Chapter 20
Joel and Jesse were already sitting at a table outside of Meade’s Tavern when Lucy came out carrying her tray of food. She smiled as she set down her tray and sat with them.
“Are we coming across as totally needy and pathetic?” Joel asked.
“Not at all,” Lucy said kindly. “I enjoy your company.” She took a bite of her turkey wrap. It still felt a little weird to be eating around them, but at least now she understood why they never actually ate lunch with her.
“Is it good?” Jesse asked.
Lucy nodded. “Yep. Pretty much everything here is good.” She lowered her voice, since there were a few other diners nearby. “Do you guys miss eating food?”
“Nah, not really,” Joel answered. “We never get hungry, and we can’t smell the food, so it’s not like it’s really tempting anymore. Sometimes I do miss the idea of food, you know? Meals are something to look forward to. Something to do,for God’s sake!”
“That makes sense.” She couldn’t imagine the tedium of being a spirit who couldn’t smell, touch, or taste. Seeing and hearing were all they had. Lucy never realized how much she’d taken the other three senses for granted.
“Ya know what I miss?” Jesse asked. “Coffee. And I mean real coffee. Not that stuff we had in camp.”
Joel grimaced. “Oh, man. That stuff was awful. It tasted like liquid dirt.”
“Did you choke it down anyway? Just for the caffeine?” Lucy asked.
“Yeah. At least I did. It was called ‘essence of coffee,’ and it’s kind of like what you’d call instant coffee nowadays. Was more like essence of garbage.” Jesse said. He glanced over at a group of women eating lunch. One of them had a cup of coffee. “I can hardly remember what coffee smells like.”
Lucy looked up from her lunch and smiled, but not at Jesse. She was looking past him out to the street where Theresa was approaching. Lucy had told Theresa that she would be eating lunch with the boys, and she wasn’t surprised in the slightest to see that she’d found the time to drop by. She hadn’t seen the guys since finding out they were dead.
Theresa strutted over to where they were sitting. She leaned over on the railing that separated the outdoor tables from the street, revealing an impressive amount of cleavage in the process. She looked at Joel.
“What’s up, Casper?” Theresa said.
Joel chuckled, amused that Theresa was clearly unafraid of the two dead soldiers in her presence. She looked approvingly at Joel’s physique. She glanced around to make sure no one was looking, then she poked a finger right into his chest. Naturally, her hand went right through. She didn’t even flinch.
“Too bad,” Theresa said with a sigh. “You would have been absolutely delicious to touch.”
Joel looked unabashedly right into her cleavage, then looked up at her face. “Likewise,” he told her.
“Is she always like this?” Jesse asked Lucy.
“Always,” Lucy replied. “Especially around men in uniform.”
“Hey!” Jesse said, sounding wounded. “I’m in uniform, too. Kinda.” He was in a gray Confederate uniform, but his worn and tattered clothes were a far cry from Joel’s crisp, blue Union attire.
Theresa glanced at him, looking him up and down. “I’d do ya.”
“Gee, thanks,” Jesse said wryly.
“That was a pity compliment, you know. She’s just trying to be nice,” Joel told him.
“It matters not!” Jesse said, with a dramatic toss of his head. He looked across the table at Lucy. “I’m only interested in winning the fair Lucy’s affections.”
Jesse looked into Lucy’s eyes in a way that made her shiver with delight. She’d always felt so plain, especially around Theresa. Theresa was so beautiful and vivacious that men rarely gave Lucy a second look when she was around. Jesse made Lucy feel like she was the only woman in the room.
Lucy looked at Jesse, fascinated. “It’s funny how I never noticed before that nothing moves on you. Like when you toss your head.” Lucy mimicked the way Jesse had dramatically tossed his head a moment ago. “Nothing moves. Not your hair and not your hat.”
“Nope,” Jesse said, a little sadly. “Nothing works anymore.”
“Your mouth still works, that’s for sure,” Joel said.
Lucy glanced at Jesse’s mouth, his lips. If only… She wondered what it would have felt like to kiss him. She imagined his kiss would be tender and gentle. She quickly looked up before Jesse saw her staring at his mouth. She turned to Joel.
“Joel. You promised to tell me more about your family.”
“So I did,” Joel said, grinning. “What do you want to know?”
“What did your little boys look like?” Lucy asked.
“Me!” Joel said proudly.
Jesse shook his head. “Those poor babies.”
Joel narrowed his eyes at Jesse, but then brightened when he resumed talking about his children. “They both had my eyes. It was funny to see these little tiny babies with these big, bright blue eyes lookin’ at you. I could have stared at them for hours. I probably did!”
Lucy, Theresa, and even Jesse fell silent as they listened to Joel talk. You would never know that it had been well over a century since Joel had seen his children. He spoke as fondly of them as if he’d seen them last week.
“Did Emma like being a mother?” Lucy asked.
Joel smiled at Lucy. “Oh, yeah. Emma was the most wonderful mother. The thing I remember most was the laughter in our house. Emma and the kids laughed all the time. I don’t know what they did all day when I was working, but the kids were always so happy. God, they adored her. She was like a kid herself with them. But she was a good mother, too, you know? She raised ’em right. Sure, they had fun, but she made sure they behaved. God help ’em if they talked back to her!”
Lucy laughed. “Good for her!”
Joel paused for a moment, looking rather melancholy. “I always wondered what it was like in that house when I didn’t come home. I can’t imagine there was much laughter there after I was gone.”
“That must have been so hard for her,” Theresa said softly.
“It sounds like she was a strong woman,” Lucy said. “I can’t begin to imagine her heartbreak, but I know she must have been strong for the children.”
Joel nodded. “I think so, too. I hope so. Do you want to have kids someday?”
“Oh, yes!” Lucy said. “I would love to be a mother. I want to get through school and teach for a few years, but I would really love to get married and have a family.”
“Well, you’re going to make a wonderful mom someday,” Joel told her.
“She is gonna be a great mama,” Theresa said. “And I’m gonna be a kickass Auntie Theresa. So did you have a wife and kids back home, cowboy?”
Joel opened his mouth to give a smartass answer, but Lucy cut him off before he could speak.
“Jesse had a doting mother and loving father back home,” Lucy said, giving Joel a pointed look. He grinned at her. “He was an only child, and his parents must have missed him terribly.”
“Well, if I’d had a beautiful girl like you back home, I’d probably never have gone to war,” Jesse said, looking into Lucy’s eyes.
Theresa raised an eyebrow and said seductively, “Oh, yeah. Lucy would give you good reason to stay home.”
Lucy blushed deeply. “Stop.”
Theresa shot her an apologetic look. She hadn’t meant to make her uncomfortable.
“You remind me so much of my wife,” Joel told Theresa. “She always spoke her mind just like you do.”
“I’m honored, Joel,” Theresa said with a soft smile.
“I know you both miss your families so much. That’s why I’m going to help you get back to them,” Lucy said, her voice full of determination and confidence.
“You are?” Theresa asked.
“Yes,” Lucy said forcefully. “I’m going to help them cross over whether they like it or not.
“Well, you’re welcome to try,” Joel said. “Just don’t get your hopes up. We’ve been stuck here for a very long time.”
“We’ll see about that,” Lucy said, a twinkle in her eye. Though she would miss them terribly if they crossed over, she hated the thought of them being trapped here, alone and away from their families. Lucy glanced around at the other diners. “I think we should meet somewhere more private tomorrow. Where we can really talk. I get the feeling there’s a lot of stuff you guys avoid talking about, but it might help if you opened up about it. Might help you work out some of your issues.”
“Oh, you’re playing amateur therapist now?” Theresa asked, grinning. “I thought I was the psychology major.”
“There’s an awful lot of psychology in teaching, too, you know,” Lucy said wryly, looking at the soldiers. “I have to figure out how to teach stubborn students who don’t want to learn.”
“I’ll learn anything you want to teach me, Ms. Westbrook,” Jesse said seductively.
Lucy chuckled. “Good.”
“Where do you want to meet?” Jesse asked. “Anywhere, you know, but Devil’s Den.”
“You yellowbelly!” Joel said. “I died there, too, you know, and I go there all the time.”
That comment got some strange looks from nearby diners, but his Union outfit seemed to explain his “death.”
“We can avoid Devil’s Den,” Lucy said gently. “For now.”
“Wuss,” Joel mumbled.
“Why don’t we meet at the Eternal Light Peace Memorial?” Lucy asked, but it didn’t sound like a request. It was more of an order.