Page 36 of The Most Unusual Haunting of Edgar Lovejoy

Edgar

Edgar wasn’t sure how long he sat on the ground in Pirate’s Alley. He had his head in his hands, trying to block out the din of Jackson Square to his left, Southern Decadence to his right, and Poe prowling up and down in front of him.

At one point, he heard Poe say, “Dude, just come. He needs you, and I can’t… Okay. Yeah, I will.”

Then Poe was crouching in front of him.

“Edgar. I need you to stand up right now and come with me. Jamie’s going to pick us up, but they can’t drive down here with the parade.”

At Jamie’s name, Edgar looked up.

“Yeah. Can you get up?” Poe’s hands were fists shoved in the pockets of his jacket.

Edgar pushed himself up. Now that the cold of Antoine’s ghost was gone, he felt hot and shaky. His head was light, and his sinuses were clogged.

Poe led the way, looking back every minute or two to make sure Edgar followed.

Jamie met them at Canal Street, face drawn with worry. They tossed their keys to Poe and came to Edgar.

“C’mere, baby,” they said and helped him into the back seat, climbing in after him.

Jamie stroked his hair and held his hand as Poe navigated traffic, swearing constantly and cursing a number of families into the tenth generation. He threw the truck into park outside Allie’s place and unlocked the door.

“What the hell happened to you?” Allie asked when she saw Edgar. “Oh, hi, Jamie. Sorry, I didn’t know you were here.”

Edgar was shuttled to the couch, hands trembling and head swimmy from crying.

“What the fuck, Poe?” Allie asked softly.

“ I didn’t do anything,” he shot back.

“I’m fine,” Edgar managed. “He didn’t do anything.”

“Then would someone like to tell me what’s going on?”

Poe snorted. “Got that mom tone down, eh?”

“Listen, you little shit,” Allie said. “You show up here after six years of avoiding us like the plague. Ever since, you’ve acted weird, and now Edgar is…liquified. So shut your face about my tone, get me a fucking snack, and then sit down and explain yourself. Please. Thank you.”

Poe glared, but he made Allie a peanut butter and honey sandwich without comment, and Edgar told her and Jamie about how they’d seen Antoine.

“Oh, shit.” Allie took a bite and spoke through it. “Did he still look twelve?”

“He was thirteen,” Edgar corrected automatically. “His birthday was two weeks before. We made an apple cake.”

“Right,” Allie said softly. “I forgot. How did he look?”

“Kind of…”

“Dead?” Poe offered flatly from his perch on the arm of the couch.

Something about the way he said it made Edgar look at him closely.

“How did he look to you, Poe?” Edgar asked.

Poe’s eyes narrowed for an instant before he wiped all expression from his face. “Honestly, I was trying not to look at him.”

That was reasonable. But something about his brother’s voice made alarm bells go off in Edgar’s mind.

“But you saw it when he liquefied into a puddle, right?”

“Yeah,” Poe said. “Poor bastard.”

Edgar’s stomach dropped like he was on a roller coaster. Poe hadn’t seen that because it hadn’t happened.

Poe was lying.

But why?

Edgar ran through other options, seeking some reason— any reason—for the untruth.

Maybe Poe had been too scared and really hadn’t looked at Antoine.

Maybe he’d seen how emotional Edgar had gotten and wanted to give him privacy.

Could he be lying just to fuck with Edgar’s head?

Weird and cruel, but Poe had been gone since he was sixteen.

Maybe Edgar didn’t know him anymore. True though that might be, if Poe had wanted to mess with him, wouldn’t he have been more likely to disagree with what Edgar said?

Hell, maybe ghosts looked different to everyone; what did he know? Well, you know that Allie sees pretty much the same thing you do, because you’ve seen ghosts together. Same with Mom.

But Poe had been there too when they were kids, and he’d seen them as well.

At least he’d said he had.

Edgar slowly became aware of Jamie’s hand on his thigh. Someone had said something, but he couldn’t track what. He ignored it and looked at his brother.

“Poe?” he asked softly. “Do you see ghosts?”

A muscle jumped in Poe’s jaw, and he went still. It was a change so subtle that Edgar wouldn’t have noticed it if he hadn’t been looking for it.

“Not at the moment, no. You?”

“Poe. Have you ever seen a ghost?”

“We just saw one, like, five seconds ago. What are you talking about?”

“What are you talking about, Edgar?” Allie asked, leaning forward. She looked, in that moment, so much like their mother, and a longing rose in Edgar for the first time in years. To be enfolded in her arms as he hadn’t been since he’d grown taller than her at fifteen.

“That’s not what happened,” Edgar said. His voice sounded thick and dull in his ears. “Antoine didn’t liquefy. He floated away. And he didn’t look dead. Well, he did at first. But then he looked…almost like he used to.” He swallowed hard.

“I told you, I was trying not to look.” Poe stood up, pulling his jacket around himself. Edgar stood too. He was a few inches taller than Poe and broader. Poe didn’t raise his chin to look at him.

“You were really that scared?” Edgar asked.

“Yup. I’m a huge wimp,” Poe said and rolled his eyes. “Now can we discuss the way—”

“I don’t believe you.”

It was something that Edgar had never said to another soul.

Growing up with a mother who saw ghosts and a father who didn’t believe in them and seeing ghosts himself when the world said they didn’t exist…

it all added up to a deep knowledge that there were a lot of things in the world he didn’t know about or understand.

And if someone said something was true for them, he always erred on the side of believing them rather than the alternative.

Poe flinched.

Edgar searched his face for any sign that Poe felt like he was being falsely accused and didn’t find it. Something was wrong.

“Poe?” Allie said, her voice a gentle warning. Allie had always been their staunchest ally. Their fiercest champion. But when you fucked up, she would not hesitate to let you know exactly how much. “What’s going on?”

For a moment, Poe seemed to teeter between fury and bravado. Edgar thought he might walk out the door, walk to his car, and leave New Orleans for another six years without telling them.

But then he squeezed his eyes shut and jammed his fists into them.

“ Fuck! ”

Allie and Jamie were watching them, wide-eyed, from the couch.

“Just tell us what’s up, buddy,” Allie said gently. Edgar hadn’t heard her call him buddy since they were kids.

Poe swore a blue streak, running hands through his wild hair.

“I thought…when I was little, I thought you both were playing along with Mama. So I did too. When we’d be out, and she’d point and say there was a ghost and she thought it was from the 1920s because of this hat or that dress?

I didn’t even know what the 1920s were. And you’d both nod and say, yeah, you saw it too.

So I said I saw it. And I thought…I guess I thought you were doing it so she’d feel better.

Since Dad always gave her so much shit. I thought—”

Edgar’s stomach flipped imagining little Poe, just trying to make their mom less alone.

“And I don’t know, I thought maybe I was seeing the same things as you guys.

I wasn’t trying to tell some huge lie. But then—” He shook his head.

“Dad left, and you still talked about seeing them. By then, it had all gotten so big I couldn’t say anything.

And I just…I didn’t want you to think I was like him. ”

Allie was on her feet by the time he finished speaking, and she came at him with open arms, ready—always so ready—to comfort. Poe jerked away from her and pulled his leather jacket closer.

Allie looked hurt but gave him space.

Poe said, “There is just one more tiny thing.” He laughed nervously.

“Oh shit,” Jamie murmured and clapped a hand over their mouth.

Poe looked at them and shrugged. “I can see the future.”

Silence. Blinking. Then a wail cut through the silence, and Allie sprang to attention. She stabbed a finger at them all. “Don’t any of you say one single word until I get back, on pain of death.”

Poe mimed zipping his lips and then throwing away a key. Jamie started to say something, then snapped their mouth shut. Edgar was pretty sure they’d been going to ask why something that zipped would have a lock on it.

They all stayed still and quiet, like the world’s most awkward tableau, until Allie returned, holding the baby.

“You can see fucking what now?” she said.

“It’s not always, like, clear. But. Yeah.”

“When you touch people, right?” Jamie said slowly, like they were putting a puzzle together. “Just like Phillipe Rondeau. That’s why you wear that batshit hot jacket in the summer in New Orleans?”

“Better than being deluged with information about how people are going to die or the ways their relationships are going to fail or that their kids are never gonna speak to them again,” Poe said.

Jamie made an expression of agreement. “Is it always negative things?”

Poe shook his head. “Not necessarily. A lot of the time, it’s jumbled. I can’t tell who anyone is or where. Or when.”

“Stop, stop, stop,” Allie said. She managed to be commanding without raising her voice above baby-approved volume. “Pause. Go back to the beginning. Like, birth beginning. And tell me everything.”

Poe sighed and sat back down, settling himself on the floor. Edgar sat back down next to Jamie. Their eyes were wide, and they were practically vibrating with excitement.

“I didn’t know what it was at first,” Poe said.

“In the beginning, it was just like, sometimes when someone would hold my hand, I’d get impressions of their life.

I dunno how I knew that’s what it was. But it made sense.

I assumed it was like that for everyone.

Like, that was why people shook hands and hugged or kissed when they first saw each other: to learn stuff about how their life was going. Kind of a tactile How are you?