Scarecrow’s Dream (3 page)

“Research.”

“As in? I doubt there are any answers on your computer, no matter how cool it is.”

“Prepare to be amazed. Besides, I do have letters from you and Paul before you vanished and were presumed dead by everyone except your dad. Most of them are about you protesting about racial injustice and hanging out with folk singers in Greenwich Village. I also remember something about you writing for an underground newspaper and working on a play. I was pleased to hear you were also a writer.”

Addie closed her eyes and thought for a moment. “Wait. You didn’t write the play. Someone else did but you were involved somehow. You were also dating someone but neither you nor your dad said much about it. I remember your dad being a bit worried but he seemed to like the guy. It was someone older. In his thirties. And I gather there was some other issue but Paul didn’t say what. Anyway, then you disappeared. And I came back from Paris to stay with Paul about six months later. Your dad pretty much kept to himself and I didn’t want to intrude and nudge him for information if it was hurtful.”

“Oh wow. Hang on for a second. I’m getting a flicker of something. Not a who but more a feeling of someone.” I tried to force my mind to remember. “Shoot. It’s gone. I don’t have the first idea of who he was but I’ll tell you this much. He was special. I have good kind of feeling somewhere in the pit of my stomach and it doesn’t seem to be going away. If we could figure out who he was, I’ll bet we could find him and ask him what happened on the bridge.” I winced. “Oh crap. I hope it doesn’t turn out I was seeing a serial killer or something. Or watch…this guy’s probably gotten so old and senile he doesn’t remember either.”

“I hate to say it but he may not be on this earth anymore. Then again, he could
also
be a ghost, which would be really interesting in terms of you guys getting together.”

I ignored her, stood, and began to pace. Boo-Boo paced with me. “Addie, so far I see no benefit to being a ghost. I can’t walk through doors—no matter how often you try to convince me I can. I hate to disappoint you but I’ve tried and it ain’t happenin’. My only parlor trick appears to be invisibility to everyone except the dog. Oh, and giving off weird vibes when you’re near me. I don’t get why I’m haunting you, or if I’m even
supposed
to be haunting you. Or anyone. I need purpose. I need answers.”

I looked up at the ceiling. “I also need a job. I’d imagine haunting is not exactly a lucrative career unless you can get a gig on one of those TV shows where people investigate ghosts and spooky old houses. Which are
way
too much fun to watch, by the way. It’s an interesting world in the twenty-first century.”

“I believe it’s required to be a mean, nasty ghost to be featured on TV and you’re still very sweet. Now then—a job? Why?”

“Addie, I’m living here and taking one full bedroom and eating your food and I’m not contributing. As I previously noted, I can’t exactly walk Boo-Boo for you. I feel guilty. My father brought me up better than to be a mooch. I paid rent from the time I graduated high school because we agreed I needed to learn independence even though I was living at home. I may not remember much but I’m sure Dad did not allow me to hang out at home and do nothing.”

She smiled. “I get it. You’re independent-minded and responsible. You are woman. I hear you roaring. So. Job. Hmm. I could try to film you and write about you on my blog, although ghostly relations aren’t considered entertainment news. Plus, you’re normal, apart from being invisible, and folks would believe all the movement was nothing more than smoke and mirrors. Useless for a resume.”

“Well, I’d try wandering into an employment agency but I’d have to explain why I’m invisible—not to mention failing to produce any paperwork. Not to mention, technically dead and all that jazz. But, there’s got to be a way for me to make some money to help out. I can’t believe how the prices in Manhattan have quadrupled over the last forty years. Obscene.”

“Hush. Nothing to be done about Manhattan real estate and this apartment has been rent-controlled and stabilized forever so we live cheap. But I understand your need to feel useful. What did you do in the early seventies? We know you were studying at NYU. You were only twenty but already working on some ridiculous master’s degree in some field guaranteed for perpetual unemployment. Journalism or theatre?” She chuckled.

“Theatre or English lit comes to mind but don’t take my word for it.”

“Well, you were one smart and ambitious lady. Paul once said you were taking about twenty-one hours each semester and summer sessions and working somewhere. Ooh! You helped your dad paint apartments after people moved or when renovations were due. Although I’m not sure an invisible painter is going to fly with the unions. Okay, let’s go back to our lives in 1973. I was off in Paris. You and I were both still protesting the war. We didn’t quite trust Nixon to end it. We were furious about the wreckage of the planet by big businesses dumping waste materials everywhere and we also were involved in various other movements. You were big, big, and big into animal rights and civil rights. Racial equality—or lack thereof.”

I willed some memory, any memory, to float my way. “I have this vague feeling I had a partial scholarship and worked part-time as well. I did have a fellowship for grad school.” A memory hit. “Wow! News flash. This just in. I taught some freshman grammar classes. It was horrible. I was the same age as half the students and I believe there was much resentment over my passing out low grades for their lack of understanding regarding how not to split an infinitive or dangle a participle.”

Addie snorted. “Do
not
get me started on grammar. Every time my editor wants me to mentor some kid at the
Chronicle
I end up moaning about how texting is destroying the world of language.”

“Texting?”

“Later. We’re on a roll here. Go on.”

“Addie, I wanted to be a writer. I’m sure of it. Something exotic, like a foreign correspondent or an investigative journalist. Expose Nixon as a crook and win a Pulitzer while I was at it. I have no idea where that gem came from but I just got another flash of something. I can see a newspaper. College? But, as you say, there was some play wafting about out there, so it seems my writing was leaning more toward the creative.”

Addie pushed herself off the couch and headed toward the window. She opened it, letting in air that was surprisingly cold for April and then stood looking outside for a moment. “We’re a lot alike. Activists and writers. The first helps one save the planet but is very stressful and can be dangerous. The latter can also get you into trouble depending on what or whom you’re investigating. Of course it’s a profession destined for unemployment. Hell, it shouldn’t be called a profession. Like acting or singing, it’s a calling. Or an obsession.” She turned around. A wicked glint flickered in her eyes. “How good were you?”

“Excuse me, but have you been listening to the person you’re asking? The one who has more than a few holes in her memory?”

“Ah. True, true.”

I paused for a second then asked, “Why?”

“I have a very off-the-wall, wild card, long shot possibility. I need to check with a friend of mine and see if he’s okay with letting me use a collaborator. I want you to write a short script.”

“What kind of short script?”

“Like for a soap opera. And don’t tell me you don’t know what one is because some of the best soaps came out in the sixties and seventies and don’t deny you’ve been checking out the daytime dramas every afternoon for the last two days when you’re not watching DVDs.”

True. I’d figured watching the soaps would help me catch up on the culture of the New Millennium. I found it interesting that the soaps hadn’t changed a lot in forty years. Illegitimate babies, greedy oil barons, incest, murder, multiple marriages and divorces—if it hadn’t been for the hairstyles and costumes and a broader attitude toward gender and race, I’d have never believed more than forty years had passed.

“Would you mind telling me
why
I’m coming up with this script? And how do I type without a typewriter? Your computer thing scares me. Don’t say it. I’m a wimp. But cable television was barely a blip in 1973. Dad and I still had rabbit ears. If I’m recalling things correctly.”

“The computer is not going to blow up. But if you’re that freaked out by technology we could try voice-activated software. Assuming of course, it works for voices beyond the grave or some fourth or fifth dimension.” Addie snickered.

“Stop! Now you’re just being evil.”

“Sorry. My humor tends to stray toward the sardonic and the occasionally lethal. But I’ve had a hankering to try the voice activation stuff, although I’d have to buy the software. Whacha think, wimp?”

“Worth a shot. Otherwise I have to dictate to you, which puts you in the position of being forced to hear my inner writer trying to eke out plots. Or you could be nice and simply help me get over my fear of technology and teach me the mysteries of the keyboard.”

“Holly, I swear it’s nothing more than a super typewriter. I’ll teach you tonight. Meantime. Script. Job.”

“What’s this for? You said soap but that’s a bit vague.”

“My buddy Jeff is producing an Internet soap opera called
Salacity City
and could use some good writers. It’s not as cool as uncovering scandals at the mayor’s office or whatever but you can make up the scandals, which is far more fun. I haven’t had the time to deal with it but I’ll talk to Jeff and tell him I have someone who will co-author with me. He’ll love it. He’s been nagging me for weeks and I keep telling him I’m too busy. Which reminds me. I need to get a move on if I’m going to take off and cover the demonstrations downtown. Which I happen to consider
is
performance art to some extent—so I don’t feel guilty writing about them for my blog. I’m supposed to be writing about the next big play or music group in New York but my heart wants to be blogging about climate change and staying out of wars and immigration issues and unemployment.”

“Are your bosses okay with you branching out?”

“Yes and no. My readers seem to be headed there so my editor graciously allows me to hit topics more important than some rapper’s tenth marriage. Seriously though, lately instead of letters asking if trashy prime time drama
Seasonal Discord
is going to be renewed, I’m reading ‘Dear Miss Adelaide, I’m a Harvard graduate with a master’s in history and I can’t get a job so would you please tell me the best way to make pumpkin spice coffee so I can beat out the other barista wannabes with degrees from Yale and MIT?’ I’m also getting some cool and interesting questions asking about the next election in Manhattan. Politics is in. Of course, celebrities and politics together make for great reading since they involve scandal. Then again, my job description doesn’t specifically include gossip.”

“Whoa. The mind boggles.”

“It does, doesn’t it? For many reasons, not the least of which is forty-odd years of experience in protesting, I’m reporting and often joining in with other anti-establishment groups to try to change the world—perhaps end a war or two.” Addie peered at where she assumed I was sitting. “Holly, are you going to be okay? I mean, physically there’s not a lot to be done, but emotionally you seem a bit rockier than you were yesterday.”

I waved her away, not caring that she couldn’t see my hand. “I’ll be fine. I’m getting—what do you call it? I saw it on one of the soaps yesterday. Bipolar. Yeah. I’m going bipolar. Careening from ‘I’m so glad I’m here with you’ to ‘why in bloody hell can’t I remember anything and why am I here?’ Or it’s PTDS. Heard it on one of the forensic shows I watched last night. Post Traumatic Syndrome with the ‘D’ standing for drowning, dying, or dammit! And going back to—why now? Why not forty-three years ago? I’m sorry I’m being repetitive and annoying but it’s all very confusing.”

“Well, if it helps, confusion is running rampant. In fact, the only sane creature in the room right now is Boo-Boo.”

I laughed and patted the dog, who’d started a frantic tail thump the moment she heard her name. “I do recall this much. Back when I walked among the living I’m sure I was one stubborn, determined cuss. Independent. So go get ready for your interviews with the unemployed Ivy League chemistry majors who are directing awesome revivals of
Cabaret
. Write them all up in Miss Adelaide’s
Guys and Dolls in the City
and let me create something dramatic for your friend Jeff with a semi-original plot in a mythical town with a picturesque name and I promise
not
to write anything close to as run-on as what I just said.”

Adelaide headed toward the door and picked up her bag. It intrigued me since it held all sorts of magical digital goodies.

“Addie, wait a sec, okay? Before you go, would you mind popping in one of these movies and getting it started for me? I’m afraid the whole building will explode after I press the wrong button. I’d like to imagine I can turn the darn thing on psycho-or para-kinetically or whatever works there, but so far moving objects across the room is not in my wheelhouse of ghost tricks.”

“You really are a techno-wuss, aren’t you? Actually, I understand. I still prefer my Walkman over an MP3 player and my cassette recorder over both.”

“What in blazes are you talking about now?”

“Sorry. I’m not Wikipedia. I can’t recall dates of inventions without looking them up.”

“Wiki-what? I thought I saw the word on your computer the night I came back from the dead but wasn’t exactly in the mood for terminology at the time. ”

“Tell you what. We’ll do a crash course in modern tech when I get back. Computers and emails and texting, oh my! In the meantime, which movie do you want?”

“Let’s see. I’m not in the mood to be educated about decades of music, politics, and social norms. Is there something I can enjoy without trying to keep up with whatever nuances are being nuanced?”

Addie nodded and began sifting through the DVDs she’d just bought and tossed onto the coffee table. “Ha! I have the perfect flick to aid you in your quest for mindless but delightfully trashy. Talk about soapy. You could wash dishes with this sucker.”