by Roger Hayden
“Everyone liked her,” my mother said. “That’s why this doesn’t make any sense. Who would’ve killed her?”
“You said she was friendly with the coven?” I asked.
“Always,” Malia said. “She was one of the few townspeople who trusted us, enjoyed our company even. She was fascinated by our history.”
“How fascinated?” I asked wryly.
“It was an innocent interest,” Karma clarified. “There wasn’t a deceitful bone in her body.”
“Well, someone wanted her dead,” I said. “There has to be a reason for it. What’s the coven been up to lately? Anything out of the ordinary?”
“Nothing that would involve murder,” my mother said.
“That you know of,” I muttered. All of a sudden, I couldn’t stand to continue the conversation. I wanted to be alone, so I pushed back my chair and stood. “I need a shower. Wash off this crappy day, you know?”
Surprisingly, no one protested. I left my sisters and my mother to resume speculating without me, taking the creaky stairs two at a time to the second floor. I knocked on the door at the end of the hall. When no one answered, I pushed it open.
Wren, the youngest Summers sibling, occupied the smallest bedroom of the house. He sat hunched over his desk in the corner of the room, oblivious to my presence. Massive studio headphones engulfed his ears. I could hear bass-heavy electronic music pumping out of them from the doorway. For a few moments, I simply watched him. He was tall now. I could tell from the way his lanky legs spread out underneath his desk. I felt a sharp pang of guilt hit me. When I’d left Yew Hollow, I hadn’t thought about how my absence would affect Wren. He video conferenced me often while I was away, keeping me updated on the coven’s antics and his own life, but I still felt guilty that I wasn’t around to help him grow up.
I walked over to his desk and gently removed his headphones, trying not to startle him. He jumped anyway, turning toward me. He only looked at me, eyes wide, as if he couldn’t believe that I was standing in front of him.
“I suppose you’re too manly for hugs now?” I asked, unable to stop a smile from spreading across my face. I’d missed Wren. I resisted the temptation to squeeze his cheeks, knowing that he probably wouldn’t appreciate it.
“Morgan,” he finally said. “Wh-What are you doing here?”
“I missed my favorite sibling.”
He stood up. I was right about his height. He towered over me now. The top of his head nearly brushed the sloped ceiling of his bedroom. “Yeah, but you’re not supposed to be here,” he said.
“You’re not happy to see me?” I joked, punching him lightly on one shoulder. “By the way, thanks for nothing. I could’ve avoided a whole lot of trouble if you’d just answered the door earlier.”
He seemed confused. “Earlier? When?”
“Around five. That’s when I got home.”
“Oh.” He reached forward to take his headphones back and held them up. “I’ve had these on pretty much all day. If I’d known you were coming home—”
“Hang on,” I said, holding up a hand to stop him. “So you don’t know what happened?”
“What happened?”
My eyelids felt suddenly heavy, as if the full weight of the day’s events had just settled in on them. The last thing I wanted to do was break a piece of disturbing information to my little brother. Nevertheless, he deserved to know what was going on, so I said, “A woman was murdered in town today.”
Immediately, Wren’s face distorted itself into an alarmed expression that sent acute twinges of shame through my chest. No eighteen-year-old should have to deal with the news of murder in his own town.
“Who?” he asked.
“Someone named Leigh Lockwood.”
He sank back into his desk chair, holding his head in his hands. I waited, not sure what to do. At a loss, I put what I hoped was a reassuring hand on his shoulder.
“I liked her,” he said, his voice just a mumble as he spoke into his palms. “She was so nice.”
The words echoed my sisters’ sentiments from downstairs. Whoever Leigh Lockwood was, she’d managed to impress my entire family, a rare and admirable feat.
“I’m sorry, Wren.”
“Is she—do they know who did it?” he asked, looking up at me. His eyes were bright, as if he was holding back tears.
I decided there was no point in hiding from Wren. He was bound to find out about the police’s suspicions anyway. Rumor spread through Yew Hollow like the plague, and I’d rather Wren heard the gossip from me than anyone else.
“They think I did it,” I admitted, feeling strangely culpable, as if I’d just confessed to the actual crime.
Wren shot out of his seat so quickly that I took a step back. “What?”
“It’s a long story,” I said, rubbing my tired eyes with the back of my hand. “Actually, no it’s not. I found the body. No one else was around, so when everyone came out, they automatically thought I did it.”
“But there’s no proof!”
I reached up to plant both hands on Wren’s shoulders, pushing gently to encourage him to sit down again. “Wren, relax. They’ll figure it out. Nothing’s going to happen to me.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. Like you said, there’s no proof.”
He ran his fingers through his hair, quiet. It struck me how similar Wren and I were. When things got complicated, we both withdrew to our private places, unwilling to deal with the situation head on. I decided to let him be. I figured he needed time to process the bad news.
“Listen,” I said. “I’m going to grab a shower. If you need anything, don’t hesitate to come upstairs and ask, okay?”
“Yeah.”
He put on his headphones again, clearly indicating that he was finished with our conversation. I patted his shoulder once more before leaving and shut the door behind me. Then I trudged up the next flight of stairs to the third floor.
The third floor of the Summers house used to belong solely to me. There were only three rooms up here: my old bedroom, a small study that I used as a library, and a tiny bathroom. When I was still living in the house, the third floor had been my sanctuary, especially the library. My sisters had rarely disturbed me up here. They used to say the third floor gave them weird vibes. It wasn’t unusual for a certain place to appeal strongly to one witch over others—for example, Karma had always had a strange attachment to the rickety swing set in the backyard—so my family accepted my preference for the third floor without question. It was this, I always thought, that made the third floor so appealing. It was peaceful, a guaranteed place of solitude in an otherwise chaotic household.
I showered first, grateful to finally scrub the dirt out from underneath my fingernails. The decrepit pipes gurgled with defeat as I wrapped one towel around my wet hair and another around myself. Then I pushed open the door to my bedroom, fully intending to collapse on my old twin bed and not move until morning. There was only one problem with my plan.
My bed was already occupied. Leigh Lockwood was sitting on it.
Chapter Four
In Which I Make a Friend
It wasn’t exactly Leigh Lockwood. It was her spirit, or essence, or whatever you wanted to call it. She looked completely alive. That was a bad sign. The more corporeal a ghost was, the less likely she or he would move on to the afterlife. She glanced up as I swung the door wide, and I understood why my family was so infatuated with her. Leigh was the textbook definition of pretty: high cheekbones, soft blue eyes, and a sad, knowing smile. She had no aura—ghosts never did—but I imagined it as the pale-pink hues of sunset, washing across easy waves on a beach.
“I don’t know where I am,” she said solemnly.
Before I responded, I closed the bedroom door behind me. It was a habit of mine to keep my posthumous transactions private. “That’s because you aren’t supposed to be here,” I said. I hoped she couldn’t pick up the tone of regret in my voice. It wasn’t her fault she was haunt
ing me. I was the only medium in the coven. Naturally, Leigh’s spirit had sought me out.
I sat down next to her on the bed, pulling the towel off my head and beginning to dry my hair with it. I waited for her to say something.
“You’re Morgan, right?” she asked.
I nodded.
“Karma showed me pictures of you. She talked about you a lot.”
“That sounds like Karma,” I said. “Did she tell you much about me?”
“She told me that you can speak to ghosts.”
I nodded again, anticipating her reaction as she made the connection. For me, the worst part about meeting someone’s ghost for the first time was telling them that they were dead. Some of them already knew and understood. Others didn’t take the news so well. When a single tear appeared on Leigh’s eyelashes, I expected her to fall into the latter category, but she determinedly swiped the moisture away with the back of her hand.
“I never tried the apple pie,” she said.
“What?” I asked, confused.
“The apple pie,” she said again. “At the Fall Festival. Everyone always said it was like tasting a little piece of heaven, but I never got to try it.”
This was new. Most spirits lamented greater regrets. Leigh, it seemed, was a much simpler woman. “Trust me,” I said, attempting to reassure her. “I’ve had the apple pie. You’re not missing much.”
She chuckled softly. Then she asked, “What am I doing here?”
I tossed the wet towel to the corner of the room, retrieved my duffel bag from near the door, and turned it upside down, dumping its contents onto the bed next to Leigh. “You have unfinished business,” I explained to her, picking out a pair of flannel pajama pants and an oversized T-shirt to sleep in.
She turned around, politely facing the wall as I got dressed. I wouldn’t have cared either way. My privacy had been invaded by the dead so many times in New York that I’d forfeited any remnant of modesty in front of them.
“You can’t move on to the next life until you resolve whatever it is that’s keeping you here,” I explained further as I pulled the T-shirt over my head. “I assume you’re still around because you don’t know who killed you.”
“I was killed?”
Great. It was normal for ghosts to have shoddy memories about the details surrounding their death. I guessed memories didn’t transfer as well to the space between life and death. Unfortunately, it made my job as a medium a bit challenging. How was I supposed to help ghosts pass on if I didn’t know why they were still here in the first place?
“In town, earlier today,” I said to Leigh. She was handling the news rather well. She seemed quite acquiescent of her fate, listening intently as I filled her in. “Someone murdered you under the yew tree in the town square,” I continued. “Sacrificed you, actually.”
“Someone sacrificed me?”
“They tried to,” I clarified. “Pentagram drawn around your body, black candles, daggers, the whole shebang. Dark-magic stuff. So far, nothing’s come out of it.”
“What was meant to come out of it?”
I shrugged, sitting cross-legged on the bed. “Depends on the intention. Dark magic isn’t really something to mess with. Whoever did it is probably going to face the consequences eventually.”
She lay back on the bed, crossing her arms behind her head. For someone who had just found out she’d been murdered, she appeared rather content. If anything, she was more interested in the details of her death than devastated over the loss of her life. I respected her sense of calm. If it was me in her shoes, I would have been beside myself.
“What’s going to happen to me?” she asked as she stared up at the ceiling of my bedroom. “I mean, I won’t morph into something demonic? Since I was sacrificed or whatever?”
I tried not to laugh. Matters of the afterlife were hard to grasp for those who weren’t already familiar with it. Honestly, I didn’t even know if there was a heaven or hell. I just hoped that the souls I helped moved on to a better place. “No, fortunately for you, that’s not how dark magic works,” I explained. “Usually, a sacrifice requires a pure soul. Someone decent. From what I hear, you fit the bill.”
“But will I move on? To whatever’s next?” For the first time during the conversation, I heard her voice waver. A breath caught in my throat. It was one thing to fear the afterlife as a living, breathing human, when death seemed far enough off to avoid thinking about it. As a spirit, trapped between worlds, facing the fate of your eternal soul was a whole new type of terrifying.
I decided not to mention that the likeliness of her passing on wasn’t high. If I didn’t know better, she seemed alive enough to reach out and touch her. If I tried, my hands would pass through her, as if she wasn’t there. She wasn’t, really, no matter how mortal she appeared. Some people simply got stuck in between. Usually, it was because they needed to tie up loose ends on earth, but every once in a while, I had to give up on a spirit. No matter how hard I tried, some ghosts just couldn’t pass on.
“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “You’ll find that out on your own. Like I said, it’s probably because you weren’t meant to die so soon. Your memories might come back, they might not. Try to remember what happened to you. Sometimes, spirits just need to know why they died in order to accept it and move on.”
“Will you help me?” she asked. She sat up. Then, heartbreakingly enough, she tried to take one of my hands. I felt the familiar sensation of a ghost’s touch. It was like dipping my fingers into a chilly pool of water. Leigh, bemused, stared at her fingers. Then she passed a hand across one of my cheekbones, sending a frigid blast through me. I shivered involuntarily.
“It’s weird, I know,” I said, trying to defuse the situation. She responded by thrusting a fist through my nose, giggling madly. My brain glaciated. “Do you mind?” I asked, leaning away from her. “Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad you’re amused, but it’s kind of like getting a really intense case of brain freeze.”
“Oops.”
I wrinkled my nose then rubbed it with both hands, hoping to regain some sort of sensation in it. “Should I be worried about your lackadaisical attitude?” I asked. “Most people are a lot more upset when they figure out that they’re dead.”
Leigh sighed, her eyes softening. “I guess it hasn’t really sunk in yet. Besides, I lived a pretty nice life. Do I wish I had the option of continuing to live it? Of course. But it’s probably for the best that I don’t dwell on that, right?”
I nodded, floored by Leigh’s maturity. All my life, I’d been all too aware of how delicate life was. Speaking to dead people had that effect. Many ghosts lacked the emotional depth to accept their death, attempting to justify their leftover presence in the mortal world with any excuse they could think of. Every day I met a newly deceased spirit, I was reminded of my own fleeting mortality.
“And your family?” I asked. “Is there anyone you want me to call?”
Leigh shook her head. “My parents passed away a while ago, and I don’t have any other family.”
“Boyfriend? Husband?”
She gave another shake of her head. I was a little surprised at her lack of a support system, considering how polite and caring my family had made her out to be. People like Leigh usually attracted all types of people wanting to be involved in her life. At least I wouldn’t have to make any phone calls. Everyone always shot the messenger.
“Will you help me?” she asked again.
I couldn’t say no, despite the fact that I thought Yew Hollow would’ve afforded me a break from all of my ghostbusting. Leigh deserved to move on, and maybe she could help turn up a few more details about her death. It couldn’t hurt to look into it. After all, if I figured out who murdered Leigh, the police would have no choice but to cross my name off of their suspect list.
“I’ll do what I can,” I said.
She reached forward, as if to hug me, but I held my hands up to stop her.
“No offense,” I said, “but I’d
rather not freeze to death.”
“Would that happen?” she asked, tucking her arms against her chest as if preventing herself from trying again.
I laughed. “No, it’s just really cold.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “Listen, I’m exhausted. Can we start Nancy Drew-ing tomorrow?”
“Of course.” She hopped up from the bed, allowing me to pull back the duvet without reaching through her. She gazed around the room. “Um… what should I do?”
I slipped underneath the covers and plumped up my pillow, which had flattened out over the years. “You can stay here, if you like,” I said, “but it might do you some good to wander around town. Check out the yew tree and the town square. Sometimes, it helps to revisit the places you were right before you died. It might jog your memory.”
She nodded and vanished. If there was anything I envied about ghosts, it was their carefree method of transportation. I pulled the duvet over my head and, within seconds, fell asleep.
In the morning, I woke to find Leigh sitting at the end of my bed. Sunlight streamed in through the round window above the bed, dust dancing through its golden beams.
“Good morning!” Leigh said. She patted the bed impatiently. “Get up! We’ve got a crime to solve.”
“Easy there, Sherlock. Let me wake up first.”
She stood and started pacing around the room. “Fine, but tell me about the town legend.”
I threw off the duvet, lugged myself out of bed, and stretched. The old twin bed hadn’t done any wonders for my back. I felt sore and stiff. “I thought you knew all about the legend,” I said to Leigh, passing by her and into the bathroom. “My sisters said you helped out with the reenactment every year.”
“I did. That’s why I’m curious. Didn’t you use to sacrifice men under the yew tree every year?” She followed me into the bathroom, leaning against the doorway as I brushed my teeth.
“I didn’t sacrifice anyone,” I clarified, mumbling through a mouthful of toothpaste. “It wasn’t done out of spite or power either. The annual ritual was meant to provide the original coven with a foolproof type of protection.”