“There’s no way in hell I’m going back to that tree.” I yanked my hands off the pointer and scooched back against my bed.
“You can’t just end a session, Kaitlyn. It says so in the directions,” Dylan hissed, focusing back on the board. “Spirits of Hunter and Keisha and anyone else who is here, please go in peace until we speak again.” Dylan guided the planchette to goodbye, then let it go.
A pained, worried look gripping his face, he packed everything back in the box, and then leaned his head against the dingy wall.
I shoved the Ouija board into a cobwebbed corner under the desk with my toe, vowing I’d never touch that thing again. Even if it was just a game, it was totally creepy.
“Did you move the planchette?” He looked at me, his eyes deadly serious.
“Do I look like I moved it?” I hopped up on my bed and pulled my knees under my chin, hoping nothing would jump out and grab me from the slim seam of blackness beneath my box springs.
Dylan twisted his class ring round and round his finger, never taking his eyes off me. “No,” he said. “You don’t.”
“Did you?” I peeked up at him, half-hoping he’d pushed it, but I knew Dylan well enough to trust he wouldn’t have.
“Of course not.” He sat beside me and rubbed his chin. “I don’t have an explanation, but I know what I saw at the funeral. I know their spirits are here. But if that was really him . . . then Hunter and Keisha are trapped in that tree. And if they’re trapped, then we have to do something to help. We can’t just leave them there.”
“What do you want us to do? The cops don’t believe a damned thing we told them about the black truck.” No tire tracks. No tread marks. No evidence, they’d said. They said we were making it up based on the town’s stories. But they sure as heck seemed scared of something to me, like they couldn’t close the case fast enough. “You want to take on an investigation ourselves? Go and shoot more pictures? We’ll get chased by the same damn truck and we could get killed this time!” My voice rose with every word. We were all supposed to graduate from high school next year. Now two of us were dead.
“No.” He pointed to the Ouija board. “I say we take that with us and find out who or what is keeping them trapped.”
“Same thing.”
“No. It’s not. No camera and no peeing—”
“Oh, what? Now it’s Hunter’s fault?”
“No. Kaitlyn, stop. Hunt—Hunter—was my best friend. He was who he was. I’m just saying, we’ll do things differently this time. We’ll be quiet. Respectful. We’ll find answers.”
Shivers crawled all over me like a mound of fire ants set loose at a picnic. That was so not a good idea. “Is this the same Dylan who wouldn’t go off-roading with Hunter last summer because it was too dangerous?”
Dylan frowned. “That was different. And we’ll do more research first. Not just the Google searches I did about accidents out there. We’ll see what we can find about someone living—or dying—near that tree.”
“We already know about Old Joe. The whole town does.” My voice trembled and hitched itself up a notch. I couldn’t shake the image of him out of my mind. Old Joe in that photo. Hanging from that tree. Flannel shirt, dirty beard, bloated corpse. That dang truck must have driven him off the road and into the ravine. It killed him just like it killed Hunter and Keisha. I bounced my knees up and down, making my bed squeak.
“But there are stories of other accidents out there. Other people have died. You know we’ve heard whispers about it all our lives. What we need to do is to really dig into the history of the area. We need to do more research.” Dylan laid a hand across my legs to stop the bouncing, and a little jolt of hormones went racing through me. Oh, no. That was not okay. No one touched my knees but Hunter. No one made my hormones go racing like that except him either. I pulled away from Dylan, wrapping my old quilt tightly around me. Could Keisha have been right? Did Dylan want more from me now than I could give?
“It’s okay, Kaitlyn. We’ll go together. It might give us important information. So at least we’ll know what we’re up against.”
“You’re crazy,” I said, knowing I was getting sucked into a plan I wanted no part of.
Dylan’s iPhone buzzed. He glanced at the screen, which wasn’t cracked like mine. Granted, his was brand-new and mine was a hand-me-down from Mama’s friend at the welfare office.
“It’s my dad,” he groaned and tapped the ignore button. “I’d better go. But meet me at my house tomorrow morning at ten o’clock—sharp.”
“Your house?” Aside from the Devil’s Tree, the last place I wanted to go was Dylan’s house. Especially not if his mama or daddy were there. They’d like my trailer upbringing just about as much as they’d liked the color of Keisha’s skin.
“Just meet me there.” Dylan sighed, like this wasn’t the first time he’d had to convince someone to come to his house.
“I guess,” I said, far from convinced I’d even leave my room tomorrow.
My eyes shot open and I stared at the bloodred numbers on my alarm clock: 2:03 a.m. I didn’t even remember falling asleep. The last time I’d checked it was just past nine. Sweat plastered my T-shirt to my body and I wiped damp hair out of my face. Everything was quiet except for the faint hum of the window unit that pumped air into our living room, barely snaking its way under my door.
I kicked my quilt to the end of the bed and settled back, pulling the sheet to my chin. I didn’t like to sleep without covers—no matter how hot it was. Something about being all wrapped up and cocoon-like was comforting, safe. But the darkened silence of the room pressed in on me, like a covering of black wool over my eyes and ears. Not even moonlight seemed to make its way through my too-thin curtains. I closed my eyes, trying to shut out the eerie silence of my room, and hoped I could go back to sleep.
A jiggling, rustling sort of sound made my eyes snap back open.
Sheet pulled tight, I sat up. Peeking over the edge of my bed, I stared at the Ouija board box still tucked under my desk, just beneath my plaid curtained window. Crap. Dylan forgot to take it with him. Or maybe he’d left it on purpose so I’d have to go to his house to give it back.
Another rustling sound.
I swear it was coming from the box.
Oh, Lord, I didn’t want to see Hunter or Keisha again. Not dead, anyway. And not in the middle of the night.
Rustle. Rustle. Rustle.
Dammit, Dylan. Why’d you have to go and bring a Ouija board into my bedroom?
Shoving my fear aside, I threw back my sheet and stepped toward the box.
Rustle. Rustle. Rustle.
Oh. My. Gosh. It moved. My heart rate sped up in time with the jiggling box.
There was no way I could go back to sleep with that thing in my room. I had to get it out of here. And the quicker, the better.
Shoving the curtains out of my way, I unlatched the window, opened it, and popped out the screen. Warm, muggy air slammed into me, plastering my hair to my face.
I reached over and grabbed the Ouija board, ready to hurl it as far away from my window as possible.
That’s when a huge tree roach scurried out of the box and scuttled across my bare foot. I screamed and dropped it so the lid popped off.
It’s not like I wasn’t used to seeing roaches. In this part of Texas we had tons of them. Great big flying ones. The kind that liked to dive-bomb your head in parking lots at night on account of the big, blazing streetlights. I never quite understood why roaches did that, but it gave me the willies. Still, I sure as heck wasn’t used to seeing them in my bedroom. Mama at least had the sense to buy roach traps and bombs when we needed them. Ugh. I’d buy more when I was back to work at the Food Mart.
Then I laughed. Me. Afraid of a dumb, freakin’ roach. I watched it skitter up the wall and out my window. Good riddance. I kicked the Ouija board box across my room and stubbed my toe. “Ouch. Stupid game.” At least it was a roach and not some ghost. I sighed and closed the window. Dylan could come and get his Ouija board tomorrow—after he spent some alone time at home with his laptop. Seriously, only Mensa-boy Dylan would think research could give you anti-ghost super powers.
I turned back toward bed and stopped dead. Chilly air wrapped itself around me and my breath came out in billowy white puffs. Goose bumps crawled over my skin, and I shivered. That’s when I saw her. Through the waiting darkness of my room.
Keisha.
Sitting on my bed, she fixed her angry eyes on mine. “I know you, Kaitlyn Karly. I know who you are. I know what you’re like. And I may be dead, but I can still hurt you,” she hissed. “You stay away from Dylan. Or I’ll never leave you alone.”
I’d been sitting outside of St. Phillip’s Catholic Church, Father Alvarez’s church, since 3:00 a.m. The minute Keisha spoke, I bolted out of my room, and I wasn’t sure I’d ever go back. It wasn’t like her. Not the Keisha I’d known. My Keisha had been friendly and confident and happy. That is, until she got all boy crazy over Dylan. Still, she had never been mean. This Keisha was pissed as hell at me and I didn’t know why. I’d never try to take her man – ever. That was crazy. I loved Keisha. Something was seriously wrong. Maybe that’s what dying did to her . . . went and made her bat-ass crazy.
At first I’d wandered, chilled in the T-shirt and jeans I’d grabbed from the laundry line after busting out my front door, but then I came up on the church and it seemed like the best place to hide from ghosts. I’d been here since. Waiting. Hoping. Praying. Not that praying was something I’d ever really done. The last time I’d prayed was when Daddy left. But he hadn’t come back and I’d given up on the idea of a God who cared.
I never thought I’d go into a church again. Not after the funeral. Not ever. But if anyone would know how to deal with spirits, it would be a Catholic priest, right? Sooner or later, Father Alvarez would show up. I preferred sooner.
I wasn’t much for going to church. And when I did go, I usually dressed up. I guess God would have to forgive me looking scruffy. I clutched the hunter-green messenger bag Hunter’d given me last Christmas, which I’d snagged from my porch after changing out of my PJs in the early morning darkness. The bag had been sitting there, next to my sneakers, making me think of Hunter. It was way more dude-like than anything I’d ever used before, but he’d said it’d be good for me to have something “utilitarian” that also had a color that bore his name. I’d scoffed about it at the time and told him he shouldn’t have wasted his money. Now, I was glad I had the bag not only could I fit a lot of my crap inside, but it also gave me a way to keep a little piece of Hunter right beside me.
A dark blue Chevy pulled up, which was now the only car in the parking lot. There weren’t many churchgoers at 8:30 on a Friday morning. I sighed and stretched out my stiff legs. Sitting on the concrete entryway for over five hours had made my still-bruised butt hurt even more.
Father Alvarez’s booted feet and blue jean–clad legs emerged first. He stood up, then shut his car door with a thud, revealing a different man than I’d seen at the funeral. Not only was he wearing cowboy boots and jeans, but also an Astros T-shirt with no robes in sight. Really? A baseball-loving cowboy Catholic priest. Huh. Maybe I wasn’t so underdressed after all.
And maybe our town was actually starting to change. I didn’t think we’d had a Hispanic priest in town before. At least not that I knew of. It reminded me of a time Daddy’d said that when he was a boy no one would’ve gone to Keisha’s daddy’s bakery on account of him being black. I’d never understood that. Keisha’s daddy was the best baker around and what on God’s good earth did skin color have to do with his baking?
But Daddy said things were changing, and that now it didn’t matter to most people what color their baker or barber or dentist was so long as he was good at what he did. I was only around thirteen when he said that, but I remember thinking it was all very strange. Why would someone judge someone else because of their color? It made no sense at all. I sure as hell never cared about the color of Keisha’s skin. Black or white, pink or purple. Keisha was Keisha. I guess that’s how Dylan saw it, too, even if his daddy didn’t.
Father Alvarez saw me as soon as he shut the car door, his gaze flittering around the parking lot, then back to me. “Kaitlyn. Are you okay?”
With two-day-old smudged makeup, no sleep, and lingering bruises, I’m sure I looked anything but okay. And I felt like crap. But I wasn’t going to say all that. Now that he was here, I wasn’t entirely sure how to even mention seeing ghosts. No one at the funeral had seemed to see anything but the lights go out and me and Dylan running like lunatics from the church. For all I knew, they thought I was crazier than a cat who’d drunk a bucket of moonshine. So, I shrugged.
“Long night?”
“You could say that.” I climbed stiffly to my feet.
Silently, he unlocked the double glass front doors and led me inside.
I stopped in the doorway to his office, wondering if Keisha and Hunter would appear here again on church land now that their bodies were buried by a priest in hallowed ground. I wasn’t one to give much thought to superstition before the accident. Between work and school, I hadn’t had time for it—or much of anything else. Still, they’d showed up in my room since they were buried. So, I guessed they could show up just about anywhere.
Father Alvarez put his things beside his desk and looked up at me still lurking in his doorway. “Please, come in.”
I didn’t move an inch.
“There’s nothing here that will hurt you, Kaitlyn.”
I crossed my arms over my chest and shoved back a shudder. Maybe. Maybe not.
He opened his hands to me, his smile warm. “I promise.” He gestured to the chairs in front of his desk. “Please. Sit down. I’ll get you some tea.”
“Coffee. Black,” I barked without meaning to. I needed the caffeine if I was going to make it through the day. “Please,” I added lamely. “I’m more of a coffee girl.” Hunter used to treat me to a Starbucks every Sunday afternoon. I sure was gonna miss that quiet time with him. The time we dreamed about our lives together after high school. Our lives after getting out of this town.
The father nodded and went into an adjoining room I assumed was the kitchen.
Before I could read the copy of the Apostles’ Creed hanging on Father Alvarez’s wall, he was back. He set down a steaming mug in front of me, then held a cup to his lips. He took a sip, eyes never leaving my face.
I picked up my cup and stared into the dark liquid, letting the comforting warmth of the mug seep into my fingers.
“So,” he asked, setting down his mug, “you’re having trouble sleeping?”
“Yeah.” How lame. I squeezed my cup hard, then took a sip. My thoughts and fears twisted together, making everything I’d seen and heard seem totally crazy. Would Father Alvarez believe me? Would he call Mama? Social services? The police? I needed to tell him, but how?
“What happened to you and Dylan and your friends was a terrible tragedy. I know the funeral was extremely difficult for you both. It’s normal to grieve and feel angry and uncomfortable. Pope Benedict XVI once said, ‘The ways of the Lord are not comfortable, but we were not created for comfort, but for greatness, for good.’”
Was that supposed to make me feel better? There was hardly anything great or good about the deaths of Hunter or Keisha or my miserable life. Teeth clenched so tight so I wouldn’t say something I’d regret, I felt my jaws ache. Maybe I’d made a big mistake coming here. Telling people my feelings and asking for prayer just wasn’t me. Not even after Daddy left. But what choice did I have if I wanted help? Who else could I turn to?
“But I sense there’s something you’re not telling me. Something that’s bothering you.” He opened his hands on the desk – as if welcoming me in. “That’s what I’m here for. You can talk to me.”
“Yeah” I let the word out with a breath, hoping I could trust him. “You see, the thing is, Father . . . I . . . we, me and Dylan, we’ve seen things. Seen them . . .”
“Seen them?” His expression was serious, but not judgmental.
I couldn’t do this. He’d never believe me. Not in a million years. Who would? “Never mind.” I shot to my feet, clutching Hunter’s bag to my fluttering belly. “I—I think I made a mistake coming here.”
Father Alvarez stood with me. Reaching across the void between us, he touched my arm. “No, you didn’t. Please, Kaitlyn. You can talk to me in confidence. I won’t tell anyone. Truly, you’re safe here.”
I swallowed hard and fought the urge to run. Where would I go? Back to my drunk mama and Keisha’s ghost? To Dylan’s house? Comforted by his touch, I let out something between a laugh and a sob and fell back into the chair. “I don’t know how to say this, Father Alvarez. Maybe I’m going crazy. But Dylan and I, we’ve both seen Hunter and Keisha since the accident. We’ve seen their ghosts.”