Golden Calf, Part Eighteen

15 June 2005

"I just think you need to give her a chance," I said, before lighting my cigarette. Lori and I were laying on Alpha's hood, looking up at the stars. It had been almost a week since Jackie moved in, and Lori had barely spent even ten minutes at the house the whole time.

"I'm not comfortable with her," she answered, rolling off my chest and laying on her back beside me. "I mean, you have this attractive woman move in with you, you don't even tell me about it until it's all settled and she's practically on the plane, and you guys have this history--" I scoffed.

"What history? I've known her, in person, two weeks now."

"Yeah well it was a hell of a week, wasn't it? Cavorting about Chicago, doing all that ghost hunting you love so much--which I can't exactly help you with, you know--and then you almost fucked her, and then you did sleep with her, which you swear was nothing, but really? I'm supposed to just be okay with her having this kind of access to you?"

"Okay, so, the worst of that was a ghost using her body, and neither of us was actually into it."

"Not like that, anyway. How do you know she wouldn't have been otherwise?"

"What's that matter? There was no otherwise!"

"But there is now, Matteson!" She rolled onto her side, propping her head up with her elbow. "Don't you get it? She wants to be close to you, and now she's sleeping right across the hall from you, and she says she has this magic which scares the hell out of me and the only thing standing between her and anything she may want from you is me!"

"She's not after me or you, babe. Look, just, try to give her a chance, please? Talk to her? You guys might get along if you give it a shot." She sighed.

"Why is this so important to you?"

"I made a promise."

"To watch out for this ghost?" I nodded. "And you haven't seen any evidence of her?"

"No, at least nothing I know how to work with. My books on hauntings and possession went missing a little while ago."

"She's not going anywhere any time soon, is she?"

"I have no idea." She slid over and laid her head on my chest, looking up at the stars again.

"Okay. I'll try, if only because I don't want her to stick around longer than me." I chuckled and stroked her hair gently as a wisp of a cloud slowly drifted across the moon.

"Thanks, babe."

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