by Eliza Nolan
“What? What?!” Jenna shouts. Metal crashes to the floor. Her feet shuffle around the kitchen island.
She crouches in front of the open oven, and then grips my arms. “Are you okay? What happened?”
“I don’t know. Is the fire out?” I peer over her shoulder.
“What fire?” She follows my gaze.
I blink and wipe my eyes, then pat my cheeks. They don’t feel burned, or even warm. But I swear they were a second ago. I slide past Jenna and move over to the oven, examining the insides. On the center rack is a sheet of perfectly baked, sugar cookies. No flames, no smoke, and nothing burnt.
“You didn’t see the flames rush out at me? Or smoke?” I ask, no longer sure of what I saw.
Jenna shakes her head. “I watched you open the door. I watched you spring away, but I didn’t see any smoke or flames. I thought maybe you got something in your eye. But you’re okay?”
I check my apron, my hair, and my face one more time, and then check the oven. The smell of smoke is gone from the air, but something happened. Didn’t it?
“Are you okay?” Jenna asks again. “Maybe you’ve had too much sugar. Can you hallucinate from too much sugar?”
The timer dings, indicating the cookies are done.
“I’m okay,” I say. I’m not sure I believe it. It felt so real.
5
Eva
“Is that what the board meant?” I ask. “Are we talking to something called ‘Mother Demon’?” Saying the name raises the hair on the back of my neck.
We both look down at the spirit board. Neither of our hands are on the planchette, but I’m waiting for it to answer anyway.
Thankfully it doesn’t move.
Fiona brushes her dark hair back from her face. The blacks of her eyes seem wider in the dim candle light. She places her fingertips back on the planchette and nods for me to do the same. “We’re still playing, right?”
I don’t want Fiona to think I’m too scared to follow this through. It’s just a game. If it really was some spirit trying to talk to us, why would we need to be touching it in order for it to work? I nod and reluctantly reach out to the other side of the planchette.
The flames of the candles flicker. One of us must be breathing on them. Instantly I realize it can’t be me, because I’m literally holding my breath. I exhale. If I was doing this with Grace, she’d see I was scared and insist on stopping. But Fiona isn’t Grace. And I don’t want to be scared, I want to be brave. “Go ahead.”
Fiona stares across at me as she asks the spirit board, “What do you want?”
The planchette shifts around the board once more. Gliding from one letter to the next so fast I can hardly keep track of what it’s spelling out.
But it’s just one word.
payment
“Payment?” Fiona’s brow pinches together.
I shrug. “Maybe it’s offering information from the spirit world for a fee?”
“Let’s ask. What are you selling?”
souls
I shudder and jerk my hands off the planchette. My eyes fix on the small ivory pointer as if it could somehow attack me. My stomach ties itself up in slimy, wormy knots. It’s too hot in here. I unzip my hoodie, then crawl over to a window and unhook the locks, yanking the thing open.
Icy cold air blasts into the room, slapping my face. I gulp it in as if I’ve been holding my breath underwater for hours.
“Eva,” Fiona says. “Are you okay?” She appears next to me, her hand on my shoulder.
I nod and lean against the side of my desk underneath the window, gripping one of the square legs for support. “I don’t know what that was, but I almost got sick or something.”
She frowns, and my eyes latch onto her lip—it’s starting to swell. I should have gotten her ice; also, I shouldn’t have kicked her in the first place.
“Maybe we should pack it up for the night,” Fiona says, motioning over to where the board still sits on the rug between the towering red candles.
She’s offering me an out, but I can’t take it. One of the coolest things about Fiona is that she likes to push boundaries in ways I never would have done before. It’s exhilarating. It makes me feel alive. Plus, her eyes are still full of excitement. She’s only offering to stop for me. Me, the one who doesn’t even believe in this stuff.
I shake my head. “We can keep going. I’m good. I just ate too many cookies or something.” I crawl back to the board. “Let’s see what it wants.” My voice sounds stronger than I actually feel.
“You sure?” Fiona presses away a smile. She totally wants to play this through.
“Might as well see why the demon mother is contacting us.” I try to put a dash of sarcasm in my voice.
I place my jittery hands back on the board, fingers brushing the top of the pointer. Fiona studies me for a moment, then her hands join mine.
“What do you want from us?” I ask.
obey your sister
“The heck?” Fiona says.
First confusion but then relief washes over me, and I snort-laugh so hard at the last word I nearly choke. I roll back on the floor laughing. It’s obvious now that the stomach thing was nerves or maybe too many cookies. There’s nothing in this board.
“Were you messing with me this whole time?” I ask Fiona. She’s a way better actress than I thought.
She shakes with laughter. “What, me? This is all you.” She waves me off, as if I did this to her. Whatever.
I let out a relaxed breath. I can’t believe I’d gotten so wound up about this stupid board. Fiona was messing with me. I mean, it had to be her. Right?
6
Grace
Jenna squeezes me in one of her mammoth hugs, made even better and more massive due to her puffy winter coat—it’s like being hugged by a cloud. “You sure you’re gonna be okay?” she asks as I walk her to the front door.
“Sure,” I say. My stomach is still a little tight, but maybe it’s too much sugar or something. Or a hot flash? Seriously early menopause? No, probably not that.
“Call me if you need anything?”
I nod. “I’m fine. I might just need to take it easy for the rest of the night.”
“Okay.” She unlocks the front door and pulls it open, flashing a grin at me. “Happy first day of Christmas!”
“Happy first day of Christmas,” I sing back. We wave, and she skips down the steps and into a quiet winterscape. Streetlights reflect off the snowbanks and snow-covered branches of the trees lining the street, giving everything a sparkling, pinkish hue.
My shoulders relax and my smile grows. I am already feeling a lot better. Maybe sticking my head outside and getting some fresh air was all I needed.
Back inside, I stop and appreciate the amazing job I did on the bannister in the front hallway. Even better than last year. I inhale a deep breath of fresh green pine, close my eyes and relish the moment. Crossing into the living room, I do a half twirl and plop down on the couch. I haven’t even started on the decorations for the living room yet.
I consider the accent tables on either side of the couch, completely empty and waiting to be decorated. I rub my stomach and test my forehead with the back of my hand to see if I have a temperature or if I’m sick from the weird oven incident, but I feel fine. My eyes fall on the empty table to my left. Dressing up this room with cheery decorations would be just the thing to get my mind off that whole episode.
I push up from the couch, and then drop back down as I remember where the decorations are.
The attic.
I groan thinking about what’s involved in getting up there. I accidentally broke the hatch to the attic last year—the one with the attached folding steps. So now we have to drag the ladder from the basement, up two floors, then balance it to get up into the attic. That part I could do alone, as much as it sucks. But with the ladder system now in place, it’s nearly impossible to get anything down from the attic without someone to hand off the boxes to. The Christmas ornament b
oxes aren’t heavy, but they’re bulky and awkward. It’s at least a two-person job.
A door clicks open upstairs. Floorboards creak overhead. They’re both laughing and pause at the stairs to mumble something. I swear I hear one of them whisper my name. The laughter gets louder as their feet thump down the steps.
“Hey, Grace,” Eva says as she appears in the doorway. “I see the Christmas Monster hasn’t barfed all over this room yet.”
I glare at her, and then get an idea.
7
Eva
“I need the Christmas stuff from the attic,” Grace says.
“Good luck with that.” Getting into the attic is all kinds of tricky, and I don’t plan on breaking my neck over a box of Christmas ornaments. I push off the doorway and head for the kitchen—we’re on a mission to grab snacks. Chips, pretzels, anything salty to balance out all the sugar in the cookies.
“I thought I’d have you get them for me,” she says to my back.
I turn to face her, crossing my arms over my chest. “Why in the world would I do that for you?”
“Because you’re a good sister,” she says.
I laugh, because I am a great sister, but I know she doesn’t see it that way. If she did, she wouldn’t have thrown me away the second Jenna entered her life.
“Or, how about because you stole an entire cookie-sheet’s worth of my cookies, and if you don’t help me now, I’ll tell Mom and Dad.” She leans back on the sofa and smiles innocently, tilting her head to the side.
Crud. I weigh the trouble I might get in for stealing cookies against the task of going into the attic. Mom and Dad have been getting in a more hyper-protective mode lately when it comes to Grace. They’re always taking her side. Just like back when she used to get sick all the time. Still, Grace is asking a lot.
“Come on,” Grace pleads.
Fiona nudges me. “It’s cool. We’ll do it. I’ll help.”
I raise an eyebrow at Fiona. But her face is deadpan; she’s serious.
I shrug. “Fine. Let’s go get Grace’s stupid ornaments.”
∞∞∞
Fiona lifts and I tug at the long, cobweb and dust-covered ladder in order to get it around the final corner at the top of the steps.
“Crap.” I scramble and grip the underside of the ladder in order to not drop the thing on my stockinged feet. “Why did you want to do this? I thought you hated Grace,” I say.
Fiona shakes her head. “Hate’s too strong a word, I just don’t like the way she acts, especially when Jenna’s around.” She scrunches up her nose as if even the thought of Jenna smells bad. “But I’m not doing this for Grace. Don’t you remember what Mother Demon said?” Her eyes sparkle with excitement.
Obey your sister. A chill crawls up my spine. Of course, I remember. But, why is she following through on it?
“So, you thought we should do what the evil spirit-board thing said?”
“Well yeah, why not play it through. See where it leads.” She laughs as if it’s no big deal.
It probably isn’t. I shake my head and lift the ladder upright positioning it underneath the attic hatch and climb the first few rungs.
“Stay down here.” I pull open the hatch. “I’ll pass the boxes down.” I crawl up the rest of the way and reach my arm up into the darkness above my head. I wave my hand around, searching for the light, until the string-pull catches on my finger, and I tug. A single, bare bulb illuminates the unfinished attic. Underneath the low-peaked, wood ceilings lies a sea of tired boxes, stray chairs, a headless mannequin, and some fold-up backdrops for community theater. Dad’s a drama professor at the University and volunteers to help out with the neighborhood’s community theater group. Part of his volunteer gig includes storing tons of their props up here.
The cramped attic is somewhat organized. Well, at least I have an idea of what part of the box maze is what. Around the farthest edges where the light barely reaches are boxes of old things my parents have hung onto over the years. Boxes from our grandparents’ houses, old craft projects that Grace and I made as kids. To my right is Dad’s store of random props including costumes, furniture, and even a large papier-mâché dragon head which I’m not sure how he fit through the attic door. To my left are boxes of decorations for various holidays, mostly Christmas.
Of course, the boxes Grace wants are not in front, so I wade in—stepping cautiously into the shadows between the boxes—and begin the process of shifting dusty boxes around in the limited space to find what I need.
“Whoa! There is so much stuff up here!” Fiona startles me. She’s made it to the top of the ladder. Her head pokes up into the attic, her eyes wide as she scans all our crap.
“Welcome to my family’s dark secret. This is where we stash all of our junk.”
“Flippin’ sweet!” Her eye catches on the side dedicated to play props. “Can I take a look?”
“Sure. But be careful. Some of the stuff is pretty delicate. If you hurt the dragon head, my dad might actually cry.” We both laugh. Dad can get very dramatic when he wants to.
She pushes herself up with her arms and twists around, plopping her butt on the attic floor, then wipes at a smear of dust on the front of her black blouse. My own black sweatshirt is already coated in the same light film.
As I continue to search through Christmas boxes, I occasionally glance up to find Fiona jabbing an imaginary opponent with a wooden sword, then slow dancing with the mannequin, her arms around its headless neck, her darkly lined eyes gazing into those of her imaginary lover. In between stops she navigates carefully through the mass of props, her all-black clothing and dark hair blending her into the shadows. She’s slowly making her way to the side where sparkly costumes hang from a tall rack, when she stops, gaping down at her feet. She’s staring at something behind a rocking chair. I turn back to my task, and lift up one more box, finally unearthing the last of what Grace requested. A flattened spider carcass obscures the words “Christmas Bows,” written in my sister’s neat handwriting. I cringe as I flick the dead spider off the box. Dead things are so gross.
When I glance up again, Fiona’s kneeling over a small, wooden chest. The top rests open on its hinges and she’s holding a large book with a dark cover. She flips through a page, then another.
“What is it?” I ask.
Fiona’s forehead is wrinkled. “I don’t really know. This is all your dad’s theater stuff, right?”
I nod.
“Then he has a creepy prop book filled with instructions on how to summon demons.”
“Huh?” I slide around a tower of boxes and swat my way through a large cobweb to her side of the attic. “That doesn’t make sense. If it’s a prop, it shouldn’t need actual words, like inside the book.”
“I know. Thus, I’m staring at this thing with my mouth open and such. Why do you suppose this is here?” She turns the book to face me, and in the dim light of the single bulb I make out a pentagram.
I step closer. There’s no way Dad is into demon worship. He’s the most straight-laced creative ever. In love with the classics and art history, there’s nothing new-age or experimental about him. And my mom’s his match. They’re both stuffy professors at a private university and would never get into the occult. When it comes to stuff like this, they usually laugh and say anything and everything can be explained by science.
“Maybe it’s one of those spell books you can buy in the bookstore,” I say. “You know, the ones that tell you how to land the love of your life—but the spells don’t actually do anything. I mean, maybe they got it from a store because they needed a dark, occult-ish book for a play or something.”
Fiona flips to the middle of the book. “Look at this one. Tell me this is a spell on how to land the love of your life.”
The page has a neatly, hand-written list of directions and several diagrams. One of them is a pentagram. It talks of binding the demon once it’s been summoned, in order to have it do your bidding.
She’s right. This i
sn’t a book of love spells.
I take the book from her and feel the weight of it immediately. The soft leather cover is warm to the touch, and instantly feels right in my hands, like it somehow belongs to me. In fact, I have to resist the urge to hug it to my chest.
“I knew it!” Fiona smiles and claps her ring-covered fingers together. “I knew if we went up here, we’d find something. Do you think this is part of the whole Mother Demon thing?”
“You think we were supposed to ‘obey’ my sister and come up here in order to find this?” I ask. “Why?”
“So that we can call upon the demon in the book and have it do our bidding or whatever.” She raises her hands and smiles with delight. I can tell she thinks this dark treasure hunt is the best game ever.
I chuckle.
She digs a tissue out of her pocket, dabbing at her lip. It’s bleeding again. She dabs a few more times all while she pushes out her lower lip, pouting. “Why shouldn’t this be the thing—the reason we were supposed to obey your sister in the first place?”
“For starters, the spirit board doesn’t really work. It’s a toy. That was some weird joke you played, or our subconscious, or whatever. Now you’re searching through my dad’s old junk to find anything that will make what the board said mean something. If you hadn’t found this book, you would’ve found some other thing, like the dragon’s head, and made that into some sort of meaning.”
“Okay, fine,” Fiona says, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Fine? What do you mean? Are you saying the dragon head is the reason the board sent us up here?” I laugh again.
“No. I’m saying if you don’t think we were sent up here to find this particular book, and it’s all a bunch of smoke and mirrors, why not bring the book downstairs? Maybe we should check it out. You could spend the night next weekend. We’ll go to the abandoned warehouse by my house and try the summoning spell.”
I’m no longer laughing and realize I’m clutching the book to my chest. I let it fall open again in my hands, glancing down at the diagrams, then shake my head. “No. It’s too cold to do anything outside right now.” It is cold, but I’m not sure that’s why I don’t want to try the spell. Even as the book feels right in my hands, or maybe because it feels so right in my hands, I can’t stop the feeling that we’re getting dangerously close to something we should leave alone.