Page 1 of Ghost Town Boogie

CHAPTER 1

The coffeepot sputtered in the background as the sounds of Simon and Garfunkel filled the main room of what had once been a busy train depot. Half a dozen spirits danced or sang along or ignored the music and everything else around them as if they were not only dead, but elsewhere. Another place, another time.

All the regulars were present. A recently deceased grandmother who loved any and all music. Well, most music. A grumpy old man in an ill-fitting gray suit who remained silent, as he had for years. A young man, maybe twenty years old, who was constantly looking for something. Up, down, all around. Was whatever he’d lost keeping him earthbound? A fisherman; a mother who clutched a child’s toy; a ghost in rags who’d been here so long he’d begun to fade into the woodwork. Others came and went, but most didn’t stay long. Thank goodness.

Coltrane Hart, still among the living, stood in the middle of it all. He was the last of the Harts living in Seawolf Beach, Mississippi. At one time he’d had parents, uncles, and cousins down the street or around the corner, but they’d all died or moved away for better job opportunities. He kept in touch with a couple of his cousins, but he couldn’t say they were close. They had families of their own; he kept secrets that made it hard to be honest with anyone. Even family.

Judging by his love life it looked as if Colt would continue to be the last Hart in town. Forty-two years old, single, and living on the second floor of a two hundred year old once-abandoned train station hardly made him anyone’s dream date.

Not that he had no social life, beyond his ghostly friends. On occasion living females flirted and made it clear they were available, and goodness knows he was no monk. His mother, God rest her soul, would be horrified by how forward some of the women were, but she wasn’t around to disapprove. She’d been gone four years now. Well, he hoped she was truly gone. He’d once believed death was the end of everything, but it wasn’t. He knew that too well.

Now and then Colt would take the bait one of those willing women threw his way. If it seemed there was more than met the eye, if she intrigued him in a way that went beyond the physical, he’d optimistically think this time could be different. Twice in the past ten years it had been… for a while. Until they’d caught him talking to himself, carrying on one side of an often contentious conversation.

Ghosts complicated everything.

If he dismissed his exchanges with thin air as a normal quirk, just simply talking to himself as some people do, the once-willing women thought he was crazy. He couldn’t blame them. They didn’t catch him saying, “Don’t forget to take out the trash,” or “You should’ve known better.” No, it was more likely to be “You shouldn’t be here,” or “What will it take to get you to leave me alone?”

If he bit the bullet and told the truth they still thought he was crazy. They didn’t believe it was possible. If they did believe him they were spooked at the idea of having a constant audience. More than once he’d heard the whispered question, “Are they here right now?”

Usually his honest answer was yes, and that was that. Off they went, immediately or in a day or two. Sometimes it was hard to tell if the women who’d fled were frightened by this new, earth-shattering knowledge or simply didn’t want to deal with his ghostly baggage. Both made sense.

Early on there had been times when he’d grabbed his cell phone whenever he talked to a ghost, pretending there was a living person on the other end of the conversation. A few times he’d forgotten, when he’d been caught off guard, and somehow that was worse. Eventually he’d given up that ploy. There was more than enough deception in his life without adding to the mix.

More than a dozen years had passed since the car wreck that had brought on this gift, or curse, or oddity. The accident had killed Colt’s bride of less than a year and left him dead for a few minutes, before some enthusiastic EMT had brought him back to life. Twelve years. He should be used to his invisible-to-everyone-but-him friends being around all the time. And he did mean, all the time.

The spirits sometimes gave him privacy when he requested it. At least, as far as he could tell. Maybe they stuck around and he just couldn’t see them. He’d like to believe he could shower or take a piss without an audience, but he wasn’t entirely sure that was the case.

Hart’s Vinyl Depot, a business he’d opened ten years earlier, occupied the lower floor of the old train depot. The floors creaked and the pale green walls needed yet another coat of paint, but the place had a nostalgic charm. A few worn wooden benches had survived the years and were placed here and there, battered but sturdy remnants of another time. Four large, square windows evenly spaced across the front of the building let in lots of light on sunny days. The panes of glass in those windows were old, making the view beyond appear unfocused, unreal. Colt lived in his own sheltered world, here with the ghosts. Everything beyond was another world entirely, out of sync and with no place for a man like him.

Until the past couple of years, records alone wouldn’t support the cost of running a business, much less provide a profit, but he’d added the coffee bar a few years back and that was good for a few bucks. He’d even added a small and coffee to the sign out front. That brought people in. He sold quite a few Seawolf Beach souvenirs during tourist season. Coffee mugs, keychains, posters from the latest music festival, which always brought in a crowd. Most of the doodads included some kind of wolf, even though the Seawolf in Seawolf Beach meant pirate, not an actual animal. It was a long standing tradition and seemed to be expected.

Records were enjoying a surge in popularity, so these days that alone was enough to keep him going. He loved music and he’d always preferred vinyl, even before it had become cool again. The kids thought they’d discovered something new. He did not dissuade them.

The rental properties he’d inherited after his mother passed provided a decent income all on their own. Everyone wanted to live near the beach, and why not? There were no cottages right on the water, not in Seawolf Beach, but all seven of his properties were an easy walking distance to the water.

Simon and Garfunkel came to an end. That didn’t mean there would be silence. Not for Colt.

“It’s going to be a lovely day,” Maude said in her usual singsong voice. She’d said that pretty much every day, rain or shine, ninety degrees or a chilly forty for the past two years, since her departure from the real world and her arrival in his.

“Yes, it is,” he responded. “Perhaps you should go outside today.” If she could bring herself to step beyond the shelter of the old train station, maybe she’d move on. The spirits who visited here did, on occasion. Some had been stuck for hundreds of years, others for a handful of precious years. Now and then something in the universe shifted and a ghost moved on to their rightful place. Sometimes he missed them. Most often, he did not.

“Oh, no,” Maude said with a shake of her head. That tightly coiffed gray head looked perfectly solid to Colt, but no one else could see her. Lucky him. “I couldn’t possibly leave the shelter of this lovely place. Could you put on that album I like so much?” she asked in a quick, light voice, changing the subject. “Billy’s Boogie. You know it’s my favorite. It’s not just me. Gerald likes it, too.” Gerald had passed a few decades earlier than Maude, but the two had struck up a kind of friendship. That was surprising, since Gerald was a silent grouch and Maude — living or dead — was a sunny social butterfly. It probably didn’t hurt that she did all the talking.

Maude was a sweet old woman. There was no anger in her, no obvious injustice that held her earthbound. She reminded him of his own deceased grandmother, who thank God had never made an appearance after she’d passed. He couldn’t figure out why Maude’s spirit was stuck.

Building a retirement home a half mile from a train depot that had a tendency to suck in lost souls and hold onto them for a while might not have been the best idea. Not that it had been his decision.

He’d had a dozen years to try to make sense of what had happened to him. Surely there were rules. What held a spirit here? What did it take to release them? Why did some move on instantly while others lingered? Or worse, got stuck where they did not belong. Did they always stay close to the site of their death? That seemed to be true.

He’d tried living in his Pensacola, Florida condo after he’d physically recovered from the crash, but there were ghosts everywhere he turned. Too many people; too many ghosts. His job in advertising had required that he meet with coworkers and clients, all day, five days a week. Ghosts were everywhere, especially in a city of that size.

It had taken him years to learn not to react when one popped up unexpectedly, as they so often did. Back then, he hadn’t had a chance to control his response. Even now, he sometimes failed in that respect.

Friends and co-workers had overlooked his weirdness for a while, but six months after the crash Colt was still jumping out of his skin for no reason, talking to ghosts, and looking for Lizzie.

He’d never seen his wife’s spirit, though he’d gone to the site of the crash more than once hoping to find her. She’d moved on. That was great for her, but he did wish he’d been able to see her one last time. He saw ghosts everywhere. The long dead, the recently deceased, the ones who didn’t seem to realize they were dead. Why not her? Why couldn’t he talk to Lizzie again?

More than once he’d cursed the EMT who’d revived him. Colt had insisted to himself for years… he should be dead; he should’ve gone with Lizzie. If he had, would they still be together? Those thoughts came less and less often, in recent years.