Awakening (Lily Dale #1)(31)
It’s hard for Calla to believe that this is where they turn for comfort, but judging by the number of registered mediums in town, spiritual counseling is a booming business.
“Hey, don’t forget,” Evangeline calls after her, “you can come over to our house whenever you want to get online.”
“Thanks, I will,” she says gratefully.
Calla was dismayed to find out that there’s no public Internet access here in Lily Dale. The Maplewood Hotel’s lobby is wireless. She’s out of luck without a laptop to use there. But Evangeline said Calla can check her e-mail on her aunt’s computer anytime.
“It was really nice of you to show me around, Evangeline.”
“No problem. It was fun.” With a wave, Evangeline disappears into the house next door.
It was fun, Calla thinks as she walks up the path toward Odelia’s porch, wondering if her grandmother ever locks the door. Maybe she doesn’t bother because it doesn’t do much good when you’re dealing with the spirit world. A deadbolt wouldn’t stop the likes of Miriam.
Terrific, now you’re starting to think like they do, Calla scolds herself. Maybe that’s because Lily Dale has turned out to be more ordinary—at least, on the surface—than she expected.
The locals who were out and about today could live in Anytown, USA, as far as she can tell. She wasn’t sure who was a medium and who wasn’t unless Evangeline pointed it out, and even then, she was often surprised.
The ordinary-looking, balding middle-aged man on a ladder washing the windows of his cottage over on Cleveland Avenue was a world-renowned clairvoyant, which means he can see into the future. The word, Evangeline explained, literally translates from French into “clear seeing.”
Meanwhile, the elderly woman decked out in a black felt hat and some sort of cloak, who looked for all the world like she must live in a haunted house, turned out to be nothing more than a local busybody who works for the post office and supposedly steams open other people’s mail.
The cute, freckled, pigtailed little girl with holes in the knees of her jeans recently channeled a dead president. The dumpy housewife without a shred of supernatural talent is having an affair with a volunteer fireman who does past-life regression in his spare time.
Calla couldn’t help but be fascinated by Evangeline’s accounts of their private lives—paranormal, extramarital, and otherwise. In some ways Lily Dale could be any other small town in the world, if you ignore the shingles that dangle from many of its houses. Calla is almost used to them now. Almost.
ODELIA LAUDER, REGISTERED MEDIUM
That one still catches her off guard as she passes beneath it on her way up the steps.
She glances at the spot where that girl— Mrs. Riggs’s daughter—was standing the other night, in the middle of Odelia’s flower bed. To her surprise, the dense growth of flowers there shows no sign of being disturbed. You’d think the stems would be snapped or crushed or something.
The front door isn’t locked, as Calla suspected. When she lets herself in, her grandmother is nowhere to be found, and the door to the back room is closed. Hearing the rumble of voices, she figures Odelia must be in there with a client.
All right, then, she’ll go upstairs and do some reading. She heads to her room, a few books from the Lily Dale library tucked under her arm. Evangeline helped her find some local nonfiction titles on the history of Lily Dale and spiritualism. She checked them out on Evangeline’s card, not wanting to get one of her own just yet despite the librarian’s invitation.
There’s just something so . . . permanent about a library card.
Calla isn’t opposed to spending a few weeks here in the Dale, as the locals call it. But it isn’t her home, and she isn’t trying to make it feel that way. She isn’t prepared to make herself at home in a place that counts something called Inspiration Stump as its most sacred landmark.
Evangeline took her out to the site, a spiritual retreat at the end of a trail in Leolyn Woods. As they hiked over, she explained in a hushed, reverent tone that otherworldly energy is stronger at the stump than anywhere else in Lily Dale.
After that buildup, Calla expected to experience something profound there, as they stood staring at the concrete-encased stump, listening to the soft patter of raindrops. But she felt nothing other than slightly chilled and damp. Evangeline, who was hoping to run into Jacy there, seemed disappointed both in Calla’s reaction and Jacy’s absence.
On the way back to Cottage Row, Evangeline confessed that she has a major crush on Jacy. Surprise, surprise. “Does he like you, too?” Calla asked cautiously, telling herself that she couldn’t be interested in Jacy now. Not if she wanted to keep Evangeline as a friend—and she did.
“He’s so quiet it’s hard to tell how he feels. About anything. I wish you could meet him.”
Calla hesitated before saying, “I’m sure I will.” Why didn’t you tell her you already did? Maybe because she felt guilty, having been instantly attracted to Evangeline’s crush.
Evangeline invited her to come to a message circle—a regular gathering of mediums and visitors hoping to receive communication from lost loved ones.
“Jacy always goes,” she said, “and Blue, too. Pretty much everyone goes.”
Blue. Okay, that’s one good reason to show up there. Evangeline doesn’t seem interested in him. Just a little awed.