Dying for You

  “Thank you,” she replied neutrally.

  “Friend of mine owns a Chevy dealership. I’ll get you set up.”

  “Thanks, but that’s really not—”

  “I’ll call him for you tomorrow.”

  “Thanks, but frankly, after buying a new house, the last thing I need to do is—”

  “Go pop the trunk.”

  Grinding her teeth, she did so. He’s just being nice, she told herself. A good neighbor.

  “Gotta tell you,” he said, lugging her boxes and suitcases inside with zero strain—ooh, those rippling muscles— “it’s nice to have that fucking old bitch out of here.”

  “That’s so sweet.” She’d never met someone so equally handsome and obnoxious. The foul words that kept coming out of that sinfully sullen mouth nearly made her gasp. “And by sweet, I mean vaguely disturbing.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nice to have somebody you can look at, you know? You know, you’d be almost cute if you cut your hair and didn’t button your shirt all the way up.”

  “Okay. Well, thanks,” she said as he set down the last of the boxes in her living room. “I’m sure you want to get back to your project.”

  “Fuckin’ A. I’ll see you around, Cathy.”

  Why did that sound like a threat? She shrugged it off as single-woman paranoia and set about emptying the few boxes she had brought for Closing Day.

  Chapter 3

  “Oh my God!” her best friend and worst enemy, Nikki, gasped and nearly swooned. “Who is that?”

  “My next door neighbor. You’d like him; he’s vulgar.”

  “Don’t tease.” Nikki lasciviously wiggled her eyebrows. “Day-amn! Cute, cute, cute!”

  “Knock yourself out.” Then, louder as Ken approached, she said, “Good morning.”

  “Hey.” He nodded to Nikki. “Hey.”

  “Nikki, this is my next door neighbor, Ken Allen. Ken, this is my best friend, Nikki Sheridan.”

  “Hey,” he repeated.

  “Well, hi there. Nice to meet you.”

  “Do you own a shirt?” Cathy asked politely. Shirtless Ken was once again flawlessly, if casually, attired in work boots, jeans, and a tool belt.

  “It’s too fuckin’ hot,” he complained. “You’re lucky I’m even helping you move all your shit.”

  “So, so lucky,” she replied, annoyed at the amused look on Nikki’s face. They had known each other since the fourth grade and were more like sisters than friends—like a close family member, she often wanted to strangle Nikki, or at least banish her. The flip side was, if anyone ever threatened Nikki, Cathy would take a baseball bat to their frontal lobe. “Thank you for coming over.”

  “Yeah.” He turned his back to them and trotted down the porch steps, sidestepping her other friends and wrestling the television out of the back of the rental van.

  “I said it before and I’ll say it again: day-amn!”

  “He’s obnoxious,” Cathy muttered under her breath.

  “Like you could do so much better. If you could, sunshine, you would have by now.”

  “Here comes the ‘you’re not getting any younger’ speech.”

  “Well, you’re not. You’re on the wrong side of your twenties, girlfriend, and you’ve got a golden opportunity right next door.”

  “He’s not what I would call golden,” she commented.

  “Golden tan,” Nikki said dreamily. “God, he must work out ten hours a day. In the sun. Getting sweaty. All sweaty in the blazing sun. Ummm…”

  “Go for it. You two were made for each other.”

  “Meaning I’m an obnoxious bitch,” she said cheerfully, taking no offense. “Thanks tons. Hey, he wouldn’t be coming over here if he didn’t think you were cute.”

  “I’m not cute,” she said coldly. “Kittens are cute. I’m a grown woman.”

  “Says the five-foot-nothing shrimp-o,” Nikki said, smugly secure with her five feet, ten inches. “You’ve got to get over the cute thing. It’s not a dirty word, y’know. You’re short, you’re gorgeous, women pay hundreds of dollars to make their hair as curly—”

  “Frizzy.”

  “—as yours is naturally, and you’ve got Sinatra blue eyes. You’re like a gypsy princess with Sinatra eyes.”

  “Why, Nikki. That was almost poetic.” Nikki always saw her friends as gorgeous beauties, which sounded like a good quality, but really was a little on the annoying side. Particularly if you were the type who knew you weren’t beautiful. “I didn’t know you cared.”

  Nikki ignored the jibe. “Now you’re getting pissy because he’s attracted to you?”

  “He doesn’t know me.”

  “Hardly anybody does, sugarplum. You’re kind of famous for keeping us all at arm’s length.”

  “It certainly doesn’t work on you.”

  “No chance, baby,” she said, grinning. “I know I’m your hero.”

  “I suspect Ken’s interest in me is strictly of the novelty type.”

  “It’s what what of the what?”

  “I’m here,” she explained, “like Everest. So he’s interested.”

  “So? That’s as good a reason as any to get sweaty with a sexy neighbor.”

  “Nikki…”

  “Come on, let’s get you moved in.”

  Nikki was right, Cathy thought, following her friend to the van. She is my hero. I could never be so relaxed, so fun. So obnoxious and blunt. But I’m not going for Ken, no matter how much she nags me. It just wasn’t meant to be.

  However, I have no plans to buy him a shirt in the near future.

  Chapter 4

  She couldn’t find her keys, which was infuriating and, worse, made her want to cry with frustration. She hated, hated not being able to find things. It’s why she was still unpacking at 3:00 A.M. It’s why she decided it was a good time to drive to the local 24-hour supermarket and stock the fridge, so when she got up in the morning—later today, rather—she could have her toast and yogurt and tea.

  “Goddammit!” she cried, running her fingers through her frizz—yes, that’s right, frizz, never mind how often Nikki admired her hair and said it was curly and, ugh, cute. “Where are you?”

  She had a place for them, of course—the drawer in the writing desk in her foyer. That was where they belonged. That was where they should be. But she’d lent them to Karl so he could move her car out of the way of the van, and who knew where he’d put them? Karl was an engineer, so you’d think he was reliable, but the fact was, he was infamous for losing his checkbook, his keys, his contact lens case. What had she been thinking, letting him take her keys?

  She’d looked everywhere. Everywhere. If she didn’t find them soon, she was calling Karl, and never mind how late it was. He was probably up, anyway, playing another marathon session of War Craft.

  She started going through the kitchen drawers again, which was stupid because she knew they weren’t there. Then, oddly, she heard a familiar jingle. She turned…and froze in place as her keys bumped down the back stairs and slid across the floor, stopping two inches from her left big toe.

  She was tired.

  She was tired, and it had been a long day—a day not over yet—and she was very, very tired. And, apparently, the proud new owner of a haunted house.

  “No I’m not,” she said aloud. “I’m just tired. They were probably there all the time and I-I made a little mind movie to explain how they got there.”

  The keys, resting beside her foot, suddenly raised themselves up two inches and shook, jangling merrily.

  She ran out the back door, but not before she bent and scooped them up.

  “Ken! Ken, let me in!” She hammered on the door until her fist went numb. “Ken, I’ve got to come in!”

  He opened the door and blinked at her, swaying slightly. She could smell the beer before he even opened his mouth. “Say, Cathy, hey-hey. Whatchoo doing here?”

  She bulled past him and stood in his kitchen, wrapping her
arms around herself for comfort. “I—something weird happened and—I’m sorry to bother you so late. It’s just I don’t know anybody in the neighborhood except you and I-I didn’t know what to do.”

  “Thass okay.” He was shirtless, and pantsless, splendidly arrayed in navy blue boxers. No tool belt this time. His hairy legs, she wasn’t too rattled to note, were long, lean, and smoothly muscled. “M’glad you came over.” He lurched toward her and clumsily pawed for her breasts, but due to his extreme inebriation, and her extreme shortness, he groped her shoulders instead. “Less go upstairs? Hmmm?”

  “On second thought,” she said, removing his hand, “I will take my chances with the ghost. Good night.” She managed to evade his drunken gropings and soon found herself back in her house. Her haunted house.

  “Okay,” she said out loud. “Let’s think about this.” Going to Ken had been a stupid mistake—a stupid, hysterical, childish mistake. For God’s sake. She was a grown woman and what had she done? Run away like a coward and shaken like a puppy in a stranger’s kitchen, a stranger she was beginning to really dislike. Because her keys had moved by themselves. Stupid, stupid!

  “It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing,” she continued aloud. “The keys showed up, right?”

  A definitive rap, as if unseen knuckles had knocked on the ceiling.

  “Okay,” she said again, taking a deep, steadying breath. “Are you one of my friends playing a joke? I promise I won’t get mad.”

  Two raps.

  “This was your house?”

  One rap.

  “Well, it’s…it’s my house now,” she said with a firmness she most definitely did not feel. “I mean to say, I will be living here from now on. I-I hope that’s all right.”

  One rap.

  “Good. My name is Cathy. If one rap equals A, and two raps equal B, and three equals C, and so forth, what is your name?”

  J-A-C-K.

  “Well, it’s…it’s nice to meet you,” she said, feeling foolish. Part of her could hardly believe this was happening. It had to be a joke. Because otherwise, her beloved pink Victorian was haunted, and did she really want to share living space with the dead?

  No. She did not.

  “I’m…I’m going out now. To get groceries. Will you be here when I get back?”

  Nothing.

  “Hello?”

  Nothing.

  Feeling both disappointed and relieved, Cathy managed to walk, not run, out of the house this time.

  Chapter 5

  No one named Jack had ever lived in her house.

  Cathy had spent her lunch break doing extensive research and web surfing into land, deeds, home ownership, and spirits. She quickly determined her ghost was not a poltergeist, and did not seem malevolent, but she had less luck finding out who it—he—was. But apparently, his silence after the evening’s excitement was not atypical: manifesting seemed to really tire out a ghost.

  The question was: did she mind?

  She did not know; it was too early to tell. All it—he—had done was talk to her and produce her keys. Then nothing for the rest of the night, or the entire next day—Sunday—or this morning.

  She couldn’t discuss this with Nikki, because her friend had a strong streak of practicality. If she couldn’t see it or touch it, it wasn’t real. Cathy, however, tended to believe her senses. Her keys moved by themselves. Someone had spelled out the letters J, A, C, and K. If it wasn’t a practical joke, which she had not entirely ruled out—though if it was a joke, no one had come forward and it was going on too long—then she was prepared to believe her house was haunted. It was certainly old enough to house a spirit or two.

  She thought about calling her real-estate agent, John #1, then immediately decided against it. She’d been living in her new house less than seventy-two hours. It was a little early to go running for help.

  And whatever would she tell him? “Hello, John, the house you sold me is haunted and I…I…” What? Wanted a refund? Not hardly. She wasn’t going back to pouring money down the rent rathole. Not ever. She had felt like a drone bee in a hive, living in those low-personality apartment complexes.

  She decided to go about her business as usual, and see what the ghost—if it was a ghost—did next.

  “Perfect,” she said as lightning crashed outside her window. It was a dark and stormy night. No, really. “That’s just perfect.”

  She had finished the unpacking and was almost swaying with exhaustion. But it was finished, all finished. A place for everything and she had put everything in its place. Now the house felt a little more like her house.

  A little. She still couldn’t believe it when she pulled into the driveway and realized this was her house. She owned it and lived there and it was hers. She supposed the feeling of euphoric surprise would go away someday. It was almost a shame.

  The storm had started about three hours ago, and was building up to a rare fury—rare for St. Paul, anyway. As long as it wasn’t a blizzard, most Minnesotans didn’t get too annoyed by the weather. That might change, today, especially if—

  The lights went out.

  “And again,” she said aloud. “Perfect.” Rats and double rats. Where had she unpacked candles? After a moment’s thought, she remembered they were in one of the kitchen drawers, as were the—

  “One more time,” she said as she heard a kitchen drawer open by itself, heard things clink and shift around, heard a candle rolling in the dark toward her. “Perfect.”

  She looked down and, when lightning flashed again, saw two candles bump up against her foot, along with a small box of matches she’d grabbed the last time she’d had sushi at Kikugawa.

  “Thank you,” she said. Testing, she added, “Thank you, Jack.”

  No response.

  She bent, picked up a candle, lit it, used the lit candle to light the other one, stood. She still had a very real sense of unreality about the whole business, but one thing was certain: having a ghost around could be handy.

  Chapter 6

  Her weekly duty was almost completed. Ah, to be so close to the end, and yet have it remain so tantalizingly out of reach.

  “Cathy? You still there?”

  “Still here, Dad,” she confirmed. Her father lived in Missouri with her Wicked Stepmother, or W for short.

  Not that there was a thing wrong with Kitty Wyth (if one overlooked the absurdity of referring to a fifty-eight-year-old woman as “Kitty,” which was difficult even during the best of times).

  Cathy had lost her mother to breast cancer when she herself was barely into puberty—possibly the worst time to lose a parent. And she was not prepared to welcome anyone who was there to take her mother’s place. Thus, Kitty had been dubbed W and that was it, that was all there was to it. She was Wicked, sleeping in Cathy’s mother’s bed. She was The Stepmother—not the true Mrs. Wyth—and that was the end of it.

  “Maybe Kitty and I should come up to see you. Maybe Labor Day Weekend,” her father suggested doubtfully. Warm family get-togethers were not their thing. This was, Cathy knew, entirely her fault. W had done nothing wrong; had tried, many many times, to make Cathy feel included and loved.

  If she could not have her mother’s love, Cathy did not want the love of a grown woman named Kitty.

  This, she knew, made her a bad person.

  “Well,” she replied, not actually answering her father, “it was nice talking to you.”

  “Yeah. You, too.” He hung up. Her father never said good-bye.

  She walked into the kitchen to hang up the phone and saw one of her mother’s china plates on the table, with one of the frosted sugar cookies she’d picked up at the bakery that morning. Beside the plate was a small glass of milk.

  “Right, Jack. Because I need that on my thighs,” she joked.

  “Who are you talking to?”

  Cathy turned and saw Nikki standing in front of her screen door. “Myself,” she replied easily. She ignored Jack’s indignant knock and let Nikki in. “Oh, good, you
’ve started dropping in without calling first. I was afraid you wouldn’t pick up any bad habits this year.”

  “Go fuck yourself,” her friend replied cheerfully. “I was in the neighborhood—that bakery is kick ass—and thought I’d come over.” She held up a white wax paper bag and shook it.

  “Oh no,” Cathy said.

  “Oh yes! Cream puffs!”

  “You’re evil,” she replied, but took the bag.

  “And you’re too thin. Like, it’s time to be drinking Ensure too thin.” Nikki smacked herself on the flank. “Someday, when you grow up, you might possibly top out at over a hundred pounds, and then people will start to take you seriously.”

  Cathy laughed. Yes, that was the problem, oh yes indeed, no one took her seriously. Ha!

  “Soooooo,” Nikki said, sitting down and drinking Cathy’s milk, “have you jumped Shirtless Ken yet?”

  “I’m pretty sure that’s not his real name,” she teased.

  “Avoid the question a little more! So, I’m guessing no.”

  “You would be guessing correctly. In addition to his many other odious qualities, which are legion, he drinks.”

  “Oh.”

  “A lot.”

  “Well, drinks like, hey, come in and have a beer? You know, like normal people? Or drinks like, hey, come in and help me finish this keg?”

  “I have no idea because, thankfully, I don’t know him well enough to make that judgment. He mentioned losing his license the other day. DUIs.”

  “Ouch. Still, that doesn’t mean he’d, you know, suck in the sack.”

  Cathy rolled her eyes. Neither rain nor sleet nor substance abuse would prevent Nikki from pushing inappropriate partners on a friend. “Thankfully, I have no idea if that’s true.”

  “Well, get on it, Cath. You’ve gotta strike while the bird is in the bush.”

  “And you’ve got to stop mixing your metaphors. I cannot believe you’re pushing me toward this man, whom you know perfectly well is totally inappropriate for me. For any right-thinking woman.”

  “First off, real people don’t say ‘whom.’ Stop saying ‘whom.’ Second, what? Like you’ve got so many great other options?”