if some ghostly hand had shoved it with all its might. The lights and catwalk above began to shake and rattle violently as bulbs flashed on and off like in a disco.
“Run!” she cried.
Chapter Eighteen
“It was the most amazing, frightening, exciting thing I’ve ever seen!” exclaimed the short, grandmotherly woman with pink cheeks and bright blue eyes. “Hollis, you would have been gobsmacked!”
Jake was pretty sure the older lady’s name was Iva Bergstrom, but he wouldn’t put money on it. He was still gobsmacked himself by the sudden, overwhelming arrival of three loud and excited women, each carrying various bundles of food, and one small, yippy dog at his father’s house—which had already been invaded by Doug Horner and Hollis Nath, the veterinarian’s golfing buddy and apparently Iva Bergstrom’s significant other.
“The whole place was shaking and lights were flashing, and the wind—it was like being in the middle of a tornado inside a building!” Iva went on as she took a seat next to Nath in one of the chairs on Pop’s back deck.
From what Jake could gather, she was telling his father and their friends about something that had happened earlier today, but he hadn’t caught the details. Jake was too busy waiting on all of the unexpected guests who must have learned his pop’s ETA at home after being released from the hospital.
He’d never believe his dad again when he claimed he didn’t use his phone to text, because Pop sure as hell hadn’t called anyone.
It wasn’t until Jake heard “Vivien” and “theater” that he realized the context of the events, and he bobbled the stack of glasses and almost dropped them along with the pitcher of iced tea he was carrying to the shaded deck. The glasses and pitcher were all plastic (a prudent choice when dealing with excitable retirees and outdoor venues), but he still didn’t want to have to wash everything again.
“Uh…what were you saying, Mrs.…Bergstrom, is it?”
“Oh, honey, just call me Iva. I might be nearly seventy, but I feel like I’m barely your age,” she said with a twinkle in her eyes. “And yes, I’d just love some iced tea. How nice of you! Ricky, your boy is simply the sweetest young man. I don’t understand why some young woman hasn’t snatched him up yet.”
Pop grunted in begrudging assent—probably because he’d wanted a beer and Jake had nixed that because of the medication he was still taking.
“I’ll take iced tea,” Maxine Took informed Jake before he could press Iva for more details. “And some of your homemade bread—I know you got some inside; your daddy told us. Don’t you be opening up the things we brought—those’re for your daddy, you know. Bread with butter would be just about right. Been a long damned time and lots of excitement since breakfast at the tea shop. Makes a girl hangry, you know. And don’t you be playing shy around us, Elwood. We’re just normal folk like the rest of you—even though we just saw a ghost throw a tantrum.”
“A ghost?” Jake managed to say. “Where was this?” Please not the theater. Please not the—
“Why, it was at the theater with Vivien,” said Iva. “Weren’t you listening, Elwood, honey? It was quite a show she—it was definitely a she—put on. If only you could have been there!”
If only.
Jake gritted his teeth and nodded. “So, really? A ghost?”
“And it was most definitely a female entity—wouldn’t you agree, Juanita?” said Iva.
“Oh, sí,” replied Juanita, sitting like a queen in her chair in a flowing yellow dress. She’d inched her seat closer to Doug Horner, who was drinking a beer (which was probably why Pop was still giving Jake dagger eyes). “It was certainly a feminine spirit. Bruce Banner always puts his ears forward when he doesn’t like a man, but when it’s a female he’s not sure about, he puts his ears back. His ears were definitely back, weren’t they, bebecito mio?” she said into the face of the small black, white, and brown dog she held on her generous lap.
“Bruce Banner?” Jake found it easy to allow himself to get sidetracked by something more mundane than ghosts and their gender.
“He’s named after the Hunk,” Maxine told him as she snatched the cup of iced tea he’d just poured. “That green monster with the raggedy pants—his alter ego. Bruce Banner. ‘You wouldn’t like me when I’m hangry’ from that old TV show—that’s what he says, you know, and it’s true about that rat-dog Bruce there. You’re going about