Ghosts of Rosewood Asylum (30 page)

Never.

In the adjoining room, incense burned coiled
rings of odor toward the ceiling. The smell reminded Ginny of India (although
she’d never been to India) and she generally didn’t care for the scent. Rebecca
had suggested it and despite everything to this point, on an intuitive level,
Ginny liked Rebecca. She hadn’t judged or scoffed at Ginny as the previous
night’s events had been shared. Neither had Angel. But they seemed frozen and
confused as they awaited word from their leader, Zach. Ginny could feel the
anxiety beading off of them even from a room away. And she wasn’t typically
into all of that “hocus pocus” stuff.

Joey sighed and shifted from his right to
his left side facing away from her. He mumbled something that sounded like
“grewer.” Ginny wondered what he was dreaming. She considered the thoughts that
ran through his head and the anger mixed with fear flooded back when she considered
what he must have been thinking to play with matches. It wasn’t like matches
were laying around her house. She didn’t smoke. She’d maybe understand better
if he had seen a pack on the coffee table and decided to play with them. But
that’s not what had happened. He must have scoured the drawers (or had watched
her put them away the last time she’d had to relight the oven’s pilot flame).
She remembered doing that just two days prior. Had Joey intentionally blown out
the pilot light?

Ginny looked at her son. At his age, he
couldn’t be diabolical. At six-years old, he didn’t even have the ability to
plot such a complicated set of intentions. There had to be someone or something
else propelling him towards these dangerous acts. Fast asleep, Joey curled into
the fetal position and popped his thumb into his mouth. She hadn’t seen him do
that in over a year—since well before his father had died.

She plucked out his thumb hoping he’d give
it up for the night. Instead, just before he slipped his thumb back past his
lips, she heard Joey say something. He said it clearly. Subconsciously, she’d
heard him say the same thing just before she rushed around the corner of the
house and caught him.

“Okay, Boy.”

Ginny made a mental note to tell Rebecca and
Angel that tidbit. She couldn’t wait to get the hell out of this house—out of
this neighborhood. Only two months remained now on her lease and Ginny had
already begun packing shit up, preparing for the move.

She played with Joey’s hair fanning out
blond clumps that perspiration had matted together. Even on the cool night,
while he slept, Joey was sweating.

8:57 PM - Mrs. Elizabeth Radkey

Very few people called her “Elizabeth”
anymore. Her doctor did during check ups, as well as her dentist. The elderly florist
(she’d forgotten his name, but he always wore a name tag) smiled and called her
by first name when she stopped in on Sundays to get flowers for George’s grave.

To most, she was “Mrs. Radkey.” To a few,
who she never saw except for weddings and funerals, she was referred to as
“Aunt Liz,” even though she technically was no one’s aunt. Her special friend
called her “Elizabeth,” and he was the only one since her dear departed
husband, George, had passed away who pronounced it perfectly.

Elizabeth.

He, her special friend, had never tried to
hide what he was. Not that he would have been able to deceive her; yes, she was
an elderly lady, but she was not a stupid woman. For the first few years, she’d
merely enjoyed the presence of his company. He commanded a strong presence, yet
he never aged. It took a long time before she was comfortable enough to engage
him in conversation, but once she mustered the courage, they’d had some
delightful chats.

It was nearly time for what they’d discussed
the previous night. She shuffled to the basement door, opened the door and
called down. “Boy?”

She listened a moment for him to whisper her
name the way she loved to hear it said. When she didn’t hear his voice, she
called down again. “Are you here, Boy?”

Zachary’s Past—Age Fifteen

Monsignor Macginty cradled the back of the
boy’s head against his chest and rocked him to and fro. Zachary was more a
young man than a boy, but Macginty sang to him a song that long ago and a
continent away, Mrs. Macginty had used to comfort her weeping children. If
someone should walk in and see them now, let them be damned for thinking
somethin’ other’n holy thoughts. Besides, the blood would give ‘em a scare now,
wouldn’t it?

After several minutes, Zach came slowly back
to his senses. As always, his head was cloudy at first. As always, he felt
guilty and ashamed. And as usual, Macginty would talk him back to sanity. He’d
help’ta right him on his path, he would.

Macginty wasn’t above getting to his knees
when he needed to. Wiping the boy’s blood from the marble floor made him
thankful. Even more, he was amused at the irony. When he’d been a young priest,
he’d wanted to, had prayed for and been obsessed with, witnessing a miracle.
Now, for almost a full decade, he’d been cleaning up after dozens of Zachary’s
little miracles.

“Let me help you with that.” Zach started to
rise and then lost his balance.

 “You just rest yourself there for
another couple’a minutes. Besides, I’m not doin’ ya no favours.”

“Yes, you’re—”

“Don’t interrupt me, son. I wasn’t
finished.”

“Sorry, Monsignor.”

“What I was going’ta say, ‘I’m not doin’ya
no favours because I plan on savin’ up all this blood and sellin’ it at a
profit when you’re good’n famous.’”

Zach laughed. It was good to see the color
returning to his face. This hadn’t been a bad one, but it was his third in less
than a month. The poor boy’s heart must be doing more work than Mother Theresa.

By the time he’d done cleaning up both the
floor and the boy with holy water (it only seemed appropriate), he could tell
Zachary was good’ta go.

“C’mon, son, help me set up for the five
o’clock mass.”

The boy looked at his watch but didn’t even
complain that the mass wasn’t for several hours. He was a good one, that Zach.
They passed through the sacristy and out onto the church’s apse. Macginty stood
behind the altar and fiddled with the chalices there.

“Are ya’ ever going’ta tell me where this
stigmata of yours comes from?” He tried to make the question sound casual. As
if merely rephrasing it would be enough to get the boy to spit out the answer
to a question he’d been asking all these years. As if the stigmata’s origins
meant nothing at all.

The boy was quiet for a good couple of
minutes before speaking a word. For years he’d been claimin’ not to know how
he’d gotten his gift. Sometimes, he even called it “his curse.”

Zach finally spoke. “How do ya’ know I
know?”

Macginty chuckled. “Zachary, you’re a good
kid. You’re a smart kid. And fortunately for me, you’re a terrible liar.”

“Are all lies bad, Monsignor?”

The boy also had a gift for changing the
subject when he didn’t want to talk about somethin’.

“Not all of ‘em...”

“Really? But you being a priest, I’d think—”

“What is this?” Macginty questioned.
“Interrupt Monsignor Macginty Day?”

Zach shook his head.

“What I was going’ta say was that ‘white
lies,’ ones that keep people safe from harm or save ‘em from hurt feelings, can
sometimes be excused. They still need’ta be confessed, don’tcha be misquotin’
me.” He checked if Zach’s eyes displayed the clarity of understanding. They
did. “Now, ya don’t really think I’m going’ta get any money by sellin’ yer
blood, do ya, son?”

The boy pursed his lips together tightly to
try and hide a grin, but the corners of his mouth betrayed him.

“Ya just hav’ta come clean and take care of
it in yer head, before the lie becomes the truth.”

Zach was trying to stifle a giggle but
apparently could not.

“What’s so funny, son?”

“You’re quoting Michael Jackson songs now,
Monsignor?”

“I don’t know what’cha mean, son. C’mere now
and fetch me that incense dispenser.”

For an instant, Zachary looked as green
under the gills as he had when he’d first come out of the trance. For some
reason he wouldn’t admit to, the boy hated the smell of incense and certain
types of tobacco. But it wasn’t like the thing’d been lit. He shuffled slowly
to the dispenser, picked it up and started singing the lyrics to Billie Jean
just under his breath. He brought the incense to where Macginty was standing.

“And don’tcha get started by singin’ songs
about lies, now son,” Macginty warned.

“What? I thought you just said you didn’t
know that song.”

Macginty looked at him as if the boy’s
intelligence had shrunken to that of a termite. “C’mon now, son. I was
dancin’ta that song at weddings before you’wuz born.”

Zach’s face was marred with incredulity.
“You dance, Monsignor?”

“Of course I do. ‘Tis the only benefit’a
havin’ been a boxer.”

Zach laughed and laughed.

They continued to pretend to prepare Saint
Francis of Assisi for a mass that was hours away from starting. Not many people
knew that Saint Francis was the world’s first recorded stigmatic. Macginty
thought it was no coincidence that the boy had been called here— brought to
him. No coincidence at all.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Zach opened his eyes with his cheek pressed
to the grass. Was this the backyard grass, he wondered. He must have slipped
and fallen off the pile of milk crates again. He’d better get up before mom saw
him laying there or she’d pitch a fit. No, wait. It was dark...and he wasn’t a
child. He must have drunk too much at a fraternity bash? For being a Catholic
fraternity,
Phi Kappa Theta
really knew how to throw a party. His ears
were ringing and he felt weak. From throwing up?

He lifted his throbbing head and pushed his
torso off the ground. It smelled of dried grass smothered with oak leaves and
sprinkled with honeysuckle. Guilt at having passed out clung to him even though
logical faculties had begun to usher it away. It wasn’t his fault. Was it?

The gauze bandages on his wrists prompted
his memory. Zach knelt up and looked around.

Rosewood.

His head hurt and he was still weak, but not
as bad as immediately after his episode. He looked at the bushes he’d fallen
from. He’d not crossed all the way through them and had made it back to the
safe side. If Bryce and Matthew had returned, they’d likely passed by without
noticing him under the umbra of the hedges. Had he successfully gone through
the boxwoods and they’d returned, no doubt they would have seen him. He’d have
been a sitting duck.

Zach moved to a sitting position and slumped
against the boxwood hedges. He pulled out his cell phone to check the time.
Instead, there were a slew of missed calls: three from Sara, three from
Rebecca, two from Wendy, one from Hunter, one from Angel and interestingly
enough, one from Matthew. The most recent one was from Ray at 9:01. There were
eight text messages waiting, but Zach clicked “view later,” so that he could
see the current time. The screen cleared.

It was 9:08.

A bitter chill ran through him. He was
letting his team down. He’d broken his own rule about being alone on a case in
the dark. He could lose his show. The hint of
Sailor Black
warned him to
calm down. This was no time to panic.

The protein bar. He pulled it from his
pocket, unwrapped it and munched on the flattened fake-chocolate meal
replacement. The more gulps he swallowed, the more his head cleared. He needed
to slip out Matthew’s secret entrance. Zach hoped that he hadn’t missed Evelyn
tonight; his intuition told him that either she’d wait for him, or she’d
somehow know when he arrived. First, he needed to know for sure that Bryce and
Matthew had returned.

He opened his text messages. The last one
he’d received was from Sara—the one he needed to contact. Semi-ignoring her
message which stated that if this was his way of getting revenge, he’d better
get his ass back, he clicked reply and typed out:  Not playin games - got
somthn big. Back in 35 mins. Need to know if mtthw & bryce r back there.
Txt dont call!

He kept his phone on silent mode and waited
for the display to light up. Her reply flashed almost immediately: Thyre here.
Where r u????

“Im close,” he typed. He chuckled at the
irony and then continued. “35 mins. Will expln evrythng.”

He hit send.

Zach scrolled to a group folder that would
mass text all of
XPI
:  Sorry 4 disappearing. Im ok. Wrking on
something big...back in 35 mins. Please don’t txt or call! Will expln l8r.