Chapter 18
I rushed down the stairs. Ty stood at the front door, Georgie having just opened it. They turned at the sound of my feet clomping down the stairs.
‘You have a visitor, Sal,’ she said.
I approached the front door, wondering what Nancy meant by ‘backup plan’. Ty was shifting from one foot to the other, his eyes wide as though on high alert and he was scratching his arm and his cheek, like I do when I’m nervous or trying to hide something.
He saw her, I remembered. He saw Nancy last night, if only for a brief moment. Had she appeared to him a few minutes ago and freaked him out?
‘Hi, hey, how are you? I’m ah…’ he said, then gestured behind him with his thumb. ‘Could we have a word outside?’
I turned briefly to my friends and motioned out the door with my hand. They seemed curious but understanding. Probably thought we needed to discuss our kiss last night. Which we probably did, but that would have to wait.
I closed the door and we moved to the side of the porch where we weren’t visible through the windows, unless my friends were hiding beside one of them with their ears to the wall.
Ty couldn’t keep still. ‘This is going to sound really weird, and you can tell me to get lost if you like, but… you don’t happen to need a lift to Wattle Falls by any chance, do you?’ He shoved his hands into his pockets then took them out again.
My mouth gaped open and a surprised sound escaped. ‘Oh my God. Yes, I do,’ I said, and he exhaled in relief. ‘You’ve seen her again, haven’t you? The woman in the purple polka dot pyjamas?’
‘Huh? What? Who?’ he spoke in short sharp bursts, consistent with his highly confused and agitated state.
I turned to make sure no one was eavesdropping then moved closer to him. ‘It’s okay, I’ve seen her too. I was just as shocked as you are now.’
‘You don’t seem shocked.’
‘That’s because I’ve been hanging out with the ghost all weekend. I’m kinda used to her now.’ I smiled.
‘Whoa, this is…’ He ran his hands through his short, dark strands of hair. ‘Is this for real? Did someone put something in our drinks last night, or maybe that hot chocolate was a bit dodgy, I don’t know.’
‘Ty, it’s real. Her name’s Nancy and she’s, well, she’s not like us.’ I gestured to our bodies. ‘Only we can see her. ’
‘That’s because you two are the most receptive.’
We both snapped our heads to the direction of the voice that had suddenly appeared beside us.
‘Argh!’ Ty flinched and stumbled backwards a little, regaining his balance and taking hold of the column attached to the porch. I’d never seen him so freaked out; all his confidence and certainty was gone. ‘How is this possible? What’s going on?’ Confused mumblings kept launching from his mouth.
‘I think it’s because you’re both in the caring professions or something, I’m not sure. Or that you’ve both had a big impact on your lives by death. Makes you more receptive to other energies, like mine.’
‘What? I haven’t lost anyone,’ I said.
‘I mean your patients,’ she explained. ‘You’ve been around death a lot. And, Ty, I’m sorry about your parents.’
He eyed us both and mumbled an awkward, ‘Thanks.’
I spoke to Ty. ‘Nancy was the one who told me where to find Greg last night. If it wasn’t for her I wouldn’t have found out the truth.’
‘So, you were, like, sent here to help Sally or something?’ Ty asked.
‘Something like that,’ she replied. ‘But also because I…’
‘She needs our help,’ I said .
‘Right. And I take it this has something to do with Wattle Falls? She wouldn’t leave me alone until I drove here to offer you a lift. Kept freaking me out and badgering me with flying objects.’ He slid a slightly annoyed glance in Nancy’s direction.
I held back a chuckle, I could imagine her doing that. She’d freaked me out too at first, but now things had changed I could look at the situation more objectively. Ty was still in the processing stage, trying to decide if he was hallucinating or really seeing the spirit of someone who had died.
‘Sorry about that,’ she said. ‘I had to get you here today, before Sally goes home tomorrow.’
Ty and I exchanged a knowing glance. Today, that’s all we had. Not much time to make sense of what had happened last night or decide where to go from here. Though I knew there was no way I could start anything with him with all that had happened. Like he’d said, I was on the rebound, very freshly on the rebound, and last night was a mistake. Enjoyable and extremely pleasant, but a mistake nonetheless. I dropped my gaze when it strayed to his lips and I remembered what they’d felt like.
‘Wattle Falls is where I lived. Where my husband still lives.’ Nancy dropped her gaze too.
I explained everything to Ty. I kept it fairly brief so as to not upset Nancy with the memory, but gave him enough detail so that he knew how important it was to set things right. Not that he was obligated to meet Nancy’s husband with me, but a lift and some moral support would be welcome.
Ty looked at Nancy with less fear and confusion in his eyes and more sympathy. His posture straightened a little and his fidgeting had stopped. ‘I’ll help. We’ll both help you.’ His eyes garnered my agreement.
Nancy smiled. ‘Thank you, so much.’
Ty smiled too. ‘All in a day’s work.’ He glanced at me and I grinned. His job description was becoming more varied by the minute. ‘Nice PJs by the way,’ he said to Nancy.
A warm feeling grew inside me. Now that’s the Ty I’ve come to know!
After telling the girls Ty was taking me for a leisurely country drive (and winking at them so they assumed we wanted to be alone to discuss last night), we left for Wattle Falls. Nancy said if she disappeared occasionally it was only because she was nervous. But she promised she’d be there when we met her husband.
‘Thanks for doing this,’ I said to Ty. ‘I’m guessing it’s not every day a woman asks you to drive her to a widower’s house to tell him his dead wife has a message for him. ’
‘Doesn’t happen that often, no,’ he replied. Every now and again he’d shake his head in disbelief and say, ‘I can’t believe it. I can’t believe this is happening.’
I was relieved someone else knew about her. I didn’t feel so weird anymore.
‘So she was here this whole weekend? Even when I was at the house?’ Ty asked.
‘Yep. All the time.’
‘During my strip?’
I chuckled. ‘ Especially during your strip. If only you could have seen her then. Her dancing was nowhere near as good as yours though.’
Ty clicked his fingers. ‘That’s why you laughed. I’m right, yes?’
‘Yes. She was mocking your movements and I was having trouble keeping my composure. That’s why I said out loud that I wanted it to stop.’
‘You said ‘red’, what was that about?’
‘That’s what I called her up until this afternoon, when she finally revealed her name.’
Ty tipped his head back in understanding. ‘Red. Good nickname,’ he said. ‘The candles on the dinner table that night, was that her?’
‘Correct. ’
‘And what about the Winter Solstice Festival, was she there too?’
I cringed at the memory. ‘My little performance? Courtesy of Her Royal Ghostness. She was tugging me sideways and I had to keep resisting, to stay with my friends. Before I knew it I’d camouflaged the awkward situation with line-dancing. Got into the spirit of it and thought, “what the heck?”’
‘Ha! I knew there was something more going on with you. And the gemstone down your top?’
‘Red’s fault.’
Ty laughed. ‘Sounds like she’s been the life of the party.’
‘Ironic, hey? Oh, and you can also blame her for the bruise on your foot. I was trying to dislodge her from my shopping trolley.’
‘Aha, so that’s why you were going so fast around the corner.’ He slowed as a car ahead stopped to turn off the road, then resumed normal speed. ‘And let me guess, she’s the reason you got stuck in the pub toilets?’
‘Oh God. I’m so embarrassed about that.’ I shook my head. ‘She made the lock break, and well, I made my own trouble from then on.’
Ty laughed again. ‘What a sight that was, seeing you stuck under that door. Barron Springs has never been so entertaining. ’
‘Gee, thanks. I’ll probably go down in history as the “toilet woman” or something.’
‘Nah, to me you’ll always be Sexy Sally.’ He smiled, and our midnight rendezvous jumped to the front of my mind again. It must have jumped to Ty’s too, because he didn’t say anything further for the next few minutes.
‘Ty,’, ‘Sally,’ we both spoke at the same time.
‘Sorry, you go,’ he said.
‘I was going to say… last night, it was… well, I don’t ever do things like that. I’m not normally like that. I don’t want you to think…’
‘I don’t think anything bad about you. I was concerned for you, and I let my attraction to you take over. I’m sorry.’
The idea that a hot-as-fire stripper thought of me as attractive was as difficult to believe as the idea of seeing ghosts. I never thought someone like him would be drawn to a Plain Jane like me.
‘Don’t be sorry. I’m extremely flattered.’ I could feel my face becoming pink as we spoke. ‘And it was… amazing, last night. But you were right. It all happened too fast, and we should probably just leave it in the past.’
He clamped his lips together and nodded .
‘Wait, you two did the hokey-pokey last night? How did I not know this?’ Nancy suddenly piped up, sitting in the back seat and leaning forward between us in the front.
‘Oh, hello again,’ I said. ‘And no, we didn’t do the “hokey-pokey” as you call it, not that it’s any of your business, you nosey thing.’ I shot her a teasing look.
‘Oh, so you like, just kissed or something?’
‘Gee, you are a nosey thing, aren’t you?’ Ty said.
‘Well there’s a slight shortage of gossip on my side of the world and I could do with a fix,’ she explained. ‘So was it good? Is he better than Greg, Sally?’
‘Nancy!’ I exclaimed. ‘I think that’s enough of this topic. Discussion over.’ I glared at her in embarrassment, but when Ty’s focus turned back to the road I eyed her and gave surreptitious thumbs-up sign. She bounced up and down in satisfaction.
‘I think you two would make a great couple,’ she added. ‘Ty and Sally. Sally and Ty. Tysally. Has a nice ring to it.’ She tapped her chin.
‘Enough,’ I said, though I knew she was just trying to distract from the upcoming task. The distraction was temporary, though, and she gulped as we slowed and turned into Bentley Street, Wattle Falls, then pulled up outside number 15.