I Woke Up Dead at the Mall (15 page)

Maybe it was his shoulders. Maybe it was his grin. Maybe it was the fact that he could cook and he liked to take charge. Something in me felt safe and okay when Nick was around, like I had just gotten a warm blanket wrapped around me. Any and all stomach knots untied. So when Nick finally came back to the park, I resisted the urge to yell at him and shake him for staying away so long and making me worry so hard. And it's a good thing I resisted.

He sat on the grass and ran his hands through his hair, turning his gaze to the sky. I felt like I could see him putting his story away. “Any sign of your dad?” he asked.

I shook my head. “What happened to you?”

He sighed and looked at the ground now. “It was rough,” he said with some finality, as if I'd let him say so little. Something happened, and it got to him. We sat on the grass as he told the story of his haunting.

SOMETHING WENT WRONG WHEN NICK WAS TRYING TO HELP HIS MOM

Okay, so he knew she'd be a mess, but he didn't know she'd be a
mess
. He found her passed out in the living room with the lights on and the TV at full blast. The randomly scattered stuff everywhere made it look like someone had lifted the whole apartment and dropped it. He tried talking to her, but he didn't know how to make himself heard. He tried cleaning up after her, but he didn't know how to move objects here.

He studied her, the apartment, and he put together a list of the clues that it offered.

The Lean Cuisine boxes:
Okay, yes, she was eating, but did she have to go for this frozen, processed crap? Did she learn nothing from him? He used to talk about what he was cooking while he was cooking it and then interrogate her about it while she ate. Right now it looked like she hadn't been listening at all.

The half-consumed Smirnoff bottle by her side, the empty one on the floor, and the full one on the kitchen counter:
She was drinking way too much, drowning her grief. When Nick was alive, he had witnessed much smaller-scale bouts, usually after a bad breakup. But this one already looked worse than all of them combined.

The absence of makeup on her face:
She wasn't back at work yet. When Nick was alive, he was
sometimes annoyed at the time she devoted to her elaborate hair and makeup routine. “I don't go outside without my face!” she would insist. Right now she had no face.

The TV tuned to NY1, the all-day New York news channel:
She was focused on finding more news about her son's murder. When Nick was alive, she only ever watched the news for the weather report, then turned to her favorite reality shows.

The absence of any signs of outside activity:
She wasn't going out into the world, Nick concluded. Not even a little bit. She was having her frozen groceries and her vodka delivered, according to the receipts on the kitchen floor. When Nick was alive they went out into the world every day. The air here was stale and sad.

Poor woman. She was lost and alone. When Nick was alive he could have done something about this. Probably. Tonight he had to snap her out of this, even if it killed him. All over again.

He kept watch by her side, and then, in the middle of the night, his mom got up and stumbled to the kitchen. She stood at the sink, fished out a glass, and rinsed it for a long minute, then filled it to the top with cool water. She took a slow sip.

“Okay, Mom. I know you're incredibly sad. But you need to take better care of yourself than this. Please. For me.”

And then things went kind of wrong. His mom dumped the water back into the sink and reached
for the vodka. She poured a tall glass and squinted at it.

Nick watched her from the living room, half-wanting to give up and retreat out of the apartment. In all his living years, he had never ever seen her so self-destructive, so wrong, so incredibly stupid.

“Stop this! Don't do it!” he shouted, his own fury surprising him. She didn't hear him, he was sure.

She looked at the clear liquid in her dirty glass and muttered, “What's the point?”

“The
point?
What's the
point
, Mom? You're alive!” Nick berated her from across the living room. “And you're wasting it. Your life really is going to end one day. And you'd better get yourself together before then. Go somewhere and be alive! That's the point! Go out into this unbelievably beautiful world before you can't do it anymore. Stop this!”

She took a big swallow of her drink. She winced a bit as it went down. And now Nick had no pity for her, only rage.

“Are you doing this because of me? Is this your tribute to me?” he shouted. “Is this what my life meant?” He kept shouting at her, ranting at her, tearing into her, pleading with her. All right across from her. And when she opened her eyes from her post-vodka wince, she saw him. She saw her dead son, tragic and angry, right in front of her.

The glass slipped from her fingers and shattered.

She screamed and ran toward him. “Nick! Nicky!
My baby!
”

She reached for him, but just like that he disappeared. She stood in the middle of the room and turned in circles again, again, again. And then she stopped.

“Jesus,” she said aloud. “Wow. This is bad.”

She stood there, not speaking, just looking around her.

“I'm sorry,” Nick whispered. “I didn't mean to scare you like that. I better go now. Take care of yourself, Mom. Stop all this shit, okay? I love you.”

His forehead was crisscrossed with worry. Was he trying to come up with a new plan? Was he regretting this one?

“Wow,” I said. “You don't have to stay here. Do you want to go check on her now?”

“No,” Nick said slowly, shaking his head. “I've freaked her out enough for now. If she sees me again, I might push her over the edge. Besides, she's sleeping it off right now. I'll go back in the morning. When her head is clear.”

Sunlight began to slice through the night sky. It made the ghosts blend in with the living, who emerged to begin a new day. Weary parents and nannies filled the playground behind
us with running, stumbling, screeching children. They were all oblivious to the ghosts surrounding them. Good.

Nick kept looking around, like maybe his mother was going to show up in the park any second now. Okay, anyone could tell that Nick wanted to break away from my soon-to-be-failed mission. (Who could blame him?)

“Go. Check on your mother,” I urged him. “That's what you came here to do. Something tells me that I've wasted my haunting.” I gestured toward my building. “At least one of us should get this right.”

He stood up and tugged me to standing. When he kissed me goodbye, he transmitted his ever-present joy and excitement. “It's all going to be okay! You'll see.” He took a few steps, then hurried back and kissed me once more.

“I promise,” he whispered into my ear. I captured the scent of trees and rainstorms. I felt like a kid, wanting him to pinky-swear that it would indeed be okay. Okay would be a miracle.

He left the park, passing by two small children, a boy and a girl, playing underneath the big arch that welcomed the world to this park. He didn't seem to notice them, immersed in their own complicated game.

“You cheated! You opened one eye and saw me!” the girl accused.

“Nuh-uh! I don't know how to open just one eye!” the boy shouted back.

It was the Boy. When they saw Alice and me, they stopped playing and ran to us.

“It's the pretty girl and the angry girl!” she squealed.

“You're here?” I asked.

“Duh!” he said. “Yeah!”

“Did you save your daddy?” she asked. “Are you a ghost hero?”

“Almost,” I said. The boy and girl exchanged a knowing look. “I mean, my friends and I may have destroyed the poison. I just need to give a warning to my dad. Which reminds me: I'm wondering if I could have a bit more time here? Please?”

“No way, José!” the boy Boy said.

“You have just a little bit of time left! A li-i-i-i-ttle bitty bit!” the girl Boy said.

“She seems nice,” the boy Boy said. He was pointing to the little strawberry-blond girl who had been singing yesterday. Little Elizabeth Anne. She was holding her mother's hand, crossing through the park with a school backpack. She sang quietly to herself, and everything about this simple act was innocent and beautiful.

Oh no. Did the Boy's attention to her mean that Elizabeth Anne might die soon? (Oh please, please no. How many people can I save while I'm here?)

“Look!” the girl Boy said. “Pay attention, dummy! He's right there!”

I spun around to look at the building I'd been staring at all night, and there he was. Dad. I blinked hard to make sure I wasn't hallucinating. I wasn't. That was my dad.
(My dad! Alive! Right there!)
He was getting out of a taxi. With Karen.

I raced out of the park over to his side.

“You almost missed him!” the girl Boy reprimanded me. “Don't be such a dummy!”

I made a terrible, sad sound when I got next to Dad. He had lost some hair. His skin was grayish, with a papery quality. He looked thin, and his eyes were sunken. He didn't stand up straight, and he moved slowly. Oh, what I would give for the power to kick Karen into traffic.

I shadowed them in the lobby, where Karen was explaining to Eduardo that Dad's “cardiac episode was fairly minor. But we're not taking any chances. Bed rest for you, mister!” she said with a
(fake)
smile.

“Glad you're feeling better,” Eduardo said. But Dad just shrugged. He opened his mouth to speak, but he was too slow.

“He's on some pretty powerful medications,” Karen said. “It's making him a little loopy.” She turned to Dad. “That's okay. I'm here to take care of you!”

Karen pressed the elevator button with pushy authority.

“This is it,” I called to Alice as I floated upstairs and into the apartment. Here we go.

As Alice slipped through the door, she assured me, “You can do this.”

And then the key turned in the lock. Karen was chattering away. “Remember what the doctor said. Lots of rest. Healthy foods. Not too much salt. You've been under stress! I'm here to take care of all that. No more stress!”

Dad nodded slowly. My heart fell to my feet now that I was really able to study him. How much longer could he last? How much was he suffering right now? He looked like a mere fraction of his full self.

He slipped out of his shoes and thudded his body onto the couch. Taking hold of a pillow, he laid himself down.

“Dad! Get up! Up! Up! Up!” I sounded like a dog trainer. “Don't fall asleep here. Go outside. Now.”

He closed his eyes.

“I'll just make you a nice pot of tea,” Karen sang out from the kitchen. “Won't that be…” She paused, then marched back into the living room. She saw the damage we (Lacey) had done, and she looked pissed. Excellent.

“Charlie? Who else has keys to this place? Did Eduardo let himself in? Or that night guy, Samson?”

Dad didn't answer. He was drifting away. Karen's smile curled and expanded, like the Grinch. “Never mind,” she whispered. “Where there's a will, there's me!” She laughed at her stupid, sick, awful, not-funny joke. Dad was asleep. But not peaceful.

Karen returned to the kitchen, singing to herself.

“She's bad, that one,” Alice whispered to me. “She scares
me.” I had no time to comfort Alice. Not now. I crouched next to Dad and took a deep breath.

Turn your face to me

Turn your face and see

(I felt like an idiot singing this song to him.)

All the pain surrounding you

It worked. His eyes were closed, but he whispered, “Sarah.”

“Yes, Dad, yes! It's me! Sarah! I'm right here!” There was no word in the English language to describe the combination of joy, fear, and sheer determination that was bursting my heart with atomic power. I was doing exactly what I was meant to do.

“Dad! Get out of here! Right now! Karen is dangerous. She's killing you, and you have to get away from her.”

“Sarah,” he whispered again.

Karen emerged from the kitchen holding a large plastic container labeled
SELENIUM
and a spoon. “Did you say something?” she asked.

“Sarah,” he repeated. His breathing was fast, and his face twisted in pain.

Karen smiled and bounced her eyebrows, like this was a good sign. The kettle whistled, summoning her back to her terrible task.

“You're scaring him,” Alice advised. “Sing again.”

There was no time to argue or debate. I dropped the song I wrote at the mall and just sang the words that I needed to say to him.

Dad, get out of here

Don't let Karen near

She will kill you, if she can

He blinked his eyes open but didn't look at me or Alice.

“She will kill me if she can,” he mumbled. He sat up a bit and spoke more clearly. “Get out of here. Get out of here.”

“Yes, Dad. Now. Run! Just go! Please!” I cried, trying and failing to pull him out of this place.

“Come on, Dad. Go.
Now!
” I shouted. “
Karen's going to kill you!
”

He pulled himself up from the sofa. Good. Keep going. He took a few steps toward the door, but Karen came in. “What are you trying to say, Charlie? I wish you would just speak up!”

“I'm…I'm tired, and I…” He spoke slowly. She was turning one hand in a circle, as if to say
Hurry up
. She gave up on having him finish the sentence.

“Go upstairs, then. Go. The tea is giving me trouble, but I've got some broth. That should do the job.”

Karen stood and watched Dad. He looked to the front door, then to the stairs.

“Well? Go, go, go!” Karen commanded him.

I shouted “No!” over her, but she won. Dad nodded obediently and went to the stairs.

“Please! Get out of here!” I pleaded with him.

“Did you say something?” she asked, more than a little bit annoyed. It was obviously an effort for Dad to climb the stairs. She let out a groan and muttered under her breath, “Oh, you try my patience, old man, you really do.” But then she raised her voice and said, “Doctor's orders: go to bed!”

She spun on her heels and went back to the kitchen.

“Alice, Sarah, Lacey, Nick. It's time.”
Bertha's voice boomed through me.

“Sarah?” Alice's voice was tiny and terrified. “We must go! Please! I don't want to get stuck here.

“You go.” I spoke to Alice but kept my focus on Dad. He was standing perfectly still on the stairs. I couldn't tell if he was going to keep climbing, fall to the floor in a final heart attack, or turn and make his escape. I wasn't going to leave until I knew.

“Hurry!” Alice said as she disappeared through the door.

“Tell Bertha I'll be right there. Don't worry.” Please note that I didn't promise. I couldn't.

“Come on, Dad.” I started singing to him again.
“Dad, get out of here! Don't let Karen near!”

That did it. He turned away from the stairs and, pretty quickly for a sick guy, moved to the door. He even checked to see if Karen saw him. She didn't.

He was out the door. And he knew that he had to escape her.

I. Saved. Dad.

“Get out here right now!”
Bertha sounded furious.

I didn't have time to ride the elevator with him. He was sweating now and breathing kind of fast as he pushed the button again, again, again.

“It's going to be okay now,” I promised him (and me).