Only the Good Die Young

17

The first part of the day was uneventful: Gavin did go to work, and he was a bummer deal there, too. He buried himself in his computer, utterly ignoring me even when I tried to mess with him by blowing along his arms and chilling him, reminding him that he wasn’t alone.

But he was smart, this guy, and not only was he pretending I didn’t exist—he’d kept his office door open after asking a few of his designers to stay inside for hours as they worked on that Victorian aircraft/fire/dragon game.

That didn’t exactly stop me from trying to initiate a hallucination, in spite of his coworkers, but even that didn’t seem to be working today. He’d somehow found a way to block me even better than Amanda Lee.

The only interesting thing that boded well for the haunting was the fact that Gavin kept his phone in the corner of his desk, and he occasionally glanced at it, then up in the air, in my cold direction.

Every time he did, I dipped down and gave him another feel of my fingers over his skin.

Ghosts exist, I thought to him, like he could hear. Just ask Alicia Dantès.

After I touched him about fifty times—no joke, I was on a roll—he finally reached his limit, grabbing the phone and fishing a piece of paper from his jeans pocket as he walked out of his office, telling his employees he’d be back.

Had I driven him to falling into our mild trap?

I trailed him, recognizing that paper in his hand. Amanda Lee had written on it earlier in the day, and now I could see that it said “Alicia Dantès” just above the number of her disposable phone.

I could feel the tension in him as he went into the hallway restroom, then stared at the writing, then at the phone. After a few strained minutes, he cursed and dialed.

Since I could hear everything, I didn’t miss the barely concealed satisfaction in Amanda Lee’s voice as he asked her to come over tonight to do what she usually did with ghosts.

For the rest of the day, it was like Gavin was pissed at himself for giving in to superstition, and there were a few times he picked up the phone again and paced in front of his long office window as his employees watched him. But he never canceled the appointment, and he even called Constanza to let her know that they would have company tonight. Also, he left a message for Farah before retreating to the office’s bigger work floor, where he lost himself in other consultations with his employees.

Snore.

But when dusk seethed over his office building, he had to go home, and right after we stepped foot into the mansion’s foyer, Farah rushed to the door to stand in front of Gavin.

“I just got home,” she said.

“Good for you.”

“What are you doing, Gavin? What’s going on in the sitting room?”

“I left you a message about it.”

“My phone ran out of juice while I was running errands, and I haven’t plugged it in yet.” She was plucking at her designer lavender pencil skirt, obviously rattled by Gavin’s strange visitor. “Constanza said that you asked that stylist to come in and set up a table with a crystal ball.”

I guessed Amanda Lee had never talked to Farah today, owing to the fact that Gavin had gotten hold of her first.

“Yes, I did clear it, and if you think I’m out of my mind for doing it, I would say you’re right.” I was pretty sure he meant it. “It’s good that she’s already here. That means we can get this over and done with.”

“Get what over?” She looked freaked. “A séance?”

“If that’s what she’s going to do for us. And if you’d met with me last night instead of taking off to James’s, you’d know more about why Alicia Dantès is here. You didn’t listen to my message at all?”

“No. Constanza isn’t sure why there’s a crystal ball involved, either.”

These people might as well have lived in separate caves. I’d never known families like this in life, hadn’t known one could even exist except for on programs like Dynasty.

It just took being a ghost to find out that not every family was normal.

“This woman’s psychic,” Gavin said, “and when she delivered your clothes today, she felt something in this place.”

Farah hugged herself, looking around. I ate her fear right up.

Gavin wasn’t afraid, though. “Wendy and I have been aware of strange things going on here, too.”

He gave her a searching glance, like he was asking her if she’d felt anything. Farah shook her head, but I could tell she’d been asking herself what that chill was last night. What had been following her.

What might’ve chased Rum Tum Tugger away.

Gavin seemed impatient as he ambled over to the sitting room’s entrance with me flying well above him and, sure enough, Amanda Lee was in there, dressed in her businesswoman-in-glasses costume again, smoothing a linen cloth over a big round table. A sketch pad and a pen waited on it, along with a crystal ball.

She was going all out.

When Farah dragged Gavin back into the foyer to further discuss this with him, I cruised into the room, to Amanda Lee.

“You can thank me for having Gavin call you today,” I said. “I think I irritated him enough so that he reached his wits’ end.”

As the murmur of Gavin and Farah’s chatter crept into the room, Amanda Lee only looked sidelong at me with a faint smile. I guessed it wasn’t time to converse with the ghost yet. And when she fixed a significant glance on the other side of the room, I understood why she wasn’t speaking to me.

Wendy Edgett was standing by a fireplace, staring straight at me. Or, at least, where I would be if I existed.

“Is that her?” she asked Amanda Lee, who only kept smiling, except mysteriously now.

Good God, this girl was sharp for a nonseer.

“I do sense a presence in the room,” Amanda Lee said in her Virginia lilt. “How did you know?”

Wendy only shrugged and knit her eyebrows together. She had slung her dark hair back into a high ponytail except for her pink streak, which framed her face on both sides. She was still wearing her school uniform. “You can say there’s a sort of… I don’t know. A cloud that I can barely see.”

I tried not to have a cow. She could kind of see me?

“Who is she, Ms. Dantès?” Wendy asked.

“I don’t know yet.”

It was weird watching and listening to them like I wasn’t even here.

Outside the room entrance, Farah’s voice got panicked. She was asking Gavin to not dabble in this “dark stuff” with psychics and séances.

Grudgingly, I had to respect a man who wasn’t so macho that he was beyond accepting help when he needed it. Then again, maybe Gavin was just desperate to “get rid” of me. I would be, too, if I had something giving me waking nightmares.

Wendy was shaking her head, sending Amanda Lee a sheepish look. “Farah might not be interested in all this, but I sure am.”

“Not everyone is, and I assume that includes your sister.” Amanda Lee gave one final neat-freak swipe to the tablecloth, then adjusted her glasses. “It’s hard for some people to accept that their house has been occupied by something uninvited. Farah’s just one of them.”

“This place has always been full of uninvited stuff.” Wendy crossed her arms over her chest. “Can’t you feel that?”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

I floated closer to Wendy, kind of sorry for her. I’d been lucky during my teenage years—accepted, befriended, having a loving family without siblings who made me feel like crap.

Wendy came to the table, tracing the linen with a finger. “There’re bad feelings all over this house, and they were here way before I took those ghost pictures. We all seem to hate each other… except for me and Gavin. Mostly, it’s Farah and him who argue all the time. And me and Noah. And Farah couldn’t give a rat’s ass about me.” She chuffed. “They say that you have to love family, but we’re the things that make this house dark.”

Amanda Lee smiled sympathetically at the girl, and I was pretty sure she wasn’t just acting. “Families can be strange.”

“Mine takes the cake.”

Just as I thought Amanda Lee was about to casually investigate the subject by encouraging Wendy to go on, the girl took a deep breath and sat heavily in one of the chairs around the table as she exhaled. “You know what I’m thinking?”

“Let’s see… being a psychic, I have a good chance of guessing. Should I give it a shot?”

Wendy laughed, and it was nice to see her happy for once.

She glanced at the room’s entrance, toward the continued utterances of her brother and sister, then back to Amanda Lee. “I think I know who the ghost is.”

I freaked out a little, my energy zitzing. Amanda Lee raised an eyebrow, but she didn’t look at me.

“Who?” she asked.

Wendy’s brown eyes were wide. “My adoptive mom.”

Oh. God, this wasn’t where I’d wanted the haunting to go at all.

I could sense Amanda Lee’s relief that Wendy hadn’t guessed some strawberry blond stranger was haunting her house, but there was a bit of sadness in her, too. “Why would you say that?”

“Mom died when I was little,” Wendy said, “and this ghost has been nice to me. She wanted to comfort me. And I think Farah doesn’t want you to summon her tonight because she didn’t get along with Mom. I was young, and I barely remember how they acted with each other, but Farah gets real quiet whenever someone brings her up, and she always has a bitter look on her face before she changes the subject.”

Amanda Lee walked toward Wendy, and she looked like she always did when she was feeling sorry for someone… usually me. Or was she just now realizing that Wendy, the girl she’d wanted to pin a poltergeist on, was a real person, not just a pawn?

“I don’t know who this ghost is,” she said softly. “But we’ll find out soon enough.”

Wendy wasn’t done. “You know what else makes me think she’s Mom? Noah hasn’t had any contact with her, but it’s only because she decided to leave him alone. She knew he liked his independence—when he was little, he always played by himself in his room. She respected that.”

“So he hasn’t felt a presence here?”

“He hasn’t said anything about it. I’m not even sure Gavin showed him my pictures last night or this morning. Plus, Farah brought me home from art class just ten minutes ago, and I didn’t run into Noah before I came in here, so I didn’t see how he reacted to Gavin inviting you over.”

“And the rest of your family?” Amanda Lee said, her jaw tight. “What do they think?”

“When I showed Gavin those pictures, he wasn’t afraid.” She laughed. “Well, maybe he was kinda uncomfortable. I got the feeling a ghost wasn’t a surprise to him, though. That Mom had been around him, too, even if he wasn’t telling me about it.”

“Why wouldn’t he let you know if he’s felt a presence in the house?”

“Gavin? He doesn’t tell us anything. But that’s all right. He’s a good brother anyway. He’s what my friend Torrey calls a ‘man’s man.’”

Amanda Lee really looked at Wendy. “It bothers you that he shuts you out.”

“Yeah, but he tries his best with us.”

It looked like Amanda Lee was about to put a hand on Wendy’s shoulder—two misfits connecting—but then Gavin, Farah, and even Noah entered, and Amanda Lee straightened up.

She had that lemonade smile again, and I think I was the only one who saw her back slightly stiffen at the presence of her prime suspect.

“Are we ready?” she asked.

“No,” Farah said. “I’m not sure this is a good idea.”

“Which part?” Amanda Lee asked in that lilt. “Contacting the spirit who’s joined your household or telling it to leave you alone?”

Gavin didn’t say anything as he walked to the table, taking a seat, sinking into it. His eyes were reddened, and I suspected he just wanted to get the badness out of the mansion so he could get some sleep.

“Let’s do this,” he said.

Farah was standing in front of Noah, who seemed interested in ghost night, even if his sister wasn’t.

“Why is this necessary?” she asked. “Wendy’s an artist, and this isn’t the first time she’s Photoshopped her pictures.”

Gavin must’ve shared them with Farah, probably on his smartphone, while they’d been arguing in the foyer.

It seemed Wendy was about to argue, but Farah sent her a nervous glance that quieted her.

Amanda Lee sat in the chair with the paper and pen in front of it. “Ghosts, Ms. Edgett, can escalate their behavior, and I think you might agree that it would be best to identify who this one is and if she’s trying to convey a message to someone in this house before you get to an unsettling point.”

“I don’t like this,” Farah whispered.

Noah pushed back that hank of dark hair that kept slumping over his forehead. “I didn’t even know there was a ghost around.”

That’s because I didn’t get to you yet, I thought.

I was near the ceiling, looking down on all this. Wendy kept glancing up, like she was scanning for me.

I wished I would have better news for her tonight, wished my identity would make her smile again.

Amanda Lee gestured toward the two open chairs at the table. “We’re going to initiate a low-key contact. It won’t be painful for anyone.”

Wendy was jogging her leg, excited. “Isn’t there a chance that we could be opening some kind of portal?”

“Something has already opened it. And something already came through.” Amanda Lee slyly gazed upward, and I knew she was sending me a nonverbal message.

This séance was only a show—a prelude to supposedly getting rid of me so that Gavin would let down that guard of his. She could sling around as much bullshit about portals as she wanted to because we were in control.

“Noah,” she said. “Would you please dim the lights and join us? Ms. Edgett, we have a seat waiting just for you.”

They both didn’t move.

Then Wendy sent puppy-dog eyes at them. “Come on. Please?”

Noah still seemed resistant, but maybe only because Farah was, because I could tell he was hooked. Maybe he did belong on the school newspaper, after all.

Wendy used her most compelling argument, aiming it at Noah. “I think the ghost could be Mom, and she’s trying to tell us something.”

“Really?” Noah asked. “How do you know?”

“Would I joke about Mom like this? The woman in the picture has the same blond hair…”

And that’s all it took for Noah. He made an I’m-strong-enough-to-give-this-a-try look and went to dim the lights by using a panel near the entrance.

As he arrived at the table, Farah watched him, then closed her eyes, gritted her jaw, and joined everyone.

Gavin was surveying his family closely, but I could guess what was probably running through his mind: if Wendy’s theory was right, then why would his mom would be so cruel to him with phone calls and phantom sounds from Elizabeth?

“I know this is nerve-racking,” Amanda Lee said. “But you’re all doing just fine. I’ll be summoning our guest now, and if I’m successful she might communicate verbally through me. If that fails, I have paper and pen for automatic writing.”

“What’s that?” Noah asked.

Wendy impatiently let out a breath, then said, “That’s a way of channeling, too. The spirit writes down what it wants to say by going through Ms. Dantès.”

Amanda Lee looked around the circle, but I noticed she didn’t linger very long on Gavin.

“Are we set?” she asked.

Wendy was the only one who nodded.

“Wonderful. Let’s hold hands.”

Amanda Lee was between Wendy and Noah. Thank goodness, because I was pretty sure her acting skills wouldn’t have been good enough for her to endure touching Gavin.

As everyone linked hands, I hung back, ready to follow Amanda Lee’s cues.

For a few minutes, she only closed her eyes and sat silently, and the others followed suit, although Noah kept peeking out from under his lashes at everyone.

Then, just as the ticktock of the near-distant grandfather clock in the foyer built up an unbearable tension, she spoke softly.

“I’m addressing the spirit in this house. We’re here to talk to you. Would you please visit with us? I’m open for you to communicate with the people here, and we want to hear what you have to say.”

Silence, chopped up only by those tick . . . tocks, tick . . . tocks.

“Don’t be shy,” Amanda Lee said. “We’re sympathetic to you.”

Farah was practically squeezing Gavin’s and Noah’s hands off, while Wendy was scrunching her eyes in concentration so hard that I was afraid she’d combust.

I stood by, waiting to see if Amanda Lee would need anything from me, even though, earlier today, she’d told me she would do all the work. Just when I thought she’d changed her mind about going through with this, she bolted up in her seat, still holding Wendy’s and Noah’s hands, her eyes electrocution-wide, her mouth open.

She looked like she had that day in Elfin Forest, when the vision of my killer had hit her.

Shit.

I readied myself to swoop in and knock her away from the table, making her break the circle link. But then she fell forward, still holding hands with the others, who seemed horrified at what was happening.

When she sat up again, she was normal, and she locked her gaze on Wendy.

“Wendy,” she said gently, in her Virginia Alicia Dantès voice. “It seems the ghost is focused on you.”

Nothing whatsoever had happened to Amanda Lee. She was just bullshitting. And I had a bad feeling that she was about to blame a poltergeist on Wendy.

The girl was already asking questions. “What do you mean, Ms. Dantès?”

“The spirit is attracted to the negative feelings you’ve been repressing,” Amanda Lee said. “Put simply, it likes you because you give it energy, but it wants to hurt everyone around you.”

She looked stunned, then bit by bit, crushed. “It’s not my mom?” she whispered.

Amanda Lee hesitated, like she really didn’t want to carry through. But then she said, “No, it’s not your—”

“Cut it out,” I said from my place near the ceiling. I supported her telling Wendy the truth about the ghost not being her mother, but I didn’t want Amanda Lee to go the poltergeist route, either.

But she forged on. “Poltergeists often center on someone who’s upset in the family, and they can produce smells and images and far worse things than the chills you’ve been feeling. They can get much worse. That’s why we’re going to banish it.”

Gavin sat back in his chair, still keeping the link alive. I had a sense that he’d been studying all kinds of ghosts on his computer since the other night, when he’d first met one.

I slowly floated downward, coming to Amanda Lee’s head, exerting pressure on her. “Just do whatever you’re going to do and then we’re done. No more putting a trip on Wendy.”

And that’s when I felt it.

Something else besides me in the room.

Something so fast and cold that it slammed me away from Amanda Lee.

My energy froze, spangling outward as I arced up and away from her, flattening against the ceiling with the force of the thing’s speed.

It retreated immediately, and went to Amanda Lee.

Below me, I could only watch in terror as she started moving like a puppet, disconnecting from Wendy’s and Noah’s hands, grabbing the pen, setting it to the paper like she couldn’t control the writing.

The pen swerved, creating sloppy words. Her breathing was quick, and I knew she wasn’t the one writing at all.

You will pay, the note said.

Shivering from the electric chill the other entity had sent through me, I saw a dark haze around Amanda Lee. What was it?

Before I could recognize any identifying features, it darted up and zoomed toward me again, still harrowingly unfamiliar, then cut through me like a blade this time.

I screamed, the sensation of a sharp edge digging into me, burying itself, energy splattering like blood.

Imitating my human death.

Amanda Lee’s voice rang out. “In the name of all that’s holy, leave us!”

It didn’t take more than that, and the thing whirled away from me as my essence wailed, feeling like ripped flesh.

With a crash, it shattered the nearest window, the curtains flaring out, the wind moaning in its aftermath.

It was like it’d done what it’d set out to do, and that was that.

The room was silent as the Edgetts gripped the table and I slowly came back together, shaking. Had Wendy been right? Had Amanda Lee opened a portal and let something far worse than me in, even though the other ghosts said meeting bad spirits didn’t happen that often?

Maybe it just took a séance.

Farah went slack and Noah hugged her to him. Gavin slowly stood.

“It’s out,” he said to Amanda Lee. “Will that be all?”

My thoughts were fuzzy, but even I knew that Gavin was wrong. Whatever had flown through the window wasn’t me. The family was far worse off now.

Amanda Lee clung to her Virginia accent, even as her voice quavered. “Let me fortify your house, just to be—”

“No. We’re done here. Thank you, Ms. Dantès.”

I thought for sure that Amanda Lee was about to tell him she’d messed up, but Gavin stepped away from the table, indicating she could leave.

“You did what you came here to do,” he said. “We’ll be fine.”

Amanda Lee paused, then cut her losses and gathered her crystal ball into her arms.

Wendy just stared at the broken window.

There was a movie I’d seen on Amanda Lee’s TV after I’d been pulled from my loop. The Silence of the Lambs. Jodie Foster, awesomely grown-up from Freaky Friday, had been an FBI trainee on the trail of a serial killer, and in one scene, she’d gone into a warehouse, where she’d found a jar with a head in it.

She’d had the same enthralled, fearful look on her face Wendy had right now.

As Amanda Lee left the room, she passed Constanza, who’d come to the entrance. The maid produced a small hissing sound as Amanda Lee walked by, hugging the crystal ball, ignoring her. Or maybe not hearing her because of the worry of what she’d accidentally unleashed.

When the front door shut and Amanda Lee was gone, Constanza talked calmly to the family.

“You don’t like her, Mr. Gavin. Me, either. So we let her go. But she was correct in one matter. Let me call someone who can make the house safe right away so the spirit never visits again.”

“It’s finished, Constanza,” Gavin said, his gaze dark.

“I know of a woman from my church,” she said doggedly. “I saw what went out the window, and I must call her tonight so we never have to worry about this again.”

Even in my fear-lined state, I knew she was talking about getting a cleaner in here.