Page 4 of Ghost in the Night

“Oh, my bad!”

“That’s okay.” Robby turns to me. “Mama said you’re twelve. I’m ten, but I don’t really act like it, so we’re kind of mentally the same.”

“Oh.” I chuckle. “Uh, hey. What’s up?”

I look from Lena to Dad and back, waiting for someone to explain what’s going on.

Lena takes a deep breath, wiping her face. “I’m so sorry. I hate meeting you in this condition. But … we just got some awful news.”

“Mr. Truman was found dead yesterday,” Robby says with a straight face. Lena nudges his shoulder.

I feel a lurch in my stomach.What?

“Who’s Mr. Truman?” I ask.

“Mr. Truman was a friend of the family,” Daddy explains. “Lena knew him through work.”

“I’m so sorry,” I mumble. I feel awkward enough being at this house with these people I don’t know—but they’re mourning a friend who died? This is kinda intense. “Um, what happened?”

Lena sniffs and shakes her head. “It’s horrible.” She glances at Robby like she doesn’t want him to hear. “We’ll talk about it later. Now, where are my manners?” she adds, opening the front door. “Please come in. Dinner’s almost ready, and the guesthouse out back is all set up for you.”

We walk into a small living room with a burgundy sofa and cream armchairs, the TV set to the local news. To the right is a hall leading to bedrooms. Ahead is a round wooden dining table next to an old kitchen with green cabinets and a white fridge. Something that smells delicious issimmering on the stove. Through the back window, I see a small yellow guesthouse in the middle of a narrow, fenced-in yard.

“That’s where we’ll be staying,” Dad tells me, pointing to the guesthouse. Whew. At least we’ll be in a separate place.

“You sure you can fit in there, Daddy?” I joke.

Dad smiles and tickles my neck. “I can live in a shoebox if I wanted to. You’re the one that wants five-star everything and room service.”

I laugh and shake my head.

I see Lena watching me with a small smile. “You look just like your mother, Harmony. A beauty!”

“Thanks,” I say, my shoulders easing and my face warming. It’s a compliment I get sometimes. I never met the woman, but people say I stole her face.

I don’t remember Dad ever mentioning anyone named Lena. And she knew my mom. How? I want to ask her, but then Lena says she’ll be back and heads into the kitchen.

“Do you want to see something cool?” Robby asks. He proudly shows off a robot the shape of a flattened oval sitting on the coffee table. It looks like one of those robotvacuums Grandma always said she wanted but swore probably didn’t clean too good. “I won a competition last week with this. It can sense fires in other rooms around a house.”

“Whoaaaa,” Dad says. “Hey, man, that’s cool. Mony, you see all this?”

It’s hard to miss. Robby’s mini robots are spread out all over the living room like a collection of trophies. Some are made of  LEGOs. Other of shiny metal and plastic. Around Robby’s stuff, Lena’s is in there, with Black art paintings, African statues, straw baskets, and family photos hung on the peach-colored walls.

Grandma had albums full of old family photos like these. Her albums looked like thick Bibles, the spines worn down and fraying. Photos were pasted on the pages inside, then layered with crunchy plastic that crinkled whenever you touched it. I loved flipping through the books, seeing pictures of my dad when he was little, and then when he was in high school with my mom, the two of them going to prom together. And even older pictures, like of Grandma’s parents growing up in the South, and then of Grandma from her modeling days. My grandma was a for real model,like for shopping catalogs you get from Macy’s, Kohl’s, and JCPenney. Grandma learned about angles and how to take a good picture from all the photo shoots she did. That’s what made her fall in love with photography. She used to say that photos tell stories the same way books do except you get to see people the moment they are living their history.

That’s why I want to be a photographer someday.

“Dinner’s ready,” Lena calls, placing a bright red pot on the table. Inside is steaming shrimp, corn, sausage, crabmeat, and red potatoes.

Dad claps his hands together as we sit. “Mmm. My favorite.”

“Harmony, you ever been to a boil before?” Lena asks, dishing spoonfuls into my bowl. I shake my head. “It’s a low country specialty. We usually just spread it out on newspaper and go at it, but I’m trying to keep it cute for your first night.”

Dad is eating like he’s starving, like the shrimp is made of gold, like he’d never had Grandma’s fried chicken and honey corn bread before. He called it heaven on earth.

“So, Harmony,” Lena starts. “What do you think about Savannah so far?”

“It’s really pretty. The trees are cool. Willows?”