Whispers From the Grave (11 page)

“I guess we do have something in common,” I admitted.

“Do you want to try the virtual reality computer? You could program in your real family and have a conversation with them.”

The idea was appealing. My computer at home had a modem, so I was able to access all the family pictures without leaving the VR arcade simply by typing in our computer’s confidential code. The virtual reality computer recorded all the different angles of my family’s faces and fitted them on bodies in its own computer files.

I had no idea what my family sounded like, so I used my voice as a guideline. The computer slightly distorted my voice to create voices for my mother and sister. I let the random selector pick voices for my dad and brother.

Then I selected a previously written “happy family gathering” program, and set it in a park.

After asking Suki to wait for me outside, I shut the door and said, “Computer, begin program.”

Lush green trees sprang up around me as a fragrant summer breeze filled the air. Birds chirped and golden sun rays fell upon the clearing where I stood.

“Jenna, where are you?” a soft voice called. An instant later, my mother—my
real
mother—stepped through the trees, a wicker picnic basket dangling from her arm. She smiled at me. It was the same face from the frozen photographs, but now it was animated.
Alive!

Her eyes twinkled and blinked, her chest rose and fell with her breaths, and a strand of soft brown hair blew across her face with the breeze.

“Mother?” I whispered,

“You found a great spot for our picnic,” she said and cupped her hands around her mouth. “Steven! Rita! Jim! Come see the wonderful spot that Jenna has found for us.”

The rest of my family burst upon the scene, laughing happily.

“Rita!” I cried at the sight of my sister.

“What, Jenna?” she asked as she knelt beside the picnic basket, spreading out a checkered tablecloth. I studied her profile as she turned her head and pointed up at the tree. “Did you see the squirrel, Jenna? Maybe he’d like some potato chips.”

“It’s like you’re really here,” I said in awe. “It’s so real.”

She grinned at me as the breeze lifted her long hair off her neck.

“But you’re
not
real, are you?” I asked.

“Of course we are,” Rita said.

“No! You’re dead. You can’t be real.”

“Don’t be silly,” she replied, but I knew it was only the computer, talking for her.

“How could you have lived your whole life without knowing me?” I asked, as tears warmed my eyes. The three figures stared at me, still grinning.

“Wipe those stupid smiles off your faces!” I cried. “Answer my question!”

“How about a piece of pie?” my mother asked, slicing into a plump apple pie.

“Answer my question! Why did you die without knowing me?” I demanded, my voice rising in fury. The figures around me froze. The breeze abruptly ceased and the sun faded.

“Anger inappropriate for this program,” a high-pitched computer voice interrupted. “Would you like to select another mode?”

“No,” I said. “Forget it. End the program!” The golden-green scene vanished, taking my family with it. I stared at the stark cubicle around me, feeling more alone than ever. Trying to re-create my family had been a stupid idea. It was pathetic. As pathetic as Suki and her virtual reality fantasy about Kyle.

“It’s better if you write your own program,” Suki informed me when I met her outside. “If you pick one from the computer files, it’s never personal enough to seem real.”

“It wouldn’t matter if I spent a thousand hours writing a program,” I said.

“I could help you with it,” she said, her voice shrill with excitement. “We could make it so realistic you wouldn’t believe it.”

“Don’t you get it, Suki? It wouldn’t matter! It wouldn’t matter because no matter how real it
seemed,
it wouldn’t
be
real.”

“Maybe not,” she said sadly. “But it’s all we have.”

That might be true for her, I thought. But I still had someone left. “My brother is alive,” I said. “And I’m going to find him.”

Suki and I parted at noon. She headed down the beach as I unlocked our front door. I was relieved to find that Mom had gone out. I knew I couldn’t avoid her forever, but I wasn’t ready to talk to her yet.

My virtual reality experience had left me strangely empty. The phony computer family may have looked real, but their lack of soul had only served to mock me, reminding me of what I could never have.

I cracked open Rita’s diary.
Now
she was with me. I lovingly brushed my fingers over the slanted, looping words she had created with a purple pen. The Rita who leapt to my mind as I read was more real than any virtual reality program could ever create.

Dear Diary,

I’ve yet to hear from Ben! Shane said Ben got a fake I.D. and is out hitting all the bars instead of going to school. It sounds like I’ve fallen in love with a certified alcoholic. Diary, I have to admit that I’m scared for him. He’s obviously not taking care of himself and that frightens me. What if something awful happens to him while he’s drunk?

There is something else that’s scaring me. I’ve had this really eerie sensation that SOMEONE has been following me. I was almost sure someone was in the bushes last night, staring up at my window. I told my parents, but they just laughed. They said I’ve been watching too many horror movies.

You’d think that my parents, of all people, would trust my psychic instincts. Well, I guess they don’t have much faith in me since I’ve proved a dud in the PK department. As I mentioned earlier, I faked it with. those scientists. I pretended I didn’t have any PK ability at all. Dr. Crowell and his CUTE assistant (who I would like to date if I wasn’t in love with Ben) are the only ones who know I really do have PK talent. That’s because I’ve been helping them on a secret project. They’re so excited about it that I couldn’t let them down.

As for the rest of those boring dudes in white, I let
them think I’d lost all my psychic ability, I guess it’s backfiring on me, because now my own parents won’t believe me that I SENSE something awful is about to happen.

I wish someone would listen to me. I wish someone would believe me! Something evil is in the air. It’s all around us, closing in, and I don’t know what to do.

It was as if Rita was speaking directly to me. Though her words were written long ago, the years had not silenced them. Her thoughts were there before me, in a lavender ink that had softened over the decades into a pale, whispering shade. Her words were no longer the bright, purple shouts that must have spilled so dramatically from her pen a century ago.

Time had faded the flowing words, but it had not completely hushed them. They were like whispers—desperate whispers urging me to listen to her. They were whispers from the grave.

“I believe you, Rita,” I said aloud. “And I would have done
anything
to keep you safe. If only I’d been there.”

My sister knew she was in danger. Yet, she did not guess the boy she loved would be the one to kill her. I gently closed the diary. Perhaps there would be another page for me to read tomorrow. Perhaps not.

As I sat grieving for my sister, soft thudding footsteps sounded on the stairs outside my room.
That’s strange,
I thought.
I
didn’t hear Mom’s car pull up.
“Mom, is that you?” I called out.

An eerie silence followed. “Mom?” I crossed the room, opened my bedroom door, and peered into the dark hallway. Footsteps, fast and furious, thumped down the steps. Somebody was in our house!

My stomach dove to my knees as I slammed my bedroom door. With shaky hands, I slid the lock into place. Would the flimsy little lock keep out an intruder?

Our front door slammed.
They’ve left,
I thought, sagging against the door with relief. But then something occurred to me. How did I know they’d left? It could be a trick. Whoever it was could be downstairs waiting for me.

12

The steady knock of my heartbeat echoed in
my ears as I held my breath and listened. The idea of staying in the house filled me with stomach-twisting terror. But there was no way I was going down those stairs!

I chose the route that Rita sometimes took. I opened my window and climbed into the outreached arms of the maple tree. Leaves, wet and fragrant, tickled my face as I shinnied down the trunk.

When my toes brushed the earth, I bolted away from the house, fearful that the intruder might emerge and grab me.

Someone called my name, and I turned to see Ruby hobbling out onto her porch with a walker. “I saw someone running out of your house a few minutes ago,” she said.

“Who was it?” I cried.

“I didn’t get a good look at him. I saw him from the back as he was running away. Actually I can’t say for sure if it was a man or woman.”

“Which way did he go?”

“Toward the beach, I think.”

“I was upstairs when I heard someone on our stairs. Our front door slammed, but I wasn’t sure if he left. I’m glad you told me.”

“Well, that’s what neighbors are for. We look out for each other. You were a big help to me when I fell.”

“How is your ankle?” I asked, swallowing the guilty lump in my throat. “Should you be walking?”

“I’m not putting any pressure on it. It’s been better, but it will mend. You should call the police and tell them about your burglar.”

“Okay. First I’ll look around and see if anything’s missing.”

Relieved to learn the intruder had left, I went back inside. Everything seemed just as it should be. If it had been a burglar, I must have scared him away before he could steal anything.

I didn’t call the police. I wasn’t up for explaining to the officers why I wasn’t in school.

Nervous now about being home alone, I decided to leave and try to track down my brother. On a whim, I asked our computer to access the phone directory. To my amazement, my little brother was listed there. He was living on Deep Brine Island, a retirement home on a man-made island that floats in Puget Sound, several miles off the shore of Seattle.

Route XYZ on the solar-bus heads straight for Deep Brine Island. It travels three hundred miles an hour on a thin silver track, and since my destination was twenty miles away, I could expect to be there in four minutes.

The back of my neck prickled as I boarded the bus, as if unwelcome eyes were examining me. I turned quickly, scanning the station crowd, but an impatient lady behind me nudged me up the bus stairs. I found a seat, telling myself I was jumpy because of the burglar.

All thoughts of the intruder vanished as the solar-bus soared over Puget Sound on a sparkling track that rises fifty feet above the waves before sloping gently to Deep Brine Island. All I could think of was my brother when I spotted the island crammed with tall pink buildings. He was actually
there
—perhaps sitting in one of the thousands of windows that winked in the sunlight.

He would no longer be the mischievous red-haired youth I’d come to know from my family photos. He might not even resemble the middle-aged teacher of the year from the old article.

Shivering with anticipation, I found his building and knocked on his apartment door—only to be disappointed when no one answered. Where was he? Had I waited too long to find him? Had he
died?

Drawing deep calming breaths, I headed for the nearby cluster of shops along the water’s edge. I would pass some time looking for a gift for Ruby, and then return to my brother’s apartment and wait for him.

The island swarmed with white-haired, wrinkled people. Most were robust and healthy-looking as they strolled along the sidewalks. Cars were nonexistent here, but a few solar-powered wheelchairs zipped along the roadways,

I bought strawberry jam and imported English biscuits for Ruby, and then got myself a cup of hot chocolate. As I sat sipping it, I smiled at the old folks who ambled in and out of the shop.

An old guy passing my table stopped suddenly as his eyes met mine. His knees seemed to buckle beneath him, and I leapt up and grabbed his arm. Had I done it again? Had I unconsciously made an old person fall?

“Rita?” he asked raspily.

The familiar name he spoke told me who he was. For a long moment, all I could do was stare. The same gentle blue eyes of the old photos peered out from the creased face. The man’s hair was coarse and gray, but his eyebrows were fire-red. An overwhelming wave of love surged in me. I reached across the smooth tabletop and squeezed his withered hand. “Sit down,” I said. “I’m not Rita, but
I am a
relative. I’ve been looking for you.”

My brother sat across from me, breathing raggedly. “I thought I’d seen a ghost,” he admitted, smiling with embarrassment. “I thought maybe it was time to meet my maker. You’re the spitting image of my sister. I figured she’d finally come for me. You say you’re a relative?”

“This might come as a shock. Did you know that your parents gave a frozen embryo to science?”

“Good Lord!” he cried hoarsely. “Are you telling me that’s
you
?”

“Yes, Jim. I’m your sister.”

His shaky hand reached out and stroked my hair. “I tried to find out about you over thirty years ago,” he said softly. “They told me they didn’t know if you’d be born in my lifetime. I wasn’t a candidate for your guardianship because of the way the wills were written.”

“My mom is a descendant from your family,” I explained. “She was my legal guardian and I was implanted in her. She’s Ashley Fraser’s niece.”

“I remember Ashley. She inherited the family’s home. Ashley was my cousin’s niece. Real nice gal. I lost touch with her years ago.”

“She died last summer. I live in your house now.”

“Well, I’ll be,” he said. “It’s like the closing of a circle. You helped pay for that house. It’s only right you live there now.”

“What do you mean?”

“The money our parents got for you paid for the down payment.”

“Our parents
sold
me?” Shocked tears rolled down my face.

“Now, honey, please don’t be upset. I thought you knew.”