Oh Great, Now I Can Hear Dead People: What Would You Do if You Could Suddenly Hear Real Dead People? Read online

  I feel justifiably put in my place by Miracle. Although to be fair, it is the middle of the day and daytime TV is on in the background, so it’s pretty obvious that I am not currently at a place of work, but crashed out on my sofa dressed in my pyjamas.

  ‘In fact, I’m going to make a suggestion to you, dear.’ Miracle whispers into the phone, ‘I’m not really allowed to do this, but have you ever thought of doing psychic readings for a living?’

  ‘Me?’ I laugh. ‘Let me think – er… no. I can honestly say it’s not something that has ever crossed my mind.’ I laugh again. Miracle doesn’t.

  ‘Well, I think that if you give this a go, you will soon see that I am right. This is the way that your life is supposed to be,’ she says. ‘Of course, you could always go back to your original plan and keep disappointing yourself. At the end of the day, the decision is yours. But I really do feel that you have a gift. I am being told so by my guides and yours.’

  Ooh, so I have guides now! Wow, if there were marks for self-promotion, this lady would get ten out of ten! It really is a novel way of recruiting potential employees.

  ‘I’m not psychic, I’m skint,’ I say.

  ‘Then you will be killing two birds with one stone, won’t you?’ Miracle replies, ‘It’s not often that I feel so strongly about something, but my guides and your father are all confirming that you have The Gift. I feel it’s only right to let you know that you can put it to good use - and the money’s not too bad either.’ This time it’s Miracle who chuckles.

  ‘Think about it, dear and if you are interested, call this number back. Press the star key when you’re connected and ask to speak to me. In the meantime, I can see that although you are currently single, you won’t be for long if you just retrace your steps and look in the right place.’

  OK, so how did she know I was single? Perhaps because us singletons have a desperate tone in our voices that other people can pick up on.

  ‘There is a man who is very fond of you, though you don’t know it and neither does he.’ Miracle adds. ‘He is the one for you.’

  ‘Well, can you give me a clue because right now, I don’t know anyone who is fond of me?’ I say as I think of my disastrous love life, but that’s a whole different story.

  ‘You will,’ she replies – don’t you hate it when people are cryptic like that?

  ‘Right,’ I say, ‘is there anything else?’ realising that I have been on the phone for 12 minutes now and oh, bum, that’s £18 I’ve just blown.

  ‘Not at the moment, my dear, but please think about what I said. If you want to know more about this kind of work, call back and press the star key and ask for Miracle.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll think about it, and thank you.’ I whisper back. Lord knows why I’m whispering, but it seems like an appropriate occasion.

  I put the phone down and look at Missy who is diligently licking her bottom.

  ‘Well? What did you make of that then?’ Missy looks up at me as if I’ve totally lost the plot and continues to clean her bum. She’s right, though. A year ago I wouldn’t have dreamed of phoning up a hot-line-to-the-heavens and now look at me. I’m even beginning to believe there might be something in all of this. And that’s a point; how did she know my father was dead? Did I give anything away?

  I tap my fingers rhythmically on the phone, wondering what to do next. No, I couldn’t, could I? I mean, I know nothing about how a psychic works. OK so I’ve seen Gordon Smith on telly scaring the wits out of Yvette Fielding, and that Derek Acorah bloke going into one of his trances and talking to his dead side-kick, but as for hearing voices in my head, if I started doing that I think I’d admit myself to the nearest loony house. I am a qualified psychologist, you know. However, Miracle did get my dad’s name right and she did know that I was single and in a bit of a desperate situation. I still can’t fathom out how she knew that. And if she was right on that score, then what’s to say she isn’t right about me being able to make money doing the same thing as her? I mean, surely she wouldn’t want someone coming in and taking all her work away, would she?

  I must admit I’m a bit miffed that everyone seems to think that I’m on totally the wrong path and that they also all think that I wasted three years at uni – even Mystic Miracle said as much. I humph and tap the phone again.

  ‘What do you think, Missy?’ I ask

  Missy mews, which I take to mean, go for it, what’s the worst that can happen? You make a total fool of yourself – again. Now leave me alone, I want to sleep. Trust me, when you’ve lived as long as I have with only a cat for company, you tend to get the gist of what a cat is saying.

  I take a deep breath and re-dial the number, remembering to hit the star key as soon as the welcome message kicks in. I wonder if by hitting the star key I am transported, Harry Potter style, into a special members’ only psychic club. I wonder if the star key is like one of those keys that unlock a totally new mysterious world. I’ve obviously been watching too much Witches of Waverly Place and had too much time on my hands lately.

  ‘Hello, who would you like to speak to?’ a female voice asks.

  ‘Um Miracle, please?’ I ask, still unsure whether this is a wind up or not.

  ‘OK, hold on and I’ll see if she’s free.’

  The line goes quiet for a moment.

  ‘Hello?’ the familiar husky voice says.

  ‘Miracle? It’s Samantha. I phoned you for a reading a few minutes ago and you said to call you…’

  ‘Ah, Samantha. Hello again.’ Miracle sounds pleased to hear from me. I wonder if she gets commission for this sort of thing? A kind of psychic referral bonus, like Avon ladies get. I tried being an Avon lady once, but ended up buying so many cosmetics that I really didn’t need that I ended up owing them money.

  ‘So…’ Miracle says. ‘I take it you’re interested in what I suggested earlier?’

  ‘Well, I think so,’ I say, wondering what on earth I’m letting myself in for.

  ‘OK. Well first and foremost, let me tell you a bit about how we work. And then, if you still like the sound of it, I will give you a test and see how you get on, OK?’

  ‘Er, OK,’ I say. A test? No one said anything about a test.

  ‘Right, do you have a pack of tarot cards by any chance?’ Miracle asks.

  ‘Well, I do somewhere, but you’ll have to hang on while I dig them out.’ My mother bought me a pack when she and Dad went travelling to India. It was about the same time that she was on her alternative spiritual/yoga quest and wanted me to understand where she was coming from and find herself, or something like that. I have to say, I wasn’t really paying attention at the time. Apart from me, Amy and Jack having a play around with them one night, they have never been used and, as far as I know, are still in the kitchen drawer.

  ‘Most of our callers like a tarot reading followed by a psychic reading,’ Miracle continues.

  ‘Hang on, I didn’t say I was psychic!’ I protest.

  ‘Don’t panic, dear,’ she assures me, ‘you will soon find that you tune into people and it will come naturally to you. Anything, runes, tarot cards, crystal ball, they are all just divination tools to help us tap into our psychic energies. You don’t have to believe that you are psychic to be a psychic, you know.’

  ‘Oh, right.’ That’s OK then. I breathe a sigh of relief. Miracle continues to tell me how the process works: You say when you are available for work; the company call you whenever they have a caller needing a reading; you do the reading – keeping the caller on the line generates a bonus for the reader – and that’s basically it. You get 60p per minute, plus extra if the reading takes longer than 15 minutes. I quickly tot it up in my head – that works out at £9.00 for every 15-minute reading. That’s £36 an hour, I tell myself – yippee!

  I don’t remember what else Miracle tells me. All I can think of is, wow! £36 an hour! That’s more than I would get as a therapist.

  ‘Samantha?’ Miracle asks.

  ‘Sorry, um, yes, that�
�s fine.’

  ‘Good, so we will call you Mystic Crystal…’

  Mystic Crystal? Hang on, where did that come from? Oh, well, as good as anything, I guess. At least I’m not going to be called something daft like Silver Moonbeam and it does have a certain ring to it. Oh, dear, I’ve just realised something; with my surname being Ball my stage name is Mystic Crystal Ball!

  ‘So, would you like to give it a go and do a test reading for me?’ Miracle asks.

  ‘Umm, OK. Oh, hang on, let me find my tarot cards.’ I put the phone to one side and hurry into the kitchen, digging about in various drawers until I locate the rather battered box of tarot cards my mum bought me.

  ‘OK, I’m back.’ I wheeze out of breath – mental note, must get fit, Samantha.

  ‘Right, now imagine I’m a first-time caller and I’ve been put through to you,’ Miracle says. I try to imagine doing this live. OK Sam, now just copy what Miracle did when you phoned her, I think, wondering whether I should put on a husky voice or whether she might think I’m taking the piss.

  ‘Hello,’ I say, wondering what I’m meant to say next. ‘Umm… welcome to Mystic Answers. I am Mystic umm Crystal and I will be your reader for today.’

  ‘Good,’ I hear Miracle say.

  ‘Please bear with me while I make a connection,’ I add for effect and take the tarot cards out of the box, drop several, and put them back into some kind of order.

  ‘I want to know what my future holds,’ Miracle says.

  ‘Yes, of course you do, please bear with me…’ I feel rather hot and flustered. The stupid bloody cards are falling all over the place as I try to get them into one neat pile. Why do they have to be too bloody big for your hands?

  ‘Right’ I say out of breath, ‘I am going to draw three cards for you and I will tell you what the meaning of each card is, if that is OK with you?’

  ‘That’s fine,’ Miracle says.

  I look for the book that came with the cards only to find that it is not in the box. Damn Jack! He was the last one to play with these and he’s gone and lost the bloody book – the very book that gives me all the meanings of the cards. Oh bugger!

  ‘Are you still there, Mystic Crystal?’

  ‘Yes!’ I snap. ‘Sorry, please bear with me.’

  ‘Just take your time,’ Miracle says. I’m sure she’s smiling when she says it.

  'OK now, Sam, just concentrate and try and remember what the cards mean, I tell myself. God, this is worse than taking exams! I pick out three cards. The first has a big heart with a bolt of lighting running through it. Well, that’s pretty obvious.

  ‘You have recently suffered from a broken heart?’ I guess. ‘But don’t worry because love will find a way. I feel it in my….’ I’m about to say fingers and then realise that I’m quoting the opening lyrics to Love is All Around from the Love Actually movie, ‘…heart,’ I add. I wait for a response but Miracle doesn’t give anything away.

  ‘OK, your second card is a money card.’ No, I’m not psychic, I can tell this because it has ten shiny coins spilling out from a golden bucket and a woman with a huge smile on her face, looking very pleased with herself. ‘This means that some money is soon going to come your way. It could be a settlement or something?’ Again, Miracle says nothing and I silently pray that I’m saying the right thing.

  ‘Now, your third card shows me that you are going to move house soon and live by the sea.’ I make this assumption because the next card I look at has a lovely rose-covered cottage on it, which is oddly enough, beside the sea. There are roses and happy faces all around, so I’m guessing this is a good card. ‘Your heartbreak will soon end and you will face a future of happiness, loveliness and … sand. Oh, and you will have everything you ever wished for,’ I add for good measure.

  I wait for a moment.

  ‘Hello? Are you still there?’ I ask.

  ‘Yes dear, I am.’ Miracle replies.

  ‘And?’ I’m somewhat frustrated now at our one-way conversation. I feel like I’m waiting to hear whether I’ve passed my driving test or not – and this is costing me money!

  ‘That was wonderful,’ Miracle says with glee in her gravely voice. ‘Amazing. So accurate Samantha! Let me tell you something. My husband and I were married for 25 years before he decided to trade me in for a newer model. We recently divorced and I have just found out that I am entitled to a lot of money from him, and I am planning to move nearer to the sea.’

  Wow! How chuffed am I feeling right now? Quite a lot actually!

  ‘So, does that mean I’ve got the job?’ I ask nervously – it’s one thing getting it right purely by fluke, but quite another thing being let loose on the unsuspecting public.

  ‘Yes, you’ve got the job.’ Miracle laughs her throaty laugh.

  Yippee! I want to shout. Instead I kick my legs in the air, waking Missy up and sending her flying off my lap in fright.

  ‘Now, how many days would you like to work?’ Miracle asks.

  With three credit cards to pay by the end of the month and the rent for the next two weeks to find, I’m very tempted to say seven, but I don’t want to appear greedy, so cut it down to five instead.

  ‘Days or nights?’

  ‘Oh, can I do a bit of both, please?’

  ‘Sure, but just be aware that at night time we get a lot of drunks calling that stay on the phone for ages. Mind you, that’s a good thing because the longer you keep the caller on the phone, the more money you get, and if you work after midnight, your rates are doubled,’ Miracle informs me. Double yippee!

  ‘Right, I’ll book you in for tonight from seven until three in the morning and I’ll see how you get on with that, yes?’ she asks.

  ‘That’s great! Yes. Thank you,’ I say, really meaning it. At this precise moment, all I can think about is that in one night I could earn myself nearly £300 – that’s almost one credit card paid off!

  Miracle makes me aware that I am effectively self-employed and so have to sort out my own tax and National Insurance, but then what’s the point of having a clever brother if he can’t sort out your accounts for you?

  Putting down the phone, I take a deep contented sigh. I’ve just got myself a job!

  CHAPTER THREE

  ‘What, you? A psychic?’

  This was Jack’s response when I phoned him to tell him my good news, rapidly followed by the sound of him wetting himself with laughter. I wait patiently for him to stop laughing. And I wait, and I wait…

  ‘Jack!’ I scream into the phone. I do wish he would take me seriously sometimes! He coughs and splutters for a moment.

  ‘Sorry hun, but…’

  And then it all starts again. A girly giggle, quickly followed by a huge snort, and then more hilarity.

  ‘Jack! Stop it!’ I shout. ‘I’m being serious!’ And I am. I want to share my good news with my best friend and all he can do is behave like a child who has heard the word bum for the first time.

  ‘I’m sorry, it’s just…’ He desperately tries to compose himself, but there really is no hope for him.

  Jack is one of those people who, once something sets him off, cannot stop himself from giggling. And he does giggle too, like a little schoolgirl. It’s always the same, it starts off with a kind of Benny Hill, hand-over-the-mouth-titter, and then, in no time at all, he is rolling on the floor, clutching his stomach and crying real tears.

  ‘Have you quite finished?’ I ask, somewhat annoyed at this one-way conversation. I hear Jack take a deep breath, and although I can’t see him, I know for a fact that he’s straightening himself up in a bid to prevent himself from collapsing in a heap again.

  ‘Right. Okay. I’m okay,’ Jack says slowly. ‘Right, sorry about that. It just … it just took me by surprise, that’s all.’

  I can sense that he is trying not to smile as he speaks.

  ‘Right. I’m fine now. So, um, what are you called?’ he says, desperately trying to sound composed.

  ‘Mystic Crystal.’ I snap.
r />   Oh, no, here we go again. No sooner have I said the word Mystic, Jack starts making snorting noises all over again. The snorting soon becomes a high-pitched giggle, followed by howls of laughter. I can see him now, rolling around on the floor in hysterics.

  As I’ve already mentioned, I love Jack to bits, and his sense of humour is part of the reason why we get on so well. To be honest, I would probably be rolling around in hysterics myself if he had just told me that he’d landed a job as a phone psychic too. However, a little support wouldn’t go amiss right now.

  Jack has been in my life for a long time, since we were in sixth form, to be precise. We were both fresh out of ‘big school’ and had both decided to stay on at school, rather than go to the local college. We started at the same time and were equally confused as to where we were supposed to be going on the campus. As we were both working towards an A level in economics, we kind of latched on to each other and have rarely left each other’s side since – well, apart from the fact that he went to Cardiff University and I opted for Bristol because it was closer to home.

  Every weekend, Jack and I would meet up and plan what we were going to do. And every weekend, he would turn up in some outrageous costume that he had hired from his Uncle Dave’s fancy dress shop and stand outside in the street shouting my name until I promised to stop studying and come out to play.

  Jack was blessed with the ability to do no work whatsoever and still come out with a degree in law. I don’t know how he did it, but he did. I personally suspect that he used his boyish good looks in some way to entice the examining board. However, he didn’t go into law. In fact, he actually despises lawyers, calling them the scum of the earth, but a law degree does look good on paper, he admits.

  Jack now divides his time between playing in a band and working in HMV. Actually his band, Otherwise, is very good. Jack plays lead guitar and occasionally sings, if the song warrants it. I wouldn’t say they were a patch on Oasis, but they do occasionally get paid for their music if they do a gig at the local pub, and he has two ready-made roadies in the form of me and Amy, should he ever require us.