Hologram: A Haunting Read online

  The warmth of Kurt’s body through his light flannel robe felt good. He carried her into the house, and as they descended the long staircase and came to the landing between floors, Meg saw Rex sitting on the small lion’s head table under the stained glass triptych. His huge amber eyes stared at her with an intensity and cognition that assured her that what she had seen, he had seen. What she had experienced had been real.

  For the time being, it was their secret, hers and Rex’s.

  “Doctor, first thing tomorrow,” Kurt said as he placed her on the bed.

  “We’ll see. I think I’ll be fine.”

  “No, none of this ‘we’ll see’ business! You took a fall, no matter how slight. Need I remind you that you have more than yourself to worry about?”

  How could she argue with that? She looked into the blue of his eyes and was touched by the concern she found there. “No, you don’t. I’ll go.”

  “Good.” Kurt nuzzled her neck for a few moments, mumbling something.

  “What did you say?”

  “I said you smell funny.”

  “Funny how?”

  “Yeah, like dead flowers—or something.”

  TWELVE

  Doctor Michael Horan pronounced Meg a healthy specimen. He cautioned her to take it easy and eliminate all midnight balcony excursions.

  Meg had gotten the doctor referral from Lucille at Ravensfield Hospital, a fellow social worker and former Northwest Indiana resident. The doctor’s office was located in Merrillville, a booming community several miles south of Hammond and a bit east.

  Kurt had wanted to go, but Meg insisted he go ahead and start organizing the basement, a task previously scheduled for the weekend.

  The visit to the doctor proved a waste of time, but the ride home afforded Meg the opportunity to think. She was glad to be alone.

  She had fallen from the balcony, she really had! Yet, when she opened her eyes, there was Kurt saying she had merely passed out on the balcony. She had heard the cracking of the rotten wood beneath her, felt herself falling back, not forward. She was falling, losing herself into the dead night, the dead air—until—somehow—the rush to earth stopped and she felt herself supported by some ethereal force that held her.

  How was this possible? Meg held tightly to the steering wheel so as to keep her whole body from shaking. A doubt surfaced—had she merely dreamt the fall?

  No. Neither—she became convinced—had she dreamt the appearance of the little boy in white. Had the child spirit who seemed to wish only to play with Rex, who meant it no harm—saved her? And the baby. But how was that possible?

  This thought that the child had saved her was countered when she recalled that the pungent stink of dead violets around her had overpowered the odor of ashes that she associated with the boy. It was the entity that had been in the bedroom and that had gone through her like a cold, ill wind on the stairs that had the smell of decaying flowers.

  Meg drove on, oblivious to the surroundings, her thoughts on the boy in white. She was convinced it was he she had seen in the coach house window on that first day they had looked at the house. An exuberantly visceral feeling was building up inside her now, subtle at first, then strong and heady as she came to the only conclusion she thought possible: the child was a force for good, not evil. It was he, she was certain, that had saved her life.

  And if he could not be persuaded to leave the house, to find his place on the other side, what then? How bad could it be? How could it hurt to have a spirit around that saves lives?

  Her mind caught now and the exuberance dissipated. What of the gray being from the night before, the presence she realized now she had assumed was a woman. What had made her make that assumption? Was it the stench of dead flowers, the violets? Or had she in some other way sensed it—just known it? And why had Kurt smelled the dead flowers upon her? Had she been saved by the woman spirit?

  Whatever the case, despondency set in. No good emanated from that presence.

  The return trip to Hammond ended without Meg’s having any conscious memory of the drive. Meg parked on the street.

  The contractor, Robert McKnight, was very young but very confident, almost brash. He stood on the front sidewalk taking a close visual of the balcony when Meg joined him.

  “So you think the whole balustrade needs replacing?”

  “No, Ma’am, just the rear portion there on the driveway side. I got my man up there now. Your husband said you nearly took a tumble last night.”

  Meg flushed. Damn Kurt, she thought, I probably came off as a helpless, klutzy female. “It wasn’t anything.” And this ma’am business. First the doctor was younger than she, and now this kid carpenter with tousled brown hair and large eyes was calling her ma’am! She felt suddenly old. Just when did she get pushed across some generational demarcation?

  “But there is one other thing,” the contractor was saying, pointing to the dormer above the balcony. “See that board beneath the dormer on the right?”

  Meg noticed for the first time that the horizontal board beneath the dormer’s rounded roof was in disrepair, its paint blistered.

  “That piece has to go.”

  Meg trusted him. “Okay, go ahead and replace it.”

  “Sure, just as soon— ”

  Both the contractor and Meg heard a cry come from the balcony at the north end, the area on the driveway side currently being repaired. It was an abbreviated cry, high-pitched—yet the cry of a man, a man in terror, a man falling.

  “Oh, my God,” McKnight cried, “It’s Juan!”

  The columned verandah on the first floor afforded Meg a clear line of vision. She could see now the man plunging to the hard-packed earth. But the height of the verandah’s flooring—some two or three feet above the ground—spared her seeing the actual impact.

  She winced at the dull, heavy thud.

  There was only a sickening, dead silence in those few moments before she and McKnight reached the man on the ground.

  Meg saw immediately that his leg was broken; it lay beneath him twisted as a pretzel. But he was alive just the same, dazed and groaning.

  Kurt hurried out onto the verandah and looked down on the scene. His face was white. “Christ! I saw him hit from the basement window. I’ve got an ambulance on the way.”

  “Thanks,” McKnight said, without looking up. He started to speak to the workman in Spanish.

  Meg knelt down and held the man’s hand. She felt helpless.

  The phone rang inside and Kurt disappeared.

  The workman opened his eyes. He still looked very frightened, very pale. He tried to move, but McKnight dissuaded him. His glazed eyes moved to Meg, and he made a valiant effort to smile.

  As they waited, the man’s eyes seemed to visibly clear, and he became very animated—and agitated. He pointed above, speaking so swiftly that Meg wondered if McKnight could keep up.

  Kurt reappeared. “Wenonah’s on the phone.”

  Meg shot Kurt a look of exasperation.

  Kurt understood. He shrugged, saying, “I tried to tell her it wasn’t a good time, but—well, you know Wenonah. Sometimes she doesn’t hear.”

  “Okay, I’ll come in.”

  Wenonah immediately regretted her pushiness with Kurt. She shouldn’t have doubted him. It probably was a bad time to call.

  Still, Meg had not returned her call. And she herself had found excuses not to call, not to tell her friend about the blonde in the White Hen.

  She could hear Meg’s footsteps now coming across the hardwood floor. Her resolve flagged.

  “Hello, Wenonah.”

  “Hi, Meg. Listen, I’m sorry if this is a bad time to call— ”

  “That’s okay. It’s just that we’ve got an injured workman here. He fell off the balcony.”

&nbs
p; “Good God! Okay, I won’t keep you—but—are things any better, Meg?”

  “Uh, no, not really. There’s the ambulance, Win.”

  Wenonah could hear the siren, too. “Worse?”

  “I don’t know. I took a little fall myself last night.”

  “Meg, you’re all right?”

  “Yeah, sure. Could’ve been bad—listen, Win, I’ve got to go.”

  “The baby— ”

  “He’s fine.”

  “Good.—He?—have you had an ultrasound?”

  “No. I just have a feeling it’s a boy. Female intuition, I suppose. Listen Wenonah, I really will call you. Monday? And I want you to come out again.”

  “Sure, Meg. Absolutely.”

  Wenonah hung up. Damn it, Meg, you think your life is complicated now?

  Juan was being lifted into the ambulance as Meg came out into the driveway. Even a fleeting view of his face told her he had been given a strong sedative.

  “Don’t worry,” McKnight was saying to Kurt as Meg joined them. “I’m fully insured.”

  Meg sensed immediately she had missed out on something important. “Were you— ” Meg started. “Were you able to understand him, how it happened?”

  McKnight looked to Kurt, who looked troubled. Something significant had taken place.

  “Well, that’s a bit of a mystery, Mrs. Rockwell. Your husband says you don’t have any children, that you’re waiting for your first.”

  “That’s true.” Meg felt her throat tighten and go dry.

  Robert McKnight shifted awkwardly. “Well, Juan said that someone tapped at the window off the balcony.”

  “That was enough to make him lose his footing?”

  “That and the fact that it was a pale blond kid who—and here’s where I don’t trust my translation—who passed his hand through the pane—as if—”

  Meg swallowed hard. “As if he were a ghost?”

  McKnight shrugged in a kind of unwilling agreement. “I’m sure there’s an explanation, Mrs. Rockwell. There was no kid in the house. The paramedic did say he likely had a concussion. The fall may have caused a hallucination or something.”

  “Perhaps,” Meg said. She looked at Kurt.

  He was not amused.

  THIRTEEN

  It was evening. Dinner had been strained. The discussion about the house came afterward in the living room.

  Kurt had stopped his pacing and stood now by the fireplace.

  Meg sat on a wicker settee at the side of the bay. She fought back tears. “But you said three weeks, Kurt. You did! It’s only been one.”

  “Three weeks of nothing happening, Meg. Enough has happened this week! And probably even more than you’ve told me—yes?”

  “No.”

  “Meg!”

  Damn it, Meg thought. She felt vulnerable, as if he could read her thoughts, detect any untruths. “Well, just the dreams— ”

  “The dreams that you said had stopped?”

  Meg sat in guilty silence.

  “They haven’t, obviously.”

  She shook her head.

  “Okay, well, the dreams may have some kind of explanation, but when it comes to accidents—two in twenty-four hours with real injuries and doctors and ambulances—that’s when we draw the line in the sand. That could’ve been you they put in the ambulance today. Meg, you’re pregnant and as such— ”

  “So you think it’s the house? That it’s haunted? This has convinced you?”

  “I don’t know. But if you do, that’s enough for me to say that’s it, let’s get the hell out of here! Most women would be long gone. How can you still want to stay?”

  Meg drew in a long breath. “I love the house, Kurt. Oh, I know it’s been only a few weeks, but it’s become my home. I feel a part of it. I know I keep saying that, but it’s true.” She paused, still fending off tears. “The thought of moving back to a city condo tears me apart. I don’t think I can do it.—And I’m not most women.”

  Kurt came and sat down next to her. “Sometimes we have to face facts.” He took her hand. “This isn’t working, Meg. But it isn’t the end of the world. We can start looking for another house right away—here in Hammond, if you want.”

  “It’s not Hammond, Kurt. It’s the house. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime house.”

  “Believe me, Meg, I do want you to be happy.”

  “Then let’s wait. We may be able to get to the bottom of this—this mystery. We may be able to purge the house of whatever it is— ”

  “With what? Ghostbusters?” Kurt jumped up in anger. “At what cost, Meg?” He spun around to face her. “Yours? Mine? The baby’s? Huh?” His eyes narrowed. “Our marriage?”

  “No, of course not!” Meg paused, biting her lower lip and waiting for the tension to ease.

  Kurt turned to stare out the front window. A minute or two passed.

  “Kurt,” Meg ventured, “what did you mean about there being an explanation for my dreams?”

  The conversation took a sudden turn. Meg could see that it was he who felt suddenly vulnerable. His anger vanished. He had let something leak out. What was it? Meg thought back to the drive home from the station and how he had questioned her about the dreams, as if he had learned something—

  “What is it, Kurt?”

  “Well, truth is I mentioned your—occurrences and dreams to George Ringbloom and he brought up— ”

  “You did what?” Meg felt angry blood rushing to her face.

  “I spoke to George about them.”

  “Without asking me? Great! So he and everyone at Ravensfield is having a field day at my expense! Poor Meg Rockwell, I can just hear it, Kurt. Poor Meg, did you hear how she went off the deep end? She’s gone quite bonkers in Hammond with all kinds of imaginings—poltergeists and such.”

  “It’s not like that, Meg! First of all, George was there for me every step of the way through my divorce and I can assure you that his confidence is as true as a priest’s. Not a single detail got out then, and he won’t betray my trust now.”

  Meg took a breath. Her anger was abating. She had to silently concur because had anything about Kurt’s divorce gotten onto the hospital grapevine, she would have heard.

  “Second,” Kurt was saying, “I have to say that George lent more credibility and weight to your experiences than I had in telling him. Honest to God, Meg. I had to talk to someone about all this, and I couldn’t bring myself to go to a stranger.”

  “Okay, okay,” Meg said. “I just don’t want to be known as Crazy Meg, you know? I do trust George. Now come back and sit down.”

  Kurt obeyed.

  “Now, what did he say about the dreams?”

  “Oh, I couldn’t begin to explain it—something about holograms. Life is like a hologram or some damned thing. I know that sounds bogus, but he thinks your dreams may belong to someone else.”

  “Really? I knew it! I did—how?”

  “I don’t remember exactly, but it made sense at the time, sort of. You should talk to him, Meg. No, better yet, you should talk to this doctor friend of his that specializes in this hologram stuff.”

  Meg’s mind was moving quickly. “So it is possible?”

  “He seems to think so, says the science is there.”

  “This doctor, who is he?”

  “She. I’ve got her name and number, but they’re at the condo. If you’re coming back with me— ”

  “I’m not—not yet.”

  “Then I can call you on Monday with it.”

  “Yes, please do.”

  “Meg, she’s a psychoanalyst.”

  Meg blinked in surprise, then digested the information. “All right. All right, maybe that’s what I need at this point. Maybe she can help us
solve this damn thing.”

  “Don’t count on it, Meg.”

  “Hey, this isn’t a trick to get me to a shrink?” The question was only half in jest.

  Kurt laughed. “No, it’s not. And a psychoanalyst is not a psychiatrist.”

  “I know, Kurt, a psychoanalyst. She’s not an MD and doesn’t dispense drugs, but she counsels patients using Freudian theory. So she’s a shrink. Next question: can we afford her?”

  “That’s immaterial.”

  Meg laughed now. “An ironic, even Freudian, choice of words!”

  Kurt smiled, then stiffened. He made a move, as if to take her hand in his, but he couldn’t bring himself to make the contact. “Don’t get your hopes up, Meg. The house goes on the market Monday.”

  “You could at least wait until after I’ve had a visit with the shrink.”

  “I think our course is set, Meg. Monday.”

  Kurt’s clipped comment reminded Meg of Captain Vere’s resigning Billy Budd to his fate, a literary allusion Kurt would not understand. “But you’ll call Monday with her number?”

  “I promise.”

  And he would, Meg knew; he was as unequivocally forthright as the captain in the novel Billy Budd.

  Somehow, though, she sensed that Kurt regretted having told her about the hologram business.

  Long after Kurt had gone to sleep, Meg went out into the bay again, and settled into the rocker.

  Well, she thought, why not give in? The stress was getting to her. Why not admit it? And Kurt was right: there was the baby to consider. At thirty-seven, Meg could not afford to take her first pregnancy lightly.

  Why not move back to the condo and regroup until after the birth? The time there would be confined and boring—but unstressful. No ghosts there yet—maybe in a hundred years. That is, if high rises hold up as well as the finely crafted old houses.