Jacob's Coins: A Cozy Ghost Mystery (Storage Ghost Mysteries Book 1) (4 page)

Chapter 12

Sylvester
Sylver bellowed out, “Last locker of the day, folks. Who will start the bidding
at £50?”

There
were jeers and outbursts of laughter.

“I
wouldn’t give you a penny for that pile of junk!” someone called out.

Grace
saw the hurt look on the ghost’s face, he looked as if he wanted to cry. Did
ghosts cry?

Big
Bob pulled Grace and Frankie to one side and said, “You two need to walk away
as if you’ve finished for the day. I’ll bid on your behalf but if the others
know I’m doing it they’ll make my bid go higher. Walk away now.”

Frankie
gave a slight nod as if he’d just been given a secret mission. Then he said,
far too loudly, “There’s nothing here for us, we’d better go home.”

Grace
didn’t want to leave the young boy, he looked so vulnerable. She had to trust
that Big Bob would win the locker for them.

She
walked away, Frankie at her side. She heard Sylvester call out, “Okay, it’s not
the best locker we’ve had today. Who will give me £40? No? £30? Come on, folks,
you’re breaking my heart.”

Frankie
and Grace walked towards their van. They heard Big Bob’s voice bellow out,
“I’ll give you £10 and that’s only ‘cos I feel sorry for you, Sylvester!”

There
was more laughter. Frankie stood still, Grace held her breath.

Then
Sylvester called out, “Sold! To Big Bob!”

Grace
let out her breath, she looked at Frankie. His eyes glittered. “We’ve just got
a locker! Our first locker.”

They
turned around and headed back to Big Bob. He nodded at them and said, “I hope
you’ve got ten pounds with you.”

Frankie
was grinning like a child on Christmas morning as he ran in to the locker. Big
Bob followed him in and said, “You have to pay for your locker first, you do
that in the office. Have you brought a lock to secure this back up again?”

“No!
I never thought of that,” Frankie said. “Do I really need to secure it? Will
anyone steal anything?”

Big
Bob nodded sadly, “Some of these people are like vultures, I’ve learnt that
from my mistakes. You can borrow one of my locks if you like.”

“I
don’t mind staying here,” Grace offered. “You won’t be long, will you?”

“Five
minutes at the most,” Big Bob said.

Frankie
looked like he suddenly remembered something. “I get to talk to Sylvester
Sylver again! Do you think he’d mind if I asked for his autograph? Maybe took a
photo with him?”

“He’d
love it,” Big Bob said. He turned around and headed for the office.

Frankie
followed him with a big smile on his face.

“Might
be more than five minutes then,” Grace mumbled to herself. She didn’t mind, it
would give her chance to talk to the ghost who was still sitting on the bed
behind her. She took a deep breath and turned around.

She
had never spoken to a ghost before. What should she say?

Chapter 13

“Hello,”
Grace said.

The
young boy blinked at her. “You can see me?”

“I
can.”

“How?
No one else can see me, they ignore me when I shout at them. What am I doing in
here? Where am I?”

Grace
didn’t know what to say. Did the boy know he was a ghost? There was only one
way to find out. She said, “What was the last thing you remember?”

The
boy hugged his knees to his chest. “I was in a car with my mate, Steve, we were
going to a concert.” He frowned. “I can’t remember anything else. Where’s my
mum and dad?”

Grace
sat down on the bed next to the boy. “Are you sure you can’t remember anything
else? How long have you been in here?”

The
boy looked down at the bed cover, he quietly said, “I’m dead, aren’t I? That’s
why people can’t hear me, or see me.”

He
looked back at Grace. She nodded. “I don’t know why but I can see people who’ve
died. It only started happening recently and I don’t know why it’s happening.”

The
boy considered this. “Maybe you’re supposed to help them, like some sort of
superhero.”

“I
don’t think so, I’m not a hero,” Grace said. “This is a storage unit, do you
know why you might be here? Did you live nearby?”

The
boy shrugged. “No idea, this is my stuff though. Maybe mum and dad put it here
after I ...”

He
trailed off and looked at his bed cover again.

“I’m
sorry, this must be hard for you. I’m Grace, what’s your name?”

“Jacob,
Jacob Paster, not like the food but as in faster,” he said. He gave her a
little grin and said, “I always have to say that about my last name, we all do
in my family.”

Grace
looked around the storage unit. “We’ve just bought your things, we’re going to
take them back to our shop.”

“Do
I come with you? Give you time to work out how you’re meant to help me?”

Grace
stood up. “I don’t know, and I don’t think I’m meant to help you in any way.”

She
took in Jacob’s clothes. He was wearing faded denim jeans, a T-shirt and white
trainers, his hair was full on the top and longer at the back. Was it classed
as a ‘mullet’ style?

“How
old are you, Jacob?” she asked.

“I’m
17. How old are you?”

“Never
you mind, when were you born?”

“1968.
Why are you so interested?”

Grace
paused for a second. “What year do you think it is?”

Jacob
looked at her as if she was mad. He said, “1985 of course.”

Grace
looked out of the locker and over to the car park, she could see the outline of
her brother and Big Bob in the office. She wished she was with them, she didn’t
want to tell Jacob that he had been dead for nearly thirty years.

She
turned back to him and as gently as she could she said, “Jacob, it’s 2014.”

Jacob’s
eyebrows shot up. He leapt off the bed and ran towards the locker opening. He
looked up at the sky. “Cool! Where are the flying cars?”

Grace
joined him. “We don’t have flying cars. Are you okay? I’ve just told you that
you’ve been dead for a long time.”

Jacob
shrugged. “I know but there’s nothing I can do about that, is there? Where are
the robots? How many robot servants have you got?”

Grace
smiled. How easily the young accept reality and deal with it. “We haven’t got
any of those, but we do have the Internet.”

Jacob
pulled a face. “What’s that? Something to do with fishing? Oh! I need to ask
you something, and think twice before you answer, don’t just blurt it out.”

“Okay,”
Grace readied herself.

Jacob
looked straight at her and said, “Is The Boss still making records?”

“Who?”

Jacob
clutched his chest and gasped, “The Boss, Bruce Springsteen?”

Grace
noticed the image on his T shirt. “Ah! Bruce Springsteen? Yes, he’s still
going. Is that all you’re bothered about?”

“All?
It’s a big thing, Bruce is my world. Have you got any records of his?”

Grace
didn’t want to get into a history lesson with Jacob about the decline of
records. The office door opened and Big Bob and Frankie started walking towards
her. She told Jacob who they were.

“Are
they going to take my stuff away? What will happen to me? Do I have to stay in
this locker? I don’t want to stay here!”

Grace
felt helpless. She didn’t know what was going to happen to Jacob. She didn’t
know what she was supposed to do – if she was even supposed to do anything. She
said, “You might be attached to this furniture somehow. If we take it back to
the shop you might come with it.”

“Talking
to yourself again, Grace?” Frankie called out. “Shift out of the way, we’re
going to load this stuff into the van.”

Grace
turned to give Jacob a reassuring look.

He
wasn’t there.

Chapter 14

Big
Bob followed them back to the shop and helped Frankie take the items upstairs
to the stockroom. He didn’t say anything about the near empty condition of the
shop or the fact that Frankie was living in the stockroom.

Grace
looked at the furniture as Frankie arranged it around the small room.

Had
Jacob come along with the furniture? Would she have to go back to the empty
storage room to see if he was there? Would she be allowed in the storage room
now?

She
could hardly raise the topic with Frankie and Big Bob.

Frankie
said, “I’m going over to Big Bob’s shop to see what sort of stock he sells
there. Do you want to come with us?”

“You’re
more than welcome,” Big Bob added.

“No
thanks, I’ll stay here. Perhaps I can give this place a bit of a clean,” Grace
said.

Frankie
pointed to the chest of drawers. “You can sort through that, there’s something
inside, I heard something moving about. But don’t throw any valuables away.”

Grace
nodded, thinking that it was unlikely that the 17-year old Jacob would have any
valuables.

She
waited until she heard Big Bob and Frankie leave the shop, then she called out,
“Jacob? Are you here? Can you give me a sign?” She tutted. “I sound like some
sort of ghost hunter on reality TV.”

“What’s
a ghost hunter?”

Grace
jumped and clutched her chest. Jacob grinned at her, he was sitting on top of
the chest of drawers. He jumped down and turned to look at it. He reached out a
hand as if to open a drawer. His hand passed through the drawers as if they
were made of water.

Jacob
swore. Grace tutted again and said, “Watch your language. I thought I’d left
you at the storage place.”

“I
was in the back of the van. This town hasn’t changed much, has it? Some of the
shops have been here for years. There’s some fancy cars though, have you got a
car?”

Grace
quickly shook her head and changed the subject. “Do you want me to have a look
in the drawers for you?”

“Yeah,”
Jacob responded.

He
moved closer as Grace opened the top drawer.

“My
music!” Jacob cried out with delight.

Grace
picked up a cassette. She could see a list of songs handwritten on the front
cover. “Did you make this tape?”

“Those
are my favourite Bruce songs. It was playing when,” Jacob suddenly faltered.
“Whoa! I just had a memory flash, that was weird. It was playing when me and
Steve were driving to see a Bruce tribute band.”

“When
was that?”

Jacob’s
hand flew to his head and he winced.

“Jacob,
what is it? Are you in pain?” Grace asked.

“
A painful memory, never had those before. But I’ve never been dead before. It
was the night that I died. I was in a car with Steve. We were late, I blamed
Steve and I kept shouting at him to hurry up. We were on the motorway and he
wouldn’t drive fast enough.”

Grace
looked with concern at Jacob. “Can you remember anything else? Did Steve die
too?”

Jacob’s
face scrunched up as he thought. After a while he said, “I remember Steve
crying out and I started to panic, but that’s it. Do you think that’s why I’m
here? Stuck here as a ghost because I killed Steve? I thought people were
supposed to go to heaven or somewhere when they die. Why haven’t I? I must have
done something bad!”

Jacob’s
voice got higher and his form began to shimmer. Was he disappearing?

“Calm
down! You don’t know that Steve died. You don’t know that you caused the
accident.”

Jacob
looked at her, sadness in his eyes. “Then why am I here? Something’s not
right.”

“Why
don’t we try and find out if Steve is alive first? Take things from there,”
Grace said as calmly as she could.

“How
can we do that? Have you got a phone book? He might not live in this town
anymore. It’ll take ages to find him.”

Grace
gave him a little smile. “You don’t know about the magic of the Internet, if
he’s out there and online, we’ll find him.”

Jacob
frowned and said, “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”

“You
will,” Grace said. She led him over to the corner of the room where Frankie had
left his laptop. She hoped there was nothing indecent on his home page.

She
switched it on. How was she going to explain the Internet to Jacob? She barely
understood it herself.

Chapter 15

Grace
tried her best to explain the Internet to Jacob. She could tell by his face
that he was totally lost.

“Let
me show you. It’s like lots of pages all on one screen, from all around the
world,” she said.

Jacob
gave her a sceptical look. “From all around the world? How can it do that? I’ve
seen a computer at my school and it’s much bigger than this thing.”

“Bear
with me. You’ll like this,” Grace said. She went onto a music website and typed
something in. A choice of videos came up. She pressed play on the top one.

She
watched Jacob as his mouth dropped open. “The Boss! I can’t believe it! How can
he be on that little screen? Is it magic?”

“A
bit,” Grace said. “Give me the full name of your friend Steve and I’ll see if I
can find him. Did he have a job? He might have a website.”

Jacob
sneered. “A website? What’s that? What do you think he is? A spider?”

Grace
persevered and got the information from him. She typed everything in, an image
popped up. “Is that him?”

Jacob
peered at the image. He burst into laughter. “That’s Steve all right! He got
fat! And old! Look at the state of him.”

“He
works in the next town, do you want to go see him?”

“And
say what? Are you going to tell him that you can see ghosts? And that his old
pal, Jacob, is with you? He might have some horrible injury from the car crash
that I caused. He might have wooden legs!”

It
was Grace’s turn to look amazed. “Why would he have wooden legs? Don’t you want
to find out what happened in that car crash? It might be the reason why you’re
here.”

“And
what if it isn’t? What are you going to do then?” Jacob asked, a sulky look on
his face.

“I
don’t know!” Grace exploded. “I don’t even know why I’m talking to you! I don’t
know why I can see you! I didn’t ask for any of this!”

“Fine!”
Jacob said. “I’ll get out of your life then!”

He
scrunched his face up as if he was trying to make something happen.

A
snort of laughter escaped from Grace. “You look like you need the toilet.”

“Shut
up, I’m concentrating!”

Grace
sat on the bed and watched Jacob as he pulled all sorts of faces.

After
a minute he flung his arms in the air and said, “Looks like you’re stuck with
me.”

Grace
nodded. “We’d better do something about it, you can’t stay here forever. We’ll
go see Steve. He’s a lawyer and I could do with a bit of legal advice. It says
on his website that the first hour is free.” She looked at her watch. “We’d
better hurry up, his office closes soon.”

“What
are you going to say about me?” Jacob asked.

Grace
sighed. She stood up and said, “I’ll think of something on the way there. Come
on, we’ve got a bus to catch.”

Jacob’s
face lit up. “Do buses fly?”