by Ania Ahlborn
Maggie didn’t look up, but she wanted to ask, Prove what? That what I just saw wasn’t real?
Cheryl placed the board between them both. “This”—she tapped the board—“has no power, Maggie. None of this is your fault. Only God has that kind of power, and He protects us. He does no harm.”
But all Maggie could think of at that moment was that she didn’t feel safe. That this didn’t feel right. She was afraid and, like Brynn, needed sanctuary. Because this was the last place in the world she should have been. The pain in her shoulders was back, biting, drilling hard into her muscles. And that smell of smoke? It was strong again. Either it had followed her in, or she had followed it here.
ELEVEN
* * *
DESPITE CHERYL’S INSISTENCE that she wanted to help, Maggie could tell her old friend was less than comfortable being back in Maggie’s old room. She could almost see the memories flooding Cheryl’s thoughts, her eyes darting from wall to wall, searching for signs of what had once been.
After their falling-out, it had taken a couple of weeks for Cheryl to talk to Maggie again, let alone sit with her in the cafeteria. It was there that Maggie started to share stories of the scratching in the walls, the strange sensation of being watched, and the oppressive heaviness she felt every time she opened her closet door. So, your house is haunted now? Cheryl had asked. I guess I better not go over, then. As if she had been planning on going over ever again. Maggie knew what she meant, and it hurt.
She supposed that was part of why she hadn’t told Cheryl the whole truth; why she had left out the part that, despite the knocks, Maggie had pulled the board out of its hiding place and placed it across her knees. She knew it was freaky, knew it didn’t make sense, knew that after what happened with Cheryl, she should have been terrified to ever touch that thing again. Any other kid would have stuffed it in the trash, pronto. Off to the dump, out of her life forever. And yet she found herself compelled to place it across her lap as her loneliness caught up to her. Because Cheryl had abandoned Maggie, but the board was always there.
And then there was the betrayal. Despite Maggie telling Cheryl her stories in confidence, Cher told her mom everything. Mrs. Polley was quick to blame it on the devils that must have been residing in the Olsen home. She even called Maggie’s mom to complain. You really should keep a closer eye on your kids, Stella. I’m sorry, but that older girl of yours? I’ve seen her in the cemetery. Everyone’s seen her, hanging around with that boy . . .
Their mother got angry, though it was unclear whether she was raging against Brynn or Claire Polley, who from that day forward was regarded as Pissy Mrs. Prissy. In turn, Cheryl became Little Miss Priss, and Maggie’s mom began to insist that Maggie was better off without friends like her.
And yet, despite her mother’s opinion, Maggie kept trying to win Cheryl back. But after what felt like months of failure, Maggie’s despondency began to fade. Perhaps, just as her mom kept saying, it was better that Cheryl was gone. Maybe Maggie didn’t need her. Perhaps all she needed was what she had upstairs, hiding beneath her bed. Because whenever she played alone, she felt better, as though she and that little girl from the cemetery really had become friends.
But now, years later, Maggie found herself staring at the board upon Cheryl’s lap, and a sense of unease unspooled in the pit of her stomach like a coiled snake shedding its skin. Protest was on the tip of her tongue; she vividly remembered how Cheryl had rolled her eyes at the tales Maggie had told over lunch-line tater tots and applesauce cups. You’re such a freak. The knocking. The scratching. Cheryl had discarded it all as nonsense, regardless of how hurtful that shirking had been. She hadn’t been an ally, which is why, over ten years later, Maggie already knew what Cheryl would say if she mentioned the tapping that was most certainly back, if she brought up the shadow that had darted across Brynn’s room: There’s a logical explanation for everything. And the board having been missing, only to magically reappear? A simple oversight, like searching for a pair of glasses when they were right there, poised upon the tip of your nose.
But Maggie couldn’t allow past bitterness to interfere with the fact that Cheryl was here now, wanting to help, and that perhaps she was right. Maybe facing her fear was exactly what Maggie needed to break out of this vicious cycle of guilt. She could spend the rest of her life believing that she was responsible for the deaths of her parents and sister, or she could get over this ridiculous theory once and for all. Ghosts? Curses? Please.
And yet, sitting across from her former best friend, mimicking the actions that had come just before their relationship had collapsed, was reassurance that no matter what Maggie tried to convince herself of, she would never escape the truth. Reality—no matter how insurmountable—would be heeded, just as the pulsating pain in her neck and shoulders would not be ignored.
Maggie rubbed at the knot of muscle at the top of her spine. Every minute that passed, the pain was getting worse.
“I can’t,” she finally said. Her anxiety, her sorrow over Brynn, the sadness that had crept back into her heart just seeing Cheryl in her old room again—all of it was perched upon her shoulders like a thirty-pound weight. “I’m sorry, this all just feels . . . off.”
“Maggie . . .”
“You’re right,” Maggie cut in. “This needs to end. But this—” The board, repeating the past. “It won’t fix anything.”
“How can you know that?” Cheryl asked. “Look, I’m not comfortable doing this, either. Trust me, after that night . . .” Her words tapered off, but she didn’t have to finish. The memory had scarred them both.
Regardless, Maggie kept her eyes fixed upon the board between them, her stomach churning, every muscle tense. Eventually, Cheryl exhaled in what sounded like defeat, and for half a second Maggie let herself relax. But rather than pulling the board from their knees, Cheryl spoke again, giving the whole idea one last try.
“I’m worried about you.” Cheryl rubbed her hands against the knees of her jeans. “I guess, up until your phone call, I had hoped that you were happy, wherever you were.” She plucked the planchette up off the board, flipped it over, idly inspecting the seemingly harmless piece of plastic. “I wish we could go back, you know? Erase that cemetery girl from our lives. Make that night vanish. Have stayed best friends.”
All at once, Maggie could smell it—the scent of electricity, a static charge primed to ignite. The hairs on her arms rose on end. A chill scurried up her spine and into the base of her ponytail. She could see it on Cheryl’s face—Cher was feeling it, too.
And then, before either one could acknowledge the disturbance in the atmosphere around them, a scream sounded from down the hall.
Maggie instinctively leapt to her feet. “What . . . ?!” The board tumbled to the carpet as she abandoned Cheryl, rushing for the bedroom door. Yanking it open, she could already hear footsteps bounding up the stairs—either Howie or Arlen dashing to their little girl’s aid.
“Hope? Hope!” Arlen’s voice was panicked, already on the verge of a breakdown.
Maggie skidded to a stop when she hit the upstairs hall, not because Arlen was already halfway up the stairs, but because something dodged into Hope’s bedroom just as Maggie turned her attention to her niece’s open door. It was that thing. The darkness that she swore had scorched Brynn’s bedroom wall.
“Hope?!” Arlen beat Howie up the stairs. Howie followed shortly, pausing to regard Maggie with a glance. There was something dark in his gaze, as though Arlen had told him about all the tragedy in their past, as if she had said the words so plainly that they had been undeniable: This is Maggie’s doing. She’s behind it all. Howie ducked into Hope’s room a second later, and Maggie found herself moving toward her niece’s bedroom despite that nasty look. Some deep-seated maternal instinct was pushing her to make sure everything was fine. What if that shadow really was in there? What if, finally, someone besides her would be there to see it?
But her trajectory was thrown off by another yell, this one from behind her, from inside the room that had once been her own.
“Cher?” Maggie veered around and rushed back from where she had come. The two collided as they both came to the door at once—Maggie running in to see what was wrong, Cheryl wide-eyed and determined to leave the room as quickly as she could. Cheryl’s right hand—which had been clasped across her neck—was jostled free, revealing what looked to be a bleeding abrasion just above her collarbone that hadn’t been there ten seconds before. It nearly looked like the shape of half a heart. “Oh my God, what—”
“I have to go.” Cheryl’s words were clipped, breathless. Politeness be damned, she shoved Maggie aside and moved fast down the hall.
“Wait, what happened?” Maggie pursued her, bounding down the stairs, beating Cheryl to the front door. “Cher, tell me,” she demanded, blocking the exit, but Cheryl wasn’t having it.
“Get out of my way, Maggie,” she said, trying to yank Maggie away from the door’s handle. “I shouldn’t have ever come here.” Her voice warbled. She was on the verge of panic, ready to burst into hysterical sobs. “I should have known better. Goddammit, I should have followed my gut.”
“Please, just tell me. Cher, I need to know.” But Cheryl overpowered her, pushed Maggie aside, and pulled open the door to rush across the covered porch. She nearly tripped down the front steps as she went.
Maggie bolted after her. “Stop! Cheryl, please!”
Cheryl unlocked her car with a push of a button on her key fob and quickly ducked inside. Maggie found herself holding the top edge of her old friend’s door, keeping it from slamming closed, stopping Cheryl from screeching away. “Just wait, okay? What—”
But Cheryl’s expression brought her to a midsentence halt. It was a look of undiluted terror. Everything Cheryl had come to believe had—in the few seconds Maggie had left her alone in that room—been challenged. Or threatened. Or both.
Cheryl had seen something. She’d been attacked by it.
That thing, it remembered exactly who Cheryl was.
Maggie swallowed against the sudden dryness of her throat, seeing herself reflected in Cheryl’s twisted expression of dread. Her, just after learning of her father’s death; her, learning of her mother’s death, despite the bitterness she still felt; her, the night Arlen had called, the storm howling outside her apartment, that broken shutter slamming against the exterior wall in warning: It’s happening again. All over again. It’s real. This is all so very real.
She took a backward step and let her hand fall from Cheryl’s door. But rather than speeding away, Cheryl gave Maggie an imploring look. “You shouldn’t be here,” she said. “You need to get out. Now.”
Maggie then watched her drive off. She waited for the red glow of Cheryl’s taillights to disappear down the street before she turned back toward that house—the windows warm with yellow light, the board and batten gleaming in the moonlight, everything about it simultaneously perfect and wrong. Suddenly, Maggie wasn’t sure whether she’d be able to go back inside. And yet, a moment later, she was locking the front door behind her—locking herself in—and climbing the stairs to the second floor.
She stopped at Hope’s door. Howie was missing—probably checking in on either Harry or Hay—but Arlen was sitting upon her eldest daughter’s bed. “What happened?” Arlen asked. “Was that Cheryl who was screaming?”
Maggie faintly shook her head, unsure of her own response. Was she saying no because she was in denial, or because she didn’t want to talk about it? “Is Hope okay?” was all she could manage.
“Just a nightmare,” Arlen said. “She gets them every now and again, especially these past few days. But everything is fine.” She brushed a strand of hair from Hope’s small round face and gave her kid a smile.
“Did your friend leave, Auntie Magdalene?” Hope asked. “Did I scare her away?”
“Yeah.” Maggie tried to suppress the wince that now accompanied her every move. “I mean, no, you . . . I—”
“Good,” Hope said flatly, cutting Maggie off. “I didn’t like her.”
Maggie stared at her niece.
“Excuse me.” Arlen’s words were sharp. “I don’t think that’s a very nice thing to say, do you?”
Hope gave her mother a grievous look. “She’s not really Aunt Maggie’s friend, Mom. Right, Aunt Magdalene? The only friend that lady’s got is God.” The five-year-old rolled her eyes, leaving both her mother and aunt stunned.
Arlen gaped.
Maggie opened her mouth to speak, but no words came. And so, instead of responding, she simply turned and went back to her room.
Quietly shutting her door behind her, she leaned against it and closed her eyes. It was only when she reopened them a moment later that she saw the planchette on the floor, its tip pointing at her. You.
And there, where Cheryl had sat only minutes ago, was Dolly. Blank-eyed but smiling.
A real friend.
Hello.
TWELVE
* * *
AFTER THAT PLANCHETTE had pointed to YES, it took Maggie days to find the nerve to touch it again.
She had stashed it under her bed, sure it would stay hidden there forever. Whether the Ouija was meant for parties or not, it had done a heck of a job creeping her out. Yet, during a particularly drab sleepover, when all the Chex Mix had been eaten, Kelly Clarkson’s latest CD had been karaoked to, and hours of Gilmore Girls had been watched, Cheryl issued a dramatic sigh as she sprawled out across Maggie’s bedroom carpet.
“I’m so bored,” she mused. “And I’m totally not even tired yet. I wish we had more stuff to do. Did you hear? Jenny got a new puppy. She showed me a picture and it’s so cute. I just wanna squeeze its face.” Jenny was Cheryl’s friend, not Maggie’s. And while Maggie supposed she could be a friend to them both, there was something about Jenny that turned Maggie off. Firstly, Jenny had made it clear that she thought ocean stuff was lame. Sharks? Gross. And second, Maggie got the sneaking suspicion that Jenny wanted Cheryl to be her best friend exclusively, a feeling that Jenny didn’t want Maggie around. “Next time,” Cheryl said, “we should sleep over at her place instead.”
“We can find stuff to do,” Maggie protested. “Wanna go swim?”
“Swim again? In the middle of the night?” Cheryl looked dubious, and it was true, Maggie would get in trouble for swimming without an adult to keep an eye out. But it was the first thing that came to mind. “I don’t really feel like swimming, Mags. It makes me smell gross,” Cheryl said. “Besides, there’s mosquitoes.”
“Should we look up Justin’s concert stuff again?” Maggie didn’t have her own computer yet, but her dad let her use his laptop anytime she wanted, just as long as she didn’t download anything or take it off his desk. That, and they never did talk their mothers into driving them up to Atlanta for that Kelly Clarkson concert. But that was okay, because they were into Justin Timberlake now. Brynn had a car, and Maggie had a plan. She and Cher just had to find the money.
“What’s the point? I bet the tickets are all sold out by now, anyway. We’re just wasting our time.”
“Well, um . . . we can go hunting for junk in the attic?” Maggie was running out of options. “Arlen put all kinds of things up there when she moved out. I bet there’s loads of cool stuff.”
“Yeah.” Cheryl sighed again. “Or loads of hairy spiders with gigantic fangs. No way.”
Maggie chewed her bottom lip as she looked around her room, searching for a solution to Cheryl’s waning interest. She wasn’t making it easy. What the heck was left?
“Hey, wanna see something scary?”
“Scary?” Cheryl finally twisted her head around to make eye contact. “Scary like what?”
This was probably a bad idea, but it was too late to back out now. Maggie slid off her bed and reached under the bed skirt, dra
wing the board and its planchette out into the open. She’d sworn to herself that she would never use it again, not after how the pointer had jerked away from her touch. But this was important. If Cheryl grew bored of Maggie, where would that leave her? Forgotten: a lonely girl abandoned by her best friend.
“What the heck is that?” Cheryl asked, giving the board a once-over.
“Sit.” Maggie patted the carpet. Both girls took up the position—legs folded, the board balanced between them. “Want to talk to some ghosts?”
And rather than recoiling or looking at Maggie as though she’d lost her ever-loving mind, Cheryl simply shrugged her shoulders and said “I guess?” like it was the most arbitrary question in all the world.
“Okay.” Maggie placed the planchette in the center of the Ouija. “You gotta put your fingers on this, real light-like. You can’t press down, otherwise it can’t slide.”
Cheryl did as she was told, but almost immediately pulled her hands away. “Wait,” she said. “Maybe this isn’t a good idea. I mean, can’t some ghosts be bad?”
Maggie considered this, but ended up dismissing the idea. “Sure, but only the ghosts you actually call to the board will show up. As long as you don’t call anyone bad, it’s okay. At least that’s what Brynn said.” Except Brynn had said no such thing.
Cheryl hesitated, but eventually bought Maggie’s explanation. She returned her hands to the planchette. “Have you done this before?” she asked.
“Sure,” Maggie said.
“And it worked?” Again, Cheryl was skeptical.
Maggie stared down at the YES at the corner of the board. “Nah,” she said. “Brynn says it’s just for parties, but it’s fun. Who should we talk to?” When Cheryl did nothing but shrug with indifference, Maggie slumped where she sat and peered at the plastic pointer—silly to think such a thing could be used to communicate between worlds. And to think she’d been sure this dumb pointer had moved on its own. More than likely, she’d just bumped the board with her knee.