Page 54 of Cursed
Seth shrugged. “Maybe they have an arrangement. Certain ghosts on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and they alternate with other spirits the rest of the week. It’s not like the ghosts get a cut of the ticket money.”
Evan looked thoughtful. “Not the money, but I wonder how many of the spirits that have stuck around all this time feed off the energy of the tourists. Not in a bad way necessarily, but otherwise they’d be more likely to fade away. Maybe it’s a little more reciprocal than it seems.”
Seth had never thought about ghosts being taken advantage of as unpaid tourist attractions, but he could understand becoming annoyed at being disturbed during their “final rest.” Now, he wondered if ghosts needed a union to keep from being overworked.
“If the ghosts were dangerous, the tours wouldn’t work,” he mused aloud. “The ghosts can’t be held here by anger or vengeance. Why hang around when they could go to their eternal reward and float on a cloud in the Great Beyond?”
“Some of them are probably repeaters,” Evan suggested. Those were spirits that remained only as shadows of their former selves, gradually losing energy until they finally faded. They lacked sentience or memory of their lives, trapped in an infinite loop.
“True,” Seth agreed. “They add to the ambiance, but the person isn’t really hanging around.”
“I can get tickets to the rest of the things we want to see,” Evan said. “With two days, we have wiggle room if something isn’t available today.”
“I can think of lots of things to do with wiggle room.” Seth dropped his voice to a sultry growl.
“We will be sure to pencil that in.” Evan blew him a kiss.
“From the rest of the list for either today or tomorrow, I liked the foodie tour, the tour of filming locations and Civil Warsites, and the pirate history museum,” Seth added. “Tomorrow evening, we could do the Drag Bar Crawl or the comedy club. I’m fine with either, depending on what’s available and which you think might be more fun.”
“Works for me,” Evan said, and Seth loved hearing the enthusiasm in his boyfriend’s voice. Hunting down the witch-disciples was psychologically difficult as well as physically dangerous. Evan was a trouper, completely committed to the project, but Seth worried that it weighed on his partner more than himself.
Seth’s time in the Army came in handy more than he ever wanted to think it would after he came stateside. That helped him compartmentalize and draw on the psychological techniques he had learned in the military. Seth had done his best to share those strategies with Evan, but he wasn’t sure his lessons worked as well for his partner.
They started with a walking tour that took them past some of the most famous historic homes in the city. While the tour didn’t include going inside, the guide provided plenty of information about the people who had lived there, what their lives were like back then, and what part the homes’ owners had played in the history of Savannah.
“That last one was definitely haunted,” Evan said under his breath as they walked away from a stately old home.
“Pretty sure several of the ones we’ve seen are,” Seth replied. “But haunts aside, I’m glad the old homes are being preserved. Wouldn’t want to live in one, but they’re certainly beautiful.”
The tour site provided plenty of photos of the homes’ interiors, which Seth and Evan had looked at over breakfast so they could match the inside with the outside when they saw them.
The morning flew by as they checked out the shops and stopped for coffee. Before Seth knew it, they were queuing up for lunch aboard a real riverboat.
“I’ve never been on a paddle wheeler,” Seth said as they boarded for the lunch cruise. The stately white boat looked like something from a movie with its ornate decks and huge red wheel in the back.
“It’s hard to imagine what it was like when there weren’t airplanes,” Evan mused. “We’re thinking about how relaxing the ship is, but back in its day, this was how you got from place to place unless you took a carriage. When it was all that was available, people didn’t think it was slow.”
Seth shrugged. “Ships like this were probably faster than anything that came before them, so maybe they seemed like a big improvement.” He leaned on the railing and watched the shoreline pass. “I love the view of the city from the river.”
The big buffet lunch lived up to the praise in the reviews. Afterward, stuffed and sleepy, Seth and Evan found deck chairs in the shade where they could relax and digest as the river carried them back to the city.
When the ship docked, Seth and Evan headed for the Prohibition Museum. “I’ve got to admit, I’m really intrigued,” Seth said as they paid for their tickets. “I guess I’ve seen too many Roaring Twenties movies and shows about mobsters and government agents.”
“Well, we’ve come to the right place,” Evan replied as they walked inside. They could wander at their own pace on the self-guided tour, surrounded by memorabilia from the era, including classic cars and costumed mannequins.
“Those look a little too lifelike for me,” Evan confided, giving a figure wearing a fedora a wide berth. “I keep watching for them to breathe.”
Framed posters from the era told the story of Prohibition and its repeal, and photographs showed revenuers dumping out barrels of illegal alcohol from hidden stills.
They took their time, commenting on the items that had been preserved, including a whole bootlegging setup to distill alcohol. Despite the era’s crackdown on alcohol, the path through the museum ended in a recreated speakeasy that served all sorts of cocktails that were popular at the time of Al Capone and Eliot Ness.
“That was fun,” Evan said when they finished their drinks and headed back outside.
“We’ve got an hour until the party,” Seth commented, checking his phone. “I’m sure there will be snacks, but maybe we should catch something for dinner before we go.”
“Works for me. Do you want to do a sit-down meal or something lighter?” Evan asked as they strolled down the sidewalk enjoying the nice weather.
“Lunch was pretty big,” Seth reminded him. “I’m fine with grabbing something to-go and eating in the park.”
