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“Hello, Sidney,” she said. “It’s been a long
time.” Her voice sounded cautious and uneven.

“Suzy Q,” he said, now munching a Snickers
he’d stored in his backpack. “So, you finally found me.
Congratulations.”

A look of confusion spread across all
faces.

“You know her?” Tracy said.

“This is the shrink I was telling you about,”
he said. “This is who my parents kept me from because of that
embarrassing moment many years ago when the adults finally realized
that little Sidney was in fact, ‘the speaker for the dead’.”

Susan gave a nervous laugh; she could see
that the odd sense of humor in the boy had flourished in the man.
Tracy remained confused, and the others shot questioning glances at
Sidney.

“So, you haven’t been concerned about me,”
she said. “You just needed me to lead you to Sidney?”

“No, Tracy. That’s not true. My concern began
with you. When I spoke to Marcia, I realized that what was going on
with you was so much more complex than anyone understood.”

“So, two birds with one stone, as they say,”
Sidney said. Susan didn’t answer. Sidney Pratt had grown into a
genius with an IQ level so high that no one talked about it except
behind closed doors. His scholastic work had been published in
nationwide journals, some of which came to Susan’s attention. He
was no one’s idiot. “Besides, aren’t you supposed to be a
skeptic?”

“I was, but I’m not now and haven’t been for
a long time. And you know exactly why that is, don’t you,
Sidney?”

Now she had moved straight to him, and they
stood with noses almost touching. Sidney’s chocolate chomping
ceased as a wave of guilt washed over him. He felt like the boy in
her office, hearing the sounds of war and the voice of the man she
loved. He knew what she was about to say.

“You’re parents brought you into my office,”
she said. “I tried to help you, but instead, I got a little sneak
preview of your abilities, didn’t I? You mentioned Mark and called
me ‘Suzy Q.,’ neither of which you could possibly know. Then your
parents just whisked you away and kept you hidden from me, never to
finish what you’d started. Sidney, that wasn’t fair.”

He put the Snickers down. He was no longer
hungry, knowing she was right.

Dylan stared at the confrontation with his
arms crossed, and the puzzled squint of his eyes grew deeper as he
hung on every word. He stepped forward with the intent of a captain
taking helm of his ship, but his facial expression resembled a
stage director whose production became usurped by a bigger
name.

“I don’t mean to sound rude, Dr. Logan,” he
said, “but you are on my time, and this matter concerns Tracy, not
Sidney. Whatever unfinished business you have with him is going to
have to wait.”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Rasche. I won’t be treading
on your turf, or stealing your thunder if you do produce results.”
She had come across his name while searching for Sidney and Dylan’s
face melted at the implication. Susan Logan was no one’s fool
either; she had pulled a hidden something from his soul and held it
up to his face.

She smiled and continued to speak.

“As I said, I was once a skeptic, that is,
until I met Sidney. You all know him, so I’m sure you know the
story. Sidney’s parents had filed a court injunction against me and
I was prohibited from speaking to him until he reached the legal
age. After that, I didn’t want to impose upon his education.

“Since that day, I have poured myself into
research of the paranormal: ghostly encounters, sightings,
communication. I had become convinced of Sidney. My life, my career
path, suddenly changed after that day, and all I could do was study
and search for the reasonable explanation, but there wasn’t one. I
have since helped many patients who have dealt with hauntings and
encounters, but unfortunately, you wouldn’t give me the time of
day, Tracy.”

She turned when she said this to Tracy, who
sulked. She was unaware of Susan’s secret prowess into anything
other than head shrinking.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me this during
the sessions?”

“You never mentioned anything about seeing or
hearing David,” Susan said, and Tracy knew this was true. None of
this had occurred at that time and when it did, Susan was the last
person she would have told. “I really wish you would have called
me. I could have helped.”

“She’s right.” Leah spoke up. She had been
staring at Susan the whole time and Susan stared back, rummaging
through the files stored in the recesses of her mind. She’d seen
that beautiful, angelic face before, but where? “She’s the one who
helped my Dad.”

An instant identification rubber stamped in
Susan’s mind. She could still clearly see the picture the patient
had kept in his wallet. The little girl with the golden tresses and
the deep, penetrating, blue eyes, peeping above the perfect,
smiling face of a cherub. It was her: the daughter who saw the dead
as clearly as she saw the living. The child who could bare
testament to everything that had transpired in that house was now a
paranormal investigator, and Susan realized that this grown beauty
was the direct opposite of Sidney Pratt.

“I’m Leah Leeds,” she said, coming forward
and extending her hand in a handshake to the unexpected guest. “My
father is Paul Leeds.”

“It is an extreme pleasure to meet you,”
Susan said, and began to say something else until the girl
interrupted.

“You saved my father, and I don’t know how to
begin to thank you.” Susan was overwhelmed at the grace of her and
those unmistakable, transfixing eyes.

“There’s no need to thank me, dear. I would
never have been able to help him had it not been for Sidney.” She
glanced over at him, his jaw agape in surprise at the connection to
Leah, one she’d failed to mention in her history.

Paul Leeds became a patient of Susan Logan’s
right around the time that she had declared her questionable
interest to the hospital in patients traumatized by paranormal
experiences. She came to know the entire story of the Cedar Drive
house through Paul. He had suffered from acute anxiety disorder and
what most believed were hallucinations, as well as violent
nightmares that led to sleep deprivation. His final thoughts of
suicide were prevented only by the picture of his little girl that
he kept in his wallet. Now she spoke of Paul as a survivor, a man
who had faced the devil and won.

“Paul is okay now,” Susan said. “He has
himself to thank for that, and you.” She touched Leah’s shoulder
and smiled, then turned to the others.

“I would like to stay, but that is up to you,
Tracy.”

“Sure, of course,” Tracy said, mumbling a
soft tone of embarrassment.

This awkward silence served as Dylan’s moment
to resume control, which he did. A look of uncomfortable
apprehension toward Susan wore on his face like a Halloween mask.
He stood at the spot that Tracy indicated earlier.

“Just before you arrived,” he said to Susan.
“Tracy told us that she had seen David standing, right here. We
were also discussing the chill in the room because the temperature
had dropped, and I think it’s even colder now.”

Tracy had paid no attention, but the house
did seem to be getting colder. Leah checked the thermostat—69
degrees. Dylan began explaining to Susan the role that temperature
change played in manifestations, when it all began.

All the lights in the house flicked on and
off, beaming brighter than usual, flaring up a gulf of hot, white
light. The TV had been kept on, but the all news channel reporting
in the background had been ignored, until the crashing sound of
static recommenced. The clamorous, mechanical roar was a call to
attention, rising in volume with an incessant, maddening rush that
diverted all eyes to its command. Then, six people stepped slowly
towards the gray, snowy field that absorbed every inch of the
screen.

Chapter Ten

Brett knelt down in
front of the set, and Dylan crouched alongside him, while Leah
looked around the room and Sidney shut his eyes in concentration,
hoping to hear some faint trace of anything other than the static.
Tracy nibbled on dwindling fingernails, her chest heaving faster
with each passing moment. Susan surveyed the scene with eyebrows
arched upward in attention.

A warbled, twisted sound spoke through the
static.

“Identification,” Brett said, “vocal pattern:
unidentified.”

“It’s a voice,” Leah said.

The voice spoke in a drawl, the sound of a
vinyl record playing on the slowest speed of a vintage turntable.
The recorder reels were spinning pinwheels undeterred by the noise
they would later represent, a deformed melancholy attempting escape
from the crashing static.

Tracy wriggled her nose and sniffed as
something familiar swept the air. The well remembered pungent musk
of him, thick and oily with its royal scent, had returned from a
heartbreaking absence. It was his favorite cologne: a Swiss scent
ironically named, “Good Life.”

“Can you smell it?” she asked, whiffing the
tainted air.

“I smell it,” Susan said.

The others looked at her in agreement; the
smell of men’s cologne wafted through the room, an unmistakable
calling card attached to a life that was no more.

“Neither of you guys are wearing cologne or
after shave, right?” Dylan asked the question, knowing the answer
but wanting to establish a fact: the scent was unmistakably
David’s.

“Never touch the stuff,” Sidney said, and
Brett threw his hands up in refute.

Dylan faced Tracy and the severity of his
expression was an indicator of the seriousness the team could now
confirm. He showed her the EMF meter; the needle inched its way
between the notches marked five and seven.

“When this needle jumps that high, there is
spiritual activity. And when a sudden scent invades a room, it’s a
sign of a spirit’s presence. That’s why we as investigators never
wear cologne or perfume to a sight because it might mask any
sudden, unusual scents. You have identified it for us, Tracy. David
is here. ”

She closed her tearing eyes and breathed
heavily, trying to picture him in her mind, and the image she
perceived was of him rubbing his hands together and slapping
cologne on both cheeks. She opened her eyes, hoping that the trace
of him would be standing there as it had the night before, but only
the five faces stared back at her.

The warped voice penetrated the static once
more with muffled attempts at words both indecipherable and
chilling. It was thick, heavy like molasses. Then a deeper,
throatier, growl interrupted, shouting a sharp bark. Two sounds
mixed together: one louder, faster, and dominant, the other slower
and weaker. Then friction between the two noises battled back and
forth, emitting a high-pitched, screeching sound now set on the
highest speed of the phantom turntable.

Sidney, with eyes shut and mind open,
listened. Suddenly, something amid the background noise silenced
the coarse chaotic mainstream. The voice that Tracy had heard the
night it all began became clear and present and it spoke.

“Tracy.” It was soft and fleeting but heard
by all.

The heat of shock swallowed her in a wave,
and she made a steeple with both hands over the lower part of her
face. Leah came forward and grabbed her hands away, clenching them
firmly for support. Dylan and Brett both crouched in front of the
TV, and Susan’s legs buckled under her, dropping her to the
loveseat. Sidney opened his eyes and stared at the screen. They all
had become listeners as the pipeline breached an earthbound and
forbidden barrier.

“David, is that you?” Sidney said, as he
stepped inches closer to the television.

“Tracy.” The voice repeated its call in a
distant, lifeless monotone.

“It’s him,” Tracy said, shaking as Leah held
her.

“David, my name is Sidney. I can always hear
you, if you let me. Can you tell me why you’re here?”

Sidney spoke in a tone usually reserved for
those who were hard of hearing, but underneath was a coaxing and
friendly invitation.

“David, we are all here to help you,” Sidney
said to the static filled screen. “What is it that you want to tell
us?”

No answer returned, and seconds passed with
the crashing sound of static unchanged. The small span of time
hinted at a spirit in confusion until one more word was spoken.

“Prince--cess.” The final “esses” blended
amid the static, but the word was clear.

“David!” Tracy shouted at the screen. Then, a
moan of pain and agony blared out from behind the screen,
heightening into a deformed, wailing cry that overwhelming the
static, and the fear of five hearts pounded in perfect percussion.
This voice wasn’t David’s; this voice belonged to another.

The bitter, angry, groaning burst louder
through the speakers, sending Brett, Dylan, and Sidney, spiraling
backward from the force and tone of it. The lights flickered on and
off, and the temperature of the room turned to ice, as though
someone had opened the door and admitted an early winter’s blast
into the house.

“What’s happening?” Tracy called out in the
erupting confusion, but the combination of fear and mystery on
Leah’s face told her the answer. Dylan and Brett stood aside, while
Sidney faced the TV.

“Who are you, and where is David? Speak to
me. I can help you,” Sidney’s voice boomed with the intensity of a
proud and pious preacher from the pulpit. He opened his eyes and
listened, awaiting the voice from beyond, but the sound of
something else stirred. It was a soft rumble that grew louder, a
rolling ball of thunder gathering strength and gaining magnitude.
Then, it happened.

A brilliant flash of white struck
simultaneously with the calamitous sound of thunder. The bursting
of some unseen energy exploded like a bomb throughout the room,
sending objects flying, lamps and vases breaking, tripods tumbling,
and those present cowered in the corners away from the TV. A great
gale of icy wind swept the house.