by Eve Paludan
“You made that up!” she said.
“It’s true. Listen, there is no way I would have slept with your boyfriend, but the thing is making every person in the house and every spirit go crazy for each other.”
“I don’t want to hear this nonsense that you are being controlled by some icky thing. Just get rid of the bad ghosts, Pauline, so we can make our movie on Monday in this freaking haunted mansion,” she said to me. “And then, I want you to give me my body back and get out of my sight and out of my life! I thought you were my friend, but you…you really, really hurt me tonight.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“You should be.” She let out a huffy breath.
“Okay. Right now, we’ll get rid of the bad spirits, I promise. We just have to hold hands to harness enough psychic power to deal with the spirits in the house.”
She nodded, and I saw what I really looked like when I cried. I felt bad to make her cry and screw up my face like that.
I squeezed her hand.
“Pauline,” Amanda said from inside my aging body. “Ramon is mine.”
“I know.”
“You knew and, yet, you did not set and respect a professional boundary.”
She was right. “I am sorry. He’s very…persuasive.” Sexy.
“Listen, Ramon and I have loved each other for a long time. But he is not always faithful to me, so I have kept my feelings unsaid with him, even though he is the love of my life. And you slept with him tonight. I saw his face. Did you tell him that you loved him?”
“I may have at a certain point where I wasn’t thinking straight,” I squeaked.
“Oh!” she said, angrier. “That was not for you to tell him, Pauline. You got in my body and took advantage of his heart. Never mind his body, which you apparently commandeered, not like a bunch of other women haven’t been there, too, because he is kind of a strayer sometimes, if you get my drift. But his heart, Pauline! Really?”
Now, I really do want to die. “I know you don’t believe me about being forced by this creepy flying fireball with teeth that drip blood.”
“Oh, come on!”
“Fine. If you don’t believe me about being mind-controlled by an entity, I will just apologize. Can you ever forgive me?” I choked out.
“I know what it’s like to kiss Ramon Santiago. He’s loving and passionate and giving. He’s all about pleasing the woman in the bedroom and he won’t let you up until you are completely exhausted from…you know what. I might someday forgive you for that. But it was not for you to say that you loved him. That, I cannot forgive you for. Ever.”
Speechless, I hung my head in shame. I had never felt so low. I didn’t know what more to say to her. Until she believed me about the evil thing, she thought I was just some sort of boyfriend-stealer.
“Ahem, maybe I can help,” said the witch. “Tell me exactly what you saw.”
So, I took a deep breath and addressed Allison the witch with some medium concerns. “Allison, when I was in the bedroom with Ramon, there was some sort of fireball spirit dripping blood on us from where it was floating up by the ceiling.”
She nodded, concern riddling her face. “It sounds like a soucouyant!”
“What is that?” I asked.
“It’s a Caribbean vampire of sorts that sheds its skin and drinks people’s blood. And the victim either dies or becomes a soucouyant herself—”
“Eww,” I said. “And you know this, how?”
Allison said, “I know a lot about vampires. We need to find the soucouyant’s skin and heavily salt it, so she can’t get back in it.”
I gulped. “Listen, Allison, I didn’t sign on for vampire hunting. Ghost whispering, yes. Vampire hunting, no.” My heart rate increased. Vampires are a thing?
As if reading my mind, Allison said, “Vampires are real. Get it? And the soucouyant is messing with the other spirits and even people in the house, controlling them. Making them violent. Or even making them get sexy with each other for her own amusement or to choose her next victim. It’s called ‘compelling’ them.”
It was all starting to make sense to me. “But I thought vampires had human bodies, not these fireball things with teeth that drip blood.”
“That wasn’t her blood. And there are more vampires and types of vampire in the world than you can imagine.”
Suddenly, I got a flash of something from her in my mind. “A pretty human-looking vampire with dark hair. I saw her in your thoughts. About five-two. She turns into this prehistoric-looking bat thing that flies. Wow.”
Allison gave me a sharp look. “She’s one of the good ones.”
“You know a vampire and you’re friends with her?”
“Keep that under your hat. She’s not like the soucouyant vampire in this house. We need to get rid of that creature before she kills someone. Or turns them.” She paused. “Anyone get bitten? Since it’s a soucouyant, look for small black-and-blue marks.”
I examined my body, shuddering. “Not me. She got blood on Ramon, though I don’t think she bit him.”
Allison breathed a sigh of relief. “Then you’re both lucky. But obviously, she bit someone at this party, though.”
Amanda, in my body chirped, “I’m a huge Buffy fan from back in the day and I’m up for some vampire hunting. Let’s kill the bitch that dripped blood on my Ramon and bit someone at this party.”
“Oh, you suddenly believe Allison but not me that I was being controlled?” I said.
“Allison doesn’t have designs on my boyfriend.”
“Whose blood was dripping from the soucouyant?” I asked.
Allison sighed. “We may never know until it seeks a victim. It could be days from now. Or weeks from now.”
I shook my head in frustration. “All right, Allison. Assume this thing is a soucouyant. Where do we find that skin you were talking about?”
“In a mortar,” she said.
Amanda tilted her head. “To the kitchen! I mean, it’s not my house, but I assume a mortar would be near the spices and kitchen utensils.”
We raced through the house and ransacked the mansion’s well-appointed kitchen cupboards, emptying them onto the counters and floors. No mortars were in this kitchen.
I was perplexed until Amanda, in my body, pointed a shaking finger at a big Cuisinart food processor on the counter with something icky-looking in it.
“There,” she said. “What’s that, Allison? It looks like a piece of tan suede jammed in there, with a bunch of folds.”
Allison held her hands over the Cuisinart and opened the top of it. She took a whiff and gagged. “This is it! The skin of the soucouyant! Hurry and get me some salt! A lot of it!”
Just as Amanda and I grabbed round blue boxes of salt and Himalayan pink salt and Kosher salt from the pantry, the spirit with the blood dripping from its mouth flew through the wall into the kitchen and let out an unholy screech, trying to protect its skin from us.
“Now!” Allison screamed. “Don’t let her get back in her skin! Hit her with the Kosher salt first!”
Amanda and I poured and flung all the salt we could on the folded skin in the Cuisinart and Allison put the lid back on and turned the machine on full power. Whirr!
The creature screeched so loudly, in death, that my eardrums vibrated. A fireball blasted through the kitchen window, breaking it before disappearing into thin air. We heard a sound like a coal sizzling out. And there was a little smoke that smelled badly.
I glanced all over the ceiling, looking for any evidence of vampires like that one.
I said, “I know she’s dead, but now what?”
Allison replied, “Now her minions will come after us. They are less powerful, but keep your guard up.”
Noticing Allison lifting the Cuisinart jug off the machine, I cringed. “What are you going to do with that pureed skin?”
“Oh, a soucouyant’s skin can be made into a powerful charm. Elixirs. Wonderful, powerful potions.”
I shuddered. “That sou
nds like black magic to me.”
“Most of the time, you can fight evil with good, but not always,” she said.
“Glad you’re on our side.” I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. “I feel better knowing I am not being controlled by something,” I said. “I have no designs on Ramon,” I assured Amanda.
Allison sighed. “I’m glad the compulsion is broken. That means she’s dead. Now, let’s bust some ghosts!”
“I prefer to whisper them toward the light,” I said. “Unless they are evil. In that case, Allison, please show them the curb.” I looked at her gratefully.
“What are the chances that evil things are left in this house?” Amanda asked Allison.
“Count on it that minions of the soucouyant are still about. They are not able to compel people, but they can injure or kill.”
I grimaced. “Thanks for your help, Allison.”
“You’re welcome.”
I looked at Amanda in my body. “Please believe it was not my fault that I slept with your boyfriend.”
She shrugged in my body, still butt-hurt.
“Do you really want me to go away after we dispatch them all into the light, or wherever?”
Without hesitation, she nodded. “Yes, please. I do want you to leave when your work is done, thank you. And thanks, Allison, for coming, too. You were the one who saved us.”
I was stricken by Amanda’s words. And Mack was nowhere to be seen. I felt lost and forlorn without him.
But it was time to do my medium work. Allison Lopez set up a converging trail of salt and whispered some sort of spell under her breath.
I looked at what she was doing with the salt. “I don’t work this way.”
“You’re going to need help. My kind of help. These aren’t your everyday lost spirits, Pauline. They’re minions of an evil entity and they are dangerous and demonic. They cannot go into the light, no matter how much you want that for them.”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Yes. We have to send them into the darkness, where they belong. There is no redemption for them. They were created by evil and they can never, ever turn good.”
That was a shock. But I suspected she was right.
Allison and I got busy herding all of the evil minions between the salt trails, from the bottom of the house to the top of the house. Eventually they crowded against the balcony where Ramon was sitting on the ledge. Obviously, he was unable to see them. One of them crawled up his pants and he scratched his calf.
I shuddered at what he could not see. “Ramon, come here. Right now,” I said, trying to get him out of harm’s way.
“I’m fine. There might be mosquitos out tonight, though.”
“Those aren’t mosquitos,” I said. “Come here.”
He grinned at me. “First, you want me. Then you run away from me. Now, you want me again. Make up your mind.”
Now, I could see more of the little demons climbing his legs.
“Ow,” he said. “Something’s biting me!”
In a panic, I said, “It’s the dark servants of the thing that dripped blood on you in the bedroom.”
He screamed and started whacking his legs with his hands. “Get them off me! Get them off me! I feel them, but I can’t see them. Where’s that Pauline woman?”
“I am her!” I shouted from Amanda’s body. “Begone, you evil things! Go back to the darkness where you belong!”
But they didn’t get off poor Ramon. In fact, he had more of them on him and now that he knew what was biting him, he was freaking out.
“Help me!” Ramon shouted.
“Oh, boy, here we go again,” said the witch. Allison whipped out a vial and popped it open. Then she quickly flicked drops of what looked like maroon blood at the evil entities—all of which were demons, not the spirits of the dead movie stars. As she flicked blood at them, she chanted mysterious words that I didn’t comprehend. She was obviously giving the evil spirits the heave-ho.
Gradually, they began to dissipate.
“Go home,” I said. “Go to your home!” I said when a dark door opened that looked like a black hole without any stars. It was so black that I had never seen that color of night, not ever. The black hole sucked them in as they screeched and tore at Ramon’s clothes and gnashed their teeth, biting him through his clothes to hold on. I had never seen anything like this as a medium. Ever. It was terrifying.
What was even more terrifying was realizing that I saw a lot more of the spirit world when I was sober then I ever had when I had been a constant drinker. All around me, I saw brighter auras and new colors and types of spirits that I never had. I saw things with a sharper clarity now—it was shocking at how much I had been missing.
“Psychic lady, whoever you are, do your thing!” Ramon yelled in a panic.
Right now, I had to save Ramon from these hideous demons that had been the minions of the soucouyant vampire.
“Hang on!” I grabbed Ramon’s arm with one of my hands, to keep him from getting sucked into the black void, along with the minions. And with the other, I batted those creepy, glowing-eyed creatures off him and into the black void.
Finally, there was only one left and I told it in a kinder way, “Go with your kind. You don’t belong here. Go with them. There is nothing left for you here. Your dark mistress is dead and your brothers and sisters are gone. Follow them. Now.”
Amanda, in my body, echoed my words and Allison said things I didn’t understand because perhaps, I was not meant to understand.
At all of our words, the last minion let go of Ramon with a haunting moan in a low frequency I had never heard before. It was a sound that almost made me wet myself as it disappeared into the black void and the supernatural door…closed with a bang and disappeared.
I breathed a sigh of relief at the same moment that the rest of us did.
“We did it!” I said. It made me so happy to have Allison’s help and even Amanda’s help.
“Behold the power of three,” Allison said mysteriously.
I began to relax and so did Ramon, leaning again on the balcony ledge, his hand over his heart.
Then, to my chagrin, a black snakelike aura wrapped around Ramon and my worst fears manifested in slow motion.
“It’s not over!” I yelled at Allison and I felt a horrible ripple down my spine, like a long fingernail scratching me.
Allison looked shocked as the evil entity that had been clinging to Amanda Jordan since childhood came out of hiding. As the spirit of that horrible criminal ran from me, he finally exacted his revenge on Amanda for killing him—the spirit gave Ramon Santiago a very hard…shove.
“No!” we all screamed together. Even Ramon.
As Ramon began to fall backward off the balcony, I grabbed him and held on, as if I could physically stop him from falling. But I couldn’t stop gravity. However, I didn’t let go.
That whole cliché about your life flashing in front of your eyes in the moments before you die? It’s true.
In my head, the years and moments of my life, from the earliest memories of my mother and father and grandparents holding me, through school and friends and lovers—all of the triumphs and disasters—they came at me in fleeting moments of happiness and sadness and pain and love.
And then, I hit bottom. Hard.
Right on top of Ramon Santiago.
Chapter Thirteen
I didn’t know how long I had been unconscious. All I knew was that everyone who had been upstairs, was now down here with me, standing in a circle, staring in horror.
I was in pain. Horrific pain.
But the screams and cries in the night were not mine.
They came from Mack, Amanda in my body and Allison the witch. Allison had apparently rid the house of the worst of the evil spirits, but had failed to throw an anti-gravity spell in front of her, if there was such a witchy thing as that. Now, Ramon and I were the collateral damage.
“Ramon?” I whispered. “Is he okay?”
&n
bsp; “He’s dead,” Allison said.
“Nooooo!” I couldn’t believe it.
A bunch of Amanda’s friends were calling 9-1-1. I was actually hurt so badly that I wanted to die. No, wait, it was her body. I had wrecked Amanda’s body. And I was inside my client’s broken body.
“Ramon!” I tried to shout, but it came out a whisper. Ramon couldn’t be dead. Not that vibrant man who had—done what he’d done. Who had said what he’d said.
Amanda knelt next to me. She was crying hysterically. “Pauline! I’m sorry. I didn’t mean what I said. I was just angry. Jealous.”
“I know.” I tried to turn my head, but there was an explosion of light. “My neck hurts. I think it’s broken. And everything is too bright. Is it the light coming for me? Am I dying?”
Déjà vu. I realized that I had said these very words, not days before, when I had awakened on the bathroom floor in my apartment.
“Your neck. I mean my neck, is bent at a horrible angle,” she said, her chin trembling as tears poured out of her eyes.
Allison felt for a pulse in the paling arm sticking out from under me.
“He’s already gone,” Mack said. “Let him be.”
“Ramon!” she screamed, already mourning him.
“Mack,” I said through difficult breaths, gazing up at him with regret. “I’m so very sorry.”
He shook his head sadly. “No regrets. Not now.”
“Don’t move her. Don’t move Amanda,” one of her friends said. “You could paralyze her.”
“Switch back with me,” Amanda said.
“No,” I said. “If you switch back, you are probably going to die or be paralyzed for the rest of your life.”
“Switch back. Right now, Pauline!” she demanded.
“No. As a medium, I’ve never lost one of my clients. And I don’t intend to start now. There would be karmic repercussions.”
“You don’t understand, Pauline. You have to switch back with me. Ramon is my soulmate, from another life. We finally found each other in this life and if I lose him now, I lose him for eternity.”