Final Breath

originally from Seattle, so I've always thought of this area as my home. My son and I are here for the summer, not a bad time to escape the sweltering Chicago heat...' Sydney hated lying to all these people in front of her son. She kept expecting to see Eli's scowling face among the crowd. Instead, she saw someone else. 'Um, Joe, my husband, he might be joining us next month--if he can get away from his--um, police work....'

She couldn't take her eyes off the lean, swarthy man with sunglasses and a baseball hat. He stood a few yards away. A woman directly in front of him stepped aside for a moment. Now Sydney could see his blue T-shirt-- with a silver 59 on the front of it.

She froze at the microphone.

An hour ago--and thirty some-odd miles back in Seattle--she'd almost plowed into that man in her driveway. And now he was here, watching her. At least, she was almost certain it was the same man. The T-shirt was definitely the same. Had he followed them all this way from their apartment complex?

'Sydney?' Gil said into his mike. He chuckled. 'Did we lose you for a second, Sydney?'

She suddenly remembered to smile. 'Um, I was just thinking, Gil--how great it is to be back in the Seattle area. There's no doubt about it, the Puget Sound area is one of the most beautiful places in this great country of ours. I've really missed it. Tammy, thanks for that question.'

The crowd applauded. Sydney slinked back toward her chair. She'd sounded like an idiot. This great country of ours? What, was she running for office or something?

As she sat down, Sydney looked at the man again. Was he stalking her? Up until now, her being married to a cop had discouraged the stalker types. Then again, maybe her minor-celebrity status just hadn't warranted stalkers--until this Number 59 guy. She couldn't get over the fact that he'd followed her and Eli in their car for thirty miles. Why? She remembered his scowl as he'd passed in front of her car in the driveway. 'If looks could kill...'

Sydney shifted in her chair. This guy obviously knew where they lived. He was hanging around there today. Had he been there on the night of July Fourth as well? Maybe he's the one who got inside their place. She had to remind herself to sit straight and keep smiling.

One small solace, as long as she could see the man, she knew he wasn't preying on Eli. But right now, Sydney wished she could see her son out there somewhere.

'Do you know who this dead person is?' Eli asked the psychic woman.

Gazing at him from behind her sunglasses, she held onto his hand and said nothing for a few moments.

Though the booth was open in front, no breeze came in--just heat. Eli began to sweat. Curled up under the table, her mangy dog's tail still slapped at his feet occasionally. Eli waited for Marcella to say something.

'Your father isn't--he isn't dead, is he?' she asked finally.

Eli shook his head. 'No, my dad's fine.'

'But he isn't with you. You're separated from him.'

'Yeah,' Eli replied, leaning forward in his chair. 'But it's just temporary, and my dad isn't dead.' He glanced at his own hand, trying to figure out what she was picking up from it. 'Um, do you know who this dead person is I'm communicating with?'

Marcella touched his forehead, and her hand lingered there for a few moments. Her fingers smelled like an ashtray. Eli tried to sit still. He had a pretty good idea about this dead person. He just needed Marcella to confirm it for him.

Someone dead is communicating with you.

Eli had heard the muffled voices at night. They had seemed to come from within his bedroom walls. He'd felt the weight of some other presence sitting on his bed--or touching his cheek as he tried to fall asleep. Eli didn't need to overhear the neighbor woman talking the other day about the murder/suicide in their unit. He already knew a teenage boy had once lived in their unit--and met a violent death there.

Not long after a second night visit--during which, for a few minutes, Eli had been utterly certain someone had crept into his room--he'd finally gotten a night-light. He'd also gotten his mom to acknowledge that their apartment was indeed haunted. Not long after that, he'd bought a Frisbee and a Ouija board at a neighborhood yard sale. Real smart. In order to use either one, he needed another person. Except for his mom and his Uncle Kyle, he didn't even know anyone in Seattle. And he'd have rather been shot than be seen playing Frisbee with his mother.

His uncle wasn't a big Frisbee fan. 'Eli, I'll give you ten dollars not to play Frisbee catch with you,' his Uncle Kyle had told him. 'That thing is a bent-back finger or a Marcia Brady broken nose just waiting to happen. I hate Frisbee.'

That left the Ouija board. There wasn't much public humiliation in trying out the Ouija with his mother--in the privacy of their kitchen on a rainy afternoon a few weeks back. She asked lame questions like, 'Should we go out for dinner tonight?' and 'Will Eli have a girlfriend a year from now?' Both times, the Ouija's movable indicator (his mother said it was called a 'planchette') gradually moved over to YES.

Then it was Eli's turn. They both had their hands on the planchette. Eli closed his eyes. 'Are we going to move back to Chicago and be with Dad by August?'

The indicator didn't move. Eli opened his eyes to see his mom frowning. 'Honey, I don't think it's such a good idea to ask that. I don't want you getting your hopes up.'

'But I let you ask what you wanted!' he argued. 'God, you're so unfair--'

'All right, all right,' she sighed and rolled her eyes. 'Ask it again.'

Eli repeated the question, and he felt the indicator under his fingertips as it slowly inched over the board. 'You're moving it,' his mother said.

'I'm not, I swear!'

When the indicator ended up on YES, Eli shoved his fist in the air. 'All right! We're gonna go back to Chicago and be with Dad!'

His mother winced, and shook her head again. 'Eli, I told you, don't get your hopes up. This is just a game. It doesn't mean anything. Back when I was in junior high, my best friend Rachel Porter had an Ouija board. If what it told me turned out to be true, right now I'd be a millionaire, have an Olympic Gold Medal in figure-skating, and be happily married to Michael Schoeffling. This is just a game, honey.'

'Who's Michael Schoeffling?' he asked, squinting.

'He played Jake in 16 Candles, and I was in love with him.' She set the disc back on START again. 'Go ahead, and ask another question.'

Eli rested his fingertips on the planchette again, then closed his eyes. 'Who is the ghost in this house? What is his or her name?'

'Nope, no way,' his mother said, shaking her head and pulling her chair away from the table. 'We have enough otherworldly excitement around here. I think we should just leave it alone. I'm not up for a seance right now. Let's ask it something else. Ask for the name of this girlfriend you'll have.'

'What? Are you scared?' he asked, laughing.

'Yes. I don't want to stir things up with whatever's going on around here,' she admitted. 'Bringing a Ouija board into the equation is taking too much of a chance. I don't want to push our luck. Some people believe Ouija boards can be dangerous. That's why I think you shouldn't ask it anything too serious. Call me a chicken, I don't care.'

'A minute ago you were telling me it's just a game and it doesn't mean anything.'

She got up from the table. 'I'm sorry. I just don't feel like summoning the dead right now. Besides, we should wrap this up anyway. If we're going out to eat, you should wash up and change your clothes.'

Eli stayed up late that night. He waited until his mother had gone to bed, then he pulled out the Ouija board. He felt so sneaky, almost like he was digging out the one Playboy he owned (bestowed on him by his best friend in Chicago, Brad Reece, who had inherited it from his college-age brother) from its hiding place in his desk's bottom drawer. His mother hadn't discovered the Playboy yet. And he didn't want her discovering him summoning the dead with the Ouija. He locked his bedroom door and then set the Ouija board on the spare bed.

Eli had two twin beds in his room. He didn't think he'd be living there long enough to make any friends--at least, no one he'd know well enough to invite overnight. He wondered why his mom had wasted her money on the extra bed. There was a lava lamp on his desk, and his Homer Simpson lamp on the nightstand. From his old bedroom he had a lighted Dad's Root Beer clock, two Chicago Bears posters, and another one from the Will Farrell