LITMIR.BIZ

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to secure a special food treat, it might get stolen by one of the other kids or confiscated by the adults in the home. As a result, I developed a habit of hoarding and hiding food to protect and preserve it.

      I can’t blame the foster system for all my quirks. My mother raised me for my first seven years, what the experts consider to be the formative years, but given the fact that my mother was a prostitute and my father was a mystery man who remains unidentified—assuming my mother even knew who he was—I’m guessing my chances at any normal development were slim to none.

      I see Allie approaching and shove the fruit back into my pocket, embarrassed and ashamed. Allie has a chagrined look on her face and for a moment I’m afraid she knows I’ve copped a piece of her fruit.

      “That was a work call,” she says, and I breathe a sigh of relief. “I need to pick up a body. But the good news is it’s a patient here at the hospital up on the floor.”

      “Then you don’t have far to go.”

      “Except I can’t very well pick her up in my personal car. I need to go to the funeral home and grab one of the hearses.” She sighs, frowns, and stares at Danny, who looks quite peaceful in his sleep—for now.

      “Dr. Finnegan said he can stay here and sleep off the medication they gave him,” I tell her. “Why don’t you go take care of your work detail and then check back with Dr. Finnegan when you’re done. I think she’d be amenable to letting Danny go home with you if he seems okay when he wakes up.”

      She gives me a meager smile, and her phone, which she is holding in her hand, goes off again, a different ring tone this time. Allie’s smile falters and I see hesitation in her expression as she stares at the face of the phone. Finally, with a look of resolve, she answers it.

      “Hey, Joel,” she says, turning away from me, her voice low.

      I listen as she explains to Joel what is going on, stating simply that Danny is doing better with some medication the ER doctor has given him. After telling him she needs to go out on a call, she listens for a long time, then says, “I love you, too,” and disconnects the call.

      “Everything okay?” I ask her.

      She nods. “Joel is learning... and adapting. He’s been a lifesaver, so eager to help and all, but I don’t think he fully realized how difficult things can get. That’s why I agreed to let him move in with us. I figured if we’re ever going to tie the knot, he needs to know exactly what he’s getting into. He’s embraced it all without hesitation, but I’m reluctant to let him take on too much too soon. I don’t want to scare him off. Having him here has been such a help and relief for me.”

      “I didn’t realize you were dating anyone. How long have you known him?”

      “About a year. We hit it off right away and he proposed just a few weeks ago.”

      I see Devo standing over by the nurse’s desk, and he gives me a questioning look as he points at his watch. “I need to go back out with the police officer,” I tell Allie. “Danny will be fine here. The ER staff knows him well, and they’ll take care of him until you get back. Are you okay with that?”

      She nods without hesitation. “We’ve been down this road before.” She pauses and frowns. “Though the fact that Danny’s having visual hallucinations, and not just hearing his usual voices, worries me. They’ve been quite bizarre, more than just the ghost thing.” She shoots me a worried look and I know she wants me to ask for specifics, so she can use me as her sounding board.

      “How so?”

      “Before you and the police officer got to my place, he was saying how he’d watched a man get killed and did nothing to stop it.”

      “Yes, I heard him say that, too. He seems to think that’s why this ghost is appearing to him.”

      “But you didn’t hear all of it. He was very specific about the details of how this man died. He said they put a gun under his chin and blew the top of his head off.” She shivers and gives me a worried look. “There haven’t been any deaths like that in the area, have there?”

      I shake my head. “None that I know of. I’ll check with Officer Devonshire to make sure, but I think I would have heard about it if there had been. Heck, in a town this size we all would have heard about it. Gossip goes through Sorenson at lightning-quick speeds.”

      Another meager smile graces Allie’s lips. “You’re right.” She looks away, then back at me, her smile faltering. “Danny also said that a spotted purple and pink dinosaur watched the murder.”

      I take a second to digest this. I can tell Allie is scared for her brother and worried about what these bizarre and very specific visual hallucinations might mean in terms of his mental stability.

      “A spotted purple and pink dinosaur?” I echo, both amused and bemused. “That’s a good one. And you’re right, it’s a bit different from Danny’s usual auditory hallucinations.”

      In the past, whenever Danny went off his meds, he’d hear voices telling him to do things. Some of the voices were kindly and suggested he do silly things, but others were more frightening, both in how they came across to him and in what they told him to do, things like taking off his clothes and running into the lake in the dead of winter.

      “I’ll mention the dinosaur thing to Dr. Finnegan,” I tell Allie. “Maybe the new meds Danny’s on have visual hallucinations as a side effect.” This suggestion wins me a hopeful look from Allie.

      “Oh, if only it’s something that simple.” She reaches over and gives my arm a squeeze. “Thank you, Hildy. You’ve always been so good with Danny and me. We appreciate all your help.”

      “My pleasure,” I tell her, and I mean it. I don’t like all my patients, and some I like more than others. Regardless of how I feel about them, I always strive to give them my best. But Allie and her brother have always been high on my list of favorites. I love Allie’s dogged determination and the fierce love she has for her brother. And Danny, while cursed with some nasty mental illness challenges, has a big heart.

      I’m expecting Allie to leave, but she’s still standing there looking at her brother, chewing on one side of her thumbnail the same way Danny had earlier.

      “What is it Allie?”

      “I have to admit, that ghost thing has me a little freaked.”

      I dismiss her concern with a pfft and a wave of my hand. “The ghost part of Danny’s hallucination doesn’t worry me nearly as much as the dinosaur. It would be easy for him to misinterpret something like a bit of fog he saw during a period when his emotions were heightened, and his mental status was out of balance.”

      Allie is staring at me in a most disconcerting way and I can tell she’s holding back.

      “What aren’t you telling me?” I ask her after a few seconds.

      Allie looks around us to see if anyone is nearby or listening in on our conversation. Satisfied that we are alone, she leans in close to me and says, “When we were driving by the cemetery on the way here, Danny said he saw the ghost.”

      “Yes, he did. I’m sure seeing the cemetery triggered it. I don’t know what he saw... maybe it was something he cooked up in his imagination.”

      “I don’t think so,” Allie says just above a whisper. “Unless I’m as crazy as my brother. I saw it, too.”

      I look at her, my brow furrowed. “You saw what?” I say, thinking I must have misunderstood or misheard her.

      “I saw the ghost,” she says softly. “It was exactly like Danny said earlier. An older man’s face and body, all wispy and white, easy to see yet with no real substance. And it appeared right out of the trunk of a big old tree in the cemetery when we drove by.”

      Chapter 3

      Allie’s revelation is

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