The Lifeguard (6 page)

“I’m hearing these…sounds… from upstairs.”

She reaches a hand up to the side of her jaw and rubs it, nodding.

“Do you know what…”

She nods knowingly again.

“Are they always the same?”

She takes her glasses off. “Not always, why?”

“Do you think the ghost is trying to tell us something?”

Her face softens. “I don’t know if it’s true or not, but there a story about a woman who lived in this house. Her husband had a fishing boat, I heard. Supposedly one day he went out to sea and never came back. Nobody ever found him or the boat so the story people started telling was that the voice was his wife’s and she was crying out for him. They said she’d never stop until she found him.”

“When do you hear it?”

“When the weather’s bad…They say he left when there was a bad storm approaching.”

“Do you believe that?”

“I can’t
not
believe it, even though I’d be hard-pressed to find concrete evidence.”

I feel an icy draft on my neck at that moment. But how is that possible? The house isn’t air conditioned and it’s hot outside. Is it my imagination? Tiny goose bumps suddenly rise up and dot my arms. Aunt Ellie watches as I rub my hands up and down my arms to warm myself. “Is it cold in here?”

She shakes her head. “That happens to me sometimes, too.”

“Omigod.”

The chill finally passes and I try to take a deep breath. “Have you ever seen…
it
?”

She makes a face as if to say, hmmm, that’s a hard one. “I haven’t actually seen what comic books show you ghosts look like, but once or twice at night, when it was raining hard, I thought I saw a white light, or something like that scoot down the hallway.”

“Did it scare you?”

“The first time, a little, but now, no…I feel sorry for her in a way, so I’m glad I can share my house with her—or that she lets
me
share
her
house.”

“You’re so cool about it. If my mom were here she’d run from the house screaming.”

“I’ve come to accept that there are things about this world that we’ll never nail down…never know about for certain. And in some ways I enjoy the mysteries—and the possibilities. But I do believe there are different kinds of life and spirits or ghosts, or whatever you want to call them. But—” She stops and her face softens, “fortunately we seem to share our little universe with gentle ghosts, so no, I don’t worry about it too much.”

I hold that thought as Will and I climb back upstairs. I can’t help thinking of a story I read in the local paper, just before Halloween, about a real haunted house that was supposedly built on the site of an old cemetery. There was a place in the backyard where the owners of the house insisted that their dog refused to go. One day when the police came to the house to investigate, they brought cadaver dogs. They immediately went to that exact spot and stood right there like they knew bodies were buried below. And inside the house, all kinds of creepy, unexplained things used to happen. Lights went on by themselves, so did the TV and the water faucets. Upstairs, doors shut when no one was there. And even though the owners’ dog wasn’t white, there were white dog hairs around the house. A white dog had lived in the house, but it was many years before.

The scariest thing of all, though, was the picture of the upstairs bathroom the local newspaper took and used with the story. If you looked at it closely, you could actually make out the evil-looking face of a man with dark, piercing eyes.

Only the bathroom wall was bare. There were no picture of any kind on it, and no one at all could identify the mysterious image that appeared for the world to see.

“Do you decorate your house with spooky lights or decorations for Halloween?” the reporter jokingly asked the owners.

“No,” they said. “To us it isn’t funny.”

The wife took pictures in the house and when she looked at them she could see little white disks she called orbs, floating in the air. They resembled tiny flying saucers.

I open my bureau drawer and take out my camera. I snap pictures of one part of my room and then the other.

Click. Click. Click. Click.

Then I look at the pictures, examining them carefully.

Nothing.

I exhale, relieved, and toss the camera aside. I lay in bed studying the pictures. A few minutes later, I pick up the camera again and shoot more pictures.

Click. Click. Click. Click.

I walk to the edge of the bed and turn on the other lamp. I sit down and study the pictures again in the brightness.

And that’s when I see them.

The faint, white circles.

They’re everywhere.

T
here are
ghosts
in the house here,” I whisper into the phone to my dad.

“What?”

“GHOSTS.”

Ghosts?” he says, a smile in his voice. “Okaaaay.”

He thinks I’m teasing. “I’m not kidding, dad.”

“How do you know?”

“Because when it rains or storms they come out, they come out in the attic, where I have my bed.”

Silence.

My dad is now weirded out. He doesn’t know what to say. He’s not the kind of guy who believes in ghosts, and even if he did I don’t think he’d be spooked by them, at least at first. Reality is more than enough for him to cope with. But even if there were ghosts where he slept, he’d probably fall dead asleep so fast that he’d be oblivious to them if they came out—either that, or his snoring would scare them off.

“Ghosts like Casper or what?” he blurts out.

“White, weird, shadowy, I don’t know exactly.”

“Did you tell Aunt Ellie?”

“Of course
she
knows, it’s her house,” I tell him. “Yeah, sure.” Another pause. “Does it scare you or what?”

“Yes…and no.”

“So, switch beds with Ellie when it storms. Ask her to bunk with the damn ghosts.”

“It’s not that they’re unfriendly or dangerous, it’s just…you know, so weird.”

“Life is weird, baby. You have to get used to it.”

P
MS is up there with ghosts in turning you into someone you don’t want to be. I’m stretched out on the living room couch, down and dirty in boxers and a sleep shirt. If I were home on the weekend during the school year, the scene might go:

My mom: “Sirena, for God’s sake get dressed.”

Me: “I’m studying for a stupid test. Why do I have to get dressed?” I’d slam the door of my room and go back to studying, Facebook, and ice cream.

Only not here.

Aunt Ellie’s had her fill. She plants herself in front of me, hands on hips. “Idea for you.”

I look up warily.

“Why don’t you spend a few hours a day volunteering at the hospital?”

Or not
.

I’m not great with kids, and a job without pay? Why can’t I just veg? Only I don’t talk to Aunt Ellie the way I sometimes talk to my mom—or sometimes, don’t talk to her at all.

I don’t want to be thrown out, so I don’t talk back, but I exhale, so she gets it. “What could I do there?” I ask, finally.

“Lots of things,” she says brightly, getting on my nerves. “They need people to read to the kids, bring books to the patients, run errands. I’m sure they’d love to have you.”

“Probably have to be eighteen. I’m not old enough.”

“Yes, you are. They use volunteers your age all the time.”

It’s not something I can explain to Aunt Ellie, but the truth is, bed is at the top of the list of places I want to be right now. And if I do go out, I want to sit by myself at the water after everyone is gone—especially him. I refuse to come off like a pathetic groupie.

Aunt Ellie is usually cool about things, only she isn’t now. She’s drawn a line in the sand and she stares at me, waiting.

“I guess I could go.”

“I’m driving by this afternoon, I’ll drop you.” It’s all settled in her head, but she must read the look on my face because she comes back and sits on the edge of the couch.

“Sirena, helping other people has a way of making
you
feel better. Believe it or not, it lets you forget about yourself and your own problems and see things in perspective. You’re not the first girl whose parents are breaking up and you won’t be the last. Life goes on, and you have to live your life. Nothing is inherently good or bad, it’s how you let yourself see it and react to it. Really, it’s in your hands.”

Did I have a choice?

She starts to walk out of the living room and then glances back at me.

“I’m
going
.”

How I see things and react to them is in
my
hands? How could I feel good about my life when I didn’t have one? No summer plans, no parents, no friends around and no real place to live anymore. What did that leave me? A dog friend and a fantasy? I go upstairs, stub my toe on the foot of the bed, and start to sob. I stand in the shower so she can’t hear me.

A
unt Ellie’s outside in the car by the time I’m dressed. We drive through town to the hospital without more talk. The best I can hope for is a flat tire, but it doesn’t happen.

The double doors at the front of the hospital spring open by themselves as if they’re under some invisible power. To my left is a separate entrance with a red neon sign:
Emergency
.

Compared to the hospitals at home, this looks like a small clinic. Only three floors and few people in the lobby. At the information desk there’s a woman in a pale pink jacket with a button:
Volunteer
. Next to her is a vase of flowers that looks like it was left behind by a patient who didn’t want it.

“Who do I see about volunteering?”

Her small, sympathetic smile says she understands more about me than she possibly could. “Have a seat, dear.”

I land on a hard, blue plastic bench opposite a girl my age engrossed in
People
. She sits with her skinny legs wound up like a pretzel. That reminds me of Marissa, who right now is kayaking, playing tennis, or rock climbing while I’m waiting to work for no pay. I want to call her and cry, only sleep-away camps pride themselves on not staying connected. No laptops, zero cell service in the mountains, and fewer pay phone privileges than prison inmates. That left writing letters, which arrive about as fast as they did in the 1800s.

But I look on the bright side.

No buggy bunks or thin, ancient mattresses for me this summer. No bug juice. No after-camp love handles from carb loading. No bleeding mosquito bites. No gross, bugafied bathrooms...

“Sirena?”

A woman in a green hospital jacket stands in front of me, smiling expectantly, and I crash land. At least I’m a celebrity, because the whole town already knows my name. I resist offering my autograph and smile weakly. “I was wondering if you needed a volunteer.”

“We’re a small hospital,” she says, “but there are always patients who would welcome company, and if you’d like to read to the children or play games with them…”

“Should I come back tomorrow, then?”

“You can start today.” She points to the elevator. “Go to Three and ask for Mary Carol, she’s the social worker. She’ll show you around and get you started.”

I’m given a stack of papers to fill out, and in the time it takes to answer everything, I could have written a term paper. I give it all to Mary Carol and she starts to look it over when her phone rings. “I have to take this,” she mouths. She points to a sign outside:
Patients’ library and lounge
.