Ghost Scarab

Mrs. Gunther

I couldn't help but stare as we drove through St. Augustine. The sky was a brilliant blue and there were palm trees everywhere. The stores and houses were painted pastel candy colors, the most common being pink and yellow. There were all kinds of billboards for a variety of different tourist attractions including a fort and the Ripley's Believe it or Not museum. However, the ad that caught my attention the most was a very colorful one to go see albino alligators.

Raven must have spotted one because he spoke up suddenly saying, "I want to get an alligator."

I stared back at him in confusion. What did he mean by get an alligator? Surely he didn't mean as a pet.

Raven ignored my confused stare and instead added to my confusion by saying, "I think I'd like to put it by my tiger."

Corey chuckled when he quickly glanced over and caught sight of my expression, "He's talking about getting another tattoo."

I nodded in understanding. I thought back to what I had seen of Raven's tattoos, I couldn't recall seeing a tiger on him anywhere. But before I could ask Corey spoke up, "You should get crocodile instead."

"What's the difference?"

"One's more..." Corey trailed off seeming to deliberate over the best word to use, "badass than the other."

"Which one is bigger?"

"Crocodiles."

"Then it should be a crocodile."

"Where's your tiger tattoo?" I asked when there was a lull in the conversation.

"Hang on, I'll show you," Raven said only to be hurriedly interrupted by Corey.

"Not in the car. It's on the back of his thigh, close to his butt."

"It's not on my ass."

"It's close enough."

Corey followed the GPS directions and at last, we pulled up to the front of a duplex at the end of a cul-de-sac. The neighborhood was cozy, with cookie-cutter houses all painted a different bright pastel color and the neighbors' yards were neat and tidy.

I looked more closely at the duplex we were parked in front of. The unit on the right was nice with a clearly well maintained lawn and a beautiful garden and there was a very comfortable looking bench swing on the porch. The left side was the complete opposite. The grass was mostly dead and brown and there were clearly tire tracks on the lawn. The porch was piled with trash bags and rusty metal and there were paper notices tacked up, nearly covering the screen door.

"Let's see we want 322A," Corey muttered to himself, "So that would be the unit on the left."

There was no mistaking the relief in Corey's voice that Mrs. Gunther lived in the nicer of the two units and I couldn't blame him for that. The left unit did not look remotely welcoming and the idea of approaching that unit uninvited would have been daunting.

I opened the door to the SUV and breathed in deeply, enjoying the scent of the ocean being carried on the breeze. The temperature in Charleston was starting to cool down but in Florida fall was not yet here.

Raven hopped out of the car and stretched out, the black t-shirt he was wear tightened against his shoulders as he did so.

Corey got out next and I noticed that he had put a nice white button up shirt on over his t-shirt and had combed his hair back.

"You know you can't go in looking like that," Corey said gesturing at Raven. "We want her to trust us, not scare her off."

Raven grunted in response but didn't argue, he simply reached into the SUV and pulled out a blue dress shirt. He tucked his t-shirt into his jeans before slipping his arms into the sleeves and covering his visible tattoos. He then proceeded to remove his lip ring and comb his fingers through his hair to smooth it over.