Bring Out Your Dead Valentine Ch. 03 - Witches

"No, Dad, I am not putting him on the phone so you can threaten him. Aaron is a nice guy, and he's been nothing but kind to me," Rachael pulled her ear away as the volume of squawking coming out of her phone increased.

She looked at me and shrugged while waiting out her father's tirade.

"Google the weather for Gaylord, Michigan, Dad, then tell me what we should have done," she added in a voice that challenged her father, "Mom knows his name and he's enrolled at NMU."

She looked up at me and rolled her eyes as the bombast rushed on.

"Yes, I will tell him that, but no, I will not do that to him."

She set the phone down and shook her head.

"My father is a little more protective of me than he needs to be. He wants me to tell you that he's a retired Marine Corps drill sergeant who's skilled in all forms of hand to hand combat and small arms fire," she shook her head, "he also instructed me in how to disable you until the police arrive if you get 'frisky'."

This began simply. We connected through a ride share program on the Northern Michigan University student website. Her home was in Plymouth, MI while mine was a little further down I-275 in Trenton. Our trip home for Christmas had gone well enough. We agreed to split the cost of gas, and I had pleasant companionship for my eight hour drive down state.

Why did I choose a college eight hours from my home at the frigid edge of Lake Superior? At first glance it might seem that I like all four of Michigan's seasons which are almost winter, winter, still winter and road construction, but I did have some compelling reasons. The first reason is because I see ghosts. They're everywhere and they like talking to me. For some reason, perhaps because most people remember their college days fondly, ghosts are thick around older colleges. The University of Michigan and Michigan State University teemed with them when I visited. NMU did not. Perhaps it's too far away from where people build their lives and die. Who knows? The second reason was they offered me a scholarship. The third reason is because it is so beautiful up here on the wild shores of Lake Superior. You haven't lived until you've seen a snow squall looking like a solid wall sweep in off the lake, or experienced the crush and roar of ice out in the spring, or the sheer power of a brisk north wind pushing a wall ten foot high of broken ice up onto the beach.

Rachael, my lovely companion, turned out to be a vivacious woman who wore her red hair in a pony tail pulled through the back of her Detroit Tigers baseball cap. She was on the tall and slender side with expressive hands that waved about as she talked. I was captivated by her long before we reached the Mackinac bridge on our first trip south. I couldn't for the life of me shake the idea that I had seen her before, but on a campus like NMU the student body was small enough that I could have seen her numerous times without it registering in my consciousness.

She seemed wiser than me in some ways seeing more than I did or at least understanding more of what she saw. Guys can feel threatened by that, but I found her fascinating. Besides, my Dad advised me long ago to marry a woman smarter than I was. It made for smarter kids less inclined to forget you in your old age.

Despite my aversion for sorority girls who I was invisible to because I lacked rich parents or a fraternity affiliation, I liked her. Although I didn't understand why a woman that beautiful would be attracted to me. Forty-nine percent of me wondered why a woman so out of my league would show me any attention at all, but fifty-one percent of me basking in the warm glow of her personality didn't care.

When she asked if I had a girl friend, I explained that I was an accounting nerd with little time or money for socializing. When I asked her about any boyfriends she explained that she was far too lanky and plain to attract one. She looked like a keeper to me and I told her so. She smiled and touched me a lot more after that. We had a long discussion about what we found attractive in the opposite sex among other things and it was a quick trip down state as a result.

When I dropped her off in Plymouth on our Christmas trip, I would have gladly accepted a kiss from her, but got a peck on my cheek instead. She blossomed like a flower on our trip back turning into a radiantly beautiful woman. I wasn't sure if my attitude had changed or if she had changed. She looked prettier to me, but that could have been make up. Perhaps we both had changed. All I know is that her kiss thrilled me when I dropped her off at her dorm.

We ran into each other on a campus where the health sciences building was far from the business classrooms. Rachael didn't think it was strange at all claiming kindred spirits are drawn to each other. First we studied together then we began eating lunch together and I realized halfway through a chopped egg sandwich on a winter afternoon that she made me happy and loneliness was no longer my constant companion.

In February at winter break, we climbed into my trusty Jetta once again driving south from the snow drifted shores of Lake Superior into the late winter of southern Michigan. One week later on February 13^th we headed north again.

Our trip back to NMU was supposed to be in a window of clear weather before a storm slammed into the upper Midwest. Wet snow began pelting us through 30 degree air as we crossed the Zilwaukee bridge over the Saginaw river. By Bay City, we were creeping along I-75 in white out conditions at twenty-five miles per hour on an icy expressway rubbernecking at the spun out cars and trucks along with everyone else.

Things looked dismal as darkness set in and we weren't even near the bridge across the straits to upper Michigan.

"Did you hear that, Scott?" Rachael asked pointing at the radio, "the state police have shut down I-75 at the Mackinac bridge."

"We're screwed. We're not making NMU today," I rubbed my forehead, "this happened two years ago. I ended up sleeping on a cot in the high school gym for two nights in Mackinaw City. The people were nice and fed us, but it was an uncomfortable two days. Gaylord is about ten miles up the road, see if you can find us lodging there. The closer we get to the bridge, the less lodging we'll find."

Rachel began pounding away on her phone. After a few minutes, she looked up.

"Wow, all the motels are filled."

My heart sank. Spending a night in a noisy gym was bad enough, spending a teeth-chattering night in a freezing car would be worse.

A few minutes later as I merged into one lane with a hundred other tired, cranky drivers to get around a bus that had spun out and hit a semi south of Gaylord, Rachael looked up at me illuminated in the soft glow of the instrument panel.

"We're saved. I got creative and found us lodging."

I listened as she made the call and read her credit card number.

"Take the next exit," she ordered.

I heard relief in her voice, but I remained tense as darkness surrounded us and all I saw was snow encrusting the windshield wipers and too much snow atop black ice on the pavement.

As we inched our way up the ramp, Rachael gave me directions from her phone.

"When we get to the light, turn right."

"All the cars are turning left," I offered.

"There's a ski lodge a mile down the road. They still have vacancies."

After thirty harrowing minutes of driving a mile in the dark sandwiched in between huge semis that slid sideways whenever they tapped their brakes, we pulled onto the grounds of the Elk Valley Ski Resort. The well lit ski lodge appeared like a light house beacon guiding us into port.

"This looks like an upscale place; can we afford to stay here?" I asked slumping in the seat exhausted from eight white knuckled hours of driving.

"I've checked for twenty miles around and this is the only place with rooms left," she looked out the window, "don't worry about the cost; my parents will cover it."

We parked and waded through shin deep snow to the front door.

"I have a reservation," Rachael said tossing her ID onto the counter.

The ghost hovering by the coffee station waved at me.

"I've been waiting hours for you," the ghost shouted making me flinch.

I know the vast majority people can neither see nor hear them, but sometimes when they raise a ruckus it amazes me that they go unnoticed especially since they are naked. They are stark, raving nekkid everywhere all of the time, and I am so tired of seeing them. Most folks die in their sixties and seventies which means their bodies look like a sack of potatoes. Sagging breasts, enormous bellies and thunder buns are not a pleasant sight. This one had a trim work hardened body.

"You're in the last room we have to rent," the young guy said looking up from his computer to check Rachael out.

"One room?" I mouthed at Rachael.

She held up a finger to signal that we would talk later. I read the envy on this guy's face. To him it looked like I was about to spend a night of passion with a beautiful woman, and I was. Even if I got no sex out of it, I could walk proud knowing the assumptions other men would make. I fell back on the solid business principle of 'fake it till you make it'.

With key in hand, the three of us, Rachael, myself, and the ghost walked past a couple shaking snow off their clothes at the door. Without a reservation they were not going to be happy with the news.

"We still need food," I mentioned after she had gotten off the phone with her father.

"Why don't we order a pizza?"

"I tried, they're not delivering tonight."

"I'm hungry," Rachael rubbed her stomach, "that salad at lunch isn't going to hold me for the night."

"We could eat in the snack bar. It could be a little pricey. Want to chance it?" I asked.

Rachael and I, with my ghost companion in tow, walked back down to the lobby then turned to the rear of the building where huge windows overlooked a brightly lit mogul hill and a couple of ski lifts. On one side of the huge room a massive stone fireplace kept the lounge area toasty for the ski bunnies who would normally be there. The ghost wandered off in that direction but kept a close eye on us. On the opposite wall was the snack bar where the grill man and the cashier looked unhappy that they had business this close to closing time.

We grabbed a booth. The place was clean, modern, and way too bright for my taste, but it beat not eating by a light year.

"That chili sounds pretty good," Rachel said looking at her menu.

"I would like to point out that we are sharing a room this evening," I replied with a straight face.

She reached out and slapped my arm.

"I'm going to order it as revenge for what you put me through in the car today, Mister Silent but Deadly. You made my eyes water a couple of times."

"I hoped that I had gotten away with it," I offered suppressing a grin.

"Well, you didn't, and now you'll suffer the wrath of Rachael."

When the waitress came, we both ordered chili.

"I feel like I've released terrible retribution upon myself," she replied with a frown.

"A single bowl won't get me going. If you feed me chili and hard boiled eggs for a couple of days though, look out."

I sipped my pop.

"Seriously, what are we going to do tonight? I'd volunteer to sleep on the floor, but it's drafty and there's no telling what has been ground into that carpeting."

"We're going to sleep together in the bed, silly. As drafty as that room is, I'm going to need you to keep me warm anyway," she hesitated, "my only problem is sleepwear. I didn't bring anything with me since it was supposed to take only eight hours at the most to get back to campus. I can sleep in my panties, but wearing an underwire bra all night would be torture."

"I'll lend you an undershirt. I brought along a change of underwear in case we did get stuck on the road."

"Thank you, that would work."

I finished my bowl first and excused myself to go to the rest room. My ghost who had been hovering in the lounge area followed me in.

When I finished at the urinal and turned to wash my hands he was nose to nose with me.

"You're a pathfinder," he stated.

"I'm a what?"

"Pathfinder, you help spirits. I can tell by your aura. It's white."

"My aura is blue," I replied.

"Not any more."

I held up my hand and squinted at it.

"When did that happen? It's always been blue."

"They change when you become a man. Mine changed after I slept with a woman. Now what the hell are you doing hanging around with a witch?"

"What witch?"

"The woman you ate dinner with," he frowned, "you don't know she is? Witches have a yellowish-green aura that looks like sulfuric acid fumes."

"So?"

"Witches enslave pathfinders because you guys can command spirits to do your bidding?"

"I can?"

"Hasn't anybody told you anything?" he rubbed his forehead, "you are in grave danger, my friend. Do not take any food or drink she hands to you and do not eat or drink anything you leave unattended. That's the way she'll enslave you. If she tries to get you to drink something, tell her to stop using your spectral voice."

I shook my head.

"What's wrong?" the ghost asked.

"I was hoping that she was attracted to me and thought of me as someone special."

"She is attracted to you and you are someone special but not for the reason you want. Don't go getting all maudlin on me. There's work to do to get you shuck of her."

"Maudlin? How long ago did you die?"

"I died in 1912."

"It's 2013. You've been dead for over a century."

"Pathfinders are rare. I was kept back to break you in. Time flows differently once you're dead. Anyway, you're here and you're in trouble. Let's get you free of this witch."

"What the Hell is my spectral voice?" I asked.

"You are new to this, aren't you? Pathfinders have a spectral voice so they can order a soul into the light when persuasion doesn't work. It works on the living too, but you have to remember to address the soul of the person, not the person standing before you."

"You were waiting for me when I met you. How could you know I would end up here when I didn't know myself until an hour ago?"

"I tell you you're about to be enslaved to a witch," he grumped, "and this is what you want to know? Sometimes after you're dead, you know stuff. It's like there's a plan that you're part of but you don't know why or what you're supposed to do."

"So being dead isn't much different from being alive," I said with a chuckle.

He followed me out of the men's room. I stopped and looked around. Too much snow made for a quiet night at the resort.

"So you don't know why you're helping me?"

"Look, I do need you to help me with something," his irritation with me registering on his face, "but I need to get you free of this witch first. Now can we get on with saving your scrawny ass?"

"So what are you going to do?" I whispered before I got to the table.

"Protect you."

"How?"

"I don't know yet."

Rachael remained unaware of our other companion. When we got up to go back to the room, she picked up my cup of pop and handed it to me.

"Don't forget your drink," she said holding it out.

"I'm done with it. Leave it on the table," I replied alert to the danger she presented.

"See!" my ghost replied, "you're ass deep in danger!"

"I was on my phone while you were in the john. The weather forecast says this storm will be over by daylight," Rachael informed as we walked back to our room, "do you think they'll open up the bridge?"

"That depends on a lot of things. It has to get warm enough to melt the ice, and the winds have to die down. They even shut it down sometimes for heavy fog."

She didn't seem unhappy at the thought of being holed up with me for a day or more. Normally, I wouldn't be unhappy either, but my ghost had made me wary.

Back in the room, we tried laying on the bed and watching the television, but the stress of the day caught up with us and we nodded off. I awoke a little after midnight, shut off the television, brushed my teeth, left a clean t-shirt on the counter for Rachael, slipped out of my flannel shirt and jeans, and crawled beneath the covers. Rachel stirred as I got in bed. She turned out the lights and went into the bathroom. Not long afterward, she climbed back into the bed and cuddled up next to me.

I awoke in the morning being the big spoon to her little spoon. I had thrown my arm across her waist. What amazed me was her hand holding my hand in place as I cupped her bare breast. It was a very nice breast and I wanted to fondle it, but nature called. I untangled myself then crept to the bathroom to relieve myself. Since it was early, I crawled back into bed.

She crushed her naked ass into my groin and pulled my arm over her pushing my hand onto her breast.

"My God, you are cold."

She threw her arm across my waist and pulled me in even snugger.

"You're naked," I whispered in a sleepy voice.

"Oops," she giggled, "I forgot to put on your t shirt. There's only one thing to do."

She sat up and pulled back the covers making me groan.

"Sit up," she ordered.

When I did she pulled off my t shirt and pitched it onto the chair.

"Now lay down and bridge."

When I did, she slipped off my briefs.

"That is so much better," she sighed while cuddling in.

As I warmed I grew drowsy and slept.

I awoke to Rachel humming to herself as she moved around the room picking things up. Her pillow mussed red gold hair cascaded over her pale shoulders and lay upon her breasts and back. Her lean athletic body moved with grace on long slender legs about the room. She was so utterly naked and so beautiful I did nothing to alert her I was awake; I was content to admire her beauty. I could forgive her for being a witch as long as she continued to flounce around the room naked.

Then I remembered how much more beautiful she had become after our discussion about what we found attractive in the opposite sex. Had she changed her glamour for me? In a weird way, I was flattered.

Her phone buzzed.

"Good morning, Mom," she whispered.

She looked over at me to see if I was awake and winked when she saw I was.

"After dinner last night, we came back to the room and went to sleep. We were both exhausted from the trip. We slept together in the bed, and before you ask, no, we did not have sex last night. We were both too exhausted from the drive. No, that hasn't happened. I'll keep you posted."

Was her mom in on enslaving me, too? What hadn't happened? Inquiring minds wanted to know.

She made her way to the window where she peered out through the closed drapes at the scene beyond. I was more interested in her pert butt cheeks.

"Ice and snow coats everything. A couple huge branches have broken off the oak tree out front and nothing is moving out on the road into town. I'll turn on the television, but I don't think anyone is getting out on the highway anytime soon. The snow plows haven't come through."

She walked over and sat on the bed next to me stroking my chest. I liked her stroking my chest.

"I love you, too, Mom and tell Dad not to worry. I'm okay. Goodbye."

She dropped the phone on the night stand and slid beneath the covers.

"It's good to see you're up, sleepyhead," Rachael said kissing me lightly on the cheek.

"How long have you been up?"

She pulled my arm away from my body so she could rest her head on my shoulder. Her thigh came to rest atop mine as her hand stroked my chest.

"I've been up long enough to make you a cup of coffee."

She pointed at the steaming cup sitting on the bed stand on my side of the bed. Beyond I could see my ghost acquaintance waving me off and then grabbing his throat and bending over with his tongue out. I was impressed by his acting.

I turned my head so that I could breathe in the luscious scent of her apricot shampoo. Her bare skin against mine sent jolts of pure ecstasy through my body. My body responded. How could a witch be so bad and smell so good?