by Ania Ahlborn
She’d pledged her own little sister.
And, perhaps, at any other time, Maggie would have been angry with Brynn for doing such a stupid thing. Because this was just as much Brynn’s fault as it was Maggie’s. But Brynn was gone.
It was left up to Maggie now, and she had to take it full circle to where it had begun.
In her room. Alone. Just her and the darkness, and that board in between.
SEVENTEEN
* * *
PETER OLSEN HAD spent his high school career on the swim team, his senior year as captain, went to college on an athletic scholarship, and found his way onto the national team in the spring of 1986. But rather than attending the games in Seoul, he watched them on TV while bouncing baby Arlen on his knee. That’s just life, he’d say when it came up. You roll with the punches, and I love my girls more than I love being a fish. Having kids did not, however, negate the man’s love of water.
Having a pool in the backyard was Peter’s only demand when he and Stella bought three acres of land and set off to build their dream home. Having hung up his swim cap in the name of family, he tossed aside his hopes of gold medals and busted his ass as a financial manager instead. That hard work earned him a swimming hole deep enough to dive into, measuring forty-one feet long from end to end—exactly a quarter of the length of the standard Olympic size. Maggie spent summers watching her dad butterfly back and forth, ticking off his laps in a little notebook and keeping time on a stopwatch like a pint-sized coach. Peter Olsen was skilled enough to have crossed the English Channel. He could have planned Alcatraz escapes.
And yet, somehow, he drowned.
It happened the summer before Maggie’s freshman year of high school, on a day just like any other. Hot. Humid. Maggie had hidden from the mugginess of the outside world in her room, closed up behind a door that was locked more and more often. Symptoms of becoming a teen, her dad had diagnosed. Maggie’s parents had, after all, gone through the very same thing with both Arlen and Brynn.
Except Maggie’s lock wasn’t turned out of anger or angst. It was turned out of necessity, to keep her secret from being revealed. That day had been just like any other. Maggie sat on her bed, legs pretzeled together, that board upon her knees.
“I’m going away for a few days,” she said, compelled to explain her absence to an invisible presence that, it seemed, only she could feel. The board hadn’t been happy.
Don’t go.
“It’s not going to be long.”
Don’t go.
“Well, I already told everyone that I was going, and I want to go. I haven’t done anything fun all summer.”
Friend. Don’t go.
She rolled her eyes at herself. What am I doing? Explaining herself to something invisible, to something that, every now and again, she still questioned could really exist. Just a loose screw. Subconscious. A hoax.
“I’m losing it,” she murmured, then tossed the board into the steamer trunk at the foot of her bed. Cheryl had been right, Maggie had gotten weird. She needed to disconnect from that thing, to find a new hobby. A trip to Hilton Head with her aunt, uncle, and cousins couldn’t have come at a better time.
Brynn—forever the antisocial loner—had refused the invite and decided to stay home, listening to music and playing World of Warcraft in her room. Yeah, because I need a tan like I need an asshole on my elbow, she had scoffed. Typical Brynn. Flippant. Snide. Maggie had shrugged and left with her extended family that afternoon.
The drive hadn’t been long, but after a stop for an early dinner and shopping with her aunt for a new bathing suit, Maggie had only gotten to see the beach for a few minutes before sunset. No big deal, though. She decided to wake up bright and early the next morning so she could spend the entire day basking on a towel and swimming in the surf. That, and she’d borrowed The Perks of Being a Wallflower from Brynn. She couldn’t wait to read it.
But she never got the chance.
Maggie was nudged awake and ushered out of bed by her uncle Leon—a man of large girth but few words. He murmured for her to get her things, explained that he needed to drive her home. When Maggie questioned why they were leaving, why they had to drive back to Savannah at a little past two a.m., he only shook his head, his face pale against the glow of the dashboard, his fingers wrapped tight around the steering wheel.
The house was empty when they arrived. Maggie called her mom via the house phone, but she wasn’t answering her cell. Brynn had left her own cell phone upstairs next to her computer, World of Warcraft logged out after a stretch of inactivity. Both of those things sent a shock wave of terror through Maggie’s chest. Because Brynn never went anywhere without her phone, and she would have never left World of Warcraft running like that, not unless she’d been too distracted to log herself out.
Maggie stood at the double French doors leading out to the yard, staring at the pool cover that was now crumpled and floating in the water, wondering what could have caused it to have been torn from its tracks like that. Arlen was the one who finally showed up at the house, red-eyed as though she’d spent the night sobbing. Howie was with her, but Harrison—still just a baby—was not. Arlen looked startled to see their uncle sitting silently upon their couch; Maggie had told him he could leave, but Uncle Leon wouldn’t hear of it. I’ll stay until someone comes, he had said, and then paced the house, back and forth.
Arlen’s bottom lip quivered as she spoke. “It’s Dad.” But that was all that she said.
Sitting in the backseat of Arlen’s car—Uncle Leon following close behind in his own vehicle—Maggie expected to be driven to the hospital. It was clear there had been an accident. Maybe their father had caught his hand in the pool cover’s motor. Was that why it had been torn from its rails? But instead of heading to the ER, Arlen turned down a familiar residential street and pulled into the driveway of a familiar house. Auntie CeeCee and Uncle Dee weren’t really Maggie’s aunt and uncle, but she’d regarded them as such for as long as she could remember. They lived in a hundred-year-old farmhouse that they’d spent what seemed like their entire lives renovating. Maggie loved it, from the massive carved newel post at the base of the stairs to the antique freestanding range Auntie CeeCee had custom-painted a beautiful pastel yellow to match her kitchen’s decor. This visit, however, was less than cheerful.
Inside, sitting upon Aunt CeeCee’s midcentury couch, Maggie’s mother was weeping. Brynn sat next to her, stone-faced, her eyes fixed on Maggie as soon as she followed Arlen, Howie, and Uncle Leon inside. Brynn got up, marched across a ’50s-inspired living room, and grabbed Maggie by the arm, escorting her to the darkened front yard.
“Ow, Brynn! What’s going on?” Maggie asked as her sister shoved her along. “Where’s Dad?” She hadn’t seen him inside, but if he was at the hospital, why was everyone here?
“This is your fault,” Brynn hissed, giving Maggie a shove. “You did this. I told you I didn’t want to . . .”
Maggie stumbled backward, shaking her head, not understanding. “Didn’t want to what? Brynn, where’s Dad?”
“You got that board, and I . . .” Brynn’s eyes were narrowed, her eyeliner smudged. “Admit it . . . you brought something into the house. You screwed around with that thing and you invited it. I should have taken it from you. I should have—”
Maggie blinked at her raccoon-eyed older sister. While Maggie had gone off to the beach, Brynn had gone toe-to-toe with some sort of grim reality, and reality had won with what looked to be a total knockout.
“Bee . . .” Maggie heaved the nickname onto the lawn between them, trying to keep her breathing steady, doing her best to keep her anxiety from spiraling out of control. “What are you talking about? I haven’t used it since . . . since Cheryl stopped coming over last year.”
Brynn didn’t look at her, and Maggie was glad. If she had, she’d have read the lie.
“Please,” she said,
reaching for Brynn’s hand. “Where’s Dad, Brynn?” But she knew. “Why’s Mom crying?” It had to be. “Why are we here?” There could only be one reason.
Brynn’s countenance twisted up with more emotion than Maggie had ever seen rush across her sister’s face. “Dad’s dead, Mags,” she said, jerking her hand away from Maggie’s touch.
The world tilted on its axis.
“. . . Wh-what . . . ?”
She’d suspected, but hearing those words spoken aloud made the ground shift, like tectonic plates during an earthquake.
“He’s dead,” Brynn repeated. “And I just . . .” She pressed her hands over her face. “I should have never let you . . .”
And then, the girl who never cried broke down and wept.
EIGHTEEN
* * *
MAGGIE SAT IN Brynn’s car outside the cemetery until well after dark, hoping that if Arlen, Howie, and the kids hadn’t been sleeping due to the storm, they’d at least all be gathered in a room together, waiting it out, and nobody would see Maggie arrive. Florence was rumbling loud enough to shake the windows, now. The rain was falling at an impossible horizontal angle, slamming itself into only one side of Brynn’s old Camry. The lightning was a dangerously spectacular light show. Every few seconds, a flash of bright white caught the wrought iron curves of the cemetery gates, stenciling dark curlicues against the night sky. The storm had finally caught up to her, and it was one that she wasn’t the least bit prepared to face.
Her phone, still lying on the passenger’s seat, blinked with an unread message.
MAGGIE, I’M WORRIED. BAD NEWS ABOUT THE WEATHER. NOT TOO BAD HERE, BUT THEY SAY SAVANNAH IS GETTING HIT HARD. YOU OKAY?
Dillon. He deserved an answer. She grabbed up her cell, exhaled.
I’M OKAY. Send.
WHY HAVEN’T YOU BEEN RESPONDING TO ME? DID YOU GET MY TEXT ABOUT YOUR RETEST?
YES. Send. BUT I HAVE TO STAY. I’M SORRY.
A moment later: STAY? WHAT? HOW LONG?!
He wouldn’t get an answer to his question because Maggie hadn’t a clue. If her plan worked, it would be only long enough to make sure that shadow figure was gone, long enough to wait out the storm. If the plan went awry, well . . .
It won’t. It’ll be okay. It has to be okay.
She pulled her hair back in a messy ponytail, slid Brynn’s key into the ignition, and drove slowly through the deluge of rain.
The house was dark. No doubt the electricity was out. The storm shutters were closed up tight save for one—the one Arlen had to struggle with during Maggie’s confession earlier that day. It flapped in the wind, mangled by the merciless beating it had taken throughout the day. The giant oak Brynn had swung from after their father’s death was half destroyed. A massive, leafless branch lay upon the lawn, lengths of jute still tied around its middle, as if in reminder: I wiped out your sister, I can wipe you out, too.
Maggie parked along the curb. It was an instinctual move, one Brynn had taught her when Maggie had first started to drive. Don’t wake the witch. Not wanting to rouse anyone with the sound of the engine or the slamming of a door, she only realized how ridiculous that was after she bailed out of the car. The storm was raging. It would have been impossible for any of the Olsens to have heard a thing.
The garage door didn’t budge when she pushed the button on Brynn’s key ring remote. The entry pad affixed to the house next to the garage didn’t work, either. No power, dummy. She struggled with the door, which luckily rolled upward—Howie must have gotten home after the electricity had gone; he’d pulled the emergency latch and hadn’t engaged it again. Arlen’s van, Howie’s sedan, and a pair of what she had thought had been long-abandoned bikes sat in the dark. Brynn and Maggie’s bicycles leaned against the wall, side by side, their handlebars tangled together, as if forever bound, but her bike was unlike Brynn’s. Just like in her own childhood, it was being used while Brynn’s stood forgotten. Hope was reliving Maggie’s past, and Maggie had to stop it. She ducked inside, out of the rain.
After Katrina, her father would stay up all night to make sure all was well anytime these storms hit Savannah; because out in Pensacola, Gram and Gramps had been okay, but things had gotten scary. Their place had flooded, and all the windows had been blown out. Gas stations’ awnings had been torn to shreds, leaving twisted metal in the streets. There was talk of them moving back to Savannah, where the storms weren’t quite as brutal, but they never did. Maggie wondered if Howie was the type to stay up the way her father had. Her fingers were crossed that the answer was no.
Inside the house, there was no movement, no flicker of emergency candles, no family huddled on the couch listening to the howl of the wind. It was dark—so dark that, had Maggie not known its layout by heart, she would have never found her way to the second floor. Upstairs, she closed her bedroom door and pressed her back against it, waiting for her eyes to adjust. And then she fixed her attention first on the dark inkblot of shadow beneath her bed and then onto the closed closet door. She wanted nothing more than to reach out her hand and slide it against the wall, to feel for the light switch and flip it upward—desperate for the safety offered by way of a blazing bulb. But even if she gave in to her fear, the light wouldn’t come this time. Florence would make sure of that. This time, Maggie couldn’t run from her fear.
Outside, the lightning lit up the world like a strobe; inside, only faint slashes of that brightness found their way through the shutter slats. Despite every nerve in Maggie’s body attempting to revolt, she forced herself to slide down to the floor. Rain-wet palms pressed against the carpet. She rocked forward onto her knees.
Thunder rumbled as she crawled across the room in the very same way she had as a girl. But rather than shimmying away from her room as quickly as possible, she now inched toward the pitch-black shadow that lingered beneath her bed. It was impossible to not recall the shaking. The scratching. The soft tapping from behind the headboard. Her childhood nyctophobia hadn’t been misguided, and it certainly wasn’t unbefitting now. Because there was something inside that room with her. Something watching, reducing the confident young woman Maggie had become to the scared and shivering child she had once been.
She reached the edge of the bed, the shadows beneath it so dark they seemed to pulsate with every hitch of her breath. She trembled as she reached toward the darkness’s edge, her fingers lighting up ghostly pale in another bright electric flash.
“It’s a hoax,” she whispered. “A party game.” A stupid toy she’d bought because the box had been mysterious, those soothsayer’s hands beckoning her to place her fingers on the planchette, to see what the mystifying oracle could predict.
Maggie’s fingertips brushed the hem of the bed skirt, but she pulled away. The valance shivered in a breeze that didn’t exist. She braced herself and shoved her hand beneath the bed, but felt nothing but carpet. The board was gone again, vanished from the spot it should have occupied, unregulated by reality’s rules.
And then, the closet emitted a soft click.
The scent of smoke coiled around her as the air left the room.
With her eyes having adjusted to the darkness, Maggie could just make out the closet door swinging open ever so slowly. Her body vibrated with a scream that was desperate to wrench itself from her throat. But there was nothing but silence beneath the muffled sound of the storm.
Nothing but the wind, the rain, and the faint tap, tap, tap that, despite the downpour, she still managed to hear from behind the headboard just beyond her shoulder.
Oh yes, I’m here. I’ve waited for you so long.
Maggie didn’t dare look away from the closet. The door was still creeping open, and there was something hiding beyond the threshold—something peeking through the blackness, obscured by the jamb. The sound of another lock clicking open had Maggie veering around. Her bedroom door slowly crept inward, allowing the faint whisper of music to dr
ift in from the direction of Brynn’s abandoned room. Hymnal. Archaic. Undoubtedly the same track that had been playing when Arlen had found their sister upon the flagstones downstairs.
Rising to her feet, she felt detached from her own movements. Certainly, she was controlling her limbs, and yet each step felt guided, forced by an invisible hand. Her eyes darted back to the closet, to the shadow she knew was waiting there, but that blot of darkness was gone. Just a loose screw, Crazy. Except, no. It had always been true. She had tried to deny its existence, so it reached out, as if taking up Cheryl’s challenge: Hey, ghost. Prove that you’re real.
Maggie moved through her open door and stopped in front of Brynn’s room. The door was now wide-open despite being shut only minutes before. The familiar scent of melting wax invited her inside.
Stepping into that room was the last thing Maggie wanted to do. Its interior was pregnant with a static charge as strong as the lightning outside; a sense of pent-up energy, of wicked intent. Her attention snapped to the wall that had been singed by that thing—What, a demon?—but no longer held proof of what she had witnessed. Except there, just peeking out from beneath the sheet that had been tossed over broken glass and bloodstains, was the corner of the Ouija board that should have been in Maggie’s room, but was now in Brynn’s instead.
She faltered, unsure whether she could take another forward step. A moment later, the step was taken for her. What felt like a child’s hand pressed hard against the small of her back and pushed, forcing her to the edge of the sheet that kept the final traces of her big sister hidden from view.
“What do you want?” Maggie’s words trembled, a mere whisper beneath the music nobody in the house but her seemed to be hearing. As if in response, a spike of pain skittered up her spine and settled between her shoulder blades. Her hands flew backward, palms clasping at her neck. She exhaled a muffled cry, only to feel it again, like claws biting into the flesh just above her collarbone. The intensity brought her crashing to her knees.