‘So tell me more about Ben,’ said Edie, raising an accusatory eyebrow. He was on his way over, so I’d instigated a mass cleaning session. I didn’t want him to know what state our home was usually in.
I so wasn’t falling for her bait. ‘He’s been helping me with some research, since he can see ghosts too, and he has a degree in parapsychology.’ I polished the windowsill with a cloth, putting more pressure onto it than was necessary. ‘He’s offered to help us with Abigail. I thought the least I could do was feed him to say thank you.’
It had only been a day since Abigail had had her fit, but her health had started to deteriorate more rapidly. She’d appeared fine in the hospital, but the moment she’d gotten home, she’d been overcome with fatigue. And had barely moved since.
Usually I didn’t invite people over for dinner, but he’d found an alternative exorcism for us to try and had offered to help. I didn’t know how else to show my gratitude. Exorcisms were dangerous for the possessed person and the person doing it. The more protection we had, the safer all of us would be.
Was I comfortable Edie spending more time with Ben? No. It made me nervous. I really wanted them to get on, but I couldn’t work out why.
It would be nice to have someone in the supernatural community we could use as backup. I’d always had to do things on my own in the past – Edie’s dad aside – and it was getting tiring. While books were great, they’d never be better than real-life backup.
Ben’s quick-thinking with the sleeping draft may well have saved my life when Abigail – or whatever was inside of her – had thrown me across the room. Who knows what would’ve happened if I’d tried that and been on my own? Would Edie have become an orphan?
‘But how can he help? Can he cast spells to?’ asked Edie as she cleared the coffee table of half-read books and magazines.
‘Everyone can cast spells,’ I said. ‘It’s not a special thing.’
Tilly went mad before I could say any more, barking and dancing around. A second later, someone knocked on the front door. Even aged two, our Westie Warning System hadn’t changed. Who needed a doorbell when the dog let you know as soon as someone walked down the drive?
After tossing the polishing cloth into a drawer out of the way, I answered the door with a smile. ‘Ben! Welcome!’ I picked Tilly up so that she didn’t jump up at him. She wriggled in my arms.
‘Hello again, Tilly.’ He reached over and fussed the top of her head. She licked his hand in approval.
I pointed to the sofa, where Edie was flicking through her phone. ‘And you know Edie.’
‘Evening,’ said Ben, giving her his most charming smile. My insides turned to jelly.
‘Hi,’ said Edie, not looking up from her phone. Well, it wasn’t outright hatred. It was a start.
I closed the front door and put the dog down. She jumped up at Ben.
‘Tilly! No!’ I said, picking her up again. ‘Sorry about that. She loves attention.’
‘It’s fine, I don’t mind. I miss having a dog,’ he said.
‘What did you used to have?’
He smiled wistfully. ‘A scottie. He was called Scot. Original, I know.’
‘I love scotties,’ said Edie. ‘I wanted one over a westie.’
Still holding Tilly, I turned to my daughter: ‘would you change her now?’
Edie tilted her head to the side, as if in thought. ‘No.’ Edie held her arms out. I put the dog down and she ran over, jumped on to Edie’s lap, then licked her face.
‘I must be boring already,’ said Ben as Edie and Tilly played.
‘It’s nothing personal,’ I said as we walked into the kitchen so that I could check on dinner. ‘They’ve both got short attention spans.’
He laughed, revealing a handsome and warm smile. Damn, he was cute.
No. No he was not. I was not allowed to think that about him. He was there to help me with Abigail. Nothing else.
I lifted the lid on the slow cooker to check the stew. The smell of beef, onions, and dumplings filled the air. ‘I made stew. I hope you don’t mind. It seemed easiest.’
‘So long as I don’t have to cook, I’m happy. It smells amazing.’
I couldn’t help but grin. I mean, I knew it smelled great. Maggie had given me the recipe and it was foolproof. Getting a compliment from him sent a shiver down my back and to unmentionable parts of my body.
I flicked on the kettle. ‘Brew?’
‘Please. Milk, no sugar.’
‘A man after my own heart.’
What a stupid, stupid thing to say.
He laughed. There was that smile. ‘I can drink it with sugar, but I don’t feel it needs it.’
‘I hate it with sugar. Edie has about three. She’ll have no tastebuds left by the time she’s thirty.’
‘I heard that!’ Edie shouted from the living room.
Ben and I met each other’s gazes and laughed. It was so rare for me to have another adult in the house. Usually Edie and I went to the Morgan’s place, not the other way around. It didn’t make sense for them to come to ours when there were more of them and their place was bigger. You couldn’t even fit their family into our living room.
‘How’ve you been since our, uh, encounter at your friend’s house?’ said Ben, pulling out a chair at the breakfast bar and sitting down.
I carried on making drinks for all three of us. ‘Sore, but that’s nothing new at my age.’ Self-consciousness radiated through me. It was clear by Ben’s baby face he was younger than me. ‘How old are you, exactly?’
‘Thirty five.’
‘Damn.’
‘How old are you?’
‘How old do you think I am?’
‘I’m not falling into that trap,’ he said, laughing. ‘I’ve always been bad at guessing people’s ages. But you’re about my age, right?’
I laughed so hard I almost slipped on the floor and fell over. ‘No. I’m forty. But you get points for at least pretending you thought I was your age, totally forgetting Edie’s age.’
‘You did say you had her with your childhood sweetheart. You could’ve had her as a teenager.’
‘True, but I didn’t,’ I said. I’d totally take the compliment of him thinking I was younger than I was, though. Even if he was probably lying to flatter me.
The kettle boiled, and I carried on making our drinks.
‘So, back to Abigail. How’s she been? Have you or any of the others noticed any other symptoms?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Different symptoms will tell us how she’s responding to the possession. And what’s possessing her.’
I dropped a tea bag into a mug and turned to him. ‘What do you mean “what’s possessing her”?’
‘Ghosts aren’t the only creatures that can possess people, you know.’
I scoffed. ‘Ghosts are real. Things that go bump in the night aren’t.’
Ben raised an eyebrow at me. ‘You believe in ghosts, but you don’t believe in anything else?’
‘I believe what I can see.’
‘How do you know all the supernatural occurrences you’ve seen are ghosts?’
Tilly ran past, barking. A moment later, Spectre, the ghost cat, followed.
Ben turned to me: ‘you have a ghost cat?’
I shrugged. ‘He came with the house. Tilly likes playing with him, so I let him stay.’
He shrugged. ‘Fair.’
‘You think Abigail might be possessed by something that isn’t a ghost?’ said Edie, joining us in the kitchen and sitting opposite Ben. She eyed him warily.
‘I think that anything is a possibility. We shouldn’t rule anything out or make assumptions. Your mum said you went into the bedroom and felt something?’
‘Yeah,’ said Edie. ‘It wasn’t the same as when it’s a ghost. It wasn’t as suffocating, but it felt…off, somehow. I don’t know how to explain it.’
I hadn’t told anyone how I’d felt in Abigail’s room. It still concerned me, and I didn’t want to give anyone more to worry about. Especially when what I’d felt had been so different to what Edie had. How could two people, so closely related, experience the supernatural so differently?
I put Edie and Ben’s teas in front of them and leaned against the sink, facing them. ‘So what else could be possessing her?’
‘Usually you’re right, it is a ghost,’ said Ben. He removed his glasses, wiped them on his shirt, then put them back on. ‘But there’s a lot of dark happenings in this town right now. That kind of negative energy can attract succubi, werewolves, demons—’
‘Demons?’ I said.
‘Werewolves are real?’ said Edie.
‘As in demons that try to create hell on earth and procreate with humans?’ I continued, ignoring Edie.
‘Not all of them want that, but yes. Demons out to cause trouble,’ said Ben.
I scoffed. ‘Understatement.’
‘I thought you didn’t believe in demons?’ he said, raising his eyebrow at me. I wished he’d stop doing that. It was distracting.
‘Doesn’t mean I don’t know about them,’ I said.
‘I don’t know about them!’ said Edie.
‘And you don’t need to,’ I said.
Edie huffed. One day, she’d understand. I hoped.
Ben sipped his tea. It was at that moment I realised I’d given him my Artistocats mug. I resisted the urge to laugh or close my eyes or otherwise show how embarrassed I was. If he’d noticed he was drinking from a Disney mug, he didn’t say anything. Then again, we were talking about more important things.
Edie’s phone rang, jumping us out of our conversation. She ran to where she’d left it in the lounge, knowing the only person to ring her would be one of the Morgans. And they all hated using the phone, so they usually texted. Had something happened with Abigail? I ran to her as she answered.
‘Josh? What’s wrong?’
She put it on speaker so that Ben and I could hear, too.
‘It’s Abigail. She’s gone nuts! Can you come? Please? Bring…something. I don’t know. Can kids get possessed?’
Edie and I exchanged worried glances. It looked like we wouldn’t have time to formulate a plan.
*
The three of us dove into the car and drove the couple of minutes down the road. Any time we could save would help. What were we about to walk into? How bad were things?
Josh was at the front door as soon as we pulled up. He reached out for Edie, and the two of them hugged. It would’ve been cute if something wasn’t desperately wrong.
‘Josh, what’s going on?’ she said.
I didn’t get a chance to hear his answer. As Ben and I reached the front door, it slammed in our faces.