Chapter 21 #2
“Well, hello there,” said a voice from the couch.
Rebecca and Sara Johnson were cuddled together under a large blanket.
Sitting in an armchair off to the side was a preteen engrossed in his phone.
I vaguely recognized him as one of the kids who’d run around with Adam and figured he was Tyler—the kid whose bedroom I’d commandeered.
Sitting on the floor at his feet was Adam.
Big Mike and Sage also sat on the floor with their legs squished under a coffee table.
The room was way too small for this many people.
The front room of my house was three times this size, although Agatha’s old television was way too small.
Everyone looked up as I came down the stairs.
“How are you feeling?” asked Rebecca. She paused the movie.
“Like I fell off a horse,” I said. “Did I fall off a horse?”
Rebecca chuckled. “You did. Let Sara take a look at you.”
Sara stood, stretching her back. She said, “Full disclosure, I already took a look at you when you were unconscious. Didn’t really want to have a dead visitor in my son’s bedroom and I was the one who discharged you, so I had to make sure you weren’t permanently broken.”
“Uh, thanks.” I stood behind the couch and let her poke and prod at me until she was satisfied that I wouldn’t keel over on her watch.
When Sara was done, she sat back down on the couch. “Why don’t you join us? Tyler can sit on the floor.” Tyler looked up from his phone but didn’t move.
“I should . . .”
“They’re not going to let you leave and go back to that old house,” Mike said. He had a bowl of popcorn in his lap. “This is a mandatory family movie night.”
“Family ... oh, shit. There’s someone I need to call.” I patted my sweatpants, looking for my phone. Apparently, I was wearing sweatpants—they must have belonged to Rebecca. She wasn’t as tall as me but had a similar boyish figure. Sara, on the other hand, was very short and all curves.
Rebecca, Sara, and Mike all looked at one another as if they were deciding whether to believe me.
“I do have someone—my cousin. She’s pissed at me right now, but I need to let her know I’m here. Yeah, I know, I should’ve said something earlier, but my head was kind of in the clouds.”
Rebecca got up from the couch. “Your phone is in my purse.” She led me into the hallway and rummaged around in a purse hanging from the coatrack mounted on the wall.
It held a variety of kids’ jackets, hats, and cloth grocery bags.
From the purse, she produced my phone. The screen was cracked, but it still turned on.
I dialed Yasmin, wondering if she would pick up.
“What do you want?” she said, answering after the third ring.
I let out the breath I’d been holding until she picked up. Rebecca had returned to the living room, but they hadn’t resumed the movie. No one was looking at me, but they were clearly all listening. I cleared my throat. “Hey, so, uh—”
“If you’re calling to apologize, I do not accept, Gibson. It was extremely rude of you to kick me out, and you know I don’t even have keys to the house. Annabelle had to let me back in to get my curling iron.”
“You use a curling iron? I thought your hair was just like that.”
“That’s not the point! Where are you?”
“I had an ... accident.” There was silence from the other end, then a rustling. “I’m okay, but I kind of ... fell off a horse.” I winced, picturing Yasmin’s pinched face.
“You fell off a—”
“Gibson!” Annabelle’s beautiful, worried voice cut in. “What happened? Are you all right?”
Despite myself, I smiled at the sound of her voice.
“I’m fine, Marley, just a little banged up.
I’m at the Johnsons’ house. They’re ...
I’ll send Yasmin the location.” Putting them on speaker phone, I swiped over to my maps app and sent the location of Burn Your Bridges Barbershop to Yasmin via text.
“I’ll be right there,” Annabelle said.
“Wait, Annabelle—” There was another rustling sound from the other end of the phone, and then Yasmin repeated, “Annabelle?”
I frowned. “What’s going on?”
“She just disappeared,” said Yasmin. “I don’t know ...”
I didn’t hear the rest of Yasmin’s sentence because suddenly, the ghost I’d been longing to see was standing in the hallway of the Johnsons’ house.
She flickered a few times before settling into her usual not-quite-there self.
Annabelle looked around the hallway and reached out a hand to the wall to steady herself.
“Marley, how are you here?” I stepped forward, forgetting that my ankle was fucked and grimacing at the pain.
I had never seen her outside the house, except for when she appeared at the cove.
And those times she hadn’t seemed aware of her surroundings.
“Are you here? I thought you couldn’t leave the house. ”
“I’m not sure. I’ve never done something like this before.
” Her body was now only visible from her knees up, and the rest of her legs were fading fast. “I’m not sure how long I can be away.
” Then she looked past my head at something only she could see, crinkling her forehead and frowning. “The darkness is calling.”
“Then go back home!” I waved my arms in a panic, then carefully lowered my right one when pain ricocheted through my shoulder. “Don’t go to the darkness, that sounds very, very bad.”
Annabelle turned back to me. She tried to hold on to me, but her hands went through my arms. On the third try, she managed to put her arms approximately on my shoulders. “But are you okay? You said there was an accident.” She peered at my face, scrutinizing my bruises.
“I’m fine.” I let her examine me, turning my head as she requested with gestures. “You don’t need to worry about me.”
“But I do , Gibson.”
I took a deep breath, which hurt my ribs. But I didn’t have anything to say that wouldn’t also be painful.
“You need to stop falling, my dear,” she said, keeping her cold, insubstantial hand next to my cheek. It felt nice.
I held her gaze. “Yeah. In more ways than one.”
She brought her other hand to my face and held me gently. A tear fell down her cheek, and I longed to brush it away.
Someone in the living room cleared their throat.
Annabelle turned to face the stunned group, seeming to notice them for the first time since she’d appeared in the hallway.
“Oh, hello, everyone,” she said with a little wave. “I’m Annabelle.”