Maybe This Time

Five

Andie was distracted during breakfast, and Alice took full advantage, scoring cookies with her cereal as she listed all the things she was not going to do that morning. Andie answered her automatically, thinking about the dream, until Alice said, “I should have four cookies,” and she said, “No, you should not,” and took the cookie plate away from her.

There were dreams and there was reality, and reality was stopping Alice before she made herself sick.

“You are mean,” Alice said, scowling at her.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alice, do you know a woman who has lots of curly dark hair?”

“You,” Alice said, and drank the last of her milk.

“Not me. Really pretty. Wearing a party dress. A blue party dress.”

“No,” Alice said, her nose in her glass.

“Huh.”

“I need another cookie.”

“No. You have to do your reading now. You can have a snack later. And then we’ll mulch your butterfly garden.” She wiped the chocolate from the cookies off Alice’s face, still thinking about the blue girl in the moonlight.

Blue girl. Blue dancing princess.

“Alice, who’s the blue dancing princess?”

“I want to read outside.” Alice got up and left the room, and Andie thought, This is not good.

Alice must be dreaming about the same girl. That brought up all kinds of things that Andie didn’t want to think about and Alice obviously didn’t want to talk about. And when Alice didn’t want to talk…

“Come on,” Alice said from the doorway into the dining room. “I’ve got my book.”

“Get your hoodie,” Andie told her. “It’s chilly out.” When Alice came back with her black hoodie zipped up, they headed out toward the pond, a large, green, stagnant surface that looked more like a massive leak in the moat than a planned water feature, which made sense since the moat was equally green and disgusting. Alice walked in front, her black-and-white-striped legs kicking through the fallen leaves and making her black flounced jersey skirt bounce. Cute, Andie thought, and considered telling Alice how good she looked. The last time she’d tried it, Alice had made gagging sounds, but she’d worn the skirt and leggings every day since then.

“Looking good, Alice,” Andie called.

Alice made gagging sounds.

When they got to the pond, Andie shook out the old quilt they used to picnic, and Alice threw her book down and announced, “This is the Sea of Azof. It is the world’s shallowest sea.”

Andie looked at the turgid, green pond. “Okay.”

Alice nodded. “We should go look at the butterfly garden.”

“Now?” Andie said, but Alice was already marching around to the far side of the house, so she dropped her things on the blanket and followed her around.

The garden was pretty bleak in October, most of it dead or dying with only the spiky purple asters still giving it their all.

Alice looked sad. “It’s dead.”

“We’ll put the mulch down after lunch, and that will keep it warm, and then it’ll all come back again in the spring.”

“I know. But that means the butterflies are gone.”

“They’ll be back in the spring, too.” Andie watched her, trying to see what she saw. “Did you plant this garden?”

“Aunt May did,” Alice said, sadly. “But I helped. A lot. She said it was my garden, too.”

Andie almost said, “In the spring, we’ll clean it all up,” and then she remembered that in the spring, God willing, they’d be in Columbus. “We can plant a garden like this in Columbus.” She tried to remember how much sun the backyard of North’s Victorian got.

“Last year, Aunt May collected seed. From the black-eyed Susans and the coneflowers and I forget what else.” Alice kicked at a bushy serrated-edged plant. “And this stuff takes over everywhere so we have to get rid of some of it.” She sounded like an exasperated adult, and Andie thought, Aunt May said that.

She kicked it again, and a lemony smell floated up to Andie. “What is it?”

“Lemon balm,” Alice pronounced, and Andie pictured a kindly, older woman bending down and saying, “Lemon balm,” to Alice in that same tsking voice, Alice nodding wisely beside her.

“Aunt May really knew her plants,” Andie said.

“These are what butterflies like.” Alice pointed to a stalky-looking plant that looked like giant dead daisies. “Coneflower.” She pointed to another. “Black-eyed Susan. Parsley. Columbine. Joe Pye. Zinnia. Salvia. Milkweed. Bergamot. Aster. Butterfly bush.”

She pointed to each of them, naming them lovingly, with a softness Andie hadn’t seen in her before, and then she stooped and plucked a big, ugly withered plant with a fuzzy stem. “Weed,” she said, disgusted, and threw it away.

“They must be very beautiful in the summer,” Andie said. Now, it looked like a garden of death except for the plucky asters.

“The butterflies are bee-you-tee-ful,” Alice said. “Swallowtails and monarchs and skippers. I’m going to be a lepidopterist when I grow up.”

“That’s very cool,” Andie said, meaning it.

Alice nodded, accepting the approval as her right. “And sometimes we get hummingbirds, which are also very cool. Aunt May said we could plant hummingbird plants next summer…”

Her voice trailed off, and Andie thought, Ouch, and then Alice turned her back on the garden, her face blank, and marched back to the blanket, where she plunked herself down, put her Walkman headphones on, and picked up her book.

Andie sat down beside her. “We’ll make a hummingbird garden, Alice. Either here or in Columbus, wherever we are, we’ll have a butterfly and hummingbird garden. And we’ll put the mulch down to keep these plants warm all winter.”

Alice shrugged and opened her book.

Andie thought, Tell North we need a hummingbird garden, too, and then went back to considering the thing that had been haunting her since the night before: the blue girl. Maybe Alice had inspired the dream. They were telling the Princess Alice story every night now, Alice correcting her and shaping it as they went, but the blue dancing princess was always in there. Maybe she was just dreaming Alice’s story…

She smelled something horrible and looked over to see Alice poking at something with a stick. When she looked closer, it was a dead frog, bloated in extinction.

“Alice, don’t do that, it’s dead.”

Alice pulled her headphones off, and Andie repeated herself.

“It only looks dead,” Alice said. “It’ll be okay.”

She poked it again, and Andie took the stick away before she broke it open and released God knew what. “It’s dead,” Andie told her firmly. “Leave it alone.”

Alice looked up at her, her eyes flat. “You don’t know so much.”

“Probably not. But that frog is dead.”

“No, it isn’t,” Alice said, her face screwed up to yell. “No, no, no, no-”

She turned away as her voice rose, and then she stopped, staring across the pond.

“What?” Andie said, and looked, too.

There was a woman there, dressed in old-fashioned black, her flounced skirt motionless in the October wind, her body half-bowed.

“Who is that?” Andie said.

Alice jerked around and stared at Andie for a moment, her eyes wide with surprise.

“Alice, who is that woman over there?”

“There’s nobody,” Alice said, and sat down with her book.

Andie looked back at the woman, thick-waisted and clumsy as she moved closer to the edge of the trees. “Alice?”

“I don’t see anybody.” Alice stared at her book, and for the next minute the pages didn’t turn while she stared down. Then she stole another look across the pond and closed her book. “Tell me the Princess Alice story again.”

Andie looked back at the woman. Maybe just a neighbor. Alice wasn’t the neighborly sort, maybe she didn’t like people watching her. Andie didn’t like people watching her, either.

“Princess Alice,” Alice said. “Tell me.”

“Right.” Andie started the never-ending Princess Alice story again, beginning with how brave the princess was and how her brother was the best artist in the kingdom, and how the mean witch was defeated once again-

“And Princess Alice got all the cookies she wanted,” Alice said, evidently still brooding on her lack of a fourth cookie.

– and how the dancing princess danced through the halls with her curly hair flying-

“And the Bad Uncle did not come because he was afraid of Princess Alice,” Alice said for the umpteenth time.

“No, he didn’t come because he was busy working. The dancing princess has curly hair?”

“She dances,” Alice said impatiently. “And Bad Uncle is so afraid-”

“Bad Uncle isn’t afraid of anything. He just forgets people. Alice, who is the dancing princess?”

“She dances. She has a glittery skirt like yours and she dances. And Princess Alice isn’t afraid of anything, either. Now tell me new stuff.”

“Alice, did you know the dancing princess?”

Alice looked at her warily. “It’s just a story, Andie.” She stole a glance across the pond.

Andie looked, too. The woman was still there, watching. “Who is she, Alice?”

“Princess Alice goes to the shopping center,” Alice said, “and she buys beautiful material and makes a beautiful cover for her bed, and then she goes to the bookstore and gets a book on butterflies because butterflies never die.” Alice stopped and looked back out over the pond quickly. “And then she comes home,” she said, jerking her face back to Andie. “To the Bad Witch. The Bad Witch is not so bad but she should let Princess Alice have many cookies.”

“Are there neighbors back there?” Andie said, shading her eyes to see the woman better.

“No,” Alice said. “And then what does Princess Alice do?”

The woman stepped out of the trees onto the shore, clumsy in her long, heavy clothes. She was wearing a long three-tiered skirt, and her hair was pulled back tightly in a bun. She moved stiffly, no grace at all, and she looked oddly old-fashioned, almost sepia toned.

Andie said, “There, do you see her now?”

“No. I want my story!”

“Okay,” Andie said, still watching across the pond. “After Princess Alice went shopping, she went to the Dairy Queen and she met a friend there.”

“Okay,” Alice said, keeping her head turned away from the pond.

There was something very wrong about that woman, wrong enough that Alice had forgotten her dead frog to pretend she wanted a story instead of yelling her head off at being thwarted. “Are you afraid of her, Alice?”

“Who?”

“The woman on the other side of the pond.”

“I don’t see anybody.”

“Alice,” Andie said, staring at her. “What the hell is going on here?”

“I don’t see anybody. I want my STORY!”

Alice stared back, wild-eyed and, Andie realized, afraid. “Okay,” she said soothingly. “The friend told Princess Alice about the school she went to, and Princess Alice said she wanted to go to that school, too, even though she’d have to leave the castle and go to Columbus-”

“I’m tired of that story,” Alice said, and picked up her headphones again.

Andie looked back at the woman who still stood there staring at them. Whoever she was, she was creepy. “Let’s go in.”

Alice shoved her book into Andie’s hands without a word of protest, stood up, and headed for the house at a good clip even for her. Andie got up and shook the quilt out, and then picked up their things and turned to go and caught sight of somebody up on the tower of the house. She shaded her eyes again but the sun was behind him so all she could see was a tall man up there, his shoulders oddly boxlike, as if he were wearing an old-fashioned coat, standing very straight, both hands on the ledge as if he owned the place.

It might be Bruce the contractor. If Bruce had started dressing funny and dyed his hair red and grown a beard and started showing up for work.

“I want a snack now,” Alice said from twenty feet away, and Andie pointed up to the tower.

“Who’s that?” she said, and Alice jerked her head up to the tower.

“I don’t see anybody,” she said, and kept moving toward the door, yelling back, “We have to mulch the butterfly garden today!” and Andie watched the figure on the tower watching her, and then looked back to see the woman in the trees, also watching her.

Okay, now I’m getting some answers, she thought, and followed Alice in to find Mrs. Crumb.

When Alice was curled up in the library with her book on butterflies, her Jessica doll, a cup of milk, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and two cookies, Andie went back to the kitchen to find Mrs. Crumb sitting at the table in another of her faded flowered aprons, hunched over a cup of heavily pepperminted tea, holding a hand of cards and facing the card rack across the table.

“There was a woman out by the pond,” Andie said to her.

“Woman?” Mrs. Crumb said, suddenly cautious.

“In a long, old-fashioned dress. Alice saw her. I think she knew her.”

Crumb looked startled. “Alice told you that?”

“No. She pretended not to see her, but Alice is not that good an actress.”

“On the other side of the pond?”

“Are there neighbors over there?”

Mrs. Crumb shrugged and went back to studying her gin hand.

Andie sat down across from her and shoved the card holder to one side, and Mrs. Crumb looked up, startled.

“You know, I’m getting really tired of mysteries,” Andie said. “Is there some weird-ass neighbor wandering around?”

“Language.” Mrs. Crumb looked more offended by the “weird-ass” than she was alarmed at the idea of a stranger wandering the grounds.

“Who was that woman? Because Alice doesn’t want me to know so it’s no good asking her.”

“You won’t believe me.”

“Try me.”

Crumb hesitated and then put down her cards and leaned closer. “It’s her. She watches Alice. She wants a child to look after. She won’t hurt Alice. She protects her.”

“Tell me you’re talking about a fired nanny. I’ll get a restraining order-”

“She was the governess in this house once,” Crumb said, warming to her tale. “A long time ago. A hundred years ago. More. In England. Miss J, Alice calls her. She was a lady, but a bad man dragged her down. Peter. She died. And now she walks.”

Andie looked at the light in the old woman’s eyes and thought, She really believes that. Or maybe she just wanted Andie to believe so she’d run away screaming. Maybe she’d hired somebody to stand on the other side of the pond. The woman in the dream would be harder to fake, but-

“It was that Peter’s fault.” Mrs. Crumb was positively animated now. “He was a hound, an evil man. There were lots of women. She was just the last. And the poor woman paid for it!”

“Mrs. Crumb-”

“Pregnant, you know.” Crumb shook her head sadly, playing to the balcony. “I’m not sure how she died. She doesn’t speak of it.”

“She talks to you.”

“No, but she’d sit with me. Before Alice came. Alice’s mother died when she was born, so they brought the poor babe here and that’s when she stopped sitting with me. She just takes care of Alice now. That’s all she wants, to look after Alice. She thinks Alice is her baby. Now Peter, he wants the house. Peter and Carter, they’re close.” She said the last with contempt.

Oh, dear God, Andie thought. Either Mrs. Crumb was completely nuts or there were ghosts stalking Alice and Carter. Andie wasn’t sure at this point which she’d prefer. “How do you know all this?”

“I know things,” Mrs. Crumb said, her eyes shifting away.

“Who told you this?”

Mrs. Crumb got up. “It you don’t want to believe me, fine.”

“Look.” Andie regrouped. “You believe this ghost exists. That… disturbs me.”

“You’ve seen them.” Crumb looked arch. “And Alice likes Miss J!”

“I think even Alice would draw the line at the undead.”

“That little girl has seen a lot of death. She knows there’s Something Else out there.”

Andie rubbed her forehead. “Okay. Forget Miss J and… uh, Peter. Did a nineteen-year-old girl ever die here? Beautiful, curly hair, liked to dance?”

Mrs. Crumb shivered for a moment and then leaned back looking calmer, saner. “A lot of people have died here. This house is over four hundred years old.”

“I keep dreaming about a nineteen-year-old-girl. At least she says she’s nineteen. She talked to me last night in a dream. I know she’s not real. Look, there’s something going on here, and I’m going to find out what it is, and if it turns out that this is some scam you’ve cooked up-”

Mrs. Crumb laughed, a much gayer sound than Andie had expected. “How would I give you bad dreams? Or make you see a woman at the pond?”

“Or the guy on the tower?” Andie said. “I thought it might be Bruce finally come to start work, but he was dressed funny.”

Mrs. Crumb smiled, the curve of her lips almost youthful. “Tower? Oh, that’s Peter. He thinks the house is his. He’s just looking out for his property-”

A loud screeching sound made Andie jump, and she looked around to see a teakettle on the stove, blowing steam.

Get a grip on yourself. The damn house is getting to you. “Mrs. Crumb, I don’t believe in ghosts.”

“Well, you’re the one who’s seeing them,” Mrs. Crumb said, and got up to take the kettle off the stove, moving with an oddly youthful grace. “You should have Mr. Archer come down here.” Mrs. Crumb took down a teacup and saucer. “He should be here if you’re worried. Can I make you some tea?”

“No, thank you,” Andie said, and thought, I need real information. The Grandville library wasn’t that far away. They might have a history of the house. Or a book on faking hauntings. Or exorcisms.

She left Mrs. Crumb smiling to herself and stirring her Earl-Grey-with-schnapps in the kitchen and went to get the kids.

They were talking in the library when she opened the door, their heads close together, both of them open and unguarded until they saw her. Then their faces shut down again.

“Come on. We’re going to spread the mulch on Alice’s butterfly garden and then go to the Grandville library,” she told them, and they looked at each other and then got up without argument and went to get their coats.

Alice’s Jessica doll had fallen when she’d stood up, and Andie went to pick it up and put it on the window seat. Its hair was disarranged as usual, and Andie tried to pat it back into its bun, straightening the three-tiered skirt gathered into the ribbon band-

Three tiers. The woman on the other side of the lake had been wearing a dress like that. And her hair had been like the doll’s, too.

I’m hallucinating, she thought. There wasn’t a woman over there, I hallucinated Alice’s doll. Alice was acting weird because I was trying to make her see a hallucination.

Except Alice had seen it first.

There are no such things as ghosts, she told herself, put the doll on the window seat, and went to help with the mulch.

Two hours in the Grandville library looking for “Archer House,” “Faked Hauntings,” and “Parapsychologists, Ohio” gave Andie nothing except a book called Ghostbusting: The Story of One Man’s Battle Against the Undead and a very old newspaper article about the insane Archer who’d brought the house back from England. She copied the article and checked out the book, and then took the kids home. She tried asking them a few general questions-“So, ghosts. What do you think?”-and they ignored her, so she tucked them into bed and then went to bed herself with the book. The author’s name was Boston Ulrich and he was from Cincinnati, which meant he was in the general vicinity, which was a plus, but two chapters in, she knew it was going to be no help because it was more about how smart Boston Ulrich was than it was about ghosts.

That made sense, she decided, because there were no such things as ghosts, so he hadn’t had anything else to write about. The woman across the lake was probably just looking at the house, and the man in the tower was probably checking the cable, and Mrs. Crumb hadn’t told her he was there so she could push the whole this-house-is-haunted bit. Or something. There were no ghosts. She put the book away and turned out the light and let herself drift to sleep. Maybe she’d dream about Will tonight. That would alleviate some guilt about all the hot North dreams. C’mon, Will, she thought but it was the ghost girl who showed up, smiling at her from the foot of the bed.

“Who are you?” Andie said, and the girl said, I’m you, and sat down on the edge of the bed.

She seemed more solid this time, as if she’d been eating better, whatever ghosts ate. More fleshed out and, although she still had a disconcerting translucency, the vertigo wasn’t nearly as bad. Andie frowned at her, trying to place what buried memory she’d dredged her up from.

Oh, stop it, the girl said, and settled in at the foot of the bed. Can’t you accept that I’m you? Everybody’s prettier and more interesting when they’re younger.

“Thank you. But no. You’re some weird memory. After my divorce, I used to dream about my husband all the time. One of my therapists said it was because I was trying to say a better good-bye. But I have absolutely no recollection of anybody like you.”

That’s because there’s nobody like me.

They need somebody like you, North had said. And there’s nobody else like you.

Tell me about the guy we marry, the girl said. North Archer.

“He’s a good man,” Andie said. “Just distant. The thing is, if you’re some buried memory, why would you be haunting my dreams now?” She stopped. “Haunting. Are you somebody else’s memory?”

Tell me three things about North Archer, and I’ll go away.

“I’ll trade,” Andie said. “Tell me three things about you, and I will.”

You go first.

“Okay.” Andie took the first thought that came to mind. “The one Valentine’s Day we were together, he brought me a heart-shaped Valentine’s Day box full of potstickers because he knew I liked those better than candy.” She remembered him handing her roses and the box with a completely straight face and then breaking into one of his rare smiles when she opened the box and said, “Potstickers!”, delighted beyond measure. And they’d finished them off that night in bed, and she’d licked some spilled dipping sauce off his chest and-

Potstickers?

“Chinese dumplings.” Okay, they’d had some good moments, but it was over and done with. “Your turn.”

I’ve never had Chinese dumplings.

“That’s too bad, they’re great. It’s your turn.”

I took my turn. I’ve never had Chinese dumplings. The girl slid off the bed and did a pirouette in front of the window, her skirt moving in multiple dimensions, but not bothering Andie nearly as much this time.

“Fine,” Andie said. “I’ve never had squid.”

The girl stopped twirling. That’s not fair. Three things about North Archer.

“Okay. I’m fairly sure he has had squid.” North tried everything. He’d certainly tried everything with her anyway.

The girl put her hands on her hips. I want to know things about him, real things.

“Well, I want to know those about you, too.”

Okay, the girl said, not happy at all. Your turn.

“I took my turn. The second one is that he’s had squid. Your turn.”

We could not count that one.

She sounded like Alice, bargaining for more cookies.

“Then we’re back to you. I gave you a Valentine’s Day memory.”

Okay. The girl chewed on her lip. My favorite Valentine’s Day gift was a heart-shaped necklace set with little diamond chips that my boyfriend gave me.

“Boyfriend,” Andie said. “I do not remember this necklace, so again, you’re not me. Anybody I know?”

Your turn. She swished her skirt again, impatient.

“You’re not me.”

The girl pouted and somehow was even lovelier pouting, even transparent.

“Who are you?”

It’s your turn to tell me something.

“Okay.” Andie watched her move in the moonlight, seeing her skirt swish with her. “Is that a prom dress?”

Your turn.

“Okay.” Andie sat back a little to think. “We had to go to this big fancy party and I didn’t want to go because I was going to have to get dressed up in this little black dress his mother had bought for me and act like a wife, and the day of the party he came home and said, “Here’s your dress,” and when I opened the bag it was a long greeny-blue chiffon skirt with sequins on it and a turquoise sequined stretchy tank top. He said he saw it in a window on his way to a meeting and stopped to get it because it looked like me. And then I found out he was late to the meeting because of it. That was a big deal.” And she’d been really grateful, and they’d been late to the party-

I don’t get it. What’s wrong with a black dress? I think they’re sexy.

“North understood it. Is that a prom dress you’re wearing?”

Yes. The girl swished the skirt again. I was trying it on again when…

“When?” Andie prompted.

That was my turn. Yes, this was my prom dress. Your turn. And tell me something besides what he bought you. Unless it was diamonds.

“Okay. The one birthday I had during the year we were together, he forgot. No gift at all.”

Not even later?

“Yes, but later doesn’t count.” Now she sounded like Alice.

What did he get you later?

“Diamond earrings. Very tasteful.” She was pretty sure his secretary had picked them out, which made it so much worse. He’d never have bought those for her; if there was one thing she knew about North, it was that he knew her. Until he forgot her.

See, that’s better, diamonds.

“No. Better was his brother Southie who remembered and showed up on the day with a cake and these big green hoop earrings with bluebirds sitting in them. I still have those earrings.” She smiled to herself, remember Southie handing her the box and saying, “Bluebirds of happiness, Andie. They called your name.” Maybe he’d bought them because he’d known she wasn’t happy.

Well, you still have the diamonds, too.

“No.” Andie folded her arms over her chest. “I left them behind when I left. Your turn. Something about you.”

I would never leave behind diamonds, the girl said, and pirouetted once and was gone.

“Hello?” Andie said to the empty room, and waited a minute but the girl didn’t come back. “Damn.”

She lay back on her pillows and tried to figure out what the hell was happening.

You could have hallucinations about things you didn’t know about. Maybe the girl was a hallucination.

I’m hallucinating, Andie thought. I have a brain tumor or something.

No she didn’t. She just needed an explanation.

It’s a ghost.

No, that wasn’t it, either. It was probably her subconscious.

If it was, her subconscious had a thing for her ex-husband.

“That’s not it, either,” she said out loud. She was completely over North. Done.

And now she was hallucinating ghosts.

I need help, she thought, and was making plans when she fell asleep.

The next morning, Andie told Mrs. Crumb to watch the kids and went to Columbus to the Ohio State library, calling Will when she got into town to tell him she was there and could have dinner with him if he was available.

“If I’m available?” he said, laughing. “I haven’t seen you in three weeks. I’ll meet you at Max and Erma’s whenever you say.”

Max and Erma’s in German Village. That was two blocks from Flo’s place. She should stop and see Flo. Or not.

“Andie?”

“How about six? That’ll give me all afternoon at the library.” And put me on the road in time to get back to the kids. If they ate at six and she left at seven, she could be home by ten-thirty, too late to put them to bed, but-

“Can’t wait to see you, babe,” Will said.

“Me, too.” But it would be early enough she could get some sleep before Alice started demanding cereal-

“So are you going to see North?”

“What?”

“Are you going to see North while you’re in town?”

“No. Why would I see North?”

“Well, you’re in Columbus. So is North.”

“So is Flo, two blocks from Max and Erma’s, but I have to get back to the kids. I have time to see one person. You.”

“You’re not staying the night?”

“No. I have to get back to the kids.”

“Andie, it’s been almost a month,” Will said.

“What’s been… oh.”

“I’m a patient man, but-”

“Yes, you are, and I appreciate it,” Andie said. But I have to get back to the kids.

“-my patience is running out here. You won’t let me come down to see you and you won’t stay up here-”

“I know, I know. Look, we should talk about this because for a while here, the kids are going to come first. I know that’s not fair to you-”

“I haven’t even met the kids yet, give me a chance.”

“Honey, I’ll give you all the chances you want once I get them back to Columbus and settled in.”

“How much longer do you think it’ll be?”

“I don’t know. I’m hoping to get some help at the library. Can we talk about this at dinner? Because I really have to go.”

“Sure,” he said, but he didn’t sound happy, which was understandable. It had been almost a month for her, too.

Except it hadn’t. She hadn’t even thought about sleeping with Will. Maybe it was age. Except women were supposed to hit their peaks in their thirties.

Or maybe it was because she’d dreamt of making love with North almost every night since she’d gone south, that it was North she wanted even though she knew that the North she wanted was a fantasy.

Maybe it was time to break it off with Will until she got her head back in the right place. He was a great guy and he deserved better. And she really wasn’t missing him, which wasn’t a good sign.

Later for that, she thought and went out to the university.

At the OSU library, she found a newspaper article on a panel discussion on ghosts. The big name there was the professor from Cincinnati named Boston Ulrich, the guy who’d written the book she’d found at the Grandville library, who’d evidently wowed the crowd with his assertions that ghosts did exist, although not in the ridiculous portrayals in movie and fiction. “They’re like us,” the article quoted him as saying, “except dead.” The buzzkill in the group was another professor, this one named Dennis Graff from Cleveland, who’d sourly asserted that there was no proof of actual hauntings. He was not popular. Andie wrote down his name and found his contact information by digging deeper. Boston Ulrich wasn’t the only writer on ghosts; Dennis Graff had written many dry papers on paranormal phenomena, two of which Andie found in the library, but evidently all of which had the same theme: No Such Thing As Ghosts. It took a lot to make the supernatural dry, but Dennis Graff had managed it. There were also a host of “ghost experts” that Andie was pretty sure would be of no use at all. The best of that bunch, a medium named Isolde Hammersmith, charged nosebleed prices, so somebody must have thought she was good, but the last thing Andie needed was somebody who thought she could talk to ghosts. What she needed was somebody who could explain why ghosts didn’t exist and how somebody was faking them or Andie was hallucinating them or whatever.

She left the library and drove slowly down High Street, trying to avoid hitting any jaywalking students while preoccupied with her options. Maybe a psychiatrist, maybe her mind was playing tricks. Or maybe a detective, the Archers had an agency right there in Columbus they used, so maybe somebody just needed to investigate and find out… Something. There had to be something…

She looked up and realized she’d automatically turned off High and onto Fifth Street, force of habit from when she’d been married to North and made that drive every day, so when she reached Neil Avenue, she turned left, heading south again. But when she neared the big blue Victorian that said ARCHER LEGAL GROUP on the tastefully painted sign out front, she slowed and then pulled over when the car behind her honked.

The light was on back in North’s office. It was almost six but he was in there, she could see the glow from his window. He’d be in there for hours yet probably. The second floor of the house was dark, Lydia must be out, and of course the attic apartment wasn’t lit up; North wasn’t there. I’m not there.

So he was working late behind that damn desk. She hadn’t always hated that desk. There’d been many an evening when she’d gone downstairs from their apartment at six and said, Hey, you have a wife, and shoved his papers on the floor, and he’d kissed her and they’d ended up on that desk, breathing hard. That was a sturdy piece of furniture, which had been a good thing, until the day she’d gone down to see him, and he’d snapped, Not now, I have to finish this…

The door to the house next door opened and Southie came out with the usual bounce in his step, off to have dinner with whatever woman he was chasing or drinks with some pal or something else that would make him happy. Maybe I should have married Southie, she thought, and then realized how awful that would have been. Southie was a sweetheart but she’d have killed him before the year was out just from sheer exasperation at his inability to focus on anything for longer than a month. And he didn’t work. It really was hard to respect a man who didn’t work seriously at something…

Wow, she thought. That came out of nowhere. Maybe that had been part of North’s pull, that he was such a hard worker. There was irony for you.

Southie got in his car and drove away.

She looked back at the light in North’s office. She could go in there and talk to him. She could tell him that they should look into art schools for Carter, she could tell him that Alice would love to meet a lepidopterist although she wouldn’t act like it, she could tell him she thought somebody was playing tricks on her, that she was having weird dreams…

No, she couldn’t tell him about the dreams. And she couldn’t go in there, either. He was working.

She looked at the clock and saw it was almost six-thirty and started the car. She was late, and there was no reason in the world for her to walk through that door again, walking through that door just made her angry.

She made two turns and got back on High Street, irrationally upset, and angry with herself for being irrationally upset.

She had bigger problems than being discarded ten years ago. Focus, she told herself, and turned the car down Frankfort and into German Village and her future husband.

Andie found a parking spot not far from Flo’s house and ran the block and a half to the restaurant. Will was sitting next to the window in the narrow side bay, and his face lit up when he saw her and he waved as she ran by, so when she kissed him and then sat down across from him, breathless, he said, “Easy there, kid.”

“I’m sorry I’m late,” she said, leaning back to catch her breath.

“I’m just glad to see you,” he said, laid-back as ever, the soft overhead light shining on his blond hair, and she thought again what an extremely nice guy he was.

Oh, hell, she thought. I haven’t seen him for over three weeks. I should be thinking of something besides “nice guy.”

“What’s wrong?” he said, his smile fading.

“I’m not sure.” She shook her head. “Nothing.”

“Did you see North? Did he upset you?”

“No, I didn’t see him.” I thought about him, though. She looked at Will and realized that she’d never once felt the same way about him that she felt now for North, even now when it was over and she was never going to be with him again, she’d still been parked outside his house thinking, I could go in there.

“Well, then, let me get you a beer,” Will began.

“No, I have to drive tonight,” Andie said, remembering that long trip home in the dark. “Diet Coke would be great, though.”

Will caught the waitress and asked for a Diet Coke, and Andie picked up the menu. The year they’d been married, North had just ordered a Diet Coke and ice water with whatever he ordered. So if she was late, the drinks were on the table when she got there. It wasn’t important, in fact, it was kind of controlling of him, really a black mark against him…

It had been nice. To have the little stuff like that just… handled.

“Andie?”

If she told Will that she’d like him to order the Diet Coke and water before she got there, he would. He wasn’t a mind reader, for Christ’s sake.

“Andie?”

“What? Oh, sorry. Distracted.” Andie looked at her menu without seeing it. Something was really, really wrong, and it wasn’t ghosts. She put the menu down again and looked at Will, really looked at him.

He was a good guy. Sweet, thoughtful, charming, smart, a really hard worker, she’d fallen for him because he was all those things and because he’d never break her heart the way North had because she didn’t love him that way, that hopeless, helpless, all-consuming passion for somebody that wrecked your life…

“Now I’m getting nervous,” Will said.

She didn’t want that kind of love again. But maybe Will did. Maybe he deserved somebody who loved him that way.

“Andie?”

“It’s just strange coming back here,” she told him.

“To Max and Erma’s?”

“To Columbus.”

“You’ve only been gone three weeks.”

“It’s been an intense three weeks.”

“All the more reason for you to spend the night,” Will said, smiling, easy. “Give yourself some time to decompress.”

“I’ve been compressed since I walked into North’s office.”

“I love hearing about how he makes you feel crappy,” Will said. “Does that make me a bad person?”

He was grinning at her, trying to get her into their usual laughing conversation, but she shook her head.

“You’re one of the best people I know,” she told him.

“Well, thank you very much. So what’s wrong?”

“I’m just really tired. It’s me, not you.” Well, it was a little him, but mostly it was the kids. She looked at her watch. It was almost their bedtime now, but Crumb probably wouldn’t put them to bed, and she definitely wouldn’t tell Alice a story and-

“Andie?” Will said, and she jerked her attention back to him.

“Sorry. It’s the kids’ bedtime. I’m thinking about tooth brushing and storytelling. Not very romantic.”

“See? I knew you’d want to be a mother after you had some time with kids.”

“I don’t want to be a mother,” Andie said, really sick of saying that to him. “I want to take care of Alice and Carter.”

“I can’t wait to meet them,” Will said, trying to placate her.

He was being nice. She was being bitchy. “Oh, hell, I’m sorry again. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“Maybe you’re sexually frustrated,” Will said. “Come back to the apartment and I’ll take care of that. You can go back tomorrow.”

I don’t want to. “That’s very generous. But if I leave now, I can be home by midnight. I don’t like leaving the kids alone.” Andie leaned back as the waitress put her Diet Coke in front of her. “Thank you.” Would she have said no to North? She never had, not until the end, when she was on her way out the door, trying to save herself-

“There’s a housekeeper.”

“Yeah, well, you haven’t met the housekeeper.”

“I’d like to,” Will said, his smile gone. “But you won’t let me-”

“Will, can we just…” She looked at him then, at the great guy he was, and thought, Great guy but the wrong guy. Goddammit.

“Can we just what?”

“You’re a great guy, Will.”

“Thank you.” He smiled at her again.

“You’re sweet and you’re kind and you’re smart and you’re hardworking, you’re everything I admire in a man.”

“If you’re trying to make me feel better, you’re doing a great job.” He saluted her with his beer.

“And you’re very good in bed.”

“So about tonight,” Will began.

“And those are all the reasons I wanted to be with you.”

Will’s smile disappeared. “Wanted?”

“I chose you because you really are an amazing man, somebody I could have fun with for the rest of my life, somebody I could trust, somebody who would always be there for me.” The words were pouring out of her now, she couldn’t stop if she tried-

“These are good things,” Will said, looking confused.

“And I really do love you,” Andie said.

“Good,” Will said, even more confused.

“When I left North, I left him. I never went back. I didn’t see him for ten years. And then when I went to give him the checks back, I sat in his reception room just simmering with anger, I was still so angry with him, Will, I was irrational.”

“Hey, if he makes you that unhappy, stay away from him.”

“If he makes me that unhappy, I’m not done with him,” Andie said, and there it was, right there out loud.

Will nodded. “I know. I think it’s good you’re talking to him again. I mean, I don’t like it, but I can see where you need to sever that connection-”

“That’s not it,” Andie said. “I love you, I think you’re a great guy, and I’m not going back to North, I can’t go back to him, but… I’m still tied to him, and until I work that out… I’m so sorry, Will. I’m so, so sorry.”

“So I’ll wait until you work it out.”

“No,” Andie said, and then the waitress came back to take their order and she shook her head. “No,” she said, and the waitress left again, and she said, “No, I need to stop this. I can’t see you anymore.”

Will sat back, looking stunned. “Just like that?”

“It’s not just like that, it’s been like that since I saw North again and met the kids.” She frowned, trying to think of how to explain it. “I’ve been running ever since I left North ten years ago. Well, before that, if I’m going to be honest. But now I’ve got something I can’t run from.” She leaned forward, trying to make him see. “The kids need me. They don’t want anything from me, they’d be delighted if I left, but they need me. And things are so much better-”

“I don’t care about the kids,” Will said. “I care about you. I-”

“I need to be without North and you,” Andie said. “Until I get the kids safe, until I figure out what the hell I want, I need to just be… me.”

“When have I ever asked you to be anything else?” he said, clearly annoyed now.

“You haven’t. I put that badly.” Andie rubbed her forehead. “Okay, I’ll make this simple. I can’t give you what you deserve, and I’m not going to feel guilty about it anymore, so we’re finished.”

“Don’t you think I should decide what I deserve?”

“I think I should decide what-”

“Because ‘I need to take care of two kids I barely know’ is not a good enough reason.”

“I still want North.”

As soon as she said it, she slumped, as if the tension of denial had been keeping her upright. God, that felt good, she thought. The truth really does set you free. Then she looked across the table at Will as the silence stretched out and thought, Oh, hell.

“I’m sorry,” she began, and then somebody rapped on the window and Andie jerked around.

Flo was outside, waving.

“Wonderful,” Andie said, and got up.

“Wait a minute,” Will said, looking furious.

“No,” Andie said. “I am so sorry I did this to you, I am so sorry I’m doing this now, but… no.”

She turned and walked away, out of the restaurant and around to Frankfort Street where Flo was waiting.

“I saw your car,” she said. “You look awful. What’s going on?”

“I just broke it off with Will.”

“Good.” Flo patted her arm.

The sympathy was almost too much. “I think I might still be in love with North.”

“I know, honey.” Flo put her arm around her. “Come on back to the house and I’ll make some cocoa.”

That sounded so good that Andie almost said yes, just to be able to go back home with her mother, put her head down on the old wood kitchen table, and cry like a baby from all the released tension while Flo made soothing noises and put marshmallows in her hot chocolate.

“I can’t,” she said. “I have to get back to the kids.”

“Then I’ll walk you to the car,” Flo said, and made soothing noises for a block and a half.

“Thank you for not saying ‘I told you so,’ ” Andie told her when they reached her car.

“Like I would.” Flo stretched up and kissed her cheek. “If you need me, you call.”

“Right,” Andie said. “I will. I really will. Thank you, Mom.”

She kissed her mother good-bye and then made good time heading south, turning off onto the ever-more-deserted roads and then finally onto the narrow lane to the house, taking that insane drop to the driveway that Bruce still had not gotten around to fixing-“I’ll probably be out in a couple of days or so,” he said whenever she called-all the while thinking about North. Not Will, the nice guy she’d just dumped who would have been a good, steady, loving husband who’d never neglect her, but the rat bastard who’d deserted her for his career, just left her upstairs in their attic apartment to rot…

I have to stop thinking about this, she told herself, and drove out of the trees and started around the curve to the house and then hit the brakes, her heart pounding.

The girl from her dreams was dancing on the lawn, translucent and glowing faintly blue in the dark night, her skirt flowing around her.

Alice’s blue princess who danced.

Andie drove on slowly, trying to see better, but as she rounded the curve, the headlights hit the dancing girl for a second and she wasn’t there anymore, and when Andie drove on, the lawn was empty, even after the headlights had passed.

“I’m not asleep,” Andie said out loud, her heart pounding, “and that was a ghost.”

More than that, it was a ghost Alice knew. Just like Alice knew the woman across the pond and the man on the tower. If she was hallucinating, she was hallucinating with Alice.

“This can’t be happening,” Andie said, trying to jar herself back to reality with the sound of her own voice. It was late, she was tired, she was upset, she was…

That was a ghost.

She drove on around the house automatically, thinking furiously. Tomorrow she was calling the experts. And talking to Alice. And…

“Oh, Christ,” Andie said, and parked the car, looking for ghosts everywhere before she bolted for the house.