Kiss the Goat: A Twenty-First Century Ghost Story by Brian Stableford

Author:Brian Stableford
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Wildside Press
Published: 2011-04-15T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

Stephen was already collecting his clothes, obviously intending to get dressed. He explained, when asked, that he didn’t think it was right that Kit should have to sleep on the settee while he hogged her bed, and that it would be better for him to go home to his own bed than to use the settee himself. He seemed to be at least half asleep, but that wasn’t the relevant issue. The relevant issue was that he was in full retreat.

Kit was afraid, but she didn’t want to jump to any conclusions. The time evidently wasn’t right to engage him in a long and arduous conversation about the import of what Rose Selavy had said, but that didn’t necessarily mean that he’d already blanked it out by telling himself that it was all a dream. There was still a chance that he had taken the evidence aboard and accepted the revelation. For the moment, therefore, Kit contented herself by suggesting, warily, that they ought to meet in the Phoenix at seven. The Admiral Benbow and the Jack-in-the-Box were both closer to Cemetery Junction but she knew from driving the last 17 back into town that the Benbow was a gay pub, and anyone who’s seen the paint job could easily deduce that the Jack-in-the-Box had been taken over and tarted up by one of the godawful chains that had wrecked the town centre, and had to be avoided on a point of principle.

“I can’t tomorrow,” Stephen said. “I’ve got something on. I’ll ring you Friday.”

The shock of that blunt statement left her feeling slightly numb. Something on was vague enough to mean anything at all, but in Kit’s experience such formulations were more likely to be down the you’ve just been dumped but I don’t have the heart to tell you straight out end of the excuse-spectrum than the it’s my little sister’s birthday and she’ll cry her eyes out if I don’t turn up but I’ll be back as soon as I can come hell or high water end.

“What about the cemetery?” she asked, faintly. The last word almost stuck in her throat, but she managed to get it out.

“It’ll have to wait,” he said. Just like that: it’ll have to wait. Rose Selavy had been wrong about Stephen. He wasn’t a good worker at all. He was scared. He hadn’t been prepared to admit it while they were huddling together for warmth, but he wasn’t ready to take this kind of responsibility aboard. He didn’t want to complete the picture. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to be in the picture, now that the background wasn’t just background any more. He wanted time to think, to consider his options. He wanted time to ask himself exactly what he wanted, and whether it was what he ought to want, and what he ought to do about it if it wasn’t. He had something on all right, and not just his clothes.

He even collected up the CD cases that were scattered on the table.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.