Stella, so the one who died was your father...
My entire body went numb.
I was about to explain, but John suddenly laughed.
"Stella, your dad was always like this. Couldn't stand to miss out on anything free. I built this house for my father, and yours just had to come stay a few days. Fine, stay then, but he went and set the place on fire..."
As he spoke, his amusement curdled into anger.
"People like your father are insufferable. Can't even die without causing a scene. This house cost me four hundred thousand dollars to build! He dies in it, and now what? How is my dad supposed to live here?!"
His words struck me like lightning. I stood frozen, rooted to the scorched earth.
So he really believed it was my father who died in there.
So this was what he'd always thought of my dad.
So my father was dead, and he could actually stand there and laugh.
He seemed to have forgotten that the money he used to fund his rescue squad, to launch his business, every last dollar of it had been scraped together by my father through years of scrimping and sacrifice. Even this house he'd built for his own dad, my father had paid for more than half of it.
The frantic anguish that had been tearing through my chest moments ago went suddenly, eerily still.
John, still seething, was already on the phone.
"Listen, I need you to find me a few spiritualists right now. Someone died in a fire at my family's old house. Get them out here to perform a rite and suppress the spirit."
After he hung up, he jabbed a finger at me, teeth clenched.
"Your dad loved staying here so much? Then let his ghost rot in this place forever."
"Running into this kind of thing first thing in the morning. What rotten luck."
"Denise, get away from here. I don't want any of this bad energy rubbing off on you. Go wait in the car."
As he turned, I caught a glimpse of Denise's eyes, darting and evasive.
She didn't look so smug anymore.
About half an hour later, the spiritualists John had summoned arrived. They circled the charred remains of the old house and began their work. When the lead practitioner let out a final, commanding shout, a wave of cold swept across my back like a draft from somewhere that shouldn't exist.
It was as if my father-in-law's cries for help were spiraling right beside my ear.
It was the dead of summer, sweltering heat pressing down on everything, yet cold sweat crawled across my skin in an instant. I hugged my shoulders and shrank back without thinking.
The lead spiritualist stepped past me and clasped John's hand.
"All done. Rest easy. The one who died in there is condemned to never find peace. Not in this life, not in any life after."
"Good, good. Thank you. What do I do next?"
"Pull the body out. Do whatever you want with it. Then renovate the house. It'll be perfectly fine to live in again." The man paused. "When I was performing the rite, that spirit was fighting back something fierce. Seemed like it wanted to say something, plead some kind of grievance. But you already told me the whole story, so I forced it down all the same."
"Good. Good. Thank you..."
John walked the spiritualists out with a smile on his face, chatting and laughing the entire way.
Old Mr. Harmon, who had been standing nearby the whole time, tugged gently at my sleeve.
"Miss, that young man is your husband, isn't he? He treats your father like this, and you still won't divorce him?"
"It's not time yet."
I turned to the old man and smiled.
"Sir, the one who died in there wasn't my father."
His eyes widened. "You mean... the one inside was his..."
I nodded.
Old Mr. Harmon slapped his thigh so hard the sound cracked through the air.
"Lord have mercy! A son condemning his own father to never rest in peace. What kind of sin is that..."
"What are you two whispering about?!"
John stormed over and seized the old man by the shoulder.
"What do you mean, sin?! What happens in my family is none of your damn business!"
