Finding the Way Back (17 page)

I closed my eyes and tried to relax.
Breathing deeply I started to feel calm and stress free for the
first time since I had arrived.
Scritch
. I opened my eyes
and looked at the door. Again with the sound of something leaning
against the door. This was getting real old. Maybe if I just ignore
it it’ll go away. I closed my eyes again and put my head back.

Scritch.

I hoped it wasn’t mice. I gave a low growl
and sat up. “I’m really not in the mood,” I called out loudly.

Scritch.

Fine. My relaxation was fully spoiled now so
I just gave it up. Stepping out of the tub, I quickly rubbed myself
dry with a towel and pulled on my robe. Just as I reached the door
and started to turn the handle, I heard the sound of a doorknob
turning on the other side of the room. What on earth? I turned my
head just in time to see the door to the under eaves closet open
and snap shut quickly.

I opened the bathroom door and stuck my head
out into the hallway. “Connie, come here,” I yelled down the steps.
“Quick!” I was more annoyed than scared, but nevertheless had goose
bumps running down my arms.

She sprinted up the steps taking two at a
time. “What now?”

“Come in the bathroom.” We both went into the
bathroom and closed the door. “First it sounded like someone was
rubbing against the door to the hallway, just like it did before.
But then the door to the closet inside here just opened and closed
on its own. Let’s see if it will do it if you’re in here.” I sat on
the edge of the tub and Connie started to sit on the floor with her
back to the wall. “I wouldn’t sit on the floor if I were you. The
carpet is filthy.” She shrugged and sat on the floor anyway.

I waited several minutes then started
thinking that nothing was going to happen. My mind started to
wander and I began making a mental to-do list for the next day. I
was caught up in my plan when Connie hissed, “Laney.” She was
staring wide-eyed at the door to the hallway.

Looking up at the door I didn’t see anything
different. It was still closed. Then I heard it. Fabric rubbing
wood like someone was leaning against the door. Just like before.
Before I could say anything Connie jumped up and pulled the door
open quickly. Naturally, there was no one there.

“Weird,” Connie said quietly.

We started to walk out into the hall but hit
an extremely cold spot right outside the doorway. Connie was ahead
of me and stopped abruptly but I could feel it too. She turned and
looked at me and said nervously, “It wasn’t that cold out here a
minute ago.”

We huddled in the bathroom for a few minutes,
not sure what to do. The upstairs was deathly silent. “We can’t
stay here all night,” I said finally. “If we don’t hear anything
else, let’s go back downstairs.”

“What if we do hear something else?” Connie
asked. “What then?”

I shook my head in wonder as we waited for a
few moments more. When nothing more materialized we ran down the
steps into the living room where we skidded to a halt.

A beautiful young woman, her blonde hair
pulled back in a chignon, stood by the front door. She was wearing
a full gown with a sheer pink, voile overskirt that came to her
knees then faded into nothingness. She looked at us with fear in
her eyes. Slowly raising a finger to her lips, she vanished
completely.

Connie started moving before me and she raced
for the back door. I followed a few steps behind her. She struggled
with the latch that had a tendency to stick anyway, and she cried
out as she tore a nail in the process. I reached over and helped
open it as we both scrambled to get outside at the same time. We
made it to the other side of the garden just off the back steps
before stopping and turning around to look at the house we just
evacuated. With our hearts pounding and both of us breathing hard,
we both shrieked in fear as a voice behind us spoke.

“I see you’ve met the ghost.”

Chapter
Eighteen

We only settled down slightly when we
realized the voice was of the living and not the dead. I could tell
Connie was thinking the same thing as me when she asked our new
companion, “You know about our ghost?”

The sun had already set and the shadows were
lengthening as evening was settling in. Sitting on the patio next
door was a plump older woman. Her gray hair stood up at all angles
on her head as she rocked on a wooden swing. The deep lines on her
face indicated a storied life, with each wrinkle a hard won battle
scar to be worn with pride. The smoke from her cigarette enveloped
her in a haze as she studied us with deep blue eyes.

“Know about it? We relish it. Most of the
excitement around here comes from watching the house next door.”
She laughed, a hoarse, gravelly cackle that was evidence of her
lifelong habit. “You all are the second group running out of that
house today.”

Connie and I just stared at the woman. We
were still processing what made us run out of the house just
moments ago. Then I realized what she had said. “Second today? I
don’t think anyone but us has been in the house. You must mean when
we ended up in the front lawn a couple of days ago.”

“Then you think wrong. That piece of painted
fluff the old man used to saunter around with came running out
earlier today. Left the back door wide open.”

“You mean Saundra? Are you sure it was
today?”

“Quite sure, dear. It was Mother’s day to
help at the old folks home. She’s eighty years old but she likes to
help out the old ones once a week.” The woman laughed again. “If
I’m half as spry at her age I’ll be lucky. Anyway, we’d just
arrived at home when out that hussy flew, short skirt and all. It
was a hoot. Best laugh Mother’s had in a few weeks.”

I started to feel my anger building. Saundra?
In our house alone? At the same time, I had the feeling my neighbor
was one woman I really wanted to get to know better. Not only did
she seem like one fun gal, but I could tell she probably knew
everything that happened not only on our street, but probably in
the whole town and in the next town over. She might even know more
about our house and the people who used to live in it. I walked
over to her.

“Hi, we’re Soren Thoresson’s granddaughters.
I’m Laney and this is Connie. Nice to meet you,” I said, walking up
with my hand out to shake hers.

“Nice to meet you also, I’m Louise Gilbert,
my mother’s Ruth. So, what sent you packing?” Her hand was warm and
strong, and I tried not to wince as she squeezed. Connie reached
around me and shook her hand as well.

I was brought back to our scare in an
instant. I looked over at Connie. How honest was it wise to be?

“Come now, no need to fear telling me
anything. We watch but we don’t spread it about.” I highly doubted
her, but didn’t say anything to contradict the woman. Finishing her
cigarette, she tossed it in a coffee can that was sitting next to
the swing.

“We saw a dark shape,” Connie started.

I looked over at her, surprised. Was that
what she thought she’d seen?

“By the front door,” she added.

“Hmm ... yup. Some see shapes, others have
things move about them, and then some actually hear talking. Mostly
it happens at night but it’s not unusual to see a plumber or
handyman of some sort race out in the middle of the day. Not that
it couldn’t have been the mean old goat just being difficult.” We
all turned to look at the house. Some lights shone through the
window and you could see right into the kitchen. Another reason to
get some shades for the windows. I didn’t want to be on display for
the entire town. We were entertainment enough when we were outside
the house.

“We’ve lived here next door all our lives. My
parents built this house in the nineteen thirties. Soren moved next
door before he married Teoline, but he never talked about anything.
The ghost stories started sometime after they were married when
Teoline would mention strange occurrences. The owners before them
pretty much kept to themselves so I’m not sure if they ever
experienced anything. They didn’t seem like serial killers, but
after watching TV you never know what your neighbors are up to.”
Louise began hacking like she was going to cough up a lung, then
leaned forward and stretched. “Well, I’d better go inside to
Mother, she’ll be worried about me. She doesn’t like it when I’m
out here alone at night. I’ll have to tell her about you all when I
get in. It’ll be a nice little bit of excitement to go with her
bedtime milk. Come on over some time and meet Mother. She loves
visitors.” With that she pushed off the seat and made for the back
door.

Connie and I stood and watched her, a little
dismayed that now we had nothing left to do but go back to our
house.

“Maybe we should call Emmett,” Connie
began.

“We are not calling Emmett. What can he do
anyway? I’ve seen those shows on TV. They act like they can help
but they never actually
do
anything.”

“There are things people can do, even if they
don’t necessarily show it on TV. There’s exorcism, smudging, some
people use crystals to clear negative energy.”

“Are you saying Emmett does these
things?”

“Well, I don’t know exactly, but we could
find someone else if we need to. We can’t just act like nothing
happened and we didn’t see anything. We should at least call him
and see. What have you got against Emmett all of a sudden? I
thought you guys were hitting it off?”

“Well, you thought wrong. I don’t need that
kind of complication in my life right now anyway. I just got my
divorce. I shouldn’t jump into something else. Besides, if we call
him now, he’ll come right over, and he was already up all night
last night with us. I’m sure he has to work in the morning. We can
at least wait until tomorrow.”

“So do you think we should stay here tonight
or go stay with our mothers?”

“I do not want to stay with my mother. That’s
a slippery slope I’d like to avoid.”

“I think we should stay here. Think about
it,” Connie said finally. “We know who that was.”

“We do?”

“Of course we do. She resembled you, Laney.
It had to be Grandmother.”

I thought of the young woman, with blonde
hair and features similar to mine and I had to agree. I had seen
pictures of her when I was growing up. “You’re right. It had to be
her.”

“And that’s actually a good thing,” Connie
continued excitedly. “She’s not evil. She won’t try to hurt us.
Maybe we can communicate with her!”

“I could have just tripped on the steps that
time I fell. I think we were so convinced something was after me
that we started making assumptions.”

“Let’s do this, Laney. We’ll take our cell
phones and both sleep in my room again. We’ll stick together and if
anything scary happens we’ll have each other.”

“Deal,” I said and we shook hands on it.
Marching up to the back door, I pushed it open with confidence.
Stepping into the kitchen I stopped to listen. All was quiet.

We left a light on in both the living room
and the kitchen this time then headed for the stairs. Walking past
the living room, I was getting tired of seeing boxes and was
starting to feel claustrophobic. “I cannot wait to start clearing
some of this stuff out of these rooms.”

“Me too. We should call the cable company
tomorrow and get internet service hooked up. I’m just about going
into withdrawal without my computer, and I’ll need it to put items
on eBay. The sooner we start that, the sooner we can start clearing
some of this stuff out of here. Once we decide what to sell I’ll
photograph the items then pack them in boxes so that once they sell
I can ship them out right away,” Connie said, following me up the
stairs.

“That sounds efficient,” I answered as we
entered Connie’s room, but I was only half-listening. My thoughts
had returned back to what we had seen that prompted us to go
fleeing outside in fear. I was just so tired. “It’s been such a
long day. I just want to go to bed. I don’t want to think about
eBay, ghosts, divorces, my mother, or anything else. Let’s just let
it all go for now. I’ll even let you call Emmett tomorrow.” I took
off my shoes and collapsed onto my bed.

“There’s one thing you forgot that we also
don’t want to talk about,” Connie said.

“I don’t want to think about Melanie
either.”

“No, the fact that Saundra was in the house
today.”

Suddenly wide awake, I sat up on the edge of
my bed.

“That’s right. Not only do we know she has a
key to the house but she was in here for some reason when we were
gone. Do you think she was trying to steal something?”

“I don’t know, but it sounds about right.
There are a lot of loose items that have value, but Louise didn’t
say she was carrying anything when she saw her run out. I suppose
she could have put something in her pockets like jewelry or cash.
She might know better what valuables he had in the house.
Regardless, the back door was still open when we got home. We need
to call a locksmith first thing tomorrow and get all the locks
changed. After all these years, who knows how many keys might be
out there.”

“At least that’s one thing that wasn’t a
ghostly event. We’re going to have to corner her and get some
information out of her. She must have been in here quite a bit
while she was engaged to Grandfather. Can you imagine?” I
shuddered. One, I wouldn’t want to marry someone who kept house
like this and two, the thought of my old grandfather and trampy
Saundra together was just plain icky. “What’s wrong with older men?
Why do they have to run around with younger women? They can’t
possibly have anything in common. They grew up in different eras,
so their life experiences are totally different. I don’t see how a
relationship like that can ever last.”

“I don’t think they are looking for a true
connection. But I’m so tired I’m not even thinking clearly, and
thinking about them is not going to bring on sweet dreams. Let’s go
to sleep. We can try to handle it in the morning,” Connie said.