Clay stood at the foot of the sofa bed, where his sons sat in a pile of blankets and pillows. After waking up, Eric had turned on the lamp next to the couch. Zack shared his dream first while his brother, wide eyed, quietly listened. When Zack finished, Eric said, “I had the exact same dream.”
“No way.”
“I did.” Eric then added details his brother had failed to include.
“Holy crud! That was in my dream too. What does this mean?”
“It’s obvious what it means,” Clay told deaf ears. “I visited you. And now you need to take my words seriously.”
“It’s obvious what it means,” Eric said. “Twin dreams are real!”
“That has to be it! Wow, we had a twin dream! That’s so cool! But why did we have that dream? No way would Dad say that stuff.”
“Boys! This wasn’t a twin dream. It was me!”
“Because Mom made us talk to Chief MacDonald. And seriously, can you see Dad telling us to listen to that dude, and even telling us he’s a good man?”
They both laughed.
“No!” Clay cried. “It was really me! You must listen to me! It’s for your own good!”
Their mother opened her bedroom door. She stepped out into the living room, wearing her pink terrycloth robe while rubbing her eyes. “What are you guys doing up? It’s three in the morning.” She walked toward the sofa, yawned, and paused a moment to tighten the terrycloth belt around her waist.
“Did we wake you up?” Eric asked.
“Yes, you woke me,” she snapped, now standing akimbo at the foot of the sofa bed, the ghost of her husband by her side.
“We had a dream,” Eric said. “Zack yelled in the dream and woke us both up.”
“But now you need to go back to sleep. Like I said, it’s three in the morning.”
“Didn’t you hear what I said, Mom?” Eric asked. “We were both dreaming.”
“Yes, and Zack yelled in his sleep and woke you both. So?”
“We had the same dream!”
“What do you mean, the same dream?”
“A twin dream, Mom. Remember when you told us about twin dreams? That article you read us. They’re real!”
“No!” Clay yelled. But no one could hear him.
Heather had been dreaming of jogging along the beach when she rolled over and sleepily opened her eyes. She wanted to go back to sleep, but she had to pee. Annoyed, she tossed her sheets and blankets aside and stumbled out of bed. Her bedroom was dark save for a nightlight along the wall under the window.
Groggy, she stumbled to the bathroom and flipped on the light. Even though she was alone in the house except for her cat, she shut the bathroom door anyway, out of habit. When she finished, she washed her hands and flung open the door, intending to turn off the bathroom light.
Instead, she let out a scream, for there, standing in her doorway, stood the ghost of Clay Bowman. After registering who was in her house, and now fully awake, she glared at the ghost and shouted, “What the hell, Clay? It’s the middle of the night. What are you doing?”
“There was a wreath hanging on your door. I assumed it would be okay.”
“Of course there’s a wreath on my front door. You know I put it there last night.” Heather motioned for Clay to move away from the open doorway. She flipped off her bathroom light, and he barely moved out of the way in time to avoid her walking through him. “We’ve already spoken since I hung that wreath,” Heather reminded him, her tone snarky and annoyed. “I didn’t think I needed to take it right down. I didn’t realize you’d be so dense as to see it as an invitation to drop in whenever you want! Like in the freaking middle of the night when I’m going to the bathroom?”
Clay trailed after Heather as she stomped back to her bedroom. “But it didn’t work.”
“What didn’t work?” Heather entered her bedroom and flipped on the light. She walked to her end table and picked up her cellphone, checking to see the time. It was 4:23 a.m.
“They didn’t see it as anything but a dream,” Clay explained. The previous evening, Clay had visited Heather after seeing the wreath hanging on her house. During their visit, she had suggested his sons probably would not listen to a stranger, as they had refused to listen to the chief. But they might listen to him. Heather had explained dream hops and told him to go to the cemetery where Eva and Marie would be waiting, prepared to help guide him through his first dream hop.
The light had woken Heather’s calico cat, Bella, who now stood on the bed, the hair on her back standing on end as the cat hissed at Clay. Heather walked over to the cat and swooped her up, hugging her to her chest. “Don’t worry, Bella, that mean ghost can’t hurt us.” Still holding Bella, Heather walked to the rocking chair in the corner of her room and sat down, placing the cat on her lap. She stroked the feline while shifting her attention to Clay.
Clay frowned at the petite feline. “That cat hates me.”
“What is she saying to you?” Heather asked while still stroking Bella. No longer hissing, Bella curled up quietly on Heather’s lap, her eyes locked on the ghost while her tail swished back and forth.
“She’s imagining I’m a mouse. The visual she’s giving is disgusting.”
Heather shrugged. “What can I say? She’s a cat, and you tried to kill her human.”
“She’s rather morbid.” Clay shivered.
“Did I ever tell you I met Camilla’s ghost after you killed her?”
Clay’s gaze shifted from the cat to Heather. “Seriously?”
“You know what was so pitiful?”
Clay shook his head. “No.”
“Camilla had no idea who killed her. It didn’t take her long to realize it wasn’t me. Someone like me isn’t about to screw with that type of karma. She also didn’t think you killed her. In fact, she thought you were going after me so hard because you believed I was the killer. When you tried to push me down the stairs, she begged you to stop. Telling you not to kill me because I hadn’t murdered her. In some ways, it redeemed you in her mind for the briefest of moments.”
“What do you mean? How did that redeem me?”
“I suppose you broke her heart. You two have an affair, and she assumes you have a life together. She blows up her marriage, and you leave town with your wife. She is betrayed, but years later she sees you again, and you end up revenging her death, or so she thinks. But then she hears you confess her murder to me.”
“How did she take that? She must hate me.”
Heather let out a snort. “Like I said, it was kind of pitiful when she realized you weren’t trying to avenge her. You had actually killed her. And yeah, she hates you. You helped ruin her life, and years later, you ended it. Although, I can’t say she still hates you. From what I understand, when we move over to the next place, our perspectives change. But don’t get too full of yourself. It’s not like she was still in love with you when you killed her. I’m sure she still had feelings for Brian.”
“Brian, that’s one thing I don’t understand.”
“What, that Camilla still had feelings for the husband she cheated on?”
Clay shook his head. “No. That you and Brian are a couple.”
Heather rolled her eyes. “Get in line. No one understands that.”
Clay studied Heather for a moment. “He’s not here tonight.”
“He does have his own apartment.”
“From what I understand, he can’t have kids.”
“That works out good. I don’t want kids either. What’s your point?”
Clay shrugged. “The age difference might be an issue when you decide you want to start a family.”
“Wow, now you’re concerned about my happiness and my relationship with Brian?” Heather snarked.
“I know what it’s like to make poor choices that change the course of your life.”
“Well, I already have my family. I don’t need to start anything. We should get back to why you’re here. What did you mean they thought it was a dream?”
Clay told Heather about the dream and the boys’ reaction. When he was done, she asked, “What is a twin dream?”
“My wife once read an article that suggested the possibility of shared dreams between two people who have a close emotional connection. It said twins were more susceptible to shared dreams. She read that part of the article to our boys. They are convinced that the dream last night was nothing more than a twin-shared dream brought on by their meeting with MacDonald and what he said about me.”
“Well, crud. That sucks. In the morning I’ll call the mediums and see if they have any ideas. But do me a favor and go down to the cemetery. You could run into Eva and Marie. They always have good ideas. But if you don’t see them, wait until I remove the wreath from my door. When you see it gone, this time it will mean I have something to tell you. And please don’t come over here in the middle of the night again.”
Clay wasn’t sure how long he had been standing at the entrance of the cemetery. There had been no moonlight to brighten the sky, no streetlights. Only an occasional headlight from a car passing by to break up the darkness. But now the sun was beginning to rise. He did not know where to find Eva or Marie, or if they were even at the cemetery. He started down one walkway when he heard a voice call out.
“Hey, it’s you again.”
Clay stopped walking and turned to the voice. The spirit he knew as Wesley stood some ten feet away.
“You’re Wesley, right?”
Wesley approached Clay. “I understand you’re trying to get the mediums to help you.”
“Have you seen Eva or Marie?”
Wesley stopped walking, now standing about four feet from Clay. He shook his head. “No. The last time I saw them was at Marlow House. But they left. I don’t know where they went. Not sure why you’d want to talk to either of them.”
“I need their help.”
Wesley scoffed. “You should move on. Aren’t you just putting off the inevitable? You said you murdered someone. It’s not like you can do anything to bring them back to life.”
“And why exactly are you sticking around? What do you need from the mediums?” Clay asked.
“Let’s just say I’m doing damage control, in case it’s true that we’re judged by our intentions and not actions,” Wesley said.