Page 57 of Night Falls on Predicament Avenue
Norah stilled, cupping the half-full mug, and craned her neck to peer out the window. The kitchen was mostly dark behind her save the light she had on over the stove. She went and shut it off to avoid the reflection on the window and, if she was being honest, to prevent anyone from being able to see her silhouette.
Staring out the window, Norah felt a bit like an old lady spying on her neighbors. Only this was her house, her yard, and frankly, her cemetery. The tree line behind the graves rose tall and dark against the dark sky. Norah could make out the outlines of the headstones, the shrubbery on the west side of the lawn, and the blue-black of the one evergreen that stood stark and alone behind one of the graves. A remembrance tree planted decades before by a mourning loved one.
There was no further movement.
The night was quiet and still.
Norah, feeling especially brave now that nothing was there, moved to the door and went to check the lock.
She frowned. The dead bolt was unlocked.
Norah tried to recall whether she’d forgotten to lock it before going to bed. She tugged the door open and put her palm on the screen door to push it outward.
The night song of crickets met her ears. The rustling of the breeze as it made tree leaves dance.
A stick cracked.
Norah’s breath caught. She took a short step onto the backporch just far enough to see around the screen door, but not far enough to completely leave the house.
A shape shifted near the far end of the graveyard, closest to the woods beyond. Norah froze, her eyes fixed on the dark figure as it bent and ran its hand along the stones as if memorizing the names.
It was a woman, though her face was hidden from view. She had long hair, blowing freely in the breeze, and wore a shapeless gown. Norah opened her mouth to call out, to scream, to saysomething! But the words got stuck in her throat.
The screen door creaked as Norah’s body tensed and put weight against it. The sound of the hinges ripped through the quiet. The figure in the cemetery straightened. Norah shot a panicked look at the door as if she could somehow shush it. She looked back at the woman.
She had disappeared.
“OnGhost Talesthe documentary, someone captured video of kitchen drawers opening on their own.” This from Otto, who had let himself in that morning, along with Ralph. As the two older brothers ate breakfast with Norah and her houseguests, Norah had shared what she’d seen last night in the graveyard.
“All you need is fishin’ line,” Sebastian stated, moving his coffee mug away from the papers so as not to spill on them. “You pull the line when the camera’s on, an’ it looks like a ghost.”
“Trickery.” Otto nodded in agreement, slurping his coffee as though the act of bringing air along with the liquid into his mouth simultaneously would cool it faster.
“And then the woman just vanished?” Harper directed her question to Norah, who was wishing now she’d just kept her mouth shut. Two sightings of Isabelle Addington in one week?
“Yes,” Norah replied. “When I looked up a second later, she was gone.”
“She could’ve run into the woods,” Sebastian suggested.
Otto frowned. “Or evaporated. Spirits do that, ya know? When I saw that woman’s face in the attic window years ago, I swore she turned into mist and just floated away!”
“If she ran into the woods,” Harper added, “then one might argue she was real, not a ghost.”
“It’s more believable.” Sebastian nodded.
Norah fiddled with the edge of a manila folder. “What reason would anyone have to be in a graveyard at two in the morning?”
“This.” Ralph’s voice cut through the room. He tottered over, his shoulders hunched, the straps of his bib overalls so loose that they sagged in the front. His jowls matched and were covered in a week’s worth of white whiskers. His rheumy brown eyes were yellow around the irises. Aging was a friend to no one, Norah realized. But it was what he held aloft like a trophy that grabbed her attention. He shook it in the air. “This is what someone does at two in the morning in a cemetery. They leave mementos at a grave!”
Norah couldn’t tear her eyes from the object in Ralph’s hand.
“What is it?” Otto squinted as if his glasses prescription wasn’t strong enough and he couldn’t see clearly.
Ralph dropped it onto the table with a thud.
A Coach wallet.
Sebastian shot a look at Norah before eyeing Ralph. “That was in the graveyard?”
