Give Up the Ghost

…it was because of the duty she felt to her prematurely dead sister and her father who rarely seemed to find a good thing in life that Alberta ‘Alby’ Tross the soap maker found herself walking timidly off a bustling city street and into a quaint corner café dubbed ‘The Pie Hole’. …

It was because of the duty he felt to his live-in girlfriend Charlotte ‘Chuck’ Charles who was also somewhat dead and to his good friend, employee, and P.I. in training Olive Snook (who was on a date with her not-rebound-but-bona-fide-boyfriend Randy Mann) that Ned the Pie Maker found himself standing alone inside The Pie Hole worrying. Ned was worrying a little bit about the lack of customers to come in and eat pie that day, but mostly he was worrying about just how much time Chuck spent with her step-aunt/mother and step-aunt/actual-aunt who had just a few days earlier learned that Chuck was not dead as they thought, but very much alive. Thanks to Ned.

With all his heart the Pie Maker wanted to be happy for Chuck and her family, and he was. But he couldn’t help feeling a little pushed aside as well. It made sense that Chuck wanted to spend as much time with Vivian and Lily Charles before they left on a European water ballet tour as the dynamic duo The Darling Mermaid Darlings, and she had assured Ned that no matter how much she loved and desired to be with her mother and aunt she wouldn’t leave him to go to Europe with them. Ned really tried to ignore his more neurotic tendencies (which tended to sneak up on him a bit more powerfully when he was alone with his thoughts like this), but it wasn’t helping that—

Whatever Ned was going to think wasn’t helping him was interrupted by the door to The Pie Hole opening with a light jingle of bells, and a woman wearing a short yellow trench coat over a white dress patterned with red roses stepped hesitantly inside, towing a rolling suitcase behind her. Ned looked up at her, happy to have a distraction, and opened his mouth to say ‘Welcome to The Pie Hole!’ but stopped quite suddenly. It had a little to do with the fact that the woman was very pretty – with a freckled nose and big green eyes and a small, pink mouth – and a lot to do with the fact that the look on her face took Ned back twenty years, eleven months, eight days, and forty-five minutes.

It was the same look on his young face when his father left him at the Longborough School for Boys in North Thrush. Utterly lost and alone with no one around that cared what happened to him, going through a very hard time due to events (mostly) out of his control, the emotional fallout of which young Ned had to bear completely on his own. The Pie Maker wasn’t sure how he read all that in one moment looking at the strange woman’s face, but he knew it was true and he felt a pang of empathy.

As the woman walked up to the counter and stared at Ned with that expression, seemingly wanting to say something but unable to find the right words, he smiled in a way he hoped was heartening and not gauche.

“You look like you could use some pie.”

She blinked, looked slightly guarded, but then slowly grinned back. “I think I could.”

One expert pie slicing later found the woman seated at the counter taking small bites of a delicious piece of lemon cream cheese pie as if it was not quite agreeing with her stomach. Ned found himself unsure if he should walk out from the kitchen and talk to her or continue to pretend he was doing something while he watched her. Her light red-blonde hair was pulled over one shoulder in a ponytail made out of large loopy curls, and she kept toying with the ends nervously between chewing. Abruptly – as if aware that a neurotic maker of pies was spying on her – the woman looked up, and the Pie Maker realized with a start that he had been discovered. There was no choice now but to go and talk to her.

“So how’s the pie?” his voice cracked on the way out and Ned found himself wishing that he could become a part of the floor.

The gloomy and mysterious woman smiled generously. “Really good, thanks. It sure does cheer you up.”

“Well, this is The Pie Hole. We’ve got pie good enough to fill any of your holes…the sad kind, I mean.”

Relief flooded the Pie Maker when the woman merely smiled again at his stumbling attempt at conversation that turned out to be an inadvertent innuendo. She gave him a long, hard look before pursing her lips and reaching into her pocket. Ned watched in dismay as she set a newspaper clipping down on the counter beside her plate.

“You’re the first nice person I’ve met here and I need a little help.” Her confession was anxious and she winced as she said it, but trekked on. “I’m looking for a private investigator named Emerson…” A pause while she checked the article. “Cod. Would you happen to know where his office is? I think it’s around here somewhere.”

The furry eyebrows attached to the Pie Maker’s forehead rose considerably. “Yes, I actually would happen to know where Emerson Cod’s office is. It’s one mile west of here above a dumpling restaurant.”

“Really? Oh, that’s great.” A calmed laugh bubbled out of the woman’s throat and she took in a large forkful of pie as if her worries had been temporarily assuaged enough for her to enjoy the cream-filled pastry. “I’ve been wandering around all morning and no one seemed to know, or if they did they certainly weren’t giving anything up. This is a big, fast city.”

Ned couldn’t stop himself from asking: “Where are you from?” Because it wasn’t that big of a city…Though its crime rates certainly made it seem so…

“Appletown. It’s about an hour east by train.” Swallowing her mouthful, the woman’s cheeks turned pink and she looked down. “I’m sorry. I should have introduced myself before I barged in asking directions. My name is Alby Tross.”

Her hand was being offered exactly in the middle of the two feet between their bodies, and as Ned took it to give it a friendly shake he noticed that something smelled very good. In fact he was too wrapped up in the agreeable aroma to observe the little golden shiver that seemed to pass through both of them at the contact, which Alby Tross definitely observed and said nothing about.

It wasn’t the smell of pie – which was a very good smell, but one he could easily identify – but something rich and tart that dominated all other smells in a pleasing way. It was Alby Tross from Appletown. It had to be since there was no one else there and it wasn’t Ned or his pies.

The friendly shake was lasting too long. Alby Tross who smelled so fine withdrew her hand from Ned’s and gave him a worried look. “Um…and you are?”

“Oh, I’m…My name’s Ned. And this is my Pie Hole.” The Pie Maker seemed to be having a difficult time controlling the pie hole that was beneath his nose and above his chin. “Nice to meet you, Alby. I’m glad I could help you out.”

Ostensibly satisfied that Ned wasn’t dangerous (just odd), Alby smiled again. “Nice to meet you, too, Ned of The Pie Hole.” Then there was a lull where Alby was too uncomfortable to eat any more and Ned was still trying to figure out what it was she smelled like, so Miss Tross cleared her throat and made more conversation. “Do you…know Detective Cod?”

Grateful to her for filling the silence, Ned nodded. “Well, yes. We’re sort of partners. Only not officially since I’m not a real detective, but I help him out in exchange for a small cut of what he’s paid for a job. It’s a big part of the reason I’m still in business. Not to say that the pies aren’t what keep me in business, but times and have been rough and…” Ned clenched his jaw a little to remind himself to quit talking. “Yes, I know him.”

“So you’re kind of a junior detective?” Alby’s eyes widened slightly and she leaned her elbows on the counter. “Maybe I could run my problem by you and you could tell me if Detective Cod can help me. Would you mind?”

The way she was staring at him attentively made Ned feel just a little bit important, which he hadn’t really been feeling lately, so the Pie Maker decided no one would blame him for indulging her. Well, except maybe Emerson and Chuck. But they weren’t there, were they?

Ned did the best impression of a detective’s face that he could imagine. “I guess I am kind of a junior detective. What kind of problem do you have?”

The girl who made soaps and the man who made pies did not, of course, know that they shared a similar problem: the ability to wake and then un-wake the dead with merely a graze of their skin. But this was not the problem Ned meant (since he didn’t know Alby knew it existed and vice versa), so it was not the problem Alby told him about.

“I think that my older sister Beatrice has been murdered. It’s a little bit of a complicated story, so if you want I can just skip to the key details.”

As Alby toyed with her fork Ned discovered why she had that lost-and-alone look he knew so very well, and – as he knew what it felt like for someone very, very important to you to unexpectedly pass away –his soft, doughy heart went out to her. “I’ve got time.”

The grin she offered could have lit up the dark, and Alby Tross emphatically told her entire story to Ned the Pie Maker. Minus the little hiccup of her corpse-poking escapades, that is. She began at her grandfather’s pioneering soap discoveries (leaving out what the secret ingredients were, because they were just that: secret), and ended with the moment not twenty minutes earlier when she entered The Pie Hole and saw gawky Ned standing behind the bar.

“So there you have it.” said Alby, quite breathless from recounting her tale. “I have no idea what Bea was getting up to all those years, so it could have been anyone. But judging by the bar of soap pushed so cruelly down her gullet, I think it has to be someone we know. It’s either a sign that she was going to say something someone didn’t want said and she need her mouth ‘washed out with soap’, or a personal affront to our family. Seeing as we’re so tied in with soap…So what do you think?”

Ned had bent forward to rest his arms on the counter, chin balanced in one palm. He was staring at Alby in a little bit of awe. She talked quickly and somewhat vociferously once she got going, and it was an interesting story. “I say you seem to know what you’re talking about.”

Another blush colored Alby’s cheekbones. “I read a lot of mystery novels. But do you think Detective Cod can help me? I need to find out where Bea was for that whole decade plus two months and why she was back in Appletown when I was sure she’d never come home. Because I can’t just…” the look of despair was back. “Do nothing. Not again.”

Ned wasn’t sure what she meant by the last part, but he was never one to pry (very much). He smiled hesitantly at Alby Tross, still quite surrounded by the aroma of her. “I think it’s a very interesting story you’ve got, Miss Tross, and that for the right price Emerson would gladly help you find your sister’s killer. He’s kind of a surly old grizzly bear but he’s a great detective.”

“Good.” sighed Alby, visibly comforted. “But call me Alby, please.” There was a long moment where Curious Ned and Hopeful Alby looked at each other and seemed to realize they had more in common than met the eye (despite their currently meeting eyes). Unfortunately both were people of a bashful persuasion, and turned their stare to the checkered floor instead.

The need to fill up the quiet with dialogue outweighed the need to stand awkwardly, and the Pie Maker coughed and asked a question that he didn’t entirely mean to: “Does making soap make you smell good all the time?”

“Oh.” Alby put her elbow to her nose and sniffed, leaving Ned’s look of horror at himself mercifully unnoticed. “I guess it does. After being around it pretty much my whole life I can barely smell it anymore. I think it’s…Sandalwood Sangria Sunrise. I finished it up before I left this morning.”

“That sounds right.”

Before another charged silence could settle between them Alby Tross gasped and looked at the clock on the wall. Then she was putting the entirety of the remainder of her pie into her mouth and digging in the pockets of her yellow coat. “M’sorry. I din see t’time! Ho’much do I owe?”

Ned blinked a few times and tried to remember the price of pie. Then he shook his head and waved his hand at the empty plate. “It’s on the – uh – house. You can get it next time.”

Next time? Had he just implied that he wanted her to return? Certainly she would have to return in order for there to pay for it ‘next time’. Whilst the Pie Maker wished there was a mirror or reflective surface nearby for him to glance at and make sure he was still himself, Alby Tross stopped her process of pocket-searching and swallowed a bit so she could talk as she gave Ned a tentative look.

“Are you sure?” Another swallow, and then a coy smile. “I mean…I’ll certainly be back for more, but…”

Again – as if possessed by a flaily-armed, munificent ghost – Ned wafted his hand in Alby’s general direction. “Don’t worry about it. You needed pie.” (You needed pie?! Stupid, stupid Ned…)

“That’s really nice of you, Ned. Thanks.” with that Alby stood, using her thumb to wipe at the corners of her mouth for any stray crumbs. She opened the mouth in question to say something, but stopped with the expression of a young soap maker having an epiphany. “I know! Just a second.”

Watching the woman duck down and unzip her suitcase, Ned made a note to give himself a firm talking to once she was gone. He had a girlfriend, which by definition meant: do-not-flirt-with-slash-be-overly-nice-to-random-pretty-girls-who-wander-in-off-the-street. Ned had never really been one to ‘flirt’ (it never seemed to go the way he planned) but that didn’t mean he wasn’t subconsciously trying. So his subconscious needed a good scold once he was alone.

“Here it is.” Drawing the Pie Maker out of his self-scolding reverie, Alby Tross set something on the counter next to her clean plate. It was a small rectangular box roughly the size of a wallet, an off-white color patterned with tiny lilac swirls tied with a matching lilac ribbon, a label on top reading:



“For the pie. It isn’t the manliest fragrance we’ve got but your hands will never be softer.”

She seemed quite pleased and for some reason it made Ned feel the same way. “That’s great. Oh, I mean – unless that’s your only bar. I wouldn’t want to take it.”

“No, I have a few…They remind me of home.” For a split second Alby was lost again, but then she was grinning and nodding at Ned. “Thank you again, Ned of the Pie Hole. I’ll be back!”

Ned’s eyes trailed after the soap maker named Alby Tross as she exited through the door through which she had entered in her yellow jacket, rose-patterned white dress, and flat brown shoes. Time for the talking to.

Alby Tross might have given herself a talking to about how talking to strangers in a strange town was something she should have been more cautious of, but it was seven minutes after one o’clock and she knew that seventy-one miles east in Appletown one Isaac Tross was waiting in hand-wringing silence to hear from her. Therefore she tucked away any thoughts of pies and tall, endearingly tongue-tied pie makers and prodded in her pocket for change to use the payphone she had seen one block away from the Pie Hole.

Only an eighth of a second into the first ring it was picked up and answered by a fretful, faintly croaky male voice. “Alby?”

“Hi, Dad.” Alby brightened visibly at the familiar sound of her father’s voice. It reminded her of a childhood filled with fun, love, and soap, despite the mother-shaped hole that seemed to remain in her heart. “Sorry I’m late calling. I stopped to get directions and as a result had some delicious pie.”

On the other line Isaac chuckled, relieved and warm. “That’s great, Bub! I’m glad you’re having fun and not…dwelling on the bad stuff.”

“I hope you’re doing the same.” Alby sighed and rested her weight on the brick wall to which the payphone was attached. She felt another of the many waves of guilt that had been crashing on the shore of her emotions hit like a violent sea storm. Hurricane Beatrice. But Alby was nothing if not determined, and pushed on through her grief. “Now I know where Detective Cod’s office is, and I’m heading there next.”

Isaac Tross exhaled slowly, a sound that Alby had heard many, many times in her life and despised almost as much as she despised her sister’s (probable) executioner. It was a sound like a great roaring wind of dejection had whooshed right out of Isaac’s mouth, propelled by years and years of disappointments and tragedies.

“Good job, Alb. You’re doing a real brave thing…but…if you ever want to leave it alone and just come home and--”

“Dad.” Despite her usual willingness to listen to and assuage all of her father’s many worries, Alby felt the need to interrupt. “I’m not coming home until I find out what happened to Bea.”

The painful wind blew from Isaac Tross once again at mention of his late daughter’s name, but it was followed by a noise of resignation. “I know it. I’m so proud of you, and…I know you might not think of it as a good thing, but you’re a lot like your mother this way, Bub. Never back down, never surrender…You’re a tough kid…A…a strong woman.”

“Don’t you dare make me cry on a crowded street.” Alby’s wet chuckle gave evidence to the fact that she was already crying, further backed up by her sudden desire to blot at her eyes with her sleeve. “Thanks, Dad. I’ll call you again tonight, okay?”

A muffled sniff came from Isaac Tross, who didn’t want his remaining child to know he too was a little damp around the eyes. “Sure thing. Love you, Bub.”

“Love you, too. Bye.”

Still trying to stem the flow of somewhat-pleased, somewhat-sad tears, Alby Tross hung up the payphone and began the mile-long walk to the office of one Emerson Cod, Private Investigator.