Town Haunts Read Online Free

retreating
back. “Some people just don’t have any sense.” She forked up some
omelette and ground it between her teeth. But, thinking of Greg and
his hand-kissing, she smiled.

Chapter
Three
    Having two days off made for
a short work week, especially since the department was priming for
mid-term exams. Anna was kept especially busy trying to sort
through the extra printing the faculty had ordered and tracking the
essays that were flooding into her office. Just once, she wished
that the professors would give her a break and make the students
hand in their assignments during class time, but no such luck.
    It was Saturday
before Anna knew it. She woke up at seven-thirty and glanced
blearily at the clock. Normally she enjoyed sleeping late on the
weekends, but Wendy, her three-year-old shepherd/labrador cross,
lifted her head from the carpet and stared at Anna with her soft
brown eyes, and Anna relented and got up. After taking care of her
pet’s needs, she enjoyed a long, luxurious shower before leaving
her cottage on the outskirts of town to walk the seven blocks to
The Diner.
    It was a dreary
day with a fine, cold rain blowing sideways across her face that
chilled her. Anna tucked her head inside the hood of her coat and
power-walked all the way. Reaching the restaurant door, she rushed
inside, stopping on the rubber mat to shake the rain from her
clothes. A buzz of conversation and the scent of frying onions
greeted her inside the warm, steamy room.
    “Morning,
Anna!” boomed a familiar voice. She looked up and nodded at Clive
Wampole, a tall hulk of a man in overalls and a plaid shirt who
farmed his widowed mother’s acreage. Clive’s chosen mode of
transportation was a shiny blue tractor; Anna had missed it parked
out front of the restaurant in her haste to get inside. Clive was
partially deaf and hadn’t heard her come in, but he had felt the
blast of cool air from his seat at the counter and swivelled around
to check her out.
    “Wet enough for
you?” he asked. That, and its variants, were part of Clive’s
standard repertoire. “Hot enough? Cold enough?” Good old Clive, he
was nothing if not consistent.
    “You bet,
Clive,” Anna said, patting his arm. She looked around the crowded
tables and spotted Mary pouring coffee for Mr. Andrews, a retired
rancher who spent most mornings reading the newspaper at The Diner.
Anna’s book club friends, Erna Dombrosky and May Weston, were
seated with him, laughing over a shared joke. May was wearing one
of her hand-knit sweaters, an orange concoction with a row of
yellow jack-o’-lanterns that clashed horribly with her ruddy
complexion. Her steel-grey hair was blunt cut at chin level,
accentuating the squareness of her face. Seventy-five-year-old Erna
looked cozy in a green wool cardigan buttoned over a tweed skirt,
her black pumps visible through pull-on vinyl rain boots. She
turned and waved at Anna, her sharp blue eyes twinkling. Anna waved
back and was about to join them when Frank’s face appeared at the
kitchen pass-through.
    “Hi, Anna.
You’re early this morning. Got something important to do today?”
Frank, a refugee from the hippies’ era, wore his grey hair long and
pulled back into a ponytail to complement his full beard and
moustache. In his late fifties, he was of medium height with a
slight paunch, but his stomach was offset by a muscular chest and
arms. Frank had worked hard at manual labour all of his life until
enrolling in a cooking school in his early forties. Bankrolling the
restaurant twelve years ago had been a strain, but the gamble had
paid off and The Diner had become a success. Now Frank was a
well-respected businessman and a member of the Rotary Club.
    Anna strolled
over to lean against the counter beside Clive. “Morning, Frank.
Nope, just woke up early. Is the special ready yet? I feel like
something different today.” Frank’s breakfast special was only
available on Saturdays and was one of the reasons why The Diner was
so