The moment Jessica saw her aunt Eve, she couldn’t stop her legs from running to the woman who had sacrificed everything to be her mother. Eve stood by the double doors leading to the kitchen, talking to one of the wait staff. Her eyes went wide when she saw her wayward adopted daughter.
“Come here,” Eve said. Tears trickled down her cheeks. Jessica melted into her embrace. She hadn’t realized how much she missed her until this moment. Jessica had never known her mother, but she was sure she more than approved of the love and care Eve had given her over the past twenty-two years.
Neither could speak for several minutes. They clutched one another as if opposing forces were trying to tear them apart. Jessica had forgotten they were in a packed restaurant with dozens of diners drawn to their reunion. That was, until she heard her cousin Liam say, “Yo, Eddie, how’ve you been, man?”
She looked up from Eve’s shoulder and saw her shaggy haired cousin. He’d grown at least three inches since the fall and was sporting a respectable mustache—no 80’s porn fiasco. She grabbed the collar of his shirt, pulling him into her and Eve’s orbit. Eddie stepped back, not wanting to intrude.
Eve was the one to break their group hug. She looked at Eddie and said, “Another pleasant surprise! We’ve missed you too.” She gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek.
Eddie blushed. “I missed you, too, Ms. Powers.”
“Eve,” she said.
“Sorry, I forgot. Eve.”
“Come, I have a beautiful table set up outside for us.”
They followed her to an outdoor dining porch that comfortably held half a dozen tables. The entire porch had been reserved for their special lunch. Eve pulled an extra chair over to the glass topped table and asked a middle-aged waitress with the tightest perm Jessica had ever seen to bring a setting for Eddie. The lapping of the waters of Oyster Bay and cawing of seagulls reminded her of the two weeks she’d spent in San Francisco in the spring.
“Well Jess, now that you’re old enough, would you like to start out with a Cosmopolitan? Benny, our resident mixologist, makes the best on the island,” Eve said.
“Sure, that sounds real good right about now.”
“How about you, Eddie?”
“A Cosmo sounds good to me.”
Liam coughed into his napkin, spurting out, “Gay.”
Eve slapped the back of his head. “You’re out of high school, try to act like it, at least in public.”
Jessica couldn’t take her eyes off Eve. Her naturally pale, golden hair now had streaks of gray, with more showing at the roots. She’d put on a little weight, but it looked good on her. For the first time, though, she looked her age.
If your disappearing act did that, I’m going to kick your ass, she thought.
The drinks came, along with a Coke for Liam, and the family spent the next hour catching up, munching on an array of appetizers that came without ordering, from clams casino to breaded zucchini sticks, stuffed mushrooms and little crab cakes that came with a dipping sauce that was to die for.
Eddie stayed pretty quiet, but he looked happy to be at the table with them.
Jessica clenched up when Eve said, “So, Eddie, what brings you back into the fold? Did my Jess finally decide to stop being so stubborn and listen to you this time?”
Eve had had a front row seat to their spats after Jessica left the New Hampshire hospital and set out to learn how to control the strange ability that she seemed to have when it came to both attracting and repelling EBs. At the time, Eve thought they clashed because of her natural stubborn, know-it-all nature. No matter how much she pleaded for her to go easy on him—Eve had a real soft spot for Eddie, said he reminded her of a lost puppy—Jessica just wasn’t ready to face the facts he lobbed at her.
He’d said, “Spirits aren’t only drawn to you, but they draw power from you. If you don’t find a way to control it, you’ll get what you got in New Hampshire—a twisted spirit intentionally siphoning your energy so it can continue to do very bad things in this world. What you have is amazing, unheard of, but it can be dangerous to you and everyone around you.”
Which was his way of saying she was a disaster waiting to happen.
Aside from her refusal to listen to him, to look inside herself, she sensed he was struggling with his own problems. Neither of them had walked away from facing the spirit of the pedophile set to destroy a teenage girl without serious and deep scars.
So, she left.
Better to be away from the people she loved and keep them from harm. The trick was to keep moving, stay in places that looked as if they had no or very little history, even if it meant sleeping in the Jeep in an empty field. Don’t stick around long enough to fortify any nasty EBs lurking about.
Before Eddie could reply, she said, “He’s coming with me to South Carolina.”
“You guys finally gonna stop acting like morons and get together?” Liam said.
This time, Jessica slapped his head. “Idiot.” She turned to Eve. “Look, I know you don’t like me getting involved in the paranormal stuff, but this time is different.”
To her surprise, Eve smiled. “Jess, I thought long and hard about you and everything you’ve been through while you were gone. It was wrong of me to try to hold you back. You have a gift, even though you think it’s a curse. And so does Eddie. You can see and do things that the rest of us can only dream about. You know there’s life after death, Jess. And when you’re around people who need help, you help them to know too. The both of you give answers to our greatest fear. That’s pretty incredible.”
She leaned over and kissed the top of Jessica’s head.
Jessica stammered, “I…I never expected…”
Eve sighed, her shoulders slumping slightly. “I know now that you’re not your father. He wanted to see, to know, to be sure your mother was in a good place, that she lived on. But he didn’t have what you have. And that’s what sets you apart.”
No one spoke while a pair of waiters removed their appetizer dishes, preparing for the main course. Eddie broke the silence by saying, “If there weren’t kids involved, kids like Jessica, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”
“You’re right. Jess would still be off doing good deeds and roaming to the next place,” Eve said. “For at least a day, though, she’s here. You’re both here.”
Their lunches were brought out. Eddie’s eyes looked ready to pop out of his skull as he stared down at the five pound lobster. He never could match Jessica when it came to eating. She jammed her fork into the center of her linguini with clam sauce.
“We’ll be back in a week,” Jessica said. “And if you don’t mind, I’d like to stay a while.”
Eve smiled. “You can stay until you have grandkids if you want. So, tell me about South Carolina.”
“You want to hear what we’re getting from both sides of the line?” she asked, the line meaning the division between the living and the dead. Only in her patchwork family could this be considered typical mealtime conversation.
“Of course.”
“Most importantly, I can go with you, right?” Liam said, popping his head up from his surf and turf platter, drops of clarified butter glistening on the tips of his mustache.
“No!” Jessica, Eve and Eddie said as one.
Everyone laughed but Liam.