Excerpt: Parsley, Sage and Spirits

Some sound caused her to open her eyes and stare at the ghost standing in her bedroom. She wondered briefly if it hurt to be translucent. If you were a ghost did you ever think, “Is she looking at me or the dresser behind me?” She smelled cigar smoke, almost like a flavor she tasted on her tongue along with the rich scent that overwhelmed her nose. Her eyes drifted over the apparition as it casually leaned against her dresser, armed folded in front of him, legs crossed oh so casually at the ankle. From the short, slicked back James Dean styled, wavy, black hair to the turquoise inlaid belt buckle and on down to the snake skin boots, he looked exactly as he had when he'd been alive. Now he fidgeted impatiently, the toe of one of those silvery, almost see through, boots dug into her floor as though the ghost was digging in the dirt with his toe. He looked up at her, cigar clenched between his teeth, a smiling glance of his caramel brown eyes and reached up to take the cigar out of his mouth so he could grin at her in earnest. For just moment a flash of pure grief struck her so hard that her stomach clenched. Then the memory of dozens of other nights in the past few months where she'd been awakened in a similar manner flooded through her exhausted brain and she groaned quietly and pulled her pillow over her head. “Go 'way, Daddy. It's nighttime. I need my beauty sleep and so do you,” she mumbled from beneath her soothingly green pillowcase. She felt the wave of his hurt feelings crash through her even though she couldn't see the crushed look on his face. “Well, now Janessa Eileen, that ain't even a nice way to talk to yor ol' Daddy, “ he chastised, as he shook a finger her direction, turned on his heel and stomped, silently, through the wall behind him.