‘You’re telling me you’re a ghost?’ Considering the craziness of the question, Ewan thought his voice was relatively calm.
Having seen the pitying looks in the eyes of his fellow mourners, he had left the pub shortly after his outburst. He was now sitting in the outside dining area, his only companion the odd woman who – apparently – nobody else could see.
The woman spoke again, the familiar chill coming with her words.
‘My name is Lita Balodis,’ she said. ‘I died on Earth in 1991 and have been in this plane ever since. There was something special about Billie that drew me to her. That was when she was sixteen.’
Ewan lifted a hand to cut her off.
‘So Billie could see you? Talk to you?’ he asked.
‘Billie had been sensitive to astral energy for as long as she could remember,’ Lita told him.
‘That would explain the imaginary friends she had,’ Ewan said.
‘Not imaginary,’ Lita confirmed. ‘Spirits. Billie had seen and conversed with my kind from childhood. She told me that she had believed it normal, thought that everyone could see the world as she saw it. Until she was nine, when she unwittingly scared her friends by talking to her grandfather.’
‘Grandad Bunches,’ Ewan whispered, remembering the man’s image in the photograph taken at Billie’s birthday party.
‘She was ridiculed, belittled,’ Lita went on. ‘She was shunned by the living and so she ignored the spirits. That must have been a very lonely time for her.’
Lita’s eyes glistened. Ewan wondered whether it was a trick of the light, or if ghosts could cry.
‘But if you’ve known Billie for ten years, why am I only meeting you now?’
‘I don’t know,’ Lita admitted. ‘Perhaps the grief you’re feeling has opened your senses to the spirits.’
‘There’s a lot of grieving people in there,’ Ewan said, motioning to the pub behind him, ‘but none of them can see you.’
‘You were closer to Billie than most. And you share blood, that’s important in these things.’
‘We’re only cousins,’ Ewan argued. ‘Her mother and my mother are sisters. That’s not that close, really.’
‘I won’t pretend to know why these things happen.’ Lita admitted.
Ewan shrugged. There was enough for him to be adapting to, so some of the finer points could be overlooked for now, he thought.
‘But you think Billie was murdered?’ he asked.
‘I’m certain of it,’ she answered.
‘You saw it?’
‘No.’ Sadness filled Lita’s eyes, an emotion so raw Ewan felt it stabbing at his heart. ‘I wasn’t with Billie when she died. That is the only reason they were able to get to her.’
‘If you weren’t there, how can you think she was murdered?’ Ewan asked softly. He could tell Lita believed what she was saying, even if he couldn’t see any logic in her reasoning.
‘Billie’s spirit was taken by her killer,’ Lita explained. ‘That is how I know; she has no ghost.’
‘Could she not have just,’ Ewan paused as his mind reached for the correct phrase, ‘crossed over?’
‘Souls as strong as hers do not move on so quickly.’
Ewan ran his hand through his hair as he tried to take all this in.
‘Billie has no ghost, which means she was murdered,’ he recapped. ‘But why was she killed?’
Lita cast her eyes downward. There was something more than sorrow, more than grief on her face.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered. ‘I think it was to punish me. I believe her spirit was taken because she had associated with me.’
‘Throughout my time in this plane, there have been forces pursuing me. In fact, I believe my death was caused by their actions.’
‘What? You mean someone killed you then, not content with that, chased your ghost in the afterlife?’
Lita nodded grimly.
‘Who could do that?’ Ewan asked.
‘Vadātājs,’ Lita answered. ‘Devils from the old country.’
‘Devils?’ Ewan said flatly. He’d never given much thought to God and Satan, so had never had to decide whether he believed or not. Of course, until today he’d never had to decide whether or not he believed if ghosts were real.
‘So these vada-things…’ he started.
‘Va, da, ties,’ Lita pronounced slowly.
‘…killed you in life, haunted you in the afterlife and have now murdered and ghost-napped my cousin just because she could see you?’
Lita’s solemn nod was almost imperceptible and finally Ewan understood the reason for the guilt she was feeling.
‘And now,’ he finished with a tremor in his voice, ‘I can see you.’
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