The Crying Bridge

The Crying Bridge--Chapter 37

 Evan and Del were seated on the porch swing, waiting for the psychic team to arrive. Del had had another good day, feeling the worst of the nausea upon getting out of bed. With a good breakfast and a great workout, she had felt energetic and good all day. She had made a quick pasta dish for dinner with a salad and after finishing their meal and cleaning up, they set up a drink and snack station on the porch shelf for everyone. There was a cooler with ice, bottles of water and pitchers of both iced tea and lemonade. In a particularly energetic moment, Del had decided to make some homemade sugar cookies and they sat on the table on a tray, along with a bowl of fresh berries.

"I'm nervous," Del admitted. "I expected to feel more excitement, I guess, but I'm starting to rethink this."

"We don't have to go through with it. If you don't want to, I'll send them on their way as soon as they get here."

Del considered that for a moment but then shook her head. "No," she said. "I'm really holding out hope that they will actually contact Emmett and get some answers."

Two vehicles were coming towards the bridge, Regina's minivan and a small sedan right behind it. The cars were parked and Regina, Gail and Benjamin joined them on the porch along with the two new psychics, Louise and Dylan. Louise was all that Del had always assumed a psychic would be...she had brassy red hair, dramatic makeup and was dressed in a very loud, voluminous summer dress that seemed to nearly swallow her as she was very thin. Dylan, on the other hand, looked much younger than his twenty-four years. He was tall, African American, with a baby face and athletic build.

Gail made the introductions and then Regina squealed and hugged Del. "So I guess you know by now?" She asked.

"Umm...know what?" Del asked, confused.

Regina glanced down at Del's tummy and her eyes twinkled with delight.

"You mean you know we're having twins?" Del asked incredulously.

Regina laughed. "Of course we know! We knew when we were here the last time. We told you about the aura thing? Well, you exhibit two auras. I wasn't sure what it meant until we left and Gail told me. Congratulations!"

Evan and Del both expressed thanks, still surprised that these people had known things about their children that they hadn't. Evan said, "So does that mean you do know what the genders are?"

"Evan," Del began. "You know I don't want to know!" Although she had a feeling she already did. She glanced at Regina who was trying to give a poker face but was failing. She kept her eyes on her then smiled, just shaking her head. "Damn it! I really wanted to not know until I gave birth!"

"Know what?" Evan asked, really confused. "What am I missing?"

"Regina," Del said, "Are the auras the same? Or different?"

"Very different," Regina admitted.

Del was only mildly disappointed to learn this news now instead of when he babie were born. She turned to Evan, tears shining in her eyes. "Evan, it's one of each. A girl and a boy."

Evan just looked at her, dumbstruck. "A girl and a boy?" He asked, finally. "Really?"

Del nodded, the happy tears flowing down her cheeks now. "Emma and Caleb," she said.

Evan laughed, picked her up off her feet and kissed her, spinning her around. "Emma and Caleb!" he said.

"You are naming them Emma and Caleb?" Gail asked. "What a lovely way to honor the memories of two people you've never even met!"

Louise spoke up. "Congratulations, really," she said with a genuine smile. "I hate to seem insensitive, but perhaps we should start the preparations?"

"Of course," Del said. "Sorry for getting distracted."

"No apologies are necessary," Dylan replied, his deep baritone voice in contradiction to his youthful appearance. "Do you have any questions before we begin?"

Evan and Del exchanged glances. "Where do we begin?" Evan said. "I guess we just would like to know what to expect, how this all is going to work."

"Well," Dylan began, "first, we're going to make sure we have what we call a 'closed' field. This is how we keep everyone safe...the opening by which any spirit can communicate will solely be through myself and Louise. It's how we contain what's happening and keep psychic energy from just freely flowing about."

"That doesn't really help me out much," Evan said apologetically.

"Think of it as sort of a mystical vacuum," Louise offered. "Dylan and I can allow communication but we can also keep it within a limited space and limited to just us."

"And if what Benjamin sensed before is really Emmett Steinhurst," Del asked, "and he is...I don't know, evil, what happens?"

"We can still contain him. It's sort of our specialty," Dylan told them. Despite his young age, he seemed to be the leader. "Louise and I are Christians and we spend a lot of time in deep prayer before we attempt this sort of thing. We will actually begin this process with prayer. We will all be protected and the way our combined energy works is sort of like a binding. This entity couldn't move beyond us even if it wants to. And our Christian faith and the presence of Christ in our hearts keeps anything from harming us."

"You haven't addressed any activity since we spoke?" Louise asked

"No," Del replied. "There's been a lot of activity but we've just tried to ignore it as much as possible. We followed the rules."

"Good," Louise said, nodding her head. "That is so very crucial. It actually starts the whole process of closing the space. Now, Dylan and I are going to begin completing the closing and creating the binding connection. As I told you before, it will take up to 30 minutes and then we will begin to search for the presence Benjamin detected and determine if it's indeed Emmett Steinhurst. If it's someone or something else, we break the communication immediately. We'll then maintain the binding, push it out of the opening we've created, then immediately close the opening. Once that opening is closed we can safely open up the closed space again which ends the whole thing."

Del shook her head, trying to follow all of it. "What if Emma wants to communicate?" she asked. "I want her heard if she attempts to communicate."

"If Emma needs to speak we will allow that but we're going to focus on finding out whether or not Emmett is near. If Emmett comes, Emma likely won't if she fears him."

"Can more than one...thing...come through the opening you create?" Evan asked. "How will you keep control of a whole horde of bad guys?"

"Only one can actually enter at any given moment. There's always the possibility that others will be interested with what's going on and try to join in but it won't be possible."

Evan put a protective arm around Del's shoulders. "And Del doesn't have to directly communicate, right. Not like with Emma?"

"Of course not," Dylan assured him. "We can't promise that he will give us any information but we won't allow anyone else to directly communicate with a malevolent spirit. We would never put anyone at risk in that way."

"Okay," Del looked at Evan and he nodded. "Let's do this, then."

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