Page 17 of Paper Ghosts

“Willamena, give him his umbrella and let him go, or this won’t end well.”

“No.”

Gram suddenly put herself between Wills and Jack and tried to take the umbrella herself. Wills automatically tugged back and they struggled for a moment. Her grandmother had the wet canopy end, so when she pulled sharply, the umbrella suddenly slid out of her hands with a zipping sound, throwing Gram off balance and right into Jack behind her at the top of the staircase.

Everything seemed in slow motion after that. Her grandmother turned, her voluminous floor-length dressing gown spinning. Jack was waving his arms, trying to regain his balance as the heel of his boot slid on the top step. Wills lurched forward so she could grab him. Her grandmother’s eyes darted to Wills, then back to Jack. Wills would never be sure what happened next. She only knew there was movement. Did her grandmother reach out to save Jack, and she was too late?

Or did she push him?

Jack hit the stairs, tumbling down the long staircase until he landed on the floor.

Everything went quiet; then Wills said without any breath, “Jack.”

She ran to him and went to her knees. The umbrella she’d still been holding skittered across the foyer and fell with almost perfect precision into the narrow, three-foot-long floor vent by the door, the brass cover of which Mrs. Orr had forgotten to replace after she’d vacuumed inside it earlier that day.

The commotion caused Mrs. Orr to poke her head out of her bedroom down the foyer hall. She stepped out and approached with some trepidation, one hand clenching the lapels of her terry cloth robe, the other holding a baseball bat.

“Call an ambulance!” Wills said as Gram came down the stairs and knelt on the other side of Jack, putting two fingers to the side of his neck.

“Stay where you are, Mrs. Orr.”

Wills was about to stand and run to the kitchen to do it herself, but her grandmother grabbed her arm and said, “Willamena, it’s too late.”

“No!” she said. Then she screamed it over and over, grabbing Jack’s shirt and shaking him.

“Willamena, stop. Stop this right now!” Gram stood and tried to make Wills do the same, but Wills pushed her away. She finally hoisted Wills to her feet. “Listen to me! He’ll stay if you mourn him this much! He’ll stay if he thinks there is unfinished business!”

“What?” Wills said, stunned. She ran her hand across her face, hot with tears. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about ghosts, Willamena,” Gram said. “Mrs. Orr, we’re going to need your discretion.”

“Why would I do anything for you now?” Mrs. Orr said with a short laugh.

“You know exactly why,” Gram snapped. “Because you convinced everyone that your husband died in an accident, but he told me what you did to him. I will agree never to say a word about that, if you do the same about this.”

“I’m not working for you anymore,” Mrs. Orr said.

“Very well.”

“I expect severance pay.”

“Then I expect a little help with this situation before you go. We can go on like this forever, Mrs. Orr. Either we stop here, or it’s mutually assured destruction.”

“She’ll be quiet, as well?”

“Yes,” Gram said, leading Wills to the living room.

“No.” Wills started struggling against her again. “No, I won’t! I’m telling everyone what happened tonight!”

“Could I trouble you for one of your Seconals, Mrs. Orr?” Gram said over her shoulder as she forced Wills onto the couch. She took Wills’s face in her hands and made her look at her. “Willamena, listen to me. This isn’t the end. This is where it all begins. I have so much to tell you. I was too young when I found out what I could see. I deserved a childhood, and I didn’t get it. I wanted you to have one first. But now you’ll understand the power you hold. Everything I am, everything my own grandmother was, you are, as well. And you will be amazed. It’s all going to make sense. I promise you, it’s all going to make sense.”

Mrs. Orr came back with a glass of water and a pill and handed them both to Gram.

“Take this,” Gram said, and Wills did as she said.

Mrs. Orr went to the living room window and lifted the curtain. “It looks like he brought Principal Penwell’s car. We’ll have to get it out of the neighborhood before the rain stops and we lose our cover. But what do we do with him? We can’t carry him.”

Gram shook her head. “The basement is our only option.”