Carridelle – Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fourteen: Apparitions with Attitude

A week after her lunch with Buffy, Carrie was fixing dinner. She made a terrific salad and popped a microwave dinner in. How sad it was, she thought, that she had one guy who wanted to marry her and one who she thought was interested in her and yet because of her own stubbornness she sat here eating alone. Flipping through her latest issue of Cosmo, she found the agony column and was wholly interested in the romantic escapades of others. She was so into what she was reading that the sudden noises she heard in the otherwise quiet house startled her out of her wits. The magazine fell to the floor and the fork for her salad clanged onto the countertop where her hand had rested. There was a scratching sound like nails running down a glass pane. It had come from somewhere in the parlor. There was a rolling sound across the floor upstairs and the creak of the floorboards above her. The ghosts had been so quiet as of late she wasn’t prepared for another uprising. She looked around her not knowing where to investigate first. These unfamiliar sounds were scaring her more than usual. These were not the sounds of Susannah. These were not the sounds of a mother rocking her baby to sleep. These were frightening…eerie… altogether unearthly.

Carrie grabbed the knife that she had used to chop the lettuce and moved into the parlor not sure whom or what she would confront. The scratching sounds continued, up and down, screeching…scraping. Something wanted her attention and when she moved the curtain to the window she screamed a blood-curdling scream of horror. Carrie had come face to face with a man. He was white… so white that he seemed to stand out like a beacon in the shadows of the night. His eyes were vacant. He looked right through her. His hands were scratching down the window. She dropped the knife and ran for the phone. But as she picked it up to dial, she wondered who in their right mind would believe her. A man in nineteenth century garb was haunting her. What could anyone do to protect her from that? The sound stopped and she cautiously walked back to the window and opened the curtain. The humidity of the fireplace had formed a frost and seemingly scratched into the glass were the words “HELP ME.”

She backed away and screamed again when she met the banister. Tentatively she looked up the stairs and she remembered the other noise. A light glowed from the middle bedroom. It was a light that Carrie had not turned on. That was a room she never entered. While she liked to go in and run her hands over the bedding in the baby’s room she felt as though she was intruding in the room of the older child. Hands trembling, she started her assent. Stair by stair she walked until she reached the top, and she pushed on the door with her hand. It opened slowly with a creak, the creak that one would attribute to rusty hinges. On the windowsill glowed a candle. Had it always been there and was just newly lit or had it been placed there by the hands of another world? Carrie wasn’t sure. She walked slowly into the room and at first all appeared right. There was nothing out of the ordinary, until she reached the foot of the bed and with her fist in her mouth, she bit back a startled scream.  In amongst the dust particles on the hardwood floors were little tin soldiers in perfect lines and the lines spelled out the words… “Release us.”

Carrie flew down the steps as fast as she could. She popped the door on the microwave that was beeping incessantly at her, a harsh reminder that everyday reality was mixing with some unnatural state in that ancient house. Carrie grabbed her jacket, purse and keys and ran out the door. She knew she would return later that night; she had to return and keep her promise to Susannah.  However, the newest ghosts at the manor were not ones with which she cared to dine.

She drove around the town in search of someplace to eat, preferably someplace with a lot of people.  She needed that tonight, needed to be around a crowd. She settled on the local tavern. She liked their tongue-in-cheek advertising. It promised to have the best seafood this side of Main Street. Carrie walked into the bar and grabbed a table. She nodded to the few patrons that sat around on barstools; mostly men with their eyes glued to the hockey came on TV. Her thoughts were flustered, she could not even recollect whether the game was pre-season or not and being from Philly she was an avid Flyers fan.  Focusing, her eyes scanned the menu, and she decided what to order by the time the waitress was ready for her. She was staring out the window, trying to get the image of the man out of her mind when a shadow overtook her. Glancing up to see why the overhead lights had suddenly dimmed she was pleasantly surprised to see Charlie standing there.

“Is this seat taken?” he asked her and returned her smile. He was glad she was happy to see him. There was a genuine kindling of friendship there and maybe the possibility of more. Charlie knew that he was fighting an  unseen opponent in the war for Carrie’s heart. He knew that he had to take it slow or she would never include him in her life quite the way he hoped she would. But he also was wary. Charlie wanted Carrie on his terms, he was not looking to be an escape route for her fear of commitment, and he was not looking to be the rebound romance. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for in his relationship with her, whether he wanted to date her or marry her, but this lady sure had a hold on him.

“Sir Galahad, I presume?” Asked Carrie extending her hand for him to kiss, which he promptly did.

“Well, my armor is a little rusty but I thank you for noticing it and to what do I owe the pleasure of that title?”

Damn those gorgeous eyes of his. They were always mocking her; humor glinting in those ice blue depths and something else… passion perhaps. “You have that title because you saved me from my thoughts and from the boredom of my own company.”

“Mi’lady somehow I doubt that you could bore anyone.” And he was pleased to see that she blushed under his compliments. Taking the seat opposite, Charlie looked closely at her face for the first time that evening. He could see, even under the neon lights of a barroom that her pallor was extremely pale. She reminded him of a Faberge egg beautiful and delicate and fragile. “Are you alright?”

She bedazzled him with her smile, all thoughts of staying away from him fled out of her mind as she stared back at the friendly face sitting across her table. “Of course, I’m fine. Why do you ask?”

“Cause you look as though you’ve seen a…never mind you probably have.” He let his sentence trail off there and automatically began cursing the luck that she was the one to look after his house and get it ready to sell. He didn’t want to see her upset or hurt in any way.

“I’ll admit I did see something a little startling there this evening, but it is nothing I can’t handle. It just seems as though I met two more uhhh residents that abide there and these two seem particularly troubled.” Carrie said, not wanting to tell him more. She found his fear of the house disturbed her for though it was haunted, she loved it with all her heart. She felt the way she assumed Susannah felt about the house. She wanted Charlie to come and experience the wonder of it firsthand. If she told him anymore, she would never get him there.

Charlie chose his words carefully. He didn’t want to anger her or upset the stubborn streak he felt sure she possessed.

“I don’t want you to be there if the house upsets you that much. It is scaring you. I can see it.”

“I said I would handle it!” Carrie replied. She could feel her back tense, ready for a fight. “Please, let’s change the subject.”

“Damn it Carrie, listen to me! Something in that house scared you tonight. I don’t know what it was, but I have the feeling it was pretty bad. I won’t have you staying there if it bothers you like that.”

“You have no right to say whether I will stay there! Do you think one date gives you any right to control my life?”

“No, but even as your friend and the guy that owns the house, I can throw you out you know.”

“You can’t do that I made a promise to Susannah that I would help her find peace there. Now you can help me to do that, or you can stand in my way but either way it is getting done. Make your choice Murray and you better make the right one.”

“Alright, alright I give. I’ll help you however I can.” Charlie put up his hands in mock surrender. And as Carrie laughed all was right with his world again.

They had a lovely dinner together, laughing and chatting and learning more about each other’s lives. And when the time came for them to wrap up their evening, Carrie leaned in a little closer and so did Charlie and this time their lips met, brushing softly against one another. The electricity sent them both reeling, and they each backed away awkwardly and said their goodbyes. Charlie was cursing himself for even tasting a slight piece of what he deemed forbidden fruit. And Carrie was wrestling with her desire to be with a man who was not Jon.

The drive back to the house was slow, somewhat because Carrie was thinking about her romantic life and partly because she was afraid of what she would find when she entered the stately old building. She pulled up the drive very cautiously. The house looked normal from the outside and she was relieved that it appeared normal from the inside too. Figuring she would clean up any mess tomorrow, she wearily made her way to bed. Had she led Charlie on? Would he read too much into that kiss? Did she want him too? All these thoughts were running through her head.

And in the kitchen that she neglected that night; the magazine sat on the counter neatly closed, the fork put in the sink next to the knife and the microwave meal was left unattended on the counter. Some ghostly maid perhaps or perhaps Susannah making sure her house was tidy again? Or maybe the hand of the frightening apparition at the window taking pity on the poor girl that he had scared that evening? Perhaps we will never know.