Touch (12 page)

“T
HIS IS WHERE I LIVE,” Emma said quietly. There was no strange car in the drive, which
meant no stranger in the house. It should have been more of a relief than it was.

The dead child was a young boy. Emma thought him six at most, but he calmly told her
he was eight years old. He was skinny and short for his age, and he had the same kind
of calm vulnerability of—of Michael at that age. His hand was firmly in hers; if she
could have, she would have carried him. Her hand had passed beyond pain three blocks
ago; it was numb. Her upper arm was tingling from the cold of both winter and a dead
child’s hand.

The boy nodded as he looked at Emma’s house. His name was Mark Rayner. He had one
brother and one sister. He lived with his mother; his father mostly lived somewhere
in America.

“Will we go to my house after this?” he asked.

Emma’s careful smile faltered. She had asked Mark where he lived, and with whom. She
had explained that her own mother might be worried if she was out so late in the cold.
And she hoped that Mark knew he was dead. If he did, he wasn’t sharing.

She managed to get the front door open with one hand, which took effort; she was afraid
to let Mark go. Why, she didn’t know; she didn’t cling to Nathan in the same way,
and she certainly didn’t need to touch her father. But the boy seemed to take some
comfort from the contact—and it might be the
only
comfort she could offer him. For her troubles, she got a face full of Petal as he
ran full tilt at the door, his tongue wagging almost as much as his stubby little
tail.

Mark’s eyes widened, and he tried—still holding Emma’s hand—to hide behind her.

“It’s okay, he doesn’t bite. He’s a really friendly old dog. You can—” pat him? She
was irritated at herself for speaking without thinking. “He won’t hurt you. I don’t
think he’s ever hurt anyone but himself; he’s a bit of a klutz.”

“Emma?”

This was
so
not what Emma needed. Mercy Hall walked out of the kitchen and into the front hall
as Emma tried, very hard, to disentangle her hand. She didn’t quite manage in time.
Her mother blinked. Emma could still see Mark; Mercy Hall couldn’t. But she’d probably
seen something.

“Who were you talking to?” she asked, in exactly the wrong tone of voice.

Emma was too tired to lie; lying was a lot of work. She said nothing instead, removing
her coat and her boots and putting them in the closet, her back—and her face—turned
away from her mother. Composing her expression, she finished and turned around. “No
visitors tonight?”

“No. I have a lot of work. You’re alone?”

“I’m alone.”

Nathan had left her, not at her house but in the ravine.
I don’t want to scare him,
he’d said.
And he’s already taken the risk of talking to one stranger. I think there’s a chance
he’ll run if there are two of us.

Mark was watching both Emma and her mother with a faint air of confusion.

“Emma, I wanted to speak with you about Jon.”

So
not the conversation she needed to be having right now. “You said you have a lot
of work?”

“It doesn’t have to be a long conversation.”

“I have a lot of homework. Unless you’re going to tell me you want him to move in,
can we try this tomorrow when we both have more time?”

Mercy opened her mouth, shut it, and stood very still, as if she were counting. Then
she nodded. “You’d like him if you gave him half a chance.”

“I didn’t hate him,” Emma replied. “He seemed like a perfectly nice guy.”

“He is.”

The silence was awkward. The smiles that filled it were brittle, and not much better.
Emma kept hers on her face until her mother slid back into the dining room. The dining
table was once again a mess of scattered paper piles, which was all Emma saw of it
before she turned to Mark.

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly.

“That was your mom?”

She nodded. “She has a lot of work to do, and when she brings it home, I’m always
careful not to disturb her too much.”

“Mine, too.”

“Come upstairs? My dad’s not busy right now; I’ll introduce you.”

He clearly had no desire to meet strange men. Emma wondered how he had died. She couldn’t
ask, not yet. But she held out a hand, braced herself for the rush of cold as he took
it, and led him upstairs to her room. Petal followed, whining.

* * *

Her dad was, in fact, in her room. He had a pipe in his hands and appeared to be inspecting
the bowl. It wasn’t lit, or if it was, ghost smoke had no scent. But he turned to
face her as she entered the room with her visitor and set the pipe on the windowsill,
where it vanished instantly without, oh, setting the curtains on fire.

“Emma,” he said, smiling, his gaze on the stranger.

“Dad.”

“You’re late, tonight.”

“I’m sorry. I—I heard someone crying in the ravine, and I climbed down to find him.
This is Mark; he got lost there.”

Mark was, once again, peering out from behind Emma. “Mark, this is my dad, Brendan
Hall.”

Mark said nothing, which wasn’t a big surprise.

“This is my room. That’s my computer—”

“You have your own computer?”

She nodded. “Do you want to see it?” Crouching, she hit the power button. She knew
her dad could do something to make the computer respond and hoped it was a natural
ability of ghosts, because Mark was going to be pretty disappointed, otherwise.

As it powered up, she glanced at her father and mouthed the word “help.” Mark slid
into Emma’s chair, his hands hovering above the keyboard, his gaze riveted to the
monitor. Brendan Hall gestured, and she quietly stepped away.

* * *

“What happened?” her father asked, his voice very soft.

She told him exactly what had happened, because at the moment, that wasn’t her concern.
“I don’t think he knows he’s dead, Dad. And I’m not sure what to tell him.”

“How long has it been?”

“I don’t know—I can’t exactly start Googling for details about his death while he’s
on the computer.”

“Go ask your mother if you can use hers.”

“No way.”

“Em—”

“I’m not explaining why. She doesn’t want to know, but she’ll ask. I’m too tired to
come up with a decent lie.”

“Emma—”

“She wants the dead to be dead,” Emma continued bitterly.

“The dead
are
dead.”

“Well, she wants them to be
safely
dead. And quiet. She doesn’t want to know that her only daughter is touching their
ghosts.”

“Emma, I’ll only say this once. What happens—or does not happen—between Mercy and
me is none of your business. You are our child, but we’re not one person. I’m dead,
and I accept it. So, finally, does she.”

“But you’re
here
.”

“Yes. And I shouldn’t be. You know that.” He nodded at Mark’s back. “I think your
young guest has some suspicions.”

Emma frowned and looked over her shoulder to see a familiar Google logo on the screen;
the rest of the type was too small, at this distance, to read. She walked, quickly,
to the desk and did something she hated: She stood over Mark’s shoulder, reading what
his search had pulled up.

Mark Rayner.

She fished around in her pocket for her phone, pulled it out, and hit the first speed-dial
button. Allison answered on the third ring.

“Emma?”

“Can you come here—with Michael—right now?”

There was a small pause, and Emma glanced at the clock; it was 9:45. “Never mind,”
she said. “I didn’t notice the time. Don’t come. Your mother will just worry at you.”

“At me? I’m going to tell her it’s your fault.” She could almost see Allison’s grin.

“No, Ally, I’m fine—”

“You’re always fine. I’ll call Michael’s mother as well. We’ll be there soon.”

* * *

They arrived ten minutes later, which was fast enough Emma was instantly suspicious.
Her suspicions were confirmed when she answered her mother’s up-the-stairs summons:
Allison and Michael stood in the hall, which she’d expected; Eric stood behind them,
his back to the door. He looked over their heads and up the stairs at Emma.

Aware of her mother, Emma smiled a full-on Hall smile. “I’m sorry,” she said, heading
down the stairs, her father and a young boy safely ensconced in her room. “I didn’t
mean to drag you guys out so late.”

“Eric drove,” Michael replied.

Mercy Hall, like Eric, was looking at her daughter with question marks in her eyes.
But she was a Hall as well; she kept them to herself while they had guests. Emma waited
until shoes, boots, assorted mittens, scarves, and hats had been more or less closeted,
and then led them all upstairs. “It’s a bit of a mess,” she told them before she opened
her door. Petal joined the entourage, which guaranteed it would be even more of a
mess in a handful of minutes.

He was the first one through the door, because he didn’t wait for it to be fully open;
he was also the first one on the bed, where he was technically not allowed to go.
The duvet engulfed him, mostly because he was rolling in it. Allison and Michael walked
in; Michael sat on the edge of the bed, nearest Petal; Allison sat on the ancient
beanbag chair in the corner. Eric, however, stood in the center of the room, somewhere
between Emma’s dad and her visitor.

Emma took a deep breath, closed the door firmly behind her and glanced at Eric.

“I have a visitor,” she said. She walked over to her computer; Mark was still seated
in the chair, staring at a screen full of Google.

“Would his name be Mark Rayner?” was Eric’s soft question.

The child turned at the sound of his name, his eyes widening as he saw Emma’s friends.
He had apparently failed to hear the door or see Petal, Allison, Michael, or Eric
when they’d entered the room. It was almost as if he were a younger version of Michael.
This impression was strengthened when he said, “Yes, I’m Mark Rayner,” before turning
back to the computer screen.

Eric raised a brow at his back. “Where did you find him?”

“In the ravine,” Emma replied. She struggled with tone of voice, and lost. “I heard
someone crying when we—when I was walking home.”

“And you went into the ravine on your own in the dark to find him.” Said like that,
it sounded like an accusation.

The beanbag made its usual squeaking noises as Allison pushed herself out of it; Eric
immediately fell silent.

“I did. It took me a while to find him. He’s not supposed to speak to strangers, and
I’m a stranger.”

Michael stood as well. When Michael stood, it was generally a signal. “Emma, can I
meet him?”

She nodded. She approached the chair in which Mark sat, and knelt beside it, bringing
her eyes in line with his. He didn’t look at her; he looked at the screen. His fingers
hovered above the keyboard—or the mouse. Emma wasn’t certain how he could use either,
and now didn’t seem like the right time to ask.

“I want to go home,” Mark told her, without looking down to where she now crouched.

Emma closed her eyes. “Can I introduce you to my friends, first?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll have to get down from the chair.”

“Why?”

She almost laughed. “It’s important, when meeting people who don’t know you and don’t
understand you.”

“Why?”

“If you don’t, they’ll feel like you’re ignoring them.”

“Oh.”

Since it appeared that he was ignoring them, and since Eric clearly felt he was, Emma
gently forced the chair around. He came with it; she hadn’t been certain he would.
He frowned as she held out her hand. But after a long, silent minute, he placed his
hand in reach of hers. “It feels different,” he told her, sliding off the chair, looking
for all the world like a living boy.

Her hand should have been numb at this point, but it wasn’t, and the cold of his small
palm burned.

“Mark, this is Allison, my best friend.”

Mark nodded.

“This is Michael. I think Michael and you might have a lot in common. That’s Eric.”

Mark frowned as he looked at Michael. “Are you normal?” he asked.

It wasn’t the question that anyone expected, but Michael was seldom floored by questions
that weren’t laced with anger or pain. “I’m normal for me.”

“I’m not,” Mark said quietly, staring at a fixed point on the floor. “I’m not normal.”

* * *

A long silence followed. Emma had to resist the urge to put her arms around the child;
she
also
had to resist the urge to ask him who’d told him this and, more important, why they’d
said it. “No one is normal,” she told him instead.

“Other people are normal.”

“But you’re not other people,” Michael said, which was good; Emma was silent for a
moment, struggling with a sudden surge of protective anger. Michael spoke calmly because
he was stating simple, irrefutable fact.

Mark nodded, but he added, “If I were other people, if I were like other people, people
would like me.”

Allison’s expression mirrored Emma’s feelings; Ally had never been as good at the
Hall face.

“Do you like dogs?” Mark asked.

Michael nodded.

“I don’t like the smell. And their breath. I don’t like the sound the lights make.”
These two statements were not connected. Mark really did remind Emma of Michael as
a child.

“He doesn’t smell bad, to me. He smells like dogs smell.” Michael thought for a minute
and then asked, “Do cats smell bad to you?”

“Not all cats. Some cats.”

“Do these lights make bad noises?”

Mark frowned. He looked at Emma’s hand, still entangled with his, and then tilted
his head to one side. “No.” He looked confused. “Emma’s hand doesn’t hurt. The lights
here are quiet.”

“Maybe it’s different,” Michael said, as Emma opened her mouth to speak, “because
you’re dead now.”

* * *

Silence.

Mark proved that he was not like Emma, not like Allison, and not like other children.
He blinked, then frowned. “Am I dead?” he asked Michael.