Remember Me (19 page)

It didn't even have claws. The hand was more a force that the Shadow wielded to draw me toward it. It was not actually something I saw—more something I sensed. I should have been repulsed—and I was—but I was also drawn to it. Slowly I pulled myself out of the thorns and took a tentative step in the direction of the dark being. Another appendage appeared out of its other side, and the Shadow's pull on me grew stronger. Then I looked up into those eyes again, those pale, bottomless green pits into madness, and I retreated, horrified, pressing my back against the metal poles. I told myself that I was a spirit, that I could slip through the fence and vanish on the wind. It didn't work.

The poles remained firm against my flesh. The Shadow took another step toward me.

"Hello," a voice said above me. My head shot up. Peter was relaxing on the top of the spikes.

"Help me up, it's coming!" I shouted.

"What?"

I gestured to the Shadow, which was now less than fifteen feet away. Peter stared at it for several seconds without making a move. I wondered if he had frozen in fright, then dismissed the idea. His expression was relaxed, although slightly puzzled. It was almost as if he couldn't see it.

"Hurry!" I cried, holding up my arm.

"Of course," he said, suddenly reaching down and gripping my hand. He pulled me up without effort. I didn't wait to be lowered gently onto the other side. I jumped and then ran, not looking back.

Peter caught up with me in the park across the street, where he had tried to teach me to fly. I was a trembling wreck by then, but I was still running.

"Shari," he said, trying to stop me.

"We've got to keep going," I said, shaking him off.

"It's gone."

"We've got to get out of here!"

"Shari!" He grabbed me. "It's gone."

I glanced back toward the cemetery. There was nothing, not as far as I could see. "Are you sure?"

"Yes. It's all right," he said. "You're safe."

"Oh, Peter," I moaned, collapsing against his chest.

He led me to the same bench we had sat on before. I don't know how long we sat there with me shivering in his arms. I couldn't get a grip on my fear, and I think it was because I didn't know what was causing it. There was the Shadow, of course, but what was the Shadow? Peter had called it a devil, but only because I had suggested the word. Why had he chosen the name he had? I wanted to ask but was afraid of the answer I would get. It seemed to know my thoughts, I remembered, and vice versa.

A shadow—that no sun had ever cast.

I didn't want to know whose shadow it was.

Peter was talking about escaping into the light again.

"When you least expect it, Shari, it will come after you.

You've got to give up trying to find your murderer. You've got to go on. You don't know what you're risking. It's more than your life now."

I raised my head and looked around the park. There wasn't a soul around, not a sound in the air. I wished I could say I felt at peace. "You saw Jimmy's face as he ran out of the room," I said.

"I didn't tell them that we were burning in—"

"I know," I interrupted quietly. "I shouldn't have said what I did. Can you forgive me?"

"Sure." He was so neat.

"But Peter, what happened? What went wrong?"

He shook his head. "I don't know. It started out all right, but then the indicator just went out of control."

"You mentioned that there seemed to be another force at work. Could there have been another spirit in the room that we were unaware of?"

"I doubt it."

"But is it possible?" I asked.

"Yes."

"Is it also possible that a member of the group was purposely manipulating the indicator?"

He had thought of that, of course. He was no dummy. But he didn't want to encourage any line of reasoning that would make me continue my investigation. "If someone was writing what he or she wanted," he said, "that does not necessarily mean that he or she was the one who killed you."

"But to spell what they did—that person would have to hate me." I nodded to myself. "It was one of them."

"So what? Everyone's fingers were on the indicator, and you haven't eliminated a single suspect." He leaned close.

"Shari, please, listen to me. You could close your eyes right now and in a minute be in bliss."

I got emotional. "How can I be in bliss when my murderer is walking free? How can I leave my brother thinking I'm in hell? Why can't you see that I can't leave?"

"Because Jimmy can't see you. He can't hear you. He can't feel you. As far as he's concerned, you're already gone."

I shook my head. "There must be some way to get through to them."

"There isn't."

"But what if we found a psychic? Could we communicate with one of them?"

"No."

"They can't all be phonies. Are they?"

He sighed. "There are people who can tap into our realm—without the aid of drugs.

There are even some alive on the earth today whose minds can reach to the infinite. But these people are rare. They are not found at your local psychic fairs reading palms. As a rule, they never display their powers."

"But if these people are so enlightened, wouldn't they want to help me?"

"They would help you by instructing you to listen to me and leave the problems of the living to the living. Jimmy is alive, Shari, and your death—terrible as it was—is simply something that he has to go through in his life." Peter paused, his eyes raised to the sky, to the many-colored stars and pulsating nebula that the living would never see. "Jeff had to go through the same thing."

"It must have been terrible for him," I said, thinking how terrible it had been for me when Peter had died. Indeed, with his next question, I could have told him exactly how difficult it had been. I don't know why I didn't.

"Did anyone close to you ever die?" he asked.

"My aunt Clara. She was my father's sister. She helped raise me." I smiled at the memory.

"When I was a kid, I saw more of her than I did my mom. She was crazy but such a sweetheart.

She used to feed me a diet of soda and cookies.

She figured if that's what kids liked best, then it must be good for them." I stopped smiling. "I was fourteen when she died. She got cancer. One day she was fine, and the next ... " I gestured helplessly. "It went right through her body like poison."

"You must have missed her an awful lot."

Was he trying to tell me I could see her if I would go into the light? I might have asked if the "Big Idea" hadn't hit me a few seconds later.

"That's strange you should say that," I began. "1 didn't, not really. I don't know why. It might have been because of these dreams I started to have of her not long after she died, where she would talk to me and tell me that she was—" My voice didn't just trail off. It got caught in my throat. Then it exploded. "Peter!"

I startled him. "What's wrong?"

"That's it!"

"What's it?"

"My aunt used to talk to me in my dreams! I can talk to Jimmy in his!" I jumped up.

"Let's get back to my place."

"How?"

"I don't care how. We'll take another fire engine if we have to."

"No. How are you going to get inside his dreams?"

I sat back down. "I don't suppose there's a book lying around here that I could read on the subject?"

"If there is, I haven't seen it," he said.

I studied him. "Have you done it?"

"Done what?"

"Don't play dumb. And please tell me the truth. Please?"

He took a breath, which had to be an act of desperation for a dead person.

"Yes."

"Did it work?"

"Sort of," he said.

"Come on. Were you able to get through when you did it?"

"Did Jeff strike you as someone I had gotten through to?"

"No," I said, disappointed. "Why didn't it work?"

"Because people have to be asleep for you to get into their dreams. And when they're asleep, they're—asleep. They don't know what's going on. Worse, they forget almost everything you tell them the instant they wake up."

"Almost everything?" I asked, grasping at straws.

He nodded reluctantly. "You saw with your aunt that you can sometimes remember certain things."

"You think she was really talking to me? That's amazing."

"Someone in your position shouldn't be amazed by anything."

"How do you get into a dream?" I asked.

He stood. "It's not hard. You'll figure it out, if you must." He checked his watch.

I hadn't noticed before that he was wearing one. It blew my mind that it worked. I mean, where did he buy his batteries? "I have to go," he said.

I scurried to my feet. "Where to? Aren't you going to come with me?"

"I can't."

"Why not?" I demanded.

"Finding out who killed you is one thing, but I'm not supposed to help you try to communicate with the living. It's against the rules."

"Whose rules? God's?"

"Mine," he said.

"You helped me at the seance."

"And see where that got the two of us." He began to walk away. "Catch you later. Don't get lost in anybody's nightmare."

"Peter!"

I don't remember blinking. I don't think ghosts do blink.

Just the same, he was gone.

CHAPTER

XII

A. HAD A HARD TIME getting back to my neighborhood. It was late, and there weren't many trucks on the road that I could catch a ride with. At least not many going my way. I waited at a couple of big intersections and did manage to get aboard a flatbed, but it ended up turning away from the coast, and I had to wait till it stopped at a light to hop off. If anything, my paranoia about hurting myself was increasing.

Finally, though, I found a truck that took me practically to my doorstep. It was a dump truck. I had to sit in the back with the garbage. It was fortunate my nose was no longer working on the terrestrial plane.

I had no difficulty entering my house. The front door was wide open. My father was loading a couple of suitcases into his white Cadillac, which was parked in the driveway. My bright red Ferrari must still be in the garage, I thought sadly.

I remembered Jimmy's remark to Amanda about my parents going away for a few days. I followed my dad back into the house, getting out of the way before he could close the door on me. I didn't need my nose to tell he had been drinking.

His face had that puffy red look that took a solid bout with the bottle to develop. The uncapped quart of expensive scotch sitting on the kitchen table did more than reinforce my suspicion.

My mother was holding a tiny blue pill as my dad sat down at the table beside her. A prescription bottle stood beside the toaster. My mom had on a baggy nightgown she might have worn eighteen years ago when she was pregnant with me. The whole situation could not have been more depressing.

"We can leave first thing in the morning," my dad said, refilling a shot glass. "I figure we'll head north."

"Why north?" my mom asked wearily, her jawbone visible as she swallowed her pill with the aid of a glass of water. I would not have believed anyone could lose so much weight in so few days. I doubted that she'd eaten a thing since her last bite of the chocolate cake I had wanted to throw out.

"Do you want to head south?" my dad asked. "That's fine with me. We could drive all the way to Acapulco if you'd like."

My mother smiled faintly. "Remember when we went there a couple of summers ago and Shari made us stay three extra days because she had a crush on that lifeguard?"

I hadn't realized my parents knew about my infatuation with the handsome twenty-five-year-old Mexican who had watched over our hotel swimming pool. I should have been embarrassed, but I wasn't. I was glad they'd had some knowledge of my personal life. My father nodded and tilted his shot glass to his lips.

"She had a lot of love in her," he said.

"I wonder if that young man is still working there?"

"Probably not."

My mother put a hand to her head, massaging her temple, losing whatever smile she had.

"Maybe we should go north."

My father swallowed his whiskey. "All right," he said.

I couldn't stand it. I had to get out of the kitchen. I went searching for Jimmy. I was surprised to find him at the top of the stairs kissing Amanda good night outside my bedroom door. She was sleeping over. She was going to sleep in my bed!

"Try to get some rest," she said as they parted. She had on a plain white bathrobe. Had it been one of mine, I think I would have freaked out altogether.

"We'll have a good day tomorrow together," she said.

Jimmy wore blue jeans, no shirt. He was developing a slouch. He looked like he could have used a shot of scotch.

"What should we do?" he asked.

Amanda smiled and ruffled his hair. "It doesn't matter."

Jimmy looked past his girlfriend, into my room. "We shouldn't have gone to that meeting."

She hugged him. "It was stupid. Forget about it. Someone there probably made it say those things."

He jumped slightly at the suggestion. He held her at arm's length. "Do you honestly think one of them killed her, Amanda?"

She lowered her eyes. "Please don't ask me that, Jimmy."

Jimmy, I thought. Only I called him that.

I went back downstairs. I had to wait for Jimmy to fall asleep. The door to the garage lay slightly ajar. The light was on. Sucking in my breath, I squeezed through. Someone had rolled down the window on the driver's side of my Ferrari. I climbed inside and rested my hands on the steering wheel.

My birthday present. Some people would have given their right arms for a car like this.

Well, I thought, I had certainly paid my fair share.

I must have dozed. It was a bad habit that I had probably carried with me to the grave; I had always loved to nap.

When I came to, it was dark. I had a moment of panic when I thought I had been locked in the garage for the weekend. But the door to the house, I quickly saw, was open farther than before. I climbed out of the Ferrari and went inside.

The clock in the kitchen said almost two-fifteen.