Chapter 2
CHAPTER 2
Colt couldn’t imagine his old friend turning his back on family. Sure, Jack had a temper and could go off on anyone about anything, but he wasn’t one to stay mad for long. He’d blow up about one thing or another and walk away, but after he cooled off he always came back. Colt knew the drill. He and his best friend from the old days had had more than a few disagreements. In the end they made up and there were no hard feelings.
They’d drifted apart years ago, as high school friends often do. Jack had moved on, doing what he did best. He made money for himself and for other people, constantly on the lookout for the next great investment. The next one would be it , the deal to make him a rich man. Colt had gotten a degree in advertising and moved to Pensacola, where he made a little money and a few new friends. He’d met Lizzie at a co-worker’s birthday party. Six months later they’d gotten married. During those wonderful days she’d been his only focus. She’d become his new family, his best friend, his reason for being. It was only natural that he and his childhood friends would lose touch. But with family…
Jack had argued frequently with his father since the age of ten, but he adored his mother and his sister. What would make him walk away and stay gone?
Colt tried to remember the last time he’d talked to Jack in person. More than five years, he thought, but not much more. Six, maybe? Jack had turned on the charm and asked if his old buddy wanted to invest in a restaurant that was sure to be the next big thing. He hadn’t stuck around long after the so-called opportunity was rejected. Colt understood his friend’s flaws too well. Jack was a charmer, a sweet-talker, you could even say a user.
Flaws he’d overlooked as a young man. Would he dismiss them now? Probably not.
Anna stuck around for a while, a little longer than she needed to. She’d finished her coffee and asked for a refill, drank the second cup slowly then browsed the depot for several minutes before saying goodbye. He got the feeling she wasn’t all that eager to return home.
She wasn’t his last customer of the day, but she and the memories she’d stirred up stayed on his mind as others came and went. A few of them were locals, regular buyers or browsers. Others were tourists, exploring the charming town for the day. They looked around the place, some of them buying and others not. None seemed aware of the ghostly activity around them.
Seawolf Beach was definitely charming. There was no town square, no common area designated as downtown. Instead there was a three block section of four main streets; an oblong grid made up of an interesting mix of new buildings and old. Small strip centers had been built next to colorful houses which had been turned into artist studios, restaurants, and bakeries or ice cream shops. A couple of the restaurants had decent bars and usually hosted live music on the weekends, sometimes during the week in prime tourist season.
A few businesses existed beyond the most popular area; they were sometimes mixed in with small homes, where commercial property and residential mingled for a block or two. A few of the brick buildings in the downtown area and beyond sported wrought iron features. From the right angle, it looked as if New Orleans and Key West had had a baby, and here it stood.
It was the town that brought tourists in, not the beach. The actual beach was narrow, the sand was more gray than white, and the water wasn’t the clear aqua one might find on the gulf if you moved to the east. The view to either side wasn’t at all charming. There were casinos in one direction and a shipyard in the other.
Imperfect as the actual beach was, when you focused straight ahead the gulf was magnificent. Vast, powerful, endless. Colt ran there at least four mornings a week. It was just a few blocks from the depot to the beach, a mere two blocks from the little blue house on Jasmine Street where he’d lived until a couple of years ago, when the price he could get for it as a rental had become too tempting. The ghost of the long-dead pirate who spoke with such an old, deep British accent that he and Colt could barely communicate didn’t help matters at all.
However he got there, once he reached the beach he’d take a turn in one direction or another and enjoy the fresh air, the sound of the waves, and peace.
The ghosts never bothered him there. Not even the pirate.
Pretty much everywhere else he was fair game.
A handful of regulars haunted the depot. People had been living on this land for hundreds, thousands of years. What was now a record shop had once been a busy train depot. Ghosts passed through, some lingering, many… not. Eventually most of the spirits moved on, but there were a few that had been stuck for more than a hundred years. Judging by the numbers, he assumed most who died moved on immediately, or soon after death. Otherwise his depot would be packed to the rafters.
He could estimate when the ghosts died by their clothing. Some were well dressed from one period of time or another, others wore pajamas and walked around on ghostly bare feet. Those that came through might be well-dressed or in rags, a reminder that death came for all no matter how well-to-do or poor they were. He suspected spirits went into the afterlife dressed as they’d been when they died. Made him really hope that when his time came he didn’t drop dead in the shower…
Maude was his newest addition, and she seemed to be enjoying her time as a ghost. Some days she enjoyed it too much. She wore a pretty colorful blouse and a plain blue skirt, with short-heeled black shoes and a smattering of brightly colored costume jewelry.
A handful of geeky looking kids often met at his store after school. Vinyl was the new thing, to them at least. They rarely bought anything, but they drank coffee and leafed through old albums and talked about video games and what was going on at school. Christopher – don’t call him Chris – worked at the depot on the weekend on an irregular basis. For the employee discount, he claimed.
Maude was trying to have a little fun with the kids this afternoon. She followed a pair of high school juniors, Christopher and his friend Bryson, as they checked out the Classic Rock section. She moved close, stood on her tiptoes, and blew on Bryson’s neck. Then again. The third time he reached back and rubbed his nape vigorously. Maude jumped up and down and squealed in glee. It was a squeal only Colt could hear.
She didn’t mess with Christopher, at least not today. Maybe she’d tried with him too many times and gotten no response, so she’d decided to move on to someone more susceptible than others.
How much could the spirits influence the living? He still didn’t know, not with any certainty. Until his accident he hadn’t believed in ghosts. He’d awakened in a hospital bed to find a crowd of people leaning over him. They were young and old and they all chattered. They asked questions that made no sense, not to him.
They weren’t living people, he soon found out. For a while, a very little while, he’d thought what he saw was purely imagination, maybe a side effect of brain trauma or pain meds. It would go away soon, right?
A dozen years, and he still saw them. At least now he could tell the difference between the living and the dead. The spirits looked solid enough, but there was something different about the ghosts. A glow. A vibe.
He’d spent weeks in the hospital after the drunk ran a red light and killed Lizzie. The asshole was still in jail, as far as Colt knew, but he was alive. The bastard deserved to be haunted, but that was unlikely. No, the haunting had been reserved for Colt.
After the wreck his parents had visited him, staying in Pensacola until Colt was able to function on his own. They were both gone now. Neither’s ghost had shown up in the depot or anywhere else, but they’d done their best to support him while they’d been living. To be there. His work friends had been supportive, too, until the ghosts who refused to go away made even the simplest interaction awkward.
Jack had made the trip to Pensacola. Once. He hadn’t stuck around long enough to get a full dose of Colt trying and failing to handle his invisible friends.
He’d just seen Jack a couple of times after that, when his old friend came to town for a quick visit. It was always a quick visit, as if Jack couldn’t wait to get out of town and back to his new life.
Colt cleared his throat. All three of the beings by the Classic Rock section — living and dead — turned to look at him. The kids soon turned back to the Led Zeppelin stack, which was always pretty sparse, but Maude just smiled. He waved her over; as she neared he whispered, “Leave them alone.”
“Why?” she asked. “I’m not going to hurt anyone. I don’t think I can, can I? Hmm. Anyway, I’m just practicing.”
He turned to face the back wall. The kids didn’t need to know he was talking to air. “Practicing for what?”
“Haunting,” she whispered, even though she could shout and only he would hear.
Colt raised his eyebrows, did his best to give her a censuring look.
“Well, what’s the good of being a ghost if you can’t haunt anyone?”
“Who’s your target?”
Maude smiled. “There are several I’d like to scare a bit, before I move on. I’m pretty sure Betty stole my pearl earrings, though she denied it and I could never prove anything. I made a casserole for Teddy when he moved in, and he never returned the dish. And Patsy…”
“Are a litany of minor grievances holding you here?” he asked.
“My pearl earrings and my favorite casserole dish are not minor,” she argued haughtily.
The boys walked out right at closing time. Colt locked the door and added up the receipts for the day, and left twenty minutes later. As he locked the door behind him he saw a group of ghosts gathered around the front desk. Some of them waved. Even Gerald. Colt looked to the left and to the right to make sure no one else was around, and then he gave them a small wave.
It was always best to keep peace with his deceased companions. When they were unhappy they weren’t shy about letting him know. If Maude could remain earthbound over crockery and a pair of earrings, it would definitely not be a good idea to snub her.
He started walking south, past the bakery that had closed hours earlier, then past a bright pink house that housed a popular art gallery. He walked by a small cafe where he sometimes grabbed dinner. He’d swing by later, but first he had to collect the overdue rent from one of his renters. He really should hire a company to manage the properties, but he didn’t mind doing it himself. Goodness knows he needed to get out of the depot now and again. His dad had been a contractor, and though Colt had no desire to follow in his father’s footsteps he’d picked up enough skills to be a decent handyman.
Two more blocks and he’d be there. He hoped there was no trouble. The old guy that had been renting the little white house on Pine Street was almost three months overdue. It was a pain to evict a tenant, but it could be done with time and dedication.
Almost instinctively, he turned a block early. He wasn’t eager for the confrontation with his tenant, and his brief discussion with Anna had stirred up a lot of old memories. She said her Mom had records she wanted to get rid of. Might as well look them over and see if there was anything valuable in the collection. It was unlikely, but not impossible. There were treasures out there. There were treasures everywhere.
He was a pirate of sorts in his own time, he supposed.
As he approached the two-story yellow house, Colt came to a stop. Jack sat on the porch. Jack, who Anna said hadn’t spoken to his family for five years. Jack, his oldest friend.
No wonder no one had heard from him. Jack wasn’t carrying a grudge; he was dead.
Anna glanced out the window when movement caught her eye. Colt stood on the sidewalk, staring at the house. She couldn’t hear him, but she read his lips. Fuck . He said the word many, many times, before he turned and walked away.
She watched him go, wondering why he’d come and why he’d left so soon. What made him look at her house and curse that way?
Not that she had time to worry about Cold Heart.
“Are you sure you don’t want my collectible plates?”
Anna turned away from the window. Her mother was distressed, as she’d been for the past several days. More so, as she waved an Elvis plate in the air.
“I’m sure.”
“These have to be worth something. You can sell them online.”
Anna smiled. “ You can sell them online.”
Nina Miller, sixty-six years old, five feet even tall, gray haired since the age of forty-five, pouted. “That’s so much trouble.”
“Put them in the donate box.”
“The donate box is full.”
“I’ll get another one.”
Anna put Colt out of her mind and went to the dining room, which was filled with boxes marked donate , keep , or Anna . There was a new box in the mix. Jack . There wasn’t much in it. Anna bit her tongue. She wanted so badly to tell her mom to put the plates in Jack’s box.
“Jack might want this one,” Nina said as she walked into the dining room.
Not again… “Mom, he’s not coming home. If he was going to he’d be here by now.”
“He might not know his dad is gone.”
He doesn’t care! Again Anna bit her tongue. “I’m sorry, but he made it very clear in that last text…”
“He was angry when he wrote that. I’m sure he didn’t mean it.”
Since it had been more than five years since they’d seen or heard from her brother, he’d meant it. I can’t be a part of this family anymore. Not coming back, ever. Have a nice life. I know I will. He’d even added a line of various happy emojis and one yellow middle finger as an exclamation point.
Jack had always been kind of a jerk, though there had been moments when he wasn’t at his worst. She had a handful of pleasant memories of her brother, but he’d always been prone to attacking the people who loved him the most. She didn’t know for sure, but he had the personality of one of those little boys who’d pull a girl’s pigtails if he liked her. If he was disappointed or angry, it couldn’t be because of something he’d done. No, he blamed everyone around him. Twice he’d almost gotten married, but both women had wisely seen the light before they said “I do.”
Or maybe Jack had scared them off because he couldn’t stand the idea of being committed to anyone.
He’d worked for investment companies early on, but was more comfortable on his own. Jack would find opportunities, wrangle investors, and in the end take a cut for his trouble. He loved numbers, and he really loved making money. He did a little day trading also, and seemed to do okay. He’d done well, or at least he claimed to. Knowing Jack it was possible he only mentioned the good deals, never the bad.
He could’ve done all that in Seawolf Beach, bought a house and set up an office here, but he never had. No, he’d come and gone like a vagabond, working in big cities all over the country for months at a time, then coming home for a few weeks to regroup before moving on. He wasn’t one to stay, but he always came back. Until he didn’t.
Anna had looked for her brother a few times over the past five years, but finding someone with the common name Jack Miller who moved around and worked at home wasn’t easy. The cops weren’t exactly interested in looking for a man who’d broken ties with his family and taken off of his own free will.
A few years ago she’d hired a private investigator to look for him. The PI hadn’t had much luck, though he’d managed to trace Jack’s phone from Seawolf Beach on the night he’d left, to Birmingham, Alabama, then to Nashville — her new home — and then to New York City, where eventually the phone went silent.
Her brother didn’t even want them to have a phone number for him. He really had severed all ties.
Eventually she’d given up. Why look for a person who doesn’t want to have anything to do with you? She’d let Jack go years ago. Her mom had not.
“It was just money,” Nina said softly. “Jack lost some of our savings, and your Dad was so mad. They both said horrible things, but when it comes to family…”
God, she didn’t want to have this conversation again.
“I saw Colt today,” Anna said, changing the subject.
“At his record store, I suppose,” Nina said.
“I went in for coffee. He looks good,” she added.
Nina pursed her lips and gave a little snort. “Coltrane is an odd duck. I mean, he seems intelligent enough, so why on earth is he wasting his time in that old record store? He could do better.”
Like Jack? Anna kept that thought to herself. “He seems to be doing fine.”
Nina placed the prized Elvis plate on the dining room table, not in Jack’s box. Maybe they needed a dumpster…
The plate, which had seemed to be solidly in place, moved. Just a little at first, but soon it spun, flipped, and crashed to the floor a couple of feet from the doorway to the kitchen.
“How in the hell…” Anna began.
Her mother waved off her concern. “I think the house must be settling, or else we’re having little earthquakes. That’s the fourth plate I’ve lost this week!”
Colt realized long before he reached the front door that his delinquent tenant had left, probably sneaking out in the middle of the night. Why was it that people who slipped away in the night never took their shit with them? There was a stained mattress on the porch, dirty clothing piled in both of the front porch rocking chairs, and a big black bag of trash on the front steps not a dozen steps from the garbage can.
Dammit, he’d just painted this house before the old guy moved in. White, with blue shutters. It was a small but nice cottage with a couple of old trees on the lot. The neighborhood was good. If the interior didn’t need much work he could rent it again. Maybe to someone who’d pay on time.
Colt had a key to the place on his keyring, but he didn’t need it. The front door was unlocked. The living room was filthy. There were food wrappers, crumbs, and beer cans scattered all around and actual dirt here and there, but he didn’t see any actual damage. What the hell was that smell? The odor wafted from yet another black plastic garbage bag that hadn’t made it to the front porch. He took care of that first, opening the door and dropping the bag outside. Yeah, that was the source.
The place stunk and needed a thorough cleaning, but there were no holes in the walls, no food stains on the ceiling. That was something.
Over the years he’d learned to temper his expectations.
Colt opened the kitchen window to let in the fresh air that was badly needed. That done he walked down the hallway to check the bedrooms. There were two, and one small bathroom. Halfway down the short hallway, he stopped.
It was quiet. Still. In the past the spirits of a child and a young woman who looked to have been here since the sixties had roamed the small house. He hated the ghosts of children most of all. They just seemed so wrong. Was it possible the Pine Street ghosts were gone? Had he actually found a ghost-free house?
It wouldn’t be this way long, he suspected, but maybe he could stay here while it was quiet. Maude was all over the depot, her new home. She was more active than most spirits he encountered. Maybe once she took revenge for her casserole dish and earrings she’d move on, but for now she was an annoyance.
Seeing her at work all day was one thing, but in spite of his requests she continued to show up in his personal space on the second floor.
Now and then while he was in the shower.
He needed peace. He needed a break from the damn ghosts.
Like Jack.
He’d intended to talk to Mrs. Miller and Anna about the records this evening, maybe look through and see if there was anything worth selling. Once he’d seen Jack, that had changed.
When it came to ghosts the rules, such as they were, seemed to vary. He hadn’t been able to nail down anything specific, and it wasn’t like there was a support group he could call on for instruction. As far as he could tell ghosts tended to stay near to where they died. Sometimes super close, other times within a mile or so.
Which meant Jack hadn’t run off and stayed gone. He’d never left; he’d died in or near the house where he’d grown up.
Since there was no rule book that was just supposition, but Colt had never known a ghost to travel far from the site of death.
Which left him with a dilemma. Did he tell Anna and her mother that Jack was dead? How could he explain that away? He kept his ability quiet, as much as possible. Over the years the women he’d told about what he could do, what he saw and heard, hadn’t stuck around long enough to spread the word. His mother had known, though to be honest he was pretty sure she believed he was seeing things due to a head injury and losing his wife of less than a year so violently. She’d humored him.
Should he keep what he knew to himself and try to figure out what had happened to Jack on his own? He had no investigative experience, but how hard could it be? He was pretty good with a computer. If he asked the right questions…
Maybe Jack could lead the way. If he knew what had happened to him, where his body was, maybe there would be an alternate way to spin the story.
This house wasn’t a complete disaster, but it was in need of a deep cleaning and some decent furniture. The place had been rented furnished, but all but a few pieces needed to be replaced. The mattress that had once been in the spare bedroom was currently on the front porch, and in no shape to be moved back inside. There was a bed in the primary bedroom, but the mattress dipped in the middle. One leg of the old wooden bed seemed to be shorter than the others. How the hell had that happened? People could be shits when it came to other people’s belongings.
Still, with a little work this place could be home for a while. If he decided he didn’t like it he’d move back to his apartment on the second floor of the depot and rent this cottage out again. There was always someone looking for a place to stay in Seawolf Beach. Short term, long term, his properties were in demand.
Seawolf Beach, home to a kick-ass music festival, the last of the Harts and his record store, and Jack Miller’s ghost.
Unfortunately, Jack was not alone.