Page 124 of Black
“Is he with the part of your family who wants to burn you on the stake for being a witch?” I teased, but Violet didn’t laugh; instead she raised her shoulders in a small shrug.
“Fred lives in Ohio,” she said softly and then held up the butter knife as if she just remembered something. “Do you know if Christian looked at the water faucet in the bathroom?” she asked.
“Uh-huh.” I nodded and swallowed another spoonful of Violet’s delicious tomato soup. “He fixed it so it doesn’t drip anymore.”
“Sweet… I’ll have to thank him for that.”
“Christian seems nice,” I said.
“Yeah, he is.” Violet looked thoughtful. “He’s overcompensating for the rest of the family, though… I’ve told him he doesn’t have to but he feels worse about the situation than I do.”
“About them shunning you?”
“I wouldn’t say that. They still invite me to family dinners and such, but it’s the constant pressure that gets to me.”
“What do you mean?”
“My family is just deeply disappointed with my choices in life and they don’t understand that it’s a deeper calling for me. My mother keeps asking me what she did wrong.”
I chuckled. “What did she do wrong?”
Violet smiled. “You’ve been living with me for almost two weeks now and you still think I’m a fraud?”
“Hey,” I held up both hands. “I need to see to believe… so if you can ask your ghostly friends to move a few things around right now, then I’ll declare myself a believer.”
Violet bowed her head and took another spoonful before she spoke. “I used to beg them to move things to prove I wasn’t crazy.”
“Did they?”
“Sure… but never at the right moment or the right place.” She put her spoon down and leaned back in her chair. “I can remember one time when my dad gave me a spanking for lying and I begged the spirits to do something that would convince him I was telling the truth about them being there.”
“And nothing happened?” I asked.
“Not while he spanked me, but the next day his car had a flat tire, and he walked into a door and it slammed in his head.”
“Sounds like a coincidence.”
“That’s what he said when I told him it was the spirits, and then he grounded me for telling more lies.”
I looked down and considered how to put my words. “Violet… did you ever consider that maybe there are no spirits?”
She crossed her arms. “You mean, did I ever consider that I’m just a mental basket case who hallucinates?”
“Well, did you?” I said softly.
“Of course.”
“Did you try to talk to someone about it? Like a doctor or a psychologist?”
She snorted. “Trust me, my parents pushed lots of health professionals on me.”
“And it didn’t help, I assume.”
Violet got up from the table and carried her bowl to the kitchen sink, where she placed it with a loud clunk. “No, it didn’t help, because I’m not sick, Cia. I think of it this way: some people are colorblind… they have to trust other people’s description of color. I have a different kind of sight and can see things that most people can’t, but just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there.”
“Okay, then let me ask you this. Doesn’t it freak you out?”
“It used to freak me out, but I’ve learned to control it and now I can close off if I’m not in the mood to deal with the paranormal and if someone is unpleasant I ask them to leave.”
