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“Nine feet down, twelve feet over,”
When Jimmy Palmer arrived at the crime scene he could feel the presence almost immediately. His heart stuttered and he followed behind Ducky at a slower pace. It was a hard feeling to describe to other people, you just sort of knew it. His mom, a long time Stephen King fan, liked to call it his shining.
Inside the house, his breath came out in puffs of frosty air. He tightened his grip on the cases. There she was.
The Bride was standing in the corner of the room. Sobbing loudly, “I did everything he asked. EVERYTHING!”
His heart ached for her, and he wanted to talk to her. But with so many people around, he couldn’t do anything. He tried not to look her way for too long, he didn’t want to draw too much attention to himself. It wouldn’t be too long before she sensed him, they always ended up finding him.
Dr Mallard stopped in the doorway, “Odd, It’s a bit chilly in here for July. Don’t you think Mr. Palmer?”
The question shook him out of his train of thought. His voice took on a tone Jimmy recognized, Dr. Mallard must have noticed he was distracted and was trying to get him back on track. Dr. Mallard tended to notice those things. He shifted awkwardly and launched into a ramble of an answer,
“Oh y-yeah weird right. Especially because no one’s lived here in quite awhile, it should be rather stuffy considering-”
Dr. Mallard cut him off, “ Yes I understand Mr. Palmer,” then he paused and gave him a thoughtful look. Jimmy wilted under his gaze, and couldn’t help but glance to the corner of the room, to the sobbing woman.
She locked eyes with him, “Will you help me?” she asked meekly
Dr. Mallard turned and glanced at where Jimmy was looking. He would only see an empty corner of a house that was buzzing with NCIS agents, He wouldn’t see a dead woman, who was upset and confused at being kidnapped and then abandoned.
No one but Jimmy saw those things.
Tony poked his head out of a bedroom, “Hey Ducky! Over here,”
Moment broken, Dr Mallard went over to Tony in the master bedroom. Jimmy turned to the woman and gave her a small nod. She followed behind him as he picked up the cases and followed Dr. Mallard.
“Where’s our bride DiNozzo,
“Nine feet down, twelve feet over.”
Jimmy stopped cold, and a sinking feeling washed over him, he stared down at the hole in the closet in disbelief, “You’re kidding right?”
They weren't kidding. He closed his eyes. He hated small spaces, and worse, he hated the dark. From the dark, came the dead. And Jimmy was always surrounded by the dead.
Dr. Mallard went down first. Jimmy followed, descending into the abyss, the eyes of the woman following all the way.
Jimmy was an emotional child.
His father chewed up the words and said it with distaste, “You’re a sissy,” he spat at him, towering over him and gripping his hair in a fist.
His mother whispered it to him, holding him in the dark, after his father passed out. “Being emotional is a good thing, it means you’re kind. Never forget how to be kind, Jimmy.”
Then when he was 10 years old, his father died. It was a sudden thing, went to bed one night and didn’t get up in the morning. He was a big beefy man, with a red face. The Heart Attack wasn’t surprising, or even sad. For Jimmy and his mother, it was relieving.
They got through the funeral. His mother wore a long sleeve blouse that covered the bruises, his Sunday suit covered him perfectly.
Afterwards his mother hugged him, and ran a hand through his curls “Things are going to be better now,” she told him in the back room of the funeral home. At the time, he believed it.
The Ghosts came after.
The back window was open when Jimmy tried it.
Jimmy had waited until Gibbs closed the case to go back to the house. He had a lot of practice sneaking into places he didn’t belong.
The house seemed emptier in the dark. And colder. A few empty beer bottles were littered in what had once been the front room, the carpet stained from mysterious fluids, and shadows from where picture frames were once on the wall.
The bride was in the bedroom, the one that led down to the tunnel. She sobbed quietly. The moon was bright that night and the light made her appear ethereal.
“Carolyn.”
He knelt down, carefully balancing on the soles of his feet. It was hard to keep his voice steady but somehow he managed it. She looked up.
She frowned, “You were here the other day.”
Jimmy swallowed, “That’s right. We came in after your…body was found.”
“My body…” She sniffed. “I remember, there was an older man with a funny accent with you.”
Jimmy couldn’t help but smile. “That’s right. That’s Ducky, he’s a medical examiner. I’m his assistant.”
“How come you can see me?” She asked.
The dead don’t often tend to notice that they’re dead. Carolyn knew. Was it the way she died? Slow and trapped underground? Jimmy mentally filed the thought away for future use. There was only one reason why he was here: to help Carolyn move on. It would be unkind to keep her here for any longer than she had to be.
“I don’t know,” Jimmy said, “it started when I was a kid, after my father died.”
“My dad was in the navy,” Carolyn moved on, she looked off in the distance. “I wanted to be just like him.”
This was always the hardest part. Finding the right words to help someone. Jimmy wasn’t always great with words, he had a tendency to stick his foot in his mouth.
“My co-workers found out who did this to you.”
The temperature in the room dropped.
She looked back at him and her face twisted, “Brett.”
He nodded. “He’s gone and he can’t hurt anyone else.”
She didn’t say anything at first, tears slipped down her face. “I tried to be the wife that he wanted, why wasn’t it enough?”
He didn’t know what to say. “You did your best. If he wasn’t happy…” Jimmy trailed off, unsure of the right words to say. “That’s on him, not you.”
“Were there others?” She asked. The moon light hit the vale around her head, creating a halo effect around her.
He wasn’t exactly afraid of her or anything. The fear of ghosts lessened as he got older, but a sound in the dark was still a sound in the dark and could scare you at any age. It was always when they showed up in his apartment that frightened him the most.
“My co-workers found her, she’s alive.”
He thought there could have been tears in her eyes. She walked away, fading into the dark shadows of the hallway as she went.