My dad was dead, and I didn’t need ghosts to complicate that. I didn’t needanyoneto complicate that. My family was already complicated enough—never mind my history with Mairmont. If I started talking with ghosts again, I was sure to land in the Mairmont gossip circles within the week: “Did you hear, Florence is back and talking to herself again?”
Poor Florence and her imaginary friends.
Florence and her ghosts—
I swallowed the knot in my throat, and without saying another word, I turned off the lights and fell onto my bed and pulled the covers over my head.
All I could think of was how quiet the inn was, and how my thoughts were so loud against it, and how in New York I never had to hear silence. I never had to think about Mairmont, or the people here, or why I left.
For ten years, I hopped from one apartment to the next, chasing after a love story that wasn’t mine, trying to force myself to be the exception instead of the rule, and over and over again all I found was heartbreak and loneliness, and never once did I see a murder of crows in a dead oak tree, or a ghost on my front steps, because I was like everyone else, normal and lost, and my dad was still alive.
And just for a second—one second longer—I wanted to be that Florence, and live in that pocket of time again.
But it was gone, and so was my dad.
11
Past Tense
I SLEPT FORalmost three hours.
Almost.
I knew how ghosts worked. They always popped up in the most unexpected places, and I wasn’t sure when Benji Andor would show up again.Ifhe showed up again. A very small, very unreliable part of me well and truly hoped I’d imagined him. But tell that to my anxiety, which was dead set on not letting me get a full REM cycle of sleep. Every groan and crack of the old house startled me awake, until my phone finally went off at 9:30a.m.
And I felt like a truck had run me over, backed up, and hit me again.
At least I had packed my heavy-duty concealer—the good stuff. I slathered it under my eyes and hoped I looked at least a little alive as I traipsed down the steps to the foyer, where a larger redheaded man sat on the stool Dana occupied last night. He had on an anime T-shirt and about half a dozen piercings in his face, and it took me a moment to recognize him.
“John?”
He looked up from his magazine at the sound of his name, and put on a smile. “Flo-town! Dana said you were staying here!” He stood and quickly hurried around the desk to give me a bear hug. Approximately three of my ribs cracked and I died. He set me down with a laugh. “It’s been—how long, ten years?”
“About,” I conceded. “I barely recognized you!”
He blushed and rubbed the back of his neck. He had on a hat with a pizza design on it, and a loud floral button-down. Miles from the guy I dated in high school—polo shirts and short buzzed hair and a football scholarship to Notre Dame. “Ah, yeah, a lot’s happened.”
“You’re telling me. Congrats on you and Dana!”
“Yeah, can’tbelievemy luck. How’s New York been treating you?”
“Good. Well—not bad,” I amended.
He laughed. “That’s good to hear. And how’s your wr—” The old rotary phone at the desk began to ring, and he apologetically excused himself to go take the call. “Mairmont Bed-and-Breakfast, John speaking...” Then he put his hand over the receiver and whispered to me, “It’s good to see you, though I’m sorry about your dad. He was a real good guy.”
The words hit me like a hurricane, because for a moment I’d forgotten. “Thank you,” I forced out, fixing a smile onto my face.
He went back to the person on the phone, and I left as quickly as I could. I think he shouted after me about breakfast, but I was already late to the Waffle House to meet my family, and no offense to the breakfast at the inn—nothing topped hash browns scattered, smothered, and covered.
The WaHo was at the end of Main Street, near the elementary school and the bookstore, and the parking lot was jammed withtravelers stopping through Mairmont on their way through South Carolina to North Carolina and Tennessee. It was close enough to Pigeon Forge to visit Dollywood whenever you wanted or pop over to Asheville to tour the Biltmore. Mairmont was situated just on the outskirts of the Appalachian Mountains, hilly enough to have great walking trails but flat enough for the mountain roads to not kill a Prius. My family sat in the farthest booth at the diner, already eating their cheesy hash browns and sausage-and-egg omelets. I quickly hurried over and slid into the booth beside Mom.
She said, “We already ordered you a waffle and hash browns,” as she slid over a cup of coffee.
I took a long drink. “Mmh, battery acid.”
“Late as usual,” Carver added dryly, mocking a look at his expensive Rolex.
Alice agreed. “Some things never change.”