Toe to Toe Read online

  “I was helping,” Nonie said defensively. “Uncle Fezzo came in and relieved me. Buggy hasn’t been here long. We’re talking.”

  “Well, chat time’s over. I think you need to march your little butt over to the reception area, where your mama is. She’s beside herself, being there’s so much to do and all. Flower deliveries are already coming in, and they’re piling up near the front door. The viewing room needs to be set up, prayer cards need printin’—you know the drill. Your daddy’s going into the embalming room right now to do his business with Mayor Dover, Lord bless him, then I’ve got to go in right after to see if I can do anything with hair and makeup. Given the mayor’s condition, though, I doubt it.”

  “Where’s Butchy? Why isn’t he doing the embalming?” Nonie asked, referring to the resident apprentice.

  “Polishin’ the hearse with Fezzo,” Margaret said. “Your daddy decided to take care of Dover with him being the mayor and all. Plus the poor man’s face needs some reconstruction ‘cause his wife’s demanding an open casket viewing. Anyway, it’s none of your beeswax who’s where and doing what. All you need to be worrin’ about is where you need to be. Now get!”

  Nonie turned to Buggy and rolled her eyes. “Gotta get back to work.”

  “Okay, but call me,” Buggy said. “Like soon. Or, well, just be ready. We’ll be there at eight. We’ll talk more about it then. It’ll give you time to come up with more questions.”

  Nonie gave her a warning scowl.

  “It’ll be fine. Great. Don’t worry.”

  “Nonie Marie Broussard, don’t make me tell you again,” Margaret warned, as if Nonie were a petulant child. She stood stock-still, determination deepening the wrinkles in her face, obviously set on not leaving until Nonie followed her out.

  “I’m coming,” Nonie said, wondering how many years it had been since Margaret drew up the nerve to talk to her as if she were her mother. Then she remembered . . . ever since Nonie could remember.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Death sucked.

  Especially when it was your own.

  Guy Skinard watched Nonie veer off into the coffee room and itched to follow her inside. He wanted to eavesdrop, find out what Buggy had to say, know why she’d come here. Must have been important or some real juicy gossip for her to come to the funeral home. Even from where he stood, he could hear Buggy talking loudly, excitedly. Something about ghosts . . . and money. He wasn’t sure.

  As anxious as he was to find out the scoop, he knew better than to try and sneak into the coffee area. Nonie would spot him in a heartbeat and that would be the end of that.

  Sulking, Guy turned around and walked through the back wall of the funeral home, closest to the embalming room. He paid little attention to the drywall fibers, insulation and two-by-four studs as he walked through them. There’d been a time, not long after the boating accident, when he’d thought walking through walls, people, basically anything and everything had been really cool. Now it was simply something he was able to do. Like fishing, hunting and playing blackjack had been the talents he possessed when alive.

  Living, breathing, seeing to be seen, hearing to be heard, felt like it had been his reality only hours ago. So did his memory of the accident that had taken his life. Guy remembered it all too vividly. He and his best friend, Too Tall Touchet, had been fishing for catfish in the Atchafalaya late one afternoon. They’d just pulled out of a slough to find a more productive fishing hole, when a speedboat came of out nowhere and plowed into the back of Guy’s skiff—right where he’d been manning the outboard motor.

  The next thing Guy knew he felt like someone had perched him on the top of a cypress tree for a bird’s-eye view of everything happening below. Too Tall flapping around in the water with one arm, yelling and gulping for air. There’d been very little left of the skiff, and the speedboat with its shiny red and white striped body looked like a crumpled Coke can. Guy had spotted its driver lying in a heap at the bottom of his boat, covered in blood. The weirdest part, though, was when Guy saw himself floating face down in the bayou about sixty feet away from the wreckage.

  Dead.

  He’d died. Plain and simple. And it pissed him off. Left him frustrated and disappointed. Where had all the guardian angel crap they’d fed him in catechism gone to? He’d seen no angels, seraphim, archangels or pearly gates. No one to show him the ropes now that he was dead. What the hell was he supposed to do?

  The notion of being dead refused to fit in Guy’s brain. He couldn’t be dead. He knew that the speedboat had hit them, but he’d felt no pain, didn’t remember landing in the water.

  Then, while trying to absorb all he surveyed, Guy’s mind suddenly took a hard, involuntary detour. He no longer saw the basin, the boats, or Too Tall. He found himself standing at the edge of some field he didn’t recognize and staring at a strange purple light that appeared to grow brighter with each passing second.

  Guy felt the light beckon to him, warm and welcoming. He felt love coming from that light, a sensation so powerful, it had been difficult for him to comprehend. Its call had been so enticing he’d taken a couple of steps closer to it. Then he’d thought of her.

  Nonie.

  He’d made promises to her. Loved her. Needed her. Wanted to protect her always. The love he’d felt coming from that light was powerful, but not as strong as his love for Nonie. And besides, he’d never heard of any dead person seeing a purple light. It was supposed to be white. Something had to be off here.

  So he’d turned away from the light—from the warmth and welcome and made a conscious decision to stay earthbound for as long as Nonie needed him.

  As Guy popped out from the outer wall of the funeral home, he faced a sunny afternoon, which gave him no sense of pleasure. He shuffled around the building, hands in his pants’ pockets, waiting for Nonie.

  Once Guy came to terms with death and the fact that he’d tossed away whatever might have been waiting for him on the other side of that bright purple light, he’d struck out on his own.

  Dead man walking. Literally.

  No matter. He tackled it like he did most things when he was alive. Figure it out on his own as he moved about.

  It was odd to walk around Clay Point, recognize people you’d known your entire life, yet not be able to communicate with them. He listened to their conversations, could follow them anywhere and there wasn’t a damn thing any of them could do about it. Although the gossip he’d picked up had been exciting, it left him feeling like the odd man out. What good was great gossip and secrets if you had no one to share them with?

  Although alone where conversation was concerned, it didn’t take Guy long to realize that he was far from being alone. He’d been surprised to discover just how many spirits occupied Clay Point and the surrounding small towns. So far, the spirits he encountered appeared to fit in one of four categories.

  The first simply refused to move on due to fear. What remained on this earth was familiar to them, felt safe. The light, no matter the color or how inviting it appeared, was still strange territory and caused them great anxiety.

  The second group seemed to remain earthbound due to unfinished business. Things they didn’t know how to wrap up now that they were dead. It left them angry at everything and everyone they came into contact with. The third group refused to move into the light because they inherently knew the light would cause them to lose control over their environment and they were used to maintaining control. They had managed and manipulated everything and everyone in life and expected to do the same in death. A bunch of sad saps if you asked him.

  The fourth group was one Guy avoided to the best of his ability. They were evil spirits, people who created chaos and havoc in life and saw death as a kick-ass tool to produce mayhem at every turn simply because they could.

  Guy figured he sat between groups one and two. He ached for the familiarity of Nonie. They’d been inseparable in life, and he didn’t want his death to terminate that. He regretted that they’d not be
en able to marry before he died, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t watch over her as a husband would his wife.

  For some reason Guy still couldn’t explain, it had taken him some time to find Nonie. Every street and alley in Clay Point looked the same as it did when he was alive. He knew the directions to Nonie’s house as well as he did his own. The problem was every time he’d get within two blocks of her house, in a snap, he’d suddenly find himself sucked back into a gray vacuum of sorts that inevitably took him back to the scene of the boat accident. He felt like a hunk of metal and the bayou a giant magnet that refused to let him go very far.

  Each time that occurred, he’d trek from the swamp to Nicholson Street, which sat two blocks from Nonie’s, and the trip seemed to take forever. A thousand endless miles. Maybe it was some macabre punishment for turning away from the light in the first place.

  Punishment or not, the one quality he’d maintained in death that he’d carried strongly in life was stubbornness. So no matter how many times he got sucked back to the swamp, he’d storm back toward Nonie’s.

  Then one night, seemingly out of nowhere and for no apparent reason, Guy found himself crossing Nicholson Street, then walking through Mrs. Banks’ petunia garden on Guidry Street. The next thing he knew, he’d not only made it to Nonie’s house, he’d marched right through it and into her bedroom, where he’d found her asleep. He was glad she slept for had she seen him at that moment she’d have seen a bug-eyed fool. He still couldn’t believe he’d managed to break the barrier that had kept him away from her for so long. He never understood why the barrier had been there in the first place. Nonie must have had something to do with it. He could only speculate that he was finally able to break through the barrier because she was mentally ready to see him. He hoped.

  A deep ache filled him when he spotted the tear stains on her pillow. He wanted so much to touch her, reassure her. But when he placed a hand on her cheek, he might as well have swiped through thin air. He felt nothing. She, however, stirred, eyes fluttering open, brow furrowing, as if waking from some undesirable dream.

  Within seconds, she’d turned in his direction and her eyes widened. That’s when Guy knew she saw him. Neither of them spoke. She raised a hand to his chest. He felt the heat and energy of her skin go through his being.

  He’d been so shocked when he realized that Nonie could actually see him that if the dead were able to piss their pants, he would have right then and there.

  His death and her life had never been the same since.

  Suddenly feeling a little spring in his step, Guy bounced his way over to the funeral home garage, where he saw Buggy’s Taurus backing out of the driveway. In front of the Taurus, parked inside the garage was the hearse, all shiny and black and protected from the elements. Between the hearse and a garage workbench, Guy spotted Margaret squatting and sneaking a quick smoke.

  Grinning and unable to help himself, Guy went over to Margaret, stood right in front of her and put his right hand on the hood of the hearse, where the battery was located. One thing he’d learned since dying was that in order to manifest anything in the physical world, he needed to borrow energy from other sources, like batteries, lamps, anything that produced an electrical current.

  Guy felt a tingling sensation ride up from the palm of his right hand, flow into his chest, then over to his left arm and hand. It was enough energy for him to pound on the hearse’s hood once, which sent Margaret jumping upright and squashing out her cigarette in one stomp. Wide-eyed, she kept watch on the hearse as she squeezed herself past the vehicle and back into the funeral home.

  Being dead did suck.

  But sometimes it had its advantages.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  After Buggy left, Nonie halfheartedly followed Margaret to the reception area, where her mother, Rita, sat behind a large oval mahogany desk. As usual, her auburn hair was coiffed to perfection, her long nails painted the same tint as her rust-colored suit and matching pumps.

  “Nonie, for heaven’s sake, we have so much to do,” her mother said, then let out a theatrical sigh. “I’m so glad you’re here. I need you to start placing all these flowers in the chapel.” She waggled manicured fingers towards the thirty-plus arrangements clogging up the front entrance. “The Fontenot family has already chosen the prayer cards, and Margaret has them set to print. I need you to handle the obit, too. Here’s the info they gave me about Dover.” She handed Nonie a slip of paper.

  “Aw, Ma, not the obit,” Nonie protested. “Can’t you do that?”

  “I just had my nails done. What would tomorrow’s visitors think if I ran around with chipped nails? I need you to type the obit and send it off to the Gazette before two so it makes the paper run for this evening.”

  Nonie blew out a breath. Rita Broussard’s maiden name was Menard, which was a surname as Cajun as the rest of the town, save for a handful like Margaret. And the funeral home was a small business that worked maybe fifty funerals a year. Why then, did her mother have to act so uppity, like she’d come from some fancy city out West or East? It puzzled Nonie. It was almost as if Rita was ashamed of her inherent culture. She loved her mom, of course, but sometimes she had to swallow the things Rita said or did a little at a time, so she wouldn’t choke.

  Margaret stepped in and waved a hand with two-inch red-painted fingernails. “I’ll finish the prayer cards because it’s gonna take a little while I’m suspectin’ before I can get to the Mayor’s hair and makeup anyway. That’s if T-boy was able to do something with his face.” She turned to Nonie, “You do the obit and flowers, then vacuum up a little. You know how the baby’s breath in those arrangements leaves those little white diddies all over the floor when you move them.”

  Nonie held back a groan. Why her father had chosen to stay in this business boggled her to this day. He was a talented man in so many ways. He could’ve easily told his father no when he’d been offered the funeral home baton. But Cajun was Cajun, which meant traditions and responsibilities were seldom taken for granted or shaken off.

  Without a word, she gathered the funeral sprays closest to the front entrance and started to haul them away. She stopped and turned to her mother. “Which parlor?”

  Rita tsked. “Nonie Marie, we’re talking about the mayor of Clay Point for heaven’s sake. Which parlor do you think?”

  “It’s a chapel service? No mass?” Nonie asked, surprised. The Fontenots were devout Catholics, at least every Easter and Christmas devout, and it surprised her that they weren’t going to run Dover through St. Anthony’s.

  “Mrs. Fontenot hasn’t decided yet. They’re talking cremation. I should hear either way relatively soon.” She dismissed Nonie with a wave. “Go on now. Get this front area cleared out so we can clean it.”

  “Who’s we?” Nonie asked with a dig.

  Rita sighed heavily. “You, Nonie Marie Broussard, so you can clean it. Now stop with the nonsense and do your job.” She slapped a hand on top of the huge box of unprinted prayer cards sitting on the reception desk. Can’t you see we’re busy here? Now where in God’s name did Margaret run off to?”

  Nonie shrugged, knowing full well that the seventy-year-old woman had probably sneaked off to the garage for a smoke. As obnoxious and bossy as Margaret was, Nonie liked her. She had a no-nonsense, do-as-I-please attitude, which Nonie couldn’t help but admire. Margaret’s voice, with its raspy twang, reminded her of magnolias and whiskey. There was a significant difference between a Southern woman and a Cajun woman. A Southern woman carried herself with grace and charm, the way Margaret did, even though she was hunchbacked. Nonie could picture her as a young woman, wearing a hooped skirt, perched on a porch swing, and drinking mint juleps. A Cajun woman, on the other hand, you’d more than likely find wearing cutoff jeans and sitting on a riding lawn mower, steering wheel in one hand, Budweiser in the other.

  “I swear, do I have to do all the work around here?” Rita whined.

  Turning away with an eye roll, Nonie took the sprays into th
e largest viewing room. She hated the smell of multiple flowers compacted into one room, regardless of its size. It was like going to a perfume counter and sampling every brand at once, the scent overwhelmingly sweet, spicy and confusing to the brain.

  After placing the flowers in hand against the wall closest to the casket bier, Nonie turned on her heels, ready to head back for more, when she ran into—or more to the point—through Guy. She gasped as a rush of cold air whooshed through her body. Usually that cold air was a precursor to his presence. He’d never sneaked up on her like that before. He appeared solid in form, yet she’d walked through him as if he was mist.

  “Don’t do that!” Nonie hissed in a loud whisper.

  Guy grinned. ‘”Just having a little fun, babe.”

  “Well, that wasn’t fun or funny. You scared the hell out of me!”

  “Aw, baby, you know I’d never hurt you.”

  Nonie threw a quick glance over her shoulder towards the viewing room door to make sure Margaret or her mom hadn’t decided to follow her and give floral placement tips. So far, the coast appeared clear.

  “You need to leave,” Nonie whispered. “What if my mom comes in here? Or worse, Margaret?”

  Still grinning, Guy shrugged. “It’s not like they can see me, hotcakes.”

  “I know but having you around when other people are talking to me screws with my head, and you know it. Now, go. Shoo. Be gone.” Nonie turned and took a step towards the door. In a blink, Guy was in front of her again.

  “Jesus!” she cried. “Why are you doing this?”

  “’Cause you’re leaving too fast, and I’ve got a present for you.” Guy waggled his eyebrows, a habit Nonie had always hated.

  “Don’t do that,” she said, and waved a dismissive hand. “I’ve got to get back to work.”