Authors: Bonnie Hearn Hill
Ghost Island (3 page)
CHAPTER 4
I left it alone, but I couldn’t help thinking about what Grace had said. She had seen her sister, but she no longer had a sister. It was as over my head as the languages she exchanged with Daniel on the
shoreboat
. How had I ever imagined I would fit in on this trip? Although I had known I was going on a rich-kid cruise, I hadn’t realized how odd I would feel with kids like these.
The hotel room kind of eased my fears. It was small and felt safe, and when I looked out my front door, I could see an expanse of ocean and sky. In a couple of hours, I would meet the others downstairs, and we would attend a holiday musical production in the casino theater. It was the same theater where I had first spoken to Aaron in my dream, and where Emily had found her grandparents. I wondered if that was where Grace had seen her sister as well. Right now, though, I just needed to rest. My breathing slowed and deepened.
***
The room is set up with long tables and rows of bookcases. Outside the circle of windows, the sky sparkles, and thunder sounds in the distance.
“I wondered when you’d be back.”
Aaron slides into a seat across from me. In the storm light, his eyes are a golden hazel. He’s wearing the same pale green sweater and a worried expression.
“What is this place?” I ask.
“The library.
We’ll be safe here. You heard about the hurricane, didn’t you?”
I nod and take in his face again, that bare, bronze forehead, the spiked sun-bleached hair.
His eyes.
“Why here?” I ask.
“It’s where I study.” He gestures toward the bookshelves, the fireplace. “I’m trying to graduate early and get into USC as an art major. So I work weekends on the island. What about you?”
“I’m looking for someone.
Downstairs, in the theater.”
He shakes his head. “You can’t go down there. I told you that last night.”
“Why not?”
“It’s not safe. They’re doing repair work.”
I want to say okay and just settle into this comfortable room with this guy who seems to like me. If I do, though, I’ll lose the chance to find my mother. I force myself to stand.
“There are ghosts down there,” I say. “You know that, don’t you?”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Come. Let me prove it to you. They’re all over the place.”
“All we’d find down there is a bunch of unfinished construction. You could get hurt.” He
rises
, walks to the door, stands in front of it. “Why don’t you hang out here,
Livia
?
With me.”
I’d love to. He is hot, way more than any of the guys back home, even more than Johnny.
“First I need to see the theater,” I say.
“All right.
If that’s what you want.” He extends a hand to me, and the door behind him flies open.
I scream, as a white-haired woman who must be in her eighties steps inside the room, followed by a man about the same age in a rain-spattered jacket and glasses. A second pair hangs from the neck of his polo shirt.
“You all right, Aaron?” the old man asks and shoots a worried look at me.
“I’m fine,” he replies. “This is
Livia
. You took her by surprise.”
“I’m sorry we startled you,” the woman says. “I’m Peggy. This is my husband, Norm. We just wanted to let you know that there won’t be any boats leaving here tonight. You’ll have to sleep on the island, Aaron. You, too, Miss.”
“I have reservations at the Pueblo Hotel,” I say, but my words come out slow and swollen.
“You look pale.” The woman steps inside and moves closer. “I think you’d better sit down.”
The room begins to spin, the windows a b
Thunder beats on the door. Only, the door is spinning too. No longer ornate, it begins to slow and settle into something pale and ordinary. The banging on it continues, reverberating in my head.
“Aaron,” I say. “Answer it.”
But Aaron is gone.
***
“Come on,
Livia
. Open the door, will you?”
I tried to make sense of where I was. Aaron and the old couple had vanished, and I was on cold, flat sheets, staring up at the ceiling of my Pueblo Hotel room.
“
Livia
?”
More pounding.
I staggered to the door. The hammering continued, mingling with voices from the dream.
“
You’ll have to sleep on the island, Aaron. You, too, Miss
.”
“
Why don’t you hang out here,
Livia
?
With me
.”
I shook the voices out of my head.
“Coming.”
I pulled on my jacket, zipped it up, and yanked on my black pants. How had I fallen asleep in the afternoon?
Then I remembered. I had decided to lie down for just a minute after my shower. Was this going to happen to me every time I slept now? I needed to talk to Grace. Bitchy as she could be, she had also dreamed about the building.
I opened the door and saw Johnny’s smirking face.
“About time,” he said. “Everyone’s worried about you. I vo
“I’m so sorry. Guess I overslept.” Then I breathed in the sharp scent of alcohol. “You’ve been drinking.”
“What are you talking about?
You’re just smelling
my mouthwash.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“All right, then. I won’t.” He grinned. “You should hurry, though. Thanks to you, we’re already late.”
We took one of the golf carts that the hotel provided for its guests and cruised down the hill. I looked down at the casino framed by the brilliant, darkening sea, and wondered if Aaron might actually be inside.
Ms. Gates, Emily, and Charles were waiting outside the casino building for us. Ms. Gates stood in jeans and a matching jacket, talking to Emily, who looked more vibrant than she had earlier. Charles was leaning on one arm against the building, eye-to-eye and chatting up Grace. No surprise there.
She had pulled a gray knit hat over her head and wrapped a fringed black scarf around her neck. She was even more striking like that, with only the stark beauty of her face exposed.
“Glad you decided to join us,” she said. “What happened?”
“I fell asleep,” I told her. “I’m sorry, you guys. You should have just gone ahead.”
“We’ll be fine,” Ms. Gates said. “We have reservations.”
“Besides,” Charles added, “there are twelve hundred seats in there. I don’t think we have anything to worry about.”
“So the bottom floor’s not closed for repairs?” I asked.
“Why would it be?” Grace said.
“Just asking.”
“But why?”
“I don’t know, Grace.”
We stepped into the foyer, and she went ahead as I stopped to stare at our surroundings. The theater was identical to the one in my dream.
The black walnut walls.
The circular ceiling covered with silver leaf and twinkling star lights. Within that rich red-and-gold world, I didn’t sense a single ghost. Yet there had been hundreds in my dream.
Aaron had been wrong. The floor wasn’t closed. No one seemed to be making any repairs. I couldn’t think about Aaron as a real person, though. Whatever he was, or might be, he was not real.
I felt a light tap on my shoulder.
“You’re looking better, Miss.”
A shudder shot through me. I whirled around and saw the old couple standing behind me. The man’s beige jacket was still spotted from the rain. The second pair of glasses still hung from the front of his polo shirt.
“Thanks. I’m fine.”
“We were worried about you, Aaron especially,” she said. “He wouldn’t let us near you when you had that spell. I’m so glad you’re all right now.”
I was aware that Grace had turned around to stare, and I tried to ignore her.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t remember your names,” I said.
“Peggy and Norm.”
She patted his arm. “We’ve lived in Avalon since the early sixties, down on
Descanso
Avenue, one block from the ocean. But please don’t apologize. We’re just glad to see that you recovered. Enjoy the concert. We’re hoping the hurricane doesn’t blow out our power.”
They started to walk away, and I realized that I couldn’t let that happen until I learned more.
“Wait,” I said. “Peggy, where’s Aaron right now?”
“Studying,” she said. “That young man is so disciplined.”
“Ask him to call me,” I told her. “I’m at the Pueblo Hotel.”
“I will.” She gave me a vague smile. “Although you may hear from him before I do.”
“Please, Peg,” Norm said in his thin voice. “Don’t try to play matchmaker right now. Let it be.”
“But I wasn’t...”
They walked down to their seats grumbling affectionately.
“Who the hell is she?” Grace whispered.
“Just an old woman who takes care of the place.”
I grabbed her arm and pulled her off to the side. “You and I need to talk.”
“You’ve made us late enough already.
The concert’s about to start.”
“Forget the concert,” I told her. “Something’s going on here. You and I are having dreams about the casino. I’m seeing some guy. You’re seeing your sister. Does this place look like it did in your dream?”
“Couldn’t it just be coincidence?”
“I don’t think so. That woman’s name is Peggy. I saw her in a dream I had right before Johnny banged on my door and woke me up. Twenty minutes ago.”
“Shit.” She leaned against the wall. From inside, I could hear
We Wish You
A
Merry Christmas,
the singers’ voices faint and hopeful as memory.
“What did you see?” I asked her again.
“There was this girl.” Grace looked ready to cry. “She had really pale brown eyes and straight blond hair. Her bangs were thick and cut to just above her eyebrows, not as long as yours. And she didn’t smile. She just stared right through me.”
“Why do you think she was your sister?” I asked.
“She looked like Felicia, but it was more than that.
A feeling.”
Grace shuddered.
“When was the last time you saw her?”
“She ran away when I was seven, and she was sixteen,” she said. “It’s not the happiest moment of my life, and I don’t feel like sharing it with you.”
“Okay, but your dream?” I asked. “Was it good or bad?”
“It was wonderful,” she said. “I felt as if Felicia was going to speak, to tell me something, if I had just stayed a little longer.”
“Where was she?”
“In there.” She pointed inside. “She was on the stage, and I was walking up to her, almost floating up, actually. It couldn’t have been like your dream. What did you see?”
“I told you,” I said. “A guy named Aaron.”
“What did he look like, and what’d he say?”
“It’s hard to explain but he was actually kind of hot.” My description of him was so inadequate it embarrassed me. “The first time, he told me to stay out of the theater.”
“And the second time?”
I remembered his eyes, the way the bronze light lit his skin, the hushed sound of his voice.
“Why don’t you hang out here,
Livia
?
With me.”
“Tell me.” she demanded.
“Second dream, same message.
What do you think this means?” I asked.
“The two of us having the same type of dream about the same place?”