In the living room of Marlow House, the ghost of Marie Nichols stood over the portable cribs, watching the sleeping infants, while Danielle’s cat, Max, sat next to Connor by the fireplace, batting at the Lincoln Logs.
Marie came from a generation where girls were taught their purpose in life was to marry and have children. Unfortunately, her marriage had not turned out as she had once dreamed. Simply put, her husband had been a putz.
Like many women, she had fertility issues, and she could only have one child, who unfortunately didn’t fall far from the tree, who was his father. While her son was as much of a disappointment as her husband, her grandsons brought her tremendous joy, especially her eldest grandson, Adam. While others might have considered Adam a scoundrel, she saw his softer, caring side, and because of that, she had longed for him to have children she might someday spoil.
Marie had since come to accept the fact Adam and his wife chose not to have children. Danielle and Lily had helped her accept this reality. Before her death, she had become close to both women, and saw them as surrogate granddaughters, and she loved their children as she had loved Adam when he was a baby.
A faint cry came from Emily Ann’s crib. Marie was at the infant’s side before the cries could wake the sleeping twins. She carried Emily Ann to the sofa and started changing her diaper when Connor showed up by her side.
“Baby,” Connor said, reaching out to his sister.
Marie smiled at Connor. “You want to hold the baby?”
Connor nodded to Marie, his grin wide.
Marie finished diapering the infant and then told Connor to climb up on the nearby recliner. Connor did as he was told and looked anxiously at Marie, who carried the now swaddled baby to him. Gently, Marie placed the baby in Connor’s arms, careful to not let her fall.
Connor looked down curiously at the infant in his arms as Marie hovered protectively at his side.
“Connor!” The unexpected shout woke the twins, who began to cry.
Marie looked up at the open doorway. There stood Kelly, looking at Connor, who appeared to be alone in the room with the three infants—with one in his arms.
Without thought, Marie slammed closed the living room doors and locked them and, in doing so, pushed Kelly from the room and into the hallway. Marie didn’t know why she had shoved Kelly from the room, it was a reflex, just like the time when she had been in the fifth grade and Ronny Butler grabbed the ribbon from one of her braids and she turned around and punched him in the nose. She didn’t break Ronny’s nose, but he was a bleeder.
The cries from the twins intensified. Connor looked confused, and Marie could hear Kelly frantically jiggling the doorknobs, trying to get back into the room. But then Marie spied the eerily realistic baby doll sitting abandoned on the fireplace hearth. Pushing the limits of her powers, Marie brought the baby doll to Connor, and before he knew what happened, Emily Ann floated from his lap, back to her crib, while the doll replaced the real baby. Instead of being upset over the switch, Connor laughed, and in the next moment, Marie released hold of the living room doors while opening one of the living room windows. The doors flew open, this time because Kelly had pushed them.
Walt and Ian stood behind Kelly, having just arrived. What Marie didn’t know, they had followed Kelly into the house, hoping she would go directly to the bathroom so they could get to the living room before she looked in on the babies. Ian’s plan had been to whisk his son into the downstairs bedroom so his sister would assume that was where her nephew had been napping, as opposed to being left alone with three newborns.
Connor looked up at the new arrivals, giggled, and then, to his aunt’s horror, picked up the baby in his lap by its arm and flung it across the room.
They all sat in the living room, with Danielle on the sofa and Walt by her side while she nursed the twins; Lily sat in the rocker with Emily Ann; Kelly and Ian sat side by side in the recliners, and in the corner Chris and Heather sat on the floor with Connor, who happily used two Lincoln logs as drumsticks, and the baby doll as the drum. Olivia had returned to her house before all the drama and had said she’d come back later to meet the new baby.
All the adults sat quietly, listening to Kelly. “So sorry for shouting and waking the babies. I feel so foolish. It looked like Connor was holding Emily Ann on his lap. I thought he had somehow picked her up from her crib and carried her to the chair, and all I could think was that he might drop her.”
“We put Connor in the downstairs bedroom for a nap,” Ian lied. “He must have come in here and found his doll.”
“And then the doors slammed shut on me. Freaked me out, and then I couldn’t get back in.” Kelly shook her head. “How did that happen?”
“Tell her you left the window open, and the wind must have blown the doors shut,” Marie coached from the corner.
“We left the front window open,” Walt lied. “The wind must have blown the doors shut. Sometimes the doors stick.”
Kelly looked up. “I’m so sorry for screaming and waking the babies.”
“I’m sorry you had such a scare,” Danielle said.
“That stupid doll looks creepily like a real baby,” Lily said.
“I know I wasn’t standing that close to Connor, but I swear, it really looked like Emily Ann, not a doll,” Kelly muttered.
“My poor sister,” Ian said after both Kelly and Marie left Marlow House.
“Do you really think that doll is stupid and creepy?” Heather asked Lily.
Lily grinned at Heather. “No. But I know my son, and when Kelly was telling us what happened, I figured she had actually walked in on Connor holding Emily Ann while Marie supervised, and Marie was trying to do damage control.”
“Yeah, it was bad enough Kelly thought he came in here with the babies. Can you imagine what she would tell my mother if she knew Connor was really holding Emily Ann and no one else was in here with him?” Ian groaned.
“What did you mean when you said you know your son?” Heather asked Lily.
“I’ve introduced baby dolls to Connor before. He’s never been interested. He’s certainly never wanted to hold one on his lap and rock it before. I told Mom, when she said she wanted to get him a realistic baby doll before the baby was born, it was a waste of money. But that’s just Connor. When I was in college, I used to teach preschool. A lot of little boys loved baby dolls, but some of them were like Connor, would rather use them as a bat. Same for some of the little girls. Not all little girls like dolls.”
Ian let out a sigh and said, “Next time we need to tell my sister the plumbing is backed up and she can’t use the bathroom.”
They all laughed, and then Walt said, “Not to change the subject, but if Marie is still willing to take those pictures tomorrow, we need to get that camera over to the florist shop tonight.”
“I got the cellphone lined up; did you get the camera?” Chris asked.
Ian nodded. “I did. I even picked up a protective case.”
“When it gets dark, we can go over there,” Walt said.
“We also need to wait until Marie returns. I want to show her how to use the camera before we take it over there,” Ian said.
Marie ended up going over to the florist shop with Ian and Walt on Friday night. They parked in front of the building, and since there was no one on the street, the men stayed in the car while Marie hid the camera on the roof. She was tempted to leave it near the back door, but was afraid someone might walk by and find it before she returned to take the pictures.
The next day, she returned to the building about thirty minutes before Adrian was to arrive. She sat on the roof, keeping an eye out for his car, and when she spied it driving down the street, she took the camera and dropped to the rear of the building. At the back door, she set the small digital camera, still in its case, on the ground a few inches from the door and then covered it with pine needles. She hoped no one would see it.
Adrian parked down the street and walked the rest of the way to the shop. When he was about five feet from the rear door, a gust of wind blew down the alley and took with it the pine needles covering the camera. Marie wasn’t too concerned Adrian would notice since the camera case blended in with the ground cover. Yet what Marie hadn’t counted on was the afternoon sun hitting the metal handle of the case, making it glisten. Adrian was just a few feet from the door when he noticed something sparkly on the ground. He stopped and looked down.
Marie shook her head. “No, no, no!”
Adrian bent down and picked up the camera. Standing back up, he turned the case back and forth and then opened it and pulled out the small camera. “Dang, this looks brand new.” He shoved the camera back in the case and then walked through the back door. Marie followed him inside.
“Look what I found by your back door,” Adrian told widow Pierson. “It’s a camera.”
She grabbed hold of the camera case, taking it from Adrian. After looking at it a moment, she set it on the counter behind her, turned back to Adrian, and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Some kid must have dropped it. But I’m more interested in you than that camera.”
Marie wasn’t cut out to be a peeping tom, so instead of watching the lovers, she focused her attention on the camera. It didn’t take long for the couple to forget about Adrian’s find and get down to business. Careful not to make a sound, Marie slipped the camera from its case. She figured if one of them looked over to the counter, they would see the case and assume the camera was still there. Of course, at this point neither Adrian nor his girlfriend cared two hoots about what was on the counter.
Marie turned to the couple, and if she could blush, she would. Instead, she closed her eyes and moved closer to the back door. Marie opened her eyes for a moment and aimed the camera at the couple and then closed her eyes again, snapping one picture after another. She had no idea if she captured a decent photo of the couple, or if there was enough light in the room, but at this point, she didn’t care. She just wanted to get out of the flower shop.
When she felt she had snapped enough pictures, she eased open the back door and made a hasty exit with the camera while the couple never noticed anything unusual. Marie did wonder what they would think when they cooled off and found an empty camera case sitting on the counter.