by Megan Atwood
“What things?” she demanded.
“Well, just things being moved around,” Michael said. “Like, mischievous, but not mean, you know? It always felt like something nice. He always seemed nice. His name is John.” His face turned red. “I probably sound crazy, but I’m not. I grew up in that bar—John’s always been there. But he always felt like...a mascot or something. Never mean. Even protective, if that makes any sense.”
Jackson looked at Jinx. He knew without saying anything that they were thinking the same thing. This many people believed in one ghost? Maybe it was mass hysteria. Even Jackson was skeptical about the existence of ghosts sometimes. He’d never encountered an entire group of people who just accepted a ghost in their presence. Even a nice one. Still, the fact that so many people had seen things happen meant there was a good chance that something supernatural actually was happening.
Jackson stood up. “Well, we won’t take up more of your time.” Jinx grabbed her huge drink and stood by Jackson. “Thanks for talking to us.”
Michael stood up, too, and shook both their hands. “Yeah, man, no problem. I hope you fix whatever’s going on. People are starting to abandon the bar, and that’s really bad for my aunt and uncle. And for Todd.”
Jackson nodded. “We hope so, too.”
“Y
ou want me to what?” Todd ran his hand through his hair. Jackson shifted on his feet.
“I know it sounds crazy, but nothing happened the night we stayed there. Nothing. Not even a temperature shift. And after talking to others who have had weird experiences . . . it seems that whatever is happening is happening because of you and your brother.”
The picnic table shifted as Jinx plunked down cross-legged on the bench. She had on her “deal with it” look, but her hands fiddled with her hair more often than Jackson had ever seen.
After their talk with Michael, the two had decided to spend another night in the pub. This time, though, they’d have Todd and Devon stay the night, too. And since it seemed that the brothers couldn’t be in the same room and not fight, Jinx and Jackson thought there was a good possibility they might actually get some ghostly action. Plus, Jackson noticed, the idea of Todd spending the night in the same room with her didn’t seem to bother Jinx one bit. The pang he had felt before hit him again, but he pushed it down again. It was time for work.
Todd was shaking his head, his knee bouncing up and down. “I don’t know if I can get my brother to come. He’s not the most reliable right now.”
Jackson cleared his throat and made the decision to tell Todd what they knew. “Look, man, we know why he’s been so...hard to deal with lately.”
Todd looked down at the table. “I’m not surprised. Portland can be a small town sometimes, when you know people.”
“Or when you’re featured in the paper,” Jinx chimed in. In an uncharacteristically soft voice, she added, “It must be hard for you.”
Since when had she been sensitive? Jackson wondered. The Jinx he knew wasn’t exactly good at empathy. He stared at her until she looked at him and mouthed, “what?” Jackson looked back to Todd. The quarterback’s eyes were shiny, bright, and wounded.
“You have no idea,” Todd said. “Dev and I used to be so close. I don’t even know who he is any more. He won’t listen to me. He keeps stealing money...I don’t know what to do.” Jackson had never seen a more miserable expression in his life. He patted Todd on the back.
“Well, first, we’ll talk to this ghost.”
“Poltergeist,” Jinx chirped.
Jackson looked pointedly at Jinx. The last thing Todd needed was someone telling him he was doing all these bad things and driving his parents’ business away. Even if it was true. And anyway, Jackson just wasn’t sold on the poltergeist thing.
“So here’s the deal,” Jackson said. “We’ll plan for this Thursday night. You try to talk your brother into coming. Just text us around bar close, let us know if he won’t come, and we’ll try for another time.”
Todd nodded. “I’ll do my best, but I’m not promising anything. Thursdays are typically when he scores.” Todd let out a sharp, bitter laugh. “That used to mean something about football, but now....” He got up and threw his backpack over his shoulder. “Thursday, then. Maybe this will actually be resolved in time for the big game.” He walked away, shoulders slumped.
“Big game?” Jinx asked.
Jackson said, “A college recruiter’s coming by for Friday’s game. That’s why I thought we could do Thursday. Maybe have a chance to put an end to things for Todd before he loses his shot at college ball.”
Jinx sighed. “That makes sense, though Thursday is next to impossible for me. Guess it’s another lie for my parents, then.” She opened a bag of Twizzlers and snapped off a piece with her teeth. “I wonder what I should wear?”
Jackson stared at her, disbelieving. “Are you on drugs?”
“I just mean—” Jinx stammered, “what I should wear in case I get stuck in a cooler. Duh.” She dropped her Twizzler and, in the process of getting another one, knocked her own bag off the table.
Jackson shook his head. “Who needs a ghost when we have our very own Jinx to throw things around?”
She smacked him in the head with a new Twizzler.
W
ith the equipment set up and the lights dimmed in the bar, all Jinx and Jackson could do was wait. Todd paced through the bar, back and forth, back and forth, waiting for his brother to come in. It was already two-thirty, and Devon hadn’t showed. Jinx had given up hope, but Todd wouldn’t let them leave. He kept muttering mysteriously, “He’ll come. I made it impossible for him not to.”
Jinx didn’t mind that much, anyway. What else was she going to do? She used the time to tinker on her computer. She was in the middle of making T-shirts with the Paranormalists logo and motto on them. After that, she’d have to add a merch page and some buy buttons to the website. She could hardly wait. Jackson thought she was being premature, but she thought being prepared was better than not having shirts handy. Plus, she’d gotten more than a hundred hits on her last post! And if anything actually happened on this case, she thought that Todd’s brown eyes—and his story, of course—would help boost their popularity. Maybe she’d post footage from the camera on YouTube, too, and see if she could get followers that way...
Just as she was about to drag the logo onto the T-shirts on the CafePress site, her computer flickered.
She looked over to Todd and Jackson. Both boys stared at their phones, which were flickering on and off.
Just then the door slammed open, making Jinx jump so high she almost crashed her laptop on the floor. She put her hand over her heart and tried to slow her breathing.
It was Devon. Looking a little worse for wear.
The lights in the bar blinked. Jinx looked at Jackson and tried to telepathically tell him she told him so. This definitely has to be a poltergeist, she thought. Devon’s crazy energy had to be causing the disturbances.
Just as she had the thought, Jackson pointed to her EMF device sitting near her foot. “Jinx...” he said. Jinx looked down. The EMF meter was glowing bright red, the needle almost snapping off, it was so far over. Jinx sat straight up and felt the hair on her head stand on end.
The temperature dropped, and she saw Jackson shiver.
But Todd and Devon seemed completely unaware of the change in the atmosphere. Devon looked at Todd with narrowed, bloodshot eyes and said, “Where is he? Where’s this guy who had stuff for me?”
Todd’s face was still, and he didn’t say a word.
Devon shook his head, and an expression of disgust took over his face. “You lied to me, didn’t you?” He looked around the room. “And for what? What weird game do you and your little friends think you’re playing?”
Todd stepped forward. “That’s hysterical, you being mad at me for lying. That’s all you’ve done for the past few weeks!”
The temperature dropped even further. Without thinking, Jinx and Jacks
on moved closer together. “Your cameras are going, yeah?” he whispered. She nodded, knowing she must have looked pale. The EMF meter vibrated so hard that Jinx had a hard time keeping hold of it. Jackson picked up the EVP recorder. Jinx could see the interior whirring like crazy. She knew when she looked at it back home it would be completely full of otherworldly voices.
“OK, I definitely don’t think this is a poltergeist,” Jinx whispered to Jackson. “None of this would register on the meters, especially the temperature drop.”
Todd and Devon continued to argue, and Jackson looked at them thoughtfully. “Yeah, but this definitely has something to do with what’s going on between them.”
A row of glasses on the bar started to shake.
“Uh, Todd?” Jackson said.
But Todd and Devon were too busy going at it to hear. “You’re wasting your life! And you’re taking me down with you, you know!” Todd was yelling. “You’ve lied, you’ve taken my money...But worse, you’re killing yourself and you don’t care at all!”
The bar started shaking harder, making everything clang together. “Hey guys!” Jackson said again. But Devon was yelling back.
“I don’t need you judging me, too. You have no idea what I’ve been going through! You’re supposed to be my brother and have my back. Instead, you’re just like everyone else!”
“Well maybe everyone else is right!” Todd fired back. “What you’ve been ‘going through’ is making some stupid choices! You’re embarrassing the whole family!”
The racket at the bar became deafening. Jinx knew the glass wouldn’t last much longer. She put two fingers in her mouth and whistled high and long. It reverberated around the room, so loud it even drowned out the shaking of the glasses. She’d learned the trick when she was ten, and it had never been handier. Todd and Devon turned to her with wide eyes.
She looked at the bar, then back at Devon and Todd. “You may want to duck, is all I’m saying.”
As the words left her mouth, three glasses came shooting from the bar, straight toward Devon and Todd. The brothers ducked, and the glasses shattered against a door behind them. Jinx felt someone flop on her as she threw her arms over her head. Two more glasses shattered against the door. Around the body on top of her, Jinx could see Devon and Todd army-crawling to one of the booths. One by one, each glass launched off the bar. Glass pieces littered the floor in front of the doorway, making it impossible to walk out. Until they picked up the debris, they were stuck.
Once things finally quieted, Jinx pinched the arm that draped over her. Jackson yelled “ouch!” and got off of her. She glared at him.
“Really, Knight in Shining Armor? I can’t take care of myself? You don’t get hurt by glass?”
Jackson shrugged. “It was instinct.”
Jinx snorted and then watched Devon and Todd climb out from under the booth, both of them breathless.
“Well, you got your paranormal activity, anyway,” Todd said.
Jinx laughed. “Yeah, I’ll say.” She added cheerfully, “This is going to be awesome on the website!”
Jackson shook his head, turning to Todd and Devon. “Whatever this is, it seems to revolve around you guys fighting.”
The two brothers squinted at each other, a wary look on each of their faces. Jinx was struck by how much they resembled each other, even though Devon’s frame was stick-thin, and dark circles hung under his eyes.
Suddenly, a hiss carried through the bar.
“Lissssteenn...” the voice said, the s’s carrying through the bar like a demonic snake.
Jackson crunched some of the glass piled around the door with a heel. “Something tells me this is going to be a long night.”
T
he word listen slithered through the bar again, and the four of them huddled together.
Jinx asked Todd, “Has your ghost ever spoken before? What are we supposed to listen to?”
Todd shook his head. “No, never. And I have no idea what that means.” Then he looked over at his brother.
Devon’s eyebrows furrowed. “Oh yeah, look at me, because it’s probably all my fault.”
Before Todd could respond, Jinx put her hands on the two brothers’ chests. “Don’t start again. Last time we got ambushed, remember?”
Both brothers slumped away and pouted.
“Let’s figure this out,” Jackson said. “Something has got to be triggering this ghost.”
Jinx rolled her eyes. “Now you want to be the ghost’s therapist?”
Jackson frowned at her. “Maybe this ghost had a brother or something. I don’t know. Can’t you look up your research about this bar?”
Jinx had to admit it was a good idea. And the brothers had stopped fighting for the time being. Even her precious equipment was quiet. It was as good a time as any.
She powered up her laptop and opened up the file about the Black Eagle Tavern. She’d gathered a few articles about the place but hadn’t had a chance to read all of them. But just as she clicked open the folder, the lights went out completely.
The only thing lit in the room was her EMF equipment.
“It doesn’t seem to want a background check,” Todd said.
Jinx felt something swoosh by her ear, then heard the smash against the door. The smell of hard liquor filled the air. Jinx ducked down.
“Jackson,” she hissed, “Now would be a good time for those night goggles, don’t you think?”
Jackson’s disembodied voice traveled to her. “Yep.” She heard the sound of a zipper and then a snap and a whir.
“OK, got ’em on. Todd and Devon, move left. Put your hands out and you’ll find the booth you were just under.”
Another bottle whistled past Jinx’s ear. The smash and sharp smell of alcohol filled the air again.
“Jinx, that was close,” Jackson said, his voice shaky “You’re right in the path where this thing is throwing things.”
The word listen traveled around the room again.
Jackson continued guiding the group. “Crawl on your hands and knees to your right. You’ll run right into the wall, and you can sit there.”
Shaking, Jinx did what Jackson said and, sure enough, bumped into something solid. She wrapped her hands around her knees. Another bottle smashed against the wall.
“Jackson,” Jinx whispered, “how are we going to get out of here?”
She felt someone grab her hand and knew it was him. She squeezed tightly, and he squeezed back. Another bottle smashed against the wall.
“Anybody’s phone working?” Jackson asked.
Todd, Devon, and Jinx all said no. “Yeah, me neither,” Jackson said with disappointment.
Then, from the booth, a small voice said, “Todd—you’re right. I’ve made some bad choices. It’s...just been really hard.”
Quiet hung over the room for a moment, and then another bottle smashed. Jinx felt a shard of glass cut her cheek. This assignment is turning out to be less fun than I thought, she thought to herself. She crossed her fingers for some great footage. If they got out of there alive, she’d definitely upload it.
After a second, Todd whispered back to his brother. “I know it’s been tough. And I haven’t made it any easier for you.”
“No, I know you’re trying to help,” Devon said quietly. “I should have listened to you before. But now...I don’t know if I can stop. If I was stronger, maybe, but I’m not.”
Jinx heard a bump, and Devon cried, “Ouch!”
Two more bottles smashed against the wall.
Todd’s voice rose. “How could you say that, Devon?”
Jinx thought she could hear tears in Devon’s voice. “What good am I?” he said. “I lost the scholarship. I can’t help out the family. All I am is a burden! I’m useless! I can’t even handle the pain without these painkillers...”
“Dev, you’re the strongest person I know. Of course you can beat this thing. So you blew out your knee—so what? That wasn’t your fault!”
Devon, sounding like he w
as fully crying, said, “But you’re my little brother, Todd. I’m supposed to protect you. I should be better than I am. I should be someone you can turn to.”
Todd sighed. “We’re brothers. We help each other. You have a problem, a disease. You just need help. It’s unfair of me to blame you for things. It’s just...”—silence hung in the air for a minute—“I didn’t know what to do, Dev. I could see you falling, and you wouldn’t let me catch you.” He choked up, and Jinx could feel a lump forming in her throat, too. As if he knew, Jackson squeezed Jinx’s hand.
“It’s my turn to help you this time,” Todd continued. “We’ll get you into a program. You can turn this thing around, I know it.”
After a moment of quiet, Devon said, “OK, Todd. I can do it—if you help me. I’ll get help. Tomorrow, even, I’ll go.”
Suddenly, the bottles stopped smashing.
Jinx could hear the drip, drip of liquor flowing off the bar and down the door. For a minute, nothing happened. And all of a sudden, the lights snapped back on.
J
ackson yelled, “Yeow!” and ripped the night goggles off his face. He rubbed his eyes with both hands, letting go of Jinx’s hand. “Would have been nice to have a little warning about putting the lights back on,” he mumbled.
He could hear Jinx giggling, and he shoved into her with his shoulder.
Through stinging eyes, he saw Todd and Devon getting up from underneath the booth. Both boys’ eyes were red-rimmed. But Jackson thought they also both looked like a huge weight had been lifted from their shoulders.
“Is it over?” Devon asked.
Jinx was already up and checking her equipment. Though the EMF meter still showed some activity, the meter was not in the red. “I think we’re OK now,” she said. Jackson nodded. He didn’t know why, but he was pretty sure that whatever was haunting the place was done smashing things. The place felt downright homey, just the way the bar patrons had described it.
He looked over to the door, where a huge pile of glass blocked the door. Drips of alcohol of all colors traveled down the wood paneling. The sharp smells filled his nose with every breath.