Liv, Forever

by Amy Talkington

  It was raining, so I wondered if the ceremony was going to be postponed. I checked the memo and there was no contact information or indication of what faculty member was in charge, so I had to assume it would proceed as planned. I set my hair and put on the tweed suit that my mother had made me. It was the only upside to having a mother who labored in the garment district. She knew how to make a good suit for these occasions.

  My parents had cried when I got the envelope from Wickham Hall because it meant they had succeeded. Things were going to change. They had come to the States from Hungary with nothing. But all their work—their callouses and bloodied fingertips—had not been in vain. I had already started a letter informing them of my newest accolade. I planned to finish it when I got back to the dorm, before going to dinner.

  But when I got to the cemetery, nobody was there. Then someone approached. A Sixth Former. I had never met him, but I recognized him. He was president of the student government so of course I knew his name. He was very handsome. He sat down next to me and asked to hold my hand. Of course I noticed he was wearing gloves, but I thought it was because there was a chill in the air.

  He quickly pulled a blade from his pocket and slit across my wrist. As I screamed and squirmed, he pushed me down onto a headstone, covered my mouth, and cut my other wrist. He dropped the blade at my feet, looked right into my dying eyes, and said, “Fac fortia et patere.” Perhaps he did not know I was an honors student in Latin, but I knew exactly what it meant: “Do brave deeds and endure.”

  As we walked away from Old Homestead, I told Gabe about Minerva. I was sure it was her. I told him what she’d done. Gabe started to repeat what I was saying to Malcolm, but Malcolm asked him not to speak.

  “Why?” I asked.

  But Gabe just shrugged at my question and kept silent. I realized Gabe was, for the first time, actually listening to Malcolm.

  We retreated to Gabe’s dorm room, where we’d be less susceptible to a visit from Malcolm’s father. Malcolm went straight to Gabe’s desk and started writing frantically. I stood above him and saw he was scrawling phrases in Latin and other languages I didn’t recognize. I looked around Gabe’s room. It was bare and unadorned except for one framed photograph on his bedside table—two boys happy and full of light, one of them an almost unrecognizable Gabe looking up to his handsome older brother. Suddenly I could see how much Gabe had changed since coming to Wickham Hall, how truly haunted he’d become. I felt even more committed to fixing things. For all of us.

  Once Malcolm finished writing, he turned to Gabe. “Sorry, it’s just there was an old notebook and I couldn’t take it, so I tried to memorize as much as I could. Oh, and I also got these.” He pulled the small vessels out of his pockets and placed them on the desk. “What’d you find out?”

  “Mrs. Slade told me the Victors President knows all. She made it sound like the regular members don’t know the true inner-workings of the club, only the presidents do.”

  “Kent’s the president,” Malcolm said.

  “That’s why he followed you downstairs,” I said. “He’s hiding something.”

  Gabe told Malcolm what I’d said, and we all agreed it was likely. “But what are the secrets?” I asked.

  “Let’s see if any of this tells us anything,” Malcolm said, gesturing to the phrases he’d scribbled.

  Malcolm borrowed a laptop from a Fourth Former across the hall and typed the first phrase into Google while I looked at the objects on Gabe’s desk. They were each inscribed with an odd imagery of insects and bees and—if you looked carefully—death. Each featured a single crude-looking ritualistic murder. It all looked familiar, but I wasn’t sure from where.

  Finally Malcolm read a translation from the computer: “Sacrifice to prevail and the weak perish for perfection of the winners.”

  “What winners?” Gabe asked.

  Malcolm shrugged and dove back into the translations. But it was so obvious to me. “Winners are victors,” I said. “The weak perish for the perfection of the Victors. The Victors are making human sacrifices, Gabe! That’s what it says.”

  Gabe was silent. He looked toward me, shaking his head, terrified. I knew what he was thinking: that this proved Malcolm was part of it. I went to Malcolm. I got close to him and looked into his eyes as he searched the computer for more information. I knew for certain he was as clueless and scared as we were. “It’s not possible,” I told Gabe. “He’s not part of it.”

  “No?” Gabe said involuntarily.

  “What?” Malcolm asked.

  “Tell him,” I said forcefully. “He’s not a part of it. I know that.”

  “Winners can also be translated as Victors, Malcolm,” Gabe said slowly, fearfully. “Meaning, the Victors killed them all.”

  Malcolm paused to take it in. That one sentence—if true—destroyed everything Malcolm’s life was built upon. It cracked his foundation. But he only nodded, his head hung low, and said, “Of course.” As if deep down he’d always known something was terribly wrong.

  “It means we—the ghosts—are not the killers,” I added. “We were the victims.”

  “Except Minerva. She is the Victors,” Gabe insisted. “She must be in league with them.”

  “What do we do now?” Malcolm asked.

  “Well, according to what Mrs. Slade said, it’s probably the presidents.”

  Malcolm nodded, absorbing the possibility that his best friend Kent had killed me. He asked the question we were all thinking: “Why?”

  “I don’t know,” Gabe said.

  “I mean, he didn’t like me being together with Liv but …”

  “He’s a selfish prick,” Gabe said, finishing Malcolm’s sentence. “Why would he risk his future to kill Liv? What’s the motivation?”

  Malcolm shrugged.

  “Unless somehow he knew it was not a risk,” Gabe offered.

  “We have to talk to the other girls—the ghosts,” I piped in. “So maybe we can get information. Piece things together from their answers.”

  “No!” Gabe yelled, reacting viscerally.

  “What?” Malcolm asked.

  Gabe told Malcolm what I’d said, and Malcolm agreed. But Gabe started to get nervous and edgy—dressed differently, but still the same old Gabe—babbling, “I can’t do it. I can’t go see them. I can’t talk to them.”

  “No, Gabe,” Malcolm said firmly, with the faintest hint of jealousy. “You can see them and talk to them. So you have to.”

  Gabe sighed.

  “I’ll be there,” I added. “I can protect you. I think I’m still stronger than they are. I’m stronger than Minerva, at least. I know that for sure.”

  “And I’ll be there, too. For what it’s worth,” Malcolm added.

  For the first time since I’d known Malcolm, he sounded scared. But I knew it wasn’t ghosts or even danger he was afraid of. It was the truth.

  GABE COULD SEE ME in any “charged” spot where a death had occurred, so we assumed he could see all the ghosts that way, too. We knew Minerva was in Old Homestead, and the others were spread all over campus. We decided to meet after curfew that night at the graveyard, both because it was centrally located, and we knew it was charged.

  In the meantime, we agreed I’d stay with Malcolm and warn him if he was in danger. But, also, he said he wanted to talk to me. Alone. Through Gabe, I promised him I would follow him, not leave his side, and I would listen.

  I followed Malcolm back to Pitman. As always, he opened the door and let me enter first. I smiled, always charmed by his chivalry. That would never grow old, so long as I was still here, still with him. But I imagined how sad it must’ve looked to other people, this guy opening a door and holding it open for no one. Nothing. But the guys in his dorm didn’t seem to notice.

  Chatter about the big Fall Festival and bonfire the next day bounced around the common room—speculation on the celebrity alumni who might be there, and plans for various shenanigans like spiking the punch or tossing fireworks into the bon
fire. Malcolm’s buddies tried to rope him into the conversation, but he shrugged them off, saying he was tired.

  He closed the door to his room and sat on his bed. He looked down and leaned his chin onto his curled up fist, his normally broad shoulders slumped. It was painfully silent. He was Rodin’s The Thinker: a broken man silently battling inside his own head. Suddenly I feared he had a confession to make. I got that same sick knot in my stomach I’d gotten when he approached me in the dining hall that first night. Only this time, I had no stomach. I wasn’t even sure how I felt such things.

  He started to talk. “Kent told me to stay away from you. He told me to. If only I’d listened to him …” He couldn’t finish the sentence.

  “Maybe he would’ve done it anyway,” I said, although I knew it was futile. I couldn’t bear to see him in such pain.

  “If I’d given you up, he might not have done it. So, I am guilty after all, aren’t I? In some ways, it was my fault. But I promise to you, I had no idea. He told me to stay away from you. I thought the worst thing that could possibly happen was that he would tell my father. Can you imagine? Just a week ago that was the worst of my fears: that my father might discover who I really was?! Who I really am?! My life was so small. I was so weak. I’m so sorry, Liv.” He paused for a beat. He looked around the room, searching for me. “Things can change quickly, can’t they? In life … in death.”

  He lay down on the bed, curling into a fetal position. There were so many things I wanted to say, but I could no longer stand uttering unheard words. All I wanted to do was comfort him. So I lay down next to him—facing him—and curled my knees up into his stomach. I draped my arm over his body and looked into his eyes. And I loved him.

  I love you.

  Love charged through me and made me feel as if I was still a vessel. As if I still had salty tears and a throbbing heart and blood churning through my veins. I didn’t know what I was made of anymore—or how or why I even existed—but I knew I loved him completely right there in that moment. And I always would.

  He lifted his head and looked into my invisible eyes. “Thank you.” He said it so quietly I could barely hear. But I could see the relief wash over his face. He knew I was there, loving him regardless of what had happened. He felt it as powerfully as I did. Then he said it again, this time loud and unafraid, “Thank you, Liv Bloom.”

  Right then, as if on cue, the steam heater under his window hissed on, startling us both and breaking the moment. He laughed quietly at his own skittishness. We both lay there silently and watched as steam slowly gathered at the base of the window. I knew he wanted me to write something, but he wouldn’t ask me to. And I knew I shouldn’t because my energy was diminishing, but I had to. I waited and waited until there was enough condensation for me to write a single sentence. It took every ounce of willpower to ignore the pain in my fingertip. But I did it.

  I will hold u again, I wrote on the glass.

  He smiled sadly, knowing that would never happen. He would never hold me—the real me, the physical me, the complete me—in his arms. He’d never hear me speak. I fell onto the bed next to him, hurting. It was getting harder and harder to affect the real world. Both my power and my very substance were dwindling.

  AT 11:45 P.M., MALCOLM crept out his window. I followed. As we did so, he told me all the dorm prefects were Victors. The reason they all lived on the ground floor in fire-exit rooms—and had master keys—was so they could attend Victors meetings in the after hours. Of course that meant Kent could get out just as easily as Malcolm. And, as Malcolm walked away from his dorm, I saw Kent was waiting in the shadows alongside the building.

  I raced up to Malcolm to warn him. As he slipped into the woods that led to the graveyard, I rushed beside him to give him a chill. But it was crisp and cold so he was already shivering. He felt nothing from me. I poured my feet through a small pile of dry leaves nearby, scorching my ankles. But, at that very moment, the wind picked up and rustled still more. Nature was conspiring against us.

  I could not warn Malcolm, so my focus shifted to Kent. He had a scarf tied around his neck. I concentrated as hard as I could and attempted to tug at it—to choke him or at least slow him down—I could endure the pain, but my hand would not hold the material. I surged past him, hoping a chill would at least give him pause. It didn’t. He proceeded stealthily behind Malcolm.

  Just after Malcolm swept past the weeping willow tree, I heard her. “The way he treats me, girls, he’ll do the same to you! That’s the reason I’ve got those weepin’ willow blues.”

  I looked over and saw Ruth at her tree. She looked different than before—solid and real. Oil paint, not watercolor. The wound on her neck looked almost fresh. Kent suddenly stopped and looked right at her. Kent saw her!

  “He sees you!”

  She nodded. “It’s that day I suppose.”

  She turned to him and coyly asked, “Are you the one who sent the note, handsome? Did you invite me to the willow tree? For a little nookie, maybe?”

  He approached her, looking at her with awe and fascination. He reached his hand to her shoulder—and he seemed to feel her.

  “Do something!” I yelled. “He killed me! He’s going to kill someone else! You have to stop him, now!”

  Kent was shaking with fear, but a look of excitement played across his face. “You’re proof,” he said. “I’ve heard you exist, and you come alive once a year for an instant. You’re proof that what we do works.”

  “No! I will not be your proof!” she yelled, instantly enraged. She grabbed him and pulled his shirt, trying to strangle him, but as he stumbled backward, gasping for air, she faded back to her ghost self.

  Kent spun around, looking for her. She’d disappeared to him. But I could still see her, once again airy and immaterial.

  Kent, invigorated, turned and raced back in the direction we’d come from, leaving me alone with her. I looked around. Malcolm was long gone. By now he’d probably reached the cemetery, so I took a moment to understand what had just happened.

  “He could see you. He could touch you.”

  “That was my deathday. For once, I almost got to use it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Every year on the day you were murdered, you materialize. Briefly. Right at the time you died.”

  “Every year?”

  She nodded. “But just for a moment, right at that special time.”

  I realized that must have been what I’d seen in the cemetery that Headmaster Holiday night, when I was still alive. I had seen Mary—Miss Jackie O—it had been her deathday.

  “I saw one once,” I told Ruth. “When I was still alive. In the cemetery. And …” I hesitated, “I think I saw you, too … in my dream.”

  She nodded. “You did. I was trying to warn you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It seemed about time, perhaps, for another death. I was attempting to spare you. But I didn’t say enough … or do enough.”

  “But you warned me about Malcolm. Why? Do you know something about him?”

  “Not him. Not him specifically. But I’ve observed the scenario before. Too many times now. I thought I could help this time.”

  “Will you come with me to the cemetery?” I asked. I’d never before had to appeal to a girl with a slashed throat. She still frightened me, but I needed her. She had answers, and she seemed willing to share them. “We need to know everything. We’re trying to figure it all out.”

  “Minerva doesn’t want me to speak to you. Or anyone. She forbids it.”

  “She keeps you all apart?”

  Ruth nodded.

  “We have to figure out why, Ruth. Please come,” I begged. “We’ve gathered so much information. We’re so close.”

  She perked up. “We?” she asked. “I knew it! Can one of those boys I’ve seen you with hear you?”

  I nodded yes. She smiled, almost exhilarated by the possibility.

  “Please come. Together maybe we can fix this.” />
  She looked around nervously, then nodded. And together, we—two dead girls—walked to the Wickham Hall cemetery.

  BY THE TIME WE got there, Malcolm and Gabe were both waiting. Through Gabe, I explained to Malcolm why I’d abandoned him and what had happened with Kent, which we all agreed was only further proof of his guilt. Then I introduced them to Ruth, and she told us her death story, involving the anonymous note. The weeping willow. Getting pinned to the tree from behind. Gabe relayed the story to Malcolm, who was scribbling notes into a spiral notebook.

  We flooded her with questions. What grabbed her? Was it a man? Who? Why? What had she observed over the years? The details were blurry. She was confused about time. She knew things were different when she had died—girls dressed differently and people spoke differently—but she didn’t seem to understand it had been nearly a hundred years. She had noticed every so often, a female student, someone on the fringe, had died. Usually after mingling with Victors. She had spotted me and for the first time, attempted to intercede. But she didn’t know how or why the girls died. She didn’t have any details. One thing she did know: her strength had diminished, except at that magical moment on her deathday once a year. But she never knew how to anticipate or exploit her brief power.

  “What do you mean your strength diminished?” Of course I’d felt it myself, but I needed to hear it from her.

  “When I first arrived, I could affect the real world if I tried very hard. But it’s very painful. I know you know what I mean. I can see you still have power because you’re not as faint as we are yet. But your energy is limited. Each spirit has only a finite amount. Every single time you affect the real world—every time you do something that interacts with it or changes it—you get fainter, weaker. It is painful, and you lose reserves. I am now powerless. All I can do is give a chill. I have been this way since I can remember. I think all the other girls have lost their energy as well.”

  “What about going through things? It hurts, but it doesn’t use my power, right?”