Everly shook her head.
Relief washed over Tennyson. He felt the same way Everly did. All he wanted was one uninterrupted day of fun with his family, where he could forget all about his powers and his daughter could simply be a kid. “We aren’t compelled to help every ghost. Some float in and out of our minds like a cloud passing over the sun. Some demand we help them, and others just want to be heard again.”
“I help every ghost who talks to me, even if they’re jerks.” Everly’s scowl deepened.
Ten felt his heart pinch. “I was the same way when I got my gift. I thought it was my responsibility to help people since I’d been given this amazing power. It took a lot of years before I realized it was okay to tell ghosts that I couldn’t help them.”
Everly wore a shocked look. “I can say no?”
“Of course you can!” Ten and Ronan said together.
“You can always say no to anything. To everything. Not just with spirits but at school and in life. This is your mind and your gift, and you have every right to say no.” Ronan sounded adamant.
Ten wanted to add it was her body too, but he’d save that discussion for another day. Everly was still processing her ability to say no, and he didn’t want to pile more on her than she could handle.
As for the ghost of Kotter Brighthouse, Ten was going to take his own advice and say no.
7
Ronan
When everyone got off the Ferris wheel, Ronan heard Ten ask Cope if he spoke with the former owner’s ghost or had the same vision of the man’s apparent suicide. His answer was no. Cope and Jude had both seen food flying on the midway and had assumed a guest of the park was being an asshat.
Leading everyone down the midway in search of something for lunch, Ronan was on guard, but everything seemed back to normal. There was no talk of ghosts that he could hear, and it seemed no one really cared about a tantrum. What with trashy reality television and TikTok, tantrums were everywhere.
“Here are a couple of tables.” Ronan urged everyone toward them. “This food stall has chicken fingers and fries. Does that work for you?” He was looking at Everly and Ezra, but all the kids answered in the affirmative.
“Me too,” Barb said, “with lots of barbecue sauce.”
“Chicken fingers all around, my good man.” Jude pulled out his wallet and got in line with Ronan. “What the hell happened on the wheel? One minute, you were having fun, and the next minute, Everly looked like she’d seen a ghost.”
“She did.” Ronan’s heart pinched at the idea that they couldn’t spend one day without ghosts coming for his daughter.
“What?” Jude asked.
“You and I saw food flying on the midway and the crowd parting like the Red Sea for someone, but Ten and Everly saw a male ghost. Then they both had a vision of sitting in the top car of theold Ferris wheel, the one with no protective cage. All of a sudden, they’re flying face-first toward the ground.”
“Holy shit,” Jude muttered. “Did the man say who he was before taking his last bow?”
Ronan shook his head. “No, but based on what Ten and Everly described, I think it was the ghost of Kotter Brighthouse.”
“Brighthouse, where have I heard that name before?” Jude frowned as he tried to recall.
“Baxter Brighthouse is the one who resurrected the park and brought it back to its former glory. His father was Kotter. He was the man who ran the park when I was here as a teenager.” Ronan had vague memories of the man who was larger than life. He walked around wearing suit pants and a vest, his trademark cigar chomped in his teeth. He always greeted the kids and sometimes handed out coupons for a free ice cream cone or popcorn.
“Wait, you were here as a kid, and then the place shut down?” Jude grinned.
“Yeah, but I’m not the reason it closed, though God knows I could have bankrupted them with my appetite alone.” Ronan snorted. When the school came to the park, they had food vouchers for meals, and he made sure he grabbed everything in sight.
Fitzgibbon and River joined them in line. Jude caught them up on the conversation.
“Can’t Ten just cross this guy over?” River asked. “Like he did with Bart Livingston?”
“Not if the spirit has other plans. All he did was ask for help, so we have no idea what kind of help he needed. To cross over. Toget revenge. To say goodbye.” Ronan took a deep breath. “Ten told Everly that they weren’t honor-bound to help every spirit who asks. As far as he’s concerned, this is a dead issue, no pun intended.”
“I’ve never heard of Ten doing that before.” Fitzgibbon looked stunned by the turn of events.
“Everly was under the impression she had to help every spirit who spoke to her. What better way to show her that’s not the case than to leave the ghost of Kotter Brighthouse to his own devices?” Ronan wasn’t a total hard-ass. He understood the spirit of the former park owner was suffering and needed help, but he never said what he needed and vanished before Ten could probe further.
