Christmas Ghosts - Fiction River (9 page)

Finally she pushed away. “That’s going to have to last me for seven months and twelve days.”

“Then we had better do it once more to make sure it holds,” he said, pulling her against his hard chest and kissing her again.

For what seemed like an eternity they held that kiss until finally Duster cleared his throat.

She pushed back. “Come by the house. I’ll have a few surprises for you.”

With that she turned, trying not to allow herself to kiss him again.

Together they all four put their hands on the small time machine so that they could remember the timeline they had all just experienced. Then Duster flipped the switch and around them the room shimmered.

They were back in 2015 and Carson was gone.

Sherri felt empty once again without him close by. But the memory of the kiss would hold her.

Six

Carson appeared in the cavern, his hands pressed against the machine, the feeling of Sherri’s kiss still firmly on his lips. And the memory of watching her change clothes. How he had managed to just not walk over there and kiss her at that time was beyond him. Wow, he had known his share of women, but never one that turned him on as much or attracted him as much.

He looked around as the crystal he had attached the wire to morphed and changed and swallowed up some other smaller crystals nearby as the timeline he had lived in for almost twenty years reset.

He turned off the small time machine and headed out into the storage chamber.

Duster Kindle and Bonnie were waiting for him, smiling. Both were wearing 1870s clothing, clean and ready to go.

“Headed back again?” Carson asked.

“We can’t stay in one place too long,” Duster said. “We’ve actually taken about ten more trips back since we met you in Boise.”

“Spent almost two hundred years total since then,” Bonnie said, smiling. “But we wanted to hold off going back again today until you got here. Just to make sure.”

Carson laughed. “Yeah, this was the one. Has Sherri gone back into the past again?”

Bonnie and Duster both laughed. “I doubt she has given it much thought. She’s been sort of busy.”

“With what?” Carson asked, suddenly worried.

“You’ll see,” Duster said, slapping Carson on the shoulder as he and Bonnie headed for the crystal room. “Just don’t forget to lock up as you go out. And drive carefully getting off this mountain. Your car is down near the river. You’ll have to go out on snowmobile. But it’s a nice day out there at the moment.”

“Thanks,” Carson said, trying to not run for the entrance of the mine. Silver City was a long two hours on a snowmobile and four hours of driving from Boise.

Maybe the longest six hours he was going to ever spend in his life.

Seven

Sherri forced herself to take a long, slow bath.

Carson was arriving just about now in Silver City. For him, only a moment would have passed since their kiss. For her seven very long months had gone by.

Seven of the hardest-working months she had ever spent.

Once she got the artificial ghost turned off, and discovered the old basement room and got everything down there removed or hidden, she managed to get some of the top contractors and stone masons and fine wood-crafters from around the Pacific Northwest to come in and work on the Edwards Mansion.

Three times she had been written up in the newspapers for the groundbreaking work she was doing on an old historical mansion. She didn’t care. She knew what it had looked like in 1898 and she knew what it had to look like now. That was all that mattered.

She had a deadline and she wanted to meet it. She wanted Carson to walk back into his own home, fully restored and modern.

The entire time she worked on the mansion, she had known where he lived just north of Boise in a modern apartment in the hills. And she had known he was working on his second masters at the university in history. But she had managed to not get close to him, although she had seen him once from a distance.

She even knew when Duster had offered him his first trip back in time and how for months after that Carson had spent decades in the past, on every trip first building the mansion that she was remodeling.

In total he had lived hundreds and hundreds of years. That made her feel very insecure, but she tried not to think about that. Bonnie and Duster had lived far longer and they were still her best friends.

Duster had warned her that she didn’t dare approach Carson now, because they had to first meet in the past for this present to work out. And that Carson needed to grow and mature and become the man she had fallen for.

“Even though he has only aged a number of months, he’s lived hundreds of years in the past,” Duster had told her. “That’s the man you fell for, not some college kid.”

So she had agreed to stay away from him. Instead she focused all her attention on the mansion remodel.

And now, it was done. And she had decorated in wonderful Christmas decorations and put a big tree in the main entry and another in the television and family room.

And Carson had returned to this time as the person she had met.

For the first time, they were together in a dual time, in both their real times.

She was so nervous, she felt almost sick. Like prom night or something.

Somehow, she managed to stumble through the next number of hours, knowing it was going to take Carson some time to get off the mountain and then drive to Boise. He might stop and change at his apartment on the way here. Finally, she decided that she needed to make a salad and cook herself a light dinner, then make some cookies.

She loved working around the mansion in the modern kitchen. And even though the day outside was a cold December day, the house remained warm and inviting. Even more so with the wonderful Christmas decorations.

She understood why Carson had built this wonderful place way back in time. It was a joy to live in and it seemed to make her feel at home, like she had always lived here.

Then, as she focused on the second batch of cookies, there was a knock at the door.

She glanced at her watch. Six hours and ten minutes from the time he arrived back in this time in the cave. It might be him. It might not be.

She took a deep breath, wiped off her hands, took the cookies out of the oven, and made herself walk calmly to the door. Part of her had thought that meeting Carson was all a dream. Part of her knew that for her it had been months, but for him only a matter of hours since they kissed.

But even more importantly, a large part of her didn’t really believe she could have someone special in her life, have a relationship like Bonnie and Duster’s.

She made herself take a deep breath before pulling open the door.

There stood Carson, about her age in his early twenties. His chiseled face just as handsome as ever and those wonderful, dark-brown eyes of his showing pure joy and laughter.

He still had on the same clothes he had changed into in the mine under an open ski parka.

He bowed slightly and if he had had a hat he would have tipped it. “Miss Sherri, I got here as fast as I could.”

She couldn’t control herself any more. She flat jumped at him, wrapping her legs around his waist and kissing him harder than she had ever kissed anyone before, doing exactly what she had wanted to do the moment he answered the door for her in 1898.

He held her without strain, kissing her even harder.

Finally, they came up for air and he lowered her gently to the front porch.

She looked up into his beautiful eyes. She could lose herself in those eyes every day.

“You want to see what I’ve done to your home?” she asked, smiling at him. She really, really hoped he liked it.

“Our home,” he said, smiling at her. “Our home.”

With that she kissed him again on the porch, her heart soaring higher than she could have ever thought possible.

And then she kissed him again in every room of their home and under every piece of mistletoe she had hung in every doorway, as she gave him a tour of the house they had both built.

Introduction to
“Christmas, Interrupted”

The marvelous short story writer, Lisa Silverthorne, can write in any genre she puts her mind to. She has published more than fifty short stories, many of them extremely romantic. Like me, she combines a love of fantasy with a love of romance. Her story, “When The Sea Gives Up Her Dead,” which you can find in her collection,
Shipwrecks in Sea Minor,
is one of my favorite romantic ghost stories.

About this story, she writes, “Some of my best and worst moments have been spent on San Juan Island [in Washington State]. Enduring my first Christmas without my grandmother and breaking up with my boyfriend. Taking my first ferry ride, discovering sea glass in hidden coves, and singing to a super-pod of orcas with friends and locals at the lighthouse. Rowan and Mallory came from a difficult Christmas I spent on the island. A time where love had tempered loss, and grief was softened by the island’s magic and spirit.”

She captures the romance, magic, and spirit in “Christmas, Interrupted.”

Christmas
, Interrupted

Lisa Silverthorne

Something didn’t feel right about the new apartment. From the first day Mallory Winter moved into the hundred-year-old house, she felt uncomfortable and anxious, like something was pushing her or she was late for something. It was only her second week back home on San Juan Island, but she still felt uneasy. And at times, like an intruder.

The white gingerbread house looked like a fairytale with its white picket fence, stepping stones, and English roses. After three years living on the mainland, she was glad to come home to San Juan Island. The furnished, upstairs apartment seemed perfect with its full kitchen, two bedrooms, and big bathroom. At first.

It had been a rough year. First, the breakup with Ben and then months of friends trying to fix her up. Blind dates, friend of a friend, her best friend’s cousin’s best friend— she’d lost count of all the failed dates. She tried, she really did, but none of them clicked. One didn’t even show up. And none had the spark she craved.

Then her sisters moved away to find jobs—Portland, Seattle, and Spokane, leaving her alone in the area (both parents were gone now). Even she’d moved to the mainland for a job. And got laid off. Right now, she felt a little lost and a lot lonely. December was officially the worst month ever.

Mallory sank back on the brown leather couch, her mind racing. She needed to find a new job. She glanced around the still unfamiliar apartment, wondering if the previous tenant had lost their job, too. It looked like someone had just walked out and left their life behind.

Dust outlined empty spots on the walls where pictures had hung. Rings imprinted the beige area rug where furniture had been. Pens and papers were scattered across the Moroccan-style desk along with a year-old grocery flyer and a DVD of
It’s a Wonderful Life
(one of her favorite movies). A six-pack of Pyramid ale and two Coke cans had been left in the refrigerator and a can of shaving gel, a bottle of aftershave, and a disposable razor were left in the medicine cabinet. A grey flannel shirt had been left hanging behind the bathroom door.

Apparently, no one cleaned up after the last tenant. The apartment had a quirky, old beach cottage feel to it with its antique chairs and hand-painted tables in cool blues and pale greens. The art deco lamps of nymph-like women holding frosted globes of light were charming against the clusters of glass floats and lanterns strung across the soft blue walls. She hadn’t expected glow-in-the dark paint on the ceilings that splashed stars and galaxies across the darkness.

The space almost felt magical except ... sometimes, out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement. A shadow. A shimmer. A brush of cold air. Like someone had just walked past. Several times, she’d smelled the faint scents of cedar and sandalwood, like someone had just slapped on the aftershave in the bathroom.

Something rustled behind her. She turned.

Two newspapers lay on the desk, pages fluttering as a burst of cold air ached through the room. The chill hurt, turning her arms to gooseflesh as she stared at the newspaper. She’d bought one this morning, but it was still in her backpack.

Shivering, Mallory approached the billowing blue curtains. The window was open.

Her UGGs squeaked across the honey-colored hardwood as she closed the window. She hurried past the leather sofa and hand-painted coffee table to the desk, fingertips like ice, and picked up the newspaper. The
Seattle Times
.

The headline read,
San Juan Island Man Fatally Shot
. The
San Juan Islander
lay beneath it, front page headline glaring back at her,
Local Woman Arrested in Christmas Day Slaying
. The photo of a gorgeous young man stared back at her.