Sour Grapes

reorient herself to reality. This was no time to let her imagination take over. She needed to stay calm and grounded, and not think about the restless spirits within the adobe walls.
    “Francie.”
    She heard it. She was sure she heard it... coming from the mission. Someone was calling her. The spirits, they were—
    “No,” she told herself. “It’s Savannah. She is here. I don’t know where her car is, but she got here before me.”
    “Francie.”
    There it was again, louder than before. It was coming from the side of the mission, from a stairwell that led down into some sort of dark cellar beneath the building. She recalled the guide taking her and the other students down there. It had been dark and damp, spooky and gloomy, and she hoped that wasn’t where Savannah was waiting.
    “Francie.”
    “Yes? I’m here. Where are you?”
    She walked to the side of the building and stood, squinting up at the whitewashed walls that were so bright in the sunlight that just looking at them caused spots to form in front of her eyes.
    Feeling a bit dizzy, she walked to the top of the narrow stone staircase. About fifteen steps down was a small landing, where the steps turned and proceeded down to the cellar. She really didn’t want to go there. If Savannah was in the cellar, she should come up here into the sunshine. Why stay down in the dark?
    “Savannah? Is that you? Are you in the cellar?” she called. “If you are, please come out. I don’t want to come down there. Savannah?”
    Standing on the top step, she strained to hear any sound from below, but all was silent.
    A seagull screeched overhead, frightening her. She jumped and leaned one hand against the wall to regain her balance. Leaning forward, she peered into the darkness below, and called, “Savannah, please answer me. I’m up here. Come out. Okay?”
    She felt it again...just as she had on the field trip... that uneasy conviction that she wasn’t alone. Something, someone was there with her. She felt their grief, their rage, their—
    A blinding white light, a lightning bolt of pain flashed through her head, obliterating every other sensation.
    She was flying. Falling forward into the darkness. She hit hard. And she heard, rather than felt, some of her bones break.
    Lying on the cold stone, she was dimly aware of someone standing over her.
    “Are you dead?” she heard a voice ask. “Well...” The nudge of a foot in her broken ribs. “... are you?”
    “No,” she whispered. “I don’t think so.”
    “I don’t think so either. You’re not making this easy, you know.”
    She felt hands reach beneath her... lift... and shove.
    Over and over she tumbled, farther down into the musty darkness. She landed even harder than before.
    “Are you dying?” asked a voice, but it wasn’t the hateful, angry voice on the stairs. This was a soft, gentle voice... maybe that of a Chumash Indian child... or a saint... or an angel.
    “Yes,” she whispered. “I believe I am.”
    “Then, come with me.”
    “Where?”
    “With me. You’re one of us now.”
    Francie felt a hand slip into hers... and tug. “But who are you?” she asked.
    “You know.”
    After a few minutes, there were footfalls on the stone stairs, going up, out of the darkness and into the sunlight Hurried steps, the steps of the living, not the dead.
    The dead remained behind with all the others who had died violently, unjustly, within the thick, adobe walls of Mission de San Carmelita.

    With her black garbage bag in her hand and a grim smile on her face, Savannah walked up the sidewalk to a building that held hardly any good memories for her at all. It was the medical examiner’s complex—a drab blue-gray cement-block structure that would never be confused with anything more cheerful, like a discotheque or even a funeral parlor.
    Savannah had spent some of her worst moments as a cop inside that building, bringing people to identify the physical remains of their loved ones. Another part of the job she had hated and didn’t miss.
    This time the victim was a dead chicken, and as much compassion as she had for barnyard poultry, it wasn’t as bad.
    Inside, sitting at the reception desk with his finger in his nose was the repulsive Officer Kenny Bates, another reason why Savannah avoided this place like a bad case of PMS.
    “Savannah, baby! It’s about time you dropped in to see me!” he exclaimed as she walked through the door.
    “Drop dead, Bates.”
    He grinned as though she