End of the Road (Ghost Stories Trilogy #1) Read online

  “I love you too, Mama.”

  Mariella got into the car and with a final wave, she pulled onto the highway. I watched until they disappeared around a curve. The tugging sensation grew increasingly stronger until I couldn’t focus on anything else. I didn’t fight it.

  ***

  LAWRENCE

  Observing Juanita’s interaction with her family, I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of envy. The sheer joy on her face said it all. This was the happiest I had ever seen her. Their reunion was brief, but I’d do anything for two more seconds with my children. Juanita had received a miracle.

  Not only was her reunion amazing, but the fact that she was able to touch and speak with her family was incredible. She had reached a whole new level of our existence. With each passing moment she spent with her daughter, Juanita had grown so solid she seemed almost human, made out of flesh and blood again. I couldn’t wait to ask her questions. As soon as her family drove off I turned to face her, but she was gone. I quickly surveyed the area, especially the area around her tree, but couldn’t see her.

  “Where’s Juanita?” I asked Frank.

  “I don’t know where she went. Maybe she needed to be alone.”

  “Yes, but she can’t travel very far. I’ve checked everywhere.”

  I asked the group to split up and search for Juanita. Minutes later they reported back that she was gone.

  “Do you think she…moved on or crossed over?” Peggy asked.

  “Maybe she did,” I answered. “Where else could she be?”

  We stared at each other in stunned silence, our circle suddenly incomplete.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  BOB

  Larry was the most frustrated. He spent days roaming the side of the highway. Back and forth he paced a holographic image from another era. We respected his anguish. I think Frank shared some of it too. He never showed it outright like Larry, but every once in a while he’d lash out at one of us. Or, when he didn’t realize he was being watched, he would lift his face toward the sky and whisper a prayer.

  They all wanted to cross over and envied Juanita’s swift exit. She had closure, her family came to visit. They all lived happily ever after and all that fa la la bullshit. I knew I wasn’t going anywhere. Nobody wanted to claim me.

  Our group had become increasingly restless with each passing day. We were waiting for something new to happen. Peggy thought Tobin would be the next in our group to crossover.

  “His family knows he’s here, they’ll be back to help him,” she said to me at the end of another uneventful day.

  “Doesn’t do us any good though, does it?”

  “No, but maybe we’ll get more answers. I don’t understand why I’m stuck here. I can see why you’re being punished…it’s not like you contributed anything good to society.”

  “Hey, I served in ‘Nam.”

  “Right, jail or war…real honorable.”

  She shook her head with disgust and moved away to join Lawrence who was staring off into the horizon again. I didn’t get it, just staring and not moving for hours on end drove me batshit. I shrugged off Peggy’s caustic comments and stood out in the middle of traffic for a while. Each time a car moved through me, a pulse of energy came with it. After a couple hours of this activity, I had enough stored to move objects without putting any effort into it. Since my writing in the sand experiment backfired, I stuck to drawing (usually stick figures of well-endowed women) and making little rock sculptures. Instead of a random sculpture, that afternoon I started working on a monument of sorts for Juanita, underneath her tree.

  We all missed Juanita, even though she was only twenty when she died and one of the youngest, she was a mother and her maternal instincts carried over. Each one of us had a unique relationship with her. For me, she was practically obsessed with how I died. She wanted to know how much pain I experienced when I was shot, both during the war and my fatal wound.

  After a particularly grueling interrogation session I stopped her, mid question, and asked her why she wanted to know. Her answer was simple. “I want to know if my husband suffered when he died. I want to know exactly what his last moments were like.”

  I thought of her short life, of where she became a wife, mother and widow in less than two decades on the planet. What I had done with my time? Not a whole hell of a lot. Well, I did a lot of drugs.

  My sculpture for Juanita started out as something simple; an extension of the cross she created herself. I used a large rock with a flat side and with a sharper, harder rock, I etched her name. I wasn’t happy with the basic tombstone. Her life was deserving of something more ornate. Over the course of the next few months, I collected broken glass from the side of the road and small unique shaped stones. These were placed on the ground, fanning out from the tombstone in all directions. Slowly a mosaic of sorts formed. During the day the sun reflected brilliantly off of tiny shards of brown, green and clear glass. At night, especially under a full moon, they would glow. Larry commented that this was fitting and symbolic of how our forms change in strength and intensity depending on the energy around us.

  Juanita’s daughter did come back and she went right to the mesquite tree where she found the finished monument. Mariella sunk down to her knees and lightly touched a piece of glass.

  “Mama, are you still here?”

  We stood around Mariella, but none of us made a move towards her. Instead, we all looked to Lawrence.

  He sighed and squatted down next to her. He found a stick and picked it up in his hand. As he brought it around in front of him, Mariella watched its progress, her eyes wide with astonishment.

  Your mother has moved on. Larry wrote in the dirt by Mariella’s feet.

  “Do you mean she is no longer a ghost?”

  Yes, we believe so.

  “We?” Mariella’s eyes darted around, but she couldn’t see us. “So, she wasn’t alone?”

  No, there are 6 of us. I was here when your mother died.

  She became quiet and stared at the memorial while absentmindedly playing with a small gold cross which hung on a simple chain around her neck. She slid the cross in a slow motion, side to side, just below her chin. A gust of sand blew up from behind her and covered part of the mosaic with a fine layer of dust. She released her pendant and leaned forward to brush the debris off.

  “Did you make this for her?”

  Yes, Bob did after she left. She crossed right after your visit.

  “Bob,” Mariella whispered and dipped her head to her chest. Her lips moved, but I couldn’t hear what she said. When she made the sign of the cross across her torso with her hand I figured it was a prayer. Was she praying for me? She stood up and particles of sand clung to her jeans at the knees so she bent over to wipe them off.

  “I’m glad she wasn’t here alone. I just wish I knew her.” A single tear ran down her cheek and she let it fall unchecked. “Thank you.” She lowered her head one more time and walked back to her car, but she didn’t leave. Mariella returned with a small bouquet made up of pink roses, white lilies and some other flowers I didn’t recognize. “Today is Mother’s Day,” she said and set it down on top of the rock that bore her mother’s name.

  She stayed for a few more minutes, looking down at the arrangement, before leaving without saying another word. Mariella never came back after that.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  TOBIN

  When Juanita’s daughter placed the flowers on the grave marker, I was reminded of Candy and her similar effort at making a tribute. Mother’s Day…if I were still alive I’d have made breakfast for Candy and then we would have gotten together with my dad and brother to take my mom out for dinner. No one from my family had been to see me in a long time. Was I so easily forgotten? Their absence took root in me as deep rejection and put me in a bad mood.

  My mood festered over the weeks. Georgia was the only one who dared to come near me. Despite my efforts at ignoring her, she insisted on hanging out. Each day she asked if I w
as going to talk to her and I told her no. The rest of the day we watched traffic. Occasionally a Roadrunner or a lizard would scurry across the desert. Each time an animal drew near us, it would pause and sniff the air. They could sense our presence, but after a few moments of stillness, we weren’t considered a threat and they’d move on in their wanderings.

  Self-pity, which was the source of my bad mood, made the days go by real slow. The arrival of Juanita’s family had been the trigger for her to crossover. Well, my family had already been to see me, knew I was here and nothing fucking happened. I was going to be stuck on the side of the highway forever.

  Georgia had kept her distance for a few days, but she came back. I admit, I enjoyed her company even if I was trying to alienate everyone.

  “Feeling better?” she asked.

  “Not really,” I said and kicked a pebble. I watched it skip and bounce across the sunbaked earth, disappearing into the light brown landscape as if it was swallowed whole.

  “What’s wrong?”

  I regarded her and started to speak, but didn’t want to bitch and moan about my existence. Georgia had been here a lot longer.

  “When do you think it will be our turn to move on?” I asked instead.

  “I have no idea and gave up on the idea a long time ago…until Juanita.”

  “Yeah, Juanita changed things, didn’t she?”

  “I think she renewed our hope and despair at the same time.”

  It was selfish of me to think I was the only one experiencing the frustration of being in limbo.

  “Tobin, do you believe in Heaven?” Georgia asked, her voice almost a whisper.

  “When I was little I did, but my dad…well he kind of got a little crazy with all the religion shit…turned me off of the whole idea.”

  “My father too although he assured me and my brothers and sister that everyone had a place in the Lord’s Kingdom. When I was killed and realized I wasn’t at the Pearly Gates, I assumed my behavior had caused my free pass to be revoked.”

  “My dad didn’t seem too eager to help me out.”

  “I think he was scared shitless. Your existence as a ghost shook his beliefs to the core. He’ll be back when he’s ready. I envy you. My parents never came to see where my life was snuffed out.” Georgia flashed brightly before going back to her more natural, muted state.

  Georgia’s point made me realize my selfishness again. According to the others, until Juanita, I was the only one who had family visit the site where I died …and more than once.

  “If your parents had visited, would you have tried to communicate with them?” I asked.

  “Oh, definitely! Any resentment I harbored didn’t carry over with me. I like to think that they came to Arizona, claimed my body and took me home to be buried. Isn’t it weird to not know where our bodies ended up? I often wonder about that. Like, why didn’t we stay with it?”

  “I don’t know, but I’ve thought about it too.”

  We kind of got lost in our thoughts after that. Georgia hummed an old Doors song and occasionally glanced at me, but mostly watched the procession of cars heading north. Trucks bound for the lakes struggled to make it up the incline; the burden of the boats they towed slowing them down.

  People drove by completely oblivious to the fact that we watched them. They were busy getting to their cabins on a lake or campground in the mountains and living for the weekend. It really made me wonder what the whole point of my post-death existence was for. Sitting by the side of the road and counting cars? There had to be a bigger purpose. And what power kept us tied to this location? I get that we all died here, but how were the perimeters of our prison decided? Juanita didn’t come back to clue us in. Where did she even go?

  “Hey Georgia.” She stopped humming and turned to face me. “Do you think Juanita is in Heaven now?”

  “Who knows, but I hope so.”

  “I wish she could have told us what it was like and if it’s like they describe in movies where people were waiting for her on the other side.”

  “Or she got recycled and her time was up. Now she’s back in rotation somewhere.”

  “I hadn’t considered reincarnation,” I said and shrugged my shoulders. “Now that opens up a shitload of possibilities.”

  “Yeah, you could come back as a girl,” Georgia teased.

  “And you a dude.”

  “Or a Bob?” She snorted and I laughed with her. Bob was standing in the middle of the highway again; his arms stretched wide and his head tipped back, his face reaching for the sun.

  “What is he doing…trying to fly?” This set us off again and we watched our crazy friend. The weight of my oppressive mood started to lift.

  Chapter Forty

  LAWRENCE

  I struggled to hold it together after Juanita left. Her ability to leave tortured me night and day. She was my first companion in the afterlife and quite frankly, I always thought I’d be the first to go…I had been stuck the longest. Everyone else came to me for an explanation and I had none. Well, I certainly wasn’t going to begrudge Juanita her happiness. She found her closure and was able to move on, which in itself was a miracle. It just made my situation all the more helpless.

  In the days after she left us I spent my time walking the parameter, the invisible boundary that kept us tethered to the desert. I tried all sorts of things to break through. Once I focused on a rock in the distance hoping that would help me, what Bob calls, “teleport”. That didn’t work. Objects so easily passed through us, but the boundary I wanted to pass through the most eluded me.

  At times I was content to wander by myself and keep the others at a distance, but inevitably the need for companionship drew me in. I was reminded of the time before Juanita joined me in the desert and how painful the passing of each sunrise and sunset had been. It seemed as though a century had gone by before Juanita died and became my compatriot in death. We probably would have never crossed paths when we were alive.

  I moved into the shade underneath Juanita’s mesquite tree. It’s barbed branches casting intricate patterns of shadows on the sandy soil. Soil once fortified by Juanita’s decaying body. We watched the process together until the bones sunk into the earth. I hoped for a connection or some sort of sign from my departed friend, but none came. She was gone and I mourned her loss.

  Peggy appeared at my side and bowed her head in respect at the tree. Her presence interrupted my moment, but any annoyance was forgotten when I saw the tears glistening in her eyes.

  “I miss her too,” she said and reached over, her body grew brighter and denser before she lightly touched my arm. “We’re glad you came back.”

  “I couldn’t go very far,” I reminded her.

  “No, but you looked lost nonetheless.”

  “We’re all lost, aren’t we? Somehow we made a wrong turn.”

  “I’ve always had bad luck, but this is extraordinary by any means. Maybe we’re here for a reason and we just don’t know what it is yet.”

  “Well, that reason can show up any time. I’m ready.”

  “We did save Tobin’s family. That’s something.”

  I nodded in agreement. “True.”

  “Maybe that’s our purpose. We’re like roadside guardians.” She said this with a smile and I couldn’t help but grin too. “And we’ve been selected, like special members. Not everyone is up to the task. We’ve been chosen.” One of her eyebrows arched up deviously as if she was letting me in on a secret.

  She was teasing me and her silly theory cheered me up. I needed to stop thinking of Juanita’s departure as a betrayal. I needed to honor her by making the best of the situation. Perhaps everything did happen for a reason.

  Chapter Forty-One

  BOB

  It was early spring. The cacti and wildflowers were in full bloom and it had been almost a year since Juanita left us, when we had a visitor. A minivan pulled onto the shoulder and a gorgeous blonde stepped out of the driver’s side and hurried around, out of the way of pa
ssing traffic. She had the longest legs I’d ever seen, the hem of her skirt pulled far above her knees when she walked.

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw Tobin and in an instant he was standing next to the woman. A light breeze lifted the hair out of her face and that’s when I recognized her.

  She walked up onto the sand, which was covered in sporadic patches of grass.

  “Tobin, are you still here?” she asked.

  Tobin picked up a stick and wrote yes in the ground by her feet.

  “I’m sorry I haven’t been up to see you, but it was too hard.”

  I understand. How’s Egan?

  “He’s good and getting so big. He’s in first grade. Can you believe it?”

  Tobin hunched over like he had been kicked in the balls. After a few seconds he composed himself and continued writing.

  How are you?

  “I’m good. We’re all good Tob, which is why I came up here. I need to tell you…” She pursed her lips and started fidgeting with her hands, twisting a large diamond ring. “I’ve met someone and we’re getting married.”

  Tobin hunched over again and Georgia moved closer to him. “Are you okay?” she asked and he nodded.

  “Tobin, I forgot what a babe your wife is,” I said.

  “Bob, stop being such an ass. You are so inappropriate!” Peggy glared at me, flickering with rage.

  “Hey, I’m just sayin’.”

  Peggy shook her head a mumbled something under her breath, then proceeded to ignore me.

  I looked down to see what Georgia had written for Tobin. Who is he?

  “You don’t know him. He’s a Physician’s Assistant and works at Egan’s pediatrician’s office.”

  Tobin was fainter than usual even disappearing briefly before flickering back into existence and he didn’t respond for a few minutes. Georgia was poised and ready with the stick, but soon grew tired, growing more transparent each passing second. I walked over and took the stick out of her hand. She peered up at me in surprise.