“I did. But he didn’t sound at all like the description you gave me. He was older. Not some young guy.”
“I’d bet my right ovary he manifested in the way he most liked his physical appearance when he was alive, which was young and blond. And he wants to help because I’m guessing, during your mother’s illness, you were pretty good to her.”
“You’d better stop handing over ovaries if you hope to have those children someday. You know, with the guy you’ll find once you get that life?”
Delaney knew he was teasing her, forcing her to continually face her boxed-in life the way he did, but his words had a tinge of regret she wanted to cling to. Savor. If Clyde was still alive, and could recuperate, would he choose her when his spirit no longer needed guidance? Thinking about that right now was selfish. There was no time for self-indulgence and pansy-ass behavior. Not now.
“Okay, so if he was an older doctor when he died, he was probably vain enough to miss his youthful form. So in death he chose to manifest in the body that pleased him most. I’d bet my uterus he’s got pics online somewhere. If you can remember his name, that is. Maybe from the hospital he worked at—something. There has to be something.”
“Stop handing out your birthing bits so casually. And Dr. Watson. Gordon Watson was his name. But I can’t remember the hospital my mother was in. In fact, now that I try, I can’t remember any of the area hospitals. One of those blank spots again. And don’t feed me that shit that it’s convenient for me to forget. Why would I want to forget I’m still alive and not tell you where the hell I am?”
Talk about clinging to one stupid remark. Okay, okay, okay. She’d been caught with her pants down. But they had bigger issues to address than her calling him a liar. “How about we don’t argue about your integrity now? Let’s just get inside and get online. We’ll order a pizza and start digging. You can’t be far.”
The elevator ride to their room was spent in silence, Clyde brooding and Delaney lost in the possibility that his body still ticked somewhere—that somewhere in North Dakota, no matter the shape he was in, Clyde lived.
His heart beat.
His pulse throbbed.
He breathed.
His body had life.
She couldn’t think any further than that.
She wouldn’t.
seventeen
Delaney typed in the words das and Koma only to come up dry. Maybe she was spelling them wrong. She took a trip to Babel Fish, punching in the URL on her laptop while Clyde sat on the chair, facing the bed she sat cross-legged on. She’d been so absorbed in figuring out who the woman with the doily on her head was, she’d forgotten that Clyde had just found something out that changed the landscape of his life in an enormous way.
She’d just have to be overjoyed for the both of them because Clyde wasn’t feelin’ it.
Looking up, she took in his face, so somber and serious. “You still absorbing?”
“Yep.”
“Okay, sponge. Well when you’re done, you let me know. I could use some help deciphering this das Koma thing and figuring out who that ghost was. It sounded just like the word coma, but I need to double-check. With the way our luck’s run lately, I’m probably wrong and it’s another clue to whatever’s going on that we’ll miss if I don’t get it right. Thinking back, she had big heavy skirts on and that doily on her head. I’ve seen that somewhere . . .” Delaney drifted back off, typing in the word Koma on Babel Fish, an online foreign language translator. “Aha! It does mean ‘coma,’ only it’s spelled with a K in German . . .” Okay, so the woman had been trying to relay Clyde’s condition to them. But why and who was she that she’d stepped up to the plate on Clyde’s behalf, and if they figured out who she was, what difference would it make? She hadn’t reappeared. Maybe all she’d wanted to tell them was that Clyde was in a coma. Mission accomplished.
“Describe her dress again,” Clyde ordered.
Delaney eked out as much of the memory as she could. She’d been fuzzy and distorted due to Clyde’s presence.
“That doily on her head sounds familiar. Here, gimme the laptop.”
Delaney let him have it, pleased he was finally taking an active role in getting them closer to finding his body.
“Did she look like this?” He tilted the laptop to show her a grainy portrait of a woman.
“Holy shit—yeah, that’s her. Who is she?”
“Well, it makes sense if we keep following the pattern that half of the dead medical profession is trying to give us clues. The picture is Florence Nightingale, probably the most common, well-known name associated with nursing, and she did speak German among other things.”