The Ghost Locket Read online

  "What are you thinking about Kit?" Alicia asked, noticing Kit's preoccupation.

  "Oh, nothing," she replied.

  "Even I know better than that," Alicia said, "that brain of yours is always working on something. My head would explode if I thought about as much stuff as you do."

  Kit suddenly stopped walking, "You guys go ahead; I forgot to get a snack for my lunch at the store. I'll catch up," Kit said.

  As she turned around Kit heard Tommy speak to her as she passed.

  "Hey Kit, where you going? School's that way!"

  "Keep walking Tommy. I think Alicia wants you to catch up,” she said back.

  "Really!" Tommy said smiling. It seemed he did like Alicia. Couldn't imagine why, she treated him like he had the bubonic plague.

  Kit walked the half block back to the intersection, paused and looked around. She stepped off the curb, looked up and down the street, and tried to imagine what had happened. By chance, she looked down and saw something shining against the curb. She bent over to pick it up and wiped a red splotch off it. It was a gold heart-shaped locket and chain. The chain had a broken clasp. She looked around to see if anyone had seen her pick it up, then putting it in her pocket, quickened her pace to catch up with her friends.

  After school, Kit and her friends took the long way home from the bus stop and stopped at the comic book store. They stood by the racks' reading, until Mr. Carducci yelled at them. "Hey you kids, this ain't no library. If you ain't buying, get lost!" Alicia stuck her tongue out at him and gave him the finger as they walked out the door. Mr. Carducci looked only mildly shocked and muttered under his breath, "Damn kids got no respect these days!"

  "What a douche bag," Alicia said angrily. "You know what that creep did?"

  "What?" Kit and Gwen both asked, as if they were expecting to hear something shocking, judging from Alicia's tone.

  "You know Tommy's older brother Phil; he's been, like, collecting comics since he was four or five. So you know he joined the army, see, and he's like, goin to Afghanistan or somethin, and he goes to sell his comics to Carducci. He wants to buy his girlfriend, Monica... you know Monica, right" (they both nod), "he wants to buy Monica a nice ring, so she'll, like, wait for him. Well, Carducci offers him a hundred bucks flat. Won't budge a nickel. Phil, see, he needs the cash bad, so he takes it!"

  "Yeah, so what's wrong with that?" Kit asked, not understanding what Alicia was so pissed about.

  "I'm gettin to that," Alicia continued. "So, like the very next day he sells the whole bunch he got from Phil, to some rich collector guy, for five grand!" The other girls let out a collective, "No shit!"

  "He knew what those comics was worth!" Alicia said, angrily. "And Phil, he's out there protecting our country, maybe dyin, so scum bags like that can rip other people off."

  "There's a lot of lousy people in the world," Gwen said. "Yeah," Alicia agreed.

  The girls arrived in front of Kit's apartment building. Kit bounded up the steps and turned to say good-bye. "See ya tomorrow, guys," Kit yelled.

  Kit pressed the intercom button to Mrs. Friedberg's apartment. The response was almost immediate. "Yes!" a voice replies. "It's me Hattie; I forgot my key again. Will you buzz me in?"

  Instantly, the door buzzed, unlocked, and Kit climbed the stairs to the third floor. On the way, Mrs. Frieberg was waiting on the second-floor landing, to once again, give her a hard time for forgetting her key. The scene replays two or three times a week.

  "Yes Hattie, I'll try to remember tomorrow. No Hattie, I don't expect you to be here every day to let me in,” she said, in a slightly sarcastic manner.

  "Even if you are here every day, because you never go anywhere!" Kit thought to herself.

  Kit retrieved the key hidden in the fake moss in the fake ficus tree outside her apartment door. She entered, dropped one shoulder, and tossed her backpack into the overstuffed chair by the door.

  She walked into her room and laid down on her bed. She felt something crinkling under her, reached beneath her, and pulled out a note. "Kit, I'll be home around 6:00. Reheat the tuna-noodle casserole in the fridge if you're hungry. Love, Mom."

  Kit reached inside her pocket and pulled out the locket. She examined it for a long time, opened it, and tried to make out the inscription. At the same time, she reached across to the phone on her nightstand and dialed a number.

  A voice answered. "Antony's Pizza, will this be carry out or delivery?"

  "Delivery please," Kit replied.

  Kit was more tired because of her day then she thought and began to nod off. She tossed from side to side and fell into a restless sleep. As she slept, she began to dream. She saw herself riding in a car seated next to a man she did not know. He smiled pleasantly at her; and was saying something, but she could not hear what, only that he was talking to her as if he knew her. She glanced out the passenger window of the car and noticed a large truck bearing down on them; breaks locked, tires squealing. She turned her head back to see the horrified look in the man's eyes just as the truck struck her door.

  Suddenly, the scene shifted and Kit found herself standing on the eerily quiet, deserted street, with no cars or people in sight. Feeling a hand take hers, she turned to see a young girl, near her age, standing next to her, wearing a long white nightgown. She wore no shoes, and her feet were cut and bleeding. Kit guessed from walking on the broken glass in the street. Kit stared at the girl until her face broke into a smile. Kit's gaze lowered to the girl's chest where the gold locket hung around her neck.

  "This is the place I died," the girl said.

  Kit looked the girl up and down and shuddered at the realization that she was having a conversation with a ghost. For some reason, she was not afraid!

  "Did it hurt?" Kit asked.

  "Only for a moment,”

  "The gold locket I found was yours?" Kit asked.

  "Yes, but it's yours now. You were meant to find it."

  The girl lifted the chain over her head, placed the locket in Kit's hand and closed her fingers around it.

  "What do the words inside mean?"

  "Oh, that's the best part! "It means; I love you with all my heart. Cool huh?"

  Kit awoke with a startled gasp and struggled to catch her breath. Her heart was racing, and she felt beads of sweat on her forehead and upper lip. Suddenly, the door buzzer sounded loudly, jerking her back to reality. Kit jumped off the bed and answered the door. It was the delivery guy for Antony's Pizza.

  Chapter 3 - Julia's Sadness

  Julia stood at the graveside, dressed in black, a veil concealing the tears streaming down her cheeks. Two caskets, side by side, rich in their lustrous cherry wood finishes, were poised to be lowered into the ground. The minister's words droned in a steady monotone. Friends and family members stood in somber silence.

  "I am the resurrection and the life,' saith the Lord; 'he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die,”

  Julia heard the minister's words but sound seemed to fade in and out like a car radio with bad reception. There was silence as her mind wandered to happier times, only to be interrupted by being suddenly pulled back to the present, and the continuation of the service.

  "We, therefore, commit the bodies of Paul & Emily to the ground; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust; in the sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal life."

  Someone, she would not remember who later, nudged Julia, helped her up and walked with her to the caskets. Her legs felt weak, as if they could barely support her. The sound of the birds happily singing in the nearby trees seemed somehow strange. She placed a hand on Paul's casket and felt the slick feel of its polished surface. She took the yellow rose from her other hand and gently placed one in its center. She repeated this for Emily's smaller casket.

  The minister concluded the service as the throngs of mourners drifted off toward their cars.

  A friend drove Julia home to the apartment after
the service.

  "Julia, let me stay with you tonight. You don't want to be alone this soon after. We can sit up and talk. Anything you want." The friend said.

  Julia politely refused her friends' offer insisting that she would be fine; she just needed some time to be alone with her thoughts. The friend tried to be insistent; however, Julia was adamant, almost to the point of rudeness. She raised her voice to the friend and said, "I'll be f-fine; I just want to be alone, please...” her voice trailed off to nearly a whisper when she suddenly realized that she had been almost shouting.

  "Okay Dear, I understand; you call me if you need anything, anything at all." The friend said, all the while Julia's hand at her back gently pressed her toward the door. When she was outside the door, she heard Julia set the deadbolt and attach the chain lock. Julia's forehead pressed against the door as she listened for the sound of her friend's footsteps leaving down the hallway. When she was satisfied, she had left; she leaned back against the door and slowly slumped to a seated position on the floor. She was still wearing the black dress and heels from the funeral service. One by one, she pulled off her shoes, and angrily threw them across the room.

  The next day Julia did not get out of bed, or the next. If she left her room at all, it was only to go to the bathroom. When the phone began to ring continuously, she yanked the cord from the wall. She could still hear it ringing in the studio, but it was soft enough through her closed door that she could choose to ignore it.

  On the fourth day, survival instinct, for lack of a better term, kicked in. Julia got out of bed, now a wad of twisted sheets, and walked to the bathroom. She pulled Paul's Sierra club t-shirt, the one she always slept in, over her head, tossed it on the floor and turned on the shower. She felt the water for temperature and adjusted it much hotter than usual. She stepped into the shower and moved her head under the hot stream. She stayed there a long time, feeling the water's soothing pulse, before she even applied shampoo to her now, greasy, stringy hair. After rinsing, she sat down and lay back with the shower still streaming down on her face. She began to cry. "How convenient," she thought, "I can cry all I want, and all my tears will be washed away, right down the drain."

  Julia dressed in her baggy sweatshirt and her favorite pair of holey jeans. She put her still wet hair up in a towel but did not bother to apply makeup or any of her usual routine. She walked to the kitchen and turned on the coffee maker. Hell, she didn't even like coffee, and rarely drank it. She only made it for Paul. Now, the coffee was finished, and she was soon on her third cup.

  Maybe the caffeine helped. She was starting to come back to life. Maybe she could cope with this. Maybe she just did not have any more tears left to cry. She felt dry and drained inside, as if all the moisture had been wicked from her body. She wasn't the only one to go through a tragedy. Most of them, most people, make it through, don't they? But what happens to the ones who don't make it, what happens to them... "They go fucking nuts; that’s what happens!" she shouted angrily aloud.

  Julia got another cup of coffee, swung open the double leaded-glass doors and walked stiffly into her studio. The familiar smell of turpentine, oil paints and the earthy aroma of fresh clay permeated her senses. Finished and unfinished canvasses lined the perimeter, propped against the red-brick walls. The hardwood floor beneath her easel was dotted with multi-colored splotches of dried paint and gesso. Across the room, she noticed the bust of Emily that she had created so lovingly with her own hands. She walked toward it and stopped a few feet short of it. It was still as beautiful as she remembered, and it hurt as if a rusty blade had thrust deep in her heart, to imagine that she would have to settle for this poor substitute for the real Emily.

  "I miss you baby, so much! I don't think I can make it without you and your Dad,” she said aloud, sobbing until her whole body shook, holding her face in her hands.

  The room fell suddenly silent. Even on the quietest days you could hear some street noise through the closed windows, the hum of the compressor of the small refrigerator Julia kept in the studio, the syncopated pulse of the battery-powered clock on the wall, ticking away the seconds, there was nothing but the quiet! It was as if the whole world had stopped. Then there was the soft, sweet and clear voice of Emily in her head...

  "Mom," the voice said, "I'm alright, and Dad's alright, now we both need you to be alright!" Julia dropped her hands and looked all around the studio, then down at the face of Emily's bust. It was now facing directly at her. She was sure that only moments earlier; it had faced 90 degrees to the left of where it now sat.

  Julia shuddered as the sound of the clock ticking, the refrigerator compressor and the sounds of traffic on the street below... began again.

  Chapter 4 - Kit Meets The Ghost

  Celeste came home to find Kit sitting on the couch watching television. Celeste saw the pizza box and said, "It looks like the tuna noodle casserole is going to be hanging around another day or two," Celeste said.

  "Sorry Mom," Kit said, not sounding too remorseful. "I got half with extra mushrooms, just how you like it," her voice raised in feigned excitement.

  "That's not the point Kit. You know we can't afford to order pizza every day," Celeste replied.

  "I know Mom. I just couldn't look at that casserole one more day," Kit said, trying to sound pathetic.

  Celeste opened the pizza box with one hand as she set her purse on the kitchen counter. She took a slice and took a bite.

  "I should have put it in the oven to keep it warm for you," Kit said.

  "That's okay Kit, you know I like cold pizza- practically lived on the stuff it in school," Celeste replied, smiling.

  Celeste tried hard to be a good mom to Kit; god knew it hadn't been easy for her since Kit's Dad had left while she was still in diapers. Celeste toughed it out with many low-paying jobs for several years, going to night school, and finally getting her business degree. She eventually landed a good-paying job working as an assistant to an executive in an investment firm and was on the way up in pay and benefits. They still didn't have much money to spare after paying the bills, but their lives had taken a turn for the better.

  It left little time for Celeste to have any kind of love life. Men had asked her out, but she had politely declined, devoting herself totally to school, work, and providing for Kit. She convinced herself that there would be time for romance later, and besides; she still wasn't trusting of men. Besides being a drinker, Kit’s father would sometimes fly in to a rage for no apparent reason, often resulting in Celeste being the recipient of his hostility, and his abuse. Celeste had promised herself that she would not repeat the mistakes of her past, especially where Kit’s safety was concerned. She would exercise caution for now, or even absolute celibacy. If she couldn’t find a good man, then she would have none at all.

  Celeste was grateful for Kit. She really was a good girl! She had grown to be uncommonly responsible and had shown herself to be quite self-sufficient.

  In the beginning, she worried about Kit. When she was a baby, she never cried; not when she was hungry, not when she needed changing and not even to be held. At first, Celeste attributed this to her superior parenting skills. She reasoned that she must be able to anticipate Kit's needs before she felt the need to cry out for attention. Later, Kit got a very painful and severe diaper rash, but still never cried. It caused so much concern for Celeste that she took her to a doctor to have it checked out.

  The doctor poked Kit with a sharp needle on the bottom of her foot to try to get her to cry. Several attempts later, all he managed to do was make the child mad. Still, she would not cry. Celeste even had her checked to see if she had working tear ducts. The tests revealed that Kit was perfectly capable of creating tears, she simply chose not to. In all other respects, Kit appeared to be a happy and well-adjusted little girl. As time passed, Celeste forgot about Kit’s small abnormality and eventually thought little about it.

  Poor old Mrs. Friedberg had babysat Kit when she was younger, but when Kit was nine,
the question of who was caring for who, became less clear. Celeste had often come home from night school to find Hattie asleep in the recliner with Kit still watching television or doing her homework. Kit had always dutifully covered Hattie with the knitted throw from the couch, and Hattie would always wake with a start when Celeste would gently shake her.

  "Guess I must have dozed off a bit," she would say, trying to excuse her lapse. After Hattie had left, Celeste had asked Kit what time she fell asleep in the chair.

  "Oh, about eight," Kit answered. "You can almost set your watch by her," she laughed.

  From then on, Kit had pretty much looked after herself, with only the nightly call from Celeste during her break between classes to see that everything was okay.

  Kit yawned, said goodnight to her mom and headed off to bed. She had a hard time getting to sleep though. She heard her mother coughing from her room. She got up, walked to Celeste’s bedroom door, and peered in.

  "You okay Mom?" Kit asked, concerned.

  Celeste had turned on the lamp on her nightstand and was pouring a dose of cough syrup. She took the small plastic cup and downed it. She shuddered and made a face from the taste of the bitter liquid.

  "I'm sorry sweetie, did I wake you?" she replied, "Just can't seem to shake this darned cold."

  "I think you should go to the doctor Mom," Kit said.

  "I already made an appointment for Friday afternoon. That's the earliest I could get in."

  "Okay, hope you feel better soon," she said, "Goodnight Mom. See you in the morning!"

  Kit went back to bed and was comforted that the cough medicine seemed to be working. It was a small apartment, and she could soon hear the familiar sound of her mother’s gentle snoring. Better than hearing her coughing, she thought.

  Kit was soon fast asleep and again found herself in the car seated next to the smiling man who was driving. The dream she had earlier now replayed itself. When the truck struck her door again, she cried out softly, but did not awaken. She found herself on the street in her nightgown, barefoot and walking through the broken glass. She looked down and noticed that her feet were bleeding, but she felt no pain. She noticed the car she had been riding in, now lay in a twisted heap in the intersection; the huge front tires of the truck rested on its partly caved-in roof. She started to walk toward the car, to look inside, when a hand reached out and softly touched hers. She turned to see the blond-haired girl standing next to her. She seemed to be near Kit's age and took Kit's hand in hers.