Chapter 10
Eden woke the next morning, a little more tired than she expected, but it had been an exciting evening, and not in any good way.
She had helped brush off Eric’s clothing after his sudden fall and sent him off to bed, leaving his jacket behind.
She put it in the shower this morning to get some steam while she showered, and it was looking better, but it wasn’t back to the condition it had been in before.
It would probably need to be dry-cleaned when he got home, but she accomplished something with it, and hopefully he could still use it here on their trip. As she opened her bedroom door, she found him standing there, just getting ready to knock.
She smiled as she stepped forward. “Hey. How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine,” he muttered, brushing off her concerns.
She rolled her eyes at him. “And, even if you weren’t, you would say you were anyway.”
He just half nodded, obviously something else on his mind, as he ushered her out of their suite and toward the elevators.
Eden’s gaze sharpened. “Did you hear anything?” She glanced around, in case anybody else was listening in.
He nodded. “She died overnight.”
She gasped. “Seriously?”
He nodded once more. “They’re not sure what happened, and, of course, it’ll take time for an autopsy, but she did have cancer. More details are still to come, but I don’t have much so far.”
“Cancer or not, that’s still pretty awful.”
“It is.”
As they quickly finished up breakfast and coffee, they headed into the meditation lounge for the seminar events today.
As soon as everybody was seated, Richard stepped out.
In a voice full of compassion and sorrow, he explained the outcome of the previous night’s misadventures, explaining that she had, indeed, passed away overnight and that his heart went out to the family.
Lots of murmurs followed, even a couple of cries.
Several women were obviously distraught about the whole thing, and it didn’t sound or feel fake.
Yet it added such a pall to the entire atmosphere that Eden wondered how Richard could overcome that, considering that everybody was here to reduce their stress, not to increase it.
Richard led the group first into a meditation for releasing grief and shock and trauma, which was very smart.
Eden certainly appreciated it because she definitely felt better by the time she was done.
As Richard brought it to a close, he led them right into more lectures about the science of grief and how to overcome unexpected loss.
The lecture felt insignificant compared to the meditation, in Eden’s opinion.
As they quickly went through the morning, she felt others starting to settle in and relax, releasing whatever had been bothering them about the entire scenario, which must have been traumatic for the woman’s family.
They were all here, hoping she would find some solace and healing. Instead she ended up dying.
During the coffee break, Eden heard lots of murmuring about it all, and she asked one gentleman, “What was she even doing out there at night?”
He shook his head, as he glanced around. “I wanted to ask about that myself. However, it doesn’t really feel appropriate.”
“Right. I understand,” she agreed, then moved on, as he didn’t want to talk anymore.
Eden caught sight of Eric wandering through several of the groups, looking for answers himself.
When they were called back into session again, they were all admonished, saying that it was natural to question these things when they happen, but, for the family’s sake, if the others would keep their questions to something much less intrusive, it would be helpful.
Eden wasn’t sure what precipitated the call for that, but, during lunch, Richard approached her and asked if she needed help dealing with the trauma. She looked at him, not sure where this was coming from—and specifically why here. “No, I don’t think so.”
He frowned, then nodded. “I understand you’ve been asking a lot of questions, and that usually happens when somebody is struggling.”
“Ah, well, it certainly was upsetting because we were outside that night, and I really didn’t expect to deal with that.”
“Of course not. You were out there?”
“Yes, we’d been sitting outside,” she recalled, with a sad smile, “enjoying the evening air, just looking at the views.”
Richard nodded. “It’s truly beautiful here, isn’t it?”
She had to agree. “Indeed, and that just compounded the whole thing,” she shared. “We didn’t see what happened, so we feel that element of guilt that maybe we missed something. What if we had seen her earlier? She might be fine now.”
Richard gave her a gentle hug. “It’s very nice for you to be so worried, but she was dealing with a very difficult prognosis already.
She was at the end by then. I probably shouldn’t have let her come, but she was so insistent that she would make it through and how it would bring her so much peace that I gave in.
I didn’t feel as if I could deny her the opportunity to do something positive for herself. ”
“Of course,” Eden replied.
“Hopefully you will just let it go now.” With that, Richard smiled genially at her and then headed off to talk to somebody else.
Almost immediately Eric was at her side. “What did Richard say?” he asked.
“Let’s just say it was noted that I’ve been asking too many questions,” she summarized, “and he was hoping that I would let it go. I explained that we had been outside at the time, so we felt a certain amount of guilt that, if we had found her earlier, she might have been okay.”
“I’m sure he thought that was something that you really couldn’t have done, right?”
“No, he didn’t seem to think it was anything we could have helped with.”
Eric just nodded and didn’t say anything more.
“He more or less asked me to stop raising the issue and to stop asking questions.”
“Of course. It’s probably very disruptive to the energy,” he noted in a half-mocking tone.
She winced and then nodded. “It is very disruptive to the energy, which I can even feel myself. So, I guess I can’t really blame him for that.”
Just then, they were called back in for the afternoon session, which ended up going very, very quickly. By the time they were done with their first full day, Eden once again felt pretty wiped out.
Eric found her soon afterward and asked, “Do you want to eat now or maybe go for a walk first?”
“I would love to go for a walk,” she replied, and they headed for the doors. They were called back by one of the organizers to share that dinner would be served soon.
She replied, “No problem. I just want a few minutes of fresh air.”
The man watched them as they left.
As Eden stepped outside, she whispered, “Does that gaze feel a little too directed our way?”
“Absolutely,” Eric confirmed, “but that’s okay. Let’s just see what they do with it.”
She stayed close to him, and he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. They walked slowly out to where they had been the previous night, just wanting a few minutes of peace and quiet.
The man probably wondered if he should follow them.
As Eden and Eric reached the space, she pointed out a barrier, apparently to warn people away. She frowned at it. “Is it really dangerous, do you think?”
“I don’t know,” he muttered in a steady tone, as he studied it.
Eden continued. “It does appear they are trying to stop people from going there, and that could be just a safety consideration for the people here. Also maybe just to keep out people who are potentially looking to investigate.”
Eric nodded. “Don’t look now, but we’re being watched.”
She tried not to stiffen up, but it was hard. As they sat down, and a breeze came up, she jerked around as she thought she heard something. Something way too recognizable.
“What’s the matter?” Eric asked.
“I swear to God”—Eden tilted her head, as another mocking laugh came her way again—“I swear to God, Debbie said something to me, which I didn’t understand. She’s here with us.” Eden’s voice was breathless. “How is that possible?” she muttered.
“I don’t know that it is,” Eric pointed out. “Are you sure it’s Debbie?”
“No, I’m never sure it’s Debbie. I always assume it’s her because once it was her—or so I thought—but there’s always that chance it’s not her at all.” She groaned, then glanced back in the direction where the woman had died. “You don’t think the deceased woman is speaking to me, do you?”
Startled, he shook his head. “No, I don’t think so at all. I don’t think that’s anything to worry about. Not sure we want to do hauntings as a weekend experience either.”
“Yeah, well, you say that, but—”
He again wrapped his arm around her, hugged her close, and added, “I’m sorry this is turning out to be a little more than we expected.”
“You’re not kidding,” she grumbled.
Just then her name was called across the wind. She stiffened and looked around.
Eric frowned and asked, “What’s the matter?”
“Somebody just called my name,” she replied, twisting to look behind her again. “Somebody literally just called my name.”
“I didn’t hear anything. Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
Frowning, he faced her and asked, “And was it earthly?”
She winced. “I don’t know.” She slumped back beside him and clarified, “I would have thought so, but I really don’t know.”
Just then, it came again.
Eden.
She stiffened. Eric eyed her, questions in his expression, and she asked, “You heard that too? It’s not just me, right?” But, when they both turned, nothing was there. No one was there.
She cried out, “I feel as if I’m going crazy.” Then she frowned. “You know, Debbie did mention something about that.”
“What do you mean?”
“She told me once about feeling as if she were going crazy.”
“When?”
“Recently,” she replied. “I never even thought about it until just now.”
He stared at her. “Want to give me some context to go with that?”
“I don’t know that I can,” she conceded. “I’ll have to think about it and see if I can remember more about that. It was during our joint seminar weekend.”