I wanted to tell them I loved them, that I would marry them and have their ghosty babies if they wanted me to. But I couldn’t utter a word.
“She’s so gray,” Scott said.
I gave it the All-American try. “Bat… ter… y…”
Scott grinned as Louis stood, glancing at that space-age car behind the fountain. “That’s exactly what I’ve been thinking since we landed. What we have there is an electric car, and it’s got a huge battery pack to propel the engine.”
I imagined Scott probably had a hot rod when he was alive, and he’d probably been lusting after every car model that had come along for decades, wishing he could go to one last drive-in movie with a girl in each one of them.
Louis shook his head. “We can’t take her over there ourselves.”
Scott proved that point when he tried to grab my arm. His hand went straight through with a faint buzz.
Louis sighed. “You know better than that. She doesn’t have the energy to harden herself.”
Huh?
“This is my first rescue, so cut me a break,” Scott said. “All these years, and I’ve never seen something like this.” This close, Scott had long lashes, big blue eyes, and a full mouth. “What’re we gonna do? She’s a nice chick. I don’t wanna see her in an imprint.”
Louis smiled down at me, like he had an idea. Next thing I knew, I heard a car starting up, quietlike, not like a regular engine, and Scott and Louis weren’t next to me anymore.
Now I was flickering every few seconds, coming to a bad end, getting colder and colder, like I was freezing up.
I was barely aware of the Jetson car rolling to a stop by the steps.
When Louis materialized from under the hood and Scott seeped out of the crack in the driver’s-side window, I laughed in my head. I couldn’t manage to do anything more.
Ghosts in the machine.
“Jen,” Louis said, bending down to me. He seemed winded, his essence blipping. “You’re going to have to take it from here. Slide under the hood, just like I did, and you’ll find the promised land.”
“A battery pack really is in there,” Scott said, equally weakened. “I don’t know who drives this turd, but I’ve got the feeling they won’t be able to leave after you’ve sucked out this thing’s energy source.”
A cleaner owns it, I wanted to tell them, warning them. But I couldn’t.
Maybe the danger nearby gave me extra incentive. I’d pulled them into a dangerous place, and they’d come. I owed them.
“Come on, Jen,” Scott said, his essence getting grayer. “Moving this car took a lot out of us. Get your keister under the hood so Louis and I can take a sit on those power lines.”
I could feel the buzz of those batteries so close that I could almost taste the charge in them. I strained, making it an inch off the stoop.
“That’s the way,” Louis said, waving me on. “A little more.”
Another inch.
They encouraged me all the way, until I’d slithered up the car and, after making myself into a Slim Jen again, in between the crack of the hood to the battery pack.
Lying on it, feeling the zmmmmmm of energy, I sighed. I was pretty sure I passed out again, too, because the next thing I knew, I was awake and ready to rock.
This time, when I made myself thready enough to slip through that hood crack again, it didn’t take much out of me, and I came to stand by the car, looking up at the nearby power lines to find Louis and Scott balanced on them. As they sent me chipper waves, I saw they weren’t alone now.
Twyla was there, too, her petticoats hanging down. Just in time for the party, huh?
They all flew to me, checking me out on the way.
Louis said, “You look right as rain. You gave us a scare, Miss Jensen.”
“I didn’t mean to. God, I owe you everything for coming. If it wasn’t for you guys…”
“We were at a bash nearby,” Scott said. “No big thing.”
Twyla snorted. “You are sooooo lame. Total amateur move, Jen.”
Scott didn’t look at her as he threw out an insult. “And who was the flake who needed Cassie’s help once upon a time?”
“Oh yeah.”
Airhead. Twyla must’ve just remembered that she’d told me about her embarrassing possession screwup earlier in the day.
Then she gave me a sassy glance. “Were you doing what I think you were doing in that mansion? Is that why you almost went imprint again, because you overhaunted?”
I couldn’t believe we were just hanging out, nattering away, while there was a cleaner nearby.
When I nodded at her question, Twyla and Scott thought my adventures were supercool, and he gave me a thumbs-up; she did a pivoty dance move that brought out her Lauper. Louis just crossed his arms.
I rushed to speak. “I’ll tell you everything after we put some space between us and this place. There’s a cleaner in that mansion right now.”
Twyla just about jumped out of her petticoats. “No way!”
Louis and Scott flew to the windows, pasting themselves against them for a look-see.
What?
“Death wish, anyone?” I asked.
Twyla was floating toward another window, a little more cautious than the guys. “Cleaners are, like, pop stars.” Then to the others, “Can you see them or what?”
“Nope,” Scott said.
I’d done what I could to warn them. “Maybe you should be asking if she can see you?”
“Okay,” Twyla said. “Can she?”
“No,” I said. “At least, she couldn’t see me. But she had this gauge thingamabob in her hand that read the temperature or whatever. And she sensed me, so she knew I was around.”
Louis flew to yet another window, almost like they were playing peeping leapfrog. “She might’ve been using an electromagnetometer. It’s one of the tools of the trade. Measures electrical conductivity variations.”
I shifted on the steps. “You guys, you’re making me nervous. This is a chance we don’t have to take. I guess she’s not super experienced, but who knows?”
I was cautious, not scared. And certainly not dumb.
Scott laughed and followed Louis to his new viewing spot. “We’re not in the house, Jen. And we’re all powered up besides. If the cleaner comes this way, we’ll take off in a jiff. She can’t exactly expel us from the earth like she can a domain.”
Still.
I said, “Then maybe you’ll listen to reason when I say that she was called to this place because one of those bad spirits you guys pooh-poohed the other day invaded the mansion.”
Twyla made a frustrated sound. “I knew I should’ve stayed with you today.”
Boredom. It made even ghosts yearn for ridiculous things, like getting into it with a baddie they’d taken the time to warn me about.
They made me tell them all about the séance and everything. Suddenly, Amanda Lee was even a pop star to them, too, and they asked every question in the book about her.
“You’re gonna show her to us, aren’t you?” Twyla asked in the end.
Oh, brother. “I wasn’t planning on it.”
Then Louis started asking a lot of questions about Gavin’s latest dream that I’d entered, and I realized that I hadn’t had a second to even figure out the meaning of all those symbols.
And would you believe it—one of the things that was bugging me the most about that dream was the random appearance of that pool guy. His cameo niggled at me even more than the spider and Elizabeth’s chilling walk-on.
I would figure it all out later, though, because right now the front door was opening, and we all flew back to it, taking cover behind the car. Such brave souls.
Eileen appeared in the doorway along with Constanza, who was still in her gray maid uniform. When they hugged, Constanza clung to her.
“Gracias,” she said, her cheek against the woman’s flipped-up hair. She smiled through her tears as she pulled away from Eileen, still holding on to her arms.