Eyes to the Soul (2 page)

“The different men’s aftershave that clings to you. Men usually stick to one kind. And you’re often surrounded by different ones.”

“Damn, really?” His voice full of chagrin as he said, “I shower every day.”

“Yeah. Those goodbye kisses must be dynamite.”

Jacob’s lusty laughter rolled through the almost empty music hall. “Oh, they are – they are.”

“Besides,” she added because she couldn’t resist. “Your voice also deepens when you’re around an attractive male.”

“Oh no.” Bashfulness colored his voice. “I had no idea.”

“Most people wouldn’t notice,” she reassured him. “But my senses are sharper than most people’s.”

“Ugh,” Jacob grumbled. “Still, it’s a little unnerving to consider anyone being able to notice such mannerisms.”

A heavier footstep walked toward them. Jacob leaned closer and whispered, “You won’t tell anyone, will you?”

“I haven’t yet.” She reached out a hand and patted his shoulder, hitting him somewhere around the collarbone. “The world is a little more accepting now…”

“But the music world is very small. And not that accepting.”

“I won’t say anything,” she promised. “Of course, my silence might require a drink to seal it.”

“Blackmailing me, are you?” His voice was overly hearty as Bruce walked over.

“What’s she blackmailing you for?” Bruce asked. “Maybe I can get in on this deal.”

Celina’s laugh tinkled freely across the spacious room. “Go find your own deal to make. This one is mine.” With that she walked toward the exit.

“Wait for us,” Jacob called out, the clipped sound of his footsteps echoing as he raced to catch up.

She put out a hand to grab the large square handle on the big double doors when Jacob said, “I’ve got it.” The heavy door whooshed open. Cooler air hit her in the face as she walked through the small entrance room to the exit. She waited, a small smile on her face, for Jacob to open the exterior door for her.

The fresh air rushed to greet her. She tilted her face slightly into the breeze, loving the wash of coolness. Portland street sounds and smells greeted her. Gasoline. Car engines, people joking and laughing. The hum of an everyday evening.

She tilted her head, straining her senses, searching for something, anything other than what was on the surface. A habit she couldn’t break since her accident.

And found nothing. Thank heavens. She had no idea what she’d do if she ever did – it hadn’t happened yet.

“Are you all right?”

She started, then relaxed. “I’m fine. It looks like a beautiful night out.”

“It is, but how you could know that I’ll never understand.”

With a smirk his way she stepped out into the night.

*

The bar was
hopping. Celina didn’t need to get any closer than the curb to hear the music flowing out of the pub in front of her. Lights flashed and bounded behind her eyelids as she faced the building. “Surely they don’t have an old disco ball in there, do they?” She laughed as the colors flashed her way again.

Jacob approached from the right, his steps tired, heavier on the weaker left leg, his laughter bright regardless of his obvious fatigue. Excited. Almost too excited. She tucked that away inside.

“They do indeed. This place hops all the time. Come on, let’s go find the others.” Jacob grasped her elbow gently and tugged her toward the noise. She couldn’t explain the instinct to pull back. Jacob’s touch? Or the destination? She’d been to many a pub over the years and several of those same ones since her accident and subsequent eye surgery.

At this time of night the pub was loud, as in it was possibly too much of a good thing. She’d prefer a glass of white wine in the corner by a fireplace listening to live music. This felt like tequila shots being egged on by everyone in the room.

She sighed inwardly. She only had to stay for one drink, and hers wouldn’t be a shot of anything. She’d have a Baileys and coffee if she could. Although caffeine wasn’t the best thing at this time of night either.

“Just one drink, then I’ll take you home.” Jacob said quietly from her side, as if understanding her reticence.

“And I’m going to hold you to that,” she muttered as Bruce opened the door and she was hit by the full blast of music and people spilling into the entranceway. Jacob tightened his grip on her arm and half-led, half-dragged her forward through the ruckus.

“Celina’s here!”

A cry went up to her left as Jacob nudged her into the large group.

The fun was infectious, loud – and, as it included her, irresistible. She was grabbed and hugged, her cheeks bussed as people talked to her, over her and around her.

She recognized most of the people by their voices, some by their hugs and others that just felt the need to keep a hand on her.

That was another thing she didn’t understand. Once she became blind, so many people seemed to feel that her ability to recognize them would be enhanced by physical contact – at least she assumed that was the cause. They were right, but not in any way that they’d understand. With her eyes closed and her sight gone, she couldn’t see the bright colors that filled the pub. They were still there, she knew – she’d seen enough of them over the last several decades – and to a certain extent she still saw a pale ghost of them now.

The bright colors were one of the things she missed most about not being able to see. The vibrant, moving ribbons of sound – especially when she played. They used to fill her eyes with tears; then she realized that she was the only one who could see them. It was such a disappointment to have lost the brilliance of those colors with the loss of her eyesight. That she could see them at all now was wonderful, but… it wasn’t the same. She’d thought of herself as both a musician and an artist, controlling the colors as they danced to the notes she played. She made artistic creations in the air while her music was art for the ears.

It hadn’t taken her long to accept that the visual art was a gift even if she was the only one who could see it – and was still a gift in faded form.

And with so few gifts in her life, she’d been happy to have what little there were. Although she’d had a few low spots in her life, she’d also been blessed.

She needed to remember that.

“What took you guys so long?” Cindy asked beside her. Cindy played a wicked trombone and couldn’t sing a note, much to her chagrin.

“Just cleaning up behind you,” Bruce teased. “Everyone raced out so fast no one took the time to clean up.”

“Ah, well. What would we do without you?” Cindy moved something that tinkled – ice in a tall glass – past Celina. “Here, the first drink is on me as thanks!”

Jacob laughed. “Well, in that case…” He took a long drink. Celina could hear him swallowing. He was that close to her.

“Celina, what will you have?”

She started at Cindy’s question, the word
nothing
on the tip of her tongue. Bruce spoke up before she could and said, “She’d like a glass of white wine.”

“I do, do I? Maybe I want something else,” she said. The instant spark of anger felt odd inside. She didn’t want to be here and really didn’t want people answering questions for her – even if they were decent answers.

What was wrong with her today? She shouldn’t be so waspish. He was only trying to make it easy on her. Like everyone tried to make everything easy on her. There was just no making this…easy.

I can make it easy. Just let me see.

No. Never.

I can do it without you, but it would be more fun with you.

No. Killing people is not fun.

Oh, it so is.

That dry dusty chuckle reverberated inside her head. She trembled.

Especially when no one knows who I am,
the nasty voice whispered.
Or what I can do.

I don’t even know what you can do. I don’t want to know
, she cried silently in her mind. How had her life come to this?

That’s easy. You wanted me here You wanted to have your eyesight back – so I stepped in to help you
.

No. No
. She shook her head.

Oh yes. See, you still don’t believe me. Or understand why. That’s funny. I’m so going to enjoy your reaction when you do find out about me.
He laughed.
Maybe a little proof is needed.

What? No.
She shook her head, not caring if other people stared at her strangely. She knew she’d become odd this last year, but who could blame her? She’d lost her fiancé a year ago from an aneurysm. She’d been involved in a serious car accident three weeks later. And it had been bad enough she’d ended up with several busted ribs and a head injury, with her eyesight compromised by the trauma that even surgery hadn’t been able to fix. Then to top it all off, she had somehow collected a vengeful ghost. One who wanted her to believe he could do so much.

She was being haunted. If such a thing were possible.

No proof. Please,
she whispered in her head.
I believe you.

No. I don’t think you do. So give me a moment. I’ve been planning something like this for a while. It’s the perfect time. This way you’ll know for sure.

The weird blackness left her mind. Thank heavens. She needed help. Someone who could understand what she was going through. But it wasn’t exactly something she could go to a doctor for. And a psychologist would have a heyday inside her head. Weren’t there enough people in there already?

Bruce lifted his glass beside her, the ice smaller, softer, clinking softly along the glass. “Another. I want a couple of tequila shooters,” he cried. His suggestions brought on screams for shooters.

Celina sank back into the booth beside Jacob. She wanted to leave. She didn’t know what kind of proof this evil thing inside of her was going to offer, but she wanted no part of it.

“Are you okay, Celina? You look ill.”

“I’m not feeling well. Please, I know I haven’t finished my wine.” In fact, she hadn’t touched it. “But I’d really like to go home.”

Cheers broke out beside her. Instinctively she turned. “What are they doing now?” she asked.

“Just tequila shots.” The tone of his voice sounded slightly odd. She stilled, her mind racing to turn the suspicions and fear squeezing her chest into something calming. She had to get out of here. Now. Urgency had her lurching to her feet. She struggled to find the entrance to the pub. She stumbled into one person and bounced off another. “Sorry,” she said. “Sorry, I’m sorry. I’m just trying to get some fresh air.”

“Celina, wait.”

But she couldn’t. An inner drive propelled her forward to the entranceway, only she was jostled from one side to the other with no room for her walking stick. And the entranceway was no longer where it should have been. She hit a wall. Hands out, she scrambled back as far as she could down that wall.

Under all the loud music and laughing a roar built. No one appeared to notice. She tilted her head, listening as the sound rapidly grew.

In the background, as if in a movie on slow motion, she heard the first screams. Then more.

Then the sound of a huge roar. A crash. Panicked cries. Glass shattering, sprinkling down on everything and everyone.

Finally silence. The horrible, deafening silence.

Celina waited, shock, fear, terror holding her locked in place. She couldn’t see. She could only hear. She bowed her head. Fatalistically, she turned ever so slowly to stare blindly at the blank chaos in front of her. She could only imagine the scene.

A woman screamed. And screamed. A man groaned. Then another one off to the side started to cry.

“Help me,” a woman whispered close to Celina. “Please help me.”

Celina reached out a hand in her general direction and was jerked forward as the woman clutched at her and tried to pull. “I’m here. But I don’t know what happened.”

“I don’t know.” The woman started to sob. “Help me, please. I’m hurt.”

Instinctively Celina crouched at the injured woman’s side, patting her hand gently. There wasn’t much she could say, but she knew comforting sounds were coming from her mouth.

People moved slowly amidst the cries of pain and the weeping. Something dreadful had happened but she had no idea what could have taken place.

A man in front and off to the left of her said, “A large truck drove into the front of the pub. He’s halfway inside the damn room. He’s hit dozens and probably killed half of those.”

Oh no.
Her heart seized as she turned to face the chaos. “Jacob? Bruce? Are you okay?”

There was no answer.

“Jacob!” she screamed. “Where are you?”

She couldn’t hear any response over the building noise as people cried out for help and still others wept for their friends and family.

She tried to control her panic.
Oh God. No. Please, not my friends.

She didn’t dare try to find them in the mess. She gazed in the direction of the injured woman, her hand gently patting her on the shoulder. She’d never felt so helpless. How had this just happened? And why? And did the predator have anything to do with it? Her heart pounded in her chest and she could barely breathe. And that’s when she heard something else.