A Strange There After (6 page)

“You watch my shows?”

Crap, I nearly slapped my forehead. I forgot
it was one of his quotes. “A moment of weakness,” I ground out.
“Focus on me, please? Are you ready to believe me yet?”

“You’ve had a little more time to get used to
it than I have.”

“Will you tell me what the heck is going on?
Who are you talking to?”

Boone and I both startled at Abby’s outburst.
He answered as he pulled out his camera and queued up the footage
of what I assumed was me. Apparently, the device worked just
fine.

“I’m talking to Quinn. She was upstairs for
some reason, told me to come and talk to you.” He fixed her with a
hard gaze. “Don’t freak out. I’m guessing this might be a bit of a
shock. Look.”

He showed her the display screen, and as it
played, her expression changed from doubtful to shocked and
finally, awe.

“I knew it! I mean, I suspected, but this
explanation seemed too crazy, even for Quinn.”

I chuckled as Boone looked at her as if she’d
lost her mind. “Not the reaction I expected.”

“Wait, if she’s here, who is in her
body?”

“Catherine,” I answered.

“She says it’s Catherine,” Boone repeated.
“Who’s Catherine?”

“Long story.” Abby sighed, but her eyes
glittered with excitement. “I probably should go inside and tell
them I’m leaving early. Blame it on the broken arm. This is going
to take a few hours.” She made to go, then turned back. “How come
you can see her, and I can’t?”

“Maybe I’m that good at what I do.” He
flashed a grin.

“Oh, please,” Abby and I said at the exact
same time. I shot a grin at my BFF, not caring she didn’t see
it.

“Quinn isn’t too impressed,” he joked.

“No, she ain’t exactly your biggest fan.”
Abby departed, leaving us alone in the alley.

“Ouch.”

“Oh, I’m sure you’re really hurt.”

Listless, I wandered to the right, close to
the empty corner lot next to Moon River. I’d heard rumors they were
going to make it a huge outdoor patio pretty soon. Now, it was
overrun with weeds and marks from cans of spray paint, showing the
patio might actually not be too far off.

“How long has it been?”

Exhaustion weighed me down. Using so much
energy talking had really taken its toll. I opened my mouth to
speak. Then, I realized I wasn’t exactly sure.

“What day is it?”

“Late Saturday night.” His brows knitted
together in confusion. “You don’t know how long it’s been?”

Crap, it was Saturday, wasn’t it?

“I do now,” I snapped. “Seventeen days or so.
Time passes differently. Emotions take over, or I get distracted.
Like tonight, all I wanted was to make it to Abby, but something
lured me upstairs. A ghost I’d seen before.”

“You’re a sensitive, too?” Finally, I heard a
trace of respect in his voice.

“For as long as I can remember. Experiencing
it from the other side has given me a whole new perspective. Now I
understand why they try so hard to be heard.”

He nodded, shadows crawling across his face.
Unbidden, empathy crept in. I didn’t want to feel any kind of
kinship to him. Staring back at me, I felt him assessing and
fidgeted.

Abby bounced out of the restaurant, slinging
her purse over her shoulder. I loved her so much for her
positivity. “Let’s get this show on the road. Boone, you are in for
a heck of a tale, completely off the record, and hopefully, you can
help me find out from Quinn what is happening in that house of
hers.”

Chapter
Six

While Abby got some provisions from the
corner store, Boone and I waited in awkward silence on the
sidewalk. We were on East Bryan Street, across from Johnson Square.
Abby’s idea was to use one of the town greens, saying it would draw
less stares than a restaurant when Boone talked to someone who
wasn’t there. Then she disappeared inside the store for junk food,
her late night go-to when she was stressed.

“I bet you two are quite the pair,” Boone
said, grinning, holding his phone up to his ear and pretending to
talk to someone instead of empty air.

“Pretending to be on the phone? What are you
afraid of? People finding out you’re not as cool as you act?”

“You can be quite nasty, you know that? I’m
not even sure why I agreed to put up with this.” He put the phone
away, appearing slightly embarrassed.

“Um, maybe because you’re also not as smart
as you think and recognize a good learning opportunity when you see
one.”

“I repeat, nasty.” He flashed me an amused
grin. “Tell me about you and Abby.”

I shrugged as the crosswalk changed and
walked over to the other side of the street, knowing Abby would
catch up. “She’s a sister to me. The only real family I have.”

“Well, that’s just sad.”

“Daddy died five years ago, which is sort of
a beginning point to the story. He had remarried, and, for a while,
we were happy. I gained a stepmother, Marietta, and two
stepsisters. Once he was gone, things changed. Marietta became
mean, making me work at her salon while she doted on her
daughters.”

“Wait, I see where this story is going.”

“Yeah, I have a few things in common with
Cinderella, but I have not had my happy ending...yet.” I continued
with the story. “I began seeing a shadow following her. Not long
after, her behavior changed. She became terrible, worse than
before, and eventually somewhat abusive. That’s when the attacks
started.”

I filled him in on the events of the last
three months, building up to my eighteenth birthday. We were
sitting in the grass, and I’d just gotten to the night we tried to
beat Catherine in the cemetery when Abby showed up with a bag of
goodies. She sat across from Boone and pulled out a giant bottle of
Mountain Dew.

“So, what’d I miss?” she asked.

“I feel like I’ve stepped into an episode of
the X-Files,” Boone joked.

“Ha, I wish. Then I’d have Mulder instead of
you.”

He flashed me an appreciative smile. “Not
many people your age know about that show. Impressive.”

“I got her hooked on it,” Abby said, ripping
open a pack of Twizzlers, as well as she could with the cast, and
offered one to Boone.

“Ask her how she hurt her arm.”

Boone relayed my question.

“Right after everything escalated. You were
screaming. Jason had been tossed aside like a rag doll. Travis was
trying to keep Anna calm because she was freaking the heck out. I’m
guessing it was the moment Catherine booted you from your body.
This burst of energy exploded out of you, or Marietta, I couldn’t
tell at the time. Knocked me off my feet and right into a
tombstone. One concussion, an overnight stay for observation and
twenty-two stitches.”

She lifted her hair and showed me an ugly
gash crusted with blood and stitched together.

“I’m so sorry. I don’t remember anything
after Catherine let Marietta go and started in on me. I do remember
feeling as if my soul was being sucked from my body. I guess we all
know what that meant.”

Boone told Abby what I said, pulling a bag of
chips from her stash. “I can’t fathom any being having such power.
The only thing I can think of is a demonic spirit.”

I shuddered and nearly dismissed the idea. It
was possible, but while the entity in the yard did look like a
character from a low budget horror movie, this didn’t feel evil in
that kind of way. But what did I know? At this point, I’d explore
any option.

“We can look into it,” Abby mused. “I’m not
sure though. Where would we have picked up a demonic entity?”

“Maybe it’s been on your land for years, and
some random act opened it up to the stepmother. A Ouija board?”

“I don’t think we own any. One of Suzie’s or
Anna’s friends might have brought it to the house,” I
suggested.

“Idiots,” Boone muttered. Louder, he said,
“It’s also possible Catherine ran into something particularly nasty
on the other side and brought it with her.”

“She’s evil enough on her own.”

“Think about it, Abby. A normal ghost or
spirit does not have the power to take over a body completely. It
can inhabit it with the host but never replace it.”

“So, you’ve never heard of this kind of
possession before?” she asked.

“Nope. But I can do some research.”

I shifted in the deep grass. “It can’t be
demonic. I saw it. This thing looked human.”

“And you didn’t think to tell me earlier?”
Boone barked.

“Tell you what?” Abby demanded.

“She’s seen whatever this is.”

“Catherine, yeah, of course she has.”

“No,” I interrupted them. “This wasn’t
Catherine.” I paused. Was it? After spending an unknown amount of
time in the river, her body might have become that unrecognizable.
No. The longer I considered it, the less likely it became. This was
something new. “Catherine would have taunted me. She enjoys making
me suffer.”

“Unless in her natural form as a spirit, she
doesn’t have full function, didn’t know it was you. Maybe she can
leave your body, like at night.”

“Tell me what’s going on.” Poor Abby. It must
have sucked to be excluded from the conversation.

As Boone relayed the information, my mind
wandered. The best way for me to get answers was to ask Catherine
directly, but I didn’t see that happening. I didn’t want her to
know how desperately I was trying to get my body back. She’d take
my hopes away from me, too.

We went round and round for another hour,
each time realizing we knew very little about what was actually
happening. Abby laid back, staring at the stars and stretching her
casted arm to the side.

“You’ve been through a lot,” Boone said,
breaking the sudden silence and dumping the last of the chips in
his mouth.

“There were days I thought I wouldn’t make
it.” I snorted at the irony. “If I’m honest with myself, I haven’t
made it.”

“You’re not dead. Not in the traditional
sense.”

“Helpful, thanks.”

“What do you want me to say? I could compare
it to an out of body experience, but you’re not in a hospital
dying. That’s the only other instance I can think of where a body
has lived and a soul’s been walking around without it. Or where the
physical form is above ground and healthy.”

“Yay for me. I’m a freak of nature.”

“That’s a good thing.”

“Please, tell me how this is good?”

“Chill. I don’t mean your situation. I mean
you in general. You’re not like other girls, and that is always a
positive.”

His words reminded me of Jason, and I fell
quiet. Not long ago, Jason told me the exact same thing, how my
uniqueness attracted him. It’d made me feel special. Coming from
Boone, I wasn’t sure it was a compliment. The guy just pushed my
buttons. The wrong buttons.

“I’m not like other girls because I am
missing a body.” I picked at the grass. “I don’t like you.”

He didn’t even pretend to be hurt. “So?
You’re not the first, and you certainly won’t be the last. I like
controversy. If you rattle someone, human or spirit, you often get
an unabashedly honest reaction.” Boone leaned closer and actually
winked. “I don’t believe you, by the way. I’m very likable. Soon,
we’ll be BFF’s.”

Abby laughed, pushing up onto her good elbow.
“Is she giving you a hard time?”

“Nothing I can’t handle.”

“I miss her sarcasm,” Abby said
wistfully.

“I’d be glad to share some of it with you,”
Boone joked. “If it gets me out of the line of fire, take it.
Sooner or later, Quinn’s bound to give me a complex.”

“You already have one,” I drawled. “I’m
surprised your big head can fit through the doors of most
buildings.”

He ran a hand over his faux hawk. “I’ve been
told I have a very nice head.”

Okay, that made me laugh, right along with
Abby.

We sat there a while longer, me trying to
delay going home, Abby and Boone wanting to toss more ideas back
and forth. Nothing inspirational struck, and it bummed me out. I
didn’t expect instant miracles, but I couldn’t help feeling a
little depressed.

“Don’t let it get you down,” Boone
whispered.

He must have sensed my mood. “I’m
trying.”

“We’ll figure it out. I’m invested now.
You’re a great research subject.”

“Awesome. I’m your lab rat.”

He chuckled and rose to his feet, picking up
his and Abby’s trash and tossing it in a nearby can. Stretching his
back, his t-shirt rode up, revealing an interesting looking tattoo
on his side, but I didn’t want to show too much interest in his
skin. He’d probably take it the wrong way.

“Abby and I will do some research,” he shot
her a glance, “if she’s got time.” She nodded. “Good, we’ll come by
in a day or two. I have to get a look at this house I’m hearing so
much about.”

I bit my tongue to keep from suggesting they
make it one day instead of two. I had unnatural expectations of how
fast things would move after getting others involved in my plight.
Each day I felt myself slipping away a little more. Soon, I’d end
up like Jackson, stuck and grumpy, not caring what went on in the
world around me.

Chapter
Seven

At home, I existed in this strange
bubble—joyous over having found help and anxious due to all the
time slipping by. I wasn’t used to relying on others. For five
years, I had to take care of myself. Marietta never included me in
her family dinners with the twins. I was in charge of finding my
own food, or else she’d let me have whatever was leftover after
they ate. Any parental guidance came in the way of a warning. Thank
goodness that survival instinct carried over with me into the
spirit world, even if I didn’t always remember it. Despite trying
to remain positive, my mind and body had other ideas.

Hoping to distract myself, I decided to
venture into the yard to see if I could find out what appeared in
my window. Even though I kind of expected it to, nothing happened.
No blackouts. No thunder of god. No horrific figure. Just me and
the lush landscaping.