––––––––
Joey felt dizzy, as if someone had hit him on the head occasionally with a blunt, heavy object. He had no recollection of the night before, except that he vaguely remembered promising Piper to do something with her...or for her. He couldn’t really recall it.
He blinked a couple of times before he could see anything. Not that it helped a lot, because when he woke up, he still had no idea where the heck he was. White walls, strange lights, unfamiliar surroundings, and a vague buzz of people chatting in the background.
It was only when he saw the machines surrounding them that he figured out he was at the hospital. More so, he was attached to an oxygen mask, which helped him with his breathing.
“Joey?” he heard a familiar voice ask. “Oh Joey, you’re awake.”
Someone bent over him and looked at him. All right, so he was awake, but he was still a bit too groggy to reply, or to move for that matter. Eventually his mind registered that the person hovering above him was Piper, and her voice sounded worried and relieved at the same time. Although he didn’t have a clue why she was worried in the first place, he was glad to see her. Glad...and slightly afraid.
But that didn’t make sense, now, did it? Why would he be afraid of Piper? She was a small girl, and although she might be able to take on another girl, she obviously stood no chance against him. He was a football player, for God’s sake. His fear of her was stupid, and he didn’t even know why he felt like that to begin with.
He probably had a concussion. Got hurt during a game, or hit his head on something. He could be clumsy like that sometimes.
Piper left. He had no idea where she went, but a part of him was actually relieved that she had left. It was only gradually that his memory returned, and he could recollect the events that happened last night. He had gone to Piper’s house. She had asked him to help her with something, something involving an antique mirror that was haunted or cursed. They had performed a bizarre ritual, along with Felicia, a girl he knew vaguely from school, and an old woman named Jeanne.
Next, Piper had turned against him. But crazy as it may sound, she seemed like she was actually possessed. She had dragged him along, up the stairs even, and all the while she had looked at him with this manic, depraved smile as if there was truly a demon inside of her. And for a flash of an instant, he thought he had seen features of Alison while he looked at Piper. But of course that was his imagination running wild. Obviously, he missed Alison and he felt guilty for what happened to her, and he was making things up. So Piper went berserk and hurt him, bad enough to get him to the hospital. Any sane person would choose to stay as far away from that nutcase as possible.
But Joey also remembered the way she had looked at him. How she had held his head and whimpered “Joey...oh, Joey...”, how she had tried to lift him up, how she and the others had dragged him back downstairs and had laid him down gently in the back of the old woman’s car. He was conscious still and had helped them along the way, although he probably hadn’t been of much use. He had been just too weak.
Maybe whoever attacked him wanted him to believe it was Piper who had hurt him. Yes, that must be it...
Joey used to be a rational person, and he didn’t believe in ghosts, apparitions, or demons. But a lot of that changed after Alison died. He sometimes swore that he could feel her presence, even now, as if she was watching him from a world beyond. He found the thought both soothing and terrifying. It certainly had made him less skeptic.
When he saw Piper’s complete change after Alison’s death, he thought maybe she had been seeing her too. At first, she had seemed okay with it, and although she was crying over her best friend, she was at least dealing with what happened.
But that changed after Piper moved to their new house and discovered that antique mirror. Ever since that day, she lived in denial, and maybe that had taken its toll on her, causing her to attack him. But Joey wasn’t convinced. He had seen something happen last night, and he would bet his entire collection of autographed football helmets on it that it was something paranormal, not Piper, that attacked him.
Other images flashed through his mind. He remembered the ghosts now, and how they had vanquished them.
“The doctor will be here any moment, Joey,” Piper said. He hadn’t even heard her return. She looked at him, her eyes telling him exactly how sorry she was.
“I’m sorry that you think it was me who dragged you along and hurt you,” she continued, tears filling her eyes. “It was the demon, Angele Renée. She took on my form to make you think it was me. At least, that’s what Jeanne said.”
She looked so innocent then, so hurt and alone, that it made his heart melt.
“And I’m sorry for Alison,” she added, tears now falling freely. “I’m so sorry,” she said eventually, and involuntarily Joey used his free arm to drag her closer and pull her into a half hug.
“It’s all right,” he whispered, feeling the incomprehensible need to comfort her, even after what she had put him through.
Be it post-traumatic stress or something paranormal, whatever was haunting Piper, it was over now. He could see that in her eyes. She had accepted the harsh truth that her best friend was gone and that no mirror, cursed or not, would ever bring her back.
Seeing her like this reminded him of when he had first realized he had fallen in love with her. His relationship with Alison was already deteriorating, and he had felt lonely and sad as he had walked to his locker after school. Then, out of the blue, Piper had been there. She had shot him one of her brilliant smiles, and asked him with all the innocence and carefree spirit he so longed for, “Come on, Joey, what’s that sad face for?” The sentence had been simple enough, and obviously well-intended, but it had hit him straight in the chest. The way she stood there, looking like there was no harm or pain in the entire world, she had made his heart melt.
Alison had been a persistent drama queen, a perfectionist by nature, a person who always criticized others because it was easier to do that than search for her own flaws.
Piper was completely the opposite. She never judged, she was friendly to everyone, and she always had a beautiful smile that could light up an entire room. He fell for her there and then, and those feelings hadn’t decreased over the next months, no matter how hard he tried.
“It’s all right,” Joey eventually managed to say, as he used his other hand, which he could barely move, to grab Piper’s hand. “It’s okay,” he repeated. “We’ll get through this, P. We’ll get through this together.”
She looked at him and smiled through her tears. That same brilliant smile she always had, except it seemed less shiny, less glorious now somehow.
Joey felt his fear return, for just a moment.
***
Piper and Joey held hands as they walked across the graveyard. They hadn’t felt the need to hold hands before, but now they did. Not to make a statement to themselves, Alison, or the rest of the world, but because they needed each other for support. They relied on each other, which became all too obvious as Piper squeezed Joey’s hand harder and harder as they neared their destination.
The tombstone in front of them was simple and elegant, just the way Alison would’ve liked it. It was made of white marble, and was entirely covered with carvings of souvenirs of the past. There was Alison’s favorite teddy bear, Papa Dumbles, which her parents had put on there. In addition, there were some pictures of Alison while she was still alive, hanging out with her friends on the cheer squad, and a couple of pictures of Alison and Piper. Those pictures hurt Piper probably more than seeing her best friend’s grave. They had looked so happy in those pictures, so carefree, and now all of that was gone forever.
“Let’s go,” Joey suggested after a couple of minutes. There was obvious grief in his voice. Piper simply nodded, and they turned around, leaving the grave of her best friend and his previous girlfriend behind them.
“This was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do,” Piper reckoned.
Barely paying attention to what was ahead of her, and lost in her thoughts completely, she was startled when she suddenly heard someone call out to them.
The voice belonged to Felicia. She stood a couple of rows further to the back of the cemetery. Although she didn’t really know Felicia and they didn’t hang around in the same social crowd, Piper would never forget the trouble Felicia went through just to help her out. They weren’t exactly friends, but they were getting there.
“Hey, Felicia,” she greeted. “What are you doing here?”
“Visiting an old relative,” Felicia replied, pointing at the tombstone behind her.
Piper bit her lip as she regarded the tombstone Felicia was pointing at. On top of the tombstone stood a small statue of an angel, and although it was covered with fallen leaves, Piper would recognize that tombstone anywhere. It was the final resting place of the previous owner of that cursed mirror. Abigail Spencer. Beloved sister and daughter.
“She’s...she’s your relative?” Piper asked, stumbling over her own words, her throat suddenly unbearably dry.
“Yes,” Felicia replied. “I didn’t really know her, but I always stop by her grave when I visit the cemetery, which is quite often,” she added, as if laughing at the fact that she had a morbid fascination for graveyards and the dead.
“Abigail Spencer, my great-aunt,” she explained. “She died long before my time. They say I inherited most of my gifts from her.” She winked at Joey as she walked over to the two of them. “Not those kinds of gifts,” she added as a joke.
Piper and Joey were the only people besides Felicia’s family who knew about Felicia’s ability to sense the dead.
After the events in Piper’s house, Felicia had told Piper about how she sometimes saw the spirit of Alison tagging along wherever Piper went, meaning that Piper wasn’t the only one who could see Alison. However, Felicia was convinced that the two events–the haunted mirror, and Alison still hanging around–had been unrelated. It happened a lot that ghosts seemed to stick around for a while to see if their friends and family members were all right. Since Alison was never up to anything malicious when she was with Piper, Felicia hadn’t assumed Alison had anything to do with the mirror.
As Piper looked at Felicia, she realized she should have seen the connection between Abigail and the young Goth girl a lot sooner. They had exactly the same piercingly blue eyes. Piper had never seen those eyes before with anyone outside the Spencer family. Also, when Felicia told somebody to shut up, she used the exact same gestures as Diane had.
“Well, it was nice running into you,” Piper remarked. “See you around.” She still felt uneasy around the Goth girl, although Felicia had always been perfectly friendly toward her and even helped her when she needed it the most.
For a second, Felicia’s eyes widened as she regarded Piper.
She recovered fast, but nevertheless Piper had noticed her startled expression.
“Yes,” Felicia replied then, but there was something in her smile that Piper thought was unsettling. As if she knew something about Piper, something that wasn’t quite right.