Chapter Two

“Alright their kiddo?”

“Peachy keen…”

“Where’s our partner in crime?”

“ Right here”

 

“Ready to go?”

 

“Oh you know it…”

 

“Looking spiffy”

“And it’s the real McCoy”

 

“Tell it too Sweeney, baby”

 

“Let’s just go get plastered”

“This joint is the cat’s meow”

 

“ It is indeed…”

 

“Well don’t you look a baby vamp in your glad rags…”

 

“Not so bad yourself slugger…”

 

“Are you two going to neck all night?”

 

“Would you like us too?”

 

“Hell I have no problem with that baby”

“I do…”

 

“ We should go, its pretty late out…”

 

“Ruthie, Henry come on…Beds awaiting”

 

“Okay Okay, we’re coming Dot…”

 

*****

 

“So…” I mumbled self -consciously as I sat back on the sofa that evening.

Ryan’s only answer was the start tapping his fingers on the arm of the chair he was sitting on.

“Channelling Erin are you?” I couldn’t resist asking.

“I didn’t even realise…It’s a good job she’s not here or I’d never hear the end of it.” Ryan looked over at me with a laugh.

“Especially after all the times you’ve reamed her out for it.” I pointed out.

Ryan shook his head. “For shame.”

I laughed. The tension between us suddenly seemed a bit lighter.

“Don’t worry, your secrets safe with me.”

“Thanks.” Ryan cleared his throat. “Amber, about earlier…”

The smile on my face dropped, I knew the subject wouldn’t stay dropped for long and of course Ryan would mention it first. He was  never known to keep things bottled up, if he wanted to talk about something he’d get right to the point.

“What about it?” I decided to play dumb.

“Ams, you felt that I know you did.”

Of course I knew what he was referring too, but I’m one to run away from the unknown and this was definitely classified as that.

“Felt what?”

“That spark between us.” Ryan said earnestly.

“It was probably just static electricity. You know? Like you get off of cars sometimes. Friction or whatever it’s called.” I rambled.

Ryan gaped at me. “That’s all you think it is?”

“No. That I know.” I insisted. There couldn’t be any more to it, because Ryan was my best friend and that was it.

“You’re lying.” Ryan accused.

“I am not!” I told him sharply. Cursing his ability to know me so well at this moment.

“Fine.” Ryan held up his hands in defeat. “Deny it all you like.”

“There’s nothing to deny.” I retorted, probably a bit too quickly.

Ryan sighed. “Well if you don’t want to talk about that. Let’s talk about what freaked you out earlier. You said you’d tell me later.”

I leant forward resting my elbows on my knees. “I realised that the voices I’ve been hearing are connected to the dreams.”

“Something you said reminded me of these voices that I’d heard before. I couldn’t remember what they said, but as soon as I tried to remember I could. I heard more than I did before. Just before it ended, they…they were killed.” I continued, swallowing the lump that had formed in my throat.

“Killed? You’re sure?”

I nodded. “ I heard the gunshots, and they spoke about it.”

Ryan ran a hand through his hair. “Whoa.”

“I know.” I agreed.

“What made you think they’re connected?”

“Remembering one of my dreams. I never mentioned it before because I didn’t think it was important but…the dreams, there’s never any sound its just silent. It’s really eerie. But when I thought hard about it, I realised that the words I heard from the voices fit right into the situation of my dream.” I explained in the best way I could, hoping it made any sense.

“You should write this stuff down.” Ryan counselled me. “ Then that way, you  might be able to piece together more of the voices and dreams and which goes with which.”

“That’s actually a good idea.” I agreed.

Ryan disappeared down the hall and a few minutes later returned with a notebook and pen in hand.

“Get writing Roberts.” He handed the notebook to me.

I jotted down a few notes.

Henry, Dorothy, Ruth �" shooting, dead?

Chicago Lightening? Button Man?

Evie, Charles, Mary�"Dancing?

Swallowing goldfish? A shelter?

Ryan looked over my shoulder at what I’d written down so far. “Any idea what that all means?”

“Not a clue.” I answered wearily.

“Now that I’m helping and you’re getting all this written down, maybe we can research into it? That might help.” Ryan suggested.

“You don’t have to do that. It’s my weird brain, I don’t want to drive you crazy too.”

It really did upset me to think that I might be on the verge of insanity, but I kept thinking that phrase I always heard ‘people who are crazy rarely question that they’re crazy’. I certainly don’t fall into that category, I question it all the damn time.

“I want too, and just for the record… you are not crazy.” Ryan told me, and from the look on his face I could tell that he meant it.

“Thanks.” I smiled up at him. “Now pass me that laptop, there’s some research we need to do.”

“I wish I knew these peoples surnames.” I  admitted as I waited for the laptop to power up.

“Why?” The colour drained from Ryans face slightly. “You don’t think they’re like ghosts or something do you?”

I pulled a face at him. “Ghosts? Really?”

“Hey! Don’t look at me like that. You’re the one hearing strange voices.” Ryan said in defence. “For all we know, I couldn’t be far off with Ghosts.”

“I don’t think its ghosts. But I do think they were real people once.” I explained.

Ryan rolled his eyes at me “and how is that any different to ghosts?”

“I don’t know it just is. Trust me.” I told him. “Finally.” I muttered as the internet finally loaded.

I tapped my finger on the mouse a few times until I pulled up a search engine. “What should I search?”

I looked at Ryan for some form of guidance.

He frowned. “Don’t search the names, that’d be useless.”

“Thanks Einstein.” I countered. “What about if I search Chicago Lightening?”

“Go for it” Ryan held up his hands. “But don’t be surprised if you just come out with a load of results for lightning storms in Chicago.”

I was disappointed to see that he was right. Page after page of articles and scientific research into lightning storms.

“Fine, you were right.” I deleted my search and decided to move onto something else.

“Button Man.” I spoke aloud as my fingers hit enter.

To my shock the second entry fit right into what I’d dreamt.

“Button Man…” I whispered. “ Is a Hit man or Mafia soldier…” I trailed off.

“F**k.” Ryan said plainly. He leant in and continued reading. “ Button Men usually do the dirty work for their bosses.”

He grabbed the laptop from me, hit the back button and typed in ‘Chicago Lightning’ next to where ‘Button Man’ was already written.

This time a worthy result showed up.

“Chicago Lightning is Gunfire.” Ryan rubbed at his eyes and looked at me. “ Does that make sense?”

I slapped my hand to my forehead. “ Yes! I should have known that. They even said it. ‘they’re shooting at us.’ They were all shot.”

Ryan peered back at the screen. “It says here that its slang from the 1920’s.”

“The 20’s?” I asked.

“Yep.”

“I guess that sounds right, they were dressed really old fashioned, and their names. I’m so stupid! Dorothy was wearing a Flapper Dress, for Christ sake. That was all the rage back then.” I rambled to myself, knowing I’d lost Ryan.

“Okay so these mysterious voices, we know now that they’re from the 20’s �" if they are real that is.” Ryan confirmed, though with a sceptical tone to his voice.

“If they’re real” I rolled my eyes. “I’m not making this stuff up you know. If I was I would have known what all this stuff means already, I’m not smart enough to think it up off the top of my head on the off chance that it’s actually a real thing.”

“I believe you.”  Ryan scribbled down ‘gunfire’ and ‘hitman’ down on the notepad. “ Tomorrow we’ll work on finding anything we can on these people you heard. Sound like a plan?”

Relieved that he didn’t think I was insane, I agreed. “ Yes, but I have one request.”

“What’s that?”

“That I get to wrote everything down, if we’re going to figure this out. We need to at least be able to decipher the notes.” His handwriting really was atrocious.

“Now put that movie on.” I said in my most superior voice.

“Yes Mam.” He mock saluted me, as he put the disk in.

“What movie did you choose?” I asked, as I settled back in the settee.

Ryan smirked. “I don’t know if you’ve heard of it. It’s about these 3 people around in the 1920’s they accidentally get on the wrong side of a hitman and he starts shooting at them.”

“You are SO not funny.” I shoved him. But despite my words I couldn’t help but laugh. This whole situation was bizarrely funny.