Chris Green - Only the Good Die Young

“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 . . . tock s, tick . . . tock s.

“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.