Barb Hendee - Hunting Memories

But no matter how hard he tried, he could not stop thinking about the letter.

He went back upstairs, through the sanctuary and then outside, through the gate to the street, looking up and down. Eleisha was nowhere in sight. If only she would come home, he'd hand the letter over, and then he was certain she'd let him read it. But to open her mail? Something addressed to her? That felt wrong.

He walked slowly back to the sanctuary, closed the doors behind himself, and sank down onto the floor.

He felt torn between Eleisha and Philip. He didn't have to read their minds to see where they stood. Eleisha trusted Rose completely. Philip clearly believed this whole arrangement was a trap.

The problem was, Wade had no idea which of them was right, and he wasn't used to leaning upon his own instincts. All his life, Wade could read minds. Other people could not feel him doing this, so they couldn't stop him. He was never invasive without a reason, but he'd been a police psychologist, with tough calls to make every day. Knowing what was going on inside somebody's head was a unique advantage in offering diagnoses.

However, Eleisha and Philip could feel him inside their thoughts, and if they chose, they could keep him out… and the three of them had set up some ground rules anyway.

No, if he was going to protect Eleisha, and himself, from a trap, he was going to have to rely on his own judgment. What if he didn't read the letter, didn't know what was in it before giving it to her, and his caution resulted in her being hurt?

Reaching inside his shirt, he took the letter out and opened it. Even while doing this, a part of him felt it was wrong, and another part felt that it was the only right thing to do.

He read.

Eleisha,

I cannot tell you what your letter meant to me. The church… the underground, sounds like a haven and a fortress.

There are so many things I long to say that cannot be written down on paper. You keep promising the danger is over, that you brought Julian to his knees and sent him away. But you speak of things you do not understand… could not understand.

I still tremble on the nights I must leave my apartment.

You have shown trust in me, and it is my turn to show trust in you. Because of you, I believe that we do not have to exist alone anymore. I reside at:

2743 Jones Street Apt. 2-A, San Francisco, CA

I will expect you soon.

With hope,

Wade sat staring at the page, and a feeling he could not explain washed over him: that Rose was the wisest of people, that she could be absolutely trusted, that her words rang true.

He lowered the letter and looked away. The feeling passed.

What was that?

He shook his head to clear it.

Then he heard Eleisha's voice outside, and he shoved the letter inside his shirt again. The front doors opened.

Mary materialized just inside the churchyard, around the back, keeping well hidden among the rosebushes. In her current state of existence, one thing that surprised her was than anyone could see her if she changed locations without knowing exactly where she would appear… and she ended up materializing out in the open.

She'd scared the hell out of a couple of old ladies at the Seattle Center before realizing they could see her-and then she blinked out again. But she was learning tricks to avoid this.

She hadn't told Julian, but she was learning how to manipulate her abilities far beyond the scant instructions he'd given her.

For instance, she'd found that she could materialize right inside the walls of a building. This didn't hurt her, and no one could see her. The problem was that she couldn't see or hear either. But she was discovering new ways to spy and eavesdrop without being spotted, and she was gaining a much stronger grasp on wishing herself into «nothingness» or a state of limbo where she was invisible to people until she either wished to materialize again… or Julian called her.

She thought of this as being able to "blink in and out."

She'd also learned that she had a powerful advantage over the other spirits who'd remained here in what she called "the real world." From what she understood-by talking to other ghosts-spirits of the dead could exist on three different planes: 1) the real world of the living, 2) the gray in-between plane, and 3) the afterlife. She had no idea what the afterlife looked like, as she had never seen it, but during her time on the gray plane, she'd come to believe the vast majority of ghosts ended up there, as she once could have… had she been willing to leave the in-between plane of the spirits who refused to accept death, who still longed to find a way back here, back to the living.

While first hunting for Eleisha in Seattle, she realized she couldn't yet tell the difference between various forms of the dead. So she'd ended up finding several other ghosts. They weren't common here in the real world.

But the few she'd met had all been trapped here the moment they died by strong ties to either a person or a place, and many ghosts spent their time in the relaxed state of «nothingness» beyond the sight of living people. However… being tied down to a person or place, they could not move with the ease that she could, even if they wished to. As of yet, she hadn't met a single spirit who'd crossed over from the other side, like she had.

She was unique.

She liked it here. She could go anywhere. See anything. She wasn't tied to anyone.

Well, that wasn't true. She was tied to Julian. Bastard. He hated her. She could see it in his dirty face. But when he threatened to send her back, she believed him. She was terrified of going back to that ugly gray plane of nothing, with only other ghosts like herself who shouldn't be dead… who knew they couldn't be dead, who struggled and fought and wept to find a way to get back here.

She was here.

And she wasn't leaving.

Once she was done with Julian's tasks and he released her, she was going home to her parents. They were never abandoning her at home again. They were never getting rid of her.

She'd considered popping in on them several times but decided against it just yet. She wanted to wait until she had her freedom first. Then, boy, would they be surprised. This was all their fault! They left her to go see some stupid art opening, not even asking if she wanted to go. They never asked her if she wanted to go with them, and her dad was selfish enough to turn his phone off so she couldn't even call. They'd practically murdered her. They'd be sorry soon.

Looking around, she realized she was alone outside the church and floated up a few feet to look in one of the stained windows. Peering through a piece of yellow glass, she could see the blond guy sitting on the floor of the empty sanctuary, reading a sheet of paper.

He suddenly looked up and crammed the paper in his pocket. The front doors opened and Eleisha and the other one-Philip-walked inside.

Mary had to find a way to listen. Julian was getting sick of her just reporting on their whereabouts, and he had started demanding she give him reports on what they said to each other. Ugh.

She put her face against a piece of red glass and let the side of her head pass through just enough so she could hear what was being said.

No one would see her against these thick, colored windows.

"Of course you won," Eleisha said, opening the front doors. "It was no contest. The best I could do was lure a 7-Eleven clerk into a back room."

She'd cut her own hand and then gone into an empty convenience store and turned on her gift, and the clerk had fallen all over himself to help her. Philip's success had been much more clever and creative.

But she hoped he would not wish to play his game again, and she could not understand why he'd been so quiet afterward. She chatted to try to cheer him. She was half-tempted to try reading his mind, but he'd feel her and push her out if he was hiding something private. What could he be hiding? She had agreed to his "more fun" change of plan tonight. She'd done exactly what he wanted.