The Presence (3 page)

The nurse bent forward. "Is something the matter, Miss Lovelace?"

Collin, who'd finished loading the plants, came to stand next to us. "Is she OK?" he asked the nurse. "Should I get her a glass of water?"

The nurse frowned. "I think we should just go home. It's not good for her to be upset like this."

Miss Lovelace bent her finger at me, even more urgently.

I made myself lean over her. I could smell a strange mixture of lavender and mothballs and maybe a short, sweet breath of liquor.

"Stay away from St. Matthew's," she whispered. "Run. No as waiting."

"'No as waiting'? What do you mean?" I drew back, fumbling for Grandma's hand.

Miss Lovelace was making faint mewling sounds like a baby about to cry.

"We're leaving," the nurse said firmly. "Say goodbye to your friends, Miss Lovelace."

Grandma and Collin and I stood silently as the old woman was wheeled away.

"What did she say to you, Catherine?" Grandma asked.

I wet my lips. "She said to stay away from St. Matthew's. And something about not waiting. And that I should run."

Grandma frowned. "What on earth did she mean?"

Collin touched his forehead. "I think maybe she's a bit dotty," he said. "Geez, she must be a hundred years old. She probably doesn't know what she's talking about."

I remembered how sharp those eyes had been. Even though her voice had quivered, the old woman wasn't dotty. I didn't believe that for one minute.

The Presence waited for them to come back. It bothered him that Catherine was with Collin Miller. But that sort of thing was inevitable. Soon she would be with no one but him.

He smiled, thinking of the nice surprise he had readied for her when she returned.

We were back at St. Matthew's. I was careful to stay close to Collin as we went in and out of the church carrying the plants.

When the flowers were arranged along the altar rail, Grandma stood back, admiring them. "We have the most beautiful midnight service on Christmas Eve, Catherine," she said. "I almost love it more than the one on Christmas Day itself. It's dark inside with the lights turned off. We carry candles and sing carols. You'll see. And of course these magnificent poinsettias line the altar." She began soundlessly counting them, then gave an exaggerated sigh. "I can't believe it. There's one too many ... thirty-seven. Can't be. I should have noticed."

"Here's one with a blank card." Collin lifted it from among the poinsettia leaves and turned it in his fingers. "Nothing on it. Didn't you say you gave them the printed name cards to put on when you left the order?"

"I did," Grandma said.

Collin passed her the card, and she shook her head and gave it to me.

"What do you mean, blank?" I asked. "Look!"

Collin and Grandma peered over my shoulder, then stared at me.

"I don't see anything," Grandma said, then sharply, "Do you, Catherine?"

My mouth was as dry as sand. I tried to say something, but what would I say? I shook my head. Plain as anything—plain to me—were the words: TO CATHERINE FROM NOAH.

Grandma sighed. "Well, I guess I'll send them a check toe over this extra plant, and we'll just not worry about it."

The card fluttered from my fingers and fell to the oak floor. TO CATHERINE FROM NOAH! Was I losing my mind? Was I seeing words now as well as hearing them? I shivered and stuck my hands in the pockets of my jeans.

"You're cold, Catherine," Grandma said. She took off her white wool scarf and wound it around my neck. "It's freezing in here. We've got to do something about the heating system in this church. Sometimes it's unbearable." She rubbed her hands together. "So, who'd like to walk up to Starbucks and get a cup of latte? I'm buying."

"Man, that sounds good." Collin slapped his long arms around himself and added, "Especially since you're buying. Let's go."

We were walking back through the choir room when Grandma stopped. "I just thought of something," she said, frowning. "Donna Cuesta ... poor little Donna Cuesta. Do you remember, Collin? No, of course you wouldn't. You weren't helping with the poinsettias then. Let me think. We had one extra plant last year, too, and..." She tapped her finger on her chin. "It's coming back to me now. We couldn't see a name on that card, either. But I recall, Donna looked at it and said, 'Oh, don't worry. It's for me.' She looked so pleased."

We were outside now. The late-afternoon sun was warm on our shoulders. A crow carrying a seed as big as a marble rose heavily into an oak tree.

"Why do you say 'Poor little Donna Cuesta'?" I asked.

"Oh, she always seemed timid somehow. And then, well, she disappeared. Ran away. Her mother was distraught. She said Donna had started wearing a ring on her engagement finger before she left."

The crow dropped the seed and flapped down after it.

"Her mother told us it had two red stones in it," Grandma went on. "It was in an old-fashioned antique setting like a serpent. Sounded hideous to me. I guess Donna was secretive about the ring. I never noticed it. But it obviously came from some fellow. We all decided she'd run away with him. Or maybe they broke up tragically and she couldn't stand being around without him. That kind of thing is always happening in the books I read. And then, of course, the heroine meets someone better." Her voice was cheerful. "In
Lady Margaret's Journey,
the son of the squire dumped Lady Margaret for a vixen he met in a London dance hall and..."

I walked between them, not really listening. What had Donna seen on that card that they hadn't? Did it say, "To Donna from Noah"?

A sick feeling washed over me. What was going on?

The Presence had watched them leave for the place called Starbucks. The office ladies went there a lot. He himself had never been because these church walls were his boundaries; the church, his prison. But he knew about Starbucks. He knew a lot about almost everything.

In the office were newspapers to read, a television to watch, a computer that had a search engine from which he could get answers to any questions he had. He'd read the iMac manual and the Teach Yourself the iMac book that Maureen had brought in, and he'd practiced and
worked till he knew the clever little machine by heart. How could those office women not understand it? So simple. It had opened the entire outside world to him. What advances there'd been since he was alive!

The St. Matthew's library had books shelved and cataloged. Politics, history. He'd found his own era. Interesting. But there was nothing about him. Too bad. His could have been the story of the millennium.

The Presence liked books more than the computer. He liked the encyclopedia, the feel of the pages. He'd read through The World Book four times, A to Z. "A is the first letter of our alphabet. It was the first letter in all the alphabets from which ours evolved.
"

"
Zygote ... see Fertilization.
"

And ghosts. "A ghost, according to tradition, is a spirit of a dead person that visits the living.... Many ghosts are malevolent. That is, they try to do harm. But some ghosts are friendly.... Ghosts—which are associated with darkness and night—usually end their visits by dawn.
"

He'd smiled at that. What did they know? He cared nothing for day or night. They were both the same. Perhaps, the Presence thought, he'd write a book. Why not? It would be a bestseller. He'd tell that he could be, had been
,
both friendly and malevolent. No doubt he'd be both again.

He smiled to himself. He'd be a ghostwriter.

In the church library were books on god and His plan for humankind. The Presence stayed away from those. He and god were not friends. god had punished him for Lydia with endless years of loneliness. He'd found company for himself a few times, but only temporarily. More than anything he wanted a mate. Someone he could talk to. Someone who'd listen. There might even be love. He had a good feeling about Catherine. Catherine might be the one. And then this ache of emptiness inside him would be gone forever.

Collin and Grandma and I walked up to Starbucks. We sat at a small table outside in the sunshine while traffic buzzed by on Colorado Boulevard. Across the street, workers were erecting scaffolding for the Rose Parade on New Year's Day. It would go along here, the floats and the bands, but I would be in the snows of Chicago. Mom and Dad would be back home, too, and I'd pick up living again. If I could.

I was half-listening to Grandma's and Collin's conversation, but I couldn't concentrate. Was it possible that this Noah was the one who had spoken my name twice in the church? Why?

I secretly looked around. What if he was watching me, maybe sitting at one of these other tables? There was an old man tossing crumbs to the birds that flocked around his feet. He was paying no attention to us. A woman with a toddler waited for the kid to finish a tall milkshake. He slurped and blew into the straw. Chocolate froth filled the top half of the glass, and chocolate bubbles rose and popped close to the rim. I turned and gazed along the sidewalk. Only an elderly couple walking their two dogs. Not Noah, I was sure.

"Tell me about being in Scotland," Collin said.

I glanced quickly at Grandma and then said, "It was nice."

"How long were you there?"

"Three months," I said.

"Do you have relatives there or what?" he asked.

I could tell he didn't know anything about the Scotland connection or he would have let it go, would never have started it. He knew about the accident. I'd already sensed that. That must have come in on the St. Matthew's grapevine, or maybe Grandma had told him, but the details weren't there.

"No relatives," I said. "I visited a friend."

His eyebrows were raised, so I added, "Actually, she was my penpal. I met her on the Internet."

Collin grinned. "No kidding. There's probably a word for that. Netpal. Or cyber chum." He took a bite that demolished half of his croissant. "So did she live in a castle in the Highlands?"

I stirred my coffee, swirling the spoon round and round and round. "No. In a house. In a little town called Kilbarcin." There was a river that ran through the village. The low stone bridge that crossed it said "bilded" in 1434. Kirsty and I loved to jump off that bridge into the brown, clear water, cold and sharp as needles. There were pebbles on the bottom, and little fish, sprickly backs, Kirsty called them, that darted around our legs. My eyes were beginning to blur.

"
Your
family went to Europe last year, right, Collin?" Grandma asked quickly. Nice Grandma, changing the subject.

"We did," Collin said. "France, Italy, ... no Scotland." He leaned across the table. "So did you discover what the guys wear under those kilts?"

I tried to smile. "Never did ask," I said.

Grandma put her hands flat on the table. "I can tell you. They have on underwear, just like anyone else. Lady Fiona, who, by the way, was a perfect lady, mentioned that in passing in the book I read last week.
Her Highland Lover.
"

Collin leaned back. "Whew! That's good to know. I've worried about that for a long time."

"By the way," Grandma added, "
Her Highland Lover
was a historical romance set at the time of the Stuarts. Very educational."

There was a faint, faraway ringing. I looked around, but Grandma immediately picked up her big canvas purse.

"Darn thing," she grumbled. "It's probably Rita, telling me she's lost her template and can't finish the bulletin. She's always calling me about something gone wrong with that computer. But I thought the office people were ready to leave."

We watched while she fished out a cell phone and unfolded it.

Collin grinned at me, and I couldn't help smiling. My grandma, the cyber queen. "Yes?" she asked into the phone. Then she held it away from her and glared at it. "Dumb thing. Why I even have it, I don't know."

From where I sat, I could hear the loud rumble and clicking of static.

"Maybe it's Mom," I said, "and the call's coming in all the way from London. Didn't she say she'd call today?"

"Tonight, I thought." Grandma was banging the phone against her knee.

"That'll really make it sound better," Collin said mildly.

She clicked the off button, but it rang again before she could drop it into her purse.

"Here," she said, and handed it to me. "You try."

"Hello?" I shouted over the static, and suddenly the line was totally clear.

"Catherine? Are you sad?"

The words made my breath catch in my throat. "Catherine?" the voice repeated. "Did you like the flowers I gave you? I want to comfort you."

"Noah?" I whispered.

"Yes, it's Noah. I want you to know that I've talked to Kirsty."

I couldn't breathe.

Grandma was smiling at Collin. "Someone she knows," she whispered happily. "Someone called Noah."

I held the phone away from me, hypnotized by it as if it were a snake.

"Oooh," Grandma whispered. "I guess she doesn't want to talk to this guy."

"Good," Collin said.

Nervously, I put the phone back to my ear, but there was only the loud beating of my heart.

Grandma's voice had changed. "Who was it, child? You've gone as white as milk." She stood up.

Collin stood, too. He took the phone from my limp hand, folded it, and gave it back to Grandma.

I sat there, stunned.

He put his arm around my shoulders. "Was it bad news?" he asked softly.

I shook my head. What
had
it been? What?

"Can we go now?" I whispered.

"Absolutely." Grandma gathered up her purse and scarf. "Is Noah a friend of yours from Chicago?"

I shook my head. I was cold all the way to my bones. What had he meant—he'd talked to Kirsty? When? It had to have been sometime before the accident, of course. That meant he was from Chicago. Why had he followed me here? The awful answer flashed into my mind. Some- how he knew that it had been my fault. Maybe he was Kirsty's dad? A cousin ... a brother who'd come from Scotland? But I knew her dad and her brothers. They'd never try to scare me like this. Someone who'd known her? Who hated me?