Murder in Middleton

Murder in Middleton

Charlotte Gerber

Copyright 2007 by charlotte Gerber

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2007 Charlotte Gerber

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 9781310423277

Cover art by Tiplyashina at Dreamstime.com

Chapter 1

Three little ghostesses,

Sitting on postesses,

Eating buttered toastesses,

Greasing their fistesses,

Up to their wristesses,

Oh, what beastesses

To make such feastesses!

--An Old English Nursery Rhyme

Shannon O’Reilly wasn’t crazy; she had an unusual gift for seeing the unseen. Call them ghosts, spirits or what have you. It all amounted to the same thing- the O’Reilly house was haunted and Shannon was the gatekeeper for the supernatural.

Shannon lived with her parents, Victoria and Brendan and her orange tabby cat, Ralph. She was currently 5’2, but she hoped to grow taller. Her wavy brown hair cascaded down her back to just above her belt, and she had aqua blue eyes.

Victoria was a very intense woman with vivid green eyes and light blonde hair. She was tall and rather thin, but that was because she worked very hard all hours of the day and into the night, working on ways to improve the business. Her number one priority in life was turning a buck, but she would never admit it to anyone, not even herself. Some people called her driven, but Shannon knew her mother was just nervous most of the time, probably because of all the caramel lattes she drank.

Brendan was the polar opposite of Victoria, which was probably why they got along so well. His laid back personality and good looks made him popular with the locals. He was tall with reddish blonde hair and twinkling blue eyes could still make the older ladies in town blush when he paid attention to them at town functions.

Brendan was also Victoria's business partner. He purchased most of the antique items that the store sold. He loved to haggle with merchants and he really enjoyed a good auction with fast bidding. Brendan also was very handy with caring for the many antiques that came through their store. He could fix practically anything and was an expert furniture refinisher. His workshop was in the basement where he kept it meticulously clean. Victoria rarely ventured down there because she hated the smell of paint stripper, but Shannon loved to be with her father, no matter where he happened to be in the house.

Shannon and Ralph were used to seeing invisible guests by now but it wasn’t a polite topic of conversation in the O’Reilly household. It was difficult to be fourteen years old and have ghosts bothering you on a regular basis. Most kids have to worry about their complexion, grades and who they are going to the dance with on Friday night. Shannon had all of this to worry about and the added burden of trying to solve problems for spirits that lurked in and around her home. She had accepted the ghosts as part of her life; Ralph on the other hand, found it necessary to hiss and run whenever they made an appearance. He was not as accepting as his owner was.

Shadowy figures, strange dreams and misty faces had haunted Shannon since she had been twelve years old. Sometimes the figures looked lost, some were angry and many times they simply stood in her way. She guessed that they were her dead relatives since most of the inhabitants of the home had been related to her in one way or another. However, she knew that spirits could be attached to the antiques that her father brought into her home as well.

The movies had done a good job scaring kids and making them afraid of ghosts and Shannon had been no different. Initially she thought that the shadow figures would make a noise, slime or hurt her the first time she screwed up the courage to walk through one. The experience only proved one thing; the figures didn’t move and they didn’t make a sound. They simply followed her around the house popping up when she least expected them.

Strange things happened to Shannon all the time in her home. One night in particular, Shannon simply wanted to brush her teeth like a normal teenager. After lying in bed and watching re-runs of Duck Dodgers on her TiVo for the millionth time, she had gotten up from her warm and comfortable bed to go to the bathroom. Her dry contacts told her it was time to take them out and she was looking forward to the relief she felt when she removed them from her eyes. She removed her contacts, washed her face with Ivory soap and then patted it dry. Shannon then put on her pink wire-framed glasses.

When she returned to her bedroom she saw a dark figure standing by the turret room, which was next to her bedroom. At first her mind didn’t register what exactly she was looking at. It was as if an invisible force had put their arms out and stopped her from walking. For a moment she looked at the shadow, which was the same size and height as she was. There was no visible face, just a shadow in the shape of a person. The five foot four transparent black figure simply stood there, not moving.

Puzzled, Shannon said loudly Go away. She sucked in her breath, closed her eyes and started walking a straight line toward the bedroom. When she got to her bedroom door she cautiously opened her eyes again. The figure hadn’t followed her and she let her breath out like the slow hiss of a radiator. Sometimes the ghosts in her home could be so troublesome. Luckily, this particular ghost seemed harmless.

Shannon had just started the 9th grade at school, and she desperately wanted to be just like any typical girl her age. However, there wasn't anything typical about Shannon O'Reilly. She was incredibly intelligent and had scored a 167 on an IQ test. Good looks ran in her family, and she had been blessed with gorgeous strawberry blonde hair, vivid blue eyes and a flawless complexion. Some of the locals who had lived in town for a long while knew that Victoria's family had a few psychics in the family. However, they were unaware that Shannon possessed some of these powers, and she had no intention of spilling the beans. It was bad enough to be labeled a geek, but it would be much worse to be called a psychic kook.

The first few weeks at the new school had been a little difficult though. A few times Shannon couldn’t find her classrooms in the huge brick building. Rumors abounded about which teachers were the hardest to please and who were the easiest on students. She seemed to luck out with several of her teachers and didn’t have anyone that was perceived as particularly difficult. The only teacher that Shannon was a little afraid of was Mr. Pardee, the history teacher. Mr. Pardee had the annoying habit of staring right at her for minutes at a time. Shannon felt compelled to stare right back as if she were in a trance. Whenever a student seemed to drift off to sleep Mr. Pardee would state their name loudly, which would make them jerk back to attention. He would then interrogate the offending student about what he had just said in class. The student usually would blush a bright shade of red. If they were lucky, the bell would ring and give them a quick escape.

Shannon’s favorite class was home economics. The teacher, Ms. Violet Ormond, loved to teach and decorated her bright yellow classroom with pictures of happy homemakers, current dress patterns and fashion models, as well as the giant food pyramid on the back wall near the ovens. This class was the most fun because she loved to cook and sew. Ms. Ormond had taken a liking to Shannon right away and complimented her on her unusual sense of style. Though Shannon could sew, she hadn’t completely mastered cooking. She wasn’t a bad cook because she didn’t try, but rather because she often daydreamed and forgot what she was doing.

Shannon remembered the time when she was baking a chocolate cake at home and was reading The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. The book was so interesting she completely forgot to watch the clock. The cake got burned and resembled two round brown bricks; unsuitable for consumption. Although she had noticed the hot chocolate smell, she didn’t react until smoke started seeping out around the edges of the oven door, setting the fire alarm off.

After school Shannon would do one of several things: go to the library, work in her parent’s shop or attended one of the drama club’s weekly meetings. The library was a great hiding place because none of the other kids in town frequented there. She spent about four days a week there enjoying the solitude. The upstairs of the library held particular interest for her because it was full of teen books as well as a few computers with high speed Internet access, something her parents didn’t think she needed.

The upstairs library room was sparsely decorated with old book posters and a few dated announcements about volunteer opportunities for teens. Old oak bookcases that were as tall as the ceiling took up most of the wall space except for two large windows that faced the street below. Shannon liked to sit in front of these windows with a few good books and gaze out. She enjoyed watching the squirrels try to balance on the phone wires that ran from the library to an old abandoned house across the street. Occasionally the squirrels would be knocked around on the wires in a strong wind and would be hanging upside down, much to Shannon’s horror. The squirrels, however, never seemed to be worried and they simply righted themselves and scampered away. When the library closed at 6 P.M., she would check out her books, smile at the librarian, Mrs. Hazel Sanders, and head over to her parents store.

Shannon spent about two days a week after school at her parent’s home and store, The Opportunity Shop. If there were no customers in the store she could sit on the window seat in the bay window and watch people coming and going up and down the main street.

It was on one of these days that Shannon sat on the bench staring at the maple trees changing color across the street that she saw her first spirit, though she didn't know it at that particular moment. The woman, who turned out to be a spirit, was walking with determination down the street towards her parent’s store. She was dressed very oddly, considering it wasn’t quite yet Halloween. She had on a long, dark-colored skirt, a tight fitting blouse and a small hat perched on the top of her head. She had a small purse hanging from her left wrist and wore black boots. As she came closer to the store, Shannon could see she had a stern look on her small, pale white face. Shannon also noticed how elaborately braided the woman's hair was. She wasn’t sure what to think of the visitor, but she couldn’t wait to get a close-up look of the woman when she entered the store.

Shannon waited to hear the woman enter the store. She strained to hear any conversation that the woman would be having with her mother in the next room. The merchant bell above the front door never rang. There wasn’t any sound until she heard the sharp clicking of her mother’s green tapestry mules on the hardwood floors.

Where's the lady who just came in? Shannon asked her mom. She looked so strange!

No one came in dear, her mother said absently. It has been dead in here all afternoon. If you saw anyone they must have changed their mind and left before coming in the store.

Shannon had a puzzled look on her face and was at a loss for something to say.

Really, don’t you have anything else to do upstairs other than spying on the locals? Be a good girl and go sit by the register at the front. I have to go check on your father downstairs. He’s been refinishing some chairs and I want to make sure he hasn’t passed out from the fumes.

Shannon made a little grunting noise before assuming her position on the stool next to the register. She spent the next hour before the store closing wondering about what she had seen earlier. The woman that had entered the store certainly looked real enough to her, and she was sure that she hadn’t turned around and left before she entered the store. Her mother couldn’t have missed the woman unless she had walked back to the kitchen or bathroom for a few minutes. The front door had a huge pane of glass that had frosted scrollwork around the edges and there was another large window at the front of the store by the register. No one could have missed the unusual looking woman if she had walked into the store, not to mention meeting her on the street.

Six o’clock came sooner than Shannon expected and she was allowed to leave the stool in front of the little merchant desk that supported the cash register. She slowly walked upstairs again to retrieve her messenger bag and to turn off the old gooseneck lamp in the turret room. A noise ahead of her made her stop in her tracks on the stairs. She distinctly heard a slow rustling noise going up the stairs ahead of her. Her father must have finished his work and had come upstairs to get her, she thought.

Shannon continued walking up the stairs to the hallway where it met the turret room. The rustling sound was now coming from a bedroom that was being used as a storage room, next to the turret room. She walked to the storage room expecting to find her father rummaging through an old trunk. Instead, she saw the odd woman she had seen earlier outside. The woman slowly turned to face Shannon and then turned back to face the far wall. She was taking off her hat and apparently placing it on an unseen table. Shannon stared in amazement at first, and then started walking quickly backward in an effort to get away from the strange woman. She started to feel sick to her stomach and her hands felt clammy. As she took another backward step, a wave of dizziness hit her hard. The hallway began to spin around her and her legs buckled. The last thing she saw before she passed out was the strange woman standing in the doorway, looking down at her with cold, gray eyes.

Chapter 2

Shannon awoke on the floor in the upstairs hallway with two, very concerned parents looking down on her. Brendan was kneeling down next to her and her mother was standing with her hands on her hips with a look of dismay upon her face. Her mother was never good at emergencies. In fact, if the house were burning down, she would probably go outside, light a cigarette and make cell phone calls to her friends asking them what she should do. Her father, on the other hand, was always practical. If Shannon were to be stranded on a desert island, she would want her father there with her.

What happened? Victoria demanded. I heard a terrific thud and then I find you up here flat on the floor passed out!

Shannon didn’t know how to respond; her head was throbbing and a lump had formed on the side of her head where she’d hit the floor. Leave it to her mom to want an explanation when she had just awoken from a fainting spell.

I have no idea, she lied. One minute I was walking down the hall, the next, well, I just don’t remember, Shannon said, looking away so she could avoid the steady gaze of her mother. Her mom could spot a lie a mile away, and she knew her daughter wasn’t telling the whole truth.

Brendan put his arm around Shannon and helped her to get up off of the floor. He carefully held her hand and supported her while she swayed a little.

I think I’m all right, Shannon said. I just need a little drink of water.

Victoria walked to the top of the stairs with Shannon and her father followed close behind. The trio carefully climbed down the staircase into the kitchen. Shannon sat down on one of the old farm chairs and sighed. The day had been incredibly long already, and now she was going to face the scrutiny of her parents.

Brendan got an old jelly jar from the cupboard and filled it with ice-cold water for Shannon. Here, drink up, he said.