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Nineteen
The train swayed back and forth as it rocketed through the subway system. Morticia had been on vacation in the shop all week, and while she would never begrudge her beloved hearse the attention she so richly deserved, Bunny had to admit she would be glad when she could go back to driving herself to work again. Catching the subway at the hours she did tended to throw up a wild card assortment of fellow passengers, and tonight was no exception.
One guy was peeling a whole bag of oranges. Not eating them, just peeling them. The peels went into one bag, and the freshly peeled oranges into another. As she watched him curiously from behind her huge sunglasses, Bunny had to hope that he wasn’t doing food prep for some ill-fated restaurant. She made a mental note never to order takeout that had oranges in it ever again.
They screeched to the stop and the doors swooshed open to admit the passengers waiting on the platform. Bunny saw the bright white glow from the corner of her eye before she even turned her head to look. These days, ensouling vessels en route, as she called it, was just a common courtesy rather than her usual day-to-day. Quite often she casually bumped the person and the job was done with very little effort on her part—no muss, no fuss.
But this time she looked up as the woman pulled along one of those shopping baskets on wheels and parked it right next to the seat Bunny occupied.
“Pippa?” she asked incredulously, reaching up to take her glasses from her head.
The woman looked at her in slight confusion. “Sorry. Do I know you?”
Bunny’s Southern manners came to the fore right when she needed them the most. “I beg your pardon,” she apologized, standing. “I’m Bunny. We met at Doctor Edmunson’s office, in the waiting room a while back?”
“Oh!” Pippa sighed, recognizing her at last. “Bless your heart—I’m sorry!”
“No need to be sorry.” Bunny smiled, shuffling down the seat to make room for Pippa. “How are you?”
“I’m well, thank you for asking,” Pippa said, taking a seat. “You know how it is! Just keep on keepin’ on.” She nodded at Bunny’s belly. “How are you?”
During her searches for Pippa in the Between, Bunny had often wondered how she would get out of telling the woman the white lie that she had been expecting a baby of her own. She forced an undertone of raw emotion into her voice and cast her eyes downward, having reasoned that no answer was the best answer for now. It was a delicate subject, correcting one’s lies, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to get into it on the subway. “I’m fine.”
Pippa took her meaning and pressed her lips together in understanding. “I’m sorry,” was all she said.
“Thank you,” Bunny replied, accepting the apology before moving on to what would hopefully be a pleasanter subject, if Pippa’s bright white aura was anything to go by. “I hope everything is going well for you.”
“I hope so too,” the other woman sighed wistfully. “Though I suppose I won’t know now for a few weeks.”
“Well,” Bunny smiled, leaning over to place a hand kindly on Pippa’s arm. “I’ll keep everything crossed for you.”
A soul zinged out of her pendant and straight into the expectant mother. After a few seconds, her aura began to glow blue. It was all that Bunny could do not to beam at her.
“That’s so kind, thank you,” Pippa smiled. “Hey, would you like to get a cup of coffee sometime? I don’t have a lot of friends here in the city, and it might be nice to have someone who understands what I’m going through.” It was only then that she backed up, as though worried she had been too forward. “Of course, if you don’t want to, then—”
“I’d love that,” Bunny said, cutting her off kindly before the poor woman could apologize for the fourth time during their conversation. The train began to slow down, and she reached for an old receipt and the pen she always kept in her purse. She scribbled her number down and handed it to Pippa before standing.
“There. Text me, so I have your number. I work nights, but I have three days off a week. Let’s tee something up.”
Pippa beamed. “I’ll look forward to it.”
“Me too,” Bunny grinned back. “See ya.”
“See ya!”
As she stepped off the train, she noticed Pippa had subconsciously laid a hand on her belly as she typed Bunny’s number immediately into her phone.
* * *
Her shift had been suspiciouslyquiet until the alarm in Mrs. Cavendish’s room sounded. Bunny raced down the halls to room 207, not knowing whether she would be met with a patient who had simply gotten up to go for a wander or one who had fallen out of bed. While she’d certainly been sour on the whole ‘aged care’ experience in the beginning, some aspects of the job had definitely started to grow on her.
Like the way she got to chat to Mr. Davies about whichever jigsaw puzzle he was working on, or the kind words Mrs. Rawsonne always gave her. Genuinely sweet people who needed her help were a blessing, and often served to turn around a bad shift or, dare she say it, a trying week altogether.
But tonight was not one of those nights. Because it was a night when weird, unexplainable shit was happening at Arcadian Waters.
When she got to room 207, Mrs. Cavendish was still in her bed even though her alarm was still buzzing. Bunny stepped in the room with a frown, ready to turn off the faulty device before it woke up her patient.
And that’s when she noticed Mrs. Cavendish’s face was blue.
