11
Isit on the porch, impatiently looking down at the screen of my phone. The internet can be so fucking slow out here sometimes. Jared is dragging fallen branches out of the front yard and putting them in what he keeps referring to as “the burn pile.”
Finally, the article I want to read opens, and I scan it so fast I have to go back and read it again. Jared summed everything up pretty well: a guy named Josh Harper was the last guy working in his office when—according to him—he heard someone crying and went to see who it was. He saw a woman in a pink dress standing in the hall, and when he asked her what was wrong, she “went psycho” and attacked him. If this article is right, he got pretty beat up. Three broken ribs, a nasty bump on the head, and covered in cuts and bruises. The article ends with a statement saying to contact the police if anyone has any information about the woman.
Son of a bitch. I can’t go into work. I can try to call and get info…depending on who answers. I close the internet tab on my phone and shake my head at myself. Yeah, it’s really fucking coincidental that I did a spell that opened a rift, then saw a ghost who fits this description to a T, and then someone gets attacked.
But it doesn’t mean the guy was actually attacked by a ghost.
Can ghosts even hurt people like that? If they can walk through walls, how can they physically harm anyone? Wouldn’t their fist go right through you if they tried to throw a punch?
I get up and go inside, debating on calling Tiffany and asking if she knows anything more about the case. She’s a crime scene photographer and wouldn’t have been called to this scene. And even if she had been…what would I say? Tell me about the crazy guy who said a ghost attacked him? He was attacked by something, with injuries severe enough to require a hospital visit. Was this looked into like an assault? The office probably has some sort of security footage to look through, though I don’t know if ghosts show up on camera.
I set my phone down and open the fridge, looking for something to make for dinner. The guys go through a lot of food in a short amount of time, and I need to go grocery shopping. Not wanting to go out now, I just order pizzas.
Jared knocks on the front door, and looks inside as soon as I open it.
“Come in, have a look around,” I say.
“The whole house?”
“No.”
“But you said I could—”
I raise an eyebrow. “This is still my house, kid. It’s not a museum. I have personal shit in places, you know.”
“Oh, right. I knew that. Is it creepy living here by yourself?” He steps through the foyer and raises his gaze to the balcony.
“I don’t live by myself. My boyfriend lives with me.”
“The one I saw at the party?”
I nod. “Yeah. Him.” And three others…but I’ll keep that to myself. I don’t want to go putting ideas in this kid’s head. “He’s at work now.”
Jared goes through the living room, still looking around as if the house might wake up and grab him. The house won’t, but who knows if there are any spirits lurking.
“There’s poison ivy all along the front,” Jared tells me as he slowly walks to the library. “I’ll come back with long sleeves and gloves.”
“Good plan.” I lean against the wall and cross my arms, watching Jared. He stops in the threshold of the library but doesn’t go in. I know I should say something else, give him a little more info to hold onto that’ll keep him from looking for answers elsewhere. But, dammit, this isn’t my area of expertise.
“I have seen a ghost,” I say, going back to our conversation earlier. “Right here, in the house.”
Jared snaps his head up, looking back at me. “Likeherehere?”
“Yes, she walked through the house and into the library.”
“And then what?”
I shrug. “I didn’t see her after that.”
“Any idea who it was? Have there been murders in this house?”
I laugh. “Not that I know of. And I think…I think it was my mother.”
Jared casts his eyes down. “That’d be cool if she was here.”
“Yeah. It would be.” I take a step forward and shift my gaze to the door, hinting that he should leave. Taking the hint, he heads for the foyer.
