Spookygirl - Paranormal Investigator (18 page)

“No, that’s not why. And I haven’t been ‘talking’ to her, Dad. I wanted to know if she could tell me anything about Mom, so I tracked her down and e-mailed her once. That’s it. I didn’t answer her because I didn’t like what she had to say.”

“About me?”

“Yeah.” It was kind of hard to look at him just then, so I concentrated on the speckles in the gray Formica countertop. “All I wanted was to learn about Mom. Because you won’t tell me anything. Not about her, not about that
night.” I finally glanced up. “You’ve been keeping Mom’s stuff in a coffin. Will you
think
about that for a minute? You can’t bear to look at any of it, but you can’t bear to toss it, either, so you lock it up like a dead body you can’t bear to bury. You’ve never let go of her.”

“How could I?” he asked. “Your mom was the love of my life. How could I ever let her go?”

Dad sat next to me at the breakfast bar. His face was lined and tired; I had never seen him look so old, and it scared me.

“She wouldn’t want you to live like this.”

“But she’s not here to say so. Don’t you understand, Violet, everything we did—every one of those investigations—they were all for her. It was her passion, and I got pulled in because
she
was
my
passion. Before then, I’d been content thinking nothing existed beyond this world and the solid things in it. I didn’t believe in an afterlife. I thought the idea of ghosts was complete nonsense. Then your mom came along and made me question that, and I went along with what she wanted because I loved her. If I’d held back, if I’d been more honest about how skeptical I was, maybe I could’ve dissuaded her from all those investigations. From starting the team. If I’d done that, we wouldn’t have gone to Riley Island that night, and—”

“You can’t do that to yourself,” I said, giving his arm a squeeze.

“I do that to myself every single day. And when I see you getting involved in the same thing…”

“You’re afraid I’ll get hurt, too.”

“Or worse. And there’s another reason I’ve never wanted to talk about this stuff.”

I already knew. I’d guessed long ago.

“If I just pretend you don’t have these abilities, I don’t have to think about the fact that you might be able to see her.” He looked miserable. “Knowing she was around but not being able to see her or feel her or talk to her…I couldn’t do it.”

“She’s not here, Dad. I’ve never seen her. She probably moved on a long time ago.”

He made a weird, strangled kind of sniffling noise. It was one of those noises you never want to hear, not from your dad.

We sat in silence for a few moments. Then I found my words again.

“Why’d she lie to me?”

“She didn’t want you to grow up afraid. She thought that if she told you ghosts were harmless you’d feel safe. I didn’t agree with her decision, but she insisted on it. You were so little. She always said she’d explain when you were older. She thought she could protect you from
anything bad until then. She thought there’d be time.”

“And you didn’t think this was something I should’ve been told at some point?” I asked, staring at him. I mean, holy crap. I’d been strolling around without a care all this time, sure that the things I saw and sensed couldn’t possibly hurt me.

“You want the truth?”

“It would be nice, yeah.” A little late, maybe, but nice all the same.

“I hoped you’d grow out of the whole thing. I thought all the time you spent with your aunt Thelma would encourage that.”

“Yeah, well, she wasn’t exactly ghost-friendly. But how could you think I’d just snap out of it, like it’s a bad habit or something? Seeing ghosts isn’t exactly the same thing as biting my nails.”

“I know that now. But you almost never mentioned it, so I thought maybe I was right.”

“I never mentioned it because you didn’t want to hear about it. Neither did Aunt Thelma. No one wanted to hear about it, so I learned to keep it to myself. And now…now I don’t know what to think, Dad. There’s so much I don’t know. You won’t even talk about that night.”

He sighed, rubbing a hand over his eyes like he had a headache. “What do you want to know?”

“Everything,” I said.

“All right. The investigation was a wreck. The storm, the lightning…The conditions threw off my readings, and your mom wasn’t having any luck getting in touch with James or Abigail Riley. Bryan lasted all of five minutes before he went skulking back to the car, and Sabrina went off by herself in one direction while your mom and I went in the other. We agreed to meet in twenty minutes in the upstairs hall, near the staircase.

“After about fifteen minutes, your mom decided the night was a bust, and she and I went to wait by the staircase. I…I wish I knew exactly what happened next. I was standing near your mom, less than two feet away. A flash of lightning blinded me for a second, and then I heard these…thumps going down the staircase. If I’d been paying better attention, maybe…I don’t know.

“That’s it, kiddo. I don’t know what kind of revelation you were hoping for. Your mom fell. It was all very fast. I don’t even think she had time to realize she’d fallen before she died. Sabrina saw everything from down the hall, but the lightning probably disoriented her. She thought she saw someone push your mother, and I was the only one close enough to do so.

“We called 911. The police talked to me, and to Sabrina. You know what she told them.”

“So you’re sure Mom just tripped?”

“Of course.”

“How do you know a ghost didn’t push her? I mean, I didn’t have much time to learn about this stuff from her, and now you’re telling me some of what she did teach me was wrong anyway. I just…” My voice gave out, and I couldn’t explain anymore. I needed to be alone; I needed to think. I stalked to my room and slammed the door.

Great. The room was freezing, and Buster was merrily tossing a few stuffed animals around the room. Stupid oblivious pseudo-poltergeist. A stuffed pig bounced off my arm; Buster gave a playful scream and pulled my hair.

“GET OUT!” I yelled. “JUST GET THE HELL OUT!”

With a startled, hurt whine, Buster left, taking the cold with him.

It wasn’t fair. I was questioning everything I thought I knew about ghosts, everything Mom had ever told me. Dad didn’t want me doing anything on my own, but he wasn’t offering to help me investigate, either.

I needed Mom. I needed to talk to her. I deserved that much.

I thought about the house on Riley Island. I couldn’t help thinking that some of the answers I needed were in that house. Would I find the ghost of James Riley, Jr.? An echo of the night Mom died? Either way, maybe I’d be able to use what I’d learned from the locker-room investigation to help put the mystery of Mom’s death to rest.

A little online research told me that psychic echoes are often strongest on the anniversary of the inciting occurrence. The Logan Street investigation had taken place on December second, which was only two weeks away. I’d have to work quickly if I was going to find a way to get to Riley Island and finish Mom’s investigation.

And I was more determined than ever to do both.

Because Coach Frucile truly loved gym, I was kind of nervous she’d change her mind and insist my physical fitness was more important than keeping her word about that student aide position. Just because we’d temporarily been allies didn’t mean we were suddenly best friends forever.

Still, I hoped she’d make good on her promise, so I wore my normal uniform instead of my gym clothes to school the next morning. She took a long look at the scratch on my face, shook her head a little, and told me to report to the main office. Fifteen years’ worth of school sports records—boring things like participant medical records and release forms—were being held there in a storage room, messily boxed and waiting to be scanned, digitized, and electronically filed. The job promised to be tedious, but after yesterday, I more than welcomed a little
boredom. I was ready to file those papers until my fingers fell off.

The secretary showed me to a storage room full of boxes. Each box was full of old files and papers; it all seemed like a terrific fire hazard. There was a desk in one corner with a computer and a scanner; a tall boy stood nearby, painstakingly positioning a sheet of paper on the scanning bed.

“We’ve had another student aide working in here for a few weeks,” the secretary said. “He’ll show you what needs to be done.” She looked toward the tall boy. “Emerson?”

“Just a minute, Ms. Aspen,” the boy said.

Ms. Aspen—I’d always just thought of her as the unfriendly secretary; I’d never considered that she might actually have a name—gestured toward me.

“You’ve got help,” she told Emerson. “Show Violet what to do.” Then she left us to our filing.

When Emerson was satisfied the paper was absolutely straight, he closed the scanner and clicked something on the computer. Then he walked over, nearly tripping on a pile of papers on the way, and stuck out his hand. “I don’t believe we’ve met. I’m Emerson Bean.”

Emerson Bean…Of course!
The guy whose name I’d erased on the guidance sign-up sheet the first day of school. He wasn’t exactly puffing a pipe in his study, but the name
still fit. Emerson Bean was the biggest geek I’d ever seen. Rectangular glasses balanced crookedly on his nose; his straight dark hair was slicked back from his large forehead; his regulation khakis had neat, straight creases running down the front of each leg. And now he was offering his hand like I was supposed to shake it. Does anyone under the age of twenty actually do that?

Whatever. I could be polite, especially since I’d apparently be spending first period with this guy through January.

I shook his hand. “Violet Addison.”

At first he smiled. Then his eyes widened, and he blurted, “Oh! Spookygirl!” A blush spread over his lightly freckled cheeks, and he started to stammer. “I—What I meant was–”

“My reputation precedes me,” I muttered. The void was apparently spreading my funeral home connection and my drawing class behavior far and wide. “Don’t worry about it.”

Emerson Bean cleared his throat. “Not that I believe in any of that, of course.”

“Um, okay?”

“The things people say about you, I mean. That you can see ghosts. It’s obviously just a rumor.” He said this as though it was supposed to please me.

“And why is that?”

“Because ghosts don’t exist, of course. That kind of phenomenon is scientifically impossible.”

Oh, so he was one of
those
. I narrowed my eyes and brushed past him. “If you say so. Can we just get started in here?”

“Um…” He wavered for a moment, apparently surprised I wasn’t thanking him for not buying into the rumors. He regrouped quickly enough when I started poking at the scanner, though. “I have that set up already!” he said, scurrying over. “Maybe I should be in charge of the computer, and you can go through the boxes and hand me papers to scan.” While he spoke, he managed to slip himself between me and the computer. Talk about territorial! Not that I really cared. Even sifting through boxes of records and handing papers to Emerson Bean, who kept trying to chat about sci-fi TV shows that I didn’t think anyone but my dad watched, was better than gym. Plus, it was one more thing to keep my mind off the fact that I hadn’t gotten anywhere in my quest to help Isobel with Dirk and the oh-so-mysterious Black Rose.

Every day at lunch on the rooftop of the east building, Isobel would give me a hopeful glance. And every day I would have to answer her with a shake of my head. I couldn’t bear to tell her about Dirk’s insistence that the
painting had been destroyed. When we could speak without being overheard, Isobel gave me other questions to ask him, things to tell him that might persuade him to be a little more forthcoming. Nothing worked.

Finally, she took me aside and muttered, “Tomorrow. Lunch. Room 314.”

The next day, after apologizing to Tim for not taking him along—he was okay with it once I said I was doing a favor for Isobel, especially since the other gothlings actually talked to him now—I sneaked into the art wing at the beginning of the lunch period. Isobel was already there, waiting for me outside the closed door to room 314. She wore her hair pulled back into a bun, with only her bangs and a few long, curling tendrils left loose around her pale face.

“Is it locked?” I asked.

She gave me a mascara-heavy eye roll that clearly said, “Pfft, please,” then pulled a bobby pin with a tiny silver skull on it from her hair. She rattled the end in the lock while turning the knob, and the door popped open. “So much for school security,” she muttered, sliding her skeleton key back into place. We went in and locked the door behind us.

Dirk stood in the center of the room, critically studying
the fabric draping on the still life Mr. Connelly had set up for his classes that day. He looked up when the door opened; when he saw Isobel, he made a strange, strangled sound in his throat. “What is she doing here?”

“She wants to talk to you,” I told him.

“Wait, he’s here? He’s here now?” Isobel grabbed my arm, suddenly unsure. “I mean, you’re certain he’s not going to go all
Poltergeist
on us, is he?”

“What’d she mean by that?” Dirk asked, looking a little insulted.

See, this was why I hated helping people communicate with dead friends or loved ones. Neither side was ever willing to shut up long enough to let me relay their words back and forth. It was the paranormal version of being a translator at the United Nations.

“Okay,” I said, holding up my hands, one at Dirk and the other at Isobel. “Both of you need to shut up. We’re going to keep this organized, or else I’m not helping. Isobel, Dirk’s still the same Dirk you knew. He’s just see-through now. He won’t hurt you. Dirk, Isobel’s not used to this. Give her a break.”

“Where is he?” Isobel asked, looking around the room.

I pointed, indicating the spot where he stood—or rather, where he hovered an inch or so off the ground, as ghosts often did.

Isobel stepped forward. “I wish I could see him.”