A Gift of Ghosts (Tassamara) (3 page)

“You’re going to fit right in around here,” Meredith said, as
she slid the key into the ignition and pulled away from the curb. Akira shot her
a curious look. Now what did that mean?

Meredith smiled at her, a little wryly. “Now this next house
is big for you, but it’s in your price range, and Dr. Latimer suggested that
you might be interested in it.”

“Dr. Latimer? Is that Zane Latimer?”

“No, no, it was Max Latimer. He was the one who set up your
appointment.”

Akira frowned. She’d tried to research the company from
California, but it was almost invisible. Oh, it had a web site, a completely
unrevealing web site. The copywriter who wrote the text had been a master of
saying nothing in many, many words. Apart from that, the name was too generic.
The phrase “general directions” had 14 million hits on Google, most of them
maps. Akira had deduced that the company was privately owned, but that was
about as far as she’d gotten.

“I don’t believe I met him,” she told Meredith.

“No?” Meredith’s voice was casual. She tucked a strand of
long red hair behind one ear as she ostentatiously paid attention to traffic,
of which there was none.

“Is there something I ought to know about him?” Akira asked,
exasperated. She was getting a bit tired of the mystery. Over the course of the
past month, she’d given notice at the college, rented out her house, packed up
her belongings, putting some in storage and arranging for the rest to be
shipped to Florida, said good-bye to everyone and everything she knew, and
flown to Orlando.

This time there was no private plane to deliver her almost
straight to General Directions, so she’d made the long, slow, winding drive
north in a rental car. She’d gotten to Tassamara expecting to check into a
hotel and start work immediately. Instead, Grace told her to take her time
getting settled and introduced her to Meredith, a pretty mid-30s redhead who
would “show her everything important.” As far as Akira could tell, though, there
was nothing important in Tassamara. She wasn’t even sure she’d seen the town
yet. It seemed to be a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it spot on the map.

“Most of the people in Tassamara work for him either directly
or indirectly,” Meredith finally said. “GD is the only company in town.”

“Which means what? He runs the place like an old-time mining
town? What he says goes?”

“Oh, no, no,” Meredith chuckled. “You’ll like him, I’m sure.
Everyone does. He’s just . . . well, you’ll see.” She pulled to the side of the
road and parked.

Akira didn’t move to get out. “He’s just what? Pick a word,
any word. I’ve moved here all the way from California, I don’t know anybody,
and if I’ve made a huge mistake, then the sooner I figure it out, the better.”
She knew she was being too blunt, but she couldn’t help herself.

Taking a job so far away from home had been an act of denying
imagination: she’d convinced herself to do it by focusing on the lab and the
work. She hadn’t tried to picture what her life would be like, where she’d live
or buy her groceries or go for walks, who her friends would be or what she’d do
on weekends. She had very deliberately not thought about the challenges of
navigating unfamiliar places, strange houses, unknown landscapes. If she had
thought about all those things . . . well, she would have been working at the
7-11 down the street from her house in California and going hungry to pay the
bills rather than braving all of this uncertainty.

It wasn’t that she was a coward, she assured herself. But her
challenges were different than those of most other people, and she had to be
careful in a way that most people wouldn’t understand. Okay, and maybe she was
a little bit of a coward.

Meredith smiled at her. “Eccentric. Dr. Latimer is eccentric.
But really, I think you’re going to fit right in in Tassamara. It’s a quirky
little town.” She gestured at the house behind Akira. “That’s the place. You
should take a look.”

Quirky? Akira didn’t feel better. But she turned and looked.
The house was two stories, white frame, with a wraparound porch and a turret.
She glanced back at Meredith in surprise. Was she kidding? “There’s only me,
you know. I’m not bringing a family.”

Meredith was already getting out of the car. “Come take a
look. Like I said, it’s a little big, but Dr. Latimer thought you might like
it.”

Akira followed her up the short walkway. The house was close
to the street, and she looked around curiously at the neighboring houses. “Are
we near the town?”

“Yes, Millard Street is the main drag, and it’s about two
blocks that way. An easy walk, if you don’t like to drive.”

Akira didn’t mind driving, although being able to walk for
small errands would be pleasant. But the mention of driving reminded her of the
black Taurus and Dillon. She’d asked Grace if she could lease the car that she’d
driven the first day, with no idea what she’d answer when Grace asked why.
After all, it was just a generic car, several years old, nothing special about
it if you couldn’t see the ghost boy inhabiting the back seat, and no reason to
want that car rather than some nice new model.

But Grace hadn’t asked why. She’d paused and her face had
stilled, then she’d turned away and busied herself with some files, before
turning back, smiling cheerfully, and saying, “I think that can be arranged. I’ll
have it waiting at the airport.”

Akira still wasn’t sure whether she’d seen something on Grace’s
face—sadness? worry?—or whether it had been her imagination. But she’d been too
relieved that Grace hadn’t asked her any hard questions to try to decipher
Grace’s response.

Meredith unlocked the door, gave a hard push, and shoved it
open. “Door’s a little sticky, we might need to get someone out to take care of
that.” She stepped into the house and Akira followed, feeling wary.

The first two rooms were empty and echoing. Hardwood floors
were worn and battered, showing signs of hard use, and the fireplace in the
front room was blackened with years of smoke. But the light was nice and the
ceilings were high, with overhead fans. A narrow staircase led upstairs to a
hallway that extended in both directions. Another hallway led to the back of
the house.

Meredith chatted about paint colors and furniture, but Akira
wasn’t really listening. She turned slowly, looking around. The house had a
feeling. But not a bad feeling. It should have felt abandoned, alone, the way
houses that were uninhabited always did. But this house, despite its emptiness,
felt lively. Akira’s wariness increased. Was this town simply infested with
ghosts?

She followed Meredith down the hallway, passing a small
bathroom, and into the kitchen.

“Rose! We have visitors.” An old man was folding his
newspaper and standing up as Akira walked into the room. She glanced quickly at
Meredith. No reaction. Okay, so he was a ghost. Akira kept her eyes off him,
not wanting him to realize she could see him, but she tried to steal looks from
the corner of her eye, as she murmured something in response to Meredith’s
running commentary.

He looked like a kindly grandpa. Not her kindly grandpa—she’d
never met any of her grandparents—but like a television version of a kindly
grandpa, with white hair and laugh lines and a little more belly than had
probably been good for him. He was wearing what she thought of as golf clothes:
a collared, short-sleeved shirt, with a sweater vest, and plain light-colored
pants.

“Oh, yay!” A whirlwind came barreling through a doorway that
Akira hadn’t noticed and she had to concentrate hard on Meredith’s face to keep
from staring openly. The young woman clapped her hands, and twirled in the
center of the room, her peach skirts flaring around her. “Maybe she’ll get cable.
Maybe she’ll love that music show. Quick, what can we do to keep her? I know,
let’s make it smell like chocolate-chip cookies.”

The old man chuckled. “Now there’s a nice idea. You’ll have
to work on that. It’d be right pleasant if you could make that happen.”

“Oh, I do hope she stays. Should we call the boys in?” Rose
danced her way to the back door, within Akira’s line of sight, and pressed
against it, peering out the window. Tall, willowy, with long blond curls, she
was dressed in the full skirts and sleeveless top of the 1950s.

“Now, Rose, you know it’s been ages since they’ve come
inside. You leave them be. They’re fine.”

Rose turned and Akira hastily directed her attention to
Meredith. “I’m sorry, what were you saying?”

Meredith was watching her, a curious look on her face. “Some
people think this house is haunted.” She made the statement calmly, almost
casually, without even a hint of thrill in her voice.

“Noooo!” Rose wailed. “Don’t do that. You’ll scare her off.”

“Oh, dear, that’s bad,” the old man murmured. “That must be
why we’ve been empty for so long.”

“It was that last lady, the one who lit that smelly stuff,
and tried to talk to us. But she couldn’t hear a thing.” Rose actually stamped
her foot.

“They say the ghosts are friendly, though.” Meredith was
smiling, but her look was too intent, too expectant.

“We are, we are friendly,” Rose burst out. “We like people.
Oh, please live here. I miss television. I miss music. It’s just too quiet
without people.”

“And do you believe in friendly ghosts?” Akira tried to
infuse her tone with skepticism.

“In Tassamara, believing in six impossible things before
breakfast is taken for granted. But let’s move on. As you can see, the kitchen
is nice, nothing special, but a good layout. The appliances all stay, including
the refrigerator, and there’s a washer and dryer over here in what used to be
the pantry.” Meredith opened the back door and stepped outside. “The back yard
is fully enclosed and spacious for this area of town. There’s a small pool and
maintenance is included in the rent.”

Akira followed her, but she was still puzzling over Meredith’s
first words. What impossible things? But as she looked out into the backyard,
her thoughts derailed.

It was a pocket paradise. Flowering plants and lush bushes
created a scenic border to a small yard where an oval pool, surrounded by brick
pavers, played center stage. Two ghost boys ran and played as if the pool didn’t
exist.

They were the kind of ghosts that Akira thought of as faders.
Unlike the ghosts in the kitchen, the boys were translucent to her, their
colors dimmed and pale. But she could hear their laughter, and she couldn’t
help but smile in response.

“This is beautiful.”

“Two citrus trees. You’ll love the smell of the orange
blossoms in another few weeks and the fruit would be yours, of course. Let me
show you the upstairs.” Meredith had reverted to a business-like realtor mode,
and as Akira followed her back into the house and up the back staircase, she
wondered what the realtor was thinking.

Upstairs, Meredith paused at the first door. “Four bedrooms,
so as I said, it’s big but you’ll be able to pick which one you like and
perhaps use another as an office. And lots of storage, of course. The rent is
very reasonable, despite the size.”

“That one’s mine.” Akira didn’t react to the sound of Rose’s
voice behind her, just pasted a smile on her face for Meredith’s benefit. “But
you can share it, if you like. I wouldn’t mind having a roommate. Oh, and if
you like television at night, that would be so terrific. I promise I wouldn’t
talk much.”

Akira glanced in the room. It was bright and big, but she
kept walking. The next room was smaller and must have once been a child’s room.
She skipped that, too.

“Henry mostly stays downstairs, so you don’t have to worry
about him.” Rose’s tone was a little plaintive, as Akira opened the door to the
turret room and stepped inside.

She crossed to the window and looked out, more to hide her
face from the seemingly perceptive Meredith while she thought than to admire
the view.

As a matter of principle, Akira avoided ghosts. She knew from
painful experience that her interactions with them were hazardous. But these
ghosts weren’t the dangerous kind: Rose had said they were friendly, but Akira
hadn’t needed her words. She could recognize a dangerous spirit from a
distance, sometimes even from just a vibration in the air.

Of course, any ghost could become dangerous. And if her
father knew she was even considering the idea of living with ghosts . . . but she
didn’t need to worry about his reaction, not anymore.

And then there was Dillon. Talking to him had been an
impulse. When he sighed and mentioned the parking lot, she’d guessed he was
tied to the car. That meant safety for her: he wouldn’t be able to follow her
home. He wouldn’t be showing up in her bedroom or her shower or her classroom,
like the ghost she’d spoken with back when she was a teenager who’d proceeded
to make her life a living hell for months out of his own loneliness and misery.

She’d taken the risk, thinking it was for an afternoon, but she’d
liked him. They’d fallen into conversation as easily as if they were old
friends, talking about astronomy and science and movies and Harry Potter. Like
most ghosts, he seemed desperately lonely but he was also curious and
interested in the world. And he’d been willing to accept that she didn’t have
any answers for him.