Chapter 3

When I came to, I opened my eyes tentatively, half-expecting John the ghost to greet me to my new fixed abode. Instead, I was cheerfully greeted by Steve who had conveniently propped me up against an apple tree which looked like it might have been as old as the one that had led to the discovery of gravity (a non-trivial force which I could vividly remember having challenged with little success).

"So, how are you feeling?"

The list of possible answers was easily narrowed to just one:

"Blown away?"

"That seems normal. You were in fact blown away. Still, you're in one piece."

I instinctively went about finding out whether that was indeed the case, and when all the body math checked out I happily concurred that indeed I was wholesome, at least physically. I actually felt great. I thought it must've been a miracle that I hadn't even broken a single bone. It was a most welcome turn of events, surviving a gas explosion intact. So much in fact that I felt compelled to ask without worry:

"Where's Eileen?"

And then I saw her lying flat on the ground, her hair curled up around her face, tangled like she had just washed her face. She looked insanely serene, no pun intended. She really looked peaceful. Like in a deep sleep or ... The thought just flashed across my mind like it was being stamped with the words by a really fierce customs officer, and my mouth moved of its own:

"Is she dead?"

And then I heard this really warm and sensuous voice coming out of nowhere with crystal clarity, as loud as a nagging thought:

"Right here, Bobby."

I pride myself in thinking that I have extensive experience with using my eyes to look at things. Nevertheless, I was unable to see Eileen's lips move, not even by a hair's breadth.

"I'm in here with you, Bobby. Don't be scared," I heard her voice in my mind and I knew she was telling the truth.

Steve was putting together some twigs and sticks on a small pile, when he said as if on cue:

"Yeah, it worked. There was this slight side-effect though. It'll wear off once we're done."

What the words implied instantly made my brain sent powerful signals across my body, urging me to go ballistic. Holding my head with one hand I could feel my pulse grow stronger and stronger, to the point where if someone pricked me with a needle I'd probably explode. I heard Eileen's voice sweet and calming, as if everything was right as pie:

"Don't worry, Bobby. It's only temporary. I won't be a bother, you'll see."

Somewhere along my mind there was a battle being fought between the impartial, calculating, cold forces of the logical parts of my brain and the mushy, animal-based subconscious mind that always believed it knew better. Beaten time and again, just this once it had won over and its uproar was translated into words coming out of my mouth:

"Damned if I'll be, but I believe her."

Steve looked up to me as if frogs were spewing forth from my mouth and he just blurted:

"I was not ogling your ass when you were unconscious; that's just something troubled spirits might say when outside their usual host bodies, you know because they're confused, can't tell their ass from their elbow usually. I really wasn't; Cross my heart and hope to die. Indian scout's honor."

"You weren't doing what?" I asked, but I never really meant to know anything about what he might've been really doing, ever.

I could see the fire trucks and the sheriff's office had done their part, and had extinguished the fire. The mansion had turned into a very big piece of charcoal, and we were safely and quite pertinently almost half a mile away, idly sitting under a tree, looking as innocent as any picnickers. The mansion was pretty much far off the road, so there weren't really any bystanders or eye-witnesses, and that only meant it would merely be a matter of minutes until someone noticed us and thought about coming around and start asking questions. Steve was probably on the same train of thought when he said somewhat hesitantly:

"Shouldn't we be, leaving? I mean, I don't think you're exactly on good terms with the boys over there."

"Even though I should just tie you up on that tree alongside a five-gallon of gas and a blowtorch and write 'I LOVE TO WATCH THEM BURN' on your forehead, I won't. And yeah, you could say I avoid law enforcers like the bubonic plague. Yeah, it's time we made ourselves scarce."

"What about me?!" I said, and knew it wasn't me saying that. I covered my mouth with one hand in shocked surprise, while the other one was already on my waist adding to a very feminine body posture which must've looked very ridiculous and gay, perhaps much to the chagrin of Steve who paused and turned around looking at me like there was overwhelming evidence of something weird going on. He sighed and said:

"Eileen? While he was out, we had a talk. Don't do that, it's not polite."

"You were going to just walk away!"

Steve was motioning slowly with his hands, as if that would calm her down. I was standing there very much like a statue, blinking erratically.

"No, we just now decided we should leave. No reason to get upset. We're going to carry you to..."

He looked at me with a helpless expression. I focused on just one name and curiously enough I was able to say it as well:

"Mama Adele!"

"Mama Adele!" echoed Steve quite unconvincingly with a half-witted smile.

I suddenly could move again as if some invisible cords had just snapped. I flexed my muscles as if they had been brand new again, and then I dutifully proceeded to lift Eileen up and carry her on my shoulder. She was a lithe little thing and she wouldn't be a bother until we could get down to the road and maybe hail a cab. Steve looked a bit worried though, so I asked him:

"What's on your mind?"

"How are we going to walk around carrying her around like that?"

"Oh, that? Just pretend she's my wife to be."

"And does that make it okay for her to be unconscious?"

"Sure it does. It's kind of a tradition around these parts. As the saying goes -"

A grin formed on my mouth and I cocked my head slightly sideways before I said in an exaggerated southern drawl:

"Knock'em down, bag'em up, knock'em up while sheriff's outta town."

"Seriously?"

"Yup. Besides, I've done this before."

"With whom?"

I sighed and tried to look as bland and blank as possible with little success when I said:

"Eileen."

"Oh, I see. So there's quite some past between the two of you."

"Yeah, you could say that. By the way, what was that shit inside the mansion? What the fuck where you tripping on?"

"Oh, that was just part of the ritual."

I think I frowned really hard when I heard that, almost trying to connect one eyebrow with the other. I was inclined to ask Steve about his thoughts on the strategy of preemptive strikes in general, colloquially known as 'shoot first, ask questions later', and in this particular instance 'punch first, then punch again'. But somehow I felt it would be a very counterproductive thing to do, at least until this situation with Eileen had been resolved. I'm pretty sure my teeth made a grinding noise when I said:

"You did this on purpose?"

Steve cleared his throat and settled into a calm, even voice. It was what could have passed as the voice of a narrator in a boring documentary about the use of poultry in ballistic forensics. Speaking from experience though, it was just Steve, indirectly admitting he was a rather huge asshole:

"Part of the ritual involves letting the spirits run wild, and free. Best way to do that, is make you act like yourself, speak from the heart if you will. Normally, we would have spend weeks together in the wild, hunting, bonding, perhaps bathing naked in ice cold streams, with nothing but the cloudy sky for a roof and our knives for shelter. The light of the stars would have shone in our souls, and our spirits would mingle with the Father Wind, the changer of all things not set in stone. And you would learn to feel the currents of Mother Earth flow within you, all living things as one force, separate but not divided, unique but not alone. And your spirit would be ready then. But because we had to do this real quick, I improvised and nearly killed us all. It worked better than I expected."

"You're an asshole, Steve."

We soon reached the side of the road, and I saw a sign right across the other side advertising cheap food, strong coffee and liquor, and I quote: 'fit for pharmaceutical use'. I was genuinely surprised then to see Steve wet his lips with his tongue, and look at me with an expression that verged on what I believe mental health professionals (yeah, the overpaid quacks) call bipolar disorder. The left part of his face was contorted in a jarred grimace, the kind of mess that happens to your face when you realise you've put yourself into a situation that can only result in abject, petrifying horror or death-of-the-soul (kinda like visiting the in-laws or watching the eight o'clock news).

The other half, his right half, shone with the intensity and brilliance of a miniscule sun, as if the skin was made from the same stuff as the stars (which - technically speaking - is of course true), the same kind of face that an alcoholic makes at the first whiff of anything ending - or beginning - with 'ethyl'.

He started then to put his one foot in front of the other, when he stopped and looked at me once more.

"I'm ... I am, a bit thirsty. Parched, actually. Don't you think we deserve a drink? Just a refreshment." he said with a fake hoary voice.

Even though I was carrying Eileen on one shoulder, I managed to kick him in the nuts right about when he was about to cross the street anyhow. I looked at him and saw the universally recognisable, painful expression of a man feeling a little smaller.

"That was for earlier. You can get a drink when I'm alive, the job is done, and Eileen is back where she belongs."

And then I think my left hand slapped me in the face, probably because I ended that sentence in my mind with "back in her crazy ass"; Eileen was left handed.

"See? You need a drink too, you just won't admit it. Like the fact that you are actually attracted to members of the same -"

"You're getting us a ride to Mama Adele's, and if you try and finish that sentence the way I think you intend to, I'm gonna make sure you're viscerally reminded of that dead horse of yours."

I think he tried to laugh while on his knees, trying to stand back up, still in pain. He asked:

"You're just pissed off, I get that. But you need me, and besides; you wouldn't do that kind of thing."

"No, not before I made sure you experience some non-consensual animal sex first-hand."

He blinked, vacantly staring at me, not being able to connect the dots.

"'Gonna horse-rape you."

"Okay... ," he said and started looking up and down the road, while I couldn't wipe the smile off my face because I wasn't sure it was me or Eileen who had actually said 'horse-rape'.

I was getting the impression that Eileen's spirit was somehow different, yet the same, from the 'Crazy' Eileen I'd known. It felt like her, but without the craziness. It somehow felt right, kinda made me feel a little bad too. But all in all, I was quite optimistic even though I had less than twenty hours to live, the spirit of my ex-wife was trapped in my body, and I was resting my hopes on a ghost and a shaman with a drinking problem. Who wouldn't think to themselves: "How on Earth could ever, things be any worse?"

Mama Adele had laid out a really delicate tablecloth, the color of blinding white. A small feast had been laid out on the table, and the overpowering smell of freshly baked cornbread filled the small, homely kitchen. Steve was sitting opposite me, hesitant to start eating, constantly flicking his gaze between Mama Adele, me, and his plate. I was playing around with my fork, trying to appear as I was ready to start eating at any moment, while in fact I was classifying the potatoes on my plate according to size, shape, and complexion (an old habit I inherited while doing time in prison - it really helped with trying to not think about the showers).

Eileen's body was upstairs, comfortably lying in bed. Even though I could use a bit of a nap myself at that point, there was very little precious time to waste, and Mama Adele did not help things by insisting that we sat down and had supper. When she saw Eileen was out cold it seemed as if someone had pulled away the world under her feet. We told her half of the truth: some kind of trouble, the mansion burned to the ground, Eileen knocked unconscious, safe and sound but in need of rest.

She'd known the line of business I was in and that I've had some shady dealings in the past, and that her father wasn't exactly a virgin in the domain of law-breaking, so she knew that whatever it was I had gotten her into, a hospital would be a bad idea.

God bless her soul, she grudgingly took us in, on two conditions nevertheless: one, that we'd sit down, eat supper, have some coffee, a nice long talk and perhaps a couple of beatings. Two, if Eileen didn't wake up soon, she'd put a curse on me so vile, that I'd wish I'd never been conceived, much less born, and so evil, that'd make the devil and all his minions look like pussies (these were, to my recollection, her exact words).

She was known to have experience in the ju-ju crafts and a cabinet full of all sorts of dead animal parts, as well as all the spunk and the ferocity of a really old black lady that had raised Eileen like she had been her own. Her dry wrinkled face nevertheless sported piercing cougar-like eyes, and if looks could kill, hers would have been a weapon of mass destruction. I noticed she was eying me with just that kind of a look, and while Eileen inside me urged me once more to tell her the truth, before I could open my mouth and speak a single word, she motioned me to stay silent, waving a bony arthritis-swollen finger and saying:

"Robert Eugene Barhoe, you've got lots of explaining to do, young man."

I was about to point out that I was only thirty-three and consequently, according to national averages, not even middle-aged yet, but my cautious instincts got the better of me, and I simply braced myself for the beating which was probably where this would soon end.

"First of all, who is this Indian? I don't like him one bit. I think he's a queer. Just wait and see."

Steve shot me a look of surprise, like a rabbit popping up from his hiding place only to find out the hunting season is still on. He opened his mouth to speak, but Mama Adele still had the advantage and it didn't look like she was going to give it up anytime soon. She put up one hand with a warning finger that made us pause and watch as she unbuttoned her blouse with the other hand, slowly and decisively.

Normally the sight of a - probably senile - old woman undressing would have been met with urges and pleas to just stop, but this was Mama Adele and I dared not. Steve on the other hand was trying to politely look away, without appearing positively horrified at the thought of seeing any sort of tits that had lost any meaningful function since before the moon landing.

There was no other choice but to look away. Somethings are better left unseen, and this here was a case of things that cannot be unseen. It was primal instinct that made us flinch and shy away from her bare breasts.

A frying pan connected with my head. Mama Adele then said:

"That was because you're a son of a bitch. And him?" she said pointing an accusing finger at Steve, her breasts juggling and bobbing like a flag made of jello.

"He's definitely a queer. You'd never dare look at my breasts and I'd try and kill you for it, but any real, hot-blooded man, couldn't help taking a peep at Mama Adele's tits," she said and sat upright in her chair, smiling with all the pride a former, professional, well sought-after milkmaid could command.

Eileen kept shouting a singular, persistent 'no' inside my head, but I found the courage (and made the mistake) to somehow defend Steve from this atrocious show of lack of any sort of reason; I failed horribly when I said:

"He was just trying to be polite! Please, Mama Adele, button up, for God's sake. What if he just kept staring, like some sick rapist?"

Steve me gave a startled look, and I saw his eyes filled with the gleam of mounting horrors, his face broken like a man who knows he's lost a battle even before it has been fought. Mama Adele was adamant in her belief and said so with a bang of her hand on the table, her voice craggy but fierce:

"He'd be a devil-worshiping pervert straight from hell! But at least, he'd be a man! This one's just as gay as Mary Poppins. Believe me, I know. My last husband was gay, and I didn't know it until our wedding night, God bless his soul."

"You got married? And then he died?"

I ineffectively tried not to sound as if these two facts were actually somehow connected. Fortunately, Mama Adele seemed too focused on her tale, actually sounding a bit nostalgic:

"Last spring. He avoided my trappings of sweet love like a fly would a spider's web. Even when I finally cuffed him to the bed, he couldn't get it up. He wouldn't even look at my breasts, or say something sweet about my ass. Gay as a peacock. God bless his soul."

I swallowed with some difficulty. The old woman certainly had been strongly opinionated in the past, having called me a 'beelze-bob' and a 'a peck of a cock' among other less colourful and not as endearing terms. But it looked like she had finally grown really old, and thus, really weird in many ways, to the point that some courts would probably even deem she had lost her marbles for good. 'Just like Eileen, ' I said in my mind and quite without expecting to, I picked up the jar of water and unloaded its contents on my head. 'I'm not crazy!' she said inside my head, and I could feel her recede to a silent corner at the back of my head, as if she was suddenly holding a grudge against me.