Souls Searching
Nineteenth episode in the Fourth Sister Series
"San Francisco Youth Crisis Center. This is Phoebe."
She sat at her desk, working the night shift for the third night in a row. This night she was manning the hotline for children in distress and suicide calls.
"Please…help me," a young, quiet, female voice said. It sounded like the voice of a girl in her early teens, no more than 15. "Help."
"I want to help," Phoebe said in a calm, soothing tone. "What's wrong? How can I help?"
"He's here," the voice said. It was obvious that she was frightened of someone.
"Who's there?" Phoebe asked, now on the alert. This could be one call that she would have to route to 911.
"He's going to hurt me. He doesn't want me to tell," the girl said.
"Who? Who doesn't want you to tell what?" Phoebe asked. She now was sure that the girl on the other end of the line was in immediate danger. It was very likely a case of domestic abuse. Phoebe looked at the caller ID and started writing down the phone number. There was no name to go with the phone number. The girl hadn't responded yet. All Phoebe could hear was the breathing of a very frightened little girl. "Honey, I want to help you, but you have to tell me who's going to hurt you."
"I can't," the girl said. "I can't."
"I understand you're afraid," Phoebe said. She decided to rewind and take things slow. "Can you tell me your name?"
"Emily," she said. Phoebe wrote that down. She continued making notes about the conversation while she spoke.
"Okay, Emily, how old are you?"
"I'm thirteen," the girl replied.
"Sweetie, are you hiding from someone? Where are you hiding?"
"In the hall closet," the girl said. Then she gasped. "I have to go. He's here."
"No, wait…" But all Phoebe heard was the dial tone. She looked down at her notes and decided to call the telephone number from the caller ID. At the very least she would keep whoever it was that was scaring Emily from hurting her. A noticeably older woman answered the phone.
"Hello?"
"Hello, ma'am. My name is Phoebe Halliwell. I work at the Youth Crisis Center downtown and I just received a call from this number. Is there a girl there named Emily?"
"Um, no, there's no one here by that name," the woman said.
"Is there a teenage girl there by any name?" Phoebe asked.
"No, my children are all grown," the woman said. "I live here with my husband dear."
"Just the two of you?" Phoebe asked, confused. She believed the woman she was speaking to was telling the truth.
"Yes, just the two of us, except for when the kids stop by with the grandkids," the woman said.
"Um, okay. I'm sorry to bother you ma'am," Phoebe apologized. "I must have gotten the number wrong."
"Not a problem, dear. Bye-bye."
Phoebe hung up the phone and looked back at the phone number she had copied down. She was almost positive she had gotten it right. She just hoped that the mistake wouldn't cause her to miss out on saving a young girl from abuse.
Price sat at the dining room table, staring blankly at the blinking cursor of her laptop. For the second in the past year, Puck was preoccupying her mind to the point where she couldn't work. She hadn't heard from him in over a week. She was worried that she had lost him for good. Even after what she had said about not giving up on what they could have, she wasn't sure what she could do.
"Call him."
Price looked up, startled. Piper was standing at the opposite end of the table, holding Melinda.
"What?" she asked.
"Call Puck. I know you want to," Piper said. Price tried to look innocent. "Come on, you've been moping around the house, complaining about writer's block. It's obvious."
"I just don't know what to say to him. His fears aren't outrageous. I'm afraid of the same things," Price said. "I'm afraid to open up to him and get so close, only to have a demon kill him."
"I've had those same fears," Piper said. She shifted Melinda in her arms and then sat down. "There were times when I nearly lost Leo. And I was afraid to have children, worried that I wouldn't be able to protect a child from evil. But I've learned that I can't let fear rule my life. And neither can you. If you do, you'll never find love, you'll never have a family and you'll end up as an old single woman with a bunch of cats."
Price smiled at Piper's little speech. "You've thought about this a lot."
"Every day for about three years," Piper replied with a smile. She rested her hand on Price's. "Call him. Don't let him go."
Piper stood, grabbed the phone out of the kitchen and handed it to Price. Then she headed upstairs to put Melinda to bed. Price stared at the phone, wondering what she should do.
"San Francisco Youth Crisis Center. This is Phoebe."
She had spent the last hour trying to put the phone call from Emily out of her mind, but she couldn't. She was worried that a young teenage girl was out there somewhere being abused, and she couldn't stop it just because she wrote down a phone number wrong.
"I need help," a young boy said. He was whispering and obviously afraid.
"Okay, what's wrong?" Phoebe asked.
"He's coming to get me," the boy said. "He's going to find me and hurt me. He said he wants to destroy my soul."
Phoebe was surprised by that comment. Abusive parents often made threats when beating their children, but destroying the soul was a new one to Phoebe.
"Who wants to do this to you? Your dad?"
"No, not him," the boy said. "I'm so scared. I don't want him to hurt me."
"Okay, let me help you. Why don't you tell me your name? Let's start there," Phoebe said.
"My name is Mitchell," the boy said. "People call me Mitch."
"How old are you, Mitch?" Phoebe asked. She hoped to keep Mitch on the phone. She quickly wrote down the telephone number off caller ID while she waited for his answer.
"I'm fifteen," he replied. "Oh God, he's here."
Phoebe heard the click before she could say anything. She looked down at her notes and was about to dial the phone number when she noticed something. The phone number she had just written for Mitch was the same number as the one she had written for Emily. Now she knew something wasn't right. Instead of calling the number the calls had supposedly come from, she dialed a different number.
"Morris."
"Darryl, it's Phoebe," she said. "Would it be possible for you to trace a phone number for me?"
"Um, I'd feel better if I knew why I'm tracing the number," he said.
"I've received two phone calls tonight on the crisis hotline. They were both from teenagers who were scared of something. And they both came from the same number," she explained. "But I called the number after the first call and I got an older woman who said only she and her husband were in the house, that her kids were grown and moved out."
"You sure she wasn't lying?" he asked.
"Almost positive," she replied. "I really don't think she was lying."
"All right, I'll check it. But I wanna ask you one question," he said. "Do you think this is related to you-know-what?"
"I hope not," she replied. Darryl then told her he would call her back after checking the number. Phoebe hung up the phone and looked at her notes. Mitch and Emily. Who were they? And what connection did they have with this old woman's phone number?
Phoebe arrived home in her apartment and sighed. It was so quiet. She had thought about getting a pet, and that caused her to spend an hour thinking about their cat, Kit. The poor thing had gone MIA almost a year ago. She decided she would go to the Humane Society in a day or two and see if she could find a feline friend to keep her company.
She put the kettle on to boil some water for tea, and while she waited she pulled out her notepad. She had received three more calls from that same telephone number during the night. Every time it was a different teenager who sounded very fearful of what was going on. After Mitch's call there was 14-year-old Tobias, 16-year-old Madeline, and 15-year-old Elizabeth. Phoebe thought about her second telephone conversation with Darryl.
"The address is 231 Sycamore Drive, and the residents are Matthew and Angela McCormick," he said. "The couple has been living there for thirty-five years. Neither of them have a criminal record."
Phoebe told Darryl about the other three calls she received and he decided it was time to check this place out.
"I'll go over with a black and white," he said. "If the woman's as cooperative with us as she was on the phone with you, she'll probably let us look around. If not, there's something fishy going on and I'll be able to get a warrant off of all of this information."
"Okay, just call me after you check the place out."
Darryl did call her after he checked the place out. As flustered as she was by the late-night visit from the police, Angela McCormick allowed them to look through the entire house. Her husband was visibly irritated, but he didn't argue. Darryl and the other officers found nothing in the house. And as Mrs. McCormick had told Phoebe, only she and her husband were in the house.
Phoebe poured the water and took her tea over to the living room sofa. She thought intensely about these children. Who were they? Was their connection to the McCormicks or was it to the house? Or were they connected to anything but each other? She sipped her tea and laid her notebook down. Tomorrow she would research this situation. She knew she wouldn't have peace until she got to the bottom of it.
Price and Puck sat in Buddy's. Puck picked at the bun on his burger. Price stirred the ice around in her soda with her straw. She had convinced him to meet her, and he insisted on meeting someplace neutral—not his office, not her house. So they agreed on this diner. They hadn't said much since they had arrived.
"All right, so, we've just spent the past half hour saying nothing to each other. Not even pleasantries," Price said. "Are we going to talk or are we going to fidget with our food?"
"I don't know what you expect from me," he said finally.
"I expect you to try. If there's one thing I've learned from my sisters, it's that you don't give up when things get scary," she said. "Piper and Phoebe have fought so hard for Leo and Cole. Piper moved heaven and earth to be with Leo. Phoebe pulled Cole out of the depths of hell to be with him."
"And he's dead," Puck said.
"Leo's not," Price countered.
"You told me he's immortal," Puck shot back.
"Not completely," Price said. "Piper told me about the day she found out that Leo is…what he is. She found out about it when he had a poison arrow sticking out of his body. He was dying because of the one and only thing that can kill him. And Piper didn't give up. She looked through the Book of Shadows for cures. She switched powers with him, and just when she thought she had lost him forever…she saved his life. They're married, they have a daughter, and they're where they are now because they never gave up."
"What? Do you see us getting married?" Puck asked, now wondering about a different issue altogether.
"No…I don't know…but I don't see us quitting here," she said. "I don't see the end between us. Do you really think this is where we should end it?"
Puck looked down at his burger. He had absently torn what almost resembled a heart in the top of it. He giggled. "No, I don't."
"So, what do you think?"
"I think that I got scared. I'm still scared," he said. "And I don't know if I'll ever not be scared."
"I'm scared, too," Price said. "But we can't let fear run our lives."
"So, what do we do?"
"We go slow and we don't get scared," Price said. She stretched her arm across the table and took his hand. "And if we get scared…we'll be scared together."
Puck smiled and squeezed her hand. "I think I can handle that."
She had been following Phoebe since that morning. She had spent two hours at the library, two at the historical society and now Phoebe was stopping in front of a house on Sycamore Drive. She had no idea what Phoebe was up to, and she didn't really care. Hope had come here to protect the Charmed Ones, and at the moment Phoebe was the least protected. She sat in her car across the street and watched the elderly woman let Phoebe into her home. She settled in for more waiting.
Phoebe knocked on the door, wondering how she would convince Mrs. McCormick to let her in and speak with her. While she was at the library she had discovered news articles about the house on Sycamore Drive. In the 30s it had been a halfway house for runaway teens. It was a very successful place. Many teens were guided and returned to their families. Some of San Francisco's most successful business men in the 80s cited time spent at this house. But all record of the house disappeared in the mid-40s. She had done research and done the best she could to find anything about the house, but the only thing she could find after the official closing of the house in the 40s was information about when Mr. McCormick bought the house in the 60s. She hoped that maybe the McCormicks could shed some light on what had happened at that house during those missing years.
"Yes?" The woman standing on the other side of the door looked younger than Phoebe had expected. She had expected an 80-year-old woman, but this one was no more than sixty. She was wearing a casual, pale pink pants suit, and while one might assume a woman of her age would have to dye her hair the color Phoebe saw, it appeared to be very natural.
"Uh, hi, Mrs. McCormick," Phoebe said. "My name is Phoebe Halliwell. I spoke to you over the phone last night. I'm from the Youth Crisis Center."
"Yes, you sent the police here last night," Angela said.
"I apologize for that. The police explained why they were here, right?"
"Yes, they said that you had received phone calls from teenagers and that they came from our phone number," Angela replied. "I don't understand how that could be. My grandchildren are five and seven. My children are in their thirties. There are no teenagers here."
"There were seventy years ago," Phoebe said. Angela looked confused. "Could I come in and speak to you? I hate to bother you, but I think it may be important."
"Um, yes, dear you may come in. My husband is out playing golf with our son, Ethan. So, I'm afraid he won't be here to speak with you," Angela said.
The two of them went into the parlor and Phoebe sat on the sofa. She picked up a framed photograph of two teenage boys in soccer uniforms.
"Are these your sons?" she asked. Angela took the photograph and nodded her head.
"Oh yes, that's Ethan and Joshua when they were in high school.," she said. "They're both very athletic. Both received full soccer scholarships—Ethan at UCLA and Joshua at Oxford. Of course, they called it football at Oxford."
Phoebe offered a smile and decided to break the ice by continuing to express interest in Angela's family.
"So, what do your sons do?"
"Ethan is a regional manager for a computer company. Joshua is a professor at Cornell," Angela said. "Now, what is it you wanted to speak to me about?"
"Well, I've been looking into the history of your home, and I discovered that it used to be a halfway house for runaway teens," Phoebe said. "Did you and your husband know about this history when you bought the place?"
"Oh, yes, Matthew was very aware of the house's history. He always looks into those kinds of things when making a purchase," Angela said.
"Did he notice that there are a few decades of missing information from public record?" Phoebe asked.
Angela looked confused. "Missing information? Matthew never spoke of missing information."
"I know I've only had a day to research this place, but I couldn't find one scrap of information between the 1940s and the time your husband bought the house," Phoebe said. "Does he have anything regarding that gap of time?"
"He has some old journals that belonged to Mr. Lawford," Angela said.
"The man who ran the halfway house?"
"Yes, that's right. I could get them, if you would like," Angela offered.
"Yes, that would be very helpful," Phoebe said. Angela left the room for a few minutes, and when she returned she was carrying two leather-bound notebooks. She handed them to Phoebe, who opened up the top one and skimmed the first page. It was dated August 21, 1944. That was the year that the house had officially closed, according to public record. The entry began by speaking of the closing.
"There were rumors that Lawford got a little too attached to the runaways who came here in the later years that the house was open," Angela said. Rumors. That was the kind of thing Phoebe needed to know about. She looked up to Angela questioningly. Angela sat and nodded her head. "Yes. Some people even thought the man wasn't quite right upstairs."
"When did Mr. Lawford die?" Phoebe asked.
"Oh, as far as I know, he's very much alive," Angela said. "He's in his 90s by now, I think. But yes, he's still alive."
"And he didn't keep his journals?" Phoebe asked.
"It was quite odd, when he sold the place to us. He said the journals went with the house, that he couldn't take them with him," Angela said. "He said we could read them if we wanted to, but neither of us felt the need to read them. I suppose he wouldn't mind if you read them." Angela looked to Phoebe curiously. "Why is that you've become so interested in this place?"
"Um, I'm just a really curious person I suppose. And I was kind of hoping knowing the history of the house would help to explain those phone calls," Phoebe said. Angela looked confused, but she didn't question it. Phoebe stood. "Well, I think I've taken up enough of your time Mrs. McCormick. Would it be okay if I borrowed these journals?"
"That would be just fine, dear. In fact, I would guess you're going to speak with Mr. Lawford. See if you can get him to take the journals back," she replied. "Matthew and I never felt quite right about keeping another man's personal journals."
Phoebe left the house and quickly got into her car. She wanted to get as much read from the journals as possible before she had to go to work.
There were rumors that Lawford got a little too attached to the runaways who came here in the later years that the house was open.
Phoebe knew she would have to find another approach at her research if she hoped to discover if those rumors were close to the truth.
She turned the corner and suddenly had the sensation that she was being watched. But she shrugged it off and continued on her way to the Manor. She wanted to let Piper and Price in on this situation because she was starting to get the feeling that there was no coincidence that those calls came to her.
Price had just arrived home from work when Phoebe showed up. The three sisters sat in the living room while Melinda sat in her bouncy seat, cooing happily. Phoebe filled her sisters in on what had happened so far.
"Are you sure the caller ID wasn't wrong?" Price asked.
"For one call I would accept that explanation, but not for five," Phoebe said. "Five telephone calls from teens at a phone number that belongs to a place that used to be a safe haven for runaway teens kind of makes me suspicious about what's going on here."
"Do you think the McCormicks are hiding something?" Piper asked.
"I don't know. Mrs. McCormick seemed so sincere. I can't imagine she would be involved in anything bad," Phoebe said. "I haven't had a chance to really look at them, but I think Lawford's journals might be able to shed some light on the situation."
"I still don't get it. You didn't have a premonition. Why are we getting involved in this?" Price asked.
"I don't think those phone calls coming to me was a coincidence. I think there might be more to this than there appears," Phoebe said.
"All right, then what are we going to do next?" Piper asked, knowing it would be best to trust Phoebe's instincts.
"Well, I'm manning the crisis hotline again tonight," Phoebe said. "I was hoping that maybe one of you could look through the journals and one of you could maybe do some research into Lawford."
"I'll take the research," Price said. "I've got subscriptions to various news databases through work, so I can do a more thorough search."
"I guess I'll read the journals, then," Piper said. Price left to get her laptop and Piper turned to Phoebe. "What do you think we're going to find?"
"I don't know, but I do know that my instincts are right. There's some connection between these phone calls and Lawford," Phoebe replied. "And I think we're meant to find it."
The children are becoming more and more disobedient. They refuse to follow the rules that I have set. They keep saying that they want to leave, they want to abandon me after I have taken them in, after I have fed them, clothed them, given them shelter. They are ungrateful, no wonder they ran away from their own parents. These children would not be happy, no matter where they lived. They could be given every amenity without even earning their keep, and yet they would still be unhappy, ungrateful. Ingrates. But I must continue this work. I must set the children straight. I must teach them how the world works.
Piper rubbed her eyes. She had been reading Lawford's tiny scrawl for so long she felt like she was going cross-eyed. So far she hadn't discovered much about Lawford except for the fact that over time he didn't enjoy running the home for runaways. It seemed as though he felt duty-driven. At first it seemed as though he did the work for the joy of helping others, but as time went on it was like a routine. He didn't want to do it, but he had to do it. Or someone was forcing him to do it. But other than Lawford's dislike of the teens in later years, there was nothing else suspicious.
She went into the dining room to discover Price still researching over the Internet. Price had a notepad beside her with various things written on it. She looked up when she noticed Piper had come into the room.
"Find much?" Piper asked.
"Not much on Lawford," Price said. "So, I went a different angle. I started looking into all the runaways that visited his house. That didn't get me anywhere and suddenly I had this brainstorm. What about missing children reports for that time period?"
"Missing children?"
"Yeah. See, these kids called Phoebe looking for help. So, what if some of those runaways that went to Lawford for help never made it back home?"
"Wait, are you saying that the spirits of some of the teens that went to Lawford called Phoebe for help?" Piper asked.
"Maybe. I think that's what Phoebe believes. So, I've got a list of names here from the year the house shut down," Price said. "I'll show them to Phoebe and see if any match the names of the kids that called her."
"But still, are we thinking that Lawford did something to these kids?" Piper asked.
"Maybe. Did you get anything from the journals?"
"Not really, except that as time went on he was liking the kids less," Piper explained. "I guess I'll keep reading. Maybe there will be more towards the end."
Piper headed back to read the journals while Price continued to look up information on missing children from the early 20th century.
Phoebe answered the crisis hotline, her thoughts not exactly on helping those who call her. But when she heard a familiar voice her attention was drawn solely to the telephone.
"He's coming to get me," the young girl said.
"Emily? Is that you?" Phoebe asked. She looked at the caller ID, and sure enough, it was the same number.
"You have to stop him. He's going to destroy our souls," Emily said fearfully.
"Who is he?"
"Waldorf. He's a monster. He killed us and now he's going to destroy our souls."
"He killed you?" Phoebe asked. She had guessed that these kids weren't exactly alive, but it still caught her off-guard. But Emily said no more. Phoebe heard a click and then a dial tone. She immediately dialed the Manor.
"Hello," came Price's distracted response.
"Price, I've got another name for you," Phoebe said. "Waldorf."
"I think I know him. Red and white striped sweater. Glasses. Nobody seems to know where he is," Price joked.
"Not Waldo. Waldorf," Phoebe said. "It might be the name of a demon."
"Did you get another phone call?"
"Yeah, it was Emily again," Phoebe said. "Have you gotten anywhere yet?"
"I've got an angle I'd like to talk to you about, but it'd take too long over the phone," Price said. "You're coming here after work, right?"
"Right. Well, I should get back to work," Phoebe said. "See you later."
"Bye." Price hung up the phone and looked up when Piper entered the room carrying one of Lawford's journals.
"Our good Samaritan was a few slices short of a full loaf in the later years," Piper said, holding up the journal. Price snickered at Piper's food reference and then took the journal as Piper handed it to her. "He rambles on and on about stuff. It's hard to understand most of it. But the last few pages are nothing but his scribbling, 'I will not die. I will not die.' Check it out."
Price looked at the pages and sure enough those words were scrawled in childish handwriting throughout the pages. She looked to Piper, confused.
"I don't get it. From what Phoebe said about her conversation with Mrs. McCormick, Lawford was sane enough to successfully sell his house and move somewhere else."
"Well, there's another question. Where does Lawford live? Why did he sell his house and leave these journals behind?" Piper asked. "Have you found any current information on him?"
"Not really. Although, I haven't found an obituary, so he's at least still alive."
"I think we need to track him down," Piper said. "Something tells me that he hoped to hide from something by selling his house."
Phoebe entered the Manor to find Price asleep on the sofa in the parlor while Piper was reading something off the screen of Price's laptop, cup of tea in hand. Phoebe smiled at Price and joined Piper in the dining room.
"She's been researching all night. We decided to switch jobs. I couldn't make much of Lawford's journals. So she thought she'd give it a shot," Piper said. "How was work?"
"Not extremely eventful. I only got two calls tonight. One from Emily and one from Mitch," Phoebe explained. "Either they're getting weaker or they're just not trying as hard. Did you guys look up Waldorf?"
"Price looked in the Book of Shadows. No demon by that name," Piper replied. "But she made up a list of missing children from the year the house shut down. Any of them match the names your callers gave you?"
Phoebe looked the list over. There were many names on the list. She found a Tobias, Mitchell and Madeline that matched her callers. But there were two Emily's and three Elizabeth's of the same age.
"I've got three pretty positive matches," Phoebe said. "Are all these cases unsolved?"
"I think so," Piper replied. "Our guess is that Lawford did something to these kids in some fit of insanity. The last entries in his journal are a little nutty."
"Any luck in tracking down Lawford?" Phoebe asked.
"None so far. We're hoping he's still alive, since we haven't found an obituary. But there's no other record of him either," Piper explained. "There isn't even a missing person report. Nothing. It's like he never existed after he sold the house to the McCormicks."
"So we need to stop looking for Lawford and start looking for Waldorf," Phoebe said, realization suddenly hitting her. "I can't believe I didn't notice this before." She wrote the two names on a piece of paper and showed it to Piper.
"Waldorf is an anagram of Lawford," Piper said, noticing what Phoebe had realized. "And here I was just thinking it was the name of a hotel in New York."
"I'll get Price up. She has better resources than we do," Phoebe said. Piper stared at the two names on the same page, wondering if they would have any better luck looking for a man named Waldorf.
Daniel R. Waldorf had lived in the Shady Pines retirement community for nearly 25 years and had been pretty much a hermit. He lived alone. According to other residents, he never had visitors except for a grocery delivery service. No one ever even saw him leave his home. But everyone assumed he was fine. The grocery delivery service never mentioned anything odd and he was paying his bills, so no one thought anything of him.
The sisters approached his small home and surveyed their surroundings. The retirement community provided landscaping services as part of the residents' rent so the yard was well-kept. The shades were drawn on the windows, and there was no car outside.
"I'm still not sure what we expect to find out here," Price said. "The guy's surely in his upper-90s by now and judging from those journals he's as loony as a toon. If he killed these kids he'll get off on insanity and he'll probably keel over from old age before the trial even begins."
"Well, we can't just ignore these kids calling me," Phoebe said. "They called for a reason."
"Let's just talk to the guy and we'll see what happens from there," Piper said. She walked up the two cement steps and knocked on the front door.
They were surprised when a man who looked no older than 60 opened the door. Piper looked to her sisters behind her and they just shrugged their shoulders.
"Yeah, what do you want?" he asked in a bitter tone. Piper looked back at him and decided it might be better to back down a step.
"Um, sir, we were looking for Daniel R. Waldorf," she said.
"That's me," he said.
"We were expecting you to be in your 90s," Price said.
"Why would you expect that?" he asked, obviously growing annoyed with them.
"Because you used to be named Reginald Lawford, and you used to run a halfway house for teenagers in the 1920s and 30s," Phoebe continued, getting straight to the point. The man looked very surprised, and it was pretty obvious that he was in fact the man they were looking for.
"I was born in 1936," he said. "I'm not the man you're looking for."
"Oh, I think you are," Phoebe said, now more confident. "And I don't know what you're hiding or how you could look as young as you do, but I think it would be in your best interest to answer our questions."
He glared at Phoebe and thought about it for a moment. "You can't prove that I'm Reginald Lawford."
"You would be surprised at what today's technology can do," Price said.
"We were able to find you. If we could find you, all we would have to do is give our inspector friend in the police department enough reason to arrest you," Piper said threateningly. "Like snowflakes, Mr. Lawford, no two sets of fingerprints are exactly the same."
He grumbled quietly and then stepped aside. "Come in and say your piece. You've got my attention."
The sisters looked at each other and then walked one-by-one past the man whom they had pretty much proved was Reginald Lawford. The place was dark. Only two table lamps lit the living room, which was sparsely furnished with an off-white sofa, end tables on either side of the sofa, an old brown armchair and a television. The kitchen was to the left and it was small but functional. A hallway was to the right, leading to the bedrooms and bathroom. Price noticed a faint odor in the air that was somewhat familiar, but she couldn't place it. It wasn't the typical "old person" smell that she would have expected in this place. It seemed very out of place in the home of a retiree.
They sat on the sofa and he sat in the armchair, his annoyed glare did not change. It was obvious he wanted to be rid of the sisters as soon as possible. Phoebe pulled out the list of missing children that Price had found and she handed it over to Lawford. He took it, but he didn't look at it. His gaze was fixed on the sisters.
"Any of those names look familiar to you?" Phoebe asked.
"I've met a lot of people in my time, young lady. You can't expect me to recognize the names on this list," he said. He took a moment to glance at it, noticed the ages next to the names and laughed. "These are teenagers. You said it yourself. I ran a halfway house for teens for nearly a decade. You expect me to remember names?"
"I expect you to remember the names of those kids," Phoebe said, gesturing to the list.
"And why is that?" he asked.
"Because those kids were never seen again after the year that you shut down the halfway house," Price said.
"And do you have any proof that they were ever at my house?" he asked antagonistically.
"Yes. We do," Piper replied.
He was visibly surprised, but then he regained his angry glare. "What proof?"
"I received phone calls from five of them, asking for protection from someone named Waldorf," Phoebe explained. She continued, not even giving him a chance to question her. "The caller ID identified the number as the house on Sycamore Drive. The house you used to live in. So, why don't you tell us what you did to those kids before we call the police?"
The sisters watched in awe as Lawford's face turned the brightest shade of red they had ever seen on the face of a human. His anger was skyrocketing.
"Do you mean to tell me that you've tracked me down and come here with these accusations because you believe you received calls from children who have been dead for almost 70 years?" he asked, almost screaming at them.
The sisters looked at each other, appearing not to be phased by his anger or his shouting. Piper looked at him calmly. "We never said they were dead, Mr. Lawford."
He growled at them, wadded up the list of names and threw it at them. Then he stood and went to the door and yanked it open.
"Get out! Get out of my house!" he shouted. "You have no proof. Go ahead and tell the police your foolish ideas. You have no proof because there is no proof."
The sisters stood and calmly walked out the door. He slammed it behind them, and they stopped halfway to the car.
"Okay, did anybody else think his head was going to explode?" Price asked with a smirk.
"To be honest, I thought he was going to turn into a demon," Piper said as she fished for her car keys. "So, what exactly did we accomplish here?"
"I think it's pretty obvious that he did something to these kids," Phoebe said. "But he's right. We have no proof. So we need to find it."
"How?" Price asked.
"We can start with what I smelled in his house," Piper said.
"Okay, good. I thought I was the only one who smelled something funky," Price said. "What was that? I couldn't place it."
"It was a few things," Piper said. She continued walking to the car and they followed. "Basil, alfalfa leaf and cayenne powder, which aren't too uncommon. But the other smell was an herb that has no practical every day use. It's only use is in ritualistic potions and elixirs. I can't remember the name off the top of my head, but I'd know that smell anywhere."
"So, what's he using it for?" Phoebe asked.
"That's what I need to look up when we get home," Piper said as she got behind the wheel and started the car. "But if my instincts are right, it's not anything good."
All Piper had to do was look in the cupboard with all their potion supplies to know what it was she smelled in Lawford's home. She pulled out a jar and tossed it across the kitchen island to Price. Leo had joined them with Melinda, and the sisters had brought him up to speed on what was going on.
"Mugwort," Price read off the label. "So what does that do when you mix it with the other stuff?"
"Well, those things—along with some water, hamburger, tomato paste and chili peppers—would make one very poisonous batch of four alarm chili," Piper joked. "But mix mugwort, alfalfa leaf, basil and cayenne powder with the right incantation and a few young people, and you've got yourself the fountain of youth."
"That's how he's so young?" Leo asked.
Piper nodded her head. "I saw a recipe for it once in a potions book that I found in a used book store. Part of me thought it was a load of bull. And another part of me wanted to buy the book to keep it out of innocent hands." She walked over to the kitchen desk and pulled a worn, dusty book off the shelf. Phoebe took it from of her.
"I'm pretty sure I know which part you listened to," Phoebe commented. She started looking through the book and Price looked over her shoulder.
"You kept this book? When did you find it?" Leo asked, alarmed that a book like this was in the house.
"I would've burned it," Price commented. "Most of the stuff in here looks like black magic."
"I found it about a year and a half ago," she replied. She took the book, flipped a few pages, and then gave it back to Phoebe. She had turned to the potion and ritual she believed Lawford was performing.
"Wait a minute," Price said as she was reading. "This says you have to drink the potion. Mugwort is poisonous."
"Normally, yes it is," Piper said. "But with this ritual, the incantation protects you from the poison."
"So Lawford stole those kids' souls to stay young," Phoebe said quietly. She closed the book and looked to Piper. "This still won't prove to police that he killed these kids."
"And how could the kids contact you if Lawford had their souls?" Price asked.
"They called late at night," Phoebe said. "Lawford was probably asleep."
"But why haven't they called sooner?" Price asked. She was having a hard time sorting all this out in her head.
"We smelled the potion in his home. That means he's performing the ritual again," Piper said. "He's starting to get old again. So he's taking more kids."
"We should call Darryl," Price said. "He could tell us if there's any kids that have gone missing recently."
"You do that," Piper said. "I've got an idea on how to reverse what Lawford did so we can release those souls. Phoebe, I'll need your help."
Price picked up the phone to call Darryl while Piper and Phoebe put their heads together to come up for a way to save the souls of the teens that had contacted Phoebe over the crisis hotline.
When Price got off the phone she looked very serious. Piper was in the process of making a potion and Phoebe was writing a spell. Leo had taken Melinda upstairs.
"Darryl gave me the names of five kids that have disappeared in the past week," she said. Phoebe and Piper looked up. "I'll give you each a guess on what the names were."
"Tobias, Emily, Elizabeth, Madeline and Mitchell," Phoebe said. "So the kids that called me weren't from when Lawford ran the halfway house."
"Then why did the calls come from the house on Sycamore?" Piper wondered.
"Just because these kids disappeared recently doesn't mean Lawford wasn't doing this stuff in the 30's too," Price said. "Maybe their souls were too weak."
"Maybe," Phoebe said. "But at least they'll finally be free."
"Right, we're setting them loose," Price said. She smirked and looked to Piper. "So, what's the plan, Stan?"
"We're going to transfer the souls from Lawford to one of us until we can release them properly," she said. "That should force him to go to the age that he's supposed to be."
"But won't that also make us younger?" Price asked. "Lawford is like 30 years younger than he's supposed to be. Piper you're the oldest and you're not even 30."
"It won't make us younger," Piper explained, setting Price's worries at ease. "The souls will only possess whoever performs the transfer."
"That's a lot of souls in one body," Price said. "Whichever one of us does this, will we be able to handle it?"
"I think so," Piper said. "This potion should help contain the souls. And the spell Phoebe is writing will actually cause the transfer."
"The real question is, which one of us does it?" Phoebe asked, looking up from the spell.
All at the same time the three of them said, "I'll do it." Then they laughed.
Piper walked over to the counter, pulled out three long kitchen matches, broke one and then closed her fists around them, making sure each match was at a different height.
"Okay, draw. Whoever gets the short match does it," she said.
"You know, Prue and I did this once with a quarter," Phoebe said as she stood from the table. "I don't have very good luck when it comes to chance."
She and Price each pulled a match, Piper opened her fist and they all saw that Piper had been left with the short straw.
"You get to have all the fun," Price joked with a sigh.
"Right, having a bunch of souls possess me is going to be so much fun," Piper shot back with a smirk. She poured the potion into a mug and let it cool a little. Then she drank, grimacing at the taste. "Why don't potions ever taste good?" she wondered.
"You're the chef. Can't you remedy that?" Phoebe asked. Piper just smacked her on the shoulder.
"You got the spell?" she asked.
"Yeah, it's done," Phoebe said. "Let's go get Lawford."
"Woah, are we just storming the fortress or do we have some way of proving that Lawford killed these kids?" Price asked. The three of them headed through the house toward the front.
"When the souls possess me our consciousness will integrate," Piper said. "I'll know what they know and they'll know what I know."
"So you'll know where their bodies are," Phoebe said.
"Right," Piper said.
"How are we going to connect them to Lawford?" Price asked.
"We're hoping to scare a confession out of him," Phoebe said. "Let's just hope this works."
Lawford opened his door and tried to slam it shut when Price forced it open with her power. He backed into his home and stumbled backward onto the sofa. They followed him in and shut the door.
"What are you doing? What do you want from me?" he asked, seeming more afraid now.
"You stole a few things that don't belong to you," Phoebe said. "We're taking them back."
He was confused, but Piper didn't let him say anything. She immediately began the spell.
"The youth you stole, must now be free. Release those souls into me."
A blue stream shot from Lawford's chest and hit Piper, causing her to stumble backward and hit the door. The two of them cried out in pain, but all Phoebe and Price could do was watch. When the stream ended, Piper doubled over, leaning on her knees. She was breathing heavily, seemingly exhausted. Then suddenly she stood upright and flipped her hair out of her face. Her eyes were glowing blue. She stepped forward and glared at Lawford. But he had changed as well.
Phoebe and Price had been watching Piper during the transfer and they didn't even see that Lawford had aged to 96 years old, the age he was supposed to be. He was trembling and staring up at Piper in fear.
"You stole our lives from us," she said. Her voice was mingled in with the voices of many children. "You stole our youth because you are afraid of death. Now you will see justice. Either confess that you killed us, or we'll kill you. You fear death, but now you must face it. What will it be old man?"
"Um, kids, you can't kill him," Phoebe said, touching her possessed sister on the shoulder. Piper's head spun around and the eyes glared at Phoebe, who jumped back in surprise. "We did this to get justice. We'll turn him over to the police. And he will confess."
"Right, Mr. Lawford?" Price asked. "You'll confess, right? Because I don't think you wanna see what all those angry kids can do in our sister's body."
"I'll confess," he said in a quiet trembling voice. "I'll do it. Just don't let them hurt me."
"And you'll tell the police where all the bodies are?" Phoebe asked. "And I'll let you know, that if you don't tell the police, our sister will. She knows everything the kids know."
"I'll tell them. I'll tell them," he said. "There's five in my yard outside. I buried the and planted pushes over them. And there's more in the basement at Sycamore Street."
"That's what we want to hear," Price said. She went to the door and signaled for Darryl to come in. On their way to Lawford's place, Phoebe had called Darryl to let him know he would have an arrest to make. Darryl came in, shooting wary glances at Piper as he helped Lawford stand and cuffed him.
"Is Piper okay?" he asked, worried by the glowing blue eyes. "I mean, normally her eyes don't glow like that. Do they?"
"No, she's possessed," Phoebe said. "We'll take care of her. As long as you take care of him."
"Got it," Darryl said. He left with Lawford and Price turned to Piper.
"Okay, Piper…I mean, kids…or…everybody," she stumbled. "Let's go set some souls free."
They arrived at the Manor and Leo was taken aback when he saw Piper. He knew of the plan, but he was still not ready for what he saw.
"Are you guys sure that you can set these souls free?" Leo asked.
"Pretty sure," Phoebe said. They went to the kitchen and Phoebe went to the refrigerator, pulling out a small bottle. "Piper made this earlier while she was waiting for the other potion to boil. She said it should release the souls. Let's hope she was right."
"Yeah, otherwise, she's going to be the first literal case of multiple personality disorder," Price joked.
Phoebe handed the bottle over to Piper, who took it and drank the contents. It took a few moments, but soon teenage spirits started emerging from Piper's body and gathering in the kitchen around the sisters and Leo. When the final spirit emerged, Piper's eyes closed and her knees started to buckle. Leo caught her and moved her to a chair, where she sat with her head in her hands.
"Piper, are you okay?" Price asked. Piper nodded her head, rested her left elbow on the kitchen table and rubbed her left temple with that hand.
"Yeah, I've just got a headache," she replied. "It's hard enough having one person in here, let alone fifteen extras."
"Thanks for your help," a girl said. She looked to Phoebe. "I'm Emily Stone. Mr. Lawford took me last Friday."
"Now our families can have closure," a boy said. He identified himself as Mitchell.
"I wish we could have saved your lives," Phoebe said sadly.
"You saved our souls," Tobias said, stepping forward. "That's more than anyone else could have done."
"And thanks for offering yourself as a vessel," Madeline said to Piper.
"No problem," she said with a smile. Then she looked to her sisters. "Although, next time someone else gets to be the vessel." Everyone, including the kids, chuckled at that.
"We have to go," Elizabeth said. Several of the spirits started to fade.
"We'll never forget what you've done," Emily said. She was the last one to fade. "Goodbye."
The four remaining in the kitchen were silent. Then Price spoke up. "Wow, Phoebe. Your first week on the job and you've already helped save the souls of fifteen kids and put a murderer in jail. How do you feel?"
"Tired," Phoebe said with a smile. "I'm exhausted."
"You're exhausted?" Piper asked with an incredulous smile. "Try letting fifteen teenagers ride around in your head for about an hour."
"I'll pass, thank you," Phoebe said. She looked at her watch. "Well, it's been a long day. I should head home." Piper nodded her head and Phoebe noticed the disappointed look in her eyes. "What's up, Piper?"
Piper shrugged it off. "Nothing," she said, offering a smile.
"Something's up," Price said. "You're not blocking the connection, sis."
Piper sighed. "It just seems weird. You're calling your apartment home already. I know I'm just being sentimental, but I'm still not used to it. And lately when we see you it's always magic related."
"Yeah, I've just been working through stuff lately, I guess," Phoebe said.
"And I understand that. Just don't forget that we're still here for you," Piper said.
"I won't," Phoebe said.
"We should have a movie night. Just the three of us," Price said. "We'll rent a bunch of romantic comedies or something. It'll be fun. I used to do it all the time with my friends in Boston."
"That sounds like a great idea," Phoebe said. The phone rang then. Leo answered it and then looked to Price.
"It's Puck," he said. Piper raised an eyebrow to her younger sister.
"Did you patch things up with him?" she asked.
"We've both got unresolved issues, but we agreed to work on it," she replied with a smile. "That's the best we can hope for right now." She stood and took the phone from Leo, heading into the other room for privacy.
"Those two are getting pretty serious," Leo commented. He sat at the table next to Piper.
Phoebe smiled. "Who says we can't have relationships with regular old mortals?"
Piper laughed. "I think Price is definitely determined to break our losing streak."
Hope watched Phoebe leave the Manor and get into her car. She knew that they had just confronted Reginald Lawford and had released the souls he had stolen. Things were going exactly as she knew they would. It wouldn't be long before she would have to step in again to help the Charmed Ones. She started her car and drove down the street to keep an eye on Phoebe.
Her stake outs of Phoebe's apartment building were technically pointless. She knew nothing would happen to Phoebe. But she was an anomaly in the system. If she was an anomaly, nothing stopped other anomalies from coming along. She wouldn't let that happen. She wouldn't fail her mission out of carelessness. She would save the Charmed Ones.
THE END