6 Steps To Write A Book
Let me know where to send it...
Let me know where to send it...
It’s the 1960’s and Seby has a problem. Someone moved into his house without his permission. They didn’t think he’d mind of course, because he’s already been dead 30 years. But he does mind. And so does his housemate Isaac, the basement ghost. Together they conspire to drive the new couple out of their home at any cost.
Sunshine just moved into their new home with her husband Jace. Well, the house itself isn’t so new. It has history. History that predates the house.
History that could cost Sunshine her life and Seby his very soul.
“SEBY, SEBY, WAKE up. Someone’s here.”
The voice echoes through my attic, rousing me from my slumber. I resist waking, allowing my mind to stay in its darkness. Once, I loved waking up, the promise of a new day, ready to take on the world.
But now, I wake up dead.
Not dead tired.
Just dead, dead.
Every day unfolds just like the last. Me in the attic. Isaac in the basement. And between us, the Liver space where nobody ever lives.
We make certain of that.
As my mind returns to the attic, shapes come into focus. A headless figure, half hidden among the piles of several decades worth of soil, filth, and boxes, sits silhouetted by the window from the world’s smallest nook.
I’m not scared, of course. New ghosts just don’t move into places. They have to die there. Plus, no one was ever decapitated in my house.
Well, I was.
Well, sort of.
Besides, it isn’t a person or a ghost. It’s my dress form. Well, it wasn’t my dress form. It was Lita’s, or rather her grandmothers, from back when women still made most of their own clothes. Lita always said she was going to learn to sew. She didn’t, though. Scratching out a living, life, got in the way. She might have learned later I suppose, but after I died, she never stepped foot in the house again, not even to get her stuff.
“You awake yet?” Isaac’s tone holds a note of impatience. Why does he care? It’s not as if we have a life to get back to.
There’s no point in answering; he already knows when I’m up. Ghosts have a sort of telepathy where they can read each other’s mind. At least, Isaac and I do.
His voice comes again, louder this time, more urgent. “Sebastian! WAKE UP!” I hate it when he calls me Sebastian.
“I’m up.”
Actually, our telepathy only seems to work one way. Isaac’s thoughts and feelings remain hidden from me. He says that the spells that keep him trapped in the basement also makes that ability not work.
I guess I believe him. I mean, what do I know about it? He’s been dead longer than me, and I think he was some kind of witch in life.
“There are Livers in our house.” Isaac spits out the word, almost as if someone asked him to eat actual liver. I hate liver. It’s a cheap meat and I ate far too much of it in the orphanage. Nuns apparently love liver.
“That annoying real estate agent again?” I thought I’d gotten rid of her last time. Oh well, now it was time to play haunted house, round two.
“Pay attention. Focus on downstairs.” Isaac certainly sounds like he got up on the wrong side of the basement.
What does he have to complain about? I do the real work of haunting since the spells surrounding the basement don’t let him come out and play.
I concentrate on the Liver level so I can see the intruders without leaving the comfort of my attic.
Without carpets or furniture to soften the noise, the clicks of their shoes on my hardwood floors carry throughout the house. There are two intruders, a man and a woman. Most likely a young couple.
She’s young, barely out of university. Her shirt looks like another shirt threw up on it. Clearly some kind of laundry color mix-up. I suppose those things happen. I wouldn’t know. I wore only black, white, and gray in life, except for the ties. I loved colorful ties. But suits and ties have to be specially cleaned anyway. She’s wearing pants so she works in a factory, the way Lita did. But those pants aren’t suitable for factory work.
The triangular patch of fabric on the bottom of her pants doesn’t match the rest. Apparently, she can’t sew patches either. That absurd way the pant-leg flares out at the bottom with mismatched fabric; they’d never allow that in a factory. Can’t have anything getting caught in the machines after all.
They must be old pants, regulated to everyday life, not work. Her nest of hair hangs loosely around her shoulders and brushes against her waist as she moves it. Again, not suitable for a factory. She must braid it or something to keep it out of the machines.
I bet she’s a horrible worker.
She twists one of her many oversized, layered necklaces around her finger. Her gaze darts around the house, careful never to land on one thing too long. As if she is looking for something.
Looking for what? For me? No. Nonsense.
She shakes her head. “I don’t like it, here, Jace. Something happened here. Something bad.”
Jace, a man older by only a few years, has incredibly long hair that comes down halfway to his shoulders and equally bad taste in clothing. The wriggling bright stripes on his shirt look they were drawn with crayons. He laughs. I don’t think she notices the condescending tone to it. But I do. Senses are heightened when you’re dead, particularly audio cues. “Sunshine, darling. You worry too much. Always going on about bad things. This house is from the forties. It’s ancient. And it’s been empty most of that time. Nothing happened.”
Rage rises up inside me. Nothing indeed.
My death was something.
Such arrogant, disrespectful Livers. I’ll make them regret the day they ever entered my house. There has to be something, anything, I can use to scare them off.
My favorite trick is The Hanging Man. It’s where I pretend to hang myself right in front of them. It never fails to scare, but the catch is they need to be able to see me.
And unfortunately, only young children, animals, psychics, and the insane see ghosts.
This couple doesn’t have any children I can use. So that leaves me the old standby–poltergeist. Though I can’t touch Livers, this house remains my domain, as much a part of me as my arm. I can control everything in it.
Well, everything except the basement. I can’t even see down there.
I focus my thoughts downstairs so I can materialize—my usual mode of travel. It’s easier to move things when you’re in the same room with them.
I concentrate on the lights until they flicker. The girl’s eyes widen in fear. She grabs the man’s arm and squeezes. Her heart skips a beat, a sound only the dead can hear. “What’s that?” Her voice comes out in a breathy whisper.
She’s scared.
Perfect.
The man only shrugs, the fool. “Some kind of short. The house is old. We can have that fixed.”
The woman frowns. She knows he’s lying. Either that or he’s in denial. “Does this place have a short?”
“It might. I told you it’s old. It’s been inspected though. I would never buy a house without that.”
Her eyes narrow, an accusation coming through. “But you bought it without telling me. I don’t like it here, Jace. I want to go home.”
“Sunshine, we are home!” He slams his palm on the counter. His ferocity even makes me jump. The girl takes a frightened step back and clutches her beads to her chest. Her frightened eyes are even wider now, like when you shine a light on a deer at night.
Jace lowers his voice to more soothing tones. “This house is ours now. You’ll have fun fixing it up, you’ll see. Can’t you just be grateful for once?”
Wait, did he say they owned my house?
Never.
This will always be my house. Time to intensify my efforts.
A defeated sigh escapes the girl’s lips. “Of course, Jace. I’m sure I’ll learn to love it.”
No, she won’t. Not if I have anything to do with it. Time to give them a taste of what I have in store for them. Without touching them, I open every single cabinet door simultaneously, then slam them closed.
There, let him explain that away.
“What was that?” Sunshine winds the beads around her finger and stares. Only, she isn’t staring at the cabinets, she’s staring at the dark corners of the room.
As if she knows I’m here.
“Drafts.” Jace goes over to one of the windows and closes it. I didn’t even notice it was open. This guy is really unbelievable.
Isaac’s voice interrupts my thoughts. “It’s not working. That man’s not a believer. You need to take drastic action. That trick I taught you with the knives. That’ll make them run. If they live through it, that is. If not, we’ll have a couple of extra roommates. Don’t you think this place needs a woman’s touch?”
I ignore him. Isaac always jokes about getting more roommates. I hate that joke. And Sometimes, I’m not sure it’s a joke.
No.
I shove that idea from my mind. I’ve known Isaac ever since my death. He is the one who acclimated me to being dead. He even taught me my haunting tricks. He’s just been dead too long to understand humor. I might get like that too after three quarters of a century.
I need to stop letting my thoughts ramble. Focus is everything to a ghost. When you can’t actually touch anything, your mind becomes your everything.
The knife trick, of course. That will work. The kitchen knives still lay in the drawer, dusty, but useable. And since knives aren’t heavy, throwing them is an easy thing to do. I move to the kitchen and check the knives without opening the drawer. Sometimes it’s good to be a ghost.
Still razor sharp.
I used to enjoy cooking, so I kept good knives in life.
The type that last a lifetime. They certainly lasted mine.
The problem is my aim. True, I can make the knives fly through the air, but I often lose control halfway through. The knives might end up stabbing someone. Hurting them. Killing them.
“Do it,” Isaac urges.
I need to make him understand. “No. It’s too risky. We want them gone, not dead.”
“Speak for yourself.”
Again, I ignore his bad joke.
Isaac is right though. I need to be more dramatic.
Writing always works.
I coax a stubby piece of chalk out of the kitchen drawer. It isn’t heavy, but writing takes a lot of effort.
Like a first grader, writing their name for the first the time, I struggle to remember which way the loops and the lines go. Left or right? Right or left? Does the loop go above or below the invisible line?
My grip loosens. The chalk gets so heavy, so awkward.
It would be easier to write with bar of soap.
The man doesn’t seem to notice. He doesn’t even look in my direction. He’s still too involved looking at my oversized fireplace.
I used to love that fireplace. It’s like something out of a fairy tale.
The girl’s small gasp fills the room. Her pupils follow my chalk as I write my words.
Leave or Die.
Simple, but effective. I don’t mean it, of course. I’d never hurt a Liver. Still, no reason they need to know that.
The girl grabs the man’s arm and points towards my writing. “Jace, look.”
“What the…” His brow furrows as he attempts to process my warning. He takes a step towards the writing and traces a finger around the letters without touching them. He acts like he’s not afraid of the words, but is afraid of ruining them.
Finally, he speaks up. “I’m surprised I didn’t notice that when we entered.”
The girl takes a step toward me, her gaze locking on my eyes. Like she can see me.
No. What a silly thought.
“The ghost did it.” Her gaze on me never falters.
I resist the uncomfortable urge to squirm. She can’t see me. It just isn’t possible.
The man frowns. “But what does it say?”
Honestly, nothing gets through to this man. He must be an idiot. I used simple words. What’s so hard here?
Isaac’s voice reveals his frustration. “Sebastian. You wrote it backwards.”
FOOTSTEPS REVERBERATE OFF the damp, stone walls and add to the pounding in my head.
Livers in my house. I’m not about to let that happen.
If only I could give them a proper haunting. Just a little possession. A touch of madness. The kinds of tricks that make people turn on each other and slit each other’s throats.
I was so good at it in life.
But now my powers, like me, are trapped in this accursed basement.
I thought I was so clever in life spelling this basement to keep the demons contained. But now I’m the one trapped down here by my own spells.
Oh, the irony.
Fortunately, I didn’t lose everything when I died. I still have my hearing, my clever mind, my knowledge, and my powers of persuasion. I even still know some spells.
And most of all, I have Sebastian. I mean Seby. Such a stupid nickname, but he insists I call him by it. At least it won’t be for eternity.
Not if everything goes according to plan.
I hate heightened ghost senses. Even a Liver’s breathing sent waves of pain through me. But being trapped in a house where they lived? Conversations, lights, life. In my house? Never.
But it didn’t matter. They won’t be breathing long.
I focus on Sebastian’s thoughts. Our bond lets me see through his eyes. Looking down from the attic is a very different experience than looking up from the basement.
Only this time, I hit a wall of black emptiness.
Damn it! Asleep again?
He’s always asleep.
I’m getting sick of it. It would be different if we actually needed the rest to sustain ourselves, the way Livers do. But ghosts only require rest once every few weeks…Or if something happens to our energy levels from expending a lot of effort, like an exorcism or traveling for too long away from the house.
Not that Sebastian ever has those issues. He barely exerts himself at all. And even though he can leave the house, he never does. That actually works for me. If he left the house more, he might have contact with other ghosts and that could ruin everything.
Still, I wish he didn’t sleep so much. He only does it because he’s bored.
I call to him as loud as I can. “Seby, Seby, wake up. Someone’s here.”
He resists waking. He tries his best to ignore me. He always does this. But you can’t ignore a voice in your head.
Especially when it’s mine.
His tattered consciousness returns. I’m not sure why he’s so fond of sleep. It’s not like a ghost’s dreams make you feel alive. Or make you forget you’re dead.
“You awake yet?” I fight down my rising impatience. Sebastian doesn’t know the kind of temper I really have, and I’m not about to let him find out.
If only secrets guarded themselves.
“Sebastian, WAKE UP!”
“I’m up,” he answers.
Up, sure. But he’s not focused. He doesn’t see the Livers yet. He doesn’t understand the danger. He’s such a fool. “There are Livers in our house.”
He lets out a sigh, still refusing to see the danger. “That annoying real estate agent again?”
Rage rises up at his indifference. Why am I the only one who cares, who sees? After all this is his house. Yes, I reside here too, but it’s more his house than mine. The main part of the house is original to his time, built in the nineteen forties.
The only part original to my time in the eighteen nineties is the basement and you can’t even access it easily anymore.
“Pay attention. Focus on downstairs.”
His thoughts shift and he stares at the couple. The girl, for some reason, captivates him.
Terrific.
I don’t need him going soft on me again. It’s those pants, it has to be. His girl wore pants, so it must stir a memory. Already I see trouble for me. We need to get rid of them, now.
Sebastian uses to cheap poltergeist tricks, flickering lights, and similar. Such a waste. He never practices his haunting. No wonder he isn’t any good at it. He certainly isn’t convincing that man.
I hate non-believers. They make haunting so difficult. That girl believes though. In fact, she might believe too much.
Time for me to step in. If Sebastian doesn’t realize he needs to overact to this, it’s my job to remind him.
“It’s not working. That man’s not a believer. Do that trick I taught you with the knives. That’ll make them run. If they live through it, that is. If not, we’ll have a couple of extra roommates. Don’t you think this place could use a woman’s touch?”
I laugh at the thought of both of them, trapped here, like me. The idea excites me to no end. I laugh harder, careful to shield my true thoughts from Sebastian’s mind. Sometimes the spells that keep me trapped come in handy. I don’t need to be so careful. The telepathy only works out, not in.
Lucky me.
Of course, I am lucky. Sebastian is a trusting sort. Naïve, really. He never wonders about the real meaning behind my words. Never wonders how someone like me gets himself trapped in his own basement.
“Do it,” I order.
His defiance puts up a wall between us. I’m not used to that. “No. It’s too risky. We want them gone, not dead.”
Already the trouble is starting. They can’t be allowed to stay. He’s such a goody two-shoes. He doesn’t understand that their lives, their death, are insignificant details.
I should have picked someone else.
Nearly three decades of my influence would change most people. In fact, sometimes only minutes with me changes people. But not Sebastian. No, not Sebastian. He isn’t really stupid, just stubborn.
Damn those nuns. Usually, their influence on people like Sebastian doesn’t last in adulthood. Of course, it might be due to the fact he didn’t live long enough to see those stupid religious falsehoods for what they were.
I need to remind him, again.
Livers. Don’t. Matter.
“Speak for yourself.” I want them dead. I want them both dead.
He can hear me all right. He’s just ignoring me. I hate it when he does that.
He decides to write on the wall with some chalk. I wait while he writes. If I had still had feet, I’d be tapping one impatiently.
He takes forever. But still, most ghosts lose the art of writing once dead. Your fine motor skills abandon you. It makes simple things, like writing, hard. I never actually mastered it myself, so I should be more patient with him.
Should be.
But if he practiced more, he’d be better at it. I keep telling him that. He can barely hold the chalk.
The girl’s eyes follow the chalk’s movement. Her gaze shifts from the chalk to Sebastian and then back to the chalk. She attempts to make eye contact, but Sebastian’s too engrossed in his writing to notice. Such a dangerous trait, being so oblivious.
As usual, Sebastian doesn’t recognize the danger. She sees him. Truly sees him.
Only a handful of people see ghosts.
Psychics.
The insane.
And exorcists, who are usually a mixture of the two.
Any of the three means trouble.
That man says they bought the house. If that girl is truly psychic, she can destroy everything I’ve worked for.
She could ruin my plan.
I can’t let that happen. I need to get rid of them by whatever means necessary.
Even if that means their death.
Welcome home, Livers.
Welcome home.
LINES OF SAPLINGS and tiny houses speed past the car window. I press my palm against the glass, but the chill makes me pull back my hand. The houses in this area are small, but cute. Starter homes, my mom would have called them. That is, if she was still alive, which she isn’t. I miss her. Dad too.
The new trees show the town’s efforts to improve, but they don’t hide the old rusty factory looming over the town, a grim reminder of better times and more jobs.
I suppress a shudder. The houses look like they’re are all from World War II, and haven’t had much work done to them since.
“Isn’t this a beautiful neighborhood?” Jace grins at me from the driver’s seat.
“It’s very nice.” I snuggle into the car seat and wrap my love beads around my finger. I know it’s an immature, nervous habit but I don’t care about breaking it yet. “Jace, what’s this surprise you keep talking about?”
“You’ll see.” His eyes twinkle with the mystery of it all. He gives the wheel a sharp turn. “We’re here!”
We skid into the driveway of the most dilapidated home I have ever seen. It’s not big either, only a single story and maybe an attic under that sloped roof with the dormer. The shutters, ravaged by time, hang limp at the side of the dusty gray windows. Faded yellow paint curls from the weather-beaten boards. This home hides a dark soul.
This time, I can’t stop the shudder from running through me. A hard, heavy ball of dread makes itself at home in my stomach. I stare out the car window, expecting to see the familiar fuzzy outline of a ghost.
Surely, a house like this has at least one. Some houses have more.
“Here we are.” Jace walks around to my side of the car and opens the door. “Isn’t it beautiful?”
“I suppose it could be.” The doctor said I should try to see the good in things. I used to have that skill. Before the incident.
The attic dormer winks at me, an outline framed in the window
Someone is up there.
I purse my lips and squint against the glaring sunlight to see the figure better. But it isn’t there now.
Typical of ghosts. I wish I didn’t see them so much. Or at all. Most people don’t see them, why do I have to?
Jace scrapes the key in the lock. “It was built in the nineteen forties.”
Of course it was. “It was very nice of the realtor to let you have that key.” The chill creeps down my arms, and forces the hair to stand up. I swing my oversized knit purse back and forth to distract myself from the ghost and ease my nerves.
I don’t need this type of stress.
The inside of the house is no better than the outside. Dust blankets everything. The kitchen spills into the living room and dining area, creating one cavernous room. The gaping fireplace in the middle of the all-in-one living room reminds me of the oven from Hansel and Gretel.
I shake my head. No, it’s just a house. An old, dusty house. I can’t afford to let my imagination run away with me.
Not anymore.
“Look at this craftsmanship.” Jace stomps his foot, shaking the rafters. “Real hardwood floors. And that fireplace.” He caresses the stone mantel with the tips of his fingers. “They don’t build them like this anymore. Even back then, fireplaces weren’t normally this big.”
I can see why. You could disappear forever in that enormous fireplace.
Jace walks to the center of the room and does a quick turn with outstretched arms. “With some new paint, some furniture, this place could be spectacular.”
Though I love the way Jace’s face lights up, I am not staying. “I’m sure it would be. Let’s go.”
“Leave? You haven’t even seen the bedrooms yet. Besides, why leave our new home?”
A cold fist squeezes my chest. What did he say? I focus on my breath, the way they taught me in the hospital. Finally, I can speak again. “What do you mean our new home?”
“I bought it. Isn’t it perfect?” His grin widens, but I suddenly feel a damp coldness around me.
I swallow my rage. “What do you mean you bought it? I thought we were going to wait for my trust to kick in at the end of this year before we bought a house or started a family. Wasn’t that the plan?” We’d agreed on this. How could he just buy something without even consulting me?
Jace squeezes my shoulders, pinching them. I wince at the pain. Sometimes, Jace doesn’t know how strong he is. “Sunshine. We need this, a fresh start for both of us. And decorating it, fixing it up will take your mind off…well, you know. We can’t wait.”
What did he just say? Take my mind off…how dare he? He promised never to bring that up again.
I struggle to find the words I need, but the flickering light interrupts me.
I glance up. “Does this place have a short?”
Jace shrugs. “I told you, it’s old. But it’s been inspected. I would never buy a house without that.” He trails his hand over the kitchen counter.
“You bought it without telling me, without even consulting me. I don’t like it here, Jace. I want to go home!” He has to understand how much I hate it here. We…I, couldn’t stay. The idea is out of the question.
Jace slams his hand on the counter. “Sunshine, we are home!”
I take an instinctive step back. I’ve been on the other side of that anger before, and it isn’t something I want to repeat.
Home.
The words bounce off me without ever entering my soul. I know they say home is where the heart is, and my heart is with Jace. So I should be happy wherever we are together. But I’m not. This place could never be home.
The truth is, no place has felt like home since my parents died.
Jace must have noticed my expression because his voice turns uncharacteristically soft. “It’s ours now. You’ll have fun fixing it up, you’ll see. Can’t you just be grateful for once?”
The kitchen cabinets all swing open in unison, then slam shut so hard the foundation shakes.
“What was that?” I rub my fingers over my necklace’s smooth surface. Anything to distract from the dark presence in this place.
Jace heads over to one of the windows and tugs on the frame. “Drafts.”
It isn’t drafts, it’s a ghost. I don’t see him now, but it doesn’t matter. When you’ve seen ghosts all your life, you just know these things. That’s why the house is so cold.
I scan the room squinting, searching for the telltale signs of spirits. Where is that ghost? Out of the corner of my eye I see something move in the darkest part of the house. I focus my attention on it. It’s a figure, a man with fuzzy edges. His arms are folded across this chest. His clothes look like something from that Elliot Ness show, The Untouchables.
He nods towards the kitchen. One of the drawers slides open and piece of chalk slithers out. It wriggles its way across the room like a disgusting worm.
Jace doesn’t even notice, but I don’t take my eyes off the ghost. I need to know what he’s up to. He’s writing something.
Leave Or Die.
The chalk falls and shatters.
I grab Jace’s arm to get his attention. “Jace, look.”
“What the…” His brow furrows as he attempts to process the warning. He takes a step towards the writing and traces one finger around the letters without actually touching them. He doesn’t want to smear them.
But he can’t make out the backwards words. Ghosts always write backwards for some reason, at least the ones I’ve met.
“I’m surprised I didn’t notice that when we entered.”
He doesn’t realize the words are new.
“The ghost did it.” I stare at the Elliot Ness ghost, locking his eyes with my steely gaze. At least I hope that’s what I’m doing. Ghosts usually get nervous once they realize I can see them. It might be enough to make him leave us alone. Or it might make him angrier.
There’s really no way to predict ghosts.
“What does it say?” Jace asks.
I am too busy staring down the ghost to answer. The ghost finally notices me. He squirms as it sinks in that I can see him.
The sprit fades away into nothingness, but he isn’t gone. Ghosts never go away. They just stew, gathering strength. The presence in this house hangs like a damp blanket. He wants us to go.
Jace puts his arm around my shoulders, and I jump. He is so oblivious to the danger here it isn’t even funny.
He flashes me a toothy grin. “Isn’t it perfect? Welcome home, darling.”
THEY CERTAINLY WASTE no time moving in. I don’t even remember half that stuff coming in. One day it was my house, and then practically overnight, it looks like this. Their horrid pulps fill my beautiful built-in living room shelves. They painted over Lita’s wallpaper with bright orange and purples. Then, they hung up some kind of blankets with strange, foreign designs.
Blankets on walls. Unbelievable.
The stuff they call furniture is even worse. Shapeless, gaudily colored blobs of who knows what without form or function, sit in the living room where they’d been plopped down. A blanket resembling a mop covers most of my hardwood floors.
But the bedroom is the worst. My bedroom.
They actually sleep on a mattress on the floor. No frame, no other mattress. But they don’t decorate like this or sleep on the floor because they’re broke. That I could understand. After all, I am no stranger to an empty wallet. You make the best of it and land on your feet, somehow.
No. They do it because they have no taste. They actually think this looks good.
They’ve ruined my house.
I stand at the foot of their mattress bed, and watch the strange shadows from their lamp oozing with some kind of goo. I squeeze my hands into fists to fight the anger, even though the gesture means nothing without power behind those fists.
Lashes brush against their cheeks, their breath rising and falling in rhythm. Such a peaceful, nourishing sleep. In my ruined house. In my destroyed bedroom. They’ll wake in the morning feeling good and refreshed. The type of sleep that only the living enjoy. The type of sleep you never get when you are a ghost.
No.
I will NOT let them have peaceful nights in my house. Not after they destroyed it.
“You want revenge?” Isaac asks, even though he already knows my answer. Even without our bond, he knows my moods.
“You bet I do. I want to make them regret the day they set foot in this house.”
Isaac laughs. Something about that laugh always unnerves me, but I try not to dwell on it. You can’t help the way you laugh after all. “You can accomplish that through her, right now.”
“Through her?” The words make no sense. Then again, half the things Isaac says make no sense. I’m quiet while I wait for him to explain, like he always does.
“Livers aren’t like us. We can go days or months without sleeping. Livers can’t.”
“I know that. You think I should make so much noise it keeps them awake?” I can do it easily, but that might bring in the exorcists. I’ve heard horrible stories of what happens to exorcised ghosts. It’s really the only thing to fear once you’ve died.
“Something more subtle,” Isaac replies. He is scared of exorcists too. “Are you familiar with dream infiltration?”
“No.”
“Allow me to explain.” He says it as if I could really stop him. Of course, I can’t. He loves to hear himself talk. But if I’d spent so many years with no one else to talk to I might be in love with the sound of my own voice too. I should make more of an effort to be nice to him. After all, he was all alone before I came and we are roommates for eternity.
He goes on about how dreams bridge the world between the living and the dead and how sensitive people, like her, are easy to control through their dreams.
“Enough,” I interrupt him, sick of his rant. “How do I do it? And what if I can’t think dark enough thoughts?”
“Phht. Doesn’t matter. That’s the beauty of this technique. Everyone has something they fear. Their deepest, darkest secrets. Look for the door, and open it.”
“The door?” I should have listened more carefully. None of this makes sense.
Isaac’s exasperation with me is evident in his voice. “Don’t you know anything about dreams? Listen up. This is an easy trick, even for you. All you have to do is create a locked door make sure it looks ominous. Her brain will put all her secrets in there. Then, open the door and they’ll spill out into her dreams. You don’t have to know anything; her brain will fill in the gaps. Think you can do it?”
I look again at the blobby furniture, the mattress bed, and the wall blankets hiding hideous colors. My beautiful house. How could they have done this too it? All my memories, all traces of my once happy life, obliterated.
I stare at the intruder in the bed. The way her hair spreads out on the pillow, the serene look on her face.
No.
I ache to ruin her life the way she ruined my house. I’ll ensure sure she never has another peaceful night here.
I keep my voice even as I give Isaac his answer, “Yes.”
THEY MOVED IN so fast, I barely had time to plan. I wanted Sebastian’s help in driving them out on the first day. But this girl had a friend who is no stranger to ghosts. The friend gave her spelled incense to burn when her husband wasn’t looking. She claimed it would protect her. I guess it did, sort of. It filled the house with magic smoke designed to make ghosts sleep.
Sebastian was already asleep when she burned it. He fell under the spell in moments without ever waking up. It kept him asleep for the better part of a week.
Thankfully, my basement keeps me partially protected. Her incense wouldn’t have worked on me anyway. It isn’t strong enough. It isn’t the good stuff exorcists use; it’s for lower level ghosts. Ordinary ones like Sebastian. Not for ones of my caliber. But I still have a problem. Sebastian being out cold interferes with my own abilities.
I hate relying on him so heavily.
Well, only one thing to do, take advantage of Sebastian’s down time with a little something called dream infiltration. Most ghosts use it on Livers, but the spells on this basement prevent that. A Liver must be in a highly receptive state. I might be able to infiltrate that girl’s dreams. But it’s much easier to infiltrate Sebastian’s dreams, thanks to our bond.
He is dreaming of Lita and of his last years of life. No surprise there. It’s what he usually dreams about. I invade his mind and replay some carefully chosen days. The day he bought this house. The day he planned to propose to Lita and live happily ever after. Then I make him watch, over and over again as the unknown man slits his throat from behind and leaves him to bleed out, alone on the tiled floor. I slow time down in his mind so each minute feels like an hour. Minutes where he feels life ebbing from him. Minutes where he sees his future passing in front of his eyes. Minutes where he tries to communicate with Lita, who kneels in his blood and sobs over his corpse.
Even in his spelled sleep, Sebastian starts to cry. Tears cascade down his cheeks, sounds escape his mouth, and he sniffs. Sorrow and anger radiate from him in waves.
Perfect.
A smile tugs on the corners of my mouth. Sebastian isn’t a man who gives into tears awake. His culture didn’t allow it, nor did mine. Not like today. Today, I see men on the street crying. So to be able to reduce him to tears in his sleep means I’ve truly gotten to him. I’ve ripped open his emotional wound.
He’ll wake in a foul mood, filled with anger and hate brought on by his tortuous sleep. He’ll listen to me when he wakes. He’ll infiltrate that girl’s dreams, and destroy her.
Normally though, he’d never agree. He’s too soft hearted. But his own grief will override his compassion. It’s human nature.
Misery loves to make others miserable. That’s the one universal truth of human beings, regardless of the year or how they were raised.
Now all I have to worry about is Sebastian getting seduced by the dreams of Livers.
I FIND MYSELF on a strange beach. Storm clouds gather above me. The sand crunches beneath my feet and I look down. It looks more like pieces of shattered glass than smooth sand. I reach down to touch it, but then remember I can’t feel, so I straighten up. I see her in the distance.
She sits on a beach blanket, her golden hair fluttering in the unfelt breeze. She stares at the ocean, as if trying to see something that isn’t there.
The sky darkens further, casting an eerie glow on the ground.
It’s funny. With a name like ‘Sunshine’ I expected to see fields of flowers and fluffy bunnies. This looks the beginning of a nightmare, even without my help. I could leave her to her own devices, but this promises to be so much more fun.
I crush that thought. I should not allow myself to think that destroying another person is fun. It’s just…necessary.
I stare at the sand and think of doors. A patch of sand in front of me swirls and turns to a tornado of sand. It grows until it’s taller than me. As the sandstorm subsides, a door with a frame appears on the beach.
I walk around it, studying it. It’s an older door, one from my memories. A door to a basement I can never enter. Strange. I’ve never seen this door in my reality, just in my dreams. Still, it feels familiar. Maybe I shouldn’t use a door so emotionally charged.
My little walk reveals there’s nothing on the other side of it, but then, Isaac said there wouldn’t be. The secrets are all inside.
I fling the door open, bracing myself for the avalanche of secrets. Nothing happens. I stare at the same beach on the other side.
It doesn’t work.
Isaac is wrong. Or else, this isn’t an easy trick at all. Did I forget something? I struggle to remember what he told me.
The answer lights up inside me.
Of course, the lock.
The door doesn’t contain any secrets because it doesn’t have a lock on it. I close the door and imagine the biggest padlock I can muster and slap it on the door’s front. The door quivers and groans. Growling comes from the inside the door, even though from the back, there’s still nothing there. The door bows in the middle, as if someone, some thing, pushes it from the other side.
Clearly the trick worked. What secrets lay trapped in there?
I touch the shivering door. The roughhewn wood tantalizes my fingers with its splintery surface.
I pull back, clutching my hand as if I’ve been burned. If my heart could still beat, it would undoubtedly burst through my chest.
I can feel, just like when I was alive. I didn’t notice it before, but now it’s unmistakable. I can feel things again. Touch things again. And it isn’t just the door. I bask in the warm sunlight, enjoy the refreshing wind kissing my face.
I take in deep gulping breaths, enjoying the tingle of salt on my tongue and air in my lungs. I feel alive. So alive. Maybe I won’t ruin this dream. Maybe I’ll just use this girl and stay here at night.
Feeling alive again might be worth a ruined house. I wrap myself up in the warm feelings.
I conjure a blanket to protect me from the sand glass and stretch out. My muscles delight in the stretch, they missed it too. Nothing compares to a good stretch. The sun’s rays stroke my body. How I missed its gentle warmth. I hadn’t even realized how much until now. I rub my cheek on the nubby woolen surface of the blanket.
Sleep tugs at my mind. Even that sensation feels foreign. Ghosts rarely feel tired, they just pass out. I’ve forgotten how good Liver sleep feels. Drowsy warmth embraces me. My muscles relax and I sink into the inviting blanket. My eyes slide shut, but I welcome this darkness.
Yes. I’ll just stay here. With the warm sun, the soft blanket, the—
The moan of a tortured soul fills the air. I sit up with a start, all pleasant feelings fleeing from me. A coil of snakelike terror twists my stomach.
The door.
I forgot about the door.
The door trembles, about to give under the weight of the thing on the other side trying to get out.
The lock jangles in protest, but it’s no match for that thing behind it. I scramble to my feet, ready to brace myself for the horror about to spill out from this girl’s mind. Even now, dark ominous trails of smoke seep out from around the cracks.
The door explodes open with such force I fall backward. I let out a scream of pain as glass sand shards cut into my flesh like millions of needles ripping it open.
Billowing clouds of darkness spill out, polluting the world and engulfing the sun.
Pain from those shards radiates through me. Even as I try to stand more shards bury themselves in my flesh. My stomach tightens. Isaac never told me I could be hurt in dreams.
The beach vanishes, leaving only darkness with a few patches of light, like spotlights on a stage.
The dream plane version of the girl is still there, but now she seems, younger…happier. She’s spotlighted with a set around her. She stands in a richly decorated room that looks like somewhere my friend Allan would have lived. Near the sofa in the entryway is a small table with a phone. She can’t see the dark vortex barreling toward her.
Misery personified. I’ve seen it in my own dreams enough to know it.
The phone’s jarring ring holds a forbidding tone as the tendrils of misery entangle their way up the phone stand and curl around her arms and legs.
“Hello?” The girl winds the cord around her finger, oblivious to the darkness consuming her. Her smile drops in an instant. “Oh no,” she whispers, all the color gone from her face. She sinks into a chair in tears.
Even though I don’t know what all this means, the hollowness in the pit of my stomach tells me all I need to. I called on her darkness, her pain, and now it’s taking over this world.
A strange sensation fills my gut, a heaviness that makes it hard to move. It isn’t a tired heaviness, it’s more like a weight that makes you oblivious to all the good things around you. It’s like a dark cloud has invaded my soul.
Why did I do this to her? All she did was redecorate. I overreacted. I don’t understand why I listened to Isaac. It doesn’t bring me any joy to see her suffer.
The little play continues, oblivious to my guilt. I can’t not watch. I can’t look away. No matter which way I turn, the same images assault me from every angle.
An overturned burning car appears at the base of a cliff. Inside, two people pound on the windows, begging for someone to save them. Flames engulf the car. Their screams and the sickeningly sweet smell of burning flesh waft in on the air.
My stomach churns rejecting this ball of emotion. I swallow down the bile threatening to rise. I have to stop this somehow.
“Wake up!” I scream. She doesn’t hear me.
She’s trapped in the bottom of an empty tumbler glass. She pounds on her glass prison and claws at the walls, attempting to climb out. She can’t raise herself an inch up those slippery walls. Finally, she sits in the bottom of the glass in defeat. She wraps her arms around her knees and sobs in despair.
Hot tears sting my eyes. Another sensation I’d forgotten about. This isn’t right. I never should have done this. I try again. “Wake up!”
Still, she doesn’t hear me. She has her own issues to worry about. A hail of red and yellow pills pours into the glass from some unseen cloud. The girl stops crying and staggers to her feet. Already the pills are up to her ankles. She clutches at the glass sides, her fear and desperation mirrored in her face. The pills are up to her knees now.
She tries to climb on top of them to escape, but she can’t get a good enough footing. She slips and falls, disappearing under the pills. She doesn’t come back up.
If you die in a dream, you die for real.
I’m not sure where that thought came from. I must have heard it somewhere.
The girl’s head tilts back, gasping for air before disappearing below the ocean of pills. Her jagged, cold, breaths rip at my flesh.
She can’t breathe, and that’s very real. Her heart pounds in fear, but soon, it won’t be able to take the strain anymore. It will stop.
Forever.
She’s going to die. Because of me. I can’t let her die in here.
I just wanted her to leave.
“Wake up now!”
Thumpthump, thumpthump.
No. Her body refuses my orders. Her heartbeat speeds up. I can’t even hear the individual beats anymore. But her breath slows. No new air enters her lungs.
I need to change the scene, get her out of that pill-filled tumbler. Let her breathe again. My mind reels. I struggle to think of something, anything, that isn’t going to kill her.
Darkness closes in along with the chill that seeps all the way into my bones.
Please, don’t die.
Thump-thump, thump-thump
Her heart slows, grateful for its momentary rest.
I let out a breath too, one that matches the one she drew in.
A hospital bed sits in the middle of an empty room. The girl lays on it, but she’s not asleep. She’s fighting against the leather restraints keeping her trapped on it. She screams for help that never arrives.
Thumpthump
Uh oh, her heart is speeding up again, pounding in my ears. I need to focus. Think of pleasant things, like my nice, safe attic.
Images of the attic embrace me. My snuggly attic with the headless dress form in the corner and the little eight-year-old girl in the pink dress. Her curls fall around her shoulders in ringlets. She looks so much like Shirley Temple.
Wait, what?
My blood ices over.
This time, I’m not sure if I’m hearing her terrified heart or my own.
This isn’t her memory. It’s mine.
The child playfully chases a doll across the floor. A doll I don’t see. The window in the world’s smallest nook opens and she says the doll flies outside. Only there’s no doll. The child doesn’t realize the this and gets too close the window. Isaac asks her if she can fly. The girl hesitates, laughs, then reaches for the doll that isn’t there.
She screams as she tumbles from the window, the ground rushing up to break her bones.
I gather all my strength and let out a ghostly wail.
I SIT UP with a scream, my chest heaving in fear. For a moment, I thought I was back in the hospital or jumping out of that attic window.
But I’m not. I’m safe in my own bed. I draw in a deep breath to steady my nerves.
Jace still sleeps soundly beside me. Nothing ever wakes him up. We’ve often joked about how he could sleep though a murder. I wish he’d wake up and hold me, but I know how he’d react if I woke him. Still, even a sleeping Jace is better than having no one here at all.
I check the time, 2:15. Still hours before dawn. But I’m not about to go back to sleep. Not yet.
I shuffle off to the bathroom and close the door with a satisfying click. Alone at last. Sometimes, the only place you can truly be alone is in the bathroom. I don’t want Jace seeing me like this.
I stare at my reflection in the mirror over the sink. My face is still ashen with fright.
The pills and hospital make sense, but I’ve never jumped out a window before. And I’ve never seen that attic in my life, so the last part of the dream didn’t make any sense at all.
Already, the dream starts to fade, but one image remains vibrant. That Elliot Ness guy in the corner. He’s watching, nodding his approval at my fear.
Enjoying my terror.
I wipe the leftover frightened tears from my eyes.
That ghost sent me the dream. I know it. They’re always doing that to me. Ghosts love to play in them. But the joke is on him. I know how to stop him from trying it again.
Sleeping pills.
You never dream with sleeping pills. I hate the idea of using them again so soon, but that ghost is not invading my dreams again.
I drag my fingers over everything in the cabinet, searching for my pill bottle. I can’t find it.
Swallowing down my fear, I take a good, hard look inside the cabinet. Aside from some aspirin, there are no pills of any kind in there, just non-pill things, like shaving cream, razors, and toothbrushes.
Realization flutters in my mind. Of course. Jace hid the pills after I overdosed on them. It makes sense. He still doesn’t trust me enough to be around them.
I close the cabinet.
Maybe I’ll just stay up for a while. I cover my mouth with my fist as I yawn.
SEBASTIAN ISN’T SPEAKING to me right now. In fact, when he came out of the dream, I’d never seen him so angry.
He’s angry because I didn’t tell him it would make him feel alive. Or that it might kill her.
He feels guilty now. In fact, he reeks of it. Such a worthless emotion. I’ve never felt guilt in life or death. He huddles in the attic, trying to take refuge in his own dreams. But ghost dreams aren’t like Liver dreams. We can watch events unfold in our own dreams, but we can’t feel in them, the way we can in Liver dreams.
He claims he’s not going back in, but he will. The feelings seduced him. Sebastian’s racked with guilt at the moment, but he won’t be able to stay out of her dreams. Liver dreams are like opium. So tempting and hard to resist.
He’s already addicted to it; I can see that in him, too. It’s only a matter of time before he breaks his vow and goes back in. He doesn’t even need to do to the door trick. His mere presence will create more nightmares for the girl.
The girl.
She’s in the living room, curled up in that blobby furniture. She shakes her head to clear out the sleepy cobwebs, but even determination can’t keep her awake forever. When she sleeps, she’s ours. If she doesn’t sleep, she’ll die.
Either way, I win.
“DO YOU REALLY have to go?” I plop on the bed as Jace packs his luggage. I hate how clingy that makes me sound, but after the dream last night—that I didn’t tell him about—I don’t want to be left alone in this house. How can work make him travel with only that one phone call this morning? He had no time to prepare.
Neither did I.
He sighs and rolls his eyes toward the ceiling as he folds another shirt in the suitcase. “Sunshine, you know I have to travel for work. I told you. This was a last minute substitution. The person who was supposed to go got sick or something. I’m using his ticket so I have to be on time.”
I understand, it’s work, after all. Still, it’s a horrible time to leave. “I’m not sure I want to be alone here for almost a week,” I admit, hoping he’ll pick up on my nonverbal cues.
He doesn’t.
“Then invite Meadow over or something. It’s not like I get a choice. I have to make money.”
I trace the pattern of the bedspread with my finger. “When my trust kicks in—”
“When! If! I can’t believe your parents said you could only get it on your birthday if you don’t end up back in the hospital.”
“They want to make sure I don’t do something stupid with the money,” I explain.
It makes a kind of twisted sense to me. My parents loved me, and wanted to make sure I was provided for. But they didn’t want me to be stupid with money. Of course, I wasn’t crazy, but you can’t convince people of that when you see ghosts walking around everywhere. I never could convince the doctors at any of those hospitals either.
I’m not crazy. Well, not all the time.
Most children outgrow seeing ghosts, but I still see them. Like that Elliot Ness ghost in our house. I see him clear enough. It’s not something I can help. Jace knows I’ve been in and out of hospitals all my life and just accepted it, but he still doesn’t believe. That’s why I don’t tell him about my dream.
Or that something evil exists in this house.
“I only have a few more months,” I assure him. We have savings we can live on until then. I should mention that.
“Unless you slip again,” he reminds me, pushing such thoughts as him quitting his job from my mind.
Time to change the subject. “Jace, have you seen the sleeping pills? I wanted some last night but I can’t find them.”
“I threw them down the toilet.” Jace snaps his hard-sided luggage shut. “The last thing we need is you alone in the house with a bunch of sleeping pills. And don’t get any ideas. I’ve talked to the local pharmacy and they know they aren’t supposed to sell you any.”
I love Jace, but he treats me like a child. I smile, pretending I’m not insulted.
He kisses me on the forehead. “Sunshine, darling, I love you. I don’t want anything to happen to you. Take care. I have to go. The cab is waiting to take me to the airport.” He carries his suitcase out of the room and heads toward the cab.
Now, it’s just me and the ghost.
*******************************************
“I WISH YOU’D change your mind and come over, Meadow.” I cradle the phone between my ear and shoulder so I can still stir the batter as I speak. “I’m baking brownies. Your favorite.” I’d been having such horrible dreams the past two days I didn’t want to be alone.
“No way,” Meadow replies, her tinny voice coming from the phone. “I told you, that house has a rep. My grandmother used to tell me about it.”
A sudden unnatural cold chills me to the bone. I know what that means. The ghost is back. I scrutinize the dark corners. Though he isn’t visible to me this time, his presence permeates the room.
“Meadow, I have to go.” I put the batter down on the counter and walk toward the big fireplace, almost as if in a trance.
The edges of the room grow a little hazy, and the sounds seem to come from across a cavern.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
A sound from downstairs. Only, this house is a single level home with an attic. There is no downstairs.
I plod deliberately, listening to my own footsteps fall. In certain places, they echo as if the sound is lost in a cavern.
Images flash before me, like stills of a movie.
A stone-walled room lit by torches. Stone monsters carved from the rock, grinning at the stone table in the room’s center.
Blood cascades down the table’s sides. The thirsty floor laps it up like water.
The one word that ties them all together flaps in my mind.
Downstairs.
An icepick of pain shoots through my head, blurring my vision. As it clears, I find myself in a dank, damp dungeon with windowless, stone walls.
My heart pounds, my mouth is dry, but I know this isn’t real. It’s just some kind of replay of the past. I’ve experienced them before. Visions are one of those things that get you sent to a mental hospital when you tell people.
People in red, hooded robes chant nonsense words and surround the stone table. Someone is tied to the table. She screams for help. Begs for mercy. I already know there will be none.
I move through the figures—who pay no attention to me because, of course, I don’t exist in their plane—to get a better view.
The woman is attached to the table by her wrists, feet, and waist. Spreadeagle, the way they tied me down in the hospital. Only my restraints were leather, and hers are iron shackles. Frightened tears stain her cheeks.
She turns toward me, her eyes filled with terror.
“Help me,” she mouths without audible words.
My mouth falls open as I stare into my own face. I am the woman on the altar. I can’t move, can’t breathe, the world swirls and lurches around me.
The woman’s dying scream reverberates in my brain while I’m plunged into darkness.
My eyes fly open. The cold wooden floor supports my back and my eyes focus on the ceiling of the normal part of the house. There are no hooded figures, no sacrifice room, and no bloody stone altar. My head pounds. Confusion clings to it like little bits of cotton.
I stagger to my feet and stumble into the kitchen. I slam my hand on the counter overturning the bowl. Batter splashes across the floor in long gooey streaks.
I grab a paper towel and kneel down, planning to clean up the mess.
The batter moves as invisible fingers dip into the puddle and form words.
Get Out.
I STARTLE AWAKE. I don’t sleep often, but sometimes, I just require rest and lose consciousness. Today is one of those days. My own dreams haunt my sleep. The sacrifice room. That girl on my altar.
Me, slitting her throat.
But it isn’t the dream I found so troubling. It’s the fact that I wasn’t alone in it. Lower level ghosts like Sebastian, without my level of training, don’t know when there is someone like me in his dreams.
But I know when there is someone in mine.
And that girl was in there with me. Influencing my dreams. Seeing my thoughts.
A chill passes through me, and it’s not from the icy stone basement.
This proves it. She is psychic, as I feared. But also something far worse. Latent power. In another time, in my time, she would have been a powerful spell caster. Someone who would have given even me a hard time for control of my cult. Fortunately, she doesn’t have access to any spells and she doesn’t know how to harness her power.
My thoughts hop to the one thing I’d forgotten about for years, my journal. I’d had it hidden in Sebastian’s attic. At the time, it seemed like a good idea After all, Sebastian has no power, latent or otherwise. And his protectiveness of his territory would keep it safe. But if that girl finds it, if she uses it, I could be in big trouble.
No.
I can’t let that happen. She needs to go, one way or another.
“SUNSHINE, SUNSHINE!” MEADOW’S voice pierces my sleep-clouded brain as my head slips from its perch on my hand. I jerk my head up and force my weighted lids up, ignoring the gritty, sandpaper feel.
I struggle to remember where I am. The bistro. My usual Wednesday lunch with Meadow. The iron chair’s latticework digs into my butt. Strange how senses get so heighted when you crave sleep.
Soft, steady blinks set in, each one lasting a fraction of a second longer than the one before. My head eases forward. I don’t even care that the iced tea’s straw scrapes my forehead.
“Sunshine!”
Meadow’s voice again. This time, it’s accompanied by her shaking my shoulder. As I open my eyes, a yawn and deep stretch overtakes me, waking me up a little. “Huh?”
Meadow stares down at me, concern in her eyes. I focus on one of her details to bring me around, that crazy beige knit cap she always wears, and the knit bag to match. The ones her grandmother made.
“Are you alright?” She pulls her chair up to me and sits back down. “You’re practically drooling.”
“I…I haven’t been sleeping well. There’s…” I long to tell her about the ghost, but I can’t. People don’t believe me so I have gotten used to not telling anyone. Still, this is Meadow, and she believes in ghosts even though she’s never seen one. Besides, we’ve been friends for years.
Meadow swirls her straw around in the drink, the way she always does when she’s deep in thought. “Jace is out of town again this week, right?”
“Uh huh.” I cover my mouth with my fist as I succumb to another yawn. Why does she emphasize the word ‘again’ like that? She knows Jace’s job requires travel. But all that will change once my trust comes through.
I have to tell her about the ghost. I can’t handle this alone anymore.
“Meadow, what would you do if a ghost was haunting you?”
“You’re being haunted?” Meadow nudges her glass toward the center of the table and leans closer to me. “Tell me everything.”
The words spill out of me, every detail I remember. When I finish, Meadow’s expression is one of seriousness and shock, not the disbelief I feared.
“Oh, Sunshine, I’m so sorry. That sounds awful. Like a ghost who wants to take back the house.”
“I don’t know what to do, Meadow.” I shake my head to fight off the exhaustion clawing at my brain. “It’s been almost four days and I’m so tired. This ghost is never going to let me sleep again.”
Meadow stands up. We’ll start by having you stay at my house tonight so you can get a good night’s rest. Then, tomorrow, we’ll do something.” She touches my shoulder. “We’ll get through this, I promise. No ghost is going to chase you out.”
I STARE AT the empty mattress bed. It stayed empty all last night, when the girl went out for lunch and never returned.
“She’s not here. I think we did it, Isaac. I think we scared her out.” It’s good news, but a hollowness gnaws at my guts. Maybe I miss her dreams.
After that first time, I wasn’t sure I wanted to go back into her dreams. But something drew me to them, to her. She was filled with so much pain, so much feeling, there were enough sensations to share. I needed to taste it again and again.
It was so delicious. Now it’s gone.
“Her belongings are still here,” Isaac reminds me. “And her husband is only away on business. She’s coming back. She hasn’t even been gone twenty-four hours yet.”
He is right, of course. Happiness courses through me. I want her to return, to go into those dreams again.
“Sebastian, focus!”
“My name is Seby!” I snap.
Why can’t he get that right after so many decades?
“You’re going much too easy on her. You need to kill her in her dreams, so she’ll never wake up again.”
Sometimes Isaac is just too intense. As if he’s forgotten what it’s like to be alive. And that living people fear death. “I told you, I’m not doing that.”
“Do you think I don’t know what you’re really doing in those dreams? I know you’re only going in to satisfy your own sick need to feel alive again.”
Sick.
As in twisted. The nuns always used to say certain actions, certain thoughts, were sick and twisted. Sinful even. As an adolescent, I’d heard that quite a bit when I was…discovering myself.
A satisfied smile tugs at the corners of my mouth.
I wonder what they’d say about this.
I laugh at the idea.
But I’m not sick or twisted. I just want my house back. That isn’t wrong. Just because I’m dead doesn’t mean it’s not still my house. It will always be my house.
The front door swings open on its hinges, illuminating the main room with glaring sunlight. The girl steps inside, her arms hugging something to her chest.
“Seby.” Isaac’s voice sounds almost scared. And he called me by my right name. This can’t be good.
“What’s wrong?”
“Look at her arms.”
A shiver runs through me. The item in her arms is an exorcist’s tool, something known to cause ghosts pain.
A Ouija board.
THE GIRL DIDN’T come home last night. Good. I don’t want her here unless she’s dead. The house should be just me and Sebastian. Like the old days.
But I knew she was coming back. For starters, all of her belongings are still here.
I try to explain to that to Sebastian, but I can’t believe I have to. He’s so naive at times. I guess I shouldn’t complain. His trusting way of looking at the world works out well for me. That girl was naive too, but she has the sight even if it’s not in her control. She might figure out what I’m up to, and ruin it. I will not let this girl destroy me when my own traitorous coven couldn’t even do it.
Oh look. She’s back. And she’s holding something. Fear grips my throat.
Oh dear God, is that a Talking Board?
It’s.
I shrink deeper into my basement and huddle against the stone walls for protection. Thank goodness the spells keeping me trapped down here also keep me out of the clutches of things like that.
Sebastian is on his own.
Funny how sleep and the promise of a new day make everything better. Meadow’s right. I’m not about to leave my home to please some ghost. This is my house now. The ghost better get used to it.
That cavernous living-kitchen-dining room doesn’t seem nearly as big. The fireplace still does though. And worse, it still reminds me of the witch’s oven from Hansel and Gretel.
I shudder and hug the Ouija board to my chest to settle my nerves.
“Do you think this will work?” I ask Meadow for the hundredth time.
“Of course.” Meadow’s tone tells me she’s getting tired of that question. “If my grandmother was still alive, she could do a proper séance. But since she’s not, this is really the only way. Now, let’s start by closing all the curtains and shutting all the lights but one. Ghosts hate light.”
“Why is that?” I pull the heavy drapes closed. “Does it hurt them?”
Meadow dumps the box’s contents on the floor and clicks off a lamp. “Well, I doubt that. You can’t hurt something that’s dead. But no one really knows why they hate it. It’s a ghost thing.”
I pull a couple of beanbag chairs up to the board while Meadow clicks off the other lights. I study the contents. After all, I’ve never seen one before. It seems hard to believe this brightly painted board can really deliver the souls of the dead. The board contains numbers, letters, and the words ‘yes,’ ‘no,’ ‘maybe,’ and ‘goodbye.’ The only other piece is a wooden pointer with a magnifying glass in the center. It doesn’t make sense that any of this can summon a ghost.
Something is missing. I move the lid of the box, searching for the last piece. It has to be here.
“No instruction sheet?”
Meadow flops down on the beanbag. “We don’t need one. I’ve done dozens of these. Okay, we’re ready to start. Now, normally, we start with a prayer of protection but since we’re only going to try to reach the ghost in this house, no other ghosts should show up. They’re territorial. Place your hands on the pointer like this.”
She makes a triangle with her fingers on the pointer. My hands go on top of hers in the same triangle.
We push the pointer back and forth while Meadow keeps up a steady stream of chatter. “Now, we circle the pointer around the board like this. The ghost spells out his answers, so we have to keep the questions short. Yes. No. Easy answers. We don’t him to need to write an essay. I’ll ask the questions, because having two speakers confuses the ghost. Now focus your energy. And think of the ghost you want to contact. Let his image fill your thoughts. That should summon him.”
I think back to the man’s strange clothing, his young face, and sad eyes…
I stop, stunned. I hadn’t remembered his eyes until that moment. Yes, the first time I saw him, they were sad. When he haunted my dreams, he looked amused at first, but then, when I almost drowned in the tumbler, his expression changed to one of panic and concern. The past few nights when he’d been in my dreams, he seemed almost upset when they turned dark.
Maybe he didn’t really want to hurt me.
Meadow’s voice and the movement of the pointer under my hands bring me back to the present.
“We are reaching out the ghost that lives in this house. Are you there, ghost?”
The pointer moves to ‘yes’ and I swallow the lump in my throat. “He’s here.”
Meadow scowls. “Shh. No loud noises or you’ll break the spell,” she whispers. But in the next breath, her loud, confident voice returns. “Are you the ghost who inhabits this house?”
YES
My heart flutters. Communication with a real ghost. Though I’d seen them all my life, I’d never actually spoken to one before. “Ask him his name.”
Meadow gives me a ‘his name doesn’t matter look,’ but she humors me anyway. She’s a good friend like that. “What is your name?”
S-E-B-Y
Meadow frowns. “Seby? What kind of name is that?”
N-I-C-K
“Your name is Nick?” Meadow presses.
NO
I know what he means. “Seby must be his nickname from when he was alive.” I hate the idea of asking him the next question, but I need to know. “Ask him something else. Ask him if he lives downstairs.”
Meadow’s eyebrows raise in confusion. She leans over the board so she can whisper to me without breaking the spell. “This house doesn’t have a downstairs.”
I push away the image of the sacrifice room and the woman on the altar. I can’t make her understand, so maybe she could just accept it. “Trust me, it does.”
Meadow sighs. “Alright. Let’s try this. Ghost, does this house have a basement?”
YES
I hate being right about the wrong things.
If it has a basement, then the sacrifice room is real too. “Ask him if he lives down there.”
Those eyes don’t seem the type to be involved with sacrifices, but I need to know for certain. I need to hear him say it.
“Ghosts don’t live places. But I know how to phrase this. Ghost, do you reside in the basement?”
A-T-T-I-C
“Attic?” That makes no sense. “Then what’s in the basement?”
Meadow makes circles with the pointer. “Ghost, what or who is in the basement?”
I-S-A-A-C
Though I’d never heard that name before, an icy finger of fear runs up my spine. “Who’s Isaac?”
A low rumble comes from the floor, shaking the shelves and everything on them. I stand up. “What’s that? An earthquake? This isn’t California.”
“Sit back down.” Meadow’s hands never leave the pointer, but her gaze darts around the room. “Sunshine. Sit down. We didn’t say good-bye. We can’t end it without saying goodbye. This is some kind of haunting trick, not an earthquake. We need to end this, now. The ghost can’t leave until we say good-bye.”
Books topple from the shelves, the hanging pots and pans bang in the kitchen. The ceiling fan sways like it’s on a ship during a hurricane.
I dive back to my seat and place my hands on Meadow’s.
“Goodbye!” we yell in unison, pointing to the word.
The shaking stops, but the ceiling fan still shivers as the blades spin around and around. But no one turned it on. I stare at it, transfixed by the spinning blades.
It seems lower somehow, separated from the ceiling.
“Look out!” I scream pointing to the falling fan. It’s only inches away from Meadow’s head. She dives out of the way just in time and crashes into a beanbag. Her face turns ashen gray and her chest heaves as she struggles to regain her composure.
“Your ghost tried to kill us! He’s dangerous! You need an exorcist!”
I head to the nearest window, and heave it open. The room floods with light. That ghost with the sad eyes wouldn’t hurt anyone, I’m sure of it. I can’t let Meadow hire an exorcist before I find out what is really going on.
“I think it was an accident. Jace isn’t handy. It just loosened when he rattled the house.”
Meadow shakes her head as she gets to her feet. “Damn it, Sunshine. You’re too nice! You’re always making excuses for everyone. And this time, it’s going to get you killed!”
MY NICE SAFE attic fades into nothingness as cold, empty darkness descends on me.
An icy chill fills the air. It must be fifty below in here. If I still had breath, or could see anything in this blackness, I would see my own breath.
I wrap my arms around my body, a gesture I often did when I was alive to warm up. But this time, it doesn’t work. The cold seeps into me, stealing my warmth. Chilling my soul.
“Hello?” I call into the emptiness, still rubbing my shoulders. I shiver.
So cold.
Even my fingers prick with coldness, frozen and numb.
Fear grips my throat. Isaac often talks about ‘the darkness.’ A place ghosts go once they’re exorcised. He refers to it as a dark empty place where you suffer the pangs of cold, hunger, and thirst forever without even the relief of sleep.
Death for the dead.
The very idea is too horrible to contemplate.
“Hello!” I call again. Nothing returns to me, not even an echo. If my own voice doesn’t bounce to back me, there is truly nothing in this world.
Icy daggers invade my lungs while a million tiny pins of cold prick me all over. I rub my arms faster, but it’s getting harder to move.
I drag my hand across my eyes. A nice, warm bed would feel so good right now. Even my own attic would be better than this.
A deep frigid ache settles in my muscles, rendering them useless. My arms fall limp at my sides. Rubbing takes too much effort. Exhaustion tears at my brain. It’s pure torture to want to sleep so much but be forced to stand, knowing sleep will never come.
A shaft of light appears in the vast nothingness.
Warm, welcoming light. If I can get to it, I’ll feel fine again. That has to be true, right?
I will my heavy legs to move. My feet only move up about an inch, but they do move. I plod toward the light, my body swaying so much I can barely stand. Yet, when I try to sit or lie down, an unseen force keeps me up. I resist the hot tears that long to fall.
I don’t cry.
This is my punishment for torturing that girl. This can’t be my eternity, it can’t be. Because of one lapse in judgment? I was a good man in life. No saint, but no sinner either.
Darkness closes in, but not the relief that comes with oblivion. Each thought causes pain that rips through me like a knife.
I cry out in agony, but the sound gets caught in my throat, choking me, setting my lungs on fire.
A woman’s voice slices into my thoughts. “We are reaching out the ghost that lives in this house are you there, ghost?”
I blink as I realize I can see again. I stand inside the light, it’s warmth surrounding me. If only I could stay here in the warmth. Relief at last.
Invisible red-hot needles pierce my flesh in a hundred different directions. This time, my mouth can’t even open to scream. It’s glued shut.
Every nerve ending screams for relief I don’t know how to give.
Gold letters, numbers, and the words YES, NO, and MAYBE swirl in front of me. Invisible weights attach to my body, but an even stronger force keeps me from sitting. My eyes burn with exhaustion and my mind begs for a sleep denied to me. If I were still alive, this much pain would make me pass out. That’s not how it works when you’re dead.
Touch a choice and the pain goes away.
The voice invades my anguish-clouded mind.
Huh? The voice isn’t mine.
Is someone in here with me? Inflicting the pain? “Please stop.” My voice is a whisper, but it’s the loudest sound I can muster. A red haze drifts in front of my eyes, obscuring everything but the shining golden letters.
Answer the question and you’ll feel better.
The voice again. This must be how a Talking Board works. I’d played with them in life, Lita, Allan, and I. I thought they were common, harmless toys. Just a board game, and one of the few three people can play.
But not from this side. From this side, talking boards bring only pain. The three choices pulsate in front of me, insisting I choose.
No. I refuse to do ghost parlor tricks.
If you want to feel better, answer the questions. Quickly.
I struggle to respond, but all my words abandon me. My body craves rest, relief from the pain. I try to lower myself, to close my weary eyes, but the unseen magic of this place won’t allow me to do so. I stay standing, stay awake though I can barely put two thoughts together. Sleep. I need sleep. I need air too, and I don’t even breathe. I can’t take this.
The needles drive deeper into my skin until they scrape against bone. I longed to scream out in pain, at least that would provide some relief, but like the words, the sound refuses to come. Even my tears of pain are stuck in my eyes. The needles twist and move, ripping me open.
The three choices thrust themselves in front of my face while the random characters spin around me.
I didn’t do anything this bad. Please. I don’t deserve this punishment. Please.
Answer the questions, the voice insists.
Yes. Yes, I’ll answer. Anything for some relief. YES, NO, and MAYBE surround me. Each one beats like a heart, demanding my choice.
My leaden arm fights my attempts to lift it, but it’s the only way. If I pick one, maybe all this will stop. I bite my lower lip to take my mind off the unseen dagger ripping my arm open. Salty blood fills my mouth.
None of this makes any sense. I’m dead. There should be no torture. This can’t be Hell. This can’t be my eternity.
My limp finger touches the pulsating YES, its temperature so cold it burns.
The pain stops. Everything stops. I fall to all fours, my full range of motion back, the pain gone. I inhale deep, nourishing, sweet breaths. I can breathe again? I don’t care about why that’s true. I don’t care that it doesn’t make sense.
I sprawl out, letting whatever passes for ground in this world support me.
Sleep. I need sleep.
The Liver’s voice comes again. “Are you the ghost who inhabits this house?”
The magic in this place yanks me to my feet, and once more shoves white-hot pins and needles deep into my flesh from all sides. My recovery time is over.
Not again. Please. No more.
Now I know how a Talking Board works. Each new question unleashes a slew of pain that only eases when I touch the right series of words, numbers, or letters.
I have no choice but to play.
I answer quickly, hoping for the promised relief. I’d already seen that waiting, being stubborn, doesn’t work in here.
Each recovery time is shorter than the one before it. Within seconds, another question attacks me, and another. I reply as quickly as possible, but the questions keep coming.
Harder questions with longer answers. More letters to find and touch before the relief comes.
No more. I beg the force controlling this world to make it stop. Please, no more.
The letters spiral around me like a tornado. I can’t even find the right answers anymore, let alone touch them. There is no skin left on my body. There can’t be after this much ripping and tearing. The scream of pain sticks in my throat.
The red haze engulfs me, lessening the torment.
At last, I’m passing out from the pain. Thank God. I’m not scared of what comes next. This has to be Hell.
I sink into blissful, pain free oblivion.
SEBASTIAN DISAPPEARS FROM the attic. The confusion in his mind tells me he doesn’t know where he’s going. But I know. That nightmarish plane that ghosts go to when Livers want to make them perform.
I’ve been in there once myself, and that was quite enough. The spell only worked on me then because the boys playing with the board performed it in my basement. I got even with them though.
All of them. They never touched another board.
My basement has an appetite for blood. I built it for that. But that dimension is far worse.
It tortures you until you answer, bringing up all the worst feelings from when you were alive. It also drains your energy. The longer you stay, the weaker you grew. Some ghosts never return from that dimension.
I can’t have that. Not with the seventy-fifth anniversary of my death so close. Not after all that time I spent grooming Sebastian for my special day.
I focus on his thoughts. I don’t know if our link will work across that many planes, but I have to find out. After a few tense moments, I can see him.
He stands in the center of the light, like a moth to a flame. Only he isn’t answering any of the questions. The fool is actually trying to endure the pain. If he keeps that up, he’ll never come home. His spectral energy will scatter and he won’t even have a soul left.
Why isn’t he touching the swirling letters? Wait, it’s his first time. And I’ve never talked to him about it. He might not know what to do. As usual, I need to spell it out for him. “Touch a choice and the pain goes away!”
He jumps, startled, but doesn’t actually move into action. He remains frozen. Already his spectral energy escapes his soul and vanishes away into the nothingness around him.
He’s going to fade away in there unless he answers. Why doesn’t he answer? He must be in pain. When I was there, I was in agony. I try again. “If you want to feel better, answer the questions. Quickly.”
His arm jerks as he tries to lift against the oppressive weight that dimension shackles you with. “Please. I didn’t do anything this bad. I don’t deserve this. Please.”
Unbelievable. Begging for mercy.
Whatever force exists in a Talking Board dimension is automatic, not sentient. Begging does no good at all. Only one thing can help him. I need to make him see that.
“Answer the questions!”
With great effort, Sebastian pokes an answer. The dimension rewards him with relief. His energy is so low, reduced by half already. He needs time to recover. These Livers are asking too many questions, too fast. Sebastian can’t keep up with the rapid succession in his weakened state.
His levels drop to a quarter, slowing his mind and his responses. And when you take your time in that world, it punishes you with more pain to drain your soul.
That Talking Board world is going shred him and scatter his energy to the cosmos.
No way can I let that happen. His energy is mine.
If I had my full powers, I could get out of this basement. That’s not possible. Somehow though, I’ll make those Livers pay for this. My rage convulses the walls, the antique bottles rattle on the dust-covered shelves. Even the wooden boxes that cover my secret entrance fall.
That’s when I realize the delightful truth.
The ceiling of my basement is in my domain, my control. And my ceiling is their floor. I just need to focus. I turn my rage outward, but only at the ceiling. I will it to shake. I yank the support beams, cause the very foundation to undulate. Yes, it’s a risky move. I can permanently destabilize the house or have it come crashing down. But there’s no reason I should care about such things. House or no house, I’ll be fine. Sebastian on the other hand isn’t going to be fine much longer if stays trapped in that world.
The Liver’s screams of terror delight my soul. I used to love screams like that, when I was alive, particularly when I’d sacrifice them and let their blood run down—but I digress. I need to concentrate on the matter at hand, not think about the past. After all, loss of focus equals loss of control.
I can’t afford that.
The fan comes smashing down, narrowly missing one of the Livers. Too bad. I really want a second ghost.
They say good-bye quickly, ending the spell.
Sebastian appears back in the attic in an instant. He’s curled up into a tight ball. Out cold. When Livers sleep, they sprawl out as their muscles relax.
When ghosts lose consciousness against their will, it’s because their energy is too low. They reflexively tighten as much as possible to hold their energy together and close to the core.
I’ve never seen Sebastian, or any ghost, that tight.
I hope he’s okay.
My freedom depends on it.
I STARE UP at the tiny rope, swinging back and forth, the one attached to the trapdoor that hides the attic stairs. I haven’t heard a peep from the ghost in two days. He isn’t even visiting my dreams anymore since the Ouija board incident.
I should be happy, about that. But I’m not. Those sad eyes still haunt me, even if he doesn’t.
I just can’t get rid of the feeling something’s wrong. Is he okay?
I hate the idea of anyone, even a ghost, in trouble. After all, he can’t help being dead, and it’s not like we aren’t all going to join him someday. Hopefully not soon, though.
I need to make sure he is fine.
I arch my back as I reach for the rope. Its tattered edge tickles my fingertips.
I’m too short, or that rope is.
I take a step back, stare at the rope and take off at a short run. As I leap into the air, my fingers close around the rope, so I can give it a sharp tug as I fall. The door groans open, its ancient springs echoing all around me.
The folded wooden stairs hug the door, but now I can reach. I grip the sides and give the rough wood a hard yank.
The stairs heave open with a sharp crack as they snap into place. The musty smell of old attic and unfinished wood fills the room.
I stand under the opening and peer into the inky blackness. Actually, it isn’t so dark, a hazy twilight illuminates the attic.
I half expect the ghost to descend the ladder and demand I stay downstairs. After all, he lives in the attic.
I laugh at the word ‘live.’ The attic might be his home but he doesn’t technically ‘live’ anywhere. I wonder if he knows that. Some ghosts don’t. Maybe I can help him realize he’s dead so he can move on.
Then we’d both be happy.
But there is no sign of him.
I take a deep breath as I grip the sides of the sloped ladder and climb to the attic.
I poke my head through the opening. There are no electric lights on up here, just some sun coming through a skylight and a side window buried behind stuff. A menacing headless, armless figure stands silhouetted by the light from the tiny window. I clamp my hand over my own mouth to muffle the sound of my scream.
As my eyes adjust to the dim light, I see that what I thought was headless body is really just a dress form. I laugh in relief.
I place my palms flat on the floor and hoist myself the rest of the way in the attic. The ceiling isn’t very high, but it’s tall enough to stand up. Boxes, trunks, and old furniture, all of which have seen better days are everywhere.
“Hello?” I shove some boxes out of my way. A small leather-bound journal with gilded pages skids across the floor. I pick it up and absently thumb through it. Nothing but page after page of strange words that might be Latin. In the back of the book is a list of initials and dates.
Y.T. 1890
F.G. 1891
W.R. 1892
There are a lot of letters with the dates of 1892 next them. I skip over most of them.
C.M. 1912
A.C. 1945
Though the front and the back pages have writing on them, several blank pages lay between them. I stuff the book into my knitted jacket pocket. Old books like this make groovy journals.
“Mr. Ghost, are you here?” I call.
Something thin brushes against my face. My heart does a scared dance thinking of all it could be, a straggling vine, a ghost’s fingers, a super thick spider web. Then I realize what it’s, a piece of twine. I give it a sharp tug, flooding the room with the light from a bare bulb. I guess this place has electric lights after all.
“Hello?” I try again to summon him.
A silhouette with no feet in the center of the room catches my attention.
Another dress form?
The stick from its bottom would certainly give the no feet illusion, but I don’t see a stick. The silhouette sharpens and grows more detailed. The young ghost from before, the one dressed like Elliot Ness, solidifies in front of me. Well, I say solidify, but I can still see through him, like most ghosts. They can only get so solid.
He blinks slowly and drags his hand down one side of his face. I’ve woken him up.
Guilt twinges through me. I didn’t even know ghosts required sleep. Despite years of seeing them, I’ve never actually spoken to one before. I don’t know anything about them, really, even though they’ve surrounded me my whole life.
This one doesn’t seem evil.
Maybe we can talk this out. Be respectful. If he gets mad at me, he’ll never listen. “Hello, Mr. Ghost. Your name is Seby, right? Mr. Seby?” I call him Mr. out of respect for his age, though he only looks a few years older than me.
“It’s just Seby.” His voice is sleepy.
Another guilty twinge courses through me. Did I disturb his eternal rest? Maybe that’s why he’s in a bad mood all the time. “That’s a very interesting name.” Sheesh. Could I think of anything stupider to say? Still, there was no taking the words back.
“Short for Sebastian.” He glares at me as if I am the abnormal one. Which, I normally am, but not in this room. He has no feet, just pant-legs that fade into nothingness. So when he moves over toward me, it’s like he’s gliding.
I ignore my pounding heart and stand my ground. I can’t show fear to a ghost. He probably feeds off it.
He wrinkles his nose. “Can you see me? Hear me?”
I nod. “I can. I’ve been seeing ghosts all my life. I can hear them too, but they never talk to me. They talk to themselves mostly. Or to other ghosts. My name is Sunshine. It’s really Gloria. But I go by Sunshine.”
“Sebastian Winthrop. Seby,” he responds. He seems civil enough. Reasonable. Calm. This can work. I can talk him into leaving me alone.
“You have a beautiful house, Seby.” I figure that is something he’d love to hear.
His smile tells me I’m right.
“Thank you. My boss, Mr. Masters, gave me a great deal on it. It was supposed to be a starter house…” He places his palm on the wall, a wistful gaze on his face, as if seeing his past. “But it, didn’t work out that way.”
Starter house. Those are usually for couples, like me and Jace. “You were married?”
“Engaged. Well, almost. I was going to ask her to marry me once I had the house fixed up. I bought the ring and everything. I already knew she was going to say yes. We’d talked about it. But…it wasn’t meant to be.”
He looks so sad, I almost hate asking the next question, but that doesn’t stop me. “So what happened?” The sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach already tells me the answer.
“I died.”
“How?” He seems so young, just a few years older than me. “Was it an accident or did you get sick?”
Seby runs his finger across his throat in a slitting gesture. “I was murdered. My throat was cut from behind. I never even saw who did it. I don’t understand why. I wasn’t a man with enemies.”
My heart aches for him. Murdered so young. In his prime, as my mother would say. No wonder he remains trapped here.
I try to see things from his point of view. “Seby, are we too loud for you? Do we wake you up when you’re trying to rest eternally?”
“What?” The question startles him.
“Why do you want us to leave?” No point in prolonging the question.
“What?” He still seems confused. Perhaps he’s still only half awake.
“You’re haunting my dreams. You’re not letting me sleep. You’re sending me visions. You want me to go, but why?”
“You ruined my house!” The force of his anger shakes the boxes. One topples over but it’s sealed too tightly to spill. “Look at all this garbage you filled it up with. It looks like a two-year-old lives here! I took a lot of pride in my house. And you destroyed it!”
His anger about the furniture reminds me of something they used to tell me at the hospital. When I freaked out over how my room was decorated, they said no one gets this upset over furniture.
They were right. I was actually upset my parents locked me away. And Seby can’t be this upset about the furniture either. I’ve been analyzed enough to know this.
He thinks it’s really about furniture. Too bad ghosts don’t have shrinks. Maybe I can help him with that too. Make him see the truth.
“Seby. You and I both know it’s not my decorating you’re mad at. You don’t care about the furniture. What’s really going on?”
He glides back a step, surprised at the question. His eyes lock on my face while he considers his answer. “I—of course I’m mad about the furniture. Just look at it!”
He waves his arms as if seeing some of my furniture right now. But none of my things are in the attic.
Time to switch tactics. “You look like you’re from the twenties, right?”
Seby shakes his head. “Forties.”
I ignore him and continue. The actual date is a detail that doesn’t matter. “Well, it’s the sixties now. Times change. Tastes change. You know this. You wouldn’t have decorated your house with Victorian furniture, would you?”
“Of course not. I wanted modern.”
“So do we. And this is modern now. And I know it looks weird to you, but I bet your furniture looked weird to Victorians.”
He gives another quick nod.
I go on, trying to keep the keep the excitement from my voice. I am getting through to him. “You said this was supposed to be your starter house. Well, now it’s our starter house. Jace’s and mine. Why don’t you want us to have it? Does seeing us in hurt you somehow? Bring up bad memories? We can work this out. We can coexist here together. But not if you don’t tell me what’s wrong. Why do you hate us?”
Seby bit his lower lip. “Ghosts have heightened senses. Noise, light, it bothers us. That’s why I stay in the attic instead of the Liver level. Everything’s more muffled up here.”
That makes sense. If he gets over-stimulated, no wonder he acts out. I pull the thin rope hanging from the ceiling, to turn the lights off. “Is that better?” I keep my voice low so as not to overwhelm him.
I can see Seby sigh in relief. “Much. Thank you.”
I speak in soft, soothing tones. Keep him calm. “I know we can make this work. We could be quieter, use dimmer bulbs. Set up quiet times.”
“I don’t want you here!” The lighter boxes slam against the wall. Seby thrusts his face forward so it’s only inches from mine. “This is MY house. Not yours!”
I give a quick nod to acknowledge his words. I rack my brain for something to say. All my endless psychoanalysis should come in handy here. The phrase ‘clinical depression’ flits into my mind. They’d said it about me after my parent’s death.
The rage, the mood swings, Seby probably has it too. He acts like those clinically depressed people I met at the hospital.
And who can blame him? Decades of isolation and rumination. Almost twenty-two years of seeing happy couples live their lives while he was denied his. It would depress anyone. Still, there can only be one reason he hasn’t moved on yet.
The idea forms in my mind. Though it sounds crazy, I decide to do it.
Crazy’s what I do after all. Or so I keep getting told.
“Seby, you mentioned you don’t know who killed you or why? Any theories?”
Seby shakes his head. “It was ruled a home invasion. But that’s a lie. The ring was right next to my body, drenched in my blood. It’s the most valuable thing I owned, aside from this house. A thief would have taken it. Anyone who could do that to another human being wouldn’t have been put off by a little blood on a diamond.”
I nod again. “Seby, I’ll make you a deal.”
“A deal?” Interest shows in his eyes.
“If I help you figure out what happened to you, so you can have closure, will you let us have the house?”
Seby thinks about it. The silence is long, but I force myself to stay still and quiet. I should respect that ghosts might not understand time, don’t like noise, and need a chance to think. Meadow would say I’m insane for helping a ghost, but it’s the right thing to do.
For both of us.
Finally, Seby speaks. “If I say yes, there’s one more condition.”
“What’s that?” My mind reels with possibilities. A ghost could ask for anything.
“No more Ouija boards. Those things are pure torture. I’ve never been in so much pain in my life.”
Guilt floods through me. I was right, that board did hurt him somehow. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I swear. Please forgive me? I promise, never again.” I smile at him, hoping that will work.
Seby smiles back, but he still looks sad. “Forgiven. And I’ll let you have the house, not Jace. There’s something about Jace I don’t like.”
UNBELIEVABLE!
I shake with rage. That girl has my spell book. And even worse, she plans to find Sebastian’s killer and the reason behind it.
Once Sebastian knows everything, he’ll move on.
I can’t let that happen.
Twenty-two years I’ve groomed Sebastian. TWENTY-TWO YEARS! Waiting. Biding my time. The seventy-fifth anniversary of my death is almost here.
Seventy-five years is a long time to wait, but not for a ghost. Not for me. I’ve always been patient. It took me a long time to find Sebastian, someone whose rage would keep him trapped on this plane.
It’s easy to kill people, but not so easy to make them a ghost. People who forgive easily, accept their lot in life, or die without regrets don’t turn into ghosts. They just move on. But I knew Sebastian would stay put even before I had him killed.
He was young, ambitious, and had a great life ahead of him. He was also short tempered. Perfect for my needs. I knew once I deprived him of that life, his anger would keep him here. It took me forever to arrange Sebastian’s death.
To make certain he died in this house.
Once he did, he was trapped here.
After he died, I thought it would be easy to get my second ghost. I only needed two. But I didn’t count on him being such a goody two-shoes. I should have expected as much. I mean, I knew nuns raised him, but I didn’t think that would take. It usually doesn’t at his age.
He makes it impossible to kill someone else in this house. I almost had my second one about fifteen years ago. That little girl in the pink dress. Though I’m trapped in this accursed basement, I used my influence to make that child jump out the window. All I had to do was project the image of a doll in her mind and she thought it was real. She almost died, but Sebastian used all his strength to save her at the last minute. She lost her ability to walk, but not her life.
It wasn’t enough.
I needed her neck broken.
I needed her dead.
Lucky me, Sebastian didn’t figure out what was really going on. He thinks I was too involved in scaring her to notice the harm I did. Even after all these years, he still doesn’t suspect what I was up too. He’s such a trusting fool. I can never replace him.
Over the years, I tried to influence others to kill for me but either they don’t pick the right victims or they don’t kill them in the house.
They did me no good at all.
But I’m done playing these games. No way can I allow her to help Sebastian move on. Not after all the work I put in. And she cannot keep my spell book. It’s out of the question.
That girl has to die.
