’m thinking of getting earplugs,” I said, smiling. “How’s your head?”
“Harrison has no complaints.”
And there was the joke Oscar was looking for earlier. “Wow.” I slow clapped softly. “Just… wow. I’m guessing that means you’re feeling all right?”
“Headachey. A little nauseated. I always am after one of those episodes,” he admitted. “Where’ve you been? You’re practically vibrating with excitement.”
“Oh? Am I, er… Am I a color to you?” I eased closer, curiosity warring with concern. Ezra had never spoken much about his abilities until recently, and I was eager to ask him more, maybe interview him for my research file. There were others like him out there, but so far, he was the only one I’d knowingly met.
He smirked. “Beige. Oh, don’t look so disappointed. I’m fucking with you. You’re giving me a green vibe. Ever see those videos of rhubarb growing? The ones where you can hear it crackle it goes so fast? That’s what your feeling makes me think of. Green and growing fast.” He paused. “It’s not always like that. Just with some living. It’s different for the dead. Now. What is it?” he demanded, changing the subject hastily. “Something good, I hope.”
Quietly, I showed him my phone. “I was able to dig a bit into the binders left in the study. Did some tracing of this one’s tree. It looks like a straightforward line from this William Fellowes here, for Oscar. At least one person per generation, usually identified as male, has evidenced a strong mediumship ability. A few of the identified daughters have, as well, but not as strongly.”
Ezra thumbed through the phone, frowning thoughtfully. “What about the house?”
“Ah.” My face warmed at that reminder. “I, um, got distracted. But Ididconfirm the burials in Avesford, as well as in a few other locations noted in the binders in the study, were outside consecrated ground, and everyone listed as being an outsider burial was also noted as being accused of fraud, devil worship, or something similar. Implying they all had done something similar to be so accused.”
“Talking to ghosts has never been looked upon well,” Ezra remarked dryly. “So, what are we going to do with this?”
“Oscar wanted to know his history. Hiswhy. This might be a big part of it.”
Ezra gave Oscar’s messy hair a gentle tug, softly so as not to wake him. “And just think. You did that in a few hours. What could he have found out in four days if Charlotte hadn’t been playing games?”
* * *
Ezraand I talked for a bit, his eyes heavy and drooping. Finally, when he dozed off mid-sentence, I righted him in the chair so his neck wouldn’t hate him in a few hours and let myself back out into the corridor.What about the house?I wondered. Whatever Charlotte had been doing downstairs, she seemed done. Things were quiet again, and I was too keyed up to rest. Resolutely, I took myself back downstairs only to draw up short at the pale figure under the overhead light. She faced away from me, arms tucked tight to her sides and head bowed. She wasn’t crying this time. Or if she was, it was beyond my hearing. She flickered in and out of sight, in and out of color and opacity.Like bad reception,I thought, reminded of trying to watch a movie on the television at my great-grandma’s house when CeCe and I were in first or second grade. The old, clunky box would flicker like the ghost, reception piss-poor in rural East Texas when you insisted on using old aerials and rabbit ears instead of cable like everyone else around you.
“Hello,” I called softly. She flared bright and solid for a moment before fading slowly to nearly transparent. “My name is Julian. I’m a friend of Oscar’s, if that’s who you’re looking for. Well, more than a friend.” I took the last three steps down, stopping several feet away from her. “Do you need help?”
At the wordhelp, she wavered and was suddenly facing me. Her features, sharp and beautiful, were drawn in what seemed to be anger and sorrow, silvery tracks on her cheeks. Her lips moved but no sound came out.
“Do you need me to get Oscar?” Her eyes widened, and she looked, I thought, scared. “He’s not going to harm you. I promise. But maybe he can hear you. I’m, er, kind of new at this. Until a few months ago, I didn’t believe in this.”
Her expression was caught between confused and amused. She drifted closer to me. I could make out a few freckles as she flared to a solid-seeming state. Her lips moved and this time, I caught the wordcareful.
And she was gone again.
“Shit.”
The cellar door opened and closed. Double shit. I was out of time to do anything else, and I’d left my phone upstairs so I couldn’t record the sighting. Triple shit.
Charlotte shuffled past me, head down, hair a tangle held back by a loose band rather than her usual neat braid. Her clothes were muddy and damp, her shoes leaving prints on the polished floor. She didn’t look at me, or even seem to know I was there, and I almost let her pass without a word. She looked terrible, like she’d been dragged backward through a hedge and left in the mud after. Her expression, what I could see of it, was drawn and troubled. “Charlotte,” I said before I could stop myself.
She jerked her head up, eyes wide. A tremor passed over her and she slowly drew herself up straight. “Julian,” she murmured in something like her usual tone. “Why are you lurking around in the dark?”
“Couldn’t sleep. Why areyoulurking around in the dark?”
“Gardening.” She gestured to her muddy clothes. “I find it relaxing, to replant things. Making sure they’re put in the best possible location.”
“Does Oscar mind that you’re digging in his garden?”
Her expression soured, lips pursed as she bore down on me. “I don’t know what you think you’re doing, turning him against his family, his heritage, but I won’t let you do it! Sneaking around the house,” she added, waving her hand for emphasis, “trying to find proof to turn him against us!”
