Riley Thorn and the Corpse in the Closet by Lucy Score

33

10:35 a.m., Tuesday, August 18

“Idon’t know if anyone ever told you this, Nick,” Blossom said, approaching them after yoga class. “But your mom’s got a real stick up her ass.”

Riley spit out the water she’d just swigged down. “Mom!”

“What? I’m only speaking my truth. She comes in here every Tuesday and looks down her nose at us. She doesn’t even know that Wander is our daughter!”

“You wouldn’t be the first to point out the fact that my mother’s ass has no lumber shortage,” Nick said.

“Still, that’s not a very Blossom-like thing to say about someone,” Riley argued.

“Puh-lease. I’ve been nice as pie to that woman for two years.”

“Enough chit-chat,” Elanora announced from the front of the room. She thumped the floor with a sizable staff.

“Who gave mean Granny a stick?” Nick wondered.

“You will all sit. Now,” she ordered.

They all did as they were told. Even Roger. Though Riley saw him sneak earbuds into his ears.

Canon took the cushion next to her, and Riley thought she heard Nick growl audibly.

But any testosterone-fueled growls were drowned out by an ear-splitting screech as Mrs. Penny dragged a metal chair from the back of the room all the way to the front. Lily, Mr. Willicott, and Fred all did the same.

Elanora glared and waited until the elderly troublemakers were seated and eating their hash browns.

Wander quietly took the floor cushion next to Gabe. Riley noticed that their knees were touching.

“Since you all feel that brute force is the only way to defend yourselves, it is up to me to show you another way. But be warned, this is a grueling training. Not for the weak.”

“I’m gonna go find a Blockbuster and rent a movie,” Mr. Willicott announced and headed for the door.

Lily jumped out of her chair. “I should help. The last time he went looking for a Blockbuster, we didn’t see him for three days.”

Blossom raised her hand.

“What?” Elanora snapped, pronouncing every letter in the word, including the ‘H.’

“I was just wondering what we’re protecting ourselves from, Mom.”

“Your daughter has been targeted by a murderer.”

Blossom turned to Riley. “Oh, come on. Again?”

Riley shrugged. “It’s not my fault, Mom.”

“It most assuredly is your fault. Predators sense prey,” her grandmother announced.

“If we could move beyond the bashing my girlfriend phase of the morning, that would be great,” Nick snapped.

“Everyone has the gift. Some gifts are smaller than others,” Elanora said.

Fred held up his hand. “When you say ‘gift,’ are you talking about penis size?”

Riley pressed her lips together. She didn’t know if it was laughter or barf that wanted to escape, and she wasn’t taking any chances.

Her grandmother’s withering stare had no effect on Fred. He merely leaned forward and said, “Well? Are you?”

“I am most certainly not. I am talking about the gift of clairvoyance.”

“Oh.” Fred sounded disappointed.

“It is available to each of you so long as you aren’t too lazy to work at it.”

“Now we’re definitely talking about penis size,” Fred decided.

To prevent emotional scarring, Riley focused on her dad’s head as it bopped from side to side.

“You will pair up for a demonstration. You two”—she pointed to Riley and Gabe— “are a team.”

Wander looked longingly in Gabe’s direction before Mrs. Penny dragged her chair over. “Looks like it’s you and me, Stretch McFlex.”

Nick was paired with Canon. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” Riley whispered.

“Do not question my judgment, child!” Elanora sealed her edict with a thwack on the floor.

Riley and Gabe shifted on their floor pillows to face each other. “If they start fighting, I might need you to break it up,” she said to him.

“I will punch Nick in the face again and sit on Canon,” Gabe promised.

“You’re a good man, Gabe.”

“Silence!”

Riley rolled her eyes.

“For this exercise, you will look deeply into your partner’s eyes,” Elanora continued.

“That’s gonna get awkward fast,” Mrs. Penny guessed.

Awkward and deadly with two alpha guys staring each other down.

Gabe stared into Riley’s eyes, his brown eyes seeming to burrow their way into her brain, her soul. It was like staring down a golden retriever.

“Now, you will take control of your minds and direct negative, hurtful thoughts at your partner.”

“Grandmother, is this necessary?” Wander the peacemaker asked.

“It is absolutely necessary. Begin.”

I hope the old lady chokes on her egg salad today.

What is up with that old bat dressing up like Stevie Nicks?

“I said direct your thoughts at your partners, not me,” Elanora said crisply.

“Come on, Fred. Gimme your best shot,” Blossom said, rolling her shoulders.

“What are you looking at, fuckface?” Nick asked Canon.

“A sweaty douchebag,” Canon returned.

Riley decided to leave them to her grandmother’s wrath and focused on Gabe’s face. She couldn’t think anything mean about him. It just wasn’t possible. He had the same kind of soul as her sister. Open, warm, loving.

“Your hair is not very shiny.”

Riley blinked.

Gabe was doing their assignment, and she could hear him loud and clear.

“Yeah? Well, your head is shiny enough for the both of us,”she shot back internally.

Gabe flinched as if she’d struck him.

“Sorry.”

“No, you must keep going. We must complete the assignment. You’re not a tall enough person.”

“Gabe. Come on. If you’re going to do the assignment, do the assignment. Don’t be a scaredy cat.”

“I am not a frightened feline. You are the one who does not try hard because you fear failure. Which only serves to limit your experiences in life.”

Okay. That one hurt.

“You want to talk about fear? Which one of us is afraid to stand up to a crusty old lady and date my sister?”

“Elanora made me who I am. To disrespect her is unthinkable.”

“To accept her word as law means you don’t care deeply enough about yourself or my sister to stand up to her.”

“At least I am not afraid of the hard work it takes to do good work.”

“What kind of work do you do, anyway? As far as I know, all you do is hang around eating ice cream and moping after a woman you’re too afraid to profess your feelings for.”

Gabe’s eyes filled with tears, and Riley blinked back her own. “I am not here to fall in love with Wander. I am here to guide you. Yet I have found it impossible to guide someone who is determined to go nowhere.”

Riley’s gasp was audible. “Nowhere? I’m trying! I show up for psychic boot camp. I open myself up to the cotton candy!”

“Yet you still waste most of your energy wishing you were different.”

“Enough!” Elanora’s voice rang out. The thwack of the walking stick next to her startled Riley out of her trance of criticism.

She realized that they were sitting in the midst of chaos. Nick and Canon were wrestling. Mrs. Penny was loudly apologizing to Wander, who looked a little shell-shocked.

“I’ve never even heard some of those words before,” Wander whispered.

“Yeah, well, hang out with a few Navy SEALs in Shanghai, and you’d be surprised what language you pick up.”

“What do you mean everyone knows it’s a toupee?” Fred howled, clutching his Justin Bieber hair.

“Oh, gosh. I’m so sorry, Fred,” Blossom said, rubbing her temples.

Elanora got to her feet and crossed stiffly to where Nick was squishing Canon’s face into the floor.

She prodded Nick in the ass with the walking stick. Hard.

Canon used the distraction to throw Nick off him.

The entire room felt like backstage during a taping of The Jerry Springer Show. Hurt feelings reverberated within the walls.

“Good.”

Everyone went silent and stared at Elanora.

Riley and Gabe exchanged a look. “Good” wasn’t in the woman’s vocabulary.

“I’m sorry. Did you say ‘good’?” Blossom asked her mother.

“I did. You all managed to fumble your way through the execution.”

“Yay us?” Riley said, heavy on the sarcasm.

“You have each just witnessed how powerful your thoughts are. How you were able to transmit messages to one another by merely using your minds—as lacking as they are—and your eyes.”

“What exactly did that prove?” Riley demanded.

“That, to some degree, you each have the ability to read the feelings if not the thoughts of others.”

“Damn. Granny’s got a point,” Canon said quietly.

Wander raised her hand. “Perhaps we should reverse the exercise by thinking loving thoughts about our partners? It would clear the room of any negative vibrations.”

“Nonsense. That is an unnecessary waste of time,” Elanora sniffed. “This is not a preschool class with sharing time. We are adults. We will move on.”

Canon threw an elbow into Nick’s ribs and caught a back fist in the jaw for his trouble.

“Seriously, can we split those two up?” Riley asked.

Her grandmother pinned her with an imperious look. “Stop worrying about everyone else around you and focus on yourself.”

Jeez. Okay, lady.

“We will move on to the next exercise. Instead of working against each other. You and your partner will work together.”

“Work together to do what?” Riley asked.

“The point of this exercise is to boost your own powers by using the energy of another. Gabriel’s gift lies in his ability to attach himself to the energy of others. Like a leech.”

As annoyed as she was with Gabe’s character assassination on her, Riley didn’t know how she felt about anyone else dissing him. “A what now?”

“A leech attaches itself to a host and makes the host’s blood available to itself. Gabriel can attach himself to your gifts and enhance your energy.”

This was weird. Even for a Thorn.

“Okaaaaaaay,” Riley said, wondering if her grandmother had broken into Mrs. Penny’s Bloody Mary mix.

“You will begin.”

“Begin? Begin what? What are we doing?”

“I will follow your lead,” Gabe told Riley. “Ask your spirit guides a question, and I will make myself available to aide you in interpreting the answer.”

Riley was feeling a bit raw and didn’t know if she was ready to forgive and forget. He was her friend. Friends weren’t supposed to notice your crappy parts. And if they did, they certainly weren’t supposed to throw them in your face.

Her resistance crumbled under the weight of her grandmother’s glare.

“Fine. But what do I ask? I already had a chat with Dead Bianca at the sauna seance.”

Her grandmother’s eyes narrowed sharply.

“Perhaps find another question for which you do not have the answer,” Gabe said cryptically.

“Find out where Larry is,” Nick called from behind her.

“Good idea.”

“Okay. Let’s get this over with.”

“That is not the attitude that brings your gifts into sharp focus. That is the attitude of a moping child slamming their bedroom door,” Elanora said coldly.

Riley felt her nostrils flaring even as she realized her mean grandmother was right. Just because she didn’t want to be a psychic didn’t give her an excuse for not being the best damn psychic she could be. She made a mental note to consider turning that bit of wisdom into a motivational poster with a kitten.

“Fine. I’m ready to begin,” Riley announced.

She closed her eyes and shut out the rest of the room. Bringing her breath into focus, she called up her admittedly sporadic training and dropped lightly and intentionally back into Cotton Candy World.

“Hello, spirit guides. It’s me, Riley.”

“I am Gabe.”

Gabe was in her cotton candy world. She couldn’t see him, but she could certainly sense his presence. Steady. Calming. Good. Familiar.

Just like the presence she’d felt during her vision with Bianca. “Hey. Were you in my head at the seance too?”

“I was. I should have sought your permission beforehand, but I was concerned for your well-being.”

Suddenly, she felt like a jerk for being mad at him. Gabe didn’t mean to hurt her on purpose. He’d simply been telling her a truth she needed to hear.

“Thank you for being here, Gabe,” she said sincerely.

“You are most welcome, Riley. I am honored.”

“Okay, spirit guides. We’re here to find out where Larry Rupley is. He disappeared over a week ago, and we need to find him.”

The clouds pulsed lazily. She’d learned that the energy in the clouds directly reflected her own energy. And after falling through a roof having sex, sleeping on the lumpiest divan in the history of furniture, getting glitter bombed and boot camped, she was running low on fuel.

But something else was happening. A boost, a rev, a jolt of energy. It was different from a shot of espresso. Smoother and steadier. It was…Gabe.

The man wasn’t a leech. He gave rather than took. Anchored rather than disrupted.

The clouds deepened in color and began to part. Riley felt herself being pulled into them, zooming through them, their cool moisture soothing her overheated skin.

“I see something,” she announced as the clouds thinned a little more.

It was a tall, hefty figure slowly trotting down the sidewalk. One running shoe in front of the other.

“He is running,” Vision Gabe observed from somewhere.

“Slowly,” Riley added. “He’s on the riverfront. Close to our house!”

Then suddenly there was a hard tug, and she was no longer watching Larry plod along the riverfront. She was dragged forcibly up and back. “Hey, I can see our house from here!”

A moment later she was floating above Larry’s neighborhood. Her stomach dipped as she plummeted toward his townhouse like she was on a cosmic roller coaster.

“Continue to breathe deeply,” Gabe reminded her.

“I need to start wearing motion sickness patches for this crap,” she complained as her vision swayed. One second, she was standing outside Larry’s door, and the next she was passing through it like a ghost.

“Am I a ghost? Am I dead? Did Larry kill me?”

“All is well. Your guides are just moving you through the vision.”

To be safe, Riley counted her fingers and toes to make sure they all made it through the door with her.

“They are trying to show you something.”

She looked up and saw clouds swirling around the stack of mail on Larry’s dining room table. There was a package that seemed to glow brighter than the others. But it wasn’t actually glowing.

It was sparkling.

“Oh shit. Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” Riley whispered.

Gingerly she reached out to pick up the box, which was blinding in its sparkle now.

“Does this box mean something to you?” Vision Gabe asked.

“I think Larry Rupley got a glitter bomb in the mail and never opened it.”