by Eliza Nolan
We brought the tree home this morning. A real one, of course. It towers a foot from the ceiling. Enough room for the china-doll angel with gold wings I’ve placed up top.
I’ve spent the entire afternoon working on the tree, our living room filling up with the aroma of fresh pine. The lights and the red, blown-glass ornaments hang evenly spaced on the evergreen branches. Now I’m working on adding the golden bows. I decided on a red and gold theme this Christmas.
I hum as I pull the golden organza up around one of the evergreen branches and loop it through, then startle and jump back. I pricked my finger, hard. “Ouch!” I stick my finger in my mouth and suck on it. It tastes bitter and piney, with a hint of copper. I shake my hand as if that will get rid of the pain. A drop of blood flies off my finger, landing on one of the tree branches, darkening several of its needles in glistening liquid. I grab a piece of tissue paper that one of the ornaments had been wrapped in, and use it to wipe the small droplet off the needles, but the blood doesn’t come off. I wipe some more, only to smear the blood over more of the branch. The needles are becoming coated in a dark red fluid. I blink in confusion. Holy crap, is there something else on this tree that looks like blood? Maybe some sort of dark sap? Because I swear only a drop of my blood landed on it.
I flip the tissue paper over to find bright smears of red. It’s definitely blood. I reach into the box of ornaments and grab another piece of discarded tissue paper, then wipe at the tree again. When I pull it away this time the branch is dripping deep red. So is the branch next to it. It’s spreading. I grit my teeth and fight back a wave of nausea as I wipe at the few branches nearby, but I can’t stop it all. Red drops fall, splashing onto the hardwood floor around the bottom of the tree. The new piece of tissue paper is sopping wet with blood. I raise it to my nose expecting to smell some sort of chemical paint aroma, but gasp as the copper smell hits my nostrils. I swallow back against the acidic cocoa creeping up my throat.
“Oh, my God,” I say. Each of the branches now drips dark red. “What the ever-living heck?” From the top of the tree, the angel I’d hung is covered in red, his bare feet drip with blood, like some creepy stigmata baby with wings. Red runs down the glass ornaments and stains the organza bows. I stumble back away from the tree and trip on a box, screaming as if the box is trying to attack me. I fall back, catching myself on the arm of the sofa. The air is growing thick with the smell of blood and something else, something rotten reaching my nostrils and turning my stomach.
I bolt out of the room towards the downstairs bathroom, swing open the door and crouch over the toilet, expelling my hot cocoa and the leftover pizza I’d had for lunch.
12
Eva
I sit curled up in the beanbag chair in the corner of my room. It’s right underneath one of my windows, and with the sunlight coming in, it’s warm and almost pleasant.
But not quite.
I’m trying to get an early start on my winter-break assigned reading for school, but I can’t concentrate. My eyes have gone over the same sentence about ten times, and it still won’t sink in. My brain is too preoccupied with last night. I can’t get over how Grace got that book out from under my mattress without me waking up. I’m a light sleeper.
This morning at breakfast she didn’t give me any strange looks. I asked her if she remembered wandering into my room last night. She was surprised and didn’t recall any of it. Thank God.
I try to focus on the book in front of me. I don’t have a clue what happened in the last chapter. This is impossible. I set the book on the floor beside me and crawl off the beanbag and over to my closet, sliding out the book from the attic again. I flip it open to the first page. The paper is weathered and warn—as if it’s been heavily used. Dad has a friend who’s good at making authentic-looking props. This must be one of his. The book is like an occult encyclopedia, divided up into sections with lists for a bunch of different things, and how to use them. A section for crystals, a section for incense, a section on pentagrams—I didn’t know there was more than one kind. Each entry is a drawing of one along with a list of its benefits and a few warnings.
What a lot of trouble for something that obviously won’t work. Although, after the past few days, with the spirit board, and stumbling across this book, and the nightmares, I’m no longer sure it won’t. Some part of me, deep inside, prickles with fear at the thought this could all be real.
I flip through to the back, surprised to find names written in the same fancy handwriting that matches the rest of the book.
Sarah & Michael Hunter.
Mom and Dad.
A blood-curdling scream startles me to my feet. It’s coming from downstairs. Grace is down there working on the tree. I slam the book shut, jam it back in the hole in my closet wall, and throw my bedroom door open. Dad’s already in the hallway, running to the stairs. I follow.
When we get downstairs the living room is empty. A box is tipped over with ornaments strewn across the floor, but Grace is nowhere to be seen. My heart jumps into my throat. Where the hell is she?
Dad searches the dining room, and I run through to the kitchen.
“Grace?” I shout.
Off the side of the kitchen I hear retching in the half bathroom, then a meek, “Here.” There’s a whoosh as the toilet flushes. I run into the bathroom and examine my older sister. She doesn’t appear to be hurt, but she’s coated in sweat, and her face is pale white as she hovers over the toilet bowl.
“What happened? Are you okay?”
She whimpers and hugs herself. “It was all bloody.”
“What was all bloody?”
“The tree,” she says.
I cringe. “You mean, like there was a dead animal in it or something?” I cover my mouth with my hand. That’s disgusting. Dad’s gonna have to get rid of the animal, burn the tree, and sterilize the whole room before I’ll be going anywhere near it.
“No,” she says. “The tree itself! It was dripping with blood. All the branches. It was so gross, Eva.”
Dad appears behind me in the doorway. “What happened?”
“She says the tree was bleeding. I didn’t see any blood in there, did you, Dad?”
He shakes his head. We both go back into the living room to try to make sense of what Grace is freaking out about. But nothing is out of place except for the box of knocked over ornaments. I kneel down and right it.
Dad moves closer to the tree, hands on his hips. He takes one of the branches in his hand and brushes it with his thumb. “It’s just a normal tree. I mean, she used red ornaments, but they’re round glass and look nothing like blood.” He studies one of the glass balls in his hands.
I pick up a few stray pieces of tissue paper on the floor to put them back in the ornament box but find a small blot of red on one of them. It’s turning brown, like drying blood, but there’s hardly a drop. I hold it up to Dad.
He peers over the frames of his glasses and shrugs.
“It’s all gone.” Grace’s voice is weak as she peers in from the doorway.
“We’re not sure what you think you saw,” Dad says.
“I thought I saw blood,” she says.
I hold up the tissue.
She shuffles into the living room, takes the tissue and examines it for a moment, then the tree. She slumps down on the couch. “This is from me pricking my finger.” Her eyes tear up and she covers her face with her hands.
Dad sits down and puts an arm around her. “Eva, didn’t you say you saw Grace sleepwalking last night?”
“Yeah,” I say. I know where Dad’s going.
“You’re probably having one of those waking dreams.”
The doctors said it could happen if she didn’t get enough good rest at night—hallucinations that were basically like dreams only while she’s awake.
“That’s right,” Grace says. “It has to be that.” She sniffles and smiles as she wipes at her damp eyes. “Of course. Trees don’t bleed.” But then she looks at me, her brow scrunch
ed together as if she’s trying to remember something.
“What?” I say.
“A book…” She doesn’t finish. Instead she shakes her head like she doesn’t understand. She rests her chin on her fist and laughs. “Bleeding trees.” She rolls her eyes.
But now my eyes are fixed on her. What was she going to say about a book? Was she remembering last night?
13
Grace
Dad and Eva can’t stop staring at me, so I push up off the couch.
“I’m fine,” I say. “I’ll be fine. I just need a good night’s sleep. I’m sure you’re right, Dad.” It must have been a waking dream. In fact, the whole oven fire incident was probably the same thing. Although I’ve never had such dark waking dreams before. And they felt so real.
I study the tree. It is definitely not bleeding. But I no longer want to see it decorated in red, either. I pull off several red glass ornaments and start wrapping them in tissue paper.
I sense Eva next to me. She pulls a few more of the decorations off the tree, then finds another box for them. She puts a few away. I’m not sure if she’s doing this to be nice, or to get brownie points from Dad. Probably the latter. Last year she’d have genuinely cared about me.
That was then.
“What are you girls doing?” Dad asks.
Eva shrugs. “I’m helping with whatever she’s doing.”
I stare at my sister, with her thick, black eyeliner and her hair back in a messy bun. But her expression is soft, one I haven’t had directed at me for a long time. There’s no malice in her eyes. I’ve missed this.
I smile at her. “I’m putting away the red and gold ornaments. I think this tree would be dazzling in silver and blue. Don’t you?”
Eva nods. “Sure.”
“Whatever you say.” Dad tugs at his beard. “The decorations are your department.” He pauses. “Unless you don’t want them to be anymore. We can always decorate the tree. You could take the year off.”
“No. I’m good. I still wanna do this.” I may be shaken, but I can’t let a little waking dream ruin my favorite time of year. No way. “Besides, if I let one of you guys do it, who will be able to look at it? We’ll have to keep the front blinds closed through the holidays.”
Dad and Eva laugh.
The back door of the house whumps open. “I’m home!” Mom announces.
“In here,” Eva and I say in unison, but Dad shuffles off to meet her, his slippers sliding across the hardwood.
They greet each other in normal loud parental tones, but then quickly turn the volume down. I’m pretty sure Dad’s filling Mom in on my freak out. They’ll want me to go back to the sleep specialist, or maybe a therapist. I’m so over going to doctors. It’s not like they can do much about my dreams. The drugs don’t work.
I hear the thunk thunk of Dad’s feet along with the shuffle of Mom’s as they walk through the hallway, but Mom doesn’t even pop her head in on the way. They head straight upstairs to their room, and their bedroom door gently clicks closed.
I’m tempted to pause the Christmas music to eavesdrop, but when they’re up there with the door closed the only way to hear what they’re saying is with an ear pressed firmly to the door. And I’m not sure I want to know what they’re saying, anyway.
Eva continues to remove the red ornaments, and I start on removing the gold bows. But I can’t stop glancing over at my little sister. I feel like I’ve forgotten something, but I can’t figure out what the heck it is.
“Eva, when I was sleepwalking last night, what was I doing? Did I say anything?”
Eva stops wrapping the glass ornament in her hand.
“You were sitting cross legged on the floor when I woke up. And as you left you said something about how we shouldn’t read a book. I think you said it wasn’t any good.”
“What book?” I ask.
“You didn’t say. I assumed you were talking about something you were reading for school?” She shrugs and goes back to wrapping the ornament.
“A book…” As I say the words an image flashes in my mind. It’s me sitting in the center of a pentagram, holding my hand over a book, open in my lap, and crying out in pain. The book burns my hand. I startle back to the present and nearly drop the organza bows. What kind of evil-filled book was my subconscious working with?
14
Eva
Snowflakes swirl underneath the streetlights. The fresh blanket of snow covering the ground appears blue in the light of the full moon. I tug my beanie hat down and flip my hood over my head. I’m glad my parents let me out of going to the Christmas concert tonight, but I’m not sure running around outside in the middle of a snowstorm is much better.
Fiona and I huddle together, teeth chattering, as we trudge through the open lot at the end of her street. Wind must have whipped all the snow into this one location because walking is getting more and more difficult. My feet fall through the thick snow, and I have to work to pull them up and out for the next step.
“This is crazy,” Fiona says.
“You wanna go back?” I suggest. She’s right, this is nuts. But she is also nuts, so...
“Hell no! We’re almost there!” She nods toward the loading dock at the edge of the lot. Its door is closed, but it won’t be locked. It never is. This summer she rigged it so that it appears locked, but we can still get in.
I groan internally. She’s right. We’ve come this far so we might as well do this thing. If not now, she’ll try to get me to do it again next month.
I can’t decide if I want the summoning to work or not. I mean, it won’t actually work. I’ve run it over in my head so many times. Fiona has to be the one who made the board spell out all those things. And she’s the one who made a big deal about following its instructions and then basically searched our attic until she found something creepy. She still denies it. But it’s either her, or we’ve been communicating with some sort of demon. Which is ridiculous, and I don’t believe it. There’s just no way.
“Give me a boost?” she hollers through the blowing snow. Her hands rest on the edge of the loading dock.
I lock the fingers of my gloves together the best I can, and she steps in, pushing herself up. She kicks out her other leg, hooking the toe of her boot on the edge of the platform, and pulls herself the rest of the way up. Next, she digs her arm into the snow at the bottom of the door, locates the handle, and heaves the door skyward. It clicks as it rolls back to reveal the vacant loading area.
“Come on.” She helps me up the steep ledge, and we dust the snow off our coats.
Inside the warehouse the air is still, which should make it feel warmer, but I shiver against a chill as I take in the cement walls, ceiling, and floors. There’s no wind, but there’s nothing to inspire warmth either. We’ve joked about dumpster-diving an old couch or something to bring in and make it feel more homely, but that involves a lot of brawn, and it’s only the two of us who know about the place.
“Should we start a fire?” Fiona asks, hugging herself. She scans the space as if she might be finally regretting coming out here on such a cold night.
I shake my head. “Let’s not burn the building down. But we could hurry up and get started. The sooner we do this, the sooner we can run back to your house and laugh about how silly we are for doing such a stupid thing when it’s so cold.”
She grabs the open door by the handle and pulls on it with all her weight, and there’s a rolling bunch of clicks as the door slides down and closes, cutting off the streetlights, save for a sliver which trickles in the dingy warehouse windows near the ceiling.
There’s a pop and a crackle, then light from the match in Fiona’s hand.
She lights the first candle.
15
Grace
Mom and Dad lead the way through the crowded lobby to the far side of the theater and hand the usher our tickets. The guy actually wears a button-up red coat and round red hat with a chin strap—like in the movies. He pulls out his flashlight, le
ads us through a hallway and around to a back set of stairs that wind around up and up.
Jenna squeezes my hand. “Oh my gosh! He’s a real friggin’ usher. Suit and all,” she whispers. Her smile is huge.
I was sad when Eva said she didn’t want to come. I mean, this has been a family thing ever since I can remember. But having Jenna here, my Christmas partner-in-crime, is totally great.
“I know, right?” I whisper back.
We head down a hallway with three arched doorways, each covered with a red velvet curtain. He stops in front of the first one and pulls the curtain back.
“Here you are.” He shines the light through.
The small oval box has lush carpeting with red and gold fleur de lis that match the magnificent gilded ceiling of the grand theater. Each of the four chairs is like a royal throne—red velvet with high backs and arms. Mom and Dad hang back while Jenna and I race up to the front of the balcony like kids in a candy store.
From where we stand, we can peer down into the orchestra pit where the musicians play a warm-up song. The main floor and both balconies are filled to capacity. There are several sets of theater boxes on the other side of the stage. The one directly across from us has only two chairs, and two older women who sit tall and proud and wear sparkling earrings I can see from all the way across the vast theater.
I nudge Jenna. “Put crowns on them and they’d look like royalty.”
“One day that will be us,” Jenna says. “Old and dignified, with money to spend on the beautiful things in life.”
“That’s the dream,” I say.
“Are you two ever going to sit down?” Mom whispers. Mom and Dad have settled themselves in the back two chairs, leaving the front ones open to us.
I pull off my coat and the usher takes it. The fuzz from the trim of my snow-white shawl tickles my arms as I pull it closed, then take a seat up front. Jenna holds her head up high as if she is royalty and eases herself into the chair next to me, making me laugh.
