B00528UTDS EBOK Read Online Free Page A

the coffin.
    Over the years, Sarah had come to dread these occasions. The one thing that she had discovered was that the dead were far easier to deal with than the living.
    Sarah would not go to the coffin and peer in at the body of the old man. She knew that Clyde was no longer in the shell that had once been his body. No, Clyde wasn’t in there at all. At the moment, the old man was standing next to his wife.
    Mrs. Morris was inconsolable. Someone was asking Clyde’s wife a question, but all she could do was shake her head while she sobbed into a white tissue. Clyde was standing next to his wife, trying to talk to her, but of course Mrs. Morris wasn’t aware that he was even there.
    Though Clyde was now in spirit, he appeared exactly as he had every time Sarah had seen him. He had on a black cap and blue overalls. He was still wearing the rubber boots he would wear at work to keep from getting fish guts on his shoes. His hair was completely gray, as was his mustache. To Sarah, Clyde still looked like he was among the living.
    Clyde glanced over and saw Sarah standing by the viewing room doors. Leaving his wife’s side, he drifted over to Sarah and her aunt. “Thank heaven you’re here! Will you tell this woman to stop her crying and listen to me?”
    Sarah smiled sadly, shaking her head. “Clyde, she can’t hear you now. You’ve passed away.”
    “Well I know that! Otherwise I wouldn’t be standing in this godforsaken corpse mill,” he frowned.
    Mrs. Morris noticed Sarah and came running over to her. “Oh dear girl! I’m so glad you could make it. Can you contact Mr. Morris for me? You know … he has all of the passwords to our online accounts and the fool never gave them to me.”
    Sarah looked over at Clyde. He appeared to be somewhat confused.
    “Well?” she asked.
    He shook his head. “Tell her I forgot them myself.”
    “He doesn’t remember what they are,” she told Mrs. Morris.
    The old woman frowned. “Well a lot of help he is.”
    Clyde held up his hand. “Oh wait a minute! Tell her I did write them down on a piece of a paper and hid it in one of the couch cushions.”
    Sarah relayed the message to Mrs. Morris, who seemed relieved, but had gone back to crying in her tissue. “Tell him I’m mad as hell that he went and had that heart attack … just before he was going to take me to Seattle for our anniversary.”
    “He can hear you,” she told the woman.
    Clyde shook his head. “Tell her I’m sorry, and that she should still go and celebrate our time together.”
    Again, Sarah relayed the message before turning back to Clyde. The old man’s attention seemed to have wandered. He was peering to his side, seeing something that was invisible to Sarah. She assumed it was the light and he was ready to cross over, but Clyde once again turned to Sarah.
    “Gina wants to know why you ignore her?”
    Sarah gasped. Gina was the one person that she had never been able to communicate with. She hadn’t heard a peep from her friend.
    “I can’t see her … or hear her,” Sarah told him.
    Aunt Jeanie put a protective arm around Sarah.
    “She wants you to know that if you don’t run now, you will be seeing her soon,” Clyde told her.
    Sarah stood there in shock, her mouth wide open.
    “Your friend wants you to know that if you close yourself off, she can’t help you.”
    Sarah shut her eyes and tried to concentrate, but she just couldn’t pick up on Gina’s presence.
    Giving up, she opened her eyes, but Clyde had vanished.
    “He’s gone,” she told Jeanie and Mrs. Morris.
    “The man always did have a habit of leaving without saying goodbye. Thank you for coming dear.” Mrs. Morris moved back to the group of family members that were waiting for her near the casket.
    “We should get home,” Jeanie said, taking Sarah by the arm.
    “Run Sarah!” The voice vibrated through the room, shaking the chandelier.
    No one seemed to notice but Sarah.
    The vampire had told her to run, and now Gina.