Chapter 9 #2
Remy’s logical, rational mind tried to refute the whole crazy notion. That wasn’t possible. Was it? Remy recalled seeing Lucy’s hand go through Avery’s, and she shivered.
“It’s gonna be okay, Remy. Just try to take a few deep breaths and you’ll feel better,” Lucy said, squeezing Remy’s hand from across the picnic table.
Remy did as she was told, and inhaled the fresh, warm air. It did help a little.
“I know you’re feeling completely overwhelmed right now and you must have a million questions. Just take your time, and let me know what I can possibly do to make this easier on you,” Lucy said gently.
Remy let go of Lucy’s hand and covered her face for a moment. Then she said, “It just…it can’t be true…can it?”
Lucy smiled. “I know it seems impossible. And believe me, I understand exactly what you're going through. I felt the same way when I found out that not all the uniformed people around here are reenactors. I was terrified and confused, too. But Remy, what we told you is true. Avery is a wonderful man and a loyal friend. But he’s dead.”
Remy gasped. Hearing it out loud like that was shocking.
“But he’s the same sexy, sweet Irish guy we all know and adore, Remy.”
Remy nodded.
“Oh, Remy,” Lucy began. “There’s so much I want to tell you, but I don’t know if more information will help you or just overwhelm you more.”
Remy drew in a sharp breath and let it out. “No, I think more information is good. I need to know exactly what the hell is going on. What else do you know that I don’t?”
“Oh, my goodness, where to begin,” Lucy said with a laugh. “Okay, just like you, I was friends with a guy—well, two guys actually—who I thought were reenactors, but it turned out they were real soldiers like Avery. I found out by accident when I went to touch one of them on the shoulder.”
“Oh, no,” Remy said, eyes wide.
“Remy, I had never been so scared in my life. I’d always been afraid of ghosts. I would be one of those tourists you had to tiptoe around on your ghost tours, you know? You’d be like, ‘Oh, man that brown-haired lady is scared out of her mind. I better go easy on the spooky stories.’”
Remy laughed, feeling a little better. Lucy was such a dear friend, and it felt familiar and comfortable to talk with her, even about this insane topic. She was grateful for the sense of normalcy she felt with her friend.
“I was so scared that I passed out, so you took the news a lot better than I did!” Lucy said with a laugh. “Okay, so do you promise you’ll believe what I say next? Do you believe we’re all telling you the truth about Avery?”
Remy nodded slowly. She still wasn’t sure, but her mind was struggling to come up with any other rational explanation for the day’s events. Avery O’Rorke did not seem to have a physical body, and she trusted that Jesse and Lucy wouldn’t play a horrific trick on her like that.
“The soldier I tried to touch when he was dead? It was Jesse.”
“Jesse!” Remy practically shouted. “He can’t be dead. I touch him all the time. I mean, I didn’t mean…I just mean he teases me and I punch him on the shoulder and stuff. And I just handed him my keys in there and—”
“He was dead. He’s not anymore.” Lucy surveyed Remy’s expression and pressed on.
“I know, I know it’s crazy. Okay, look…the way it works is, most people who die go on to heaven right away.
I mean, thousands of soldiers died in the battle of Gettysburg, and most of them are, you know, gone.
But there are some who have personal issues or whatever that keep them stuck here on earth.
When they finally work through their emotional issues, you cross over to heaven.
When it was time for Jesse to go, he was in love with me and I was alive.
So God gave him a choice and let him stay with me instead of going to heaven. ”
Remy put her head down on the picnic table. She heard Lucy laugh softly.
“I know, Remy. It’s a lot to process.”
Remy lifted her head and said, “Avery’s dead. Jesse used to be dead but he’s not anymore. Anything else?”
“Nope!” Lucy said brightly as if they were discussing what to have for lunch. “That’s about the gist of it.”
Remy smiled weakly.
“But Remy, I want to warn you, it was a miracle that Jesse came back to life, but the chances of that happening again with Avery…well…just know that Jesse is the only instance we know of that happening around here. I know lots of people who are, you know, like Avery is now, and they’ve been around here for a long, long time.
Nobody’s come back to life before or since Jesse.
When a spirit crosses over…” Lucy trailed off, not wanting to say the harsh facts out loud.
“They’re gone for good,” Remy said quietly.
“That’s one of the reasons I knew we had to tell you the truth about Avery. You need to know what could happen. What probably will happen. Those two soldiers I mentioned? One was Jesse and the other one was a Union soldier named Joel.”
Remy could hear the fondness in Lucy’s voice as she spoke about this other soldier.
“Joel and Jesse hated each other. They’d been enemies for more than a century and a half before I met them.”
“It’s hard to imagine Jesse hating anyone!” Remy said with surprise.
“I know!” Lucy said with a laugh. “But they fought all the time. All they could do was yell at each other, and they would have punched the hell out of each other if it had been physically possible. Anyway, as usual, they were trying to best each other in any way they could, so they made a silly bet. They decided they would pick a random, living woman and ask which guy she would choose.”
“And you were that woman,” Remy said.
“Exactly. I didn’t want to choose right away because I didn’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings. So we got to be friends, and then when I tried to touch Jesse and couldn't, I realized they were both real soldiers. Dead soldiers.”
“Wow,” Remy said.
“That’s why we wanted to break the news to you as carefully as we could. We didn’t want you to find out by accident.”
Remy nodded, and found she was grateful that her friends were so considerate of her feelings. She adored Avery, and it was only a matter of time before she would have found some excuse to touch him.
“So I became close with Joel and Jesse—”
“Especially Jesse,” Remy said with a knowing smile.
“Yes,” Lucy said with tremendous affection. “I fell in love with him when he was still a ghost.”
“And he fell for you, too.”
“That’s the really incredible thing,” Lucy said, her eyes wide. “Turns out he was already in love with me. Joel didn’t know it at the time, and I sure didn’t either, but Jesse had been watching me work in the tavern. He was invisible so I didn’t know he was there!”
“Whoa! So he was like creepin’ on ya!” Remy said.
“Yeah, kinda,” Lucy said. “I was upset at first. I liked him so much, and I hated the idea that he was watching me without me knowing. But he fell in love with me then, so I could hardly stay mad.”
Remy smiled and nodded.
“So like I said, ghosts are still here because they have personal issues that are keeping them earthbound. Jesse was struggling because he loved his home and his family in the South, but he was coming to terms with how horrible slavery was and his role in fighting as a Confederate soldier. And Joel, well, he had some guilt over some problems in his marriage. He loved his wife so much, and I knew he needed to cross over to be with her. So I spent time with Joel and Jesse and helped them work out their issues so they could cross over.”
“Did the other guy make it?” Remy asked, hardly believing her own ears. What Lucy was saying was certifiably nuts, but Lucy wasn’t. She was a stable person, and Remy couldn’t help but believe her story.
“Yes,” Lucy said with a warm smile. “He made it home to his wife and children. I really miss him, and so does Theresa. She was pretty close with him, too.”
“So Theresa knows about all this stuff, too?”
“Yes! Yes, as a matter of fact!” Lucy said excitedly.
“So you can call her up, and she’ll confirm everything I’m telling you.
She probably knows more dead soldiers than I do.
She’s working on her degree in psychology, and she has a kind of ghost counseling group to help them deal with their issues and cross over. ”
Remy stared at Lucy.
“Sorry, I’m probably overwhelming you with too much ghost info,” Lucy said.
“No, it’s okay,” Remy said uncertainly. On one hand, she wanted as much information on this strange new ghost world as possible. On the other hand, she was starting to feel like she was losing her mind.
“So yes, Joel made it. And Jesse almost went, too.” Lucy fell silent for a moment, and Remy could see this was hard for her to talk about.
“I figured there was no humanly possible way Jesse and I could be together, and I wanted him to be at peace. So I tried to help him cross over. When the time came, Joel disappeared into this big, bright portal. His wife was waiting for him. He was so happy.”
Lucy seemed lost in her memories, and Remy was enraptured by her tale.
“And then Jesse…Jesse saw his mother in the portal. I’ll never forget him saying…Mama…” Tears formed in her eyes. “I knew how much he missed his mother, and I was glad he saw her, but…but then he walked into the portal.” Now Lucy spoke in a whisper. “I thought was he gone.”
Remy reached across the table and took hold of Lucy’s hand. Tears ran down Lucy’s cheeks.
“I’m sorry,” Lucy said, wiping her face with her free hand. “It’s still hard to think of how close I came to losing him forever.”
“Oh, Lucy. I can’t imagine. You two are inseparable!”
Lucy nodded. She looked into Remy’s eyes. “And that’s why you need to be careful. I know you care about Avery and, well, I just don’t want you to go through what I almost went through.”
Remy nodded, carefully considering Lucy’s words.