The Empty Desk Read Online Free Page A

said. “But I won’t say anything to him about it in class until you’ve had the chance to talk to him yourself. Stay and finish your coffee.”
    A moment later she was gone in a flurry of motion, although there was still an echo of her presence that had a lot of the women looking in her direction and smiling.
    â€œDid you warn her about the car?” Melinda was surprised that the spirit of Jez Lowe had now taken Dana’s place opposite her when she turned back. He looked at the coffee in front of him wistfully. It was an expression that Melinda had seen many times before, almost always from those who were no longer able to drink it for one reason or another.
    â€œIt’s already in the garage,” she whispered, looking around to make sure that no one was looking at her. “Your garage. Well, your son’s.”
    â€œThat son of mine doesn’t know how to look after a fine-looking vehicle like that.”
    â€œWhat’s the problem?” she asked, still keeping her voice down, though at least one pair of eyes flicked a glance in her direction.
    â€œHe can’t tell what’s wrong with a car just by listening to it. He needs a damn computer to do it all for him, if you’ll pardon my language. A car like your friend’s needs careful handling. Special attention.”
    Melinda took a final slurp of her coffee and slipped on her coat, indicating to the waitress that the money for the check was on the table before making her way outside. She hated talking to ghosts when she had an audience who didn’t understand what she was doing, or worse still, didn’t approve. After she had struggled to slip her coat on against the sharp wind that warned that winter was not too far away, she looked around for any sign of the ghost, but he was nowhere to be seen. He was starting to make a habit of this.

Chapter Five
    â€œYou sure you’re okay with me coming into school?” she asked Aiden as they sat at the table tucking into mac and cheese. Jim was on call at the hospital and probably wouldn’t be back until the early hours of the morning. She loved the way that Jim played with their son, or sat and talked to him, but she enjoyed the time that she had alone with him too. He was growing up every day and she wanted to enjoy the time while he was still a little boy—her little boy.
    â€œSure,” he said, filling his fork again. “What are you going to bring in with you? Something really old?”
    â€œI don’t know yet. I thought that you might want to help me choose. You’ll know better than I do what the other children in class would like to see.”
    â€œOkay, that sounds cool. Can we choose after school tomorrow?”
    â€œOf course we can. There’s plenty to choose from.”
    â€œWish we could go now,” he said with his usual impatience.
    â€œIt’s too late now—you know that. You can watch a little TV when we’ve cleared up if you’d like. Unless you’ve got any homework to do, of course.”
    â€œOkay,” he said. Melinda loved how he rarely challenged her when she told him what they were going to do. She knew that the time would come soon enough when things might not be quite so easy. He made no show of moving, though, and it was clear that he had something on his mind.
    â€œDid Miss Kelly ask you about the desk?” he asked.
    â€œThe desk?”
    â€œMmm,” he nodded through a mouthful of pasta. “There’s a desk that no one sits at. No one wants to use it.”
    â€œWhy not?” Her mind was starting to consider possibilities. Was this something that Dana used to deal with children who were misbehaving? She had only been there a couple of days and it seemed unlikely that she would have seen the need to introduce something like that so quickly, unless they were misbehaving badly. Had Aiden had to spend some time in it? It would certainly explain why he had been