Grave Refrain: A Love/Ghost Story (31 page)

“Ra-ther,” Andrew answered, grinning like a cat.

“Theft? Does anyone recall the word theft? Three to five and out in two for good behavior?” Simon said, trying to get their attention.

“Now all we have to do is get something to transfer her ashes into and something to replace the ashes in her urn,” Emily said, overcome with the spirit of the adventure. “Simon, you run down to the office. There’s got to be a box or container down there. Andrew, I think I saw a potted plant near the piano…can you go grab it?”

Somehow her enthusiasm must have finally rubbed off on the beleaguered drummer, or he had just given up the fight, for he threw up his hands and headed back down the stairs. Andrew gave her a kiss and a roguish smile before taking off after him.

Minutes later he returned. In his hands he held a sad looking potted plant. She glanced down at it with a grin and proceeded to disembowel it, leaving a pot full of dirt and gravel behind.

Simon’s footsteps raced up the stairs and then halted as if he were catching his breath, or biding his time. “How’s this? I found it in a locker in the office,” he announced as he stepped into the moonlight and presented it to Emily with a deadpan expression on his face.

“You have got to be kidding me? No! No, no, no, no!” Dumbfounded, she stared at him and shook her head vehemently, appalled beyond words. “You are not, I repeat not, going to put Nora’s ashes inside—a
bong!”

The glass monstrosity gleamed in the moonlight.

Simon scrutinized what had to have been Dwayne’s bong. “Hey, it’s the only thing down there. Listen, those fine officers just got out of their car, so if you want to get arrested for breaking and entering we can stand around here and chat. Otherwise, dish ’em out darlin’. At least the thing is dry.”

Andrew bit his lip to keep himself from laughing, but she could see a small muscle spasm at the corner of his mouth. This had undoubtedly pushed him over the edge. He looked exhausted and weary and gleeful all at once.

“Oh, Nora, I’m so, so sorry. Please forgive me.” Her eyes rose to heaven. Simon guffawed. “Yeah, laugh it up, big guy, you don’t have to live with her. She’s going to be incensed.”

“Better than being
incense
,” snorted Simon.

“More like she’s going to be plagued with an eternal case of the munchies.” Andrew fell over into a fit. Simon joined in.

“Men…” Emily muttered and opened the urn, praying she didn’t drop a speck.

After she finished transferring Nora to her new, Maui-wowie home, the downstairs door creaked open. The three of them froze, eyes wide like saucers. Simon grabbed the bong and hid it in his jacket, Andrew grabbed Emily’s hand, and they all flattened their backs against the farthest wall.

Agonizing minutes passed while what sounded like two determined police officers prowled around downstairs. Emily stood cramped and frozen between Andrew and Simon, her mouth dry. Suddenly, the rays of a flashlight doused the air around them. They plastered themselves further against the crypts, so hard in fact that the locks stabbed into their backs. Emily’s heart was beating so rapidly she swore her blouse fluttered up and down.

Just then, steps, deliberate and heavy, echoed from the bottom of the staircase. She looked to Andrew in panic. Cool as ice, he merely shook his head and crouched down. His long fingers swept up something from the floor. Like a cat, he crept soundlessly to the edge of the gallery and tossed whatever it was to the floor below.

It rattled along the marble, causing the footsteps to seize and change direction. After several pulse-hammering minutes, two voices muttered in turn, “Fucking rats…Yeah, hate those things.”

Her mouth hung open. “Rats?” she mouthed wordlessly to Andrew.

He nodded. “Near the piano.”

“What?”

He swiftly placed his hand over her mouth.

It seemed like an eternity, but eventually the door shut below, the police evidently satisfied no one had broken in. The sound of their squad car disappeared into the night. Without a second to lose, they quickly replaced Nora’s urn and locked the vault before racing down the staircase.

She took a moment to glance back up to the basilica. Andrew’s eyes followed her gaze; his hand covered hers.

“We’ll always have the Columbarium,” he whispered in her ear, leaving a kiss on her temple, and then yanked her swiftly toward the door.

When the next morning came, it was overcast. At least Emily thought it was overcast, but when she dragged herself out of bed and squinted through the curtains, she realized the morning was night. She had slept through an entire day.

She found Zoey in the dining room wearing a macraméd poncho and leggings, samples of tiles and grout boards scattered over a table cobbled together from a sheet of gypsum board and stacks of magazines.

“She’s awake,” she exclaimed and raced over to give her a hug. Not letting go, Zoey walked with her into the kitchen where Margot, still in her slacks and blouse from work, sat in front of her laptop, sipping what looked like scotch.

She made a few more strikes to the keyboard before eyeing Emily flatly. “I’m glad you’re alive, but you have got to be kidding me.” She nodded toward the fireplace where Nora sat on the mantle. Emily grimaced and sat down, but not before Zoey began to dish her out some dinner from pots still warm on the stove.

“Now, just to clarify. Last night you stole the ashes of the ghost who saved you from that disgusting pig of a professor, and now she’s living in a water bong on our dining room mantle.”

“That’s about it.”

Margot tilted back on her chair and leveled Emily with a withering stare.

“Aren’t you leaving out one itsy bitsy detail? I’m assuming due to the fact that you were pawed over, and he didn’t have any buttons left on his shirt that when he carried you half asleep in the door last night—”

“I love him and he loves me.”

Margot’s chair hit the floor.

“I know it sounds crazy. I know we’ve only known each other a short period of time. I know he’s a musician that lives on the road. I know, I know, I know! But I’ve loved him since I saw him in the park.”

“Park? What park?”

“I went to watch him play his guitar. Every day. He used to play at the end of Haight Street, by Kezar, every day for hours, and I just sat there and watched him. Yes, I stalked the man, good, feminist, intelligent woman that I am. But after the first time I saw him perform, it was just, I can’t explain it. I know it makes no sense.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“It’s even worse than that. Remember that witch shop? I took him there. This stoner pulled us into a corner and read my palm. He says I’m Andrew’s soul mate.”

“Margot,” Zoey uttered. “Did you hear that? They’re soul mates. It’s destiny. Fate.”

“Whatever it is, are you sure?” Margot questioned. “It’s awfully fast.”

Emily ran her nail along the edge of the soapstone island. “Sometimes I wish it were faster. All I know is that I want to be with him. I want to hear him speak and watch him play. I want to kiss him and laugh with him and listen to him sing and see the world by his side, but at the same time, I could just watch him, that’d be enough.”

“But what about him? What about this other girlfriend of his—the one he broke up with?”

What about Andrew? Emily had had so little time to consider his words. He had called her his muse, told her there was no one else, and that there never had been. Only her.
That is the only truth.
But what did that mean?

“God, you’ve got it bad, don’t you.” Margot whistled, scrutinizing her roommate’s face and slowly shutting her laptop. “Promise me one thing.”

“What?”

“These guys…this situation is highly abnormal. They won’t stay here for long, and it’s not just a question of them having to go out on tour. They’ve chosen that lifestyle. It’s addicting, that adulation, that attention. And all those women? Life in any one place is going to become boring pretty fast after what they’ve seen. I know he’s attractive…but what attracts you is the same thing that attracts every woman he meets. He’s charming because it’s helped him succeed. Darwin would have loved him—he adapts to suit his needs incredibly well. You think you know him, you may even think you’re in love with him, but there’s been no time to really get to know him, to know how he will react to fame and pressure. And there won’t be. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“I don’t want you to get hurt, either.”

Margot didn’t respond. Whatever her relationship was with Simon, she was holding her cards close to her chest. Instead, she returned her attention to her laptop, but not before Emily saw a flicker of vulnerability pass through her eyes.

“So what’s up with that box?” Margot waved her hand to the counter where the locked metal tin they had withdrawn from the vault sat. “The guys tried all ways to Sunday to open it today. No luck.”

“They were here? Andrew, Andrew was here?”

“You were out for a long time. He sat on the floor up against your bedroom wall and watched you sleep. Played his guitar. Christian finally got him to sit here and eat dinner—they just left. Oh, and Simon rearranged Margot’s holy card collection. He put Teresa of Avila front and center. He said you’d understand.”

“Oh God,” Emily moaned, envisioning Margot’s miniature reproduction of the saint writhing in all her mystical orgasmic ecstasy.

“I know,” answered Zoey. “I can’t believe she would let him touch her holy cards.”

“So this ghost of ours,” Margot said tersely. “She has your last name.”

“Or I have hers.”

“A relative?”

“Maybe a coincidence.” Emily remembered Andrew’s words, but she still didn’t believe them.

“There are no coincidences and there are no accidents. Nothing happens unless someone wills it to happen,” Zoey said knowingly.

“Your swami?” asked Margot.

“Not unless he’s William S. Burroughs,” said Emily with a smile, remembering the quote. “But he’s dead.”

“Does that really matter anymore?” said Margot as she marched off to bed. “Oh, I almost forgot, he left this for you.” She retrieved a small envelope from the mantle and handed it to Emily.

To Emily Thomas, resident Sleeping Beauty

Margot rolled her eyes and continued down the hall, but Zoey remained, forcing Emily to keep twisting this way and that to stop her from peering over her shoulder.

Emily,

By the time you read this, you obviously will have awoken. Believe me, the temptation was great to storm your flat and kiss you awake myself, keeping the fairy tale tradition alive in this place.

I hope you’re feeling better, and if so, or perhaps if not, I’d like to take you to dinner Friday night. Seven p.m. Please wear one of your old, odd, and breathtaking dresses. Escaping should not pose a problem, as I believe Christian will be extending his own invitation for the evening, the cheeky bastard. This, however, should not be construed by anyone as a double date (Zoey, that means you, if you are reading on). Single, as in Emily and me. You and I, Emily. Full stop.

One more thing, I hope you realize how terribly dull this house is when you are asleep. The only excitement we had was trying to keep the painters from smoking Nora. Hence, she is with you.

Unfortunately, we have to leave for L.A. in the morning. But we’ll be home soon.

I miss you, Emily. I need to speak with you. And touch you.

Till then

Yours,

A.

Emily read it two more times. By the time she had it memorized a sense of euphoria filled her. The world had become filled with promise. She could finish school, be with Andrew, find Nick’s ashes, reunite lost lovers, go to her seminar, publish her book, afford rent…do everything and anything.