Harold vanished with a wisp of gray smoke, and Demi fell to the ground, landing hard on her backside at the foot of the bed. “Hurry,” Mariela said, pulling Demi to her feet and pushing her towards the door. “This ghost is a lot stronger than most. Iron might banish him to the Veil, but probably not for long.”
“She’s right,” Cynthia said. She and the others picked themselves up. “Is your grandfather buried in the cemetery out front?” she asked, looking to Vera. The blonde woman frowned.
“No,” she said, frowning for a moment. “Pa said they cremated him, and I heard Ma tell someone on the phone that she’d tossed his ashes in the garbage.”
“That’s not good,” Cynthia said with a huff of exasperation. “He’s too strong to fight head-on, and he doesn’t have a body we can burn to set his spirit free.”
“How do we get rid of it then?” Vera shouted. “I can’t let that thing stay here, not after what it did to Ma.”
“Harold might not be buried here,” Demi said, remembering the tiny graveyard from the drive up. “But Susie is. I’m surprised she wanted to be buried here at all. From what you told us, she spent her entire life wanting to be anywhere but here.”
“She didn’t,” Vera said. “She must have told us a hundred times to bury her far away. But we all just thought it was the dementia talking. Pa wanted her to be with family.”
“She might not have had dementia,” Cynthia said. “Hauntings like this… sometimes they drive their victims mad. Your mom had probably been dealing with this ghost for a long, long time, but thought it was all in her head. He probably fed off her for years… no wonder he’s this strong.”
“If he’s attached himself to Susie, could we banish him by burning her remains?” Doug asked. “Is that crazy?”
“No,” Cynthia said. “No, it makes sense.”
“What are we waiting for then?” Demi asked, rushing for the door.
“You go,” Cynthia said, remaining exactly where she was. “Mariela and I will do what we can to keep him in the house.”
“You’re sure about this?” Demi asked, stopping in the doorway.
“You know how to dig up a grave,” Cynthia said. “And there’s a tank of gasoline in the trunk. Gotta learn how to fend for yourselves sooner or later.”
“Copy that,” Demi said, hefting the iron poker in her hand before hurrying down the steps after Vera and Doug, leaving the witches alone upstairs. The entire house began to tremble, and Demi stumbled down the last few steps just as Doug and Vera rushed out the front door. She quickly pulled herself upright, only to find herself standing in the shadow of the austere blonde woman from the Veil. Like Harold, her skin was gray and decaying, and the colors of her dress were somehow muted compared to the world around her.
“You,” Lorraine hissed, shoving Demi back up against the wall, proving to be as strong as Harold had been. “You filthy whore! How dare you come into my house, flaunt yourself at my husband?”
“Lady,” Demi groaned, eyeing the iron bar that she’d dropped during her fall, now well out of reach. “If you thought me getting choked half to death by your man was flirting, you’ve got some pretty serious issues.”
“I won’t let you break up my family!” Lorraine screeched, and an invisible force pressed against Demi, crushing her body against the wall. “You’ll encourage that horrid little girl. She put a spell on my Harold, filled his head with unnatural thoughts.”
The front door flew open, and Doug stood in the doorway, a shotgun in hand. The weapon let out a harsh clap, and Lorraine vanished in a wisp of smoke just like Harold had earlier.
“Thanks,” Demi said, the pressure on her immediately vanishing.
“What?” Doug asked. “No Man o’ War jokes from you?”
“Hey, I was trying to be nice,” Demi said. “I’m not very good at it.” She grabbed the iron poker and raced past him and out of the house. Feeling the sun on her skin made her feel infinitely better, but she couldn’t shake the general sense of gloom that now seemed to hang over the property as dark storm clouds gathered overhead.
“How the hell did you do that?” Vera demanded. “My bullet just went straight through.”
“Lead can’t hurt ghosts,” Doug said. He hopped down from the porch and handed her the shotgun and a pouch of ammunition. “But shells filled with rock salt slow them down, just like iron. Not for very long though, so we have to hurry.”
“Pa,” Vera said, looking towards the new house with a nervous crease in her brow. “Please. You have to make sure he’s safe.”
“You got this?” Doug asked.
“Know how to use that thing?” Demi asked, looking to Vera and her new weapon.
“Honey, this is Texas,” Vera said, shaking her head.
“Sounds like we got this,” Demi said with a shrug, and Doug sprinted towards the new house. “Let’s go,” she said to Vera, and they ran towards the car. “I’ll drive.”
They leapt into the car, and Demi put it in drive. She pressed the accelerator flat beneath her feet, a towering brown plume of dust rising up behind them. The car rocked and shook along the uneven dirt road, and Demi slammed on the brakes when a human figure appeared in the middle of the road, just before the cemetery. She struck the unexpected pedestrian and veered off the road and into the field, spinning around before the car came to a halt.
Demi jumped out of the car. “What did I hit?” she asked.
“Nothing,” Vera said, joining her outside. The blonde pointed to a man standing amid the dirt plume, perfectly unharmed. “You went straight through him.”
Dust swirled around the figure as it emerged from the storm, and Harold stalked towards them, a snarl on his rotting face. Vera fired her shotgun, and the specter dissipated, only to reappear out of midair a few feet closer. “They get stronger when you piss them off,” Demi said, flinging the trunk open and grabbing a shovel and a tank of gas. She tossed her iron poker to Vera.
“Iron works better than salt,” she said, scurrying into the haze. The wind picked up, shifting the lingering shroud of dust through the air. “Hold him off while I deal with this.”
She heard another shotgun blast behind her, and her visibility fell to almost nothing. She didn’t even realize she was in the cemetery until she tripped over a low headstone rising only a few inches above the ground. She fell forward, spilling a little gasoline before she caught herself of a tall, thin marker that crumbled beneath her weight.
“Here we go,” she said, spying the five-foot-tall slab of marble that bore Susie’s name. She set the gas tank down, kicked the flowers aside, and drove the shovel into the soil. She heard Vera fire again and again, each blast only a few moments behind the one before while the Texan struggled to keep her grandfather on the right side of the Veil.
The ground was brittle and hard, but the grave was relatively shallow, and Demi struck a wooden surface about four feet down. There was certainly no time to unearth the entire grave, not with Harold’s spirit hopping back and forth across the Veil. She wiped sweat out of her eyes, and slammed the shovel down against the coffin over and over, until the wooden lid shattered, revealing a dark, hollow space below. Demi grabbed the gas can and poured its contents down the narrow hole she’d dug, several gallons in all. She pulled a lighter from her pocket, only to have the wind knocked out of her by an unseen force.
“I’m sorry,” Vera gasped. Harold held her aloft at the edge of the graveyard, gripping her windpipe just like he had Demi’s.
“It’s fine,” Demi groaned, her fingers fumbling for her dropped lighter. She saw it lying in the freshly-churned earth just a few feet away, but before she could reach for it, a face appeared over her—Lorraine’s rotting visage, sneering down at her.
“You won’t break this family apart,” Lorraine screamed, her colorless eyes growing wide. Her icy hands wrapped themselves around Demi’s throat and squeezed tightly. “Oh, Harold. He had so many whores. He loved me when I was young, but then all he wanted was to drive ou
t to his brothels. Then that horrid little girl started whispering her foul—”
“Shut up!” a voice cried so loudly that Demi’s ears rang. She turned her head, pressing her cheek into the dirt. A twelve-year-old Susie stood next to her own grave, the discarded lighter in hand.
“I hate you!” Susie shouted, and a whisper of flame leapt up from the lighter’s spout. “I wish you would just die!” She dropped the lighter into the open grave, and the small hole in the earth erupted in flame.
Lorraine looked back down at Demi and howled in outrage, squeezing her throat tighter. Demi’s vision began to grow dark, until after a moment, Susie threw her head back and screamed, a vibrant white light rising up within her and filling the air around her. When it finally faded, there was no sign of the girl left.
“My… my angel,” Harold gasped, and the towering specter began to tremble, his body catching fire from the inside out. Unlike Susie, there was no wash of pure light, only the stench of rotten eggs and burning rubber while flames rose up around him. He screamed and disappeared in a burst of ash.
“Look what you’ve done!” Lorraine hissed between yellowed teeth. Demi felt the flames licking at her feet, and the air around her went from arctic to hellish in just a few short seconds. Lorraine wailed as the flames engulfed her, and then burst into a puff of brimstone and dust.
“What the hell was that?” Vera asked. She stood up, and her back gave a loud crack. Demi spat dust from her mouth and joined the Texan up on two feet.
“That’s how you kill a ghost,” Demi said, patting the taller woman on the shoulder. The dust around them finally began to fade, revealing a deep red sunset on the horizon. They took the car back up to the house, where Pa and the others had gathered between the two houses. The old house seemed different now, like all its personality had fled, leaving it nothing more than the broken-down ruin it had always been. Demi glanced up at the window where Susie had once stood out watching the world her parents kept from her, dreaming of a chance to get out and run far away. It had taken a lifetime, but Demi hoped she’d finally found that freedom.
“Guess it was an easy one after all,” Doug said with a shrug. “You couldn’t even wait for me to save the day.”
“We ain’t no damsels in distress, buddy,” Vera said, handing him his shotgun back. “Thanks for the toy, but I think I prefer good old-fashioned buckshot on my hunts.”
“Here,” Demi said, handing her a box of bullets from the car. “Salt and iron are easy to come by, but if you ever run into anything a little more physical back in New York, you can’t exactly pick up silver bullets at the corner store. We make them ourselves.”
“Okay then,” Cynthia said, clapping her hands together. “I guess it’s time for us to take off.”
“Whoa, whoa,” Demi said. “After all that? No way. I need a beer, a burger, and a ten-hour nap.”
“Not you, stupid,” Mariela said. “Us. Like we said, this was our last hunt together. You bagged the ghost on your own.”
“She’s right,” Cynthia agreed. “We’ll leave you the car and enough cash to get by for a few months. We can spare it.”
“Y’all don’t have to leave right this moment,” Vera said, waving them towards the new house. “I’ve got beer and steaks in the fridge. Pa can fire up the grill and—”
“It’s better this way,” Cynthia said. “We’ve got a line on a werewolf pack outside of Odessa.”
“Sounds like you could use some backup,” Vera said.
“We’ll be fine,” Cynthia said, giving Demi a pat on the shoulder. “Take care of her, Doug,” she said, giving the tall man a hug and a quick kiss on the cheek.
“Later,” Mariela said, grabbing their things from the car. The two witches headed off down the driveway on foot, exiting Demi’s life as abruptly as they’d entered, but leaving her permanently changed—for the better, she hoped.
Doug opened his mouth, a wide grin plastered across his face. “Did you—?”
“Shut up,” Demi said. “That was a peck. It didn’t mean what you’re thinking.”
“Okay,” Doug said, still beaming. “But you didn’t hear what she whispered.”
“What could she have possibly said?” Demi asked, shaking her head wearily.
“I think that’s none of your business,” Doug said, chuckling happily. “You wouldn’t believe me anyway.”
“Oh, whatever,” Demi said, rolling her eyes before turning to Vera. “You still got that whiskey?”
Grounded
Bakersfield, April 2014
“What would you do?” Amy asked, staring down at her stepsister, Kate, while she hung off the side of their bunkbed. The blonde girl stared back up at her, dark roots betraying her true hair color, a small ring pierced through her left nostril. Amy wore her dark hair in a short bob that complemented her rounded features, as different from Kate as she could be. “If you could do anything?”
“Anything?” Kate asked, wearing a bra and pajama bottoms. It was hot, and the air conditioning had been turned off, their open window providing their sole relief from their sauna of a bedroom. “Your brother.”
“Ugh,” Amy said, dropping down to the floor next to Kate, an oversized shirt billowing down to her thighs. “Don’t be gross.”
“He’s cute,” Kate said, rubbing her hand between her legs. She and Amy weren’t exactly conventional stepsisters. They had their differences, like all siblings, but they were more like best friends than siblings—best friends that had a habit of bringing out the worst in each other. “And he’s got a big, fat—”
“Not as big as your dad’s,” Amy interrupted her. “Don’t forget I saw him coming out of the shower that time his bathroom was getting retiled. Touch my brother, and I’ll respond accordingly, skank.”
“Respond accordingly?” Kate asked, snorting. “What are you, a lawyer?”
“I’ll be whatever your dad wants me to be,” Amy said, sticking her tongue out at Kate.
“This is stupid,” Kate said. “Let’s get drunk or something. Don’t you have any weed left?”
“That’s how we got in this mess!” Amy replied. The girls, both seventeen, had been grounded after their parents caught them smoking pot on the roof a few nights earlier. Since then, they’d been confined to house arrest all weekend, which was the stupidest thing ever, because they’d scored off Amy’s mom’s stash.
“Come on!” Kate said. “We have no phones, no internet, no TV, and it’s hot as balls in here. Can we at least get wasted while the parentals are out?”
“Kevin’s downstairs playing videogames,” Amy said. “He’ll rat if he catches us out of our room.”
“I’ll handle him,” Kate said, batting her fake eyelashes and puckering her lips. “He wouldn’t snitch on his sexy stepsister.”
“More like his skanky stepsister,” Amy said, making a nauseous face. “He really doesn’t like you, you know? Or me. If he catches us, we’ll be grounded all summer for sure.”
“We just have to make sure he doesn’t catch us,” Kate said. “How hard can it be? The house is huge.”
“Yeah, but to get downstairs we have to walk right past the living room,” Amy said. “Kevin will see us.”
“Not if I distract him,” Kate said.
“Forget it,” Amy said. “You’re not even that cute.”
“Rude,” Kate said. “And that’s not what I meant.” Her eyes flashed to the window. A section of steep-pitched roof extended about two feet beyond their window, flattening out over the front porch awning. From there, it was a drop of just a few feet down to the wide railings of the porch below. Although it was always a struggle shimmying their scrawny limbs up the Greek revival column at the corner of the porch, it was their go-to means for coming and going past curfew.
“A ding-dong ditch,” Amy nodded approvingly. “But with a functional twist. Very nice.”
“Not just a pretty face, huh?” Kate asked. “I ring the doorbell, and when he comes to get the door, you sneak past hi
m.”
“One problem,” Amy said. “The stairs are right at the front door. If he’s answering the door, he’ll be even closer than if he was on the couch.”
“But his back will be turned!” Kate insisted. “Do you want to get wasted tonight or what?”
“Duh,” Amy said, wrinkling her brow. “But your dad’s bar is in the basement. Once I get past Kevin and get down to the liquor, how do I get back up? What if he doesn’t fall for the doorbell trick a second time?”
“You just have to get down there,” Kate said. “Remember those little windows in the storage room? You can open them from the inside and I’ll help you climb out.”
“The storage room?” Amy asked. “We’re not supposed to go in there! And besides, it’s creepy. It’s full of spiders and my mom’s junk.” They weren’t supposed to go down to the basement at all for that matter, although they both routinely did anytime their parents were out of the house. But the storage room was another matter—there was nothing there worth seeing.
“Come on, sis,” Kate said, playfully slapping her face. “Do you want to get sloppy drunk or what?”
“Okay,” Amy relented, her mind going numb from the heat and boredom. If she and Kate were going to be stuck in their room all night on a Friday, there was no way it was happening sober.
They removed the screen from the window, and Kate begrudgingly pulled a t-shirt over her head and stepped out onto the roof, crawling down backwards on all fours while Amy stared after her, making sure she didn’t fall to her death. When she reached the roof of the porch, Kate stood, flashing Amy a thumbs-up. Amy crept to the door and gingerly turned the knob. The door opened slowly, and she tiptoed out into the hallway. The house was a recent construct, thankfully, so the floor didn’t creak, and her bare feet moved silently down the carpeted staircase, stopping just before a landing where a 90-degree turn would put her directly in Kevin’s line of sight.
Demi Mondaine: Volume One Page 6
