Close Call

Chapter 4

More déjà vu as he stepped through the back door of the house. He knew the ground plan; he'd grown up in an identical house further down the block. The 70s kitchen had been ripped out and various other architectural changes had been made, but the basics were still there.

"D'you wanna a cuppa? Or have the States made you into a coffee drinker? We've only got instant, none of that filter stuff."

"Tea's fine." Philip smiled and leaned against a cupboard whilst the girl efficiently dumped teabags into three mugs and set the kettle boiling.

"What're you staring at?" the teenager turned her eyes on him and he couldn't help but smile.

"You're so much like your mother was,"

"At my age, I know. They all tell me that. Can't see it personally, but if you all say so..."

"I do."

She turned back to cups before she started talking,

"I've been dying to ask you what's it like? Ghost hunting or whatever it is you do exactly? What's the scariest job you've been on?"

Philip shifted uncomfortably against the cupboard as if the handle was sticking in him.

"Look, I don't know what your mum has told you about me,"

Cathy used to have this wild idea that he could investigate crimes and find missing persons and all sorts of other mysterious and romantic adventures she imagined a Psychic Investigator would get up to and all of this was built on one incident that had been the foundation of their relationship. It was in Cathy's arms he'd lain waiting for the ambulance, to her he'd mumbled incomprehensible events that had lead her to believe he had a special talent.

Later she had insisted Philip relate his terrifying experience clearly and she had been excited. As she dissected what he was saying, he'd realised she had a point, there had been other, smaller incidents he'd experienced before that, like knowing where lost things were or to avoid areas where an accident was about to happen. She insisted that he had a supernatural gift and that not to use it would be criminal.

Despite the fact that Philip knew all this and realised now that his fortune had come from this 'gift', he had never been certain that what he'd experienced whilst trapped under the earth was not some trauma-induced hallucination. He'd laughed at Cathy's fantasy about him becoming a P.I., treated it as their private joke. Still, it was one that had formed the basis of their relationship, perhaps not a sensible thing in retrospect.

"You've got to understand. Your mum and I lost touch a long time ago. Things aren't—"

"What I might think? I'm not stupid. I was just hoping that what I dug up on you wasn't the whole story." She looked guilty for a moment, "I kind of figured that perhaps mum was mistaken or you'd fed her a pile of lies because if you were some hot-shot psychic then there'd be stuff on the Net about you. But there's nothing of the sort, you're just a lousy estate agent."

"Well, actually, I'm quite success—"

"You know what I can't figure out?"

Philip shook his head, seeing that he wasn't going to be heard out.

"Why you offered to help mum, flew half way across the world to do so, when you can't. What the hell do you want?"

"Things aren't so clear cut perhaps. If I could just talk to her – she must be distraught and to have contacted me..."

Peony turned scarlet.

"She didn't. I just thought...you'd help, but I feel like a fool now."

"Oh, I see."