The Haunting Season

by Michelle Muto

  There she went again. If Jess weren’t inclined to believe her, she’d think Allison really was as crazy as she appeared.

  “That’s fine,” Dr. Brandt replied to Allison. “Perfectly understandable. You won’t have to. You’re welcome to watch, of course. Although I think it’s highly unlikely your experience had anything to do with the Ouija board.”

  Gage frowned. “What is she talking about?” He turned to Allison. “What about the Ouija board, Allison?”

  “Wrong,” Allison said. “That’s exactly how the demon found me.” She lowered her head, glaring at Dr. Brandt as though the two of them shared some intimate knowledge. “You don’t want to use that board in Siler House.”

  Bryan frowned. “Huh?”

  Gage tapped the board. “What she’s saying is that using it in this house is like waving a steak in front of whatever’s here.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  No matter how much Jess argued or pleaded the next few days, Allison wouldn’t budge on her stance regarding the Ouija board. Nothing the others said had made a difference, either.

  During their group sessions—the ones revolving around each of their abilities—Dr. Brandt spent more time with Allison than anyone. Bryan tried to make things disappear that were larger than a set of keys (he’d made a potted plant disappear the day before), while Dr. Brandt encouraged Jess to concentrate on detecting the presence of ghosts. Although Jess had sensed that someone or something was present during the sessions, she was unable to convince a single entity to materialize. Not even Gracie and Emma would make an appearance. Jess thought the girls’ shyness might have something to do with Allison or Dr. Brandt’s presence.

  “I think they’re mad at me,” Jess suggested. It was better than telling the truth, and she didn’t want to upset Allison. “They haven’t been to see me since yesterday morning.”

  Dr. Brandt finished his examination of a vase from the fireplace mantel. The guy couldn’t quit touching everything in the house lately. It was as though he was more obsessed than she was with ghosts. “What happened yesterday morning?” he finally asked.

  “I tried to get them to tell me why they won’t show themselves to all of us.”

  “Apologize,” Dr. Brandt instructed as he returned to his seat. “Gain their confidence.” He scribbled down a few more notes. Jess exchanged glances with Gage, who she knew distrusted his note taking as much as she did.

  “I’d like you to work on that before our next session, Jess. It’s very important. I’d like you to visit each room today. Call to Gracie and Emma. Get them to come to you.”

  “Alright,” Jess replied, resigned. Gage gave her a slight shrug as Dr. Brandt jotted something else down. It wasn’t lost on Jess that the looks between them lasted longer than they probably should and she wondered if Bryan had said something to Gage.

  “Allison, let’s start with you next,” Dr. Brandt said, turning Jess’s thoughts to the discussion at hand.

  “Let’s talk about the demons. Let’s talk about when the demons were inside you, Allison. There were times when they weren’t controlling you. Where did they go?”

  No answer.

  “Okay, let’s try another question,” Dr. Brandt said, undaunted. “Was there ever a time when you thought the demons listened to you? Did as you asked?”

  Still no answer. Allison was having none of it. She simply sat and stared at him. Yesterday, she’d at least been argumentative.

  Dr. Brandt jotted down more notes and once again, Jess found herself looking toward Gage. This time, he raised an eyebrow with that smile. I know, right? At least that’s what she imagined him saying. Jess did her best to wipe the smile from her face and pay attention to the group discussion.

  Dr. Brandt tapped his pen on his notepad. “Okay, Bryan, your turn. Have you been practicing with the objects I’ve given you?”

  “Too much,” Bryan replied. “It’s giving me a headache.”

  “I’ll get you some aspirin. Were you able to make any of the larger objects disappear?”

  “Not really.”

  Jess frowned. Didn’t work? He was lying! “You pushed a book off the coffee table last night,” she offered. She started to mention the potted plant but something in both Gage and Bryan’s expressions kept her quiet. Why were they lying?

  Dr. Brandt went back to writing more notes. “Take the aspirin, Bryan. Keep hydrated, too. And keep practicing. I know you can do it.” He turned his focus to Gage. “I’ve got something I’d like for you to try, Gage.”

  He retrieved a shoebox from the floor beside his chair and placed the box on the coffee table. He opened the lid, revealing a dead mockingbird. Jess and Allison grimaced.

  Gage merely shrugged. “No, thanks, trying to cut back.”

  Bryan laughed.

  “Funny,” Dr. Brandt said, and he smiled briefly as he placed an old, worn book on the table. A glossy bookmarker stuck out of its middle. “All of this is important to the study, Gage.”

  “You want me to bring back a bird?” Gage said. “Why is that so important?”

  “With a little help,” Dr. Brandt said, ignoring the question. He pushed the book toward him.

  Gage looked at Dr. Brandt, his eyes narrowing for a moment. He flipped the book open to the bookmarked page. “Is this Latin?”

  “Yes. It’s a spell to raise the dead,” Dr. Brandt replied. “Since your concentration doesn’t work every time, I though this might help.”

  After a few moments of contemplation, Gage cleared his throat and did his best at reading the incantation. Dr. Brandt reached down into the box beside the chair and pulled out the Ouija board and planchette.

  “No,” Allison said. “I’m done with this. I am so not going there.” She got up and walked out of the room. Everyone stared after her.

  “Go talk to her,” Dr. Brandt told Jess. “We need her participation. You’re all stronger as a group.”

  Jess glanced at the guys. Bryan shrugged as if to say he had no idea what was up with Allison this time. She got to her feet and headed toward the stairway.

  “I don’t get it, Allison,” Jess said, collapsing on her bed. “We’d all be there. If something bad happened, you wouldn’t be alone. We’d fix it.”

  “How?” Allison shot back. “It’s not just about the dead bird or Bryan’s cute magic tricks. I’m so tired, Jess. No one listens. It’s better if I don’t say anything else.” She reached to her nightstand and grabbed a book sitting there. The dust jacket was gone, but the hardcover was in fair shape. It was like some of Gram’s old books, the cover made out of some sort of pale blue fabric. Allison flipped the book open and pretended to read.

  “You’re not really reading that,” Jess said. “And I am listening. Talk to me, Allison! You were right about Riley being in the mirror. And, I think you’re right about him being evil. At least, I agree he doesn’t have the best intentions.”

  Yeah. Riley was a murderer and a psycho.

  Allison eyed her for a moment and Jess waited patiently. Finally, Allison closed the book. “This whole thing…it’s not just about finding your dad. You know that, right? There are other spirits here. The Ouija board, that book Gage was reading from? We’re just asking for something to happen. We can’t control it. You think you can, or at least Dr. Brandt thinks so. But you can’t. Not really. You can tell whatever it is to go away, and maybe it will. But not if it doesn’t want to.”

  “They got rid of the demons in you,” Jess said.

  “But the demons can come back! Remember when Gage said I had them on speed dial? He’s not too far off.”

  “But they haven’t returned, have they?” Jess countered. “How much of that might be because you keep thinking about it? And, if you keep thinking about them, then sure. They might be able to find you. What if you try not thinking about them so much? Would that work?”

  Allison sighed, looking either defeated or beyond frustrated. Jess wasn’t sure which. She was only trying to help, but it was as though Allison
didn’t want alternative viewpoints. Did she want to stay freaked out?

  Allison narrowed her eyes. “You wouldn’t be so eager to do this if you’d been through what I have. Like I said, this isn’t just about your dad, Jess. Or your grandmother.”

  “But we could focus only on them,” Jess offered. “Or Gage’s brother. They’d never hurt any of us. They’re not evil.”

  “See? You’re not listening!” Allison let out an exaggerated sigh. “Even if we somehow channeled your dad, the others are already right there, waiting. They’re likely to come through the portal before anyone else. And Bryan might not be able to send them all back. Not in time, anyway. All. Ghosts. Are. Evil! If your dad’s a ghost, then I wouldn’t trust him, either.”

  Jess took a steadying breath. Calling random ghosts evil was one thing. Saying that her father was evil was something else entirely. “Have you ever lost someone?”

  “What?”

  “Has anyone in your family died? Anyone that you loved?” Jess asked.

  Allison shook her head. “No, and I’m really sorry—”

  “Then you don’t know what it’s like!” Jess spat. “You have no idea how painful it is to be so close to getting a chance to find out if you can talk to them again—even one last time.” She got up from her bed and grabbed some of her things. This argument was going nowhere and Jess couldn’t imagine spending another night in the same room with Allison. “We need a break.”

  “Where are you going?” Allison asked.

  “Down the hall,” Jess replied curtly.

  She didn’t take much, just her hairbrush, toothbrush, her pajamas and a change of clothes. She left the room and walked down the hall as quietly as possible, careful to avoid the creaky floorboards in the center. She stopped in front of the room she’d showered in the other day, fumbling with her things and freeing up a hand to turn the doorknob.

  It turned easily. Jess pushed the door open, stepped inside and flicked on the light switch. A quick search told her the room was empty. She quickly closed the door behind her. Mrs. Hirsch would be angry if she came along and found the door opened and Jess sleeping in a different room.

  She retrieved a towel from the bathroom and put it along the base of the door to keep the light from spilling into the hallway. Then, after changing and brushing her teeth, Jess turned on the lamp beside the bed, removed the towel from the base of the door, flicked off the overhead light switch and climbed into bed. She reached over and turned off the bedside light and shut her eyes. Maybe for once since being here she’d get a decent night’s sleep. After a few minutes, she felt herself falling into peaceful slumber.

  The creak of a floorboard woke her sometime later. She listened, thinking she’d imagined the sound. Had it come from the foot of the bed? She reached to the nightstand and fumbled with the light. Part of her was afraid it was Mrs. Hirsch, or Allison. The other part of her was disappointed it wasn’t Gage. But her first squinty-eyed sweep of the room revealed no one, and Jess figured she imagined it.

  She shook her head and wiped her tired eyes. “Get a grip,” she said softly.

  She sighed and looked up to find Gracie and Emma standing in the middle of the room, staring at her. Jess nearly shrieked.

  “Hi Jess,” Gracie said. Emma remained quiet. The only way Jess could tell the two girls apart was that Gracie was a little thinner and she had curlier hair than her sister.

  “Sorry,” Emma said. “We didn’t mean to scare you.”

  Jess checked the clock on the nightstand. It was two-thirty in the morning.

  “You can leave the light on,” Gracie said. “Mrs. Hirsch is sleeping. We checked.”

  “How did you find me?” Jess asked, realizing how stupid that must sound. “Ghosts. Never mind.”

  “We were waiting for you,” Gracie said.

  Jess frowned. How long had the girls been watching her sleep? Is that what they meant, or was she supposed to have met them someplace? “Waiting for me?” Jess wiped at her eyes again.

  “We don’t sleep,” Emma said, leaving Jess to wonder if that was an explanation or a statement. The girls weren’t always the most animated when they talked. But then, she figured with Riley still around, they didn’t have a whole lot to be happy about.

  Gracie fidgeted a bit. “We want to help you.”

  Jess pulled the covers back and sat with her legs under her. “You do? Help me with what?”

  “The Ouija board,” Gracie said.

  “How did you know about that?” Jess asked. “Were you spying on us?”

  “Don’t be silly,” Gracie replied. “Of course we did.”

  Well, that’s unnerving, Jess thought, and wondered how many ghosts had been present, but never showed themselves over the years. “Then why didn’t you show yourselves? Everyone else is here to see ghosts, too.”

  “The other girl has seen us,” Gracie said. “And we don’t think she likes us very much. She doesn’t like any of us.”

  “We like you the best,” Emma said and her sister nodded. “We know you want to help, us, too. That you aren’t here to hurt us.”

  “I thought you two might be mad at me,” Jess said.

  “We’ve been here the whole time,” Gracie said. “Riley’s kept us busy.”

  They were unusual girls. Sort of quirky. Jess supposed that being dead for over a hundred or so years did that to them. And of course, Riley. If he was holding them here, that explained a lot. She wished she could send them into the light or heaven or wherever ghosts went when they were at peace.

  “Yeah. About that. How am I supposed to help you? Do you know of a way?” Jess asked them.

  The girls nodded in unison.

  “Use the board to cross Riley over,” Emma said.

  Jess didn’t like that suggestion much. “But, I don’t have the board and I don’t like the idea of bringing Riley out into the open. Even if we did, then what?”

  “We’ll help you,” Gracie said. “We’ll help all of you.”

  She didn’t like the way the girls spoke so sparsely. Sometimes they didn’t make much sense. But then, Grams and a few of the other ghosts had been the same way. Maybe it was hard for them to be seen and heard at the same time. The idea seemed logical, since sometimes, Grams had been transparent, other times solid, and occasionally, like the girls, she flickered or rippled when speaking. But, if the girls thought Allison would take part in using the board, they were wrong.

  “So you think we can do it? Cross Riley over?” Jess finally asked. The idea of making Riley a ghost that could appear front and center instead of lurk in mirrors or walls was terrifying, and she’d need to ask Dr. Brandt about banishing ghosts.

  Again, the girls nodded.

  “From the shadows into the light,” Gracie said.

  The comment about sending Riley into the light or wherever ghosts went should’ve made Jess feel better, but it didn’t. Not entirely. “Do you want to tell me what happened?”

  The girls shook their heads.

  “Why not?” Jess asked.

  “It’s all here,” Emma said, as though that explained everything.

  “Here? You mean Siler House? What’s all here? Are there clues?”

  Gracie lowered her head, but her eyes still met Jess’s. “We can show you.”

  Emma looked over her shoulder. “We have to go.”

  “Where? Where are you going?” Jess wanted to know.

  “To help you,” Gracie replied. The sisters turned, took each other’s hand, and disappeared through the door.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Gage found Jess sitting against the huge oak tree closest to the graves. Its trunk had to be about six feet across by Gage’s estimate. Judging from the distance from the gravesite, the tree had probably been planted around the time of Gracie and Emma’s funeral.

  Allison, it seemed, was nowhere to be found. It hadn’t surprised Gage. The girls, who had seemed to enjoy each other’s company the first day or two here, had grown more distant. Espec
ially since the Ouija board incident. Girls. Go figure. One day, they’re bonding and BFFs and the next day? Well, they were like this—all moody and non-social.

  Of course, that was mostly a front. What they usually wanted was company. With any luck, his company. He liked Jess. A lot. Smart, kind and sexy as hell. The way she looked at him sometimes nearly took his breath away. Unless he was dead wrong, she’d noticed him, too.

  Siler House might be haunted, even though he’d yet to see a ghost, but now seemed like a good opportunity to spend some alone time with the girl who’d been haunting his dreams since they’d been here.

  Besides, Gage knew what was really bugging Jess. At least he thought he did. It wasn’t Allison herself, and it wasn’t because Allison didn’t see eye to eye with Jess on the whole house and ghost business. They each had their points. Allison saw demons. Jess wanted angels.

  “Hey,” he said as he sat down next to her. “Is this side of the tree taken?”

  “No,” Jess said with a halfhearted smile.

  “This experiment isn’t turning out quite like you expected, is it?” he asked, sitting close enough that his shoulder almost brushed against hers. It was a good lead-in.

  “I’m not sure what I expected,” Jess replied without taking her eyes from the graves.

  “Sure you do. You’re looking to find someone. And, unless I’m wrong, it’s not the ghosts of those two little girls. Well, not really.” His eyes met hers. “It’s not exactly your grandmother, is it? You mentioned that your dad died.”

  She looked at him then, as though determining how serious he was. Gage didn’t look away. “Feel like talking?”

  She shrugged and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

  “I know what it’s like to lose someone you love, Jess. I get it. I loved my little brother.”

  “How did it feel?” Jess asked. “How did it feel when you couldn’t bring him back?”