A relieved smile spread across my face. Was that all? I’d come across this problem countless times. “Elizabeth,” I said, “of all the problems we have right now, that is the only one with a simple fix.”
Garrett watched our exchange—or rather my exchange—but to his credit, his expression remained passive. I’d often considered how ridiculous I must look to the living, talking to myself, gesturing wildly, hugging air. But I didn’t always have a choice. If Garrett refused to leave, he’d just have to deal with my world. I would not modify my behavior to appease his delicate sense of propriety in my own office.
Elizabeth sniffed. “What do you mean? What fix?”
“You leave a note.”
“A note?”
“Sure. I do it all the time. It saves me so much explaining,” I said with an encompassing wave of my hand. “You dictate a note to me, I type it—and predate it to before your death, naturally—and then it’s miraculously found among your possessions. Kind of like an if-anything-should-happen-to-me note. You tell her everything you want her to know, and we just pretend you’d typed it before you died. I even have a guy who can forge your signature to seal the deal, if you’d like.”
“Who?” Garrett asked.
I glowered at him in warning. What I did with the departed was none of his business.
A pretty look of astonishment came over Elizabeth’s face. “That’s brilliant. I’m a lawyer. I’m more organized than the Dewey decimal system. She’d totally fall for it.”
“Of course she’ll fall for it,” I said, patting her back.
“Can I write one to my wife?” Sussman asked.
“Sure.”
Then we all looked at Barber, expecting him to have someone to write to as well. “I only have my mom. She knows how I feel about her,” he said, and I wondered if I should be happy about that or sad because his mother was all he had.
“I’m glad,” I told him. “I wish more people took the time to make their feelings known.”
“Yeah. I’ve hated her guts since I was ten. There’s really not much else to put in a letter.”
I tried to hide the shock I felt.
He noticed anyway. “Oh, trust me, the feeling’s mutual.”
“Okay, two notes, then.”
“Hey,” Elizabeth said, suddenly thoughtful, “what day is the first day of summer?”
“Planning on sticking around that long?” I asked.
She lifted her shoulders, referenced Garrett with a nod of her head, then wriggled her perfectly arched brows.
“Ah.” I tried not to laugh. “It’s June twentieth, or sometimes—”
Garrett gasped, and Elizabeth crossed her arms and smiled, smugness radiating off her in waves.
“You’re right,” Garrett said. “Elizabeth Ellery’s birthday is June twentieth.”
I leveled a mortified glare on her. “You tricked me.”
“Lawyer,” she volleyed, as if that explained it all.
Yeah, I liked her a lot. I strolled back to my chair and plopped down with my usual fanfare.
“She tricked me,” I said to Garrett.
He grinned. But his grin was different. It had changed, and I realized why.
“Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no,” I said, wagging a finger at him. “Don’t even start with that crap.”
“What crap?” he asked, all innocence and awe.
“The crap where you look at me like I have all the answers to every question in the known universe. I don’t. I can’t see into the future. I can’t read your past. I damn sure can’t read your palm, whatever the hell that’s about. I can’t—”
“But you’re psychic, right?”
“Dude,” I said, leaning over the desk, “I’m about as psychic as a carrot.”
“But—”
“No buts!” I had serious issues with the p-s word. We’d never really bonded. I threw my hands over my ears and started humming to myself.
“That’s mature.”
He was right. I stuck out my tongue anyway, then put my hands down. “Listen, even I have more questions than answers. I’m fairly certain my abilities are more closely related to schizophrenia than to anything supernatural. Ask anyone. If I were edible, I’d be a fruitcake.”
“Schizophrenia,” he said doubtfully.
“I hear voices in my head. How much more schizophrenic does it get?”
“But you just said—”
I held up an index finger to stop him. Though a middle one would have been more to the point, I had to explain before I lost the ground I’d just gained. “Look, when people are in the position you’re in now, when they’re almost to the point of believing in what I can do, they pull out all the stops. They quiz me, ask me stupid questions, want to know where the next earthquake will hit or what the winning lottery numbers will be. Seriously, have you ever read the headline ‘Psychic Wins Lottery’? I’m not psychic. I don’t even know if such a thing exists.”
“Tell him what you are,” Elizabeth chimed in excitedly while Garrett flipped through his notepad.
I flashed her a desperate shut-up-or-die look. It didn’t work. Probably because she was already dead.
“Seriously,” she said, “just tell him. He’s starting to believe you now. He’ll think it’s cool.”