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Book 10: Second Glance

Publisher: Atria Books, 2003; paperback by Washington Square Press, 2004.

• A conversation with Jodi Picoult about Second Glance
• A short synopsis
• What others are saying…
• Book club discussion questions
• Read an excerpt

Synopsis

Do we love across time? Or in spite of it? A developer has slated an ancient Abenaki Indian burial ground for a strip mall, and now strange happenings have tiny Comtosook, Vermont, talking of supernatural forces at work. Ross Wakeman is a ghost hunter who's never seen a ghost-all he's searching for is something to end the pain of losing his fiance Aimee in a car accident. He tried suicide-any number of times. Now Ross lives only for a way to connect with Aimee from beyond. Searching the site for signs of the paranormal, Ross meets the mysterious Lia, who sparks him to life for the first time in years. But the discoveries that await Ross are beyond anything he could dream of in this world-or the next. Expertly entwining a powerful drama of the heart's redemption and the disturbing real-life history of the VT eugenics project of the 1930s, Second Glance asks if truth is always something that can be measured… and if what can be measured is indeed always true.

What others are saying about Second Glance…

A featured selection of the Literary Guild

Best Mainstream Book of the Year Award, Romance Writers of America

"Best-selling author Picoult mixes shocking fact and compelling fiction to produce a mesmerizing tale of love and second chances."

—Booklist

"Ghosts and ghost hunters collide in this compelling tale of the paranormal set in Vermont's green mountains… Picoult brings the past alive and peoples it with a cast of extraordinarily well-realized characters… Second Glance is an intricate and suspenseful ghost story that enchants and illuminates all the way to its powerful conclusion."

—Amazon.com editorial review

"Picoult ingeniously ties the ghost story to a true one about eugenics. . . . The history lesson makes for chilling, even shocking, reading, and Picoult comes up with many unforgettable characters. . . . Bottom line: Great ghost story."

—People (Critic's Choice)

"[An] elaborate, engrossing plot. . . . Suspense and the supernatural are artfully interwoven. . . . Picoult's ability to bring [her characters] all vividly to life is remarkable."

—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Memorable visual images and evocative language. . . .[A] multifaceted work."

—Library Journal

"Thought-provoking and eminently discussable SECOND GLANCE is a mix of ghost, mystery, and love stories, but it is also a sharp social commentary."

—The Denver Post

"A fun read. The flashbacks to 1932 Vermont are fresh and vivid. The ghosts are entertaining, and like all good mysteries, the key to solving the crime comes as an unexpected surprise."

—Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

"A gratifying blend of gothic melodrama and social critique. … A balance of suspense and science makes for a memorable ghost tale."

—Kirkus Reviews

"An intelligent, complex, challenging, and utterly compelling novel."

—Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)

"Fascinating. . . . Picoult fans will enjoy this; those new to her fiction will have discovered a treasure."

—Winston-Salem Journal (NC)

Book club discussion questions for Second Glance

1. As Second Glance opens, the town of Comtosook begins experiencing bizarre weather occurrences such as rose petals raining from the sky, and the ground freezing in August. What is the symbolic relevance of these occurrences?
2. Ross has no desire to live, yet can't seem to die. Ethan, on the other hand, wants to live a long life yet was born with a genetic illness that will likely result in an early death. What is the one major thing they share in common, despite this difference?
3. Why might Lia have appeared to Ross, a stranger to her, as opposed to anyone else?
4. Why does Ross feel such a strong obligation to help Lia, a woman he barely knows?
5. What is the thematic relevance of Ethan's affliction with xeroderma pigmentosum?
6. How would you explain Shelby's love of words and her superior command of the English language?
7. In what way do Ross's struggles parallel Shelby's?
8. How does Meredith's work closely parallel the work of Spencer Pike and his father-in-law, Harry Beaumont? Is her work more admirable, or is this a case of history repeating itself?
9. When leaving work and faced with a group of pro-life picketers, Meredith “wished she could explain to them that there were some sorts of lives that were not worth living. That it was not cruel to be the judge of that, but humane.” Do you agree, or disagree? Does Meredith feel strongly about this, or do you think she struggles with this belief?
10. How does his investigation into Cissy Pike's death effect a change in Eli?
11. When Ross first arrives in Comtosook, he accidentally loses his dead fiance's engagement ring. Much later, Shelby mysteriously finds it in Eli's bed the first time they are together. What is the significance of this?
12. What is the symbolic relevance of Angel Quarry?
13. Why does Az bury the evidence of the Vermont Eugenics Project, instead of letting the world know the truth about what happened to his people, the Abenaki?
14. Do you believe that through knowledge and education, we can prevent history from repeating itself? Or is it beyond our control?
15. Skeptics of the paranormal claim the existence of a ghost when it can't be proven scientifically. Yet Second Glance spotlights a period of history where science itself turned out to be unreliable. What do you think the author was trying to suggest in this contrast?
16. In what ways is the title, Second Glance, appropriate for this novel?

• Return

An excerpt from Second Glance

Ross Wakeman succeeded the first time he killed himself, but
not the second or the third.
      He fell asleep at the wheel and drove his car off a
bridge into a lake– that was the second time– and was found
on the shore by rescuers. When his half–sunken Honda was
recovered, the doors were all locked, and the tempered glass
windows were shattered like spider webs, but still intact.
No one could figure out how he'd gotten out of the car in
the first place, much less survived a crash without even a
scratch.
      The third time, Ross was mugged in New York City. The
thief took his wallet and beat him up, and then shot him in
the back and left him for dead. The bullet — fired close
enough to have shattered his scapula and punctured a lung —
didn't. Instead it miraculously stopped at the bone, a small
nugget of lead that Ross now used as a keychain.
      The first time was years ago, when Ross had found
himself in the middle of an electrical storm. The lightning,
a beautiful blue charge, had staggered out of the sky and
gone straight for his heart. The doctors told him that he
had been legally dead for seven minutes. They reasoned that
the current could not have struck Ross directly, because
50,000 amperes of current in his chest cavity would have
boiled the moisture in his cells and quite literally made
him explode. Instead, the lightning had hit nearby and
created an induced current in his own body, one still strong
enough to disturb his cardiac rhythm. The doctors said he
was one hell of a lucky man.
      They were wrong.
      Now, as Ross walked up the pitched wet roof of the
O'Donnell's Oswego home in the dark, he did not even bother
with caution. The wind coming off Lake Ontario was cold even
in August, and whipped his long hair into his eyes as he
maneuvered around the gabled window. The rain bit at the
back of his neck as he worked the clamps onto the flashing
and positioned the waterproof video camera so that it was
pointing into the attic.
      His boots slipped, dislodging some of the old
shingles. On the ground, beneath an umbrella, O'Donnell
squinted up at him."Be careful,"the man called out. 
Ross also heard the words he did not say: We've got enough
ghosts.
      But nothing would happen to him. He would not trip; he
wouldn't fall. It was why he volunteered for the riskiest
tasks; why he put himself into danger again and again. It
was why he'd tried bungee jumping and rock climbing and
crack cocaine. He waved down to Mr. O'Donnell, indicating
that he'd heard. But just as Ross knew that in eight hours,
the sun would come up– just as he knew that he'd have to go
through the motions for another day– he also knew he
couldn't die, in spite of the fact that it was what he
wanted, more than anything.
      The baby woke Spencer Pike, and he struggled to a
sitting position. In spite of the nightlights kept in every
room at the Shady Pines Nursing Home– nearly enough combined
wattage, he imagined, to illuminate all of Burlington,
Vermont– Spencer couldn't see past the foot of his bed. He
couldn't see anything these days, thanks to the cataracts;
although sometimes he'd get up to take a leak and in the
mirror, as he passed by, he would catch a glimpse of someone
watching him– someone whose brow was not spotted and yellow;
someone whose skin was not sighing off his bones. But then
the young man Spencer had once been would disappear, leaving
him to stare at the crumbs that were left of his life.
      His ears, though, were sharp. Unlike the other sorry
old morons in this place, Spencer had never needed a hearing
aid. Hell, he heard things that he didn't even care to.
      On cue, the baby cried again.
      Spencer's hand scrabbled over the covers to the call
button beside his bed. A moment later, the night nurse came
in."Mr. Pike,"she said."What's the matter?"
     "The baby's crying."
      The nurse fussed behind him, turning pillows and
raising the head of the bed."There are no babies here, Mr.
Pike, you know that. It was just a dream."She patted the
right angle that had once been his strong shoulder."Now,
you need to go back to sleep. You've got a busy day
tomorrow. A meeting, remember?"
      Why, Spencer wondered, did she talk to him as if he
were a child? And why did he react like one– sinking back
beneath her gentle hands, letting her pull the covers up to
his chest? A memory swelled at the base of Spencer's throat,
something that he could not quite pull to the front of the
fog but that brought tears to his eyes."Do you need some
Naproxen?"the nurse asked kindly.
      Spencer shook his head. He had been a scientist, after
all. And no laboratory had yet crafted the drug that could
ease this ache.
      In person, Curtis Warburton was smaller than he seemed
to be on television, but he lacked none of the magnetism
that had made Bogeyman Nights the highest–rated show in its
time slot. His black hair was shot, skunk–like, with a white
streak– one he'd possessed since a night nine years ago,
when the ghost of his grandfather had appeared at the foot
of his bed and led him into the field of paranormal
investigation. His wife Maylene, an elf of a woman whose
psychic abilities were well known to the Los Angeles police,
perched beside him, taking notes as Curtis posed questions
to the owners of the house.
     "First was the kitchen,"murmured Eve O'Donnell, and
her husband nodded. A retired couple, they'd bought this
home on the lake as a summer retreat, and in their three
months of tenancy had experienced supernatural phenomena at
least twice a week."About ten in the morning I went to the
post office, locked up all the doors, and put on the alarm
system. When I came home, the alarm was still on… but
inside, the kitchen cabinets were open, and every cereal box
was on the table, spilled on its side. I called Harlan,
thinking he'd come home from work and left behind a mess."
     "I was in a meeting the whole time,"her husband
interjected."Never came home. No one did."
     "And there's the calliope music we heard coming from
the attic at two in the morning. The minute we went
upstairs, it stopped. Open the door to find a child's toy
piano, missing its batteries, sitting in the middle of the
floor."
     "We don't own a toy piano,"Harlan added."Much less a
child."
     "And when we put in the batteries, it didn't even play
that kind of music."Eve hesitated."Mr. Warburton, I hope
you understand that we're not the kind of people who… who
believe in this sort of thing. It's just… it's just that if
it's not this, then I'm losing my mind."
     "Mrs. O'Donnell, you're not going crazy."Curtis
touched her hand with trademark sympathy."By tomorrow
morning we'll have a better idea of what's going on in your
home."He looked over his shoulder to make sure Ross was
getting this on camera. Depending on what happened later,
the O'Donnell's might find themselves featured on Bogeyman
Nights, and if so, this footage was critical. The Warburtons
received over 300 emails a day from people who believed
their houses were haunted. Eighty–five percent of the claims
turned out to be hoaxes or mice in the rafters. The rest–
well, Ross had been working with them long enough to know
there were some things that simply could not be explained.
     "Have you experienced any spectral visions?"Curtis
asked."Temperature changes?"
     "Our bedroom will be hot as hell one minute, and then
we'll be shivering the next,"Harlan answered.
     "Are there any spots in the house in particular where
you feel uncomfortable?"
     "The attic, definitely. The upstairs bathroom."
      Curtis's eyes swept from the hand–knotted Oriental rug
to the antique vase on the mantel of the fireplace."I have
to warn you that finding a ghost can be a costly
proposition."
      As the Warburtons' field researcher, Ross had been
sent to libraries and newspaper archives to locate documents
about the property– and hopefully the bonus information that
a murder or a suicide might have occurred there. His inquiry
had turned up nothing, but that never stopped Curtis. After
all, a ghost could haunt a person as well as a place.
History could hover, like a faint perfume or a memory
stamped on the back of one's eyelids.
     "Whatever it takes,"Eve O'Donnell said."This isn't
about money."
     "Of course not."Curtis smiled and slapped his palms
on his knees."Well, then. We've got some work to do."
      That was Ross's cue. During the investigation, he was
responsible for setting up and monitoring the
electromagnetic equipment, the digital video cameras, the
infrared thermometer. He worked for minimum wage, in spite
of the money that came in from the TV show and from cases
like this one. Ross had begged the Warburtons for a job nine
months ago after reading about them in the L.A. Times on
Halloween. Unlike Curtis and Maylene, he had never seen a
spirit– but he wanted to, badly. He was hoping that
sensitivity to ghosts might be something you could catch
from close contact, like chicken pox– and, like chicken pox,
might be something that would mark you forever.
     "I thought I'd check the attic,"Ross said.
      He stood in the doorway for a moment, waiting for Eve
O'Donnell to lead the way upstairs."I feel foolish,"she
confided, although Ross had not asked."At my age, seeing
Casper."
      Ross smiled."A ghost can shake you up a little, and
make you think you're nuts, but it's not going to hurt you."
     "Oh, I don't think she'd hurt me."
     "She?"
      Eve hesitated."Harlan said I shouldn't volunteer any
information. That way if you see what we do, then we'd
know."She shivered, glanced up the narrow stairs."My
little sister died when I was seven. Sometimes I
wonder… can a ghost find you, if she wants to?"
      Ross looked away."I don't know,"he said, wishing he
could have offered her more– a concrete answer, a personal
experience. His eyes lit on the small door at the top of the
stairs."Is that it?"
      She nodded, letting him pass in front of her to
unlatch it. The video camera Ross had mounted outside
watched them from the window, a cyclops. Eve hugged herself
tightly."Being here gives me the chills."
      Ross moved some boxes, so that no shadows would be
caught on tape that could be explained away."Curtis says
that's how you know where to find them. You go with what
your senses are telling you."A wink on the floor caught his
eye; kneeling, he picked up a handful of pennies."Six
cents."He smiled."Ironic."
     "She does that sometimes."Eve was edging toward the
door, her arms wrapped around herself."Leaves us change."
     "The ghost?"Ross asked, turning, but Eve had already
fled down the stairs.
      Taking a deep breath, he closed the door to the attic
and shut the light, plunging the small room into blackness.
He stepped off to the side where he would not be in range of
the video camera, and activated it with a remote control.
Then he fixed his attention on the darkness around him,
letting it press in at his chest and the backs of his knees,
as Curtis Warburton had taught him. Ross cracked open his
senses until the lip of disbelief thinned, until the space
around him bloomed. Maybe this is it, he thought. Maybe the
coming of ghosts feels like a sob at the back of your
throat.
      Somewhere off to the left was the sound of a footfall,
and the unmistakable chime of coins striking the floor.
Switching on a flashlight, Ross swung the beam until it
illuminated his boot, and the three new pennies beside it.
"Aimee?"he whispered to the empty air."Is that you?"
      Comtosook, Vermont was a town marked by boundaries:
the dip where it slipped into Lake Champlain, the cliffs
that bordered the granite quarry where half the residents
worked, the invisible demarcation where the rolling Vermont
countryside became, with one more step, the city of
Burlington. On the congregational church in the center of
town hung a plaque from Vermont Life magazine, dated 1994,
the year that Comtosook was lauded as the most
picture–perfect hamlet in the state. And it was– there were
days Eli Rochert looked at the leaves turning, rubies and
amber and emeralds, and he simply had to stop for a moment
and catch his breath.
      But whatever Comtosook was to tourists, it was Eli's
home. It had been, forever. He imagined it always would be.
Of course, as one of the two full–time police officers in
the town, he understood that what the tourists saw was an
illusion. Eli had learned long ago that you can stare right
at something, and not see what lies beneath the surface.
      He drove along Cemetery Road, his usual patrol haunt
on nights such as this, when the moon was as beaded and
yellow as a hawk's eye. Although the windows were rolled
down, there wasn't much of a breeze; and Eli's short black
hair was damp at the nape of his neck. Even Watson, his
bloodhound, was panting in the seat beside him.
      Old headstones listed like tired foot soldiers. In the
left corner of the cemetery, near the beech tree, was
Comtosook's oddest gravestone. WINNIE SPARKS, it read. BORN
1835. DIED 1901. DIED 1911. Legend had it that the irritable
old woman's funeral procession had been en route to the
cemetery when the horses reared and her coffin fell out of
the wagon. As it popped open, Winnie sat up and climbed out,
spitting mad. Ten years later when she died– again– her
long–suffering husband hammered 150 nails to seal the lid of
the coffin, just as a precaution.
      Whether it was true or not didn't much matter to Eli.
But the local teens seemed to think that Winnie's inability
to stay dead was good enough reason to bring six–packs and
pot to the cemetery. Eli unfolded his long body from the
truck."You coming?"he said to the dog, which flopped down
on the seat in response. Shaking his head, Eli slipped
through the cemetery until he reached Winnie's grave, where
four kids too wasted to hear his footsteps were huddled
around the blue–fingered flame of a Sterno burner.
     "Boo,"Eli said flatly.
     "It's the cops!"
     "Damn!"There was a scuffle of sneakers, the ping of
bottles clinking together as the teens scrambled to get
away. Eli could have had them at any moment, of course; he
chose to let them off this time. He turned the beam of his
flashlight onto the last of the retreating figures, then
swung it down toward the mess. They left behind a faint
cloud of sweet smoke and two perfectly good unopened bottles
of Rolling Rock that Eli could make use of when he went
off–duty.
      Bending down, he pulled a dandelion from the base of
Winnie's headstone. As if the motion had dislodged it, a
word rolled into his mind: chibaio… .ghosts. His
grandmother's language, which burned on Eli's tongue like a
peppermint."No such thing,"he said aloud, and walked back
to the car to see what else this night might hold in store.
      Shelby Wakeman had awakened exhausted after a full
day's sleep. She'd been having that dream again, the one
where Ethan was standing beside her in an airport, and then
she turned around to find that he'd disappeared. Frantic,
she'd run from terminal to terminal looking for him, until
at last she flew out a door onto the Tarmac and found her
nine–year–old standing in the path of an incoming jet.
      It terrified her, no matter how often Shelby told
herself that this would never happen– she'd never be in an
airport with Ethan in the middle of the day, much less lose
sight of him. But what frightened her most was that image of
her son standing with his arms outstretched, his buttermilk
face lifted up to the sun.
     "Earth to Mom… hello?"
     "Sorry."Shelby smiled."Just daydreaming."
      Ethan finished rinsing his plate and setting it into
the dishwasher."Do you think it's still daydreaming if you
do it at night?"Before she could answer, he grabbed his
skateboard, as much an appendage as any of his limbs."Meet
you out there?"
      She nodded, and watched Ethan explode into the front
yard. No matter how many times she told him to be quiet– at
4 A.M., most people were asleep, not racing around on
skateboards– Ethan usually forgot, and Shelby usually didn't
have the heart to remind him.
      Ethan had XP, xeroderma pigmentosum, an incredibly
rare inherited disease that left him extremely sensitive to
the sun's ultraviolet rays. In the world, there were only a
thousand known cases of XP. If you had it, you had it from
birth, and you had it forever.
      Shelby had first noticed something was wrong when
Ethan was six weeks old, but it took a year of testing
before he was diagnosed with XP. Ultraviolet light, the
doctors explained, causes damage to human DNA. Most people
can automatically repair that damage… but XP patients
can't. Eventually the damage affects cell division, which
leads to cancer. Ethan, they said, might live to reach his
teens.
      But Shelby figured if sunlight was going to kill her
son, all she needed to do was to make it infinitely dark.
She stayed in days. She read Ethan bedtime books by
candlelight. She covered the windows of her house with
towels and curtains that her husband would rip down every
night when he came home from work."No one,"he'd said,"is
allergic to the goddamned sun."
      By the time they were divorced, Shelby had learned
about light. She knew that there was more to fear than just
the outdoors. Grocery stores and doctor's offices had
fluorescent fixtures, which were ultraviolet. Sunblock
became as common as hand cream, applied inside the house as
well as out. Ethan had twenty–two hats, and he donned them
with the same casual routine that other children put on
their underwear.
      Tonight he was wearing one that said I'm With Stupid.
The brim was curled tight as a snail, a shape Ethan
cultivated by hooking the lip of the hat beneath the
adjustable band in the back. When Shelby saw the caps being
stored that way, she thought of swans tucking their heads
beneath a wing; of the tiny bound feet of the Chinese.
      She finished cleaning up the kitchen and then settled
herself with a book on the edge of the driveway. Her long,
dark hair was braided into submission, thick as a fist, and
she was still hot– how on earth could Ethan race around like
that? He ran his skateboard up a homemade wooden ramp and
did an Ollie kickflip."Mom! Mom? Did you see that? It was
just like Tony Hawk."
     "I know it,"Shelby agreed.
     "So don't you think that it would be totally sweet if
we –"
     "We are not going to build a half–pipe in the
driveway, Ethan."
     "But –"
     "Jeez. Whatever."And he was gone again in a rumble of
wheels.
      Inside, Shelby smiled. She loved the attitude that
seemed to be creeping into Ethan's personality, like a
puppeteer throwing words into his mouth. She loved the way
he turned on Late Night with Conan O'Brien when he thought
she was somewhere else in the house, to try to catch all the
innuendoes. It made him… well, so normal. If not for the
fact that the moon was riding shotgun overhead, and that
Ethan's face was so pale the veins beneath his skin glowed
like roads she knew by heart– if not for these small things,
Shelby could almost believe her world was just like any
other single mother's.
      Ethan executed a shifty pivot, and then a Casper big
spin. There was a time, Shelby realized, when she couldn't
have distinguished a helipop from a G–turn. There was also a
time Shelby would have looked at Ethan and herself and felt
pity. But Shelby could hardly remember what her existence
had been like before this illness was flung over them like a
fishing net; and truth be told, any life she'd lived before
Ethan could not have been much of a life at all.
      He skidded to a stop in front of her."I'm starving."
     "You just ate!"
      Ethan blinked at her, as if that was any kind of
excuse. Shelby sighed."You can go in and have a snack if
you want, but it's looking pink already."
      Ethan turned toward the sunrise, a claw hooked over
the horizon."Let me watch from out here,"he begged."Just
once."
     "Ethan –"
     "I know."His voice dipped down at the edges."Three
more hardflips."
     "One."
     "Two."Without waiting for agreement– she would
concede, and they both knew it– Ethan sped off again. Shelby
cracked open her novel, the words registering like cars on a
freight train – a stream without any individual
characteristics. She had just turned the page when she
realized Ethan's skateboard was no longer moving.
            He held it balanced against his leg, the graphic
of Wolverine spotted white."Mom?"he asked."Is it
snowing?"
      It did, quite often, in Vermont. But not in August. A
white swirl tipped toward her book and caught in the wedge
of the spine; but it was not a snowflake after all. She
lifted the petal to her nose, and sniffed. Roses.
      Shelby had heard of strange weather patterns that
caused frogs to evaporate and rain down over the seas; she'd
once seen a hailstorm of locusts. But this… ?
      The petals continued to fall, catching in her hair and
Ethan's."Weird,"he breathed, and he sat down beside Shelby
to witness a freak of nature.
     "Pennies."Curtis Warburton turned over the coin Ross
had handed him."Anything else?"
      Ross shook his head. It had been three hours, and even
with a raging storm outside providing a well of energy, the
paranormal activity had been minimal at best."I thought I
saw a globule on the screen at one point, but it turned out
to be a smoke alarm hung in the back of the attic."
     "Well, I haven't felt a damn thing,"Curtis sighed.
"We should have taken the case in Buffalo instead."
      Ross snapped some used film back into its canister and
tucked it into his pocket."The wife, Eve? She mentioned a
little sister who died when she was seven."
      Curtis looked at him."Interesting."
      The two men walked downstairs. Maylene sat on the
living room couch in the dark with an infrared thermometer
"You get anything?"Curtis asked.
     "No. This house is about as active as a quadriplegic."
     "How is it going?"Eve O'Donnell interrupted. She
stood at the doorway of the living room, her hand clutching
the collar of her robe.
     "I think it's safe to say that you're not alone in
this house. In fact,"Curtis held out the penny Ross had
given him,"I just found this."
     "Yes… sometimes there are coins lying around. I told
Ross that."
     "Did you?"
      Ross turned, frowning. But before he could ask Curtis
why he was playing dumb, his boss started speaking again.
"Ghosts can be mischievous that way. Especially the ghost of
a child, for example."
      Ross felt the charge of the air as Eve O'Donnell lay
her trust at Curtis's feet.
     "I have to tell you,"Curtis said."I'm getting some
very strong sensations here. There's a presence, but it's
someone you know, someone who knows you."Curtis tipped his
head to one side and furrowed his brow."It's a girl… I'm
getting the sense it's a girl, and I'm feeling a
number… seven. Did you by any chance have a younger sister
who passed?"
      Ross found himself rooted to the floor. He had been
trained to consider the fact that 85% of the cases they
investigated were hoaxes perpetrated by people who either
wanted to waste their time, or get on national TV, or prove
that paranormal investigation was anything but a science. He
couldn't count how many times they'd found a speaker hidden
in the moaning wall; fishing line wrapped around a quaking
chandelier. But he'd never considered that the Warburtons
might be putting on a show, too.
     "It would be an additional charge, of course,"Curtis
was saying,"but I wouldn't rule out holding a seance."
      Ross's head throbbed."Curtis, could I speak to you
privately?"
      They put on their coats and went out, standing under
the overhang of the garage as the rain poured down."This
better be good,"Curtis said."You interrupted me as I was
hooking her."
     "You don't think there's a ghost here. The only reason
you know about her sister is because I told you."
      Curtis lit a cigarette; the tip glowed like a slitted
eye."So?"
     "So… you can't lie to that woman just to make a few
bucks and get her reaction on camera."
     "All I'm doing is telling the O'Donnells what they
want to hear. These people believe there's a ghost in this
house. They want to believe there's a ghost in this house.
Even if we're not getting much activity tonight, that
doesn't mean a spirit isn't laying low with visitors
around."
     "This isn't just a ghost,"Ross said, his voice
shaking."This was someone to her."
     "I didn't peg you for such a purist. I figured after
all these months, you'd know the routine."
      Ross did not consider himself to be particularly
gullible. He'd seen and done enough in his life to always be
on the lookout for what was real, because he so often felt
like he wasn't."I know the routine. I just didn't know it
was all fake."
      Curtis whipped the cigarette to the ground."I'm not a
fake. The ghost of my grandfather appeared to me, Ross. I
took a goddamned photo of him standing at the foot of my
bed. You draw your own conclusions. Hell, remember that shot
you got of a face rising out of the lake? You think I set
that up? I wasn't even in the same state you were in at the
time."Curtis took a deep breath, calming himself."Look,
I'm not taking the O'Donnells for a ride. I'm a businessman,
Ross, and I know my clients."
      Ross couldn't answer. For all he knew, Curtis had
managed to slip the penny he'd found beneath the tripod,
too. For all he knew, the past nine months of his life had
been wasted. He was no better than the O'Donnells– he'd only
seen what he wanted to believe.
      Maybe she was psychic, because at that moment Maylene
stepped outside."Curtis? What's going on?"
     "It's Ross. He's trying to decide what road to take
home– I–81, or the Moral High Ground."
      Ross stepped into the driving rain and started
walking. Let them think what they wanted; they'd certainly
encouraged Ross to do the same. He didn't bother to return
for his digital camera or his knapsack; these were things he
could replace, unlike his composure, which he was fast in
danger of losing. In his car he turned the heater on full
blast, trying to get rid of the chill that wouldn't let go.
He drove a mile before he realized that his headlights
weren't on. Then he pulled off to the side of the road and
took great, gulping breaths, trying to start his heart
again.
      Ross knew how to scientifically record paranormal
phenomena and how to interpret the results. He had filmed
lights zipping over graveyards; he had taped voices in empty
basements; he had felt cold in spots where there could be no
draft. For nine months, Ross had thought he'd found an
entrance to the world where Aimee was… and it turned out to
be a painted door drawn on a wall.
      Damn it all, he was running out of ideas.
      Az Thompson awoke with his mouth full of stones. Small
and smooth as olive pits, he spat fifteen into the
corrugated leather of his palm before he trusted himself to
breathe without choking. He swung his legs over the side of
the army cot. He tried to shake the certainty that if buried
in the packed earth beneath his bare feet, these rocks would
grow into some cancerous black thicket, like the ones
covering the castle in that White Man's fairytale about a
girl who couldn't wake up without being kissed.
      He didn't mind camping out; for as long as he could
remember he'd had one foot in nature and one foot in the
yanqi world. Az stuck his head out the flap of the tent,
where some of the others had already gathered for breakfast.
Their signs– placards to be worn around the neck, and picket
posters tacked onto wood– lay in a heap like ventriloquist's
dummies, harmless without some spirit behind them."Kwai,"
he grunted, and walked toward the small campfire, knowing
that a space would be made for him.
      The others treated him the way they would if Abe
Lincoln got up and walked out of that tent– with humility,
and no small amount of awe, to find him alive after all this
time. Az wasn't as old as Abe, but he wasn't off by much. He
was 102 or 103– he'd stopped counting a while ago. Because
he knew the dying language of his people, he was respected
as a teacher. Still, his age alone made him a tribal elder,
which would have been something, had the Abenaki been a
federally recognized tribe.
            Az heard the creak of every joint in his spine
as he settled himself on a folding chair. He grabbed a pair
of binoculars from beside the fire pit and peered at the
land, a parcel located at the northwesterly intersection of
Montgomery Road and Otter Creek Pass. At its crest sat the
big white house, now an eyesore. It would be the first thing
to go, Az knew, just like he knew everything about this
property, from the surveyor's measurements to the recorded
number of the deed plan. He knew the spots where the ground
froze first in the winter and the section where no
vegetation ever managed to grow. He knew which window in the
abandoned house had been broken by kids running wild; which
side of the porch had fallen first; which floorboards on the
stairs were rotted through.
      He also knew the license plate numbers of every
vehicle the Redhook Group had parked on the perimeter. Rumor
had it that Newton Redhook wanted to build himself
Comtosook's first strip mall. On one of their burial sites.
     "I'm telling you,"said Fat Charlie,"it's El Nino."
      Winks shook his head."It's screwed up, is what it is.
Ain't normal to rain roses. That's like a clock running
backward, or well water turning to blood."
      Fat Charlie laughed."Winks, you gotta switch back to
Letterman. Those horror flicks are getting to you, man."
      Az looked around, noticing the light dusting of flower
petals all over the ground. He rolled his tongue across the
cavern of his mouth, tasting those stones again."What do
you think, Az?"Winks asked.
      What he thought was that trying to explain rose petals
falling from the sky was not only useless, but also futile,
since the things that were going to happen had already been
set into motion. What he thought was that rose petals were
going to be the least of their problems. Az focused the
binoculars on a bulldozer chugging slowly up the road."I
think you can't dig in the ground,"he said aloud,"without
unearthing something."
            This was how Ross had met Aimee: On the corner
of Broadway and 112th, in the shadow of Columbia University,
he had literally run into her, knocking all of her books
into a murky brown puddle. She was a medical student
studying for her anatomy final, and nearly started
hyperventilating at the sight of all her hard work being
ruined. Sitting in the middle of the street in New York, she
was also the most beautiful woman Ross had ever seen."I'll
help you,"Ross promised, although he didn't know a fibula
from a phalange."Just give me a second chance."
      This was how Ross proposed to Aimee: A year later he
paid a cab driver to take them past Broadway and 112th en
route to dinner at a restaurant. As instructed, the man
pulled to the curb, and Ross opened the door and got down on
one knee on the filthy pavement. He popped open the small
ring box and stared into her electric eyes."Marry me,"he
said, and then he lost his balance and the diamond fell down
a sewer grate.
      Aimee's mouth fell open."Tell me,"she managed
finally,"that didn't just happen."
      Ross looked down the black grate, and at the empty
box. He tossed it into the sewer, too. Then he pulled
another ring, the real ring, from his pocket."Give me a
second chance,"he said.
      Now, in a deserted parking lot, he tipped the bottle
up to drink. Sometimes Ross wanted to scratch himself out of
his skin, to see what was on the other side. He wanted to
jump off bridges into seas of concrete. He wanted to scream
until his throat bled; to run until his soles split open. At
times like this, when failure was a tidal wave, his life
became a finite line– the end of which, through some cosmic
joke, he could not seem to reach.
      Ross contemplated suicide the way some people made out
shopping lists– methodically, with great attention given to
detail. There were days when he was fine. And then there
were other days when he took census counts of people who
seemed happy, and those who seemed in pain. There were days
when it made perfect sense to drink boiling water, or
suffocate in the refrigerator, or walk naked into the snow
until he simply lay down to sleep.
      Ross had read of suicides, fascinated by the
creativity– women who looped their long hair around their
own necks to form a rope, men who mainlined mayonnaise,
teenagers who swallowed firecrackers. But every time he came
close to testing a beam for the weight it would hold, or
drew a bead of blood with an X–acto knife, he would think of
the mess he'd leave behind.
      He didn't know what death held in store for him. But
he knew that it wouldn't be life, and that was good enough.
He had not felt anything since the day Aimee had died. The
day when, like an idiot, he had chosen to play the hero,
first dragging his fiance from the wreckage and then going
back to rescue the driver of the other car moments before it
burst into flames. By the time he'd returned to Aimee, she
was already gone. She'd died, alone, while he was off being
Superman.
      Some hero he had turned out to be, saving the wrong
person.
           "Give me a second chance,"Ross said aloud now,
each word as thick as a fist.
      He threw the empty bottle onto the floor of his Jeep
and put the car into gear, tearing out of the parking lot
like a teenager. There were no cops around– there never
were, when you needed them– and Ross accelerated, until he
was doing more than eighty down the single–lane divided
highway.
      He came to a stop at the railroad bridge, where the
warning gate flashed as its arms lowered, slow as a
ballerina. He emptied his mind of everything except inching
his car forward until it broke the gate, until the Jeep sat
as firm on the tracks as a sacrifice.
      The train pounded. The tracks began to sing a steel
symphony. Ross gave himself up to dying, catching a single
word between his teeth before impact: Finally.
      The sound was awesome, deafening. And yet it moved
past him, growing Doppler–distant, until Ross raised the
courage to open his eyes.
      His car was smoking from the hood, but still running.
It hobbled unevenly, as if one tire was low on air. And it
was pointed in the opposite direction, heading back from
where he'd come.
      There was nothing for it: with tears in his eyes, Ross
started to drive.
      Rod van Vleet wasn't going home without a signed
contract. In the first place, Newton Redhook had left him
responsible for securing the nineteen acres that comprised
the Pike property. In the second place, it had taken over
six hours to get to this nursing home in Nowhere, VT, and
Rod had no plans to return here in the immediate future.
     "Mr. Pike,"he said, smiling at the old man, who was
plug–ugly enough to give Rod nightmares for a week. Hell, if
Rod himself looked like that by age 95, he was all for
someone giving him a morphine nightcap and a bed six feet
under. Spencer Pike's bald head was as spotted as a
cantaloupe; his hands were twisted into knots; his body
seemed to have taken up permanent position as a human comma.
"As you can see here, The Redhook Group is prepared to put
into escrow today a check made out to you for $50,000, as a
token of good faith pending the title search."
      The old man narrowed a milky eye."What the hell do I
care about money?"
     "Well. Maybe you could take a vacation. You and a
nurse."Rod smiled at the woman standing behind Pike, her
arms crossed.
     "Can't travel. Doctor's orders. Liver could
just… give out."
      Rod smiled uncomfortably, thinking that an alcoholic
who'd survived nearly a hundred years should just get on a
plane to Bali and the hell with the consequences."Well."
     "You already said that. You senile?"
     "No, sir."Rod cleared his throat."I understand this
land was in your wife's family for several generations?"
     "Yes."
     "It's our belief, Mr. Pike, that the Redhook Group can
contribute to the growth of Comtosook by developing your
acreage in a way that boosts the town economy."
     "You want to build stores there."
     "Yes, sir, we do."
     "You gonna build a bagel shop?"
      Rod blinked, nonplussed."I don't believe Mr. Redhook
knows yet."
     "Build it. I like bagels."
      Rod pushed the check across the table again, this time
with the contract."I won't be able to build anything, Mr.
Pike, until I get your signature here."
      Pike stared at him for a long moment, then reached out
for a pen. Rod let out the breath he'd been holding."The
title is in your wife's name? Cecelia Pike?"
     "It was Cissy's."
     "And this… claim the Abenaki are championing… is
there any validity to that?"
      Pike's knuckles went white from the pressure."There's
no Indian burial ground on that property."He glanced up at
Rod."I don't like you."
     "I'm getting that sense, sir."
     "The only reason I'm going to sign this is because I'd
rather give it up than watch it go to the State."
      Rod rolled up the signed contract and rapped it
against the table."Well!"he said again, and Pike raised
one eyebrow."We'll be doing our due diligence, and
hopefully we'll finish this deal as soon as we can."
     "Before I die, you mean,"Pike said dryly as Rod
shrugged into his coat."You don't want to stay for
Charades? Or lunch… I hear we're having orange Jell–O."He
laughed, the sound like a saw at Rod's back."Mr. van
Vleet… what will you do with the house?"
      Rod knew this was a touchy subject; it always was for
the Redhook Group, which usually razed whatever existing
properties existed on the land before building their own
modern commercial facilities."It's actually not in the best
shape,"Rod said carefully."We may have to… make some
adjustments. More room, you know, for your pizza place."
     "Bagels."Pike frowned."So you're going to tear it
down."
     "Unfortunately, yes."
     "Better that way,"the old man said."Too many
ghosts."
      The only gas station in Comtosook was attached to the
general store. Two pumps from the 1950s sat in the parking
lot, and it took Rod a good five minutes to realize there
simply was no credit card slot. He stuck the nozzle of the
pump into his gas tank and pulled out his cell phone,
hitting a preprogrammed number."Angel Quarry,"answered a
female voice.
      Rod held the phone away from his ear and cut off the
call. He must have dialed wrong; he had been trying to reach
the home office to let Newton Redhook know the first hurdle
had been cleared. Frowning, he punched the buttons on the
keypad again.
     "Angel Quarry. May I help you?"
      Rod shook his head."I'm trying to reach 617–569—"
     "Well, you got the wrong number."Click.
      Flummoxed, he stuffed the phone in his pocket and
squeezed another gallon into his tank. Reaching for his
wallet, he started toward the store to pay.
      A middle–aged man with carrot–red hair stood on the
porch, sweeping what seemed to be rose petals from the
floorboards. Rod glanced up at the sign on the building–
ABE'S GAS & GROCERYS– and then back at the shopkeeper."You
must be Abe?"
     "You guessed that right."
     "Is there a payphone around here?"
      Abe pointed to the corner of the porch, where an old
phone booth tilted against the railing, right beside an old
drunk who seemed disinclined to move aside. Rod dialed his
calling card number, feeling the shopkeeper's eyes on him
the whole time."Angel Quarry,"he heard, a moment later.
      He slammed down the receiver and stared at it. Abe
swept once, twice, three times, clearing a path between Rod
and himself."Problem?"he asked.
     "Must be something screwed up in the phone lines."Rod
dug a twenty out of his wallet for the gas.
     "Must be. Or maybe what those Indians are saying's
true– that if they don't get their land back, the whole
town'll be cursed."
      Rod rolled his eyes. He was halfway back to the car by
the time he recalled Spencer Pike's comment about ghosts. He
turned around to ask Abe about that, but the man was gone.
His broom rested against the splintered porch rail; with
each breeze, the neat pile of flower petals scattered like
wishes.
      Suddenly a car pulled up on the opposite side of the
gas pumps. A man with shoulder–length brown hair and
unsettling sea green eyes stepped out and stretched until
his back popped."Excuse me,"he asked,"do you know the way
to Shelby Wakeman's house?"
      Rod shook his head."I'm not from around here."
      He didn't know what made him look in the rearview
mirror after he got into the car. The man was still standing
there, as if he did not understand what should happen next.
Suddenly Rod's cell phone began to ring. He dug in his
breast pocket, flipped it open."Van Vleet."
     "Angel Quarry,"said the woman at the other end, as if
he'd been the one to call; as if that made any sense at all.
     "Yeah, I'm coming,"Shelby muttered, as the raps on
her front door grew louder. It was only 11 A.M. If this
moron woke Ethan…  She knotted her hair into a ponytail
holder, tugged her pajamas to rights, and squinted against
the sun as she opened the door. For a moment, backlit by the
daylight, she didn't recognize him.
     "Shel?"
      It had been two years since she'd seen Ross. They
still looked alike– the same rangy build, the same intense
pale eyes that people found it hard to break away from. But
Ross had lost weight and let his hair grow long. And oh, the
circles under his eyes– they were even darker than her own.
     "I woke you up,"he apologized."I could… "
     "… Come here,"Shelby finished, and she folded her
baby brother into an embrace.
     "Go back to sleep,"Ross urged, after Shelby had spent
the better part of an hour fussing over him."Ethan's going
to need you."
     "Ethan's going to need you,"Shelby corrected."Once
he finds out you're here, you might as well forget about
getting any rest."She set a stack of towels on the end of
the guest room bed and hugged him."It goes without saying
that you stay as long as you like."He buried his face in
the curve of her shoulder and closed his eyes. Shelby
smelled like his childhood.
      Suddenly she drew back."Oh, Ross,"she murmured, and
slipped her hand beneath the collar of his shirt, pulling
out the long chain that he kept hidden underneath. At the
end hung a diamond solitaire, bright as a falling star.
Shelby's fist closed around it.
      Ross jerked away, and the chain snapped. He grabbed
Shelby's wrist and shook until she let go of the ring, until
it was safe in his hand."Don't,"he warned, setting his
jaw.
     "It's been –"
     "Don't you think I know how long it's been? Don't you
think I know exactly?"Ross turned away. Why was it no one
spoke of how kindness can cut just as clean as a knife?
      When Shelby touched his arm, Ross didn't respond. She
didn't force the issue. Just that one small contact, and
then she backed her way out of the room.
      Shelby was right– he ought to sleep– but he also knew
that wouldn't happen. Ross had grown used to insomnia; for
years it had crawled under the covers with him, pressed the
length of his body with just enough restless indecision to
keep him watching the digital display of a clock until the
numbers justified getting out of bed.
      He lay down on the bed and stared at the ceiling. He
held the ring so tightly in his hand that he could feel the
prongs of the setting cutting into his skin. He would have
to get something– string, a leather thong– so that he could
wear it again. Wide awake, he focused his attention on the
clock. He watched the numbers bleed into each other: 12:04;
12:05; 12:06. He counted the roses on the comforter cover.
He tried to remember the words to"Waltzing Matilda."
      When he startled awake at 5:58, Ross could not believe
it. He blinked, feeling better than he had in months. He
swung his feet over the side of the bed and stood up,
wondering if Shelby might have a spare toothbrush.
      It was the absence of the slight weight against his
chest that reminded him of the ring. Ross opened his fist
and panicked. The diamond he'd fallen asleep clutching was
nowhere in sight– not under the covers, not on the carpet,
not even behind the bed, which Ross moved with frantic
haste. I've lost her, Ross thought, staring blankly at what
he'd awakened holding instead: a 1932 penny– smooth as a
secret; still warm from the heat of his hand.