10
Vicky wasn’t in danger, but Dick had to be rescued. As Vicky put it, he’d fallen and couldn’t get up. Sebastien explained
that the older man lowered himself onto a barstool, miscalculated, and landed on his back. Matty gave him a hand, tried to
lift him up, but Dick yelped with pain. The manager called an ambulance. Dick was wheeled out of the bar on a gurney, feetfirst
but very much alive.
Daphne met them at the ER. An X-ray showed a displaced fracture to the tailbone. Arrangements were made for him to be air
evacuated home. The rest of the group ordered a ride and returned to The Aurora.
Jules climbed the stairs to her room, exhausted. For a long while, she lay awake, staring at the ceiling, a ribbon of fear
coiled around her heart, keeping her breath shallow. The ghost tour had left its mark on her psyche. If Leo hadn’t been there,
his touch grounding her, she might’ve lost her mind.
Jules could not explain what she’d experienced while riding around the city on that trolly. From the beginning, every landmark
the guide had pointed out—houses, hospitals, churches, and bars—glowed with a strange light. At the memorial ground where
the children were laid to rest, golden orbs shimmered like fireflies.
There was no one she could share this with. They’d all think she was insane.
Restless, she slipped out of bed, drawn to the window.
Housekeeping had lowered the blinds and drawn the drapes, but she reversed that as soon as she walked into her room.
The view of the garden enchanted her. Now, in the night, the pergola gleamed invitingly.
In no time, she was out the door and down the stairs, making her way to the ground floor on tiptoe.
Everyone was on edge. If a floorboard creaked, they’d be out of their rooms, chasing her down with pitchforks.
Jules stepped out into the night. The air had a chilly current, which shocked her considering the day’s oppressive heat. She
made her way to the lone bench beneath the pergola, but step by step got no closer. Feeling unsteady, she lowered herself
onto the grass and watched, horrified, as the night sky receded, dragging away the house.
This is a dream. This is a nightmare.
A second veil of darkness covered the garden. Jules could not see past her hand. She couldn’t hear a thing, not the hum of
life or her own heartbeat. If she stayed on the ground, she’d die tonight. She was certain of it. Struggling for balance,
she pushed herself onto her feet. A deep breath. Another. One step. Another. She made it to the bench and dropped her head
in her hands until her heart rate steadied.
She was alone in the garden . . . until she wasn’t.
When Jules looked up, her mother was there. No, not her mother . . . a reflection floating on the surface of a lake or sliding
off glass.
The resemblance was striking, but not wholly convincing.
She wore a plain cotton dress, no shoes, no earrings, no rings on her fingers.
Her brown skin was ashen. Her hair was twisted into two short braids.
Her hands were delicate, whereas Ruby, a tailor, had strong, capable hands.
And she was young. Jules had never known her mother so young.
Ruby Jones was thirty-seven when she died, but here, before her, she couldn’t be more than nineteen.
Still, there had to be a time, well before Jules was born, when Ruby, not yet defined by motherhood, had delicate hands and a youthful figure.
What of that blank expression? Would her mother ever look at her like that?
With frosty curiosity, no warmth? Had she changed that much?
She was no longer the girl Ruby had left behind.
Did she even recognize Jules as her own?
Who are you?
No one uttered the question, yet it stretched between them, an unnatural river flowing both ways.
A light flickered on in the tower and stole her attention. Jules looked up and, through the shuttered windows, spotted Leo.
It shouldn’t have moved her the way it did, Leo in the tower, rummaging around, reading glasses on, brown hair tousled. Seeing
him shouldn’t hold her attention, shouldn’t fascinate her like it did. He’d held her hand in the trolley, came searching for
her when she was feeling alone, kissed her under a streetlamp. And now he was the light in the darkest night. She watched
him grab something off the desk, switch off the light, and leave the tower. By then, she’d snapped out of the trance. One
by one, the stars regained their glow. And once again, she was alone in the night.
Jules fled the garden. She raced into the house without a care for squeaky floorboards. She crossed the lobby, past the night
clerk dozing in a chair, and rushed up the grand staircase. She knocked on the first door she encountered. No answer. She
tested the knob. A hall closet. Next door. She knocked and Leo answered without even a moment’s delay. She took a step back,
unsure of what to say or even why she’d come. They faced each other, her breathing erratic, his calm and regular. Finally,
he reached out and cupped her face. “What’s wrong?”
Nothing was wrong. That’s what she had come to tell him. She wasn’t losing her mind. If anything, she was broadening it, seeing the world as it truly was with all that was seen and unseen. But she couldn’t get the words out fast enough, and then it was too late.
“Is that Jules?” Vicky called out from inside the suite. “Hey! Get in here! Why haven’t you answered my texts?”
With some reluctance, Leo stepped out of the way and let her through. They were all gathered in the seating area, this being
the only room that had one. Even Ayesha had joined them in her ruby silk robe and matching headscarf. The topic? The curse
of the bar of silver and how it might or might not have caused Dick’s misfortune.
“Why did he pick it up?” Ayesha wondered. “He was warned the thing was cursed.”
“Perhaps because we were chanting Pick it up! Pick it up!” Matty replied.
“You guys play too much,” Ayesha said. “That’s your problem.”
Sebastien agreed with Ayesha. “We should have a bit more respect for the local beliefs.”
“What do you think, Jules?” Vicky asked.
“Um.” She hadn’t thought of Dick at all. “It could be a curse, or karma.”
“Either way, I’ll pray for him,” Ayesha said. “Tomorrow is going to be a long day. Let’s get some sleep.”
“Hard to imagine a day longer than this one,” Matty said, even as he trailed Ayesha out the door. Sebastien thanked Leo for
his hospitality and followed the others. Vicky took Jules by the arm, leaving her no choice but to join the procession.
On her way out, she met Leo’s eyes, saw the disappointment there, and looked away. Her own disappointment flared when the
door clicked shut behind her.
“It was definitely the curse,” Vicky whispered, on their way down the stairs. “Think of it. What are the odds?”
“Hmm . . .” Jules assumed the odds of a drunk falling down drunk on a Friday night in a crowded bar were pretty damn high.
“By the way, we called off tonight’s séance,” Vicky said. “But tell us if you see something.”
Jules felt uneasy. Now that the ghost had a face and the face was her mother’s, the idea of summoning spirits lost all appeal.
Had they judged the spirit world too harshly? The mundanity of the afterlife with the roaming of the halls, knocking on doors,
revisiting old haunts . . . What if they were trying to reach us the only way they knew how?
“Maybe we should leave the ghosts alone,” Jules suggested.
“No way!” Vicky cried. “Matty is right. We have a professional obligation to see this through.”
“What for?” Jules asked, insistent. “And what if we’ve got it wrong?”
They had reached Vicky’s bedroom on the ground floor. She patted the pockets of her pajamas searching for the key. “How so?”
“What if these . . . ghosts . . . aren’t trying to scare us, but connect with us?”
Vicky echoed her question. “What for?”
“Because life doesn’t end, not like we think,” Jules replied, “and people will always yearn for connection. We’re the ones
who’ve made it out to be a horror picture. We’ve made careers out of it.”
“Ghosts are not our friends, Jules!”
“Says who?” Jules asked. “We invent the stories and write the books with little to no understanding of life or death or anything
in between. What if there’s nothing to be afraid of?”
Jules had felt no fear when her mother had appeared to her, only curiosity and some lingering resentment at her cold demeanor. Then again, why would she fear her own mother? Had she encountered the ghost of a vengeful pirate, for example, she might have reacted differently.
“Fine. I’ll keep an open mind,” Vicky said. “But just in case, wear this.”
She removed one of her necklaces and fastened it around Jules’s neck. An evil eye, dangling off a gold chain.