by Val Crowe
“You’re surprised that I’m not all over her right now?”
I looked back at Rylan. “What?”
“I’ve heard all the jokes,” she said. “Doubtless you have too. What’s a lesbian bring on her second date? A U-Haul, because she’s moving in.”
“Uh, I wasn’t—”
“Well, I’m not like that,” said Rylan. “I’m young, and I’ve got my whole life ahead of me, and I’ve got wild oats to sow, okay? So, I have no problem with hooking up with as many girls as I feel like hooking up with. Since that video filmed, I have taken home three different girls, got it? I’m all about playing the field.”
“That’s, um, that’s great.”
“Oh, no you don’t,” she said, folding her arms over her chest. “Now you’re slut shaming me.”
“I would never say that word about you,” I said. “I would never even think that word about you.” Right, I was now remembering why I kept my mouth shut around Rylan.
“Why do you care about this shit?”
“I had a theory,” I said. “But I guess it’s wrong.”
“A theory about what?”
“Look, you have this youtube channel—”
“So, why am I working at a coffee shop? Because I can’t totally support myself from the youtube ads yet. But I’m getting there. If things keep going at the rate of growth that’s happening, then by winter, I’ll be able to quit working here. And maybe I can even travel a little farther than a few hours out, make a cross-country trip or something. Hey, that reminds me. Wade says you have a vintage Airstream trailer. How much did you pay for it?”
“I didn’t. I inherited it from my dad,” I said. “But they’re not cheap. Listen, that’s not what I was going to say. I was going to ask if you had ever seen a ghost, like really seen one.”
“And if I say yes? You going to argue with me about how I must have been mistaken?”
“No. So, you have?”
“Sure,” she said. “You think I would be doing this with my life if I didn’t believe?”
“What if I told you that there was a, um, a specter attached to you?”
She drew back.
“You know what?” I sighed. “Never mind. How about an iced latte?”
“You want any flavoring?”
I lowered my voice. “Caramel vanilla.” Why should only people with X chromosomes get deliciousness?
She went off to make my drink, and we didn’t talk after that. Finally, she handed it off, and I went to sit down. I got a text from Wade that he was late for his morning class, and he wasn’t going to come to the coffee shop after all.
I sipped at my drink and wondered what I should do.
Okay, it was one thing to be committed to finding a way to get the barnacle off of Wade, who was my best friend and really important to me.
But the barnacle was gone now. Yeah, it was attached to Rylan and possibly sucking the life out of her. And that Charlotte girl who Wade had slept with, it was attached to her, so that probably wasn’t cool. But… it wasn’t attached to my buddy. Maybe it was no longer my problem. Maybe now, I could go back to the Airstream and drive off for somewhere else and leave all this behind me.
Yeah, maybe so.
I turned to the counter, debating on saying goodbye to Rylan or not. But she wasn’t there, thus saving me the decision. Shrugging, I made my way out of the coffee shop and started down the sidewalk.
I looked up at the blue sky above me, and I took a drink of my latte.
Wait, was that Rylan up in that window?
I stopped to look up. Yeah, that was her all right. She was in the third story of the building that housed the coffee shop, standing at the window, staring blankly out. She looked out of it.
Aw, hell.
What was she doing up there?
I went back into the coffee shop and went to the counter. Leaning over it, I yelled, “How do you get upstairs?”
There was no one back there. I guessed Rylan had been working by herself. I found the swing door and went back behind the counter. I wandered around the espresso machine and the rows of flavored syrups until I found a door. I went through it.
Now, I was in a storage room. Big bags of coffee, containers of flavored syrup, boxes of lids, and boxes of cups. In the corner, a set of narrow stairs. I hurried over to them and I started to climb.
I emerged onto the next level, where there was a closed door. I unlocked the door and went through it to the second floor, which was apparently apartments, because there were three doors with numbers on them. There was another set of stairs at the end of the hallway. I hurried over to the stairs and climbed up them.
At the top of these stairs, there was one big room. Maybe someone was going to try to section it into apartments as well. In a college town, you can never have too many apartments to rent out.
Rylan was still standing at the window. The barnacle on her neck was writhing and twisting. It looked more like the way Wade’s had looked outside Ridinger Hall. Ropy hair, hollow dark eyes, a female form. It had sunk long, spindly fingers into Rylan’s eyes and it was speaking to her, some kind of scraping whispers that I couldn’t understand.
“Rylan!” I yelled.
Rylan didn’t react, but the barnacle did.
It turned to look at me, fingers still sunk into Rylan’s face. It cocked its head me. “You,” it whispered, its voice like dry leaves.
I pointed at it, hurrying across the room. “Whatever it is you’re doing, stop.”
It strained for me, and its form twisted, its hair changing, billowing out, lengthening, darkening. “Get back here, you little shit.”
I stopped cold, my breath catching in my throat.
The barnacle laughed. “Deacon,” it said, stretching out the syllables of my name.
“You—you know me?” I choked.
“This loop is strong,” sighed the barnacle. “But you call to me, you sing to me. Oh, if I could, the things I would do to you.”
I swallowed. I was rooted to the spot.
“Maybe after I take care of this one…” said the barnacle and turned back to Rylan, mouth to her ear.
Rylan took a lurching step closer to the window.
“Wait!” I screamed.
The barnacle’s tone was sweet and wheedling, and though I couldn’t make out the words, I felt the tug of it, a strong urge to go through that window, just to see what was on the other side of the breaking glass.
I moved, sprinting across the room to run for Rylan.
Rylan tensed, as if she was about to fling herself into the window panes.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Rylan sprang forward.
I caught the back of her shirt.
She made a gurgling noise, hand going to her throat.
I was swaying, trying not to tip backwards. I got my balance and I grabbed another handful of her shirt. I pulled her back, into my body.
She turned, eyes wide, mouth stretched into an angry grimace. She clawed at my face. Around her neck, the barnacle screamed, like an outraged animal. It dove at me, icy air blasting me, going in my nose, down my throat.
I couldn’t breathe.
Her nails raked down my face.
I let go of her.
Immediately, she turned back to the window.
I could breathe. I sucked in air and seized her again. “Rylan!” I yelled. “Rylan, come on.”
She struggled.
“Answer me!” I snapped. “What’s your name? Say your name. Say it.”
Nothing. She thrashed.
“You don’t want to do this. It’s the barnacle. It wants you. Fight it. Come on, Rylan.” Maybe if I knew her full name… Her last name was Vincent, I remembered. “What’s your middle name?”
She still struggled, but now the struggles were less.
“What’s your middle name?” I repeated, this time with more volume. I had said it out loud more rhetorically than anything else. I had imagined commanding her with her full name, like anc
ient magic or a hypnotist or something, but now I was really asking her.
“Marie,” she sighed.
“Good,” I said. “Rylan Marie Vincent. Where do you live? What’s your phone number?”
She went slack in my arms, collapsing. She started to spout off her address, her phone number. The barnacle screamed, darting at me again.
I got a faceful of icy air, like being slapped in the face with needles of ice, and I let go of her. I went sprawling on my backside.
Rylan collapsed to her knees, panting.
I was struggling to breathe too.
The barnacle put its mouth to her ear, whispered to her again.
But Rylan brushed at her ear in annoyance, as if she was swatting a fly.
Pouting, the barnacle retreated, resting against her shoulder.
Rylan dragged a hand over her face. “What just happened?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. But I think it has something to do with Ridinger Hall.”
* * *
“Okay, let me get this straight,” Rylan was saying. “You’re Haley Joel Osment?”
I nodded.
We were in Wade’s apartment, but Wade wasn’t there. He was at his class. I had taken us there, because I didn’t know where else to go. Rylan couldn’t go back to work at the coffee shop. She’d gotten someone else to cover her shift. She didn’t want to stay there, either, so we’d gotten away from the place.
“Prove it,” she said, folding her arms over her chest.
“I just stopped you from jumping out a window.”
“Which doesn’t prove you can see dead people!”
“There’s a thing around your neck.” I pointed at the barnacle.
“Yeah, so you keep saying. And it’s Heather Olsen?”
“I don’t know what it is,” I said. “But it’s trying to make you jump like she did.”
“She didn’t jump. She fell. It was an accident.”
“Oh,” I said. “Well, you know, Wade didn’t really know what happened with her.”
“I didn’t know what?” The door to the apartment opened and Wade came in with a backpack slung over his shoulder. He eyed us. “So, next time you want a place to hang out, feel free to come to my place without asking and make yourselves at home. While you’re at it, drink out of the milk carton and sit on the couch with your bare asses. It’s no big deal, really.”
“It was unlocked,” I said. “Sorry. We needed somewhere to go.”
Rylan turned on Wade. “You said that Deacon didn’t believe in ghosts.”
“He doesn’t.” Wade took off his backpack and dropped it on a chair. “What the hell is going on?”
“Okay,” I said, “here’s the thing, Wade. I see ghosts. I kind of always have. Well, ever since I was like nine years old. My mother did this thing… it’s a long story. The thing is, I wanted to tell you, but whenever I tell people, they get really weird, and—”
“What? This is a joke, right?” Wade looked back and forth between us. “Ha ha.” He rounded on Rylan. “Are you filming this?”
She scratched the back of her head. The barnacle twined around her arm. “I sort of almost threw myself out a window in the building where the coffee shop is.”
Wade furrowed his brow. “You…?” He looked at me. He looked at Rylan. “This isn’t a joke.”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Deacon says there’s a weird black snake thing wrapped around my neck—”
“Attached to your neck,” I said.
“He says you had one too.”
“But now Charlotte has it,” I said.
Wade furrowed his brow.
“I know it’s a lot to take in,” I said. “I mean, you don’t believe in ghosts, I know that. And I don’t even know what this is. It’s a wraith or a demon or… I’m calling it a barnacle. Anyway, I don’t understand how it works. I thought it was passed on sexually, but that doesn’t make any sense. And I don’t know how it got on you, but I think you must have picked it up in Ridinger Hall, and—”
“Fuck,” said Wade. All the color had drained out of his face.
“Yeah, it’s kind of a lot,” I said. “But don’t start asking me about God or angels or fairies or whatever, because I don’t know what I see, and I basically try to ignore it, because I don’t know what it’s all about. The only reason I got involved with this was that I was afraid it was doing something to you, and I don’t want that to happen to you. I had to try to protect you. And then I saw Rylan, and I couldn’t just let her fall, so…” I ran a hand through my hair. “But I don’t know what’s going on at all.”
“It’s passed on sexually,” said Wade. “And it makes you fall out of a window.”
“Look, I don’t know,” I said. “I thought, because of Charlotte, but….”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Wade put his fist to his lips.
“You okay?” Rylan patted him on the shoulder.
Wade looked at me. “I killed Olivia, man.”
“What?” I said.
“That’s the thing I wanted to come clean to you about,” he said. “She and I sort of maybe slept together.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
I felt as if Wade had picked up a battering ram and shoved it into my chest.
I had to sit down. I collapsed onto his couch.
He sat down next to me. He was earnest. “Okay, I know we made that pact, and it was a good pact, and I fully intended to stick with it. But, man, you left. You got in that camper, and you drove off, and she stayed here. And she was just there, you know, like there. And I had to see her and talk to her and I just kept waiting for her to move on, to find someone, right? Because that would mean that she wasn’t supposed to be with either of us, that she was happy with someone else. But she didn’t. And then…”
I was having trouble with the basics of blinking and breathing and stuff like that. Olivia and Wade. Wade kissing Olivia. Wade and Olivia naked. Olivia touching Wade. I might vomit.
“Like it shouldn’t have happened, but after that night in Ridinger Hall, I just felt, weird, like drained, and I ran into her, and it seemed… I don’t know. Afterwards, I felt so much better. And then she died, and I felt like shit again, but now I feel great. This morning, actually, I woke up, and I felt a helluvalot better, but you’re saying that Charlotte… Oh, hell. This is insane. Look, Deacon, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”
I held up a finger. “Can you stop with the talking for a minute?”
“Yeah, okay.” He bobbed his head.
I put my head between my knees. He slept with her. She slept with him. All those years, and all that time thinking about her, and then he— I raised my head, nostrils flaring. “You ever think about why I left? You ever think maybe it was because it was hard to be around her?”
His jaw worked. “I’m really sorry.”
I sucked in a noisy breath.
“Um,” said Rylan. “I get that you two are having a thing here, but I’m confused. What do you mean, you killed her? And I had sex with a lot of people, so why do I still have my barnacle thing, huh?”
I blinked at her. Why was she here again?
Wade swallowed hard. He got up from the couch, wiping at his eye with the heel of his hand, and he went into the kitchen. He gripped the counter and bowed his head over the sink. “I killed her.” His voice was thick.
I rested my head on the back of the couch, my brain still playing full-color variations of Wade and Olivia doing the nasty.
“Maybe the barnacle thing doesn’t count lesbian sex,” said Rylan. “Figures that even the damned ghosts would be heteronormative. Penis penetrates vagina or it’s not sex. Whatever.” She scoffed.
Nothing from Wade or me.
Wade made a funny strangled noise in the kitchen. It echoed.
“Hey,” I murmured, sitting up straight, studying my palm. “You didn’t kill her.”
Wade turned around. He sniffed. “I think I did.”
“You didn’t know,” I said, and
now my voice wasn’t strong either. “How could you have known?”
“I’m not going to kill Charlotte too,” said Wade, and he stalked across the apartment to the door and flung it open. He threw himself outside.
“Hey, Wade, wait!” I called after him.
He slammed the door.
I shut my eyes.
It was quiet.
I tried to get my brain around all the things that I now knew, but I couldn’t.
“So, wait, I think I understand,” said Rylan. “Wade and I went into Ridinger Hall, and we contracted some spirit thing. And if we have sex—well, if we have hetero sex—then we pass it on. If not, it makes us fall to our deaths. And after we die, it goes back to the person who had it before. So, Wade had it. He gave it to Olivia. And then she died. So, then Wade got it back. But he just gave it to Charlotte. That about right, you think?”
I didn’t say anything.
“It’s kind of textbook horror genre,” she said. “The contagion aspect. The sexual undercurrent. I mean, usually, it’s sort of metaphorical. Like Dracula, you know, he was passing on his vampirism by climbing in nubile young women’s windows. And it’s not like Jason was attacking the kids who weren’t getting it on. This is the same thing, except it’s not playing hide the ball. You know, even though I said that thing about Poltergeist, I’ve since contemplated what it would be like to be stuck inside a horror movie, and I’ve ultimately determined it would actually suck. I was so right.” She shook her head, making a face.
I got up from the couch. “I need to…” I gestured at the door.
“Right,” she said. “I guess we shouldn’t be here. He didn’t want us to be here without asking, anyway.”
I pointed at her. “Stay away from windows, huh?” And then I left.
* * *
I walked around for a while. I thought about going back to the Airstream, but I didn’t. I think that I was afraid that if I went back there, I would just leave, because I wanted to run away from all of this.
It was hard enough for Olivia to be dead.
I hadn’t even made peace with that, not really. I wasn’t even sure how I was supposed to deal with it. I knew that it made me feel this awful gnawing, harsh thing in my chest if I thought about it. I knew that I didn’t like the harsh gnawing, so I didn’t think about it. I knew I had to think about it at some point.
