Audrey Claire - Libby Grace 01 - How to be a Ghost (3 page)

Main Street stretched before me, deserted and dark, all except for blazing lights illuminating the ground outside the hardware store. I drew closer and peered through the oversized window but couldn’t see much past the posters for sales, the hanging plants, which I found odd that George hadn’t brought inside after he closed the night before. Maybe he had already set them out for the morning.

Along with the posters and plants, there was a display for electric grills, complete with a bald mannequin in an apron, and a lawn chair suspended from the ceiling. I couldn’t figure out the reasoning behind that so I moved toward the front door. With a quick glance up and down the street, I stepped forward through the door, and this time avoided landing facedown on the other side. I peered over my shoulder to find the locks undone. Still, the place lay in total silence. Where was George?

“More importantly,” I whispered and crouched as I tiptoed toward an aisle, “where is my body?”

I don’t know why I lowered my voice. Perhaps in case George showed up and had the shock of his life seeing a ghost in his store. I wasn’t worried he could banish me. George was the kind of man who had one thing on his mind most of the time, and that was his business. He loved the hardware store, and when he closed down at one in the afternoon for an hour to have lunch at Gatsky’s across the street, the town’s best restaurant, all anyone ever heard him talking about was the latest tool or the best way to fix a hole in the wall. That was another reason why I had gone to the hardware store. I knew George would give me advice on what tools I needed to fix my leak and maybe even offer to help. Now that I thought of it, I recalled speaking with him about my problem.

I crept from one aisle to the next. George had secured quite a bit of space for the store, over five thousand square feet. Some speculated the mayor, George’s wife, had supplied him with the money, but George delighted in informing anyone who would listen how with planning and hard work, he was living the American dream as an entrepreneur.

Past the tow chains with grab hooks and multicolored neon rope, I eventually came across the aisle with PVC pipes and fittings. Why did this feel like the prelude to the board game Clue? Now an image popped into my head of George lecturing me about how old houses contained galvanized steel pipes and how I should have copper piping installed. I had zoned out midway into the lecture and decided that telling him I only wanted to fix the leak would be a waste of time. The rumor was that no one listened to George at home, so he showed off his knowledge with his customers and the patrons at the restaurant. I didn’t blame him really. I had spoken with Mayor Olivia Walsh when she came to the school to talk to the kids about career paths. She had seemed cold and haughty. Somehow I didn’t see her discussing the finer points of steel versus copper.

I reached the last aisle and didn’t spot my body. Neither did I come across anyone else. The store seemed abandoned, but that was not like George. This was his baby. I decided to thwart the rules and explore beyond the vinyl strip door that sectioned off the back of the hardware store with the customer section, but I stopped in my tracks when I realized only one light had been flipped on in there. Most of the space was cast in shadow with little illumination.

I stumbled back into the more lighted area and started to call for George. I stopped just short of uttering a sound, remembering my current state. Reaching through to feel along the inside wall I realized even if I did find a switch, I wouldn’t be able to flip it. Then I spotted a panel to my left, just beyond the counter where George held reign. This was where someone had turned off most of the lighting in the back. Either way, I was stuck accepting the situation if I wanted to explore farther.

The storage section of the hardware store stretched before me. While there were piles upon piles of boxes, I held a good if dim view of the layout from my position. Not unless George played hide-go-seek behind one of the stacks, he wasn’t here. A back exit lay about twenty feet away, door firmly shut. Now what?

I refused to return home without checking the store completely, so I moved to the first stack of boxes, five across maybe six high. They extended above my head, all with various company names stamped on the sides. Moving around behind them, I searched the narrow area and found nothing but more boxes and shelves built into the wall. I backtracked, frustrated and annoyed but decided to check the opposite side of the room. That’s when I found him. George Walsh lay face down on the floor in a pool of dark liquid. Sticky, wet blood clumped his hair together in the back of his head, and next to him on the floor laid a gadget that looked like a section of pipe with what appeared to be a handle attached. Either way, the device was coated with the same thick blood surrounding George.

I slapped a hand across my mouth and bent over, sure I would cast up my dinner. I gagged and coughed, shaking from head to toe. I felt a wail coming on, but remembered Ian’s words. When I recalled I had no stomach to vomit from, for some reason it calmed me. I had gone through the reaction based on emotions, feelings that were left over from my physical body and were right now unnecessary. Knowing it brought on the urge to cry, but I held myself together by threads.

Voices reached me from the front, and I looked toward the vinyl door. Here I was standing over a dead body with no explanation as to what I was doing there. I darted around the boxes to where the shelves were and crouched. Common sense gave me pause. Thinking I had killed George wouldn’t be anyone’s first thought if they saw me.

Someone stepped into the room, and a man said, “No one here.”

“I’m telling you, chief. I saw her.”

I froze. I knew that voice. Sadie Barnett, the most spiteful busybody in Summit’s Edge, a woman who in her mind had reasons enough to dislike me because she hated my mama. Never mind that Mama had passed on to her reward five years ago. Sadie Barnett’s wounds from twenty years back went deep, and she knew how to hold a grudge. Here she was with the chief of police talking about a woman that she had seen come into the store. Had Sadie seen me enter in my ghostly form? I thought not since even her hard heart would likely flutter at seeing such a thing. Maybe she meant someone else. I could only hope.

“You’re telling me you saw Libby Grace run from this store an hour ago?” the chief asked in a tone that made me think he was reading from his notes. My heart sank. No mistaking it. Sadie blamed me, and when the chief found George’s body, I was in real trouble.

“Yes, chief. I couldn’t sleep. You know I take prescription sleeping pills my doctor gives me, but I ran low, and I forgot to ask him to fill it.”

The chief made a noise that to me sounded like “get to the point.” Sadie liked to drone on and on as if her stories were riveting and no one had anything to do other than to listen to them.

“Well,” she said, in that nasally way that reminded me of nails on a chalkboard. Not that Sadie sounded the same, but rather she had the same affect on my nerves. The fact that she hated me and steered clear of my presence under normal circumstances suited me fine. Unfortunately, she didn’t feel the same about Monica, and therefore I had to hear of Sadie’s dull exploits through my best friend’s lamenting.

“Well,” Sadie said again, “I thought the evening air would help make me sleepy, and when I came this way, I saw clear as day Libby Grace running out of the hardware store. She looked suspicious if you ask me.”

“Indeed,” the chief muttered, and I had the feeling he didn’t believe Sadie. “Can you tell me what she was wearing, if she carried anything in her hands?”

“Oh you mean like if she stole anything?” Sadie said, thoughtful.

I gritted my teeth. As if I would ever do such a thing. Times were sometimes hard, but I have a better moral code than that! The woman had some nerve. If I had my body back, I would tell her what I thought of her throwing aspersions on my character. After all it had been Sadie and not me who was suspected of stealing Mama’s spiced apple and raisin pie that caused Mama to lose the bake-off, a decision reversed later on. Sadie had never forgiven the humiliation when the trophy was taken away from her and given to Mama.

I heard the chief sigh, and I could imagine his frustration. “What was she wearing, Ms. Barnett. Let’s start there.”

“White sweater, powder blue blouse, and blue denim skirt that almost reached her knees. Libby always was somewhat of a plain Jane.”

I looked down at myself and saw that Sadie had described me to a tee. My spirit was dressed the same as I had been dressed. Depression hung heavy on my shoulders until I remembered it was possible Sadie had seen me any time during the day to know what I wore.

“And she didn’t have anything in her hands,” Sadie continued, “but that could mean she already stashed whatever she stole.”

“I’ll do the interpreting of the facts, Ms. Barnett,” the chief pushed between obviously clenched teeth. I smiled, giving a decisive nod from my hiding spot. There, that would shut her up.

Sadie harrumphed and muttered something about only wanting to help the law bring criminals to justice.

“That will be all, thank you,” the chief told her in a decisive tone. Then footsteps sounded closer to where I crouched, and I began to panic. With so little space among the boxes, I had forgotten that were only two directions the chief could take to search the storeroom—where I hid and where George lay dead.

I squeezed my eyes shut, praying he would take the opposite location first, and when I heard a gasp and a small shriek, I couldn’t be sure right away if the sounds were in reaction to me or at seeing the body. Swallowing, I opened my eyes slowly and glanced up. No one stared down in horror at me. I sagged against a box with relief and tumbled through it.

“It’s George,” Sadie shouted.

“Bart,” the chief called to one of the other police officers. “Escort Ms. Barnett out. This is officially a crime scene.”

“She killed him,” Sadie cried. “She killed him!”

I sat up, jerking my head and torso out of the darkness of the box and fell back on my rear. Fear clawed at my throat. My mind chanted,
not possible, not possible
. The chief would never believe I had killed George Walsh. What reason did I have? With these thoughts, I started to calm down and even forced a smile. No one would take Sadie Barnett seriously.

“Hey, come back here,” Bart grumbled from the doorway, and I heard the vinyl strips being thrust aside and clicking heels on the cement. I assumed it was some new person fascinated with the early morning happenings at the hardware store, especially with the police cruisers that must be parked outside. Then Sadie Barnett dropped another bomb.

“I can prove Libby Grace was here at the hardware store, chief, because her car is still parked in the lot!”

As the last words fell from Sadie’s lips, the overhead light popped with a shower of sparks and broken glass. Sadie screamed, and Chief Clark Givens cursed. I buried my face into my hands, sick, terrified, and hopeless.

* * * *

This time when I entered my house, I know how I got there. In the midst of all the hubbub with finding George’s body, I had managed to phase through the back wall of the hardware store and ended up in the alley. Running through the streets of Summit’s Edge with the sun now rising in the eastern sky was not my idea of morning exercise, but I did it, managing to make it to my house without being spotted.

Worry tumbled through my mind, bringing with it thoughts that perhaps I should share with Monica about my predicament. She would wake soon to find I didn’t come home the night before. Worse, if I revealed myself to her, after she stopped screaming, she would call Mason. I would be declared dead. A funeral would take place, and subsequently my precious little boy would be taken away. No, I needed a little more time. Perhaps it was just a matter of a few hours and the mystery behind my body’s disappearance would be solved.

While I considered all the scenarios, standing in my front hallway, a knock sounded at the door. I started moving toward it to answer before I knew what I was doing, but seconds later, Monica appeared at the end of the hall yawning and ruffling her shoulder length dreads. Monica wore a rumpled T-shirt, which read, “Please do not feed the models.” She collected various styled T-shirts and had two tubs full of them at home. This particular tee appealed to her because my friend was anything but model thin. I had always envied her for her curvy figure, complete with big breasts and big booty. She still wore the blue jeans she had worn to my house the night before and the multicolored socks on her bare feet.

When she appeared, I froze, ready for whatever reaction I got, but Monica passed straight through me to unlock and pull the door open. My mental faculties shut down further when I spotted Chief Givens on my doorstep.

“Do you know what time it is, chief?” Monica demanded, hand on her hip.

Chief Clark Givens regarded her with rich cocoa brown eyes. The chief and I had gone to school together, and I remembered him in earlier years as a scrawny unassuming thing that sort of blended into the background. Now he had grown into a tall man, maybe a couple inches over six feet. His build had broadened at the shoulders and chest but with a bit of an extra paunch at the belly area. Rumor had it he had a weakness for cookies of all kinds. The gossipmongers also informed me whether I had wanted to hear it or not, that Clark Givens was still single. Not being divorced long at the time I heard such interesting news, I had dismissed it. Now, the chief might be here to arrest me.

Clark was a good man from what I knew of him, but I didn’t see him as a love interest. I think my view was a bit skewed considering I had loved Mason who had treated me like gum stuck to the bottom of his shoe, and Clark seemed too tame as a bachelor living with his older sister. The chief should be a good catch for me considering he was happy to remain in the little town I loved so much.

I waited for Clark to look past Monica and spot me semi-transparent behind her, but he kept his gaze focused on my friend. I glanced down at myself and saw…nothing. I was invisible. How in the world had I managed that, and what did it mean? Was I being pulled farther away from the living? Scanning my narrow hallway, I didn’t see a bright, warm light compelling me to step into it. Nor, to my great relief, did I see any dark holes ready to suck me to less desirable places. Needless to say my knowledge of the afterlife had holes of its own.