12. Chapter 12
Chapter 12
O utside the movie theater, Emily stepped to the side and waved goodbye to her friends, then set off toward the Just Peachy Hair Salon, where Aunt Nicky worked. The twinkling lights on the trees and buildings lit up her way, accompanied by Christmas tunes, coming from restaurants and businesses along the street. A tourist carriage, almost swallowed by red bows and garlands, rolled over the cobblestones.
Mama loved carriage rides. Even as a native Savannahian, she never tired of them.
Emily swallowed a lump in her throat. She didn’t visit Mama nearly enough to be a good daughter, but it was hard. Each time, she’d sit by her bed and tell her how volleyball practice was going and which test was coming up. And Mama would lay there, sleeping, never giving a sign. Doctors said patients in a coma heard everything, but it felt futile. For each visit to the hospital, she built up hope, only to have it shattered. So she found excuses. School work. Afternoon activity. An oncoming cold.
She shook her head, trying to will away her bad conscience.
Cutting across Reynolds Square, she passed a group of tourists on a ghost tour.
“And you’re welcome to go inside and grab a drink,” their guide explained. “You might be joined by a strange gentleman wearing an old-fashioned coat and a vest. But beware! He may disappear before you’re even finished with that beer.”
A woman nudged a man with a camera and pointed to the restaurant. Emily smiled as she continued to the riverfront, grateful for the distraction. Ghosts. They never get old. Literally.
She pulled her jacket tighter in the evening chill and checked the time on her phone. Nicky should be finished by now. Emily put the phone back, raised her eyes—and looked straight at a man on the other end of the street. Half-hidden in the shadows, the nearby lamp illuminated only his dark clothes—an old-fashioned suit with a coat and a vest.
The hair at the back of her neck prickled. Why did it feel like he was staring at her?
Loud laughter erupted behind her. Emily jumped and turned. A couple . The woman hung on the man’s arm, trying to keep her balance as she snickered. Letting out a breath of relief, Emily returned her gaze to the man… and found nothing. He’d vanished. Like a ghost.
Don’t be dumb. He was a normal guy, and he probably wasn’t even looking at you. You’re imagining things because you’ve been listening to that tour guide going on about ghosts.
For the rest of the way, she kept inconspicuously close to that couple, her pulse slowly coming down to the rhythm of her walking. She ran the last few steps to the salon. Her aunt’s bleached blonde hair and light purple jacket shone in the dark like a tacky beacon—but a beacon Emily was glad to have at the moment.
“There you are, honey. Perfect timing.” Nicky checked the alarm and closed the door behind her, then pecked Emily on the cheek. “How was the movie?”
“Fine.” Far less memorable than the creepy encounter.
Which was probably not a creepy encounter at all, but a figment of your imagination. So stop overreacting.
“Sherry says hey.” Nicky swung her purse on the shoulder, and they walked down the street. “I told her you’d come to work tomorrow.”
Tomorrow? But she’d wanted to check that diary. Well, it could wait a day. Emily didn’t mind the occasional front desk shift at the salon—it was nice of Sherry to offer, and the pay wasn’t half bad. With Mama’s state, every bit helped.
“…and had to do six perms. I sure hope they’re having an eighties-themed party. Emily?” Nicky stopped.
“Huh?”
“You alright, honey? You’re looking as pale as a ghost.”
“Mm-hmm.” Emily didn’t think her smile was too convincing, but Nicky bought it and resumed walking.
Emily shot one last glance over her shoulder, and exhaled as she found the street empty.
On Sunday, the girls and Nicky gathered for a late breakfast. Emily dug into her pancakes, generously swathed in syrup to give them a semblance of flavor. Nicky wasn’t much of a cook, which was probably why Debbie, upon seeing the pancakes, conveniently remembered she had some cereal left.
Emily’s little sister swirled the colorful puffs around in her bowl, then deposited the spoon into a chip at the edge. “It’s not even fair that Jessie Lynn gets the solo. I sang way better than she did.”
“You’re still in the choir,” Nicky said.
“In the second row. Am I supposed to put that on my college application?”
Nicky patted her hand. “You have time. Jessie Lynn won’t be in the choir next year. You’ll get a chance then.”
“Elimination by natural progression.” Emily waved her fork approvingly. “Best way to get rid of the competition.”
“For your lazy butt, maybe.”
“Debbie, don’t talk like that,” Nicky said in a tired, I’ve-tried-this-too-many-times tone.
“I’m not lazy!” Yes, she lacked motivation for certain things. But she liked a lot of sports. Did lazy people like sports?
“The point is, I want Jessie Lynn to know I’m better. Not win by the process of elimination.” Debbie frowned at the chipped edge of the bowl.
“Elimination sounds better.”
“We’ll clap the loudest at your performance,” Nicky said. “The choir’s, that is. And we won’t clap at all when Jessie Lynn sings. Ain’t that right, Emily?”
“Sure.” Emily didn’t understand why a Christmas school performance was that important. Well… Dad would be there. She supposed that was important, given he bothered to show up twice a year.
Nicky glanced at the wall clock. “My, look at the time! If you’re all done, go and get ready, girls. Say we’re leaving in… half an hour?”
“Actually, I—I don’t think I’ll be going,” Emily said. “I have schoolwork to do.”
“But, honey! We said we’d be going to the festival together,” Nicky said. “They’ve got such pretty decorations this year. Miss Lavinia—you know her, she used to work for Mr. Phelan who lives down the street—said they were getting the prettiest new garlands. And there’s always music, and face painting—”
“I thought you were too old to get your face painted,” Emily said to her sister.
“I thought you were too old to be that sulky,” Debbie returned.
“What about those purses they’ll have on sale?” Nicky said to Emily. “I can’t pick one for you, and we said we’d all get one to get monogrammed—”
Emily repressed a sigh. Nicky meant well, but was it too much to ask for some peace when one tried to do covert research on a mysterious diary? “You know I can’t have things monogrammed. My initials are EW.”
“That’s right.” Nicky drew out the last word.
Oh no. A rant was coming.
Nicky took a deep breath. “And y’all know whose fault that is? Who picked that name for you without thinking how it would look monogrammed? Benjamin.”
Previous bickering forgotten, Emily and Debbie looked at each other, silently mouthing the words in sync with Nicky.
“That useless, good-for-nothing… your dear, sweet mama should’ve never gone off with him. To marry a damn Yankee! Now look where that got us. You poor thing can’t even have your name monogrammed. Not to mention all other kinds of trouble he’s brought us.”
Nicky liked to blame Emily and Debbie’s father for every little misfortune that had befallen them. It was his fault Mama went to live up in Philly; his fault they got divorced (okay, that one was true), his fault the fridge broke and the mail got lost and Nicky got drenched when the wind blew her umbrella away. Mama’s accident had been Dad’s fault, too. Never mind that when these things happened, he was always hundreds of miles away.
“I’ll go,” Debbie cut into the silence following Nicky’s rant. “Though I’ve stuff to do later, too. Homework for algebra, I need at least two hours for the violin, and I have to start on the three books for English.”
“Doesn’t Mr. Walker only request one to read as a minimum?” Emily asked.
“Yeah… as a minimum .”
“Sometimes, I wonder if we’re related.” Emily shook her head. “You two have fun. I’ve got work to do.” She pushed her plate away and stood.
“You can hear the irony in that, right?” Debbie yelled after her as she left the dining room.
The text around the sketches in the diary made no sense. Emily had put it into an automated translator, and she got complicated instructions on how to use a watch. Who needed that? Watches were supposed to run on their own. Except this one, apparently.
Her fingers lingered over the dial as she checked the instructions again. Rotate the crown. Move the hands. Then pull the crown up… and back down.
She stared at the watch. The watch stared back. Well, that was a nice exercise in useless—
A blinding pain split her skull. She dropped the watch like a hot coal, and it landed flat on her bed. In a second, the pain ceased, but she continued to massage her forehead, breathing slowly and steadily to calm herself.
What on Earth was that? She looked at the watch, innocently shining in the sun. No. She was being stupid. Watches didn’t cause headaches. It was bad timing.
Tentatively, she picked it up, exhaling as no more pain came. She was being stupid.
The watch still didn’t work, though. Did she mess it up? She tried again.
A burst of pain, as sudden as before—but this time, it didn’t blind her. And she could swear that, for a few moments, she wasn’t in the room anymore. She stood on the hallway staircase, looking down at the front door. A force jerked her back, as if being suddenly stopped while traveling at a great speed, and both the pain and the vision ceased.
She was still on the bed.
Looking at the watch.
This was no coincidence. She got the same headache right after she performed that… ritual . What was this thing, voodoo? Hoodoo ? She gulped. She didn’t want to mess around with that.
Carefully, she laid the watch on the bedside table, eyeing it like prey trying to discern whether a hunter’s going to move. Then she uttered a short “Nope” and skedaddled out of the room.