He paused and dropped the plank he had been tearing away at. His eyes narrowed and his lips pursed together tightly. She almost regretted asking. In truth, she only wanted to lend him a sympathetic ear. Listening was one of the only things she was really good for in her current state anyway. Finally he lifted his eyes from the torn up floor to match her gaze and spoke.
“An accident,” he said, exhaling deeply. “Rachel went out for a walk, and as she was crossing the street, a drunk driver...”
He inhaled sharply and cast his eyes to the floor. She could hear him slowly exhaling as he returned to his work.
“They said that she died instantly,” he continued without looking back up. “The truck killed her on impact and she didn’t feel anything. I don’t know if I believe that.”
Carolina’s frown softened as she returned to her spot on the kitchen counter. She tried to imagine what his wife must have looked like. Maybe she had long, dark coils of hair like River and deep, soulful eyes. Her heart hurt as she considered what it must have been like for both Joseph and River to lose her. However, since she had finally gotten her housemate to talk to her a little, she didn’t want their conversation to end. With a little gentle effort, maybe she could get him to open up some more.
“How old was she?” Carolina asked.
“Thirty-four.”
Another moment ticked by as Carolina continued to think. She wrung hands in front of her and looked down at the floor again. She had never spoken out loud to anyone about what had happened to her. What she experienced and what she had seen. She didn’t know why she felt like telling this man now, if only to try and bring him some comfort. Or to bring herself some comfort.
“Spanish Flu. 1919. I was only twenty-three years old.”
Joseph looked up from his work and paused for a moment to listen.
“Father blamed Richard of course,” she said, rolling her eyes to the heavens. “None of those boys knew they were bringing home a deadly disease from the war. It wasn’t his fault.”
“Who was Richard?” he said flatly, returning to his work of ripping up yet another strip of flooring.
“My fiancé. We were supposed to be married in the spring. Well, might have been.”
“What happened to him?” Joseph said, starting on another section of floor.
Carolina sighed.
“Well, that’s just it. I’m not sure. He fell sick before I did, but I don’t know if the disease took him or not. If he passed on, he surely never tried to come and visit me.”
“Is that why you’re hanging around this place then?”
Joseph reached into a nearby cooler and rummaged around for a bottle of beer. He popped the top and chugged deeply as Carolina pondered his question.
“Whatever do you mean?”
“Don’t ghosts have unfinished business?” he asked, taking another sip. “Isn’t that why they stick around?”
Carolina pouted, still in thought. No, Richard couldn’t be her unfinished business. At the time of their reunion, she had been feeling lukewarm about their relationship at best. Even after all of this time, she had never considered why she was hanging around her family’s crumbling house. Just that she was.
“No, I don’t believe that Richard is the reason I’m still here,” she sighed. “Iwouldlike to know what became of him though. What became of my family for that matter too. But if I had to guess what my unfinished business was, I would say that it was my art.”
“You wanted to be an artist?”
“Oh, yes,” she said, her whole being brightening. “Before Richard proposed I had plans to travel to Paris and study there. Painting was my great passion. I was very good at it.”
Joseph nodded his head and reached for another beer.
“And what did you do before you decided to make a living off of tearing my home to pieces?” she asked, glad for a change of topic.
“I was a teacher,” he said. “My wife and I both taught in the same middle school in Brooklyn.”
“Well that explains why you’re so patient with River,” Carolina nodded. “He really is a lovely little boy.”
Joseph cracked a smile behind his bottle.
“He’s the whole reason I moved here,” he mused. “Well, that and the fact that Rachel and I had already purchased this place. But I only went through with the move for his sake, so he could be near his family.”
