Sparrow Hill Road 2010 By Seanan (23 page)

The phys ed major blinks, her eyebrows knotting themselves together. "Are you
sure that's a good idea? We just met this girl."

"I'm sure." Jamie looks at me, chin slightly tilted up, like he's trying to
present his best profile. That's when I realize what he thinks my role in this
little drama is going to be: I'm the wide-eyed Timmy to his mysterious Mr.
Wizard, the adoring ingénue ready to be seduced by his showmanship and drama.
I'm okay with that. I've played worse parts in my day. "We can trust her. Can't
we, Rose?"

"Absolutely," I agree, nodding so vigorously that for a moment, it feels like
my head is going to pop clean off. "I'm
really
interested. Like,
really
."

Marla still looks unconvinced, but she turns, rummaging through the big
plastic storage bin that serves as the group's "ghost hunting supply chest"
until she comes up with a battered brown journal that looks like something you'd
find in a high school senior's backpack. She holds it reverently, and for a
moment, it seems like she's going to run away from us rather than risking
bringing a non-believer into the fold.

Finally, grudgingly, she says, "You'd better be right about her," and thrusts
the book, hard, against Jamie's chest. He takes it before it has a chance to
fall, and she retreats, joining the sullen, glaring twosome of the physics
majors. It's weird, but I'm actually starting to feel a little nervous. Why
would she be reacting so badly if they didn't really have something? I
understand people getting jealous—Jamie's good-looking, and the way she looks at
him tells me she'd like to give him a little physical education on the side—but
this isn't jealousy. This is something else.

"Professor Moorhead came to our club meeting, and brought us this," says
Jamie. He flips the book open to a point about halfway through, holding it out
toward me. He's showing it, not offering it; the distinction is in his hands,
the way his fingers grip a little too tightly against the cover. That's okay. I
couldn't hold it right now if I wanted to. I'm having enough trouble keeping
myself from sitting down involuntarily, because it feels like all the air has
just left the room.

The newspaper clipping is fresh, still clean around the edges. It'll yellow
and curl as it ages, but right now, it's a little piece of sweet and recent
pain. LOCAL TRUCKER DIES IN TRAGIC CRASH says the headline.
Larry Vibber,
age 42
..., that's how the article begins. There's a sidebar—there's always
a sidebar—and that's what really makes my heart hammer against my ribs, like a
raccoon kit caught in a snare and trying as hard as it can to work its way free.
Suddenly, this little outing doesn't seem nearly as funny as it did a few
minutes ago.

A GHOST STORY COMING TRUE? The tale of the Girl in the Diner is a
familiar one on these American highways, and some of Mr. Vibber's fellow
truckers have reason to believe that it's true...

And then:
Larry Vibber's body was the only one retrieved from the crash.
So what, then, explains the woman's jacket in the seat next to his?

Stupid stupid stupid Rose; there's only so much evidence you can leave, only
so many breadcrumbs you can scatter before the witch in the woods starts
catching up with you. "Whoa," I say, hoping I don't sound as unsteady as I feel.
"So you're hunting for the ghost of Larry Vibber?"

"Better," says Jamie. "We're hunting for the Girl in the Diner."

I nod slowly. "Of course you are."

***

It makes a certain sort of fucked-up sense. If you're going to catch a ghost,
why not start big? Why not start with a ghost that everybody's heard of? I
suppose I should be flattered that this little crew of collegiate ghost hunters
wants to stuff me into a soul jar—or whatever it is the kids are calling it
these days—but mostly, I feel the serious need to run very far, very fast.
There's just one problem with that little plan. If they're going the high-tech
route, I'm fine. But if whoever gave them that book also gave them some more
traditional routes for attracting the restless dead, this could be a bad night
for everyone concerned.

"Who did you say gave this to you?" I ask, looking around the group. "I mean,
'cause wow. If I had the stuff to hunt a ghost, I'd probably want to hunt it
myself, you know?"

"She can't," says Marla, stiffly. "She's a professor. It wouldn't be
appropriate."

"A professor? Of what? Ghostology?"

"The University of Ohio doesn't have a parapsychology department," says
Physicist One. "If we did, we'd have faculty support."

"Professor Moorhead teaches American History," says Jamie, and flips to the
front of the book, where the face of a woman stares out at me from another,
older newspaper clipping. The picture is black and white, but I know her hair is
dirty blonde, and that the eyes behind her glasses are pale, and cold.

PROFESSOR LAURA MOORHEAD TO SPEAK ON THE LEGEND OF THE GIRL IN THE DINER,
that's what the caption underneath says. I take a breath. Force a smile. And ask
the one question that stands a shot at saving me:

"So what do we do first?"

***

It turns out that what we do first involves driving out to tonight's
designated hunting ground, an abandoned diner in what was once a truck stop, and
is now a deserted patch of asphalt and gravel. The freeway redirected the
traffic, the trucks stopped coming, and time moved on. I've seen it before,
these little dead spots, and they break my heart a little more each time. I ride
in the back with Angela and the Physicists, ceding the front seat to Marla in
the vain hope that it will make her glare at me a little less. This night's
going to be long enough as it is.

"So how long have you been into ghosts, Rose?" asks Angela. She's trying to
make conversation. I appreciate that.

Answering "since I died" seems like a bad idea just about now. I pretend to
give her question serious thought before I say, "Oh, forever, I guess. It sure
seems that way sometimes."

Angela nods, expression set in a look of absolute and total conviction as she
says, "I started really believing when I was eight. That's when my grandfather's
ghost came to me and told me that things were going to get better."

Scrooge was right about one thing: most spectral visitations are actually
dreams or indigestion. I have to fight to keep my eyes wide and filled with
belief. And if her grandfather really
did
come to visit her when she
was a kid, why the hell does she think catching a ghost is a good way to spend a
Friday night? If anyone was going to be live and let not-live about the dead, it
should have been her.

"Have you ever experienced a genuine paranormal visitation?" demands
Physicist Two.

I'm still trying to figure out how to answer that one when the minivan pulls
to a stop outside the broken-down old diner. "We're here!" announces Jamie, with
near-maniac cheer. "Everybody out and to your stations. Rose, you're with me."

Marla shoots me an absolutely venomous look as I slide out of my seat and
move to stand next to Jamie. He hands me a container of salt, ignoring her
displeasure.

"Angela, Tom, you go west. Marla, take Katherine inside and start setting up
the camera."

Marla may not be happy, but she doesn't argue with him. She moves quickly and
efficiently. So does everyone else. In a matter of minutes, it's just me, Jamie,
and the salt.

"Come on," he says. "Let's get started."

"I can't wait," I reply, and follow the crazy ghost-hunter into the night.

***

Their approach is a weird synthesis of traditional and technological. Cameras
to catch any apparitions, gauges to catch any unexpected fluctuations in the
local temperature...and spirit jars with honey and myrrh smeared around their
mouths, to catch any wayward, wandering ghosts. Salt circles with just a single
break in their outlines. Half-drawn Seals of Solomon on the broken asphalt. Even
scattered patterns of rapeseed, fennel, and rye, guaranteed to attract any
poltergeists who happen to be in the area. They aren't missing a trick. If I
weren't already wearing a coat, I'd be worried.

"So what are we hoping to achieve out here?" I ask Jamie, as we walk slowly
around the edges of the old parking lot, throwing down torn carnival tickets and
bits of broken glass. "This doesn't seem very, y'know. Scientific."

"That's why we're going to succeed when nobody else has," he says, seriously.
"We're pursuing synergy between the spirit and material worlds."

"I have no idea what that means," I say, in all honesty.

Jamie smiles. "It means keep scattering those ticket stubs, and by morning,
you're going to see something you'd never believe."

"Oh, I can believe that," I murmur, and keep scattering.

***

The sun's been down for a little more than an hour. Everyone seems sure that
nothing exciting will happen until midnight--which they insist in calling "the
witching hour," which is making me want to scream--so people are mostly just
checking equipment and taking walks around the grounds, making sure everything
has stayed in place. So far, the valiant ghost-hunters have managed to
successfully attract two raccoons, a stray cat, and a hitchhiker who isn't quite
as dead as I am.

"Spirit world, one, college kids with a high-tech Ouija board, zero," I say,
sweeping my flashlight around the edges of the blacktop. They're letting me
patrol on my own now, probably because they don't really think there's much I
can do to disrupt things if I'm on the other side of the yard. Marla's probably
hoping I'll see something mundane and scream, thus proving that she was right
and Jamie was wrong.

I don't think she'll be getting her wish tonight.

When I actually
do
see something, it's not mundane at all. One of
the spirit jars is closed, rocking gently back and forth with the weight of its
pissed-off contents. I stop beside it, squatting down, and tap the glass. The
rocking stops. "Yo," I say. That's about as much ceremony as I can muster at the
moment.

There are no words—bottled ghosts don't really communicate in words, per
se—but the spirit jar manages to communicate, clearly, that it would like to be
opened. Immediately.

"That's nice," I say. "What'll you give me?"

Some of the suggestions the spirit jar makes are anatomically impossible,
even for someone as flexible as I am. At least one of them would require my
cutting off one or more limbs. Still, I have to be impressed at how articulate
it manages to be, given its current lack of vocabulary.

"Nope, that won't be happening," I say. "How about we try this: I'll let you
out, and you'll go far, far away, and not bother any of nice, incredibly stupid
people that are here with me. And in exchange, I won't hunt you down and shove
you back into the jar. Deal?"

The jar mutters something sullen.

"Deal?"

Grudging assent this time. I reach out and remove the lid, ready to fight if
I have to. I don't. Some innocent backwood haunt too new to know to avoid the
scent of myrrh and honey blasts out of the open vessel, chilling the air around
me for an instant before it vanishes, racing back into the twilight, where it
will presumably be safer than it is out here.

"It's always nice to meet the neighbors," I say, returning the lid to its
half-open state. With luck, they'll never guess the jar was tampered with. I
retrieve my flashlight and resume walking.

By the time I finish my first circuit around the lot, I've freed two haunts,
a spectral lady, a will-o-wisp, a pelesit, and a very confused poltergeist that
takes half the carnival tickets with it when it goes. It's like a weird
naturalist's cross-section of the ghosts of the American Midwest, and it would
be a lot more interesting if I wasn't expecting one of the ghost-hunters to
appear at any minute and demand to know what I was doing.

Instead, a high, horrified scream rises from the direction of the diner. It
sounds like one of the Physicists. I stop where I am, turning toward the sound,
and wince as the taste of ashes and empty rooms wafts, ever so slightly, across
my tongue. "Oh, God, these idiots are going to get themselves killed," I say,
and break into a run. The screaming escorts me all the way.

***

The ghost-hunters are backed into the far corner of the diner, packed into
the space that still holds the shadowy ghost of a jukebox, playing songs I'm too
far into the daylight to quite make out. The temptation to drop down and hear
them would normally be a problem for me, but at the moment, it's easy to ignore
the phantom jukebox. The massive spectral dog standing between me and the
terrified college students seems likely to be a little more important.

"How the holy
fuck
did you people manage to attract a Maggy Dhu?" I
blurt out the question before I have a chance to consider its
ramifications—namely, that it betrays my knowing more than I've been letting on,
and that shouting is likely to attract the attention of the Black Hound of the
Dead.

Sure enough, the Maggy Dhu swings its head in my direction, lips drawn back
to display teeth like daggers, eyes burning the smoky, angry orange of midnight
jack-o-lanterns and the sort of harvest fire that used to come with a side order
of barbecued virgin sacrifice. I take a step back. "Uh, nice doggy. Good doggy.
Don't eat me, doggy."

"I don't know
what
that thing is, but it is
not
Scooby-Doo!" wails Marla.

"Not Scooby-Doo, Maggy Dhu," I say, keeping my eyes on the dog. It's the only
thing in this room that can hurt me. That means it gets my full attention. "It's
the Black Dog of the Dead. It harvests souls. What did you people
do
?"

"N-nothing," says Jamie. He sounds like he's hanging onto his sanity by a
thread. I guess when he said "ghost," he was picturing something nice, friendly,
and human-looking, like, say, a hitchhiking dead girl from the 1940s. Not the
afterlife equivalent of Cujo on a bad hair day. "We were just reading the
incantations from the book, and then this...this thing..."