Page 24 of The Psychic

Brandy made a face before biting into her sandwich.

She changed the subject to talk about the hospital, then switched the conversation again to the apartment she’d recently given up to move back into her parents’ house, the same house she and Clint had grown up in.

Brandy’s last move had come upon her mother’s unexpected death.

“Kinda weird,” Brandy admitted. “Being there as kids with the whole family and now … Well, it’s just me.”

Ronnie thought fleetingly of her own childhood home, the house her father still lived in.

And that made her think of Gabrielle, her babysitter, who’d died in a car crash a few years ago, a tragedy that had brought a number of her schoolmates back to River Glen.

There had been a service for Gabrielle at the high school, a chance for people to collectively grieve.

But when Ronnie stepped through the familiar front doors of the school, she’d gotten such a bad vibe that she’d faltered and left almost immediately, though not before she’d caught a glimpse of Brandy and Clint and Evan.

Brandy and Clint sat in folding chairs, Evan seated in his wheelchair.

For some reason, Ronnie had experienced a sense of what she could only describe as such wrongness that crawled up her spine. It had been so intense, she’d immediately skedaddled back out the door, her heart thundering, nearly bowling over a couple of mourners on their way in.

She should have shaken off that feeling and stayed and paid her respects to Gabrielle, even though she’d seen little of the babysitter after her tenth summer.

She’d heard that Gabrielle had graduated high school and gone off to some university Ronnie couldn’t remember.

Then, about the time she should have been graduating from college, Gabrielle had been in a terrible, fatal automobile accident.

She had been with a boyfriend, who was driving. He’d lost control of his car at the highest point above the East Glen River. The car skidded over the edge, tumbling down the river’s chasm. Both passengers had died on impact with the river’s edge. At least that’s what everyone had been told.

Gabrielle’s boyfriend hadn’t been from River Glen, had just been visiting Gabrielle. Their deaths had shocked the whole community.

Now, in the cafeteria, Ronnie shoved the disturbing memory aside. She tuned back to Brandy, who was waxing nostalgic about their childhood days, and Ronnie found herself growing restless. She didn’t like nostalgia. It had a way of making her feel empty.

Brandy had finished half her sandwich and wrapped up the rest while she talked. Ronnie did the same, and put her uneaten half back into the bag.

“I’ll have this on break,” Brandy interrupted herself to say, touching the red-frilled toothpick she’d stuck through it. She crossed her arms and laid them on the table. “You know there are Three Musketeers bars in the vending machine.”

“You want one?”

“You never really liked them,” Brandy observed.

“Touché. I was always selling them hard, though.”

“All for one and one for all.” Brandy smiled a bit wistfully, then she inhaled and exhaled. “I’m mad at Mel and I’m … upset with Clint for getting involved. But it’s not his fault.”

“You said that.”

“Clint didn’t really break up Mel’s marriage,” she said a bit more forcefully. “She wasn’t … faithful. There were guys before him. So, it was just a fling. Hugh, of course, being the wronged husband, blames Clint completely.”

“What about Mel?” Ronnie asked.

“Well, that’s why I wanted to see you. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m glad to see you anyway. It’s just fun, after all these years. Maybe we can make up for lost time. Connect again, as adults.”

“But … ?”

“Mel’s missing and—”

“Missing?”

“—I think it might be because of Clint.”

“Missing …” Ronnie repeated, feeling the blood drain from her face.

“Oh, shit, Ronnie. What’s wrong?” Brandy stared at her in alarm. “Do you know where she is?”

No … no … the woman in the clearing wasn’t Mel. Not Mel. Couldn’t be Mel.

But she looked familiar!

“Ronnie?” whispered Brandy. “Oh, God. Ronnie! Oh, no. Do you see her? Do you?”

“She’s why you wanted to see me …” Ronnie’s voice sounded far away to her own ears.

“Yes. Yes! But Mel is okay. Right? She’s okay. You just … you’re just … this isn’t like with Evan. You don’t really see anything. Man, I don’t like this. This is bullshit. Don’t do this. Don’t say anything.” She held both hands up like a shield.

Brandy’s face was drawn in terror. Ronnie looked at her helplessly. The woman on the ground. Her bloody wrists. Head turned … the blouse … a faint pink beneath the mud, Mel’s favorite color.

And suddenly she understood why the picture she’d seen in the alcove had tugged at her.

“The watercolor upstairs in grays and browns …” she whispered.

Brandy’s eyes stretched wide. “Mel’s watercolor?”

Mel’s watercolor.

“She gave it to me. I put it there so I could see it every day.”

“Mel painted it?” Ronnie felt slightly faint, a new clarity barging into her brain. She was glad she was sitting down.

“Yes.”

“I know where it is,” she admitted, her throat tight, her stomach turning.

“You do?” Brandy wasn’t tracking well. She laid her arms out flat across the table.

“You do, too. It’s Aunt Kat’s place. Where we all used to go to that shed, when it was better. Still had paint …”

“Oh, God.”

“Except the whole area’s worse now … old and dilapidated and yes, she’s there.”

Brandy lay her head on her arms and gazed at Ronnie with dull eyes. “Please tell me she’s all right.”

When Ronnie, her throat hot, couldn’t answer, tears filled Brandy’s eyes. Slowly Ronnie stood up and Brandy lifted her head.

“Where are you going?”

Ronnie was reaching for her phone. “I’ve got to go there.”

“I’m going with you!”

“I don’t know if—”

“I’m going WITH YOU!” Brandy insisted, her voice rising.

Heads of the people at nearby tables turned, the buzz of conversation momentarily interrupted.

“I need to call 911 …” Ronnie said, lowering her voice and taking a step away from the table as a few of the lunch crowd went back to their meals. A few didn’t.

The cell rang in her hand and Ronnie stared at it in wonder. “It’s Aunt Kat.”

Brandy moaned and looked about to faint. Until this moment, Ronnie had still held out the vain hope that she was wrong. Now, she gave that up.