Second Verse (15 page)

At her door, Vaughn knocks softly while we wait, hand in hand.

I’m not sure what I expected, but it’s not this. Sharon opens the door to an ultra-modern apartment. She’s sleek looking – tall and thin and dressed in an impeccable white pants suit and at least three-inch silver heels. She smiles at us, extending her hand to me.

“You must be Lange.” Her grasp is firm, yet friendly. Her auburn hair is cut in a bob. She’s not beautiful, but she’s pretty in a classic way with wide, light eyes and clear skin. She wears a lot of makeup, but even still, she looks good for her age. I’d guess she’s in her sixties at least, but with her style, she appears younger. She leads us into her living room, framed mostly with large windows. They look out over the downtown area, where traffic is starting to clog the streets. We’re late for our appointment and it’s nearing rush hour now.

As if reading my mind, Sharon motions to the clock on the wall behind her. “I’m so sorry I don’t have much time to talk. I have another appointment soon.”

“Sorry we’re late.” Vaughn sits back on the sofa, legs outstretched and crossed. “Took us forever.”

“It’s fine, let’s just make the most of what time we do have. What is it I can do for you today?”

“I’ve filled Lange in on the basics of what you told me, but I’m sure I didn’t get it all right.” Vaughn says, his hand resting on my thigh.

“No, you did great,” I say. “The thing is, there is just so much I’m confused about. I have a few questions and—”

“We were wondering—” He cuts me off then stops. “Oh, sorry. Go ahead.”

“No, it’s okay. You go on. I don’t even know what I’m asking.”

Vaughn frowns. “You wanted to ask about the voice, right?”

“Yeah, but didn’t you say you wanted to know about the memory thing?”

He shrugs.

“What he’s referring to,” I say, “is the voice we heard in the barn. Did he tell you about it?”

She nods. “He did.”

“Well,” I say, “I guess, what we’re wondering is …”

“Who was it?” Vaughn finishes.

Sharon pauses. “Well, it could be anyone,” she says. “Almost all of us are here again, but sometimes, others don’t technically move on right away. Sometimes they stay by choice, other times because they’re stuck for some reason and can’t yet go through the rebirth process. My opinion? I don’t believe spirits actually haunt, I don’t think they reach out to the living world. Unless they have a reason.”

Reason.

“Do you think it was one of them? Her family?” I say the words slowly.

Sharon’s face slides into the most gentle smile. ”There’s no way to know for sure, but considering where you heard it, and that the message led you to discover Ginny’s past, I would guess so. But of course we can’t really know—”

My skin turns to ice. The ghosts of Ginny’s family. In my mind, the voice reverberates with its chilling tone. And then I remember the giggles from the attic, the strange breezes in my room. How many of the Chopains were left in my house? And if they were, why hadn’t they moved on?

Vaughn runs his fingers up and down my back. His calm reassurance presses through me.

“So,” I say, forcing a smile. “What’s next?”

Her eyes dart between us, a slight smile playing on her lips. “Perhaps I can take your photo while we talk?”

Sharon sits on the edge of the couch holding an old-school 35 mm camera with a big lens.

“Vaughn has yet to let me take his picture, but watching the two of you now, I’d really like to capture you on film. Has he told you about my development techniques?”

I shake my head. “Not in detail. But he showed me some of the photos.”

She nods. “Great. Keep talking and please, ask away. Just stand over by that white wall if you two don’t mind?”

It’s slightly awkward, posing in the fancy living room of this woman I hardly know. Vaughn stands behind me, arms around my middle. I settle into him, warmed as though I’m standing beside a fireplace. We smile into the flash.

“It’s very technical, but basically, we’ve found a way to add an additional step to photo processing that helps us see the image beyond the image. My father was the first to discover the idea of capturing the energy of past lives on film. The Travises, a married couple who believed they had met in a previous life, were the first to have their auras accurately shown through development. Of course, back then, cameras weren’t what they are today and neither were development options. I use a classic C-41 process, but I double and sometimes triple expose everything and overlap them in a very precise manner in their development times.”

Even though I have no idea what she’s talking about, I nod. Vaughn squeezes my hand.

“That’s cool, but it sounds confusing,” I mumble.

Sharon laughs. “It is, but I’ve been doing it for ages.” She motions for us to step apart. We step away from each other, our fingers barely touching, like beads pulled apart on a string. Sharon snaps away.

I clear my throat. “Vaughn says you have been studying this for a while. Has your family always been into reincarnation?”

She waves to our hands, motioning for us to separate further. As she’s positioning her lens and taking more pictures, she answers. “Well yes and no. My father studied it extensively, as I have. In his day, there wasn’t the technology we have now, but he still managed to philosophize much of what I use today. Only, we refer to it as rebirth instead of reincarnation.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Semantics basically.” She motions us back to the couch, not breaking stride as she packs the camera away. “Reincarnation is a very specific belief system we don’t take lightly. But what we do here … it’s a bit experimental, I guess you could say.”

I let her words sink in and am about to ask another question when Vaughn speaks up. “We’re wondering about memories. We’re kind of confused. When we read Ginny’s letters, they’re familiar to both of us. I have no doubt about our history. Does that make sense, that we’d feel that connection, even without real memories?”

“That’s actually really normal,” Sharon says, filling three glasses with water. “Most people never make a connection to their past life. It’s only people who are open to it and have a feeling they want to explore, that may make the reconnection, or question that there is one. Those are the types of people that end up finding their way to me.” She smiles and hands us each a glass.

“But when we read those letters and think about Ginny and Beau, why do we feel like it’s all so familiar?”

“I think you’re confusing memories with what you’re reading and learning. Your case is different. If you have discovered who you were, reading about your past life will naturally evoke an emotional response in you, especially since you are reading the actual writings of the girl you believe you were in your previous
life. Now, from what I understand, Ginny’s life ended quite violently?”

Sipping my water, I nod.

“Let me ask you, have you had, in the past, any particular fears or phobias that may relate?”

“I don’t follow.”

“Well often, psychologists try to get to the bottom of people’s phobias. In reality, sometimes they’re nothing more than what we bring from our last life. For example – someone who may have an intensely deep fear of guns may have died at the hand of one in his or her past life. I once knew a woman who could not watch the news. She would cry and nearly go catatonic worrying about missing children. I do believe that was how her last life ended. I even once knew a man who was so deathly afraid of water that being near the ocean, a lake, or any open water, even from a distance, would give him panic attacks. Even water towers and aquariums bothered him to the point that he avoided them at all costs. He could have died by drowning.”

Wow. Interesting. I suppose it would explain my general freak outs and squeamishness about all things bloody.

“So our memories aren’t really memories?” Vaughn asks.

She shakes her head and offers us the distant smile of someone who’s had this same conversation a million times. “Highly unlikely. Memories rarely resurface on their own since we are, in fact, different people. But I will tell you that your particular case is very unusual for a few reasons.”

“Oh?”

“First, the fact that you are in the same place in this life as your last life is extremely rare. I can’t figure out how you’ve returned to the same exact location. It is more than a little intriguing. Also, the fact that you two found one another again. It’s not uncommon for us to find the same souls from life to life, but what is rare is for us to be in the same roles. If the two of
you have in fact been a couple in more than one life, together with being in the same location … Well, together, they are concerning.”

“Concerning?” My voice is tight, barely squeaking out of my dry throat.

She smiles at her glass. “I want to believe it’s because your love is strong enough to find itself again. I haven’t seen it. My father though, he did believe that could happen. But he was much more of a romantic than I am and as much as I’d like to say that is the only reason, I am cautious. I have seen people reconnect for other reasons too.”

“Such as?”

“In my experience, evil can be very powerful.”

“Evil?”

“Well it’s not all grim reapers and lurking shadows, but yes. The world is very torn with good versus evil, but I suppose that’s nothing new, is it?”

We shake our heads weakly.

She looks down at her neatly folded hands and seems to consider her next words. “There are people out there. People like me, but who use their knowledge and experience in the worst ways.”

“What do you mean?”

“There’s a Society,” she says, “They know everything. I really can’t get into it. I shouldn’t. But please be careful. And if anything strange happens, let me know right away.”

The doorbell buzzes and we all look at it like a bomb has gone off. I straighten on the couch, opening my mouth to ask another question, or tell her about the strange stuff that’s already happened.

“I’m sorry.” She smiles serenely and stands. “My next appointment awaits. You can come back anytime, okay?”

When she pulls me into a tight hug, I’m shaking. The smell of hairspray and a clean, almost antiseptic perfume fills the air between us.

“Watch out,” she whispers. “All around you. One thing I’ve learned is you never know. There are no certainties. In this life or the last. You never know when they’re watching.” After she hugs Vaughn, she bends to pat the camera case on the table. “I’ll be in touch as soon as I get these pictures developed.”

On the way downstairs, we don’t say much. I’m not sure what Vaughn feels, but I feel off balance, like I’ve just stepped out of a whirlwind, my thoughts stuttering, not fully connecting in my brain.

“Why do I feel like it’s us against the world?” I whisper.

Biting his lower lip, he takes my hand in his and squeezes. “Maybe because it always has been. But I don’t see why it has to be.”

He holds the door open, the cold night wind biting at us, pulling my hair across my face. I’m thankful I changed into the sweater. A middle aged woman enters the building and I wonder if she’s the one who buzzed Sharon’s bell.

“You know,” I say. “Maybe we should just stop looking back. I know we want to solve this stuff about Ginny and find those stupid words, but all Sharon’s evil talk kind of freaked me out. What did that last thing mean? A Society? They know everything and could be watching? I don’t even know what she meant, and I’m not sure I want to.”

“Yeah,” he says. “As much as I want to find those words and as much as I feel like something is pushing us to, I don’t care about the past. And that means yesterday, last week or last life.” He knocks his shoulder into mine. “If you want to stop, I’m all for it.”

“Really?” I hook my arm through his as we cross the street.

“Really,” he says. He squints up to the next block where a line of restaurants gleams with glittering lights. “You hungry?”

He bends to kiss me, but stops short, looking over my shoulder. “What the hell?”

I step around him to see what he’s looking at. It’s dark, but I can make out the shiny slickness on the pavement. The dark stains that I instantly know are red.

I scream.

Because right there, right in front of the passenger side door of Vaughn’s car, are five incredibly small, incredibly dead, baby rabbits.

M
Y LUNGS HOLD
each breath for ransom. Vaughn sits at my side on the narrow stoop of a boarded up restaurant. He’s trying like hell to keep it together, but he’s gone white as a January sky, too. He looks up ahead, where the dead rabbits lie, and back to me again. He’s waiting for me to speak, but my throat is swollen with fear. Even with my eyes closed, I still see them, their five little bodies. Furry. Bloody.

This is what Ginny saw. What she experienced. Five dead rabbits.

And five days later, she was dead.

Vaughn paces in front of me, questions all over his face. He waits, watching me like I’ll crack at any second. And for all I know, he’s right.

“Ginny,” I whisper. “It’s all in the diary. The same thing happened to her.”

He squats down in front of me. “I’m not following. I really, really need you to tell me what you know. Now.”

My breath hitches again, even though I avoid following his gaze to the scene down the street. I look across the road, where a mother kneels in front of a convenience store, zipping her son’s jacket. Behind her, neon signs scream: L
OTTERY!
C
IGARETTES!
M
ILK!

“Tell me this. Can you stay here for like, a minute?” His voice is soft and pulls me back to reality, but everything inside me stops.

“Where are you going?” Why would he leave?

“It’s fine.
You’re
fine.” His face crumples, eyes darting. “Come on, Lange. Just hold it together. One minute. I’m gonna get the car and get you out of here. Away from here. You’ll be fine. Trust me. Okay?”

I nod.

“Hey.” He lifts my face, forcing me to look in his eyes. “I’m here, okay? I’m here.”

And then he’s gone.

The mother across the street ties the child’s shoes. He kicks every time she almost has them tied and even in the dark I can sense her frustration in the way her head shakes when she talks to him. After two more attempts, she smacks his butt. I look away when he starts to cry.