Out of the Shadows (23 page)

If I was alone, then I could search the shelves for a school yearbook, and if I found none, I would check the boy’s room.

I treaded carefully down the hallway toward the kitchen, expecting a creak or two to give away my position. But the flooring was impeccable. I walked through the spacious, warm kitchen and into the living room. Flanking either side of the brick fireplace hearth were two dark, walnut bookshelves that stretched floor to ceiling.

Seeing the book titles in the darkened room would be a challenge, so I walked over to an end table next to a robust, brown recliner, and I switched on the golden lamp, casting a warm glow through the cozy family room.

It wasn’t until the space had been illuminated that I noticed the old man sitting on the couch against the wall. As our gazes locked and his eyes trained on me suspiciously, my breath caught in my throat, and it felt as though my heart stopped. A blanket covered his legs, and he raised his frail hands to cinch his gray cardigan more tightly around his torso. His gray hair was wispy, his white moustache full. Loose, olive skin hung around his jowls and under his neck, giving the impression of recent weight loss.

He continued to watch me, his eyebrows crinkling with disgust. However, when he realized that I was staring back at him, his antagonistic expression morphed into one of confusion and then of piqued interest. But I had known the old man’s secret the moment our eyes had connected:

He was dead.

The old man slowly rose to his feet, appearing to struggle, as if he still felt joint pain even though he had died. His mouth opened and closed and opened again, wanting to speak out but not able. He looked at me, his dull eyes wide with surprise. He glanced back over his shoulder, perhaps hoping to find a person in the curtained window at who I might have been looking, puzzled that I would be able to see him. With his gaze now trained back in my direction, he slowly raised his hand and pointed at me.

I nodded slowly. “I can see you,” I said quietly, my heart fluttering nervously at this deliberate interaction. “I can’t explain why. It’s just something I can do.”

The man shuffled toward me, slowly reaching forward, his frail hand nearing my arm.

When his finger went through me, I shivered, goose bumps erupting over my skin. It seemed that the dead could not physically interact with the living after all, but the inanimate looked to be fair game for supernatural hocus-pocus.

Upon realizing he could not touch me, he backed away, a severe melancholy devouring his expression. For the first time, I thought about what it must be like for the dead still stuck in this world. Not able to speak. Not able to touch. Not able to experience the comfort of something simple, like a hug.

My heart broke for this man. I watched him sulk away toward the fireplace mantle where he now stood, back hunched, staring at the framed family photos.

I owed him an explanation for my presence. Slowly walking toward him, wishing I could place a hand on his shoulder for comfort, I said, “I’m not here to steal anything.”

The man didn’t acknowledge.

“There’s a kid that I’m trying to help,” I continued. “He’s dead, and I don’t know who he is. I’m here because he went to school with a boy who lives in this house: Daniel Martinez.”

The elderly man turned toward me at the mention of Daniel’s name. His face contorted in a way that appeared distraught with emotion, but no tears flowed from his empty eyes. He pointed to a photo on the mantle of a beautiful family – a smiling mother with her arms around a young black-haired boy, the proud father standing to the side of them both, his hands resting on their shoulders.

“Is that Daniel?” I asked of the boy in the picture frame.

The old man lowered his head, placing his hand over his heart. He seemed distressed by the photos before him, and I had grown to assume over the past year that the dead only linger in this world when their hearts are burdened with unfinished business.

“They didn’t get to say goodbye,” I half-asked, half-knew.

The man pointed upward toward the ceiling. I saw nothing, but my gut flickered with understanding: the second floor contained what I was looking for.

The hairs on the back of my neck perked up, and I turned to find the shaggy-haired ghost boy having reappeared, lingering at the entrance to the family room. Despite my sadness for the old man next to me, the appearance of my young, dead stalker invoked agitation within me. He had an expression of worry on his face, looking up at the house’s top floor.

“Here he is!” I said with excitement to the Martinez grandfather. “This is the kid! Do you know who he is?”

The old man examined the boy and shook his head, again pointing toward the ceiling.

“I should go upstairs?” I asked, looking for something definitive within the vague communication from the spirits.

The boy appeared anxious, not for himself but for me.

I started out of the family room toward the hallway leading to the steps, my heart pounding with anticipation. The answers to my questions must lay upstairs, and now was my time to get them!

“
Mamá
, is that you?” came a quiet voice followed by a cough from the hallway. Around the corner shuffled a young boy, dressed in fleece pajamas, his short black hair disheveled from sleeping, skin pale with illness: Daniel Martinez.

We both froze at the sight of each other.

Daniel’s brown eyes were huge with fright, his body trembling.

I held out my hands to calm him. “It’s ok. I’m not here to hurt—.”

“You’re that woman on the news!”

Before I could say anything more, he turned and ran back down the hallway, charging up the steps to the second floor. I pursued, calling out to him, saying anything I could think of to calm him. Up the stairs I barreled, running down a dark, carpeted hallway toward the sound of the door that had just slammed.

Trying the doorknob, I found it to be locked. “Daniel!” I hollered, pounding on the door. “Daniel, open the door! I’m not going to hurt you!”

From the other side, I heard him talking.
“Papá!”
he cried. “That woman on the news is in the house!”

Shit!
He’d just called his parents.

“Mom let me stay home sick, and I found the woman downstairs! She’s right outside my room!” he sobbed.

“Daniel!” I pounded again. “Please, I just need to talk with you!”

“I don’t want to die. Hurry!” And then he went silent.

“Please open the door!” I screamed, near hysterics. “I have to talk with you!”

“Go away!”

“You went to school with a boy that died last year. You were on the basketball team together. Do you remember him?!”

“Please,” he sputtered in fear. “Leave me alone!”

“I need this boy’s name, Daniel. Tell me his name, and I’ll go!”

“Please don’t hurt me!” he blubbered.

My mind raced, and before I had realized what words I’d spoken, I said, “Your grandpa loves you and misses you very much!”

Silence.

No sound was heard, save for the occasional gasp for air from a sobbing child.

“Daniel?” I said, more calmly now. “Are you still there?”

He did not respond.

“I can’t explain how, but I talked with your grandpa. He misses you so much, and he’s very sorry that you didn’t get to say goodbye to him.”

To my right, I noticed that the dead boy and the grandfather had joined me. The old man clutched both of his hands to his heart, and he was smiling. His encouragement filled me with a renewed sense of hope.

“Daniel?” I tried once more.

I heard the lock unhinge, and the door opened slightly, revealing a young boy with red, puffy eyes. “Who are you?” he asked, almost angrily.

I took a breath, about to reveal my greatest secret to a living person for the first time. “I have a gift… or a curse… or
something
… And I was able to talk to your grandpa.”

Daniel attempted to slam the door in my face, but my hand flew up and pressed against it.

“Please, listen!”

“You’re a liar!”

“I’m not! He’s lingering here, in our world, trying to find a way to let you all know that it’s ok you couldn’t be there.”

Daniel considered me, still hesitant of my intentions. “Where is he then?”

I looked over at the old man; he was still grinning, his eyes begging for tears that would never come. “He’s here.”

Daniel’s expression of fright turned into sorrow. “I miss him so much.”

“You don’t have to miss him. He’ll always be with you.”

The grieving boy took a deep breath. “Can he hear me right now?”

I glanced back at the grandfather, and he shuffled past me, kneeling in front of the crying boy. “Yes,” I said.

Streams of anguish poured from Daniel’s eyes, as if a lifetime of the words he never got to say came pouring forth. “I miss you,
abuelito
,” he whimpered through his runny nose. “I love you.”

The old man reached forward, desperately wanting to hug the boy, but then he remembered he would be unable. He looked back at me, and I could see a twinge in his eyes that begged me to help him.

“He’s… right in front of you,” I stumbled for the right words to say. “He wishes he could give you a hug. He wants you to know everything’s ok.”

As the old man raised his hand and placed it over Daniel’s heart, the boy gasped, and then all of the tension released from his shoulders, like a peace had come over him.

Rising to his feet, the grandfather turned and smiled at me, eternally grateful to finally receive the help he’d needed to say goodbye.

And then he faded from this world.

I was awestruck by what had just taken place, my own breath lumped in my throat. For the first time, I had finally been able to make good use of the curse bestowed upon me. I looked over at the dead hazel-eyed boy now, feeling a stronger urge than ever before to find out who he was and what he wanted from me.

“What’s happening?” Daniel asked of his grandfather, wiping his face on his pajama sleeve.

“He’s gone now. I’m sorry.”

He looked up at me, his eyes dry and red, his lip quivering. “Thank you.”

I would have smiled at him, but the front door below blasted open, and a man’s voice bellowed,
“Daniel!”
Mr. Martinez charged up the steps frantically, probably taking two at a time.

Before my mind could register what had happened, Daniel pulled me into his room, slammed the door, and locked it behind him, leaning against it with all of his twelve-year-old might.

“Daniel!” his father pounded from the other side of the door. “Are you all right? Where is she?!”

The kid panicked, his mind searching for what to say. He waved his hand at me wildly and whispered, “Go!”

I spun around and saw my only escape: the window. I hurriedly ran to it and flung it open. There was a small bit of roof below, probably covering the backyard patio underneath. But I was still unsure how I would fair jumping a whole story to the frozen ground. I grew angry with the dead boy once more, being forced into the many unpleasant situations of the day.

Again, the father pounded, the panic evident in his voice. “Daniel!”

“One minute!” he called out, trying to sound calm but failing.

“Daniel, open the door! Is she in there? Is she hurting you?!”

The father began throwing himself against the door, trying to bust it down. I heard police sirens screech through the late-afternoon air as the squad cars sped down the suburban street, coming to rest in front of the Martinez House.

I flung my legs out the window, precariously finding footing on the icy shingles of the roof. I was just about to let go and make my way down when Daniel called out, “Hey, lady!”

I stopped and looked at him expectantly.

His eyes gazed into mine for a moment as he struggled against his father’s pounding behind him. He took a breath and said, “Cole Westfall.”

Cole Westfall.

The name of the mystery boy that had been following me around for a year. I nodded at Daniel, giving my silent thanks, and then I made my way to the edge of the roof, looking carefully over the edge, hoping my coat didn’t get caught on the gutter when I jumped. The name Cole Westfall meant nothing to me, so I still had answers that needed to be sought after.

I heard Daniel’s bedroom door crack from its hinges, and I knew my time was up. I took a breath and leapt from the rooftop, colliding painfully with the ground below, an intense twinge of pain searing through my injured ankle. Picking myself up from the grassy, suburban tundra, I fled through the backyard, preparing to jump the chain-link fence into the neighbor’s yard.

I stopped when I realized that Cole was no longer with me. I looked around wildly, and then I spotted him. He stood at the side of the Martinez House, gazing after me. When our eyes locked, he turned around and walked away from me in the direction of the front yard.

Toward the police cars.