Second Grave on the Left

He looked back at me in surprise. “Sweetheart, you’re the only one who can.”

I wasn’t going to argue with him. “Well, I won’t. If you don’t want to cross, I’m not going to make you.”

I looked past him at Cookie. She sat staring at me, nodding, as if critiquing my performance. I snorted, and she glanced around self-consciously.

“Are you laughing at me?” she asked through her teeth, pretending not to be talking.

“No,” I promised before focusing on Bogart again.

“Babe!”

I turned and grinned at Brad as he stuck his head through the pass-out window. “You came back to me.”

“Naturally,” I said. “And I’m hungry, handsome.”

A confident grin slid across his face. “You just said the magic words, baby.”

He ducked back in and started cooking God only knew what. But I was fairly certain his creation would be nothing short of a work of art.

“Sometimes,” I said to Bogart, “our memories are hidden, buried. And when people cross, I can see them. I was hoping you might have seen Mimi, taken note of something everyone else missed. If you cross through me, I can scan your memories, look for her. But I won’t make you cross.” I didn’t bother to mention that I couldn’t do that anyway.

He shook his head. “Don’t really have anyone waiting on me.”

“Nonsense. Everyone has somebody waiting. I promise, you might not know it, but you have someone.”

“Oh, I got people.” After a heavy sigh, he said, “I think I’ll pass, if it’s all the same.”

My heart broke a little. He did have people waiting, he knew that, but he didn’t feel worthy to cross. He’d done something in his past, something that caused a rift, most likely in his family.

I was hoping I could talk him into it. He didn’t realize what he was missing by remaining earthbound. But he had his reasons. I wasn’t going to push.

“When you’re ready,” I said, placing a hand on his arm. He looked down, picked up my hand, and raised it to his cool mouth. After placing a soft kiss on my knuckles, he disappeared.

I glanced at Cookie in defeat. “He didn’t buy it.”

“You can see their memories?” she asked in awe. Why anything should awe her at this point was beyond me.

“I can, but I’ve never tried to scan them, to look for anything in particular. I think I could, though. I have to try. And I have one more person to talk to.”

I gestured for her to pick up her cup and follow me into the dining area. About a dozen tables peppered the large room that was lined with booths along the walls. The lights were low, and a young couple sat whispering by one of the large plateglass windows that overlooked the intersection. At a table farther back sat the woman who looked like she’d been a drug-addicted prostitute. From the look of her skin, she’d done her fair share of meth.

I eyed the chair, then Cookie. “You’ll be cold,” I told her, regret filling my voice. But we were already getting odd looks from Norma. I really needed her in front of me while I talked to the woman.

As if walking on eggshells, she took a careful step forward then sat down, curling inside herself. The woman filtered through her, completely oblivious of the fact that her personal space had been invaded. “This is disturbing on so many levels,” Cookie said.

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“No,” she chastised, “for Mimi, I’d do this all day. Just wiggle your fingers, do your magic, and find out where she is.”

I grinned and sat across from her. “You got it.”

The woman’s arms were on the table as she stared out the window. She kept rubbing her wrists together, and I suddenly realized she’d cut them. But the wounds had healed, scarred up, so that wasn’t how she died. Whatever did her in, she looked like she’d had a rock-hard life.

“Sweetheart,” I said, reaching out and touching an arm.

She paused her OCD behavior and leveled an empty gaze on me.

“My name is Charlotte. I’m here to help you.”

“You’re beautiful,” she said, raising a hand to my face. I smiled as she ran her fingers over my cheeks and mouth. “Like a million stars.”

“If you want to cross through me, you can.”

She jerked her hand back and shook her head. “I can’t. I’m going to hell.”

I reached over and took her hands into mine. “No, you’re not. If you were going to hell, honey, you’d already be there. I have no jurisdiction, and hell is pretty hell-bent on taking care of its own.”

Her mouth trembled as tears pooled in her lashes. “I’m … I’m not going to hell? But … I just thought that since I didn’t go to heaven…”

“What’s your name?”

“Lori.”

“Lori, I have to admit, even I don’t always understand why someone doesn’t cross. Oftentimes it’s when the departed has been the victim of a violent crime. Can you tell me how you died?”

Cookie hugged her arms to her, fighting off the chill.

“I don’t remember,” Lori said, leaning forward and wrapping her fingers around mine. “Knowing me, I probably OD’d on something.” She cast me a shameful look. “I was not a good person, Charlotte.”

“I’m sure you did the best you could. Obviously someone thinks so, or like I said, you would have gone the other direction. But you’re here. You’re just confused, maybe.” I took out the picture of Mimi and showed it to her. “Have you seen this woman?”