Salem's Sight (5 page)

I gripped the table for support and
turned away from my mother so she wouldn’t see my eyes bugging out
of my head.

I mean I had thought it, and Berkley
said so, but this was real. My grandmother was haunting the house.
No way was it a coincidence she’d picked today to ‘make
contact.’

How cool was this? She was asking me a
question all right. She wondered if I knew the date of her
death.

Well, I did now.

Somehow telling Mom about the
experience with the ribbon and showing her the video became so out
of the question. I called Berkley and got her machine. By the time
she called me back my mother had left for the cemetery and I was
able to fill her in on the details without interruption or fear of
being overheard.

Berkley said she wasn’t surprised. She
reminded me of her findings from the report she had to write the
year before and that many sources suggested ghosts have a tendency
to stay in places where they feel familiar.

That made me sad though. Because that
meant my dad was still in North Carolina.

It didn’t take me long to mention that
little tidbit to my mother when she returned from the cemetery. The
fact that she could visit her parents’ graves yet my father was
almost a thousand miles away – alone.

Mom pointed out that the rest of his
family still lived there and that we’d continue to send flowers the
way she did to her parents before we moved back here.

She understood how I felt though. It
majorly sucked that he died. It sucked more that I couldn’t even
visit his grave.

I pouted, was grouchy during dinner,
huffed through my homework, and then set off for bed a good hour
earlier than usual.

****

“
Sleep well last night?” My
mother eyed me trying to judge my mood.

I glared at her. If there’d been one
thing I hadn’t done well last night, it was sleep. I’d spent a good
half of the night flailing about trying to get comfortable, but the
room wouldn’t let me. “Must have tried to go to sleep too early. I
was awake half the night.”

“
Want some coffee?” She
poured her cup and the aroma filled the air enticing me.

“
Sure. It’ll help me stay
awake during some of my less exciting classes,” and believe me,
there were more than a few of those. Let’s see, how about POD,
which is Problems of American Democracy where we looked at
government, complained about it, but didn’t look for any real
solutions.

Then there was Family Studies where we
learned how messed up most people’s families are and we have to
carry an egg around like it was a baby for a month. Hate to break
it to Mrs. Donovan, but most of the kids cracked theirs within the
first few days and replaced it with another. It was supposed to
simulate what it was like to be a parent. Yeah, right. Can we say,
failed miserably?

I looked up at my mom, my parent, as
she opened the cabinet and grabbed my snowflake mug that Dad had
bought me when he went on a business trip to Canada.

He was thoughtful like that. Any time
he went away he’d always come back with some little trinket. He
bought this mug because it was smaller and I always insisted on
joining Mom and Dad when they had coffee. Mom didn’t want me to,
but Dad caved. I could always get him to cave.

Well, almost always.

She held it in her hand for a moment
then returned it to the cabinet and replaced it with one of her
mugs without uttering a sound.

Once again mixed emotions. Did it mean
she thought I was finally old enough for one of her special
industrial-sized mugs of caffeine, or that she just didn’t want to
remind me more of my father? As if I could ever forget.

I mean, how could I forget the man who
made me believe the world was mine to command? I did mention he so
spoiled me, right? But it wasn’t about that, and it wasn’t about
things.

It was about how he made me feel. Like
a princess. I know that sounds uber stupid, but there’s no other
way to explain it. When I was with Dad I felt like the most special
person in the world.

Only now he was gone, so most of the
time I just felt like … crap.

“
Any dreams last night?”
she asked drawing me back to reality.

“
Some. Although it was
weird. Even while I was awake I kept thinking of all my teeth
falling out.”

“
Damn!” Mom yelped as the
coffee she was pouring me spilled onto her hand. She put down the
cup and stuck her hand under the cold water.

Was it something I said? Or was it
just an accident? She had jumped and spilled the coffee, but I
couldn’t imagine why.

After I fixed my coffee, one Splenda
packet and a splash of half and half, I turned on the computer,
Googled dreams and scanned through the list. There it was - losing
teeth – an embarrassment.

“
This is odd. It says that
when you dream of losing teeth, it’s because you’re afraid of being
embarrassed.”

Her shoulders relaxed. “That’s a
relief. Your grandmother always said when you dreamt of teeth
falling out it meant death.”

She didn’t need to say why that
thought weirded her out. I knew she was thinking the same thing I
was – we’d just had our share of death and didn’t need any
more.

“
Why’d she think that?” I
asked as if I were no more than casually curious.

Mom closed her eyes as if trying to
remember the past. “She used to also say dream of the dead, hear
from the living.”

“
That’s a good one to
know.” Sipping my coffee I debated that issue.

Mom sat down next to me at the table
and half mumbled as if she were talking to herself. “They were all
just ramblings.”

“
Ramblings? How so? You
mean you didn’t believe any of the things that your mother said?”
Her tone changed immediately and I could tell I pissed her
off.

“
That’s not what I meant
and you know it. She was just much more superstitious than I ever
was. She believed things…” My mother hesitated and I wondered what
it was she’d been about to say before she thought better of
it.

“
What kind of things?” I
probed. Mom shrugged her shoulders but I continued to stare her
down until she answered.

“
She was just different
than other people.”

“
In what way?” I continued
to put on the pressure. “How was she different?”

“
More intuitive,” I
guess.

She was holding something back and I
desperately needed to know what it was. “More info, please. What
does that mean, more intuitive? She made better
judgments?”

My mother hedged, and finally told me,
deciding I wouldn’t buy into it. “She thought she was kind of
psychic,” my mother said with a light little laugh as if she had
just told a mildly amusing joke.

“
My grandmother was
psychic? Are you kidding me?” Well this certainly put a new light
on things.

“
She wasn’t psychic, she
just thought she had a special ability to see some things before
they happened.”

“
What is that, you mean
like clairvoyant?”

“
No, not for real. She had
a few dreams…”

The minute the word dreams exited her
mouth, she knew it was a mistake and that I’d have my own
interpretation.

She was right, I did.

CHAPTER fivE

This was the part of the walk home
that I hated. Up to this point I had Berkley and a few others to
hang with, but this was my turn off. No other kids my age graced
the deserted street. Forget kids my age, I would’ve settled for a
sign of life.

Not many houses either, that’s what
made it lonelier. Even the trees sporadically placed appeared too
far away from each other. Large trees that bent toward the center
of the road hung like umbrellas masking the sky. At a different
time I would’ve thought the fall colors pretty. But the changing
shades only reminded me the leaves would soon be falling. More
death. I sulked and kicked at the fallen ones, blaming them for
their fate.

As I approached the large blue
Victorian I broke my stride and almost tripped over my own feet
when I saw the sign on the lawn. A large cardboard sign, taped to
the bottom of the mailbox. Kittens – free to good home.

It hadn’t been there when I left for
school this morning. Trust me; that’s one thing I wouldn’t have
missed.

My heart began to pound and I veered
off the path toward home. How many years had I asked for a pet? Mom
always had a cat when she was young. She went on and on about this
one cat Tabby. Yeah, like can you believe she actually stuck the
cat with that name? Anyway, she would dress it up in doll clothes.
How sick is that? Talk about mistreatment of animals. She had more
than one cat even. No such luck for me.

Dad was allergic. Cats, dogs, anything
with fur. Real convenient. I remembered my mom saying that to my
aunt once when I had asked for a Great Dane puppy after seeing my
friend Angela’s.

Convenient or not it was true. Once
one of mom’s friends showed up at the house with her Shih Tzu and
insisted that since it had hair rather than fur it couldn’t bother
Dad. Being a nice guy and an animal lover Dad crossed his fingers
and let her in.

An hour later he looked like he’d been
attacked by killer bees. His eyes were almost swollen shut and
needless to say, she was never invited back. Especially after she
had the nerve to say that Dad’s allergic reaction couldn’t have
come from her pet. She blamed it on the shrimp cocktail. End result
there – not a chance in hell for me. Call me destined to be
petless.

They offered me an aquarium when I was
six. I took it; I mean, it was the closest thing I was going to get
to a pet. But let’s be real – you can’t hold them.

So when I saw the sign it was as if
Dad looked down and said, okay kid, here’s your chance.

I walked with determination up to the
front door and knocked. An old stout woman with white hair appeared
wearing an apron. An apron! Can we say like time warp to back in
the day?

“
Hi, I saw your sign, about
the kittens.” I held out my right hand, “I’m Salem.”

She gripped my hand and shook it
firmly. “Vera Taunton,” she said in a thick syrupy voice and
invited me in. Right at the edge of her kitchen was a little
cordoned off area where beautiful little balls of fur frolicked. My
breath caught and corny or not I made some sort of ‘aww’
sound.

“
My Fluffy was a naughty
girl and snuck out on me,” she said as she picked up the longhaired
Calico mom and stroked behind an ear. She turned, gently placed the
cat down a few feet away in an adjoining room, and shut the door.
“Now here I am with a batch of kittens.”

She pointed to the litter as if I
somehow could have missed them. Yeah, lady. Not on your
life.

“
Now what did your parents
say? I hope you asked them first.”

For a second I was so afraid she’d
toss me out I actually thought of lying. But deep down I knew I
couldn’t and when I took a good look at her face, I knew she’d let
me visit even if I couldn’t take one home.

“
Not yet, I just saw the
sign. We just moved in recently, not too far down the street. I
thought if I could take a peek then it might be easier to describe
a specific one.” I shrugged but was pretty sure she understood what
I meant.

“
Well go on in the pantry
there and sit down with them. They’re ready to go and one found a
new home this morning. The sign probably won’t do much good, but if
they’re not gone in another week I’m going to take them over to the
pound. Most people looking for pets go there first. I’m just nosy
and like to place them myself. That way I know they’re going to
people who’ll be good to them.”

I stepped over the gate that was
blocking the pantry from the rest of the house and sat down in the
middle of the old Formica floor. In spite of the fact that the
flooring had lived longer than I did, it shined with a polish that
had to come from hard work and constant effort.

My eyes darted from one kitten to
another like nervous radar trying to determine which one to pick up
first. “Do you know if they are males or females?” I asked. “That
might matter to my mom.”

“
They were only eight weeks
old yesterday so it’s hard to tell and I don’t want to say the
wrong thing, but a vet would know. If you find one you want, take
it over to the pound and if it’s the wrong sex you can exchange it
for another.”

I looked at her as if she were crazy.
That would be like giving a mother a baby in the hospital and then
telling her she could exchange it if it cried too much.

“
As if I could give it up
once I took it.” I knelt closer to the kittens and started petting
them. One fluffy white one with striped paws and dark ears
sauntered over, climbed on my lap and sprawled.

She chose me. Or he did. Either way I
had to have this one. I picked up my purse, dug out my cell phone,
and punched in Mom’s number. She picked up on the second ring.
Before she could even manage a hello I blurted, “There’s no reason
to not get a fur bearing animal now. No one in the house is
allergic. I could understand while Dad was alive, but he’s not now,
and I think a pet would help me adjust better, sort of like a
security blanket.”