Thank you from the bottom my cold, black heart to my beta who puts up with a lot, lbr
"I thought I told you not to go up there," Kunzite said, frowning slightly.
The next day was rather cool and cloudy, and the beach was less crowded, but that didn't stop Minako from scurrying down to lifeguard stand (after adjusting her bikini and lace cover-up just so) to tell Kunzite all about yesterday.
Minako rolled her eyes. "I said I'd take it under advisement."
He sighed, leaning back against the lifeguard stand and crossing his arms. He was in a red windbreaker with the town's name across it, and his hair was down today - falling to just below his shoulders in pin-straight platinum strands, and Minako let herself be distracted by the way his hair complimented his broad shoulders as it shifted in the beach wind.
"- don't remember hearing it'd been sold," he was saying, and Minako snapped herself back to attention. "But I have been busy lifeguarding." Kunzite shifted his gaze back to the girl in front of him. "Speaking of which, my break is almost up."
"Well, did you want to join me on my mission or not?"
He sighed, shaking his head a little as he looked out at the ocean. "You mean do I want to spend my precious free time with a tourist I just met helping a clueless house sitter on an ill advised ghost-hunting mission?"
Minako pouted, crossing her arms under her breasts.
"Kuz, back to work!" a voice called from the tower.
Kunzite sighed again. "I'll meet you after work. Shake Shack, 6pm."
To her credit, Minako saved the victory whoop until Kunzite was (mostly) out of earshot.
"So what's your plan? Did you want to look into the history of the house or contact a temple or-"
"Seance," Minako said. "For sure!"
Kunzite paused, then pressed his nose between his thumb and forefinger. "A … seance?"
"Yup!" Minako paused only to exchange money for a milkshake at the window. "I thought we could buy supplies before we head up to the house."
"Su...pplies?"
"Yeah, hold on." Fishing her phone out of her straw purse with the non-milkshake hand, Minako dialed the number she'd saved the night before. A few shakey, stacticy rings later, Usagi's voice filtered through the line.
"Usagi! It's Minako! Listen, do you have… hold on…" She put the phone between the shoulder and her head, balanced the shake between her chest and arm, and dug in her purse for the list she'd made that morning after looking up seances on the internet (which made her practically an expert).
She felt warm fingers brush her arm as Kunzite took her milkshake away from her before she could drop it. Her flesh tingled where he'd touched, and for a moment her mind short-circuited.
"Minako? Are you there?" Usagi asked.
"Uh, yeah! Sorry! Do you have, let's see… candles, a black lace veil, a large wooden table, a radio we can set to static…"
"Well, I have lots of candles because the lights don't always work. We can go in the old dining room for a table, and I have a radio and most stations are static up here. A black lace veil might be more tricky…"
"Ok leave that to me. Now, listen, this important. Do you feel like the entity is malicious?"
"Delicious?" The connection was definitely terrible.
"No, m-a-l… like, mean? Bad? Evil?"
"Minako, until you said something I didn't even know there WAS an 'entity', let alone an evil one!" Even through the static Usagi sounded anxious and Minako had to laugh a little.
"Okay, okay. Well get out some salt just in case. We'll be there soon."
Minako clicked off her phone and glared at Kunzite who was taking a generous sip of her milkshake.
"That's mine!" She snatched it back and took a sip right on the same straw, still warm from his lips. "So, anyway, know where we can get some black lace veils?"
"What would you even need that for?"
"To WEAR so I look properly spooky of course!"
Kunzite managed to talk Minako out of searching the entire town for apropos seance attire, so her dream of rocking the Morticia Addams look was squashed. Oh well, the house didn't have air conditioning, so maybe her tank top and shorts were fine after all.
He insisted on driving up, in his cute little compact red Mazda that Minako instantly envisioned making out in. The road to the house was windy and overlooked the village and the seaside as they drove up - much different than the bunny trail from the beach that Minako had gone up the last time.
"So listen," Kunzite said finally, breaking the silence. "I need to do some more asking around, but I haven't heard anything about the mansion selling or having a caretaker."
"So what are you saying?" Minako twisted in her seat. "Do you think Usagi is the ghost? Whoooooo…." She waved her fingers.
Kunzite rolled his eyes. "I'm saying, this girl could be in trouble somehow. A runaway or a squatter, or -"
"A missing heiress!" Minako perked up. "No, not an heiress. A missing princess! An amnesiac missing princess! Whose family and… and heartbroken fiancé - a prince, obvi - are searching desperately for her! Meanwhile she ends up fixing up this old, haunted house having no idea who she really is…"
"Minako!"
She jumped a bit and shut her mouth. "Sorry." She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear, glancing at Kunzite out of the corner of her eye. He looked as hot in jeans and a gray t-shirt as he did in swim trunks. "But it could be possible!"
He sighed. "So, I know a bit about this house. Just some things I've looked up and heard about."
"You do?" She tilted her head, smiled. "So you ARE into ghosts!"
"I'm 'into' history," he said. "It's my major."
"Ooh, cool! Where do you go to college?"
"Kyodai."
"Wow!"
He cleared his throat a bit, looking a bit unsure under her attention. "Anyway, the house only had one owner, a Mr. Joseph Conway back in Meiji. He came over from Europe to run a shipping company. He had a daughter -"
"A daughter! That must be the jilted lover! The ghost! What was her name?"
"Beryl."
Minako shivered.
Kunzite shrugged a bit. "To be honest, I could never find any records of Beryl Conway's death about the time she'd be a young woman, and of course if her fiancé left her before the wedding, there aren't any marriage records to give us his name. Of course, pre-war records are a mess on a good day. So who knows? But I want you to know that whole suicide could just be a story."
Minako's brow furrowed. "But you said-"
"I know what I said." He pulled off the road at the gated 'closed' sign and put it in park. "But it's just what they say around town."
"So why'd you tell it to me?"
He paused, not looking at her. Unbuckled his seat belt and opened the door. "Let's go."
The walk up the overgrown walkway was creepier in the encroaching darkness, but Minako couldn't help but feel a bit safer with Kunzite by her side. A few windows in the house were lit up; Usagi must be having a good electricity day, Minako thought.
Usagi greeted them at the door, shaking hands with Kunzite with that beautiful, friendly smile of hers. "Kunzite, hi! Minako's mentioned you!"
He smirked, side-glancing at Minako. "Has she?"
Minako blushed. "Just wondering if you knew each other! From school or something."
Usagi bit her lip and looked down at her feet. "I went to private school," she said. A soft, pale hand reached up to pull at one blonde pigtail nervously.
"Oh?" Minako said, curious about Usagi's background all of a sudden.
"Can we… can we not talk about school?" She made a face. "Not my favorite place."
"Okay, fair enough," Minako said. "Let's talk ghosts!"
"Far more pleasant a topic," Kunzite muttered.
Minako and Usagi set up candles all around the table, their flickering light doing little about the oppressive darkness of the dining room. The windows were wall to ceiling, overlooking the ocean, but they looked flat black in the dark night, with little orbs of reflection here and there off the decades of grime and dust coating the glass.
While Usagi lit the candles, Minako wandered over to the windows, looking at her own reflection, blurry and dull. A bit of movement outside caught her eye and she pressed her face to the glass, cupping her eyes in her hands. "There's someone out on that little beach!"
Kunzite and Usagi joined her. "Really?" Usagi said. "I never see anyone there. You can't get to it except from here."
"It's not safe to be out on the water this late," Kunzite the Lifeguard said. Minako grabbed the bottom of her tank top and started rubbing at the window, trying to get some grime off.
"Look, there-" She peered out again but the beach was empty. "He's gone."
She pressed her face to the glass again, the new cleaner view showing no footprints in the sand.
"Your imagination," Kunzite said, patting her shoulder. Minako huffed, despite the warmth that bloomed where this hand had touched.
"Anyway, the set-up looks perfect!" Minako said, turning back to the table.
"It looks like fire hazard," Kunzite observed.
"Do you want to do this or not?"
"I thought I made it clear I did not," he said.
"Okay but like-"
"I can't believe I let you talk me into this…"
"The things you'll do for a great set of tits, huh?" Minako said, tossing her hair with a wink. In the candlelight he blanched and blushed.
A soft 'ahem' behind them made them turn, to see Usagi holding a candelabra, the flames reflecting off her face, eyes luminous in the candlelight. In her white dress, with her pale skin and vulnerable eyes, she looked every bit the haunted heroine of a gothic romance. Minako wondered if maybe her missing princess story was so far-fetched after all.
"Welp!" Minako pulled out the head seat and sat down, holding her hands out palms up. "Let's get started!"
She shut her eyes. "Let's all join hands," she entoned.
Usagi sat next to her and placed her hand lightly in Minako's, then Kunzite huffed a bit before sitting on Minako's other side and putting his large palm over hers.
Minako curled her fingers around their hands, her heart in her throat at the warmth of Kunzite's skin. Concentrate! she told herself. Ghosts!
"I call upon the spirits in this house to make themselves known!"
Nothing happened. Kunzite coughed a little.
"All spirits in this house, please come forth! We raise our energy to you and ask you to appear!"
Usagi squeezed her hand encouragingly.
Minako opened one eyes, glanced around the room. She heaved a big sigh. "Okay, Usagi do you have that radio?"
Nodding, Usagi produced the radio which Minako set the highest frequency that played static. "Oh, spirits! Please use the power from this radio and the white noise of the static to send your messages from beyond the grave!"
The static lingered in the background of the room, the sound starting to undulate in Minako's ears, almost like the sound of the waves. It was hypnotizing, and she swore she heard some interruptions in the static, some garbled push of speech that made her sit up and grab the radio.
"Did you hear that?"
"... c…. me…"
Wide-eyed, the three of them leaned in closer, listening to the radio with their breath held. Even Kunzite's gaze was intense and focused on the black holes of the speaker.
"...hase… me…"
"Oh my god," Minako breathed.
"But here's my number! So call me maybe!" the radio belted out, as a station suddenly burst through the static.
Minako and Usagi screamed and tumbled backwards, and Kunzite let out a yelp, then glared.
"Dammit," Minako muttered, and then she turned and saw Usagi, giggling helplessly from where she'd landed on the floor.
She couldn't help a smile pulling at her lips. Well, at least something good came of their seance.
"Well I'm not giving up! Tomorrow I'm gonna come back and look for clues in the house! You up for that?"
Usagi nodded, still smiling.
Kunzite looked around the house critically. He had made sure to extinguish all the candles, and now, even with the lamps she had, the house still seemed dark and unsettling. "Usagi, why don't you stay in town? This house doesn't seem safe."
"I'm fine, I'm fine." She waved her hand like it was nothing.
"C'mon, come spend the night in the hotel with me!" Minako said. "We can have a sleepover, eat popcorn, watch pay-per-view…"
Usagi considered, looking over Minako's shoulder toward the walkway and Kunzite's parked car, barely in sight. "Sounds fun… but I don't have a bag packed or anything and I'm really tired. Raincheck? Actually, next time it rains, let me know. I haaaate this place in the rain."
As they hugged goodbye, Minako thought about Kunzite mentioning he thought Usagi was a runaway, or someone who might need help outside of ghost hunting. Well, no matter what, Minako would do what she could to cheer Usagi up. If hunting for clues got too spooky, they could always play on the beach!