Page 81 of Mack's Horribly Hellacious Ghost Town
“Yes, ma’am. Easy to spot Mediums. They glow real bright, y’see.” He turned his head a little and pointed. “The redheaded lady, the brunette lady, and this older gentleman are allMediums. Don’t know who this Asian man is, but he glows too, just in a weird sense.”
So they could see Seiji’s aura too? Huh. Interesting.
“And of course, we all know Gwyn,” the man finished.
His casual line felt like a gauntlet thrown. Grandfather stomped in closer.
“What? You all know Gwyn? What exactly do you mean?”
“Just that, sir. We’ve seen Gwyn grow up, walk through town, go to school, all of that.” He frowned at her parents. “I don’t have much respect for two parents who make their little girl deal with hardened criminals all day and night.”
The mother looked white at this point, trembling like a leaf. She stared at Charlie like she doubted every sense she had, but I could see the realization slowly dawn in her eyes. This wasn’t a trick. It wasn’t stage magic. Hell, Mack was in short sleeves, you could see his hands and wrists; this wasn’t a projection or some sleight of hand. You could see her try and find a logical explanation, fail, and realize a core belief she held dear was nothing but lies.
And I watched her mentally break as she had to accept that ghosts were real.
Not much sympathy in this crowd for her.
The father, though, he was still trying to make this not his fault. He didn’t come around the desk, but he leaned over it, and while his voice shook, he did address Charlie directly. “Hardened criminals?”
“You think the men who lived in this area were all good?” Charlie snorted in disgust. “Thieves, murderers, rapists, they all died on this land. Some of them moved on, some didn’t. The ones who didn’t take great delight in harassing the ladies. Especially Gwyn. With her so bright, she makes an easy and obvious target. You couldn’t even protect your sole child from criminals.”
Gwyn’s father looked to her and he almost pleaded, “It wasn’t that bad, right? Tell them!”
His daughter stared stonily back and didn’t say a single word.
Mack, though, Mack had a lot to say. “She literally broke her arm trying to fight off a ghost and you have the temerity to say itwasn’t that bad?”
That broke him a little, and he retreated to stare at the floor.
Grandma had now had enough. “Mr. Charles, thank you for speaking with me. I’ll handle things with my granddaughter.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Charles grinned. “Glad someone is. Gwyn, I’ll miss seeing you.”
Gwyn actually smiled back. “You were always nice, Charlie. I appreciate you. Say, I know how to pass ghosts now. Can I do the honors?”
“Well, now, that’d be fine. Mighty fine, and I accept.”
Knowing what she’d want next, I pulled a flashlight from my pocket and handed it to her. She took it with a nod of thanks, turned, and aimed it into a dimmer corner nearby. Then, while holding the light steady, she held her hand out to him. “Just walk with me and imagine you’re going home.”
“That easy?”
“Well, yes, because that’s precisely what you’re doing.”
I watched her as she took a step, and the pathway opened, Charlie practically skipping at her side. In the week we’d had her, she had mastered this skill. She walked him through to the afterlife without missing a beat. Even I could see the door open before Charlie stepped through. I watched the crowd more than Gwyn at this point. I’d seen hundreds of ghosts pass on, nothing new there.
But the rest of them? Oh, this was quite the show. Mrs. Fairchild’s legs gave out, leaving her crumpled on the floor as she watched her daughter pass a ghost on. Mr. Fairchild watchedGwyn with a slack expression, like he really was suffering from a mental breakdown over there.
There were people in this world who couldn’t accept when they were wrong. They couldn’t handle when a core belief was dismantled. They lost their minds over it, doing mental gymnastics to claw their belief back. But between Mack and Gwyn, they had proven in multiple ways that ghosts were real. Very, very real. I didn’t think her parents would be able to really recover from this. They weren’t the type of people who could be corrected and move on.
Well, maybe I was wrong. Maybe they would learn how to adapt. I wasn’t holding my breath.
Gwyn came back, handed me the flashlight, then faced her grandparents. “Your son and daughter-in-law failed me as parents in every possible way. I will not have contact with them from this point forward, not without some massive groveling. I wish you two had believed me when I asked for help.”
“Oh, honey, we thought it was a phase you were going through,” Grandma Fairchild explained with sad eyes. “You stopped talking about ghosts once you hit ten, so I thought you were past it.”
“I stopped talking about it because I was punished for even saying the word ghost.”
She winced. “Oh.”
