Forty-Four Box Set, Books 1-10 (44) (89 page)

I heard the doors open and the sounds of people shuffling in. I peeked out a few times to see how David was doing. He was up to his usual behavior, a little work mixed in with a lot of talking. I smiled. Wherever he went, there he was.

He came in a few times during our shift to say hello. He made fun of the mesh on my head and whispered that my spaghetti sucked.

“Someone needs to go back to cooking class, Abby Craig,” he said, clearing his throat.

He buzzed back out before I could answer.

Unlike David, I stayed busy and it made the time go by quickly. I was surprised when the women started cleaning up and putting things away.

Angie had been right. By the end of the evening I felt good. I was glad that Mike had signed us up. David handed me my jacket and we said goodbye.

“Thank you for coming, guys,” Angie said. “We really appreciate it. They do too. See you next time.”

“I’m beat,” David said as we walked outside. “No way do we work that hard at Back Street.”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. “And I’m pretty sure you don’t either.”

“Ouch, Abby Craig, sizzle, burn. Why all the hostility? Did something hairy and nasty crawl under that fabulous little number you were wearing on your head?”

I swung at him and he stepped right into it, causing me to hit him harder than I had intended.

“Ouch!” he said. “Double ouch. No, triple. Ouchy, ouchy, ouchy. Help! I’m being assaulted. Help!”

I reached up and put my hand over his mouth. We both started laughing and it wasn’t long before he was in the throes of that familiar wheeze.

I was glad he was feeling better. I could see the energy dancing around him, quite the change from just a few hours earlier.

“C’mon, let’s go get some pints at McMenamins to celebrate.”

“We’re celebrating our first night of helping the needy with a beer at a pub?” I said.

He laughed again.

“Of course, Abby Craig. I have my needs too. I need a beer. Plus, we live in the Beer Capital of the World. Where else would we go to celebrate?”

I shook my head, but didn’t say no.

“It’s a date then,” he said, hooking my arm and turning me in the direction of McMenamins.

“Okay, for reals now,” he said, skipping now. “What we’re really celebrating is that I got a call while we were in there. They want me to audition again! I made it to the second round, Abby Craig! Don’t pinch me, you’ve inflicted enough damage to my poor body tonight, but it’s like I’m dreaming!”

CHAPTER 15

It was too cold for David to sit outside in the back, even with the fires going in the pits, so we sat at a table in the corner of the main room. It was crowded.

“Yuck,” David said, scrunching his face as he looked over the menu. “I forgot that I don’t like their appetizers here at all.”

“Let’s go with the chips and salsa,” I said. “I don’t think they can mess that up too bad, right?”

“Yeah. Okay. I probably won’t be able to taste anything anyway. Not with the smell of that spaghetti still in my nostrils. Am I still walking around with it?”

He stuck out his shirt sleeve for me to sniff.

“No,” I lied.

When the waitress brought our order, I lifted my glass.

“To Detective Slocum.”

“Let’s hope so,” David said, chugging back half the glass.

We drank and ate as David talked about the role and some new details he was going to add to the character in the next audition.

“Do you know how many others were called back?” I said.

“I think it’s a pretty small group compared with the original number they started with. Maybe a dozen.”

He let out a long breath.

“It’s hard, isn’t it? Going after a dream,” he said. “Not as easy as they make out.”

I sat back and let his words sink in for a moment. And then a thought occurred to me. I didn’t really have any dreams. None that I was going after anyway. I seemed to be living life day to day, week to week, not much more beyond that. Working, getting my paycheck, playing soccer. Running. Trying to sleep.

“What are you thinking about, Abby Craig? You have the oddest expression on that delicious face.”

“Just that I used to feel that way, you know about soccer. I had dreams. But I don’t anymore. It’s kind of weird, that’s all.”

He drank some more beer.

“I think with everything that you’ve been through, your dream must be to get through a day without having one of your episodes. I think that’s good enough right now. Maybe when things settle down, you’ll think of something. I’m sure you don’t want to stay at Back Street forever, right?”

“No,” I said. “But I still don’t know what I want to do.”

“You’re young,” he said. “You still have years to figure that one out.”

“But you’ve always known, right? That you wanted to be an actor.”

“I have,” David said. “But I just hope it’s not a pipe dream. Like some poor stupid salmon swimming upstream with almost no chance of making it back home. There are like a million others like me out there and thousands of really good ones. Look, I’m working at a coffee house to pay the bills.”

“Not for long,” I said.

He smiled, the beer beginning to dance in his eyes.

“So what’d you think about tonight?” he said. “I thought it was kind of nice. And kind of sad.”

“Yeah, it was good,” I said. “It sure makes you think about things. All those people, not having enough money to eat. It’s crazy.”

“Don’t get me started,” he said, starting. “It just makes you wonder about the nature of progress. Technology never stops. We find better and better ways to kill people. But our hearts, Abby Craig… Our hearts are still 10 sizes too small.”

I let him continue.

“I feel the sorriest for the older kids. A lot of the little ones are too young to understand. But those damn teenage years are hard enough without having to go through this on top of it.”

David finished his beer and ordered another.

“It’s so weird, isn’t it?” he went on. “The different lives everybody leads. Those houses up on Awbrey Butte are not that far away. You know, some of them are still priced at more than a million dollars. And those swanky condos are just down the street.”

I remembered when they were built.

“They must be nice,” I said.

“Nice doesn’t begin to cover it. When I get my first movie deal, I’m buying one just for when I come back and visit you bitches in Bend.”

“Have you been in one of them?”

“Well, no. But my old boy toy Eduardo used to go out with a guy who lived upstairs. He said it was something. All granite countertops with a great view of the city. And marble floors, Abby Craig. Marble floors.”

I looked at my watch. Somehow it had gotten to be almost 10. I checked my phone and saw that I had missed a call from Ty. I listened to the message. He said he had just called to say hi. Listening to his voice reminded me how much I missed him.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and threw the phone down on the table.

“Rhymes with
bye
?” David said, looking at me.

“I didn’t know you were a poet too?” I said, trying to regain my composure.

“I can relate. Hey, can you flag down the waitress? I need another.”

“Only if you promise to walk home,” I said.

“Promise, Mom. Or I’ll just stay here until I’m sober.”

“That might not be till next week,” I said.

“Abby Craig, get me that waitress and stop worrying so much otherwise it’s going to be a long night. Besides, I called some of my theater pals. They’re coming over to meet up with us. I think this night is just beginning.”

He ordered his beer. I was done. I had finished most of my one and only Ruby without any complaints from my liver. I figured I’d quit while I was ahead.

I started to say goodnight and then stopped.

I noticed someone I knew over in the corner. She was standing still and quiet, waiting for me.

The ghost.

CHAPTER 16

I dug my fingernails into the wooden armrests.

She looked like she had that night in the middle of the road. She was wearing a track suit. The same hair, the same thin, dark lips set off against the pale skin, the same circles around the eyes, the orbs set far back in the skull.

She was looking right at me with that same awful stare.

The people standing around her at the bar didn’t see her. I thought about pointing her out to David but remembered how that had ended the first time. All I could do was stare back at her.

And then she suddenly started to move, walking slowly, never taking those terrible eyes off mine. I fought the sick feeling bubbling up inside me. I had to find out what she wanted.

“Okay,” I said to David, still looking at the ghost. “I’m gonna call it a night. I’m beat.”

He shot up out of his chair and kissed me, giddy and giggling, the happiest I’d seen him since the drive back from Portland.

“See you tomorrow, right?” he said. “I think we’re working together for a few hours in the afternoon.”

“Yeah,” I said, putting on my coat and grabbing my bag. “See you then.”

She headed for the door and I followed.

She went up Bond and then turned on Minnesota. She walked past a wine shop and down an alley. It was lined by brick buildings.

This was the place in the visions. The alley that had felt familiar but that I hadn’t been able to place.

She stopped and turned, looking at me with those eyes. A terrible coldness spread out from her.

And I saw it for the first time, right before she faded into the bricks, disappearing completely.

Her throat.

The gash in her throat and the thick stream of black blood running down her neck.

CHAPTER 17

“I’ve got to figure this out,” I said after I told Kate about following the ghost to the alley. “I mean, I’m pretty sure she was murdered. She had this wound across her neck. But I suppose she could have been in some sort of accident too. Do you know if there have been any murders in that alley?”

“No, I can’t think of any.”

I had already done a quick internet search and come up with the same results.

“I can look into it tomorrow,” Kate said, sounding tired. “Maybe it happened a long time ago.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But judging from the way she was dressed it seems recent.”

I took a soda from the refrigerator, cracked it open, and drank most of it in one gulp. The adrenaline rush had left me thirsty.

“Abby, let’s go sit down in the living room,” Kate said. “I was just about to make a pot of tea. Would, uh, would you like some?”

She seemed preoccupied.

“Yeah,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”

I grabbed my bag and headed to my bedroom, washed my face, and changed. When I came back out, Kate was sitting on the sofa, two mugs of hot tea on the coffee table. I sat down.

She was quiet.

“Oh, Kate. I almost forgot. David got called back. He just found out tonight.”

“That’s great news,” she said, her voice flat.

She was probably upset about the ghost and what it could mean.

“So how was it tonight, the soup kitchen?” she said.

With everything that had happened, I had almost forgotten. I gave her a quick recap.

I threw a blanket over my legs and laughed suddenly when I remembered what David had said about
Murder, She Wrote
. I told Kate about the afghan joke he had made. She didn’t find it as amusing.

She stood up.

“I’m going to top off my cup. Want anymore?”

“No, thanks,” I said. “You feeling okay?”

“Yeah. I got it at Whole Foods last week. It’s a vanilla chai.”

She wasn’t listening. Maybe she was just tired.

I went back to thinking about the ghost and then noticed the new vase on the coffee table, full of fresh flowers. I got up and looked around. The anger started surging inside me.

When Kate returned, I was quiet.

“You want to watch some TV?” she said.

“No, whatever
you
want. That’s how things work around here, right?”

“What are you talking about?”

I didn’t answer, looking away.

“Well, I guess I’ll go watch in bed,” she said, getting up. “Maybe you should think about getting some rest too.”

“Stop telling me what to do, Kate,” I said, my voice quivering with rage. “Where are the cans?!”

“The what?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. The old can vases that Ty brought us. The ones he made for us. What did you do with them?”

Kate took a deep breath.

“I just put them in the garage, Abby. But if you want, we can bring them back in.”

“Well, you should have asked me first. They were mine too, you know.”

I could feel the tears rolling down my cheeks as I stared at the black TV screen. I brushed them away with the back of my hand.

“You’re right,” Kate said. “I’m sorry. I should have asked. To be honest, when I looked at them, they just made me mad. I couldn’t take it anymore. But that was wrong. They were yours.”

I sighed and then nodded.

“I’ll bring them back inside. I guess I didn’t assess it right. I thought getting them out of the house would help you in a way. I figured that it hurt for you to see them all the time as well. That they reminded you of him.”

“We haven’t officially broken up or anything, you know,” I said, still angry.

“I know,” she said.

“So why does everyone seem to think that we have?”

“I don’t know. It just seems like...”

“Stop it, Kate!” I said. “It’s not your business. Just bring in the stupid cans, okay? I’ll get rid of them when I’m ready to get rid of them. Not before and not because everyone took a vote and decided my life for me. I’ll take care of it. Keep your hands off my things.”

I stomped off down the hallway and slammed my bedroom door as hard as I could.

I threw myself on the bed, sobbing like a stupid high school girl with a broken heart.

CHAPTER 18