Beyond the Veil

Chapter 14

Al blinked at me over his coffee, it seemed to be a habit he was getting into, and yawned. He had just gotten up a few minutes ago to the coffee and breakfast I had thrown together for him. He appeared to appreciate it; a grunt from this bleary eyed giant was a good indication of it being good right?

He blinked again, and again before looking down and noticing the plate in front of him, he looked at me again, “Is this mine?”

I shrank back in mock terror, “It speaks, someone call NASA!”

He scowled, picked up his fork and began to shovel scrambled eggs into his mouth, stopping only long enough to take another drink of coffee, and breathe, but I think the last part was an afterthought on his part.

A feeling of intense satisfaction filled me as I watched him eat; it was nice to have someone to cook for, to care for.

Who am I kidding its nice to be needed, to be able to touch things without it requiring energy or blowing up light bulbs.

The chair creaked as he leaned back, resting a hand on his stomach, “That was good, where’d you learn to cook?”

An image of Mom in her blue plaid kitchen made me smile softly, she had always insisted on having blue plaid in her kitchen, whether it was her apron, or the wallpaper. “My Mom taught me.”

“I tell you she should have taught more people, she would have been rich if she was as good as you.”

I looked up; Mom was far better than I could ever be in the kitchen, I told him so and he laughed, when I frowned he laughed harder.

“What’s so funny?”

He wiped tears from his eyes, “I have a ghost in my kitchen debating whether her or her mother’s food is better. Doesn’t that sound nuts to you?”

“Maybe a little,” I admitted grudgingly, “but so is eating a meal that the ghost you’re laughing at made for you.”

He sobered, “Touché.”

“So what are we doing today? About Cole I mean.”

His face twisted into an expression that was a mix of disgust and resentment, “I don’t know, I hate to think that…that thing has any information on what’s going on,” I opened my mouth to argue, “But!” He held his hand up, “I thought about what you said last night too, and you’re right. I can’t just ignore it if the information he has could save people’s lives.”

I couldn’t keep the blush from creeping over my features at the mention of last night, “About last night…”

“What about it?” He refilled his coffee cup without looking at me.

“Thank you.”

He waved my words away, “It was no problem, and you looked so scared. Like a kid curled up under the covers, trying to hide from the boogie man. Why were you so upset?”

I looked down at the red checkered table cloth, lazily tracing the design with my finger nail. “It was the sound; there was a sound like that the night I died.” I said softly.

“How did you die? You are kind of young for a ghost aren’t you?”

I smiled ruefully, “Well, this is my age, but a ghost can be as old as he or she wishes.” I smiled wistfully at his whistle of appreciation before going on, “As to how I died? My husband killed me.”

“What?” I looked up, surprised to see outrage on his face.

“I was…an odd spouse; sometimes I would just stop and think about the oddest things for no reason.”

He argued, “That’s no reason to kill you, what happened to him? I hope they caught him and locked him up.”

I shook my head, “No, you see when I died I was up in the attic by myself, he came up to get me and…fell down the ladder.” A small twinge in my chest expressed my guilt, I didn’t feel bad for killing my husband, and I felt bad for lying to Al. He seemed to really care about what happened.

I felt fingers under my chin tilt my head back, so he could look in my face. I hadn’t even realized I had looked down again. “There’s no wonder then you don’t like the sound of the rain. How about this,” he released my chin, “we go down to the station, see if there is anything else to do, and then go find Cole?”

“That sounds good,” I said hurriedly, for a moment I had been lost. It was like after I died, I was floating in that vast ocean, unable to swim, but this time I was drowning in depths as green as spring grass.