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  Libby reached out and took his other hand. “Mom’s bi-polar, clinically depressed, has early stages of dementia, and never got past Melissa’s death, Dad. Do the math.”

  Her father’s face twisted into a familiar half-grin, one that had nothing to do with humor.

  “You devoted your life to her,” Libby said. “You’d never admit it, but I know your decision to move to The Crossing was only because it’s a much smaller church. You couldn’t handle the larger congregation in Tooele City and Mom at the same time.”

  Her father began to speak, but instead turned his attention back to the thick book. He ran a wrinkled finger along the cracked leather while his lips moved silently. Then he spoke. “I’m not sure how long I can keep this up. I can’t perform my pastoral duties with your mom in the condition she’s been in lately. I’m tired all the time.”

  “Are you taking your heart meds every day?”

  Her father nodded without looking at her.

  “Dad?”

  “I take them every day and I make sure your mother does too.”

  “Good,” Libby said. “What does Doctor Feit say?”

  “He recommends taking away her car keys and putting safeguards in place like door alarms and extra locks. I’ve also had several nice ladies at the church offer to help.”

  Libby laid both of her hands on the desk. “I know you, Dad. There’s something else you’re not telling me.”

  He turned toward the lone window in his office.

  “What do you know that I don’t?” Libby waited in silence as her father fiddled with his watch stem pretending to adjust the time. He seemed to be debating something in his head. When he finally turned back to face her, his face had a reddish hue.

  “Your mother wrestled her demons for over forty years, honey. And I think she kind of gave up when Melissa died. I didn’t want to burden you, just wanted you to be aware since…” He exhaled as his shoulders slumped.

  “Since?”

  “I’m sure part of her recent problems are being exacerbated by the upcoming anniversary.” Her father sighed. “It’s hard to believe Melissa has been gone almost a year.” He pulled reading glasses off his nose and tossed them on the desk. “Still, I sense something else going on now—something behind your mother’s eyes that wasn’t there before.”

  Libby cradled herself deeper in the overstuffed leather chair and, despite all her mental objections, once again envisioned the carnage that took place over ten months ago and six thousand miles away. The violent explosion of gray metal and cold sea, visions of Melissa’s dress white pants with their knife-sharp creases floating in bloody salt water—images against which all the anti-depressants in the world were defenseless. Libby shook her head. Enough. “Has she stopped with the paintings yet?”

  Nicholas shook his head. “She probably has twenty by now.” He swiped at the corners of both eyes with the back of his hand. “Sorry, honey. I shouldn’t be burdening you with this. I should lean more on my faith.”

  “Faith isn’t helping anything, Dad,” Libby said. “Melissa is dead, and Mom is flipping out. We’re on our own.” Her voice had risen too loud and too fast, and the look on her father’s face caused her heart to sink in her chest. Pastor and father Nicholas Meeker was not only the finest man she knew, but also the only one who was blessed, or perhaps cursed, with the gift of an unshakable faith. “I’m sorry, Dad,” she said quietly.

  “That’s OK, Shorty.”

  He hadn’t used that nickname in years, and hearing it only caused her throat to tighten and her heart to race more than it already was. She reached out for his weathered hands. “She’s still insisting it’s not me?”

  Her father shook his head. “She was wearing the Navy whites,” he said softly.

  Of course. Libby nodded her head. The uniform her mother had been so proud of. “And she’s only seeing Mel inside the house?”

  Her father nodded so imperceptibly that Libby almost missed it.

  “Does she think it’s a ghost?”

  “No such thing,” he said without hesitation. “Your mother knows we die once according to Scripture, and souls of the deceased do not linger in this world. Superstitions like that are stains on our faith, Libby.”

  She sighed. “So, Mom’s insisting Mel survived?”

  “She keeps repeating the fact that Melissa’s remains where never…” Nicholas gulped and tipped his head back so far he was staring at the ceiling. “They never verified it was your sister’s body.”

  “DNA testing is only used when necessary,” Libby said. “For gosh sakes, Dad, her dog tags were still on the body.”

  “What was left of…” Nicholas’s voice cracked and faded, and a single tear chartered an erratic course through the stubble on his face.

  “You’re not buying into Mom’s theory too, are you?”

  He lowered his head and shook it slowly from side to side.

  “The Navy’s report was very clear, Dad,” Libby said. “The propellant they stored in the Girardeau’s gun turrets dated back to the Korean War. Their tests proved it could ignite if not handled properly and the report said the warhead in the sixteen-inch gun was over-rammed. It was a simple mistake.”

  “By my daughter.”

  Libby squeezed her eyes shut and pursed her lips. “The only thing the report verified was the fact that Melissa was the munitions technician on duty in turret three.”

  “It also said the gun shouldn’t have been loaded in the first place,” he said. “How could—”

  “Stop.” Libby held up both hands. “You’re not saying she did it deliberately, Dad. You know you don’t believe that.”

  “I’m not saying anything, honey, but the circumstances are so strange. If Melissa was on duty and did load the gun like the Navy said, how did she manage to be on the deck when it exploded? Shouldn’t she have been inside the turret?”

  “She never quit smoking, Dad. She was seen sneaking a cigarette on the deck outside of turret three minutes before the explosion.”

  Her father rubbed his face with both hands.

  “I’m not sure if it’s her illnesses or the drugs she’s taking for all of it, but your mother is convinced Melissa is still alive.” He slumped further into his chair. “But you and I know who’s buried in your sister’s grave.”

  Libby turned her gaze to the hallway outside her father’s office, towards the steps leading up to her parent’s second story bedroom. Behind thick drapes designed to hold sunlight at bay, Marilyn Meeker still slept in the late morning.

  She sighed.

  A ghost from their collective pasts had materialized to haunt her mother, and if Libby were to be truly honest, she too would have to admit that she’d been sensing Melissa’s presence, and that the feeling had gotten much stronger in recent weeks. She leaned forward and planted both elbows on her father’s desk. “Do you think this could have anything to do with that Native American voodoo she believes in?”

  Her father shook his head. “Your mother is a Christian, Libby. I don’t think Marilyn put much stock in your grandmother’s old Choctaw legends.”

  Libby envisioned a glistening river in Egypt-denial-but decided against making the sarcastic observation. “Just a thought.” She waited while her father adjusted a framed photo of his wife that didn’t look as if it needed adjusting. “You know, Mom’s a lot like her mother, Dad. I loved my G-Ma, but you have to admit she was really out there at times.”

  Her father started to say something, but stopped and rubbed the corner of his eye with his knuckle. “I heard about the puzzle incident last night,” he said.

  Libby’s heart shifted inside her chest as she adjusted her weight in the chair. “So that’s why you asked me to come over this morning,” she said. “Aisha has a big mouth.”

  “She cares about you.”

  “I found a birthday card after she left, so it was a lot to do about nothing.”

  Her father’s eyes softened. “Well, that makes me feel a whole lot better. W
ho was it from?”

  Libby made a show of looking at her phone.

  “Libby?”

  “It wasn’t signed.”

  Her father stared at her. “This isn’t adding up, Libby. What was the picture on the puzzle?”

  Libby shrugged her shoulders. “Whoever started it didn’t finish, so I don’t have a clue.”

  “Who has a key to your house besides me?”

  “Aisha and...” Libby hesitated. She traced her father’s gaze as it drifted out his office door and up the dark staircase. She hadn’t considered her mother as a possibility, but it appeared her father did.

  While Libby debated the idea, her mind sifted through the logistics of it all once again, only to become lost in a jumble of images, the most prominent of which was the single piece left alone inside the completed edges of the puzzle. A tiny piece of curved wood, prominently featuring a pair of familiar green eyes.

  5

  Libby relaxed her grip on the steering wheel, lowered the window of her late model sedan, and drew cold air into her lungs. Her heart beat in perfect synch with the sweep of the wiper blades as she pulled into the parking lot of the MOBS Saloon.

  Tooele’s former town jailhouse was now a popular pub, its walls lined with graffiti, old license plates, and numerous artifacts from the region’s rich mining history. Modern LED lights strung around the ceiling shaped a unique fusion of the past and present, while also helping to keep the ghosts of northern Utah’s nineteenth-century gold miners at bay.

  Libby parked her car between two pickup trucks in the middle of the parking lot. The air was cold on her neck and face when she opened the car door, so she pulled the collar of her coat up while taking long strides toward the entrance. Two cars faced the front corners of the building, looking like bookends to a row of motorcycles with more chrome than the law allowed, prompting Libby to crack a smile. Another interesting crowd.

  MOBS’s bells jingled when Libby pushed open the front door.

  Aisha stood at the bar smiling, in deep conversation with a man who, as far as Libby knew, was not her current love interest. Aisha waved, turned, and blew an air kiss at the handsome young man while pointing to a group of club chairs nestled in front of a roaring fire—one with a familiar pink coat draped over the back.

  Libby worked her way through waitresses in black aprons carrying plastic trays, settled into the faux leather, and let out a deep breath.

  Seconds later, Aisha came up from behind and planted a kiss on the top of Libby’s head. “Hey,” she said, as she slumped into the adjacent chair.

  Libby cocked her head. “Done with Mike already?”

  “Elizabeth Lynett Meeker! You know I only have eyes for my Michael.”

  “What about that dude over there?”

  “William? Very nice man,” Aisha said with a grin. “But guys like Billy Boy are just to keep Michael on his toes.”

  “Shame on you.”

  Aisha tilted her head and scrunched her lips into a pout. “If I tell you something, will you promise not to get mad?”

  Libby frowned. “Toilet paper on the bottom of my shoe again?”

  Aisha shook her head. “You look like hell.”

  “If I tell you something, will you promise not to get mad?”

  “No.”

  “You’re awfully nosey,” Libby said. “How do you find so much time to meddle?”

  “I make time.”

  Libby rolled her eyes. “Thanks a lot for telling Dad about the puzzle.”

  Aisha frowned. “He needed to know, Libby. You have to admit that was strange.”

  Libby shrugged her shoulders. “Just some weird friend with a weird sense of decorum,” she said.

  “What did you do with it?”

  “I dumped all the pieces into a basket under the nightstand. When someone finally comes clean, Mom and I will have a whole puzzle to put together. I’m blessed.” Sarcasm was ripe in her tone.

  Aisha was about to speak when a pale, twenty-something waitress with multiple piercings and colorful tattoos running down her arms approached and popped a pink gum bubble. “I’m Julia,” she said, tapping a plastic nametag with a mechanical pencil she pulled from blonde dreadlocks. “Can I get you ladies something?”

  Aisha leaned in towards Libby. “I don’t want to sound like the rooster taking credit for the sunrise, honey, but a glass of wine might be good for what ails you.” She smiled and her eyes lit up. “I heard it through the grapevine.”

  Seriously? Libby struggled to keep her eyes from rolling out of their sockets. She turned to the young woman and smiled. “Chamomile, please.”

  “Got it,” the waitress said. “And you, Miss?”

  “How about an order of those toasted ravs?” Aisha turned to Libby. “You could use a little food too.”

  “What’s a rav and who toasts them?” Libby asked.

  “The owners are originally from an ethnic Italian neighborhood in St. Louis called The Hill,” Aisha said. “They deep-fry raviolis, sprinkle them with Parmesan cheese, and serve with marinara sauce for dipping. I always get them when I travel there on business. Trust me, they’re delicious.”

  “You’re right,” Libby said. “I could probably use something in my stomach.”

  Aisha placed a large order and waited until the waitress was out of earshot. “How’s Mom and Dad?”

  Libby pulled a tissue from her purse. “Dad’s OK. Mom was still in bed when I left at noon, so I didn’t have to…get a chance to spend any one-on-one time with her.”

  “You mean go to your happy place?”

  “Necessity is the mother of invention.”

  “You didn’t invent the out-of-body experience, Libby. But you’re the only person I know who can have one on-demand.”

  “I don’t make it happen; it just does—like a defense mechanism. It’s as though I’m in the room and watching our interaction, but not part of it.”

  Aisha’s lips pursed.

  “It’s a gift.” Libby forced a thin smile. “Her issues are getting worse and I can tell Dad’s really worried this time.”

  Aisha put her hand on Libby’s. “Talk to me.”

  “I’ll spare you the gory details. Suffice it to say I believe the upcoming anniversary of Melissa’s death is wearing on all of us.”

  “I don’t want to be spared, Libby. Melissa was like a sister to me too. You need to talk about it.”

  Libby spoke before her brain could fence in her lips. “She’s hallucinating.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Without hesitating, Libby re-told her father’s story. She hoped that sharing the bizarre tale might somehow immunize her against the cerebral malady infecting her mother’s side of the family. The whole time, Aisha studied her face. “Dad said she thought it was me at first.”

  “Before your Mom decided she was being haunted by her dead daughter?”

  Libby paused and drew in a deep breath. “She doesn’t think it’s a ghost.”

  Aisha arched her eyebrows for a few seconds and then shook her head.

  “I know, I know.”

  “You haven’t been right for the past couple of weeks either.” Aisha scooted out to the edge of her chair and rested her elbows on her knees. “When was the last time you had your nightmare?”

  A background symphony of muffled voices and clinking glasses faded, and familiar images swept over Libby as she gripped the arms of the chair. She was six, maybe seven in the dream, swinging from one of the two tires her father hung from the tall oak tree in front of her childhood home. The remnants of the same tree that still stood in what was her yard now, charred from a freak lightning bolt over ten years ago.

  The other tire was empty, but swayed back and forth in sync with Libby as she kicked her legs out from underneath a pleated gingham dress. The gravel driveway in her dream was much longer than the one in real life, surrounded by a thick canopy of spruce trees like giants out of a dark fantasy. In the shadows created by the trees, a dim figure in white would
approach during each dream, but Libby was unable to look at the specter’s face, perhaps for fear its identity might be revealed.

  “Hey!” Aisha said.

  The fuzzy images suddenly dissipated, replaced by a look of concern on Aisha’s face. “You OK?”

  Libby managed to nod. She took a sip of the tea from a mug that had magically appeared on the table in front of her.

  “You zoned out again.”

  Libby pulled in a deep breath and let it out slowly.

  “You should go see that Choctaw woman your mom always talks about,” Aisha said. “You’ve tried everything else.”

  The word eccentric didn’t completely describe her best friend, but was as good as any. “Seriously, Azzi,” Libby said, “I should visit a witch doctor?”

  “Medicine woman.”

  “Aren’t you the same person who suggested I sleep with a strand of garlic around my neck when my next-door neighbor moved in a few years ago?”

  “You have to admit, that guy was so weird. Plus, he slept all day and was up all night.”

  “He was a customer support rep working the night shift.”

  Aisha held up her three middle fingers in the shape of the letter W and then spun them sideways to form the letter E.

  “What. Ever,” she said with a roll of her eyes.

  “Well, that’s a new one,” Libby said. “Where did you learn it…middle school?”

  Aisha dropped both hands in her lap. “You and I both know your mom bought into that stuff. If you go see her it might shed some light.”

  “On what? How can—”

  “Doctor what’s-her-name hasn’t helped you. If you go, you might get a better understanding of some of your grandma and mother’s beliefs. You might even be able to help your mom work through her issues.”

  Libby nodded as if she agreed with Aisha’s point. She didn’t. “Her issues go well beyond Melissa’s death, Azzi. You know that. I’m not sure she’s capable of working through anything anymore. I’m not so sure I can either.”

  “You’re a pessimist.”

  “Realist.”

  “That’s what all pessimists say. Have you considered what I suggested last month?”