by Abigail Boyd
"What's the hold up?" he asked at the same time Theo said, "Oh my gosh, what happened?"
She took my arm and fussed over it as Henry had. It looked much better to my eyes, scabs already starting to form.
"We're staying," I said, answering the question before she asked it. "We've gone to too much trouble. And I'm fine, nothing some antibiotic ointment and bandages won't fix."
"She's being as stubborn as possible," Henry told them. Then he turned to me. "What are we doing now?"
"We need to find somewhere to hold the séance," I said. "Preferably a table or a good flat expanse of floor. We should split up."
"Uh, no, we shouldn't. That's always when the bad stuff happens on Scooby Doo," Alex said, waving his hands dismissively.
I rolled my eyes. "Theo and I can go together..."
"You're going to think this is sexist of me," Henry interjected, "But I think maybe it should be one girl and one guy together. Between your injuries and Theo's phobias" — she wrinkled her nose at him — "it might be a good idea."
"Yeah, you need a strong man to protect you," Alex smarmed at Theo.
"Are you freaking kidding me?" Theo asked, one notch below yelling. "The one who was just whining about an old cartoon?"
"God, I'm joking," he said, rolling his eyes. "Lighten up, Morticia."
"Wow, that's a new one," Theo spat, her eyes glowing with anger in the light from the flashlight. "Did you use all two of your brain cells to come up with it?"
But we split up that way anyway. Maybe it would be a good idea, I reasoned without a whole lot of reasons to support it. I was on edge and in no mood to argue. I drove Henry crazy? He drove me crazy every moment I was around him.
Henry gave Theo one of the flashlights and Alex had an LED light on his phone. After they had departed, Henry and I stood awkwardly across from each other, listening to the fading sound of their bickering.
"Let's keep moving," I said, and we set off.
"I thought I saw a table back in that room full of cages," Henry offered.
So we headed in that direction. We wound up there after what seemed like ten minutes of getting lost. The house was like a maze, with dead ends caused by decay. I took out a little pink emergency flashlight I had in my backpack, and shone it around the cages. On closer inspection in enhanced light, they looked like they had all been purchased at the pet store. A few still had price tags wound around the bars. But no table.
Back in the room with the rocking chair and the skeleton closet, Henry wandered over to the closet door, smirking in anticipation as he nudged it open. But as I peered over his shoulder we both saw it was empty.
"What the hell?" I asked, a chill going through me.
He tilted his head, inspecting the back wall of the closet. Then he leaned in and tapped the ceiling with his fingers. Pushing his hand through the flaps he had discovered, he stepped back as the obviously plastic skeletons dropped down.
"All parlor tricks," he said softly, reaching out and rubbing my shoulder. My heart leapt up into my throat. We gazed into each other's eyes for a moment, and then parted, making ourselves busy in different parts of the room.
Having not had any luck we made our way into a different skinny hallway. It was pitch black beyond where even the strong beam of his flashlight couldn't penetrate.
"I'm not going any farther that way," he said. "I don't like the looks of those ceiling beams." There were a few hanging precariously low, as if they could drop any moment.
"Well, then, I'll go," I said, shuffling around him.
He caught my arm to stop me from going further. "It could be dangerous," he pleaded. "You never know if the ceiling might collapse, and I bet there are weak spots in the floor."
I stood in front of him, acutely aware that our lips were merely inches apart. I wondered if I was the only one. But as his eyes became heavy lidded, and his breathing sped up, I realized my answer.
"Theo was right, I can take care of myself," I said gently, not taking my eyes off of his mouth.
"I don't want anything to happen to you," he whispered, moving closer to me. "That's all I meant. I care about you."
I could almost feel his lips on mine.
"Heads up!" Alex yelled from the left. Henry dropped my arm and we pulled away from each other, as if caught in an embarrassing scene. Alex didn't seem to notice how flustered we were.
Theo was on his heels. "We found the dining room. Should be a good spot."
We followed them back down the hallway, and up a short set of stairs. The remains of an old kitchen sat at the top. I paused and looked inside. Gutted spaces where the old appliances had been ripped out left bouquets of blackened electrical wiring. The black and white tile on the floor was cracked and peeling, sticking up in some sports.
"This way," Theo gestured, and Henry and I followed them through a door into the dining room. A narrow room that had probably once been grand, there were high-backed chairs around an elongated mahogany table. Two dust-layered, silver candelabras sat in the center of the tabletop. I brushed dust off of the back of the chair standing at the end.
I battled dizziness, my head pounding, but I figured I was so close now...I hadn't come this far just to quit. I would drive myself nuts with maybes.
Besides, I didn't hit my head that hard. My stubbornness continued to win out.
Alex was making jokes, as usual. He carried a plastic skull he had picked up somewhere and used the mouth as a puppet, adopting a Cryptkeeper voice.
"Welcome kiddies," he said. "Would you like to dance to death?"
"He is such an idiot," Theo whispered to me.
An oversized, muted portrait of a man hung above the huge fireplace. I had never seen a fireplace so wide. A pile of ashes remained at the bottom from some long-ago fire. It smelled awful and I wrinkled my nose, turning away.
Each one of us took a seat at the table, with me at the head. The bleeding from my forehead had stopped, and I stuffed the red tissues in the side pocket of my purse. I set the purse on the table, unzipping the main section, and started to take out the supplies I had borrowed from Corinne. Four white candles, to represent us; one red candle, to represent whatever we were contacting; a small mirror, to act as a portal; and different pieces of metal. Finally, I pulled out the séance book, which had a photo I had printed out of the orphans tucked inside between the pages.
Henry picked up the picture and looked at it, reading the caption.
"'Orphans at Dexter House, 1926, with John Dexter the third.'" He nodded towards the ugly portrait above the fireplace. "I'm guessing that's the same guy."
I looked over the picture, too. Dexter was standing behind the row of children, his face shadowed by his wide-brimmed hat. All of the kids had their hair cut short, and were wearing what looked like tattered nightgowns. For a moment that look seemed familiar, although I couldn't tell why.
Henry rubbed the picture with his thumbs. "Did you laminate this?"
I nodded. Everyone at the table laughed.
"I was worried it might get something on it, ectoplasm, or s-something," I stuttered, defensive.
"Spirit fluids?" Alex asked, causing everyone else to crack up again.
I looked up at the painting again. The man gave me the shivers. It reminded me of an evil painting in an old movie I had seen, that cursed anyone who looked at it. Or the idea that a soul could be trapped inside a photograph. The oil-painted black eyes never left mine.
Theo helped me set up the table to match the picture in the book, putting the candles in a diamond shape with the red one in the center.
"Where's the Ouija board?" Alex asked.
"I didn't bring one," I said.
"What kind of fake séance is this?" he demanded. I gritted my teeth.
It had started to storm outside, bursts of thunder rattling the walls. Funny, it seemed like a clear night before we came in. But I hadn't been worried about the weather then. And in Michigan, a storm could start on one side of the sky while the other half w
as sunny and clear.
"It was a dark and stormy night," Henry recited.
"Be serious," I said. I sat down again, and stumbled a bit on the way down.
"Are you okay?" both Henry and Theo said at the same time. They looked at each other, exchanging silent communication. It reminded me of my parents, and irritated me even more than Alex had.
"I am fine," I repeated yet again. "Let's just do this. Oh...before I forget."
I rummaged through the side pocket of my purse, and pulled out Grandma's necklace. I brought it in a plastic sandwich baggie for safekeeping.
"Fancy," Theo said. "Wouldn't want the ghosts to see you without your fine jewels."
"Are you going to pick on me, too?" I asked wearily.
"Sorry."
I put the necklace around my neck and attached the clasp. The green stone was already promisingly warm.
Alex lit the candles with his lighter. We joined hands around the table, Theo and Henry holding mine, and Alex holding Theo's.
"Gross," Theo moaned, her eyes closed.
"What?" I asked.
"His hand is wet," she said, pulling hers out of Alex's and wiping it on her skirt.
"I have a sweating problem, okay?" he said. "And I'm not holding hands with Henry."
"You don't have to. As long as we form a chain," I said, looking at the book. Theo gingerly took Alex's hand back. I took a deep breath, and began chanting the text.
"We gather here to call the spirits that have been left behind," I recited. "He who cannot face death, and so has turned away. We call thee to our gathering."
Henry started to chuckle. "'Thee'?"
"Keep it on thee low," Alex said in an old man accent. Both he and Henry laughed.
"You're really not funny," I said to Alex. Then I glared at Henry.
"I'm sorry, but I warned you," he said, still smiling. His eyebrows raised apologetically as he laced his fingers through mine again.
I tried to focus back on the book, but I was more aware of how he was running his thumb over the back of my hand. He didn't seem to notice he was doing it. All was forgiven.
The amulet was growing almost uncomfortably hot. I had to resist the urge to take it off, reasoning I only had to keep it on for a short time. I expected the stone to emit a glow or something, but it looked the same. The candles gave me tunnel vision and I blinked, mentally envisioning the Tylenol at home on the kitchen counter.
"We gather here to extinguish the flame that keeps you from finding the dark," I recited, fully aware that Henry was still chuckling under his breath. "Appear to us, so that we may send you on your way. Appear! Appear!"
A lightning bolt shot through the center of the table. The accompanying boom deafened me, and I went blind.
We are starving. He won't feed us. We are locked in the room all day long. I haven't seen the sun in weeks. I don't remember what it feels like.
A little girl, cuts visible on her arms.
This is what happens when you disobey me.
A little boy emaciated from hunger. In a box beneath the ground.
This is what happens when you try to destroy me.
I am on fire. My skin burns, the pain like nothing I've ever known before.
Jenna stands with her face in the corner of the room. Weeping.
Chapter 15
I woke up looking at a sky full of stars. I hadn't rested that well in months. For a moment in my disorientation I thought that I was in my backyard, like when Hugh used to put out a tent and we'd pretend to camp behind our house. Then I heard someone sobbing.
I looked around. We were on the lawn of the orphanage. The source of the crying was Theo, sitting back on her haunches. Tears streamed down her face.
Alex was pacing the hard ground. "We're going to get caught. This is trespassing. And I knew it, and I came along anyway, because hey, I have no life. I don't even like you guys and I'm not going down for you."
"Shut up, Alex," Henry growled, glaring at him.
"Let's just chuck her in the jeep and go," Alex said. "We can take her to a hospital —"
"And explain what exactly?" Henry was sitting stone still beside me. None of them were aware I had woken up. I didn't see what the big deal was. "We were trespassing, holding some idiotic séance like a bunch of ten year olds, and then she started having a fit?"
"I didn't throw a fit," I mumbled, sitting up. The ground was wet from rain underneath me, and the back of my clothes were damp.
"Oh, god," Theo sobbed, taking her hands from her face. "You're okay."
"Don't celebrate yet, she had a seizure," Henry said. His tone seemed rather harsh, not what I expected from him.
"What are you talking about?" I asked. "I didn't have a seizure."
"That's what it looked like," he said. "One minute you were chanting from that goddamn book and the next minute you fell on the floor, twitching." His cheeks were flushed, and his eyes were on fire.
"I'm sure it was nothing," I said brightly. I hadn't felt so fantastic in years. Energy flowed through my blood, and the trees on the lawn looked beautiful in the light from the stars. I wondered if Alex slipped me drugs. "I feel awesome," I assured them.
Three faces showed nothing but doubt.
"I don't really remember anything after...I was chanting and then I thought I saw lightning..."
Whatever it was, it didn't seem important. My hand flew to my neck, seeking my pendant.
"What happened to my necklace?" I asked.
"You yanked it off and threw it in the corner when you were...before..." Theo said, wiping the tears from her cheeks. "I got all of the other supplies together, though. I figured you would want them." She held up my stuffed purse.
"Thanks," I said gratefully. The space between my collarbones felt burnt, and I rubbed the skin gently.
"Are you sure you're all right?" Henry asked quietly, his eyes staring intensely into mine. I remembered my earlier urge to kiss him, and licked my lips without thinking. I wanted to eat him alive.
"Let's go," I said, and the words had a double meaning.
"Do you want to go back and get your necklace?" he asked.
I shook my head vehemently, surprising myself.
"No, let's get out of here." The euphoric cloud in my head began to dissipate.
As if on cue, police sirens started up in the distance. Whether they were coming for us or not didn't matter. We ran off of the lawn, the front gate slamming behind us. Hopping in Alex's jeep as he gunned the engine, we drove speedily away.
I watched the orphanage through the rear window as it became a small dot in the distance and disappeared. The earlier elation I felt when I woke up was gone, leaving me with a deep feeling of uneasiness. I never wanted to go back there. There was something in the house all right, but it was no friend of mine.
Claire and Hugh arrived home safely on Sunday.
"How was the wedding?" I asked them, helping them inside with their luggage.
"Just fine," Claire said. Her skin looked more tan than usual, even though they had only headed East. "The bride looked beautiful."
"Typical wedding, a yawner," Hugh offered. "The most noteworthy part was the best man putting one too many away before he gave the toast. I'm going to check my email and see if Steve made a video." My father, ever the romantic.
Corinne already had her minivan packed. She left, none the wiser. I had carefully returned her supplies back to her trunk the instant I got a chance. Thanks to Theo, nothing was harmed. For the first time in my life, I was convinced Corinne had no psychic ability.
Claire noticed the bump on my head as soon as we got back in the house, despite my attempts to hide it with my hair.
"How did you get that?" she asked with concern.
"Bumped my head on one of the cupboard doors," I lied. It was a good lie, because I was always leaving the cupboards open when I unloaded the dishwasher.
"You have got to stop doing that," she said, pushing my hair back. "You really got yourself. Ouch." I had
tried putting a bandage over it, but the cut was in a terrible spot due to my hair. It looked like the skin split open. I hoped it wouldn't scar too much.
I wore long sleeves, since it was harder to explain the scuffs on my arm. And the burnt mark I had found on my neck on examining it in the mirror.
Even though I hadn't been in contact with anything in the house, and no answers came to me for my trouble, calm settled over me. There was no way Jenna was there. Nothing could make me voluntarily go back to that creepy house, anyway. And whatever had been tormenting me before, now left me alone. At least for now.
Henry's father dropped him off at my house for our now-weekly tutoring session. Henry had gone to a doctor's appointment that day, and since he had been busy last week, too, we had catching up to do.
I'd never actually been introduced to Phillip Rhodes or talked to him. He remained the shadowy figure behind the wheel of his Lexus. Occasionally I would feel him looking at me through the tinted windows.
Though I was loathe to admit it, I treasured having Henry all to myself. Whenever I was around him, I felt a thousand things at once. My dull brain awoke from the slumber that captured it for months. It was often agony being in the same room with him without being able to touch him. But I didn't want to be away from him, either.
I answered the door and Henry stood there in a long sleeved shirt with his books held at his hip. He leaned with the palm of his hand against the siding.
"Hello, doll," he said, lifting his eyebrows at me like he often did. "You're mine now."
I felt giddy. He affected my brain like depression medication.
"Are you ready to learn?" he asked as I let him in.
"Ready as always," I said, and we went to the den, which had become our tutoring room.
"How are you doing?" he asked more cautiously after I had shut the door and we sat down. His cautious brown eyes went to the mark on my head.
"Why does everyone keep asking me that?" I asked, rubbing my temples. "I'm sick to death of saying I'm fine. My head is healing up, so is my arm, and I didn't have a seizure."
"I've never seen anyone have a seizure before," he admitted. "But that's what it looked like to me." He inspected my arm for himself. "Your cuts look better, though. You're lucky you didn't get tetanus."