Finding Theo

Going Down

The apartment fell silent once more. The four of them sat around Pennie's small kitchen aisle—each with a cup of untouched coffee in front of them. "I guess we should tell you what we do." Ollie smiled at Pennie. She frowned in return.

"What you do?" Deacon nodded and wrapped his hands around the mug.

"Yes, we, well, for lack of a better explanation, we hunt ghosts. Well, more than just ghosts but they are what we run into the most. Theo is our group leader, kind of." Pennie blinked at them with a blank expression on her face. She had never been raised to believe in ghosts and ghouls. And even though she was always open minded to the idea of another plane beyond her own this just seemed too weird. But then she remembered the knocking, and the box that was now mysteriously missing—along with a lot of other weird things that had happened.

"You-You ghost hunt? Like, you have an actual business?" Deacon frowned and nodded.

"Yes, is it that hard to believe?" She shrugged and looked down at her coffee.

"I mean, I never grew up believing in ghosts and stuff like that but so many weird things have happened since Theo disappeared so I'm open to anything, really." The three of them looked at Pennie then at each other as if they could read each other's minds.

"Penelope, we're going to tell you something very important about us and very real. And we need you to take it all seriously." Lyric had a strict look on his face. It reminded Pennie of the look her parents gave her on the day they sat her and her siblings down to tell them that they were getting a divorce. She sat up straight in her seat and nodded. He sighed deeply and rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly unsure of what he was about to say. "Penelope, we each have, well, gifts." Pennie nodded, doing her best to take his words seriously. "I am a clairvoyant. Which is someone who can perceive events in the future." Lyric frowned at Pennie, probably due to the shocked look on her face.

"You can tell the future? Then why couldn't you tell I was going to be in Theo's room? Or see that Theo and I would become friends?" A scowl spread over Pennie's face. "Why couldn't you see that Theo was going to go missing?" Lyric fell silent and stared down at the cup of coffee in his hands. He clasped the mug so tightly, Pennie thought it might shatter in his grip.

"I can't control my clairvoyance. I don't know when I'll have a premonition and I don't control what they're about." His voice was shaking and she knew his words came from clenched teeth.

"Lyric, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be so rude." She hung her head—a sickening guilty feeling filling her stomach. Lyric had been so respectful right from the start and here she was being so disrespectful—not to mention that probably hurt his feelings quite a bit. It wasn't his fault he didn't see Theo's disappearance coming. If he had he might have ended up in the same position as Theo and then where would they be? But worst of all, Lyric looked like he was about to break. He had been so put together before and Pennie had shook his composure. Lyric cleared his throat and took his glasses in his hand. He wiped the lenses clean with the edge of his sweater.

"Its fine, Penelope." He pushed his glasses up and looked at her with a calm look on his face—he had regained his composure. "Like I said I am clairvoyant. Deacon is a medium. He speaks to those no longer living."

"That's how we're going to find out if Theo is still alive. I'm going to try and speak to him. He can tell us what happened." Pennie frowned.

"But what if they've moved on? You know, to heaven or something?"

"I don't know. I don't know if there is anything like that. I talk to spirits from another plane. And when someone hasn't talked back they have all ended up being still alive. I've never run into a scenario where the person was dead but not responding."