Ghost Sickness Read online

  Could he call Zak and ask for the book back? He hadn’t formally given it to him, though he’d meant to offer. What if Zak and Mel were reading it, though? Golden Love. He liked the idea of his friends reaching their fiftieth anniversary. Jamie felt in his pocket for his phone. Calling Zak felt like a good idea—a mate he could bounce things off of, someone who would joke and lighten his mood. When they’d helped Montana to the house, Zak had thawed toward Jamie, though he wouldn’t let him in. That had hurt, but they were still friends.

  Zak would be asleep, though, if he wasn’t out on a rescue call. The phone would wake Melody, too, and she needed her rest from her rambunctious children. Like Mae needed rest from Jamie. At this hour, he had to face it: there was no one to talk to. At least the wine was still sitting on the table by the hot spring. Not the best way to unwind, but better than nothing.

  Jamie rose to fill a glass and noticed movement at the gate that led in from a path to the driveway. The latch was lifting so slowly that it didn’t make a sound. He stared. The gate began to creep open. No one with good intentions would sneak like that. It eased open another inch. Jamie had to warn the intruder off without scaring Mae. With silent steps, he made his way toward the gate, taking a gulp of wine on the way, and slid his hand through the opening to grab the wrist on the other side. The owner of the wrist froze but didn’t make a sound.

  Jamie was the one doing the surprising and the situation felt so disturbing he wanted to shout bloody fucking hell. He had some stranger’s wrist in his hand in the middle of the night, someone who was so cool about trespassing that he didn’t react.

  No—not he. She. This was a small wrist, and the forearm had no perceptible hair on it. This didn’t make Jamie less nervous. He had met some dangerous women in his life. Faking courage, he whispered, “Whatever you were doing, don’t even think about it again. I won’t be as nice to you next time.”

  He let go, and the woman moved away slowly, crunching mesquite pods and gravel underfoot. Something rustled—a sound like a paper grocery bag. Jamie closed the gate. He didn’t want them to see each other. It was safer if they couldn’t recognize each other on the street in case this would-be thief was angry or vengeful.

  What was he thinking? She would know him. She’d heard his voice and seen his hand, and he had to be the only black Australian in town. What would she say or do, if anything, to the man who’d caught her? Maybe nothing. She might be ashamed. A woman with a bag alone on the street after midnight could be homeless. No. If you were homeless, you stayed under the radar. You didn’t sneak into the yard of a house with two vehicles in the driveway.

  Jamie returned to the chaise longue. He wanted to get in bed with Mae, but that would wake her even if he didn’t talk, and though dawn was creeping into the sky it might be too early even for her.

  The neighbors Frank and Kenny, the dedicated yogis, were in their backyard chanting in Sanskrit. Jamie closed his eyes and rested in the soft, soothing early light, the birdsong, and their clear, untrained voices, liquid words he recognized yet didn’t understand. Have to get to Santa Fe in time for yoga.

  Mae woke him with a kiss not long after he fell asleep. She was dressed in workout clothes and smelled of sunscreen. “I wanted to make sure I said goodbye in case you’re gone when I come back. Me and Daddy are practicing the whole triathlon up at Elephant Butte. What time do you have to be in Santa Fe?”

  “Dunno. Need to call a body shop. Think I’ve got Dr. G at one ... Fuck. Yoga’s at eleven. I have to get up now.”

  “I hope you tell your doctor you slept funny. Weren’t you working on a sleep schedule?”

  “Weren’t you working on not acting like my mum?”

  This could turn into a fight or a joke. It teetered in between. Jamie offered his best smile. Mae smoothed his hair and kissed him again. “Sorry. Lock up when you leave. And drive safely.”

  “Yes, Mum.”

  Jamie figured he had an hour to do something to make up for the shortcomings of the night. He hadn’t remembered to tell Mae about the person trying to sneak into the yard, and he had to leave her something uplifting, not just a note about that. Something to make her smile when she came home. First, he needed to wake up. But Mae was out of coffee, and when he headed for the shower, a baby lizard lurked in the bathroom, transparent and frail with enormous eyes.

  How in bloody hell had that gotten in? Not that Mae would mind. She would think it was cute. Jamie caught it in his bare hands, cringing at the touch of its weird little feet. He pushed the screen door open with his elbow and crouched on the bottom step of the porch to release the creature. It scurried under the trailer, no doubt planning to come right back in. If Jamie was handy, he would fix whatever gap allowed it entry. Handy, though, he wasn’t. Niall would have to take care of the problem and Jamie would have to do something else to be of service.

  The laundry was still on the line. Bringing it in would be a small favor, but better than nothing.

  Before Jamie could look for the clothes basket, a lanky young man with a blond ponytail strolled up the driveway. He had a long nose, a large mouth, and bright blue eyes, a goofy cartoon of a face but so cheerful it was pleasant. Frank, one of the neighbors. “On my way for coffee. Care to join me?”

  Coffee took precedence over laundry.

  Walking to Main Street, they passed a row of murals on the back of a building, scenes of the river and the mountains, with animals and birds in floating visionary images above the semi-abstract landscapes. The murals reminded Jamie of one of Orville’s paintings, an image of an eagle in the palm of a hand, like a view through a keyhole. “Did Reno’s dad paint those?”

  Frank nodded. “Yeah. I used to stop and watch sometimes when he was working on them, and he was a fun guy. He’d talk with me, crack jokes—they’re so different you wouldn’t think they were related.”

  “Yeah. Reno never took after Orville except for the art.”

  When they arrived at the coffee shop, Jamie felt as though they’d somehow conjured Reno by talking about him. The young man should have been at the final blessing and the giveaway, but he was talking with the café’s owner, a tall, handsome brunette. She asked Reno, “Are you sure you won’t reconsider? It still might sell. Some take a while.”

  “No thank you.” His voice was flat and his face haggard with dark circles under his eyes. “Its time is up.”

  He lifted the only empty table, tried to turn with it, and smacked its legs into the coffee table. A couple seated on the couch grabbed their drinks as they sloshed onto an open newspaper. Reno put the table down and walked backwards, dragging it toward the door. Customers interrupted meals and conversations, scooting chairs out of his way. The owner called out, “Reno—wait. The base is ours. You can’t take the whole thing.”

  He kept moving, though he was clearly struggling. “The painting is mine. And I need it back.”

  Jamie stepped up behind him and put his hands on Reno’s slender shoulders. “Hold on, mate. We’ll help you in a minute.”

  Frank eased the table from Reno’s grasp and returned it to its place. The owner thanked him, then approached Reno, speaking quietly. “You can have it back, but we need to get the drill, take all the hardware off, and attach another painting to the base, and we’re busy right now.” A long line was forming at the counter. “Can you come back at three?”

  “I’ll get tools. I’ll do it myself.”

  “Please, at least wait until after the rush.” She gave Jamie a look that he read as talk some sense into him and went to assist the barista.

  Jamie gave Reno a side-hug. “Have some coffee with us.”

  The young man drew away. “I’d like to do it now.”

  Frank joined the line. “I thought you had today off. What’s the rush?”

  Instead of answering, Reno left. Jamie expected him run off to get tools, but the young artist dropped onto the bench on the street, the hunched shape of his narrow back visible through the window.

  “Get me an
ything vegan and a giant coffee, would you? Got to see what’s wrong with him.” Jamie handed Frank some cash and went out to sit with Reno.

  “Why aren’t you getting your tools? Don’t have any?”

  “A hammer and a screwdriver.”

  Jamie snort-laughed. “You’re as bad as I am. Think I can find a drill in the shed at Mae’s place. But you should wait, let the people here help you later. Right now, customers need to eat on that table.”

  “I can’t wait.” Reno stood. “Mae’s place is just behind Frank and Kenny’s, isn’t it?”

  “Sit down. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. Those are Niall’s tools, and he’s picky about his stuff.”

  Reno glanced back and forth, then reached for the café door again. “I need it now.”

  “Mate, it’s not a fucking emergency.” Jamie took hold of his wrist to stop him from making another scene. His delicate, smooth-skinned wrist.

  Bloody hell. That hand at the gate last night hadn’t been feminine. It had been Reno’s—and he knew who had caught him. Jamie had an image of Reno as the creepy little baby lizard that had squeezed its way into Mae’s house. What had he wanted? And what had he been carrying? There’d been that rustling sound like a paper bag. A bag of black cloth? He could have been trying to get the piece that blew away because it was in Mae’s yard.

  Desperate to hide his secret, he’d called her a witch to get rid of her, and then he’d come back to T or C in the middle of the night. Because he was suddenly worried about her using the tabletop? Because he had to finish some strange task with black fabric? “Okay, maybe to you it is an emergency. You’re scared Mae’ll find out what you’re hiding.”

  Reno yanked his hand away. “I’m not scared and I’m not hiding anything.”

  “Right, and you’re not lying either.” At Reno’s look of alarm, Jamie softened his tone. “Sit down. I’m not out to get you.” Like a half-wild animal being offered food, Reno seated himself as far away as he could get, watching and waiting. Jamie spoke the way he would to a frightened creature. “I don’t need to know what it is. Mae doesn’t need to know. But Misty does. Talk to her. She’ll stop asking Mae to find out.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Yeah, you do. And it’s making you act crazy. Trying to drag the whole bloody table out on the street. You can’t handle having a secret.”

  Reno pressed his lips in over his teeth, blinked, and looked away.

  Jamie said, “Mae’s out triathlon training at the lake. You’ve got time. I’ll tell her you took the painting home already. I’ll buy her some coffee and bake for her. She won’t need to come to the café today, and you can come back and get your painting at three like the lady asked you to. Now go home and call your girlfriend.”

  No response. Stubborn little bastard.

  Chuck Brady approached, clad in his usual tie-dye with the slogan “Truth or Consequences, New Mexico: We’re all here because we’re not all there” amid the orange and yellow swirls. “Howdy-howdy, gentlemen. Top of the morning. Or bottom of the evening, depending on how long you’ve been up.” He stopped by the bench and said to Reno, “You still have a key to Florencia’s place?”

  The young artist winced slightly. “She asked for it back.”

  “Just double-checking. I thought she might have. Is there anything you need to get, anything you left at her place?”

  Reno shook his head and looked down at his hands, clicking his thumbnails back and forth against each other. “Why did you ask?”

  “I’m installing an alarm system today. I’d hate to have you mistaken for a burglar.”

  Reno almost laughed, a nervous breathy sound. Chuck clapped him on the shoulder. “I know it’s rough, losing her. Hang in there. Maybe Flo will speak to you yet. There’s still time.”

  “You have no idea what you’re talking about.” Reno pulled back from Chuck. “And don’t say her name to me again.” He strode down the street.

  The retired lawyer’s rosy face grew even pinker as he called after him, “I’m sorry.”

  Reno paused at the corner, but he didn’t look back.

  Chuck opened the door to the café, and Jamie followed him in. “The name thing,” Jamie said. “It’s not just that he’s upset about her. It’s a taboo, in case she’s died already, so he won’t get ghost sickness. The name calls back the ghost.”

  “Thank you. I’ll try to be careful.”

  Frank was sitting at Reno’s lizard table, drinking coffee and eating a muffin. The same disappointingly modest breakfast awaited Jamie. He took a seat and slurped his long overdue coffee.

  “Is Reno okay?” Frank asked. “He’s normally so quiet, that was weird.”

  Jamie wriggled his shoulders, not sure what to say. He hadn’t expected himself to try to protect Reno the way he had. “He’s a weird kid.”

  Chuck paused before joining the line at the counter and detoured to their table. “I didn’t realize you knew him,”

  “Yeah. Since he was five.” Jamie pictured Reno at that age, watching ants or drawing and coloring, his attention span ten times longer than teenaged Jamie’s. They’d seemed to be total opposites at first, but the more Jamie was around the quiet little boy the more he sensed they were alike. Socially awkward creative misfits. However, Reno couldn’t blunder his way out of loneliness the way Jamie could. Misty had been the only person to get through to him. “He’ll be okay if he can sort things out with Misty.”

  “A good idea.” Chuck clapped his hands together. “Love conquers all.” He patted Jamie’s shoulder and added meaningfully, “As long as the woman is always right.”

  After breakfast, Jamie returned to Mae’s house, relieved that she hadn’t come home before he’d done anything for her. He took care of her laundry, then left a note in case she got back while he was shopping. Had coffee at Passion Pie. Saw Reno taking his tabletop out. It fell short of the truth, but it wasn’t quite a lie, either. Jamie didn’t like it, but then he didn’t like any of his options in dealing with his friends’ secrets.

  He bought groceries, including plenty of coffee. He’d told Reno he would make sure Mae didn’t need to go to the café. To bake for her, he had to correct some deficiencies in her kitchen. He went to the thrift shop for cookie sheets and glass mixing bowls and got interested in a slow cooker, a cast iron frying pan, muffin tins, certain types of spatulas, and other things Mae lacked as well.

  As he placed the final items on the sales counter, he noticed a woman with long gray hair pulling the cushions off a bright, overstuffed couch and peering under them.

  “Think they take the money out before they sell it,” he said.

  She smiled. “I’m looking for crumbs and dog hair, actually.”

  “F—” Jamie had rejected a spatula because of the crusted remains of fried eggs. “That’d be disgusting.”

  “That’s why I look.”

  The furniture was in good shape, better than average thrift shop material. Jamie removed the final cushion, and the woman poked into the crevices of the sofa. He put the pillows back while she did the same examination of a matching easy chair. Running her hand into the corners of the bare chair seat, she frowned and drew something out. She grimaced at it and dropped the thing onto the scuffed floorboards. Jamie bent to pick it up, expecting some bit of normal couch crap—a cracker or a penny—but it was a delicate green hair-like feather. An Eclectus parrot feather.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Mae set her barefoot shoes by the door and put her water bottle in the kitchen. She was long overdue for a shower and clean clothes, having lingered over brunch with her father after their triathlon practice, talking about sports and training. The kitchen was hot and smelled both sweet and spicy, a trace of Jamie’s presence. She turned the air conditioner up and sank onto the living room couch to read the note that lay on the coffee table. The letters, written in his sprawling, sloping script, were scrambled in most of the words, and some of the Ps faced the wrong way, but
she was used to his writing and could translate.

  Had coffee at Passion Pie. Saw Reno taking his tabletop out. Mae wished she’d gone back to try with it again, but she hadn’t thought he’d be back from Mescalero yet. She resumed reading.

  Got you a slow cooker, few other kitchen things at the thrift store. Cheap, all right? No fussing. I didn’t spend much money. Lentil soup. Mmmm. Good thing Jamie hadn’t been there. She hadn’t even seen the crockpot on the counter. Cookies!!! She hadn’t noticed those, either, just the heat. A quick trip to the kitchen revealed a plastic tub full of oatmeal cookies with raisins forming hearts and smiley faces. Laundry put away. Wear those black ones more often. Want to take them off you, slow. Feather is from furniture in thrift shop. Has to be from an Eclectus parrot. Like Placido. Nothing else has those little fur feathers. Be weird if someone here had him, but could you check and see? Just in case? You can tell it’s him if he can talk like me. Need to know he’s okay. Thanks. Love ya love ya love ya! JEJE.

  A tiny green thing that she never would have thought was a feather lay on the table, anchored by a pebble. Jamie had been attached to the parrot and would recognize its peculiar plumage. She pictured him in the exotic bird store, petting and talking to Placido. Knowing Jamie, he’d probably fallen in love at first sight.

  The odds of the feather being Placido’s were low, but there was no harm in trying to find out. Or was there? A parrot might not have much of a private life, but the people it lived with did. Maybe she shouldn’t do this.

  No. Maybe she should. The odds weren’t so low after all. Will had found—or stolen—the hyacinth macaw. The birds had vanished together. Will had been engaged to the third Chino sister. He had a T or C connection. He could have sold the birds to someone here.