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Grandma stamped her size-six orthopedic shoe. “You will apologize to your sister, Jane. And you will end this foolishness with the lawsuit and give Jenny her share of the Early legacy. I command it.”
I goggled at the raging geriatric before me and then burst out laughing so loudly that Gabriel stuck his head through the doorway to check on me. I waved him away as I leaned against the counter for support and let the bloody tears roll down my cheeks. “I’m sorry,” I said, giggling. “Did you just command me to do something? Have we met? Has that ever worked for you? Jenny got her share of the ‘Early legacy.’ She took it, out of the house one piece at a time, without asking. And so did you. You’ve been smuggling valuables out of that house since Aunt Jettie’s funeral. Don’t pretend otherwise.”
“Let me tell you something about your precious aunt Jettie,” Grandma spat.
In the corner of my eye, I could see Aunt Jettie squinting at the dry-erase marker Mama kept on her refrigerator. She grasped it and began to scrawl on the front of the fridge. Ruthie’s face froze in horror as an invisible hand eked out, “Ruthie … This is Jettie … I need … to tell you … you’ve gotten fat.”
“Jane, I don’t know how you’re doing that, but stop it. It’s morbid,” Grandma scolded, her face paling.
“I’m not doing it,” I said. “I’m telepathic, not telekinetic. Aunt Jettie, maybe you shouldn’t …”
Aunt Jettie winked at me. “Honey, she’s had this coming for years.”
“Jane, stop that right now!” Grandma yelled as Jettie called her a “natural brunette,” underlining “natural” three times.
“It’s not me, it’s Jettie,” I said. “She’s been haunting the house ever since she died. I wasn’t able to see her until I was turned.”
“Of all the sick jokes,” Grandma Ruthie spat. “How dare you use my sister’s memory this way!”
“Oh, come on, you can believe in vampires but not in ghosts?”
Grandma Ruthie sneered at me.
I sighed. “What if I told you something that only Jettie would know?” I asked as Jettie leaned in to whisper in my ear.
Grandma’s mouth flapped open like a beached guppy’s. “I’m not going to—”
“Aunt Jettie says that if you don’t cut me some slack, she’s going to visit your mother and tell her all about what you were doing in Edgar Oliver’s backseat when you were supposed to be at Bible study.”
Ruthie blanched. “How could you—my mother’s dead.”
“Yes, but Jettie can go over to the Half-Moon Hollow Women’s Clubhouse anytime she wants and visit Grandma Bebe. That’s the way ghosts work. They can haunt wherever they choose, move from place to place. They even visit each other.”
OK, that last part was a total bluff. Grandma Bebe was a sweet old lady who had no unfinished needlework, much less unfinished business, when she died. She moved into the light a long time ago. But Ruthie didn’t know that. And I told her that so I could tell her this: “Jettie’s even visited Grandpa Fred a few times. He’s haunting the golf course.”
Jettie cackled with glee as Ruthie’s cheeks drained of color. “You tell her to stay away from my Fred.”
“Tell her yourself, Grandma. She can hear you. Much better, in fact, than she could in life. Besides, you’re engaged. Why should you care? And I don’t think he’s your Fred anymore. Remember till death do us part? He’s dead. You’ve parted. Grandpa Fred’s on the market again.”
Ruthie turned a sickly white under her artfully applied Elizabeth Arden powder. “You lifeless Jezebel! You stay away from my Fred!”
At this point, it seemed a moot point to note that Aunt Jettie had actually broken up with Grandpa Fred earlier this year to take up with Mr. Wainwright. Aunt Jettie, obviously enjoying Grandma’s discomfort, seemed to think so, too.
“They can’t … all be yours. Though you … certainly had more … than your share,” Jettie scribbled out in surprisingly legible script.
“Dried-up old maid!” Ruthie yelled.
“Black widow!” the refrigerator spat back.
“Unclean spirit!” Ruthie gasped.
“Varicose-veined ho!” Jettie scrawled, prompting an indignant gasp from Grandma.
“I will not stand here in my daughter’s home and be insulted!” Ruthie shrieked. “Jane, you tell your great-aunt that I will not set foot in River Oaks until she can keep a civil tongue in her skull—which, by the way, never had the bone structure I have. And she was always jealous!”
“She can—”
The door slammed in dramatic fashion.
