18
It was not uncommon after a particularly exhausting or exciting case that the guys would fall asleep on the ride back to their old, converted firehouse, or soon after reaching it. Dr. Spengler had requested that their equipment be restored, and so it was—beyond any reason, after which they wandered a radius of several blocks around the site of the massive sinkhole, seeking any kind of psychokinetic residue, and finding nothing at all.
Uneasy about it, they declared the area "clean" and obtained information from the Chief of Police concerning to whom to address the bill. Then they had returned to their heavily rigged automobile to find the strange teenager curled up on the back seat, fast asleep already. She woke at some point to find Dr. Stantz at the wheel, his mind a million miles away and drifting further with exhaustion. He had taken several wrong turns without even noticing and was on the verge of nodding off behind the wheel just before dawn when Amanda sat upright and stared straight ahead and the Ecto-1 took the appropriate turns that would bring them all home seemingly on its own.
Golden beams of sunlight filtered between buildings and found their way through accustomed routes into the silent Hook & Ladder No. 8, highlighting magical-looking dust sparkles drifting around the silent car. A hinge creaked and Janine Melnitz walked in, her heels sounding something like pony hooves as she trotted past the elongated vehicle to deposit her purse on her desk and went to see if coffee had been made. Eventually she returned with a mug and picked up the newspaper she had grabbed from out front on her way in. There was nothing in it about the guys' adventure, so she remained oblivious to their close proximity until one of the heavy doors creaked open and Dr. Stantz stumbled out.
"Ray!" she cried, startled, and he waved her to calm herself. She drew closer, trying to walk on her toes to keep from making too much noise as she approached, finally realizing that the rest of the gang was still sound asleep in the car. "Oh my gosh! Long night, or what?"
He stretched, joints popping and cracking, then yawned. "You have no idea." He scratched at his ribs thinking he must look a mess, unaware that despite the night's activities he appeared whole and unmarked, his uniform pristine.
"So…what happened?"
He gazed fondly at her, tasted the bland pastiness of sleep in his mouth and asked, "Could I borrow your car?"
Despite her displeasure with the request, she relented and forfeited her keys with a warning that whatever he intended to do with it better not be work related. Less than five minutes later he was cruising into early rush hour traffic, heading back to SoHo.
Amanda sat in the passenger seat appearing no less sleepy than she usually did and just as unruffled. He'd thought long and hard about his decision during the night's drive, listening to his colleagues drone on about wishes and how things were going to change even as they were slowly succumbing to longer and longer yawns and greater gaps of silence between their musings. "The way I figure it," he told her gently, realizing she was wearing sunglasses and not knowing if she'd found or manufactured them, "if you're meant to remain here with us, then you'll undoubtedly find your way back no matter what I do, and if not…well, then I guess things stay the same. Assuming everything will go back to some kind of normalcy…I mean, we saw what you did with our equipment, and I seem to look okay," he added, quickly tilting the rear-view mirror for a glance at his face. He was even cleanly shorn! "So, anyway, I'm betting the ghosts that disappeared from our containment unit will start showing up again, probably in the same general places we originally found them, and the city will go back to being haunted again, well, now and then, here and there the way it was before. Oh, and Slimer," he recalled with a smile. "Peter will hate that…or pretend he does. I'm not always sure which it is. Do you think, I mean, will the ghosts all come back, Amanda? Do you think they will?"
She shrugged, seeming to enjoy watching the scenery drift by.
"The thing is, I wouldn't know where to begin to define you. I'm certain enough research will give us some better understanding of what it was we were dealing with last night. But you…well, Egon practically wants to dissect you, and Peter wants to live his fantasies and Winston's trying to be the good guy here, but we can still see he's battling temptation. And…the only thing your staying here will bring us is…extreme change. Not that change is a bad thing, but what if there were no ghosts…and the only calls we got were ones like last night…just the really, truly powerful things that I guess can withstand your presence, or your, your energy field or whatever it is about you that otherwise repels them. What if instead of a handful of minor calls every month or so to keep us on our toes, to introduce us to new ideas and experiences…what if the only calls we got were a handful of, of, call 'em Code Tens a year? Long stretches of extraordinary boredom interspersed with five or six turn-your-hair-white calls we probably wouldn't even survive without you….
"And that's another thing," he continued, maneuvering closer to their destination, "not to make any accusations or anything—nothing personal—but if you had the ability all along to quell that mess…well…I guess we just don't know how to communicate with you properly, to, to trigger you or whatever. I mean, it seemed like you knew we were in mortal danger all along, but you just let it play out…." He looked at her and she was staring straight ahead, her jaw resting on her right fist, right elbow against the base of the window. "I can see that you are unfazed by just about anything. Probably anything. But good heavens, the rest of us were convinced we were gonna die!" She turned her head his way briefly, then resumed her forward watch. "Did you think it was fun-what we were doing? What we were going through? Do you think that's the sort of thing we endure on a regular basis? We're mortal beings, Amanda. We're just not made from the same stuff as you."
He realized he'd let himself get a little angry and felt guilty immediately. "I'm sorry. Clearly we're different from you. Maybe you're not that familiar with our kind. But, letting the guys get carried away playing Wish Fulfillment Fantasy with you is only going to bring on a whole heap of trouble." He drew into a parking space and shut everything down before exiting. He hadn't heard the passenger side door open or close, but once he had exited, he saw that the girl was already on the nearest stretch of sidewalk, waiting for him. "Please don't think I don't like you…or any of us for that matter, but I think each of us wants you around for the wrong reasons, and I can't see that being mutually beneficial for any of us." He walked and she kept pace, although she lagged just slightly behind. He reached to muss her hair and she turned to smile at him "Did you at least have fun?"
"Uh-huh."
"Well…that's something. Aside from the whole nearly-dying thing and having my wits scared out of me more times than I care to admit, I guess I sort of had fun, too."
"An' you?" she asked, looking up at him again.
"I had fun."
"No…Peter wants bunnies and Egon wants science and Winston wants a better life and Ray…."
"Ray," he said, smiling as he let his gaze drift skyward. "Y'know what I was thinking last night?"
"No."
"So, you're not psychic. Okay. As I was falling asleep, I remembered that when I was younger and really starting to get excited about parapsychology, I always thought it would be truly amazing if someway, somehow, I could someday have an actual conversation with Harry Price."
"Harry…Price."
"Yeah. Originally I thought it would be Harry Houdini. He was a great debunker of fraudulent mediums, you know. He left a code word for his widow in the event of his death that she was to try and receive through a medium to prove both that there are some genuine psychics in the world and that there truly is another form of existence on the other side."
"Side of what?" They were nearing the statue of Cybele and Ray found it both mesmerizing and yet strangely repugnant as usual.
"Side of…life. Death. Life after death."
"Ghostbuster," she reminded him.
"I know, but when his widow tried to find someone who knew the word…twice she claimed the experiment failed. So…there's something more than dying and becoming a semi-transparent entity that may or may not resemble who you were in life. I mean, different religions have differing beliefs of what's to come after the end, and there's apparently a whole pantheon of god-like beings who pop in and out of their realms or dimensions or what have you…like you apparently did."
"Me?"
"Where are you from again?"
"Montana," she said, eyeing the statue and not finding it terribly appealing.
"Maybe after death there's…Montana. I've heard it's nice out there. In parts. Can get brutally cold, though…." He stopped and plunged his hands into the pockets of his suit. Only a few of the people passing by paid them any mind, and even then it wasn't much mind at all. "Oh," he said, suddenly reaching for a breast pocket so he could withdraw a card. He examined it quickly, and then handed it to her. "It's not a bologna sandwich, but that's our contact information and address in case you ever…want to visit or hang out again." She smiled as she accepted it, and while he never saw it move toward a pocket, he soon realized it had vanished from her hand entirely. "I really want you to stay," he admitted as he took her hands in his and noted for the first time the comforting, sleepy, tingling sensation they imparted. "That's neat." He reluctantly released her and took a step backward. "Well, thank you. For everything. And…maybe I'll see you around sometime…for brunch later…or the next time things get horrifically out of hand…or if I ever get to visit Montana."
She cocked her head and watched him hold up a palm, closing it for a second before holding it straight again, and then he dropped his arm and turned away, bee lining for the car, hoping she was and hoping she was not following him. He turned when he reached the parking spot and pretended to be mildly interested in the distant statue as he fumbled unnecessarily with the keys. She was nowhere to be seen. He waited for a couple of heartbeats, then unlocked the door and expected her to be already buckled into the passenger seat. The car was empty, but he smiled at the sight of the still-buckled safety belt.