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right.”
    “You’re worried I’m not going to get the story right? This from someone who just lied his ass off about his grandmother dying.”
    “Shakespeare’s jealous,” he says, wiping a greasy hand on his jeans. “When’s the last time you got laid anyways?”
    “I really don’t think I need to tell you —”
    “So not recently. This year? Ever?”
    I cup my hand to my ear. “Hear that, Nate? That’s the sound of my lawyer calling your dad and filing a hostile work environment lawsuit.”
    “If this is a workplace, then get to work,” says Nate. “You’re supposed to be a reporter; what are you going to report with ?”
    “Fine,” I mutter. I open my messenger bag to dig for my notepad, but my hand comes across something else instead, small, round, and hard. I open my bag wider and see a rip in the lining. There is something silver glinting within. My heart skips a beat. I widen the tear, and yes, there it is—my father’s ring. Fuck, I didn’t lose it. The ring’s been in my bag all this time. It somehow feels right to slip it on my finger. It’s heavy and strange but solid too—reassuring.
    “You going to put a necklace on next?” asks Nate.
    But before I can respond there’s more creaking, closer this time, which announces Lisa’s return. She holds a slightly yellowed roll of toilet paper, and Nate quickly resumes his traumatized expression.
    “Best I could find,” she says, tossing the roll to Nate.
    “Thanks,” whispers Nate. He tears off some tissue and pretends to blow his nose, loudly. “I just get a little emotional talking about Granny.”
    “I so believe you,” she says, taking off her jacket and making a cushion of it before sitting back down. “Did I miss anything good?” she adds casually. But for some reason she seems a little shaken, and I notice that her mittens are now stuffed in her jacket pockets. Her hands are also covered with dust, and a raw, mean-looking scratch crosses the back of her wrist.
    “Wanna check out my video camera? It’s got night vision ,” Nate says proudly.
    “Hey, you okay?” I ask quietly.
    “Sure, I’m fine,” she says. “Why?”
    “Well that scratch looks like it could use a Band-Aid or something.”
    “It’s nothing,” she says tersely. “I was opening a cabinet and a rusty nail got me.”
    “It doesn’t look like nothing.”
    “Is that thing on?” shouts Maddy from her corner.
    “It’s rolling,” says Nate, pointing it at Lisa. I see he’s working the zoom around her chest.
    “Well, why didn’t you say so?” says Maddy. She slowly heaves herself to her feet and then raises her flabby arms up like she’s about to catch something—a chunk of plaster from the ceiling perhaps—and her voice takes on a strange staccato cadence, like she’s a bad actor in an equally bad community theater production.
    “ Spirits . We come as friends . We come in peace . If you can hear my voice , then give us a sign . Show us your presence . Show us what happened here .” Her eyes roll to the back of her head, and we’re treated to a view of her upturned nostrils.
    But of course nothing happens, except for a few dust motes drifting tepidly in the wake of a slight draft.
    “That could get infected,” I whisper to Lisa. “Or you could get tetanus. I can drive you to the doctor.”
    “What part of ‘I’m fine’ don’t you understand?” she hisses back.
    “The spirits require silence !” says Maddy loudly, glaring at us. But just as she finishes the word “silence,” she’s struck with a deep smoker’s cough and has to hit her chest a couple of times, like something is firmly lodged there—a lung tumor perhaps. All that chest thumping causes her beehive to lean slightly to the left, so it’s hard to keep a straight face as she raises her hands again and intones, “ Spirits . What do you have to say ?”
    The ghosts here must be a shy bunch.
    “I just don’t see why you want to stay here,” I whisper, “and risk