Second Chance Magic

by Michelle M. Pillow

  “Help.” Vivien appeared at the bottom of the stairs with an armful of supplies, including pillows from her bed and couch.

  Lorna rushed over to take the pillows from her.

  “I thought we could do this on the stage.” Vivien readjusted the book and candles in her arms now that her load was lightened. “It seemed fitting since Julia used to do her séances there.”

  “I don’t see her.” Heather returned. She glanced at Lorna. “What’s with the pillows?”

  “So you don’t tweak your old lady hips when we sit on the stage,” Vivien answered.

  “I would take offense to that, but yeah, I’m still sore. I slept on it wrong.” Heather took the candles from Vivien to carry.

  “Thank you again for staying with me at the hospital,” Lorna said. “It means a lot to me. I know those chairs couldn’t have been comfortable.”

  “I didn’t mean for that to sound like a complaint,” Heather clarified. “I’m not going to lie though, sleeping in a chair is not great for the joints.”

  Lorna smiled. “Next time the two of you can just curl up on the bed next to me.”

  “There better not be a next time,” Vivien stated. She pushed through the curtains and strode down the aisle. “Come on, ladies, daylight is wasting and I don’t want to try this in the middle of the night.”

  Moments later, Lorna found herself sitting on the stage floor cushioned by a pillow. The position gave them a full view of their surroundings and felt safer than her apartment somehow.

  Vivien sat to Lorna’s right and Heather to her left. They formed a tight circle around the book, leaving room for candles between them.

  “I wish Julia were here to tell us if we’re doing this right,” Lorna said.

  “Me too.” Heather glanced around. “The illustration shows us touching the book, but I think we need to hold hands instead. There’s power when we’re joined. I don’t think we should wait for Glenn to get angry again. I think we need to talk to him and send him on his way.”

  “I agree,” Vivien said.

  “All right.” Lorna nodded. They’d discussed this plan at length, but it still made her nervous for a variety of reasons.

  “Here I wrote down the words for us.” Vivien handed them torn scraps of paper. “No drunken bumbling this time.”

  Vivien pulled a pair of reading glasses from where they were looped onto her neckline and put them on.

  “And we’re only asking for Glenn,” Heather reminded them. “We need to concentrate on one spirit at a time.”

  Vivien glanced at the empty theater seats and nodded. Lorna could feel her longing to see Sam, but the woman didn’t protest.

  “How much time do we have?” Lorna asked.

  “All day,” Heather said. “I canceled a few of the shows while you were in the hospital. We’ll reschedule them later. I think this is more important.”

  Instead of putting her hand on the book like last time, Heather offered her hand to Lorna to take. Lorna slipped her hand into Heather’s, feeling the instant connection between them. Vivien grabbed her other hand and they all three joined.

  The lights over the stage flickered, a few of them going out. Daylight didn’t penetrate the theater but, thankfully, the candles remained lit. She felt a swirling of emotions. Concern came from Heather. It formed a light knot in her stomach. Excitement came from Vivien, causing her heartbeat to quicken. Lorna wondered what they were picking up from her in return.

  “Ready?” Vivien prompted.

  Like the first time they’d tried the séance, fear left her as power rushed in. Her body tingled. Heather and Vivien’s hair lifted from their shoulders.

  Lorna looked down at the paper on the floor in front of her, and they all read aloud, “We open the door between two worlds to call forth the spirit of Glenn Addams.”

  Lorna glanced up as the temperature around them dropped significantly.

  “Come back from the grave so that we may hear,” they continued. “Come back from the grave and show yourself to us so that all may see. Come back from the grave and answer for what you have done so that you may be—”

  The lights flickered once more going out completely and a pair of transparent feet appeared on top of the book illuminated by candlelight. The fearless euphoria left her to be replaced by panic.

  “Judged.” The last word left Lorna in a whisper. She jerked her hands from Vivien and Heather, and crab crawled backward to get away. The reaction was automatic. She willed the feet to disappear. The ghost shifted his weight from one foot to the other, not stepping from the book.

  Lorna’s heart beat hard and fast, and she had a difficult time catching her breath. Her eyes traveled up transparent dress slacks. Candlelight reflected within the ghost’s body, giving him an inner glow. The shadows hid the full details of his face, but she instantly knew him.

  “Glenn?” she whispered.

  He looked at the candles on the floor, jerking his foot as if the flames and the book kept him trapped.

  “Holy crap,” Vivien whispered, crawling to where Lorna was on the floor. Heather had stood and rushed to their side. She pulled at Lorna’s arm to get her to stand. Vivien was slower to rise to her feet.

  “It’s him,” Lorna said. “I…”

  “Ask what you need to,” Heather whispered. “I don’t know how long he will be here.”

  “Gl-Glenn?” she stammered. “Can you hear me? It’s me, Lorna.”

  His eyes shifted to her and then away. He looked around, not staying focused on any one thing for too long. His translucent body and clothing lacked substance, but his dress shirt and slacks looked like what he usually wore when he was alive, not what he’d been wearing when they buried him.

  Since Lorna had released much of her anger, seeing him now just made her sad. She had loved him once, long ago, before life had dampened the flames. There was so much history there, so many memories. If she could let go of the lie, there might be some truth left in that.

  “Glenn, how could you lie to your wives?” Vivien asked. The tone of her voice came much more forcefully. She placed her hand on Lorna’s shoulder in support.

  “Cheryl?” His word was soft and she wasn’t sure she heard it. There was a hollowness to his tone as if it came from the other side of a tunnel. Heather had said the dead could be hard to hear and understand.

  “Lorna,” Lorna stated, irritated that he mentioned the other woman first.

  “Lorna,” Glenn repeated. “I can’t see you.”

  She inched closer to him, glancing down at the candles and hoping they kept him where he was.

  “Why did you hit me?” she asked.

  “I have never hit you,” he answered. The words sounded clearer than before but were still distorted. “Where are we?”

  “Do you know what happened to you?” Lorna asked. “Do you remember the accident? You were jogging and a car hit you.”

  Glenn’s spirit continued to look around as if lost.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about Cheryl?” Lorna asked.

  “You can’t know about her,” Glenn said. This time his eyes seemed to find her as he looked directly at her. “That life doesn’t concern you.”

  He said it with such exasperation like he expected she should have known the answer.

  “But it does concern me. We have kids together,” she insisted.

  “I support you and my children,” Glenn answered. “That’s all that matters.”

  “No, that’s not all that mattered.” Lorna felt a tear running down her cheek and swiped at it. “How could you lie to us?”

  “You have him,” Glenn said it almost like an accusation. His tone became increasingly stronger. “I know you’ve been thinking about him, seeing him.”

  “After you died,” Lorna corrected. “I never cheated. I never betrayed you.”

  “You shouldn’t know about that.” He shook his head, staring at her with an increasingly agitated expression. He lifted his hand as if feeling an invisible barr
ier. He slapped his palm forward a few times. His body became brighter as if his energy built. Is this what happened before he struck her? “Lorna, where are we?”

  “He has no explanation,” Lorna said with a shake of her head. Glenn’s spirit appeared confused. “I don’t know why I expected him to have an excuse, but he’s just selfish and a coward. What other reason could there be?”

  “Lorna?” he asked. “Where—”

  “You’re dead. That’s where you are,” Lorna answered. “I’m here to tell you I know about Cheryl. Our kids know. You hurt us and embarrassed us. She took everything. She left me with nothing. You said you would always take care of us. You lied. But the fact is I don’t need you to take care of me. I can take care of myself. It’s over, Glenn. I’m here to tell you goodbye.”

  “I’m dead.” Glenn sighed and nodded like she’d seen him do a million times before whenever he became resigned to something he didn’t want to accept.

  “Yes, and I want you to move on.” Lorna felt Vivien’s hand on her arm.

  “I should have been a better man for you,” Glenn said softly, his tone weakening and the light from his body fading. “I should have been the man you deserved. I remember the accident. So many things fall away in death. So many things become clear.”

  “What things?” Lorna couldn’t help herself. Part of her still longed for there to be a reason. Glenn stood before her, but he felt like a stranger. As the father of her children, there would always be an emotional tie there, but it wasn’t love. Not anymore.

  “Tell her the truth,” Heather said, her firm voice sounded like a mother directing an insolent child.

  Glenn looked toward the floor as if he couldn’t meet her gaze. He stood on the book without appearing to put any weight on it. Considering the fact he was transparent, it would have been easy to assume that he couldn’t affect the world around him. However, her recent brush with head trauma said otherwise and Lorna had to remind herself that he could be dangerous and not to take anything for granted. They had no way of knowing if the candles would keep him inside.

  “I loved you the best I could, but it was not enough, it was not as much as I loved myself.” Glenn looked into the theater, averting his gaze from hers. His tone became hard. “I do not want you to be with this new man. I don’t want to share you with another man. I do not want him to love you like you deserve. You are my wife. Mine. I will never let you go.”

  Had he always sounded so possessive? Maybe in marriage she had thought it sweet and loving. Maybe the distance of three years had given her perspective. Maybe death had added more than a trace of bitterness to him.

  “William is a thousand times the man you ever were,” Lorna answered. “If I want to be with him, I will. But with or without another man in my life, I’m not yours. I’m mine.”

  Lorna stared at Glenn, unable to look away. The many, many questions she had no longer mattered. They had all came down to, why? And the unvarnished truth to that question was both obvious and disappointing. Glenn was a selfish prick whose charisma and charms she’d fallen for when she was young and naive. At twenty, she had not experienced the world and thought she knew more than she had.

  Lorna took a deep breath. “I’m done. I have nothing more to say to you.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want to kick him in the balls?” Vivien asked. “I kind of do.”

  Lorna shook her head. “No. I don’t want to give him any more of my time or energy. I’m not angry or hateful. I’m just ready to let go. I want to continue with the next chapter of my life. I don’t want to waste another minute on this man.”

  Vivien picked one of the scraps of paper off the floor.

  “Lorna,” Glenn said, his eyes boring into her. “You can’t leave me.”

  Lorna grabbed hold of Heather and Vivien’s hands. She felt their connection to her. Their care and support flowed through her, giving her strength through their friendship. “Sorry, Glenn. I already have.”

  Glenn struggled against his magical restraints. He jerked his legs and flung his arms the best he could. Anger distorted his expression.

  Vivien lifted the paper before them. It was difficult in the dim light, but they managed to read, “Spirit we release you into the light.”

  Glenn’s mouth opened wide as if he would shout, but no sound came as his form burst into tiny pieces and fell like ash. She watched as he rained down onto the floor and disappeared.

  Vivien dropped her arm. The paper fell to the floor by Lorna’s feet.

  “Goodbye, Glenn,” Lorna whispered. She held tight to Heather and Vivien. Relief flooded her. A weight lifted from her chest, and she felt him leaving. It was over.

  Lorna took a deep breath, and then another. She lifted her friends’ hands to press against her chest.

  “He’s gone,” Heather said, turning to hug Lorna with her free arm.

  Vivien did the same. “I feel the ache leaving you. Heather, do you feel it?”

  Heather nodded. “You got what you needed, Lorna. Grandma Julia was right. We’re here to help each other heal.”

  “I thought I had a thousand questions, but really all I needed was to say goodbye and let it all go.” Lorna released her hold on their hands. “Thank you, both. I would have never had this chance without you.”

  When their hands pulled away, she felt weaker, as if she’d just finished an intense workout. Whatever they had done took a lot out of them. The lights flickered, coming back on.

  “This confirms it. We’re magical.” Vivien smiled and took off her reading glasses.

  “Grandma Julia always said it took psychic energy to summons ghosts,” Heather said. “I now understand what she meant by that. I think the three of us together creates enough energy to make things happen. Alone we’re special, but together we’re stronger.”

  “Like everything in life,” Lorna agreed. “We’re stronger with true friends.”

  Movement caught Lorna’s attention and she turned to the rows of seats. William stood in the aisle looking up at them. He appeared as if he wanted to speak but held back.

  “How much do you think he saw?” Lorna asked.

  “Most of it,” Vivien answered. “He’s been standing there a while.”

  “I brought coffee,” he said at their attention, but it was evident by the way he stared at the candles he wasn’t thinking about beverages.

  “William?” Heather asked. “Are you all right?”

  William came toward the stage. “So that was Glenn, huh?”

  “Yes.” Lorna went to meet him by the stairs. She wondered what William was thinking, if he was jealous or upset. “He’s gone now. For good.”

  “I saw.” William nodded. He cupped her cheek. “How are you? Are you all right?”

  It turned out he was neither of those things. He was concerned about her.

  “Honestly, I feel great,” Lorna said. “A little tired, a little hungry, but relieved. Are you all right? I know ghosts aren’t your thing.”

  “That was…” William nodded. “Yeah, I’m all right. Seeing is believing, and well…”

  “Look who has finally come around,” Vivien said, teasing lightly. “Welcome to our supernatural book club, Willy.”

  “I hate when you call me that,” William said.

  “I know. It’s why I do it.” Vivien laughed. She went to blow out the candles and gathered them with the book. “I think that’s enough undead for the time being.”

  William gently touched Lorna’s arm and gestured for her to walk with him. He guided her by the small of her back as she moved down the stairs. “I heard what that spirit, what Glenn, said to you. I know it was private, and I shouldn’t have eavesdropped on what you were doing, but you didn’t deserve that.”

  “I’m glad you heard what he said,” Lorna looped her arm through his. “I don’t know where we’re heading in this whatever-we-are, but I know that I don’t want secrets between us. I’d rather hear a painful truth than to be lied to any day of the week.”
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  “I hope we’re going forward, together, in a relationship,” he said.

  “I hope so too.”

  His almost sheepish half smile was hard to resist. Everything about William was attractive, a fact that was all the more real now that she knew him intimately. She liked that smile, his sexy eyes, his sultry voice, his smell, his heat, his kiss, his…

  She took a deep breath, steadying her runaway libido as a thought whispered through her mind, My apartment is right upstairs.

  “We became a little distracted earlier, and I’m not sure I apologized for leaving the hospital as abruptly as I did,” he continued. “I should have stayed to make sure you were all right.”

  William lifted the curtain to the lobby aside and let her pass through first. He glanced at the broken hook. “We should take that off of there. Someone might get hurt.”

  Lorna ignored the hook. She’d make sure to unscrew the broken piece from the wall later.

  “You stayed with me through the worst of my injury. You were there when I woke up.” Lorna didn’t need an apology from him. He had no reason to apologize. “William, I get why you left the hospital. You needed time to think. All of this,” she gestured at the lobby and toward the stage, “is a lot to take in. Especially when I consider that you’ve been trying to get away from it your whole life. I can handle bad days, and bad moods, and differences of opinion, but it’s like I said I can’t handle any more secrets and lies. So if you need time to think about something, I want you to take it.”

  William nodded.

  “What we—what your sister, Vivien, and I—did in there, what happens when we join hands, the feelings that surged...” She felt a little breathless thinking about it. Excitement flowed inside her at the thought. The lingering effects of the séance left her body tired but her mind alive and very awake. “I want that. What we did, what we can do, I want that in my life. I want to feel special. I want to see where this new chapter leads me. I know I was brought to Freewild Cove for a reason. I thought it was to escape, but it was to find who I was meant to be. Now that I found it, I’m not giving it up for you or anyone. I can’t compromise what I want for other people anymore. But, saying that, I understand if you can’t be around this. I hope you can. I really hope you can.”