Another One Bites the Dust Read online

  She cracked a window, and I floated through the gap, then heard it close behind me.

  I avoided the gaggle of ghosts who’d flocked by the sidewalk while I conjured a travel tunnel. As it popped into existence, looking like the inside of an artery, I saluted my comrades.

  “Show’s over for now, buds.”

  I shot through the air on a current of electric speed, then heaved out of the tunnel in front of my intended destination.

  Wendy and Gavin Edgett’s new condo.

  2

  I whisked to the back of the luxury condo until I came to a small hydrangea-filled courtyard with a running fountain and Italian stone tile. There, as sunlight glistened off Wendy’s second-story window above, I found three ghosts hanging out.

  Thank God they weren’t the lookiloo kind, either.

  After I said hey to them, two of them perked up.

  “Jen!”

  Scott, a fifties teen who wore rolled-up jeans, a flannel shirt over a T-shirt, and slicked dark hair, was sitting with Louis, a black man who eternally wore the World War II–era aircraft factory uniform he’d died in. They were both on an air-conditioning unit and, as the machine worked, the vibrations shuddered their grayish shapes.

  There was one more ghost here, too, lounging on the stucco wall that divided the courtyard from beds of flowers, a walking lane, and a statue garden.

  Twyla rolled her eyes to greet me, and I ignored her right back. Except it was pretty hard, what, with the way she looked and all. What a total freak, and I mean it: half Robert Smith from The Cure with creepy dark lipstick and teased, inky hair, half Cyndi Lauper with lighter wild hair on the other side. She was all corset, petticoats, fishnet stockings, and Madonna bracelets everywhere else, though.

  Basically, she was everything that I’d made fun of while living in the eighties as a SoCal beach girl. Twyla had perished while experimenting with her look, comparing her Goth dye and makeup to her Lauper side when the cord of the hairdryer she’d been using had gone into a full sink of water. So she was doomed to a split fashion personality as long as she roamed the earthly plane. Bummer.

  But she was lucky in one way. All of us were, because for some reason no ghost had figured out, we’d been spared having to deal with our death marks, so Twyla hadn’t come out of her demise all fried up. I was especially grateful for my circumstances. I mean, it’s bad enough having to traipse around for the rest of my existence in some clothes I’d just thrown on that night to hang out with my friends. But according to the little I remembered about my murder, I’d had an ax taken to me by a maniac in the woods wearing a shriveled granny mask.

  I know. I might’ve been in Jensen pieces right now if we existed in our death states. Thank God I had erected what Amanda Lee thought was a “fright wall” to spare myself the horrific memories of my murder, too—even the flashes I occasionally had of it were so awful that I wasn’t surprised I’d gone into a numbing time loop.

  But as more weeks passed, the more I realized I could handle knowing how I’d died if I could only recall who’d done it.

  You wouldn’t ever get justice on someone you couldn’t remember, right?

  “How’s Wendy?” I asked Scott, who was here because he’d volunteered to look after her while I concentrated on Amanda Lee. Most of my ghost friends were on the same shifts, just to help me out.

  “She’s copacetic.” Scott drew his leg up on the air conditioner, bending it and leaning an elbow on his knee. “I know she can see me peeking in her window every so often, but she still refuses to give me a high sign.”

  Wendy was even more sensitive than Amanda Lee when it came to seeing ghosts. I wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing.

  Glancing up at the second floor, Louis said, “That’s because she’s still put out with you for being a part of the worst night of her life.”

  “Gawd,” Twyla said. “I don’t know what little precious expected us to do. Wave a magic wand and make her sister innocent?”

  As always, Twyla was the height of compassion. Ignore, ignore, ignore.

  “And Gavin?” I asked, trying not to let my energy go bzzzt. Sometimes that happened when I said his name, just like in life, when you’d see or think of any hunky guy. But Gavin was more complex than that. I guess being harassed by a ghost will make anyone complicated and more brooding than usual.

  Louis traded a glance with Scott, then said, “He’s still working from home, designing those video games, drawing on his draft board . . .”

  Scott cleared his throat, bringing Louis to a stop. From somewhere down the path over the wall, a dog barked at the sounds of us chatting.

  Twyla gagged. “Listen to you lame-os. So sweet, beating around the bush and not telling Jen-Jen that Gavin added more pictures of her on his walls. Not very flattering ones, either.” She turned to me. “You look like a hellbitch now.”

  “Oh.”

  It was true that Gavin had gotten a look at me, not only in some vague pictures Wendy had taken while I was haunting their house, but in his dreams, when I had gone into his sleeping body and straight to his opened psyche. I’d kind of liked how he used to draw me as an angelic image. Now I was a hellbitch though?

  “Aw,” Twyla said. “Jen is sad.”

  Scott held back a grin but Louis’ tone got stern. “Knock it off, Twyla. There’s no need for you to be here, anyway.”

  “And you? Why’re you here?”

  I spoke up. “He’s taking over for Scott soon.”

  How else would interactive, intelligent ghosts like us fill the time except for activities like this? We still had personalities and the ability to reason, unlike the sad sacks we knew as noninteractives—the kind who were in time loops or residual hauntings like I’d been. Even anonymous ghosts, who were intelligent but still too afraid to engage with their surroundings, needed stimulation to keep from going back into time loop/imprint mode.

  The sound of a barking dog grew louder, and I floated up so I could see over the wall Twyla was sitting on.

  A poodle had gotten loose from its owner, who was running after it on the flowered path. By now, the dog was at the foot of the wall, yapping its head off at Twyla.

  “See,” Scott said. “Dogs are even annoyed by you.”

  “They’re, like, generally annoyed by all of us.” With a tight grin, Twyla made a gesture, manipulating the energy in the air so that the leash lifted seemingly on its own, then guided the dog away from the wall.

  It yelped while its owner froze on the path, her mouth agape as she watched her pet being pulled toward her with the leash raised.

  Twyla flicked her wrist, and the leash dropped just before the dog got to its person.

  Told you—bored ghosts like to prank, and it could be anytime, anywhere, thanks to the fact that we weren’t stuck in the places we’d died. If that was the case, then Scott would still be at the site of the old diner where he’d choked on a chicken bone while on a date with his high school girlfriend. Louis would be wandering the stretch of road where he’d driven into a ditch one dark night, tired from his shift at the factory. I’d still be in Elfin Forest at my own death spot.

  But here’s the thing: The farther away we travel from our location of death, the weaker we get. We can always charge up with an electrical source, though, or feed on the fear from someone who’s scared. It’s just that some of us don’t like to stay in one place because we’ve got things to do, people to see. We can also relocate for a change of scenery, getting our jollies that way, because one of the worst things that can happen to a ghost is boredom.

  Twyla let out a dramatic sigh, standing on the wall. Or seeming to stand on it, since her ankle boots hovered about an inch above the stucco. She stretched her arms, like she’d finished a tough job and was proud of herself for terrorizing a poodle.

  Whatever. I addressed the guys. “Today was interesting.”

  I could feel the sparks of intrigue from them. Scott and Louis even buzzed.

  “Do tell,” Twyla s
aid.

  “A student from SDSU,” I said, “came to Amanda Lee about helping a friend.”

  “So?”

  “Well, her name’s Heidi, and she thinks this friend is going to get hurt or killed someday by a guy she’s living with. Heidi wants Amanda Lee to psychically see if she’s wrong about him. And she wants me to go into him to find the truth, too.”

  Louis stood from the air conditioner. “How did she know about you?”

  I pointed toward the second-story window. Wendy.

  I told them the rest: how Wendy and Heidi had met online and become friends, how Wendy had told her that Amanda Lee and I owed her.

  Twyla arced down from the wall in a bell of petticoats. “What fun! When do we start?”

  “We don’t start,” I said. “I’m going to look into this soon enough. It might not amount to anything that’d keep your attention.”

  Twyla tapped a finger against her darkened lips, then said, “True. Besides, it’s Saturday, and there’ll be parties all over the place, and you know I never miss a chance to, like, mess with drunk-asses. I love the looks they get on their faces when their cups just happen to flip out of their hands and spill beer all over their tight, hard-body man chests.”

  Simple tastes for simple minds, I guess.

  “If you need any help,” Louis said to me, “you remember to give a holler.”

  Scott was idly making the courtyard light flick on and off. When he saw that it was irritating Louis, he stopped and sent his elder a sheepish grin. “Yeah, man. I’ll help, too, Jen.”

  “You could start by going to Amanda Lee’s place and hanging out there until she leaves the house.” They’d also been dropping by there, on the lookout for that dark spirit. “I’m meeting her soon to get rolling on Heidi’s request.”

  “Done,” Scott said.

  Twyla stroll-floated to me. “Aren’t you just all over the place, being a helper? Busiest ghost ever.”

  “I suppose it’s the Mello Yello in me.” I’d died with a few cans of it my system since I’d been the designated driver at that forest party where everyone else had been wasted before I’d wandered off to pee and never come back. Who knew why the caffeine had carried over into the afterlife, yet there were no ax cuts on me and no blood marks on my death spot?

  But maybe the Mello Yello was the reason I didn’t sink into boredom as easily as most older ghosts. More important, that time loop in Elfin Forest had been enough of an anesthetic limbo for me, and I wasn’t about to slide back into one if I got no stimulation.

  “So this boyfriend you’re ‘investigating’ . . .” Twyla said, using finger quotes.

  “Don’t mock what she’s doing,” Louis said. “She’s accomplishing some good, which is more than I can say for you most times.”

  “Yes, Daddy.” More eye rolling from Twyla. “But I’m only making a point, remembering life and how I had a boyfriend once who liked to fight.”

  “Did he get violent?” I asked.

  “Not in that way.” She waggled her eyebrows. “But what if Heidi Ho is totally misinterpreting what’s between her friend and her boyfriend? What if they like it rough, and Heidi just doesn’t get that? Know what I mean?”

  “I’m not sure I do, Twyla.”

  “You’ve had boyfriends, Jen. Didn’t you ever—”

  I cut her off with a raised hand. I’d had one serious boyfriend before I’d died, and he’d never raised his voice to me. That doesn’t mean he hadn’t broken me in other ways, after he’d left me to go to school across the U.S. Hard times had followed; Dean hadn’t been there when my parents had died in a boating accident, hadn’t been there when I’d dropped out of college and, really, life itself while I toked and partied too much instead.

  The only time Dean had come back was recently, when an entity pretending to be him had tried to fool me into staying in this weird star place that’d turned out to be another limbo of sorts. I called him fake Dean, and I hoped to hell I’d never have to see him again. Since he hadn’t shown up for a while, I was pretty sure he’d lost interest in me, anyway.

  “Oh,” said Twyla, batting her eyelashes at me. “I’ve insulted Jen. Like, gross me out! Barf-o-rama! Rough sex sucks! It should never, ever be mentioned in mixed company.”

  Louis lifted his chin, above all this.

  “We’ll see what’s what with Heidi’s friend soon enough,” I said to Twyla. “Meanwhile, once again, you’re ragingly out of line.”

  “And you’re such a mega prude.” She waved her hand and a travel tunnel appeared above the stucco wall, its innards pink and electric, beating with energy. “Bored now. Later, puritans.”

  She took a floating run toward the mouth of the tunnel, diving into it. The opening closed behind her with a swishing sound, leaving air.

  Louis clicked his tongue. “Why does she always have to be contrary?”

  “Because she was a brat when she died and she never grew out of it.” Sometimes I couldn’t believe that she was only four years younger than I was in human time. I wasn’t exactly a paragon of maturity myself, but Twyla was something else.

  I rose toward Wendy’s window, leaving Louis and Scott below.

  Scott called, “She’s not going to give you the time of day.”

  Not even after she’d sent Heidi our way?

  I wanted to find out for myself, but I wouldn’t bother Wendy if she wasn’t ready to face me. Facing me meant she was prepared to deal with the bloodcurdling anguish of the night her sister had gone off the deep end, and that wasn’t something that could be forced.

  As I peered inside the condo, I was glad to see Wendy had left the curtains all the way open, even though the window itself was shut. Most days and nights, she blocked out us ghosts altogether. She’d never chased us off, though, so that told me she was just as wary of that dark spirit that’d come through her old mansion’s portal as I was.

  Melancholy music seeped through the windowpanes as I saw Wendy lying on her canopied bed, staring at the ceiling, her hands clasped over her chest. Her long black hair still had that artistic pink streak running down one side, and she was wearing a long black shirt as a minidress with black-and-white-striped knee socks. She didn’t look a thing like Gavin, because she’d been adopted from China years ago.

  I tried not to think about where he was in the condo as I gazed at frail Wendy, unable to feel the windowpane as I rested my hand there.

  I thought I saw her head turn slightly before she closed her eyes, totally shutting me out.

  Ghosts aren’t supposed to have hearts, so maybe what I felt was a phantom pain in my chest at being rejected. Didn’t she understand that I’d only been trying to bring a killer to justice? It’d turned out to be her adopted sister, yeah, but come on—I wasn’t the one who’d chosen who Elizabeth Dalton’s murderer would be.

  Behind me, I heard a travel tunnel pop open, then close. Probably Scott going to Amanda Lee. The clock tower chimes from a nearby shopping center rang out twelve o’clock. Still, I remained at that window.

  Wendy must’ve fallen asleep during that time. I suspected that she was in a battle of wills with me, refusing to look at me or move from the bed, forcing herself to succumb to a nap instead. Stubborn girl.

  But I could be just as bullheaded, and if it wasn’t for my promise to be at Tim Knudson’s house by three to meet Amanda Lee, I would’ve stayed all damned day.

  My persistence did pay off slightly, though, because just as I was getting terribly restless, Wendy’s bedroom door eased open.

  If I had breath to hold, it’d have been held right then and there as Gavin walked into the room. He wasn’t sensitive like Wendy, so he wouldn’t be able to see me watching him, my hand against the glass again, as if that was the closest I’d ever get to him.

  He was the type of handsome that had a million rough edges to it, with pale blue eyes that looked like they had a tough story for every splinter in his irises. His hair was light brown, cut close to his scalp, because he had other things
to worry about than his appearance. His shoulders were broad, a little hunched these days, like a boxer in a ring who didn’t have a way out. But his lips . . . They were the softest part of him, shaped like a bow. I’d seen them up close when I’d haunted him.

  There was something about Gavin Edgett, a life force that made me quiver. A quality that no other human seemed to have but him.

  I didn’t realize that Louis was still here until he breezed up to my side. His body buzzed as he watched, too.

  “Good thing they still have each other,” he said.

  “At least there’s that, right?”

  “You did your best for them both.” Louis put a hand on my shoulder, but it passed through with a cold fzzzt. “And you’ll do your best when you help Heidi with her problem.”

  “I’m just happy there’s not a murder to solve this time.”

  “Not yet, anyway, according to her.”

  I smiled slightly at Louis, then, compelled, turned back to look at Gavin.

  Soon, he left the room, and shortly after, I heard the electronic drag of a garage door opening below, at the front of the condo.

  I started to fly away, but Louis stopped me.

  “Where’re you off to, Miss . . . Jensen?”

  I hated when he tried to address me with the Miss.” I knew things had been different for black people back in the forties when he’d been alive, but I’d grown up long after that, and it seemed all kinds of wrong, especially since Louis had been educated. The whole Miss thing was demeaning for him.

  “I thought I’d . . .”

  “Tell me you won’t be following Gavin around.”

  What to say? That’s exactly what I’d been aching to do. And I’d gone through with the temptation during this past month a few times, even though Gavin had rarely left the condo for anything but grocery shopping and necessities.

  “He’s on his way to recovery now,” Louis said. “And as soon as we can take care of that dark spirit, we’re going to leave these people alone.”

  “That time hasn’t come yet. What if the spirit—?”

  “Goes after Gavin when he’s outside? I know that Mr. Edgett carries a crucifix and holy water on him, thanks to that cleaner who chased some of the bad energy out of their old mansion. He’s a believer now.”