Love, Like Ghosts: A Bay City Paranormal Investigations Story

glasses. With
fake olives and everything.”
Of course I wondered when he’d been fraternizing with the night doorman, but I didn’t ask. I was too
baffled by the notion that he wanted to go out for a drink. With me.
“If that’s what you want to do.”
“You don’t look very happy. Smile—this is a good sale. I will go change my shirt.” I pressed the back of my hand against my forehead, looking around to make sure the walls weren’t
breathing and my Aunt Trixie hadn’t appeared in the hall closet wearing a sombrero and talking backwards.
Because either I was having one of those flashbacks they’d told me about in health class, or I was
dreaming.
But no, Jonathan emerged in a different black shirt, this one a matte silk that had a hand like fine
cotton but a drape to die for.
I did need a drink. Badly.
“Shall we walk?” He gestured toward my coat.
“We’ll take the car,” I said, unable to wrap my brain around the thought of the two of us strolling
along the river like a pair of starry-eyed lovers.
He pulled on his black wool coat and tucked his virus-barrier gloves into the pocket. “If you like. I
can always drive us home if you have too much to drink.”
Us. Home. As if it were our home. Together. “I didn’t know you had a license.”
“There are many things you don’t know about me.”
Was that flirtatious? And if not, what the hell was it?
No, I decided, of course it wasn’t. I just had that phone conversation with Larry on the brain, was all.
And maybe it was just a simple statement of fact. Of course there was plenty I didn’t know about him.
Because he never told me squat about himself.
No doubt Jonathan was just happy he could now buy as much damn cat blood as he wanted. Lion
blood, even. Or maybe he found it gratifying that someone else in this cold, wide world saw something
other than black squares when they looked at his paintings.
It took us longer to wave goodbye to Phil and get out of the parking garage than it did to drive to the
club. The high-rise that housed it was tall and slender, a graceful counterpoint to the Mercantile Exchange
across the river. The El snaked by. Its bulbous 1950’s train looked shiny and retro in the glow of the
streetlights, bumping and rattling along as it ferried people to their jobs—or whatever other haunts they
were seeking.
I handed the keys to the valet while Jonathan craned his neck and watched as the train disappeared
around a curve, its wheels throwing off a few halfhearted sparks.
“We should ride in that some time,” he said.
What? “You shot heroin in the bathroom while I was disinfecting the kitchen. Didn’t you?” “Of course not.” He pulled on his gloves and led the way into the building. “I hatched from a pod and
hid the real Jonathan under the floorboards.”
“You’re much less creepy when you’re pensive and focused. Just so you know.” Huge posters for
“Crinoline” studded the lobby, featuring Elvira-looking women and drinks in fancy glasses. “Is this it?” Jonathan walked up to one of the posters and stared Elvira in the cleavage. “Phil said to look for the
one with ‘big melons’.”
I rolled my eyes. “Right. This is it. Let’s go, thirtieth floor.”
I couldn’t stay bitchy with Jonathan all night long, since he was practically luminescent in his joy. He
didn’t tell me anything more about himself than I already knew, but seemed to be living in that moment
with his full mind, body and spirit. He ordered water after water, trying each one on the list and describing
to me what they tasted like, from sandalwood to soap. He gazed out over the Chicago River and told me about the colors he saw iridescing there beneath the sodium vapor streetlamps. And when he was between
novel experiences, he simply sat with me and was happy.
Me? I got pretty plowed. That bartender shook a mean martini.
All the other barflies seemed to float from the shadows in red, silver and black. Vampires drank water
and everyone else drank liquor doctored to look like blood. There was a roller coaster ride masquerading as
an elevator on the way down, and the night air was a frosty smack in the teeth.
“Would you mind if we left our car overnight?” I heard Jonathan asking the valet. A bill was pointed
at him, likely of insanely large denomination.
The valet stepped back from the money, looking ill that he’d even seen it. “I wish I could, but there’s
no parking on this street between six in the morning and five at night,