Chapter Five

“What the hell was that?” Mel asked her mother in the kitchen. They’d backed in there after the screaming had stopped, which only happened when Mikey had laid his hand on the woman’s arm gently, telling her several times that it was going to be okay.

“That was an awakening, my love.” Peggy Hargrove floated from the counter to the dishwasher and back to the counter. Like pacing on one of those hover boards. “Most people have them, unless they are aware they’ve died. Although it doesn’t often take that long for it to come on. I wonder what happened for her to still be catatonic.”

Mel was wondering the same thing, along with what they were going to do with her. She should ask her name, for the register, but was afraid to interrupt the peaceful quiet that had come over the house. Every once in a while it was punctuated by Mikey’s low voice. That was it, though. No other voices in the whole place. It was as if everyone was holding their breath. Dougal and Mumford had retreated upstairs to give the two some privacy as the woman went through whatever this awakening meant.

“Is there anything else involved in these things? And why have I never heard of an awakening?”

Mom stopped long enough to brush a hand over Mel’s shoulder. “Because you didn’t need to know. And most of the spirits who come to you are already attached to something. They’ve been awake for quite some time by then.”

Still, Mel would have liked to know what to expect, and this felt like something important in the world she inhabited. “What else don’t I need to know? Just out of curiosity.”

Her mom laughed. “Sweetie, there are things even I don’t know. There’s a whole other universe that we only dip our toes into, and you have more access than most other people in the world. Be satisfied with that, and love what you do. I’m here if you need anything and will be as long as you need me.”

A flutter of panic went through Mel. Would her mom leave and go to eternity if she thought Mel didn’t need her anymore? The thought alone had fear crawling up her neck.

“Before you go getting yourself into a tizzy, I’m not going anywhere. I just meant that I’m here for the long haul.”

Mel’s heart resumed its normal pace. “Oh, phew! I about had a heart attack, and then your services wouldn’t be needed except to help me in my awakening from the dead.”

Laughter greeted her statement. “Not going to happen any time soon. You have too much to do and too many new things to experience for the world to lose you now.”

Her mom reached out a hand, and Mel touched just a finger to her shade. The connection was there, she felt it in her soul, and that was good.

“So what do we do with this spirit?” Mel asked. “Do I have to attach her to something? Will she attach herself? I wish I had any idea at all about what I was doing.”

Mel’s mom had been right; she did usually get them months, sometimes years, after they’d been dead. At that point, they simply needed a resting place for their spirits to roam around without fear of being caught or whipped into a frenzy. The junkyard provided that sanctuary—for her, too.

“So does this mean I have a dead body in town?” The thought had just occurred to Mel. Not a good one to entertain.

Shrugging her shoulders, Mom folded her arms against her floral shirt. “I didn’t want to alarm you, but that is a distinct possibility. You might want to check the obits to see if anyone matching her description has passed away.”

Mel looked in the woman’s direction, realizing that maybe she wasn’t quite a woman yet. Her face had an older look to it, but the body looked younger, and the stance was more “young woman” than Mel had originally thought.

After scouring the internet and the local funeral home main pages, she had found nothing. Could she be so fresh that she didn’t have an obit yet? Could she be dead and not yet found?

Becker walked in just as Mel had that thought, and she ran to him.

“Keep your coat on. We need to run out and look for something.” She didn’t tell him what just yet, since she wasn’t even sure herself, and she didn’t know if she wanted to be the one to find anyone dead.

“What do we need to look for?” He held onto her hands for a moment and forced her to slow down. “Just take a breath. You look like you’re about to go off the deep end. Breathe.”

She took a couple of quick ones.

“No, slower, calm down. Unless there’s a house fire, we have a moment. And if there is a house fire, then you should be calling the fire station and not running out to find it yourself.”

Despite the fact that she wanted to book it right out into the late afternoon and start searching, what he said made sense. She needed to breathe and calm down and not be reactive. It was just that lately things had been going awry around here, with ghosts trying to drain the life force from others, and a dog and his ghost showing up who were being followed by a crazy woman. Now she was primed so that anything out of the norm felt like a panic.

“Okay.” She took another breath. “So we have a new ghost.” She ran down the afternoon for him and watched his face turn from skepticism to disbelief.

“Awakening? And no one told you about this?”

“Apparently, no one felt I needed to know about it because it doesn’t normally come into play.”

“Now, that’s not fair, Melanie.” Mom poked out of her horn. “It just never occurred to me to share it with you because it didn’t have to do with what your job is, housing the ghosts.”

Mel turned to the Victrola with her hands on her hips. “I get that, Mom, but I feel like my job description has grown over the last few months. I don’t remember you and Dad ever having to deal with rogue ghosts and people coming after you wanting to take over your life.”

“This is true, and it is a different world out there. But it wasn’t deliberate. We knew what all we were putting in your lap and didn’t want to give you more than you could handle. I’m sorry.” And she looked it, her eyes pleading for understanding.

Mel could do nothing but give it to her. “It’s okay, Mom. It really is. But I think it’s something I need to learn more about.” She turned back to Becker. “And the reason I was running out the door is that I’m afraid there’s a new body somewhere in town, and this girl, or woman, is floating free because she’s recently deceased.”

“I’m dead?” The ghost in question zoomed up to Mel with a look of horror on her face. “How can I be dead? I was just playing hopscotch with the kids I babysit, and then I went home for dinner.”