The Haunted

by Jessica Verday

  That’s because you didn’t want to notice, my subconscious whispered. Noticing it was missing meant noticing that it was real.

  I held it in one hand and ran my thumb over the crinkly texture. Even though Nikolas and Katy had claimed to be ghosts, or Shades, as they called it, and said they were characters from “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” they were real, in some sense. I’d visited their home. Drunk their tea. Exchanged gifts with them.

  Slowly, I sat the recipe back on the desk. My eyes and fingers involuntarily went to the dainty gilt-edged, rose-covered teacup sitting there. They gave that to me too. Barely visible, and crammed next to several full bottles of perfume that I was aging, it had collected a fine layer of dust.

  I should go visit Nikolas and Katy. Prove to myself…

  Prove to myself what? I didn’t know. But I was going to get proof… of something.

  The doorbell rang later that afternoon, just as I was getting ready to go see Caspian again. I was literally at the front door with my hand on the doorknob, when the chimes echoed through the house. Spiders raced along my scalp when I saw who was there, and immediately I remembered our last encounter.

  It was the odd-looking boy and girl I’d met at the cemetery.

  This time they were dressed in khakis—pants for him, long skirt for her—and white polo shirts. They looked like private-school kids or Jehovah’s Witnesses.

  Except for their hair.

  The guy still had the Mohawk, only it was red this time, and the girl’s purple-and-blond hair had been dyed completely turquoise.

  As soon as I saw them, I took a step back. I couldn’t help it; my legs were no longer in my control.

  “Hello, Abbey,” the girl sing-sang in that gorgeous, high-pitched, melodic voice. “Do you remember us?”

  Something pushed at the edges of my memory. It made me sick to my stomach. “Cacey and Uri,” I replied.

  “That’s right,” Uri said. His voice was musical too, but in a different way. A hidden timbre ran in his tone, stretched thin like a silver current. “Can we come in?”

  “That’s, um… I have to… I really should…” I lost all train of thought, and the empty house loomed at my back. Dad was at work, and Mom was at a meeting. I had the strangest urge to call 911, but what was I going to say? “Help, there are two kids dressed in khaki and being polite at my front door”?

  Hysterical laughter bubbled up, and I pushed the thought away. I was feeling much calmer now. Happy, even. Everything was going to be fine.

  “Sure!” I said, throwing the door wide open. “Come on in. Do you want anything to drink?”

  First Cacey, then Uri crossed the threshold and followed me in. “I’ll take a Coke, if you have some,” Cacey said. I entered the kitchen and fetched her one from the fridge. Bringing it back in, I turned to Uri. “Anything for you?”

  “No, I’m good.”

  They both sat on the couch, and I sat in the recliner across from them. Cacey popped the top of her can and guzzled the entire thing in three sips. She turned her wide, clear eyes to me as I watched in astonishment.

  “I just love that beverage,” she trilled. “Co-ca-Co-la. Makes me want to write songs about it.”

  Well, that was definitely one of the weirdest things I’ve ever heard. I glanced at Uri. He was smiling indulgently at her. Then, suddenly, he turned his gaze to me.

  “Do you like Coca-Cola, Abbey?” he asked. “Is it one of your favorite things?”

  “Um, well, yeah.”

  “What about potato chips? Hershey bars? Doritos? Pizza? Those are all typical teenage vices, aren’t they?”

  Vices. That was an interesting choice of words. “Yeah, I guess…”

  Cacey leaned forward. “Cigarettes? Booze? A little gin and tonic after school to help ease the stress of peer pressure?”

  What? Ew. “Those are all generally considered vices, but they’re not mine.” Why was I answering them? Why were they here? What did they want?

  I opened my mouth to turn the question-asking tables on them, but Cacey intercepted me. “I know! Sex with boys… in fast cars, and on your parents’ bed. Or with girls. I’m not judging.”

  I stood up. “Who are you people? Why are you asking me these things?”

  Cacey looked at Uri and grinned. Her eyes were paler, if that was even possible. There was absolutely no color in them now, not even the tiniest hint of gray. It was like staring into crystal-clear water. “We’re from a local college,” she said. “Just gathering statistics and data. Can’t you tell by our clothes?”

  They were lying. I knew they were lying, but I didn’t call them on it. “Oh, okay.”

  “Do you have any plans for your future? College and whatnot?” Uri asked me.

  I looked back and forth between them. A sick feeling blossomed in the pit of my stomach, and I desperately wanted them to leave. “Shouldn’t you… I mean, don’t you have someplace else to be?” I glanced at the door.

  “You want us to leave?” Cacey said, a delighted tone in her voice. “Oh, I get it. No.”

  “Why don’t you just answer our questions?” Uri asked me. His tone was soothing, and I almost closed my eyes for a second to catch that melody. “Don’t you want to answer them?”

  Yes. No. A migraine was starting to throb in the back of my skull. “I really don’t think it’s any of your business.…”

  Cacey and Uri both leveled glares at me. Every single hair on my arms and on the back of my neck stood straight up. The dancing spiders did triple time, and I almost gasped out loud at the shivery sensation.

  Putting one hand to my pulsing temples, I didn’t recognize the whispery voice that came out of me. “Please, don’t ask me these things. I can’t… Just please… don’t.”

  Uri broke his gaze and turned to look at Cacey. She shook her head at him. “No.”

  “It’s too much,” he argued. “Later.”

  Cacey gave a disgusted sigh and then began to examine her nails. “Fine, whatever.”

  Uri looked like he wanted to grab her by the arm and haul her to her feet, but she shot him a deadly look. My head was splitting, but I felt that weird sense of calm coming over me again. In one swift movement Cacey stood up and strode to the door. Uri was by her side a heartbeat later.

  “See you around, Abbey,” Cacey said, wiggling her fingers in an approximation of a wave. “Next time.”

  Uri reached around her and opened the door. The sunlight streamed in, illuminating both of them in glowing silhouettes of white. “Oh, and try some baking soda for the aftertaste. Takes away the burn,” she called out before they stepped into the daylight.

  I sat on the couch, staring at the door like I could see through it. Like I could see them walking down the street, and away from my house.

  All the while tasting burnt ash on my tongue.

  Red eyes and dark, leathery things chased me down cramped alleys and dirty side streets. Every time I tried to scream, they’d come swooping toward me, cackling and spitting fire.

  I turned blindly, searching for something to fend them off with, but every brick or stone or piece of wood I could find turned to ashes in my hands. Disintegrated at my touch.

  Somewhere, in the back of my mind, I knew this was a nightmare. Knew that I lay on my bed, trapped beneath stifling sheets. Shivering as sweat cooled on my skin.

  I opened my mouth again to scream. In my mind, my vocal chords flexed and stretched. I felt the strain as a hoarse cry edged its way past my lips. It was almost there… almost free…

  The dark thing flew low, and I took a step back. Threw up my hands, tried to protect my face…

  And swallowed it whole.

  I sat up, feverishly clutching the covers in the dark. It was here. It was in me. It was… a dream.

  I took in my surroundings. Closet, bathroom, desk, door. No hulking shapes. No dark shadows. No red eyes. But just to be on the safe side, I reached over and flipped on my light. A warm, buttery glow filled the room and swept aside my wave of p
anic.

  Looking down at my twisted sheets, I slowly unclenched my fingers. My legs were sweaty and stuck together when I moved. I took several steps toward the bathroom and fumbled for the light switch. The tile was cool on my bare feet as I shuffled in and stood in front of the sink, gripping both edges.

  Staring at the reflection in the mirror, I turned my head from side to side and looked at my throat. There weren’t any… marks, or anything. Feeling slightly foolish, I opened my mouth and looked inside. Nothing dark or scary there either.

  I shuddered as I thought about that thing swooping toward me. Forcing its way past my throat. It had screeched the most god-awful sound.… I shuddered again and ran my hands under some cold water. Pressing them to my cheeks, I tried to calm my racing thoughts. It was only a dream, but it had felt so real.

  A single thought crossed my mind, and without questioning it, I followed through.

  Leaving the bathroom behind, I changed into some jeans and a dark hoodie. Then I went over to the window seat and looked at the ground outside. There was a section of flat roof right below my window, attached to a hanging trellis. The drop down to the ground didn’t look too bad, and I was pretty sure I could make it.

  I raised the window halfway and leaned my head out into the darkness. I’ll have to be careful not to bump into anything down there and wake up Mom and Dad.

  I pulled my head back in. What was I thinking? Could I really sneak out of the house? If they caught me, I’d be so dead.

  I glanced back over at my bed and tasted burnt ash again. No way. I didn’t care what happened. I wasn’t going back to bed, and I didn’t want to stay here.

  Lifting the window a little bit higher, I threw my leg over the edge. One toe touched the roof, and I put my other leg through. Balancing on tiptoes, I pulled the window back down, leaving it open just enough so that I could get back in, but not too much so that it looked suspicious. Belatedly, I realized that I probably should have stuffed some pillows under my sheets to make it look like I was still there in case Mom came in to check on me.

  But I wasn’t going to climb back in just to do that. Besides, I wouldn’t be gone very long anyway.

  Moving over to the edge where the lattice was, I stuck my feet into the crisscrossed holes. It settled when I put my whole weight on it, and I froze, but a second later it was still. I gripped it and gave a tug to double-check. It held firm.

  Climbing down was a lot easier than I’d expected, and my feet hit solid ground in no time. It looked like everything was clear, and I moved stealthily across the yard and out into the street.

  Most of the houses were dark except for a porch light, and a wicked thrill went through me at what I was doing. When the massive iron cemetery gates rose up before me, I took another peek around, then slipped through them.

  The cemetery was beautiful and eerie in the moonlight, the bleached-bone color of the aged tombstones turned milky and luminescent. The pathways were dark, but my feet knew the one that would take me to him. It was peaceful and quiet as I passed by small metal fences and lopsided angel statues, but then I felt a tiny frisson of fear when I pictured red eyes and things on wings swooping after me.

  I quickened my pace to a half run, and I reached his mausoleum. Slipping through the door, I saw that there weren’t any candles lit. What if he’s not here? What if he goes wandering at night?

  Terror started to clog the back of my throat, and I willed my eyes to get used to the darkness. The total, complete darkness, which was black… and empty… and yawning in front of me.

  A rustling sound caught my attention. Were there rats in here? Rats have beady eyes. Red. Beady. Eyes.

  The sound came closer, and I tried to breathe slower. If it didn’t hear me, it couldn’t find me. But my heart wouldn’t stop pounding, and my pulse was racing. I wanted desperately to close my eyes, but I couldn’t even do that.

  The noise stopped. “Abbey?”

  His voice was right next to my ear, and I turned my head, groping blindly for him in the dark. A spark of electricity tingled faintly in my hands, and I knew he was there.

  “What’s wrong?” Caspian said.

  I wanted to run into his arms and be told everything was okay. “I had a bad dream. Couldn’t sleep.”

  “So you came here?”

  Had I made a mistake? “Sorry,” I whispered. “I just wanted to see you, but I shouldn’t have—”

  “No, no, it’s good. I’m glad you came to see me. But won’t your parents find out?”

  I shook my head, then realized he probably couldn’t see it in the dark. “I snuck out my window. They’ll never notice, and I won’t stay long.” I shifted awkwardly. “Can you, um, light some candles? My dream was pretty scary.”

  “Oh, yeah.” He moved, and then there was a soft scratching sound. The bright flare of a flame burst to life at the end of a match, and he lit two candles on my left. “Do you want to sit down on the bench?”

  I nodded and followed him, waiting as he lit several more candles that sputtered and shed their light across the empty tomb. He slid down into a sitting position against the wall next to me. It was deadly quiet in our little space, and I tried to imagine him here day after day, all alone. It would drive me to the edge in no time.

  “Want to talk about it?” he asked. “The dream?”

  I draped my arm across the back of the bench. The metal was cool through the thickness of my sweatshirt. “It was awful. Dark things were chasing me into dark alleys. And I couldn’t defend myself. Then this monster swooped down on me, and…”

  Caspian got up and moved over to one of the boxes. Reaching down, he pulled out two items and then came back to me. “Here.” He held out a shirt. “You’re cold. You’re shivering.”

  I wasn’t going to argue that it was just because of the dream, so I took it. It was a button-down, and felt like fleece under my fingertips. Tilting my head back, I said, “Thank you.”

  Then he placed a small brown paper bag next to me. “Second, a distraction. Sorry it’s not wrapped nicer. This was the best I could do. Happy birthday, Astrid.”

  He’d gotten me something? I opened the bag and looked down into it. A book with a colorful illustration of Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman lay there. “Ohhhhh,” I whispered, pulling it out reverently.

  “It’s a kids’-book version,” he admitted, with a bashful smile. “I hope that’s okay.”

  I flipped through the pages. It was an old book, copyright 1932, and crisp with age. Every third page had a gorgeous black-and-white illustration on it. It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. “It’s perfect,” I said. “‘Thank you’ seems so inadequate. Where did you get it?”

  “Don’t worry about that,” he replied. “I’m just glad you like it.”

  I hugged it to my chest. “I love it.”

  He stood over me for a minute, looking down with a strange expression on his face. “Every guy’s dream,” he muttered softly. “To be the one the girl comes running to when she wants to be saved. And I can’t even do anything about it.…”

  His eyes were intense, holding me captive. My breath caught in my throat. “You can come sit by me,” I offered. “Keep me company.” But he moved back toward the wall, reclaiming his seat on the floor.

  “It’s better if I stay here. Easier that way.”

  Better for who? I wanted to say, but I tried not to let the disappointment show on my face and busied myself with wrapping his shirt around me. “So how come you can touch things, but not me? Um… people. People, I mean.”

  Caspian spread his hands out in front of him and looked at them. “I don’t know why I can move boxes, pick up my charcoal, snap a pencil, break a twig… but can’t touch you. Maybe it’s the rule of this place, or whatever I am. I’m not sure.”

  “Have you tried to touch anyone else?”

  “Yeah. Kids at the high school, my dad, strangers on the street… Hell, I even went church-hopping. Figured for sure that if anyone could see me o
r touch me, it would be a priest. But they slipped between my hands just as easy as the rest.”

  I thought back to that night in my room, and the next day at the library when he’d kissed me. “How were you able to… ?” I felt myself blushing. “How could you kiss me at the library? Shouldn’t that have been impossible? And before I left, that day at the river when I found you in the rain, you said you could only touch me for one day. What does that mean?”

  He looked away, and I had to strain to hear his answer. “I can only touch you on my death day. November first. I touched your face in your room because it was after midnight. And that’s why I wanted you to meet me at the library that day. Why I was so adamant that you didn’t forget.”

  “Why didn’t you stay longer? In my room? If you could only touch me then, why were you in such a hurry to… leave?”

  “I wasn’t sure how much, exactly, I could… do,” he said. “That’s why I picked the library. Public place and all.”

  My ears grew warmer as I realized what he meant. I coughed once and cleared my throat. “How did you figure it out? The first time. How did you know you could touch me on that day?”

  “On the first anniversary of my death, the year before, I was downtown. I didn’t even know what day it was, but I bumped into someone. Literally. Normally, I’d just pass right through them, but that day I didn’t.

  “At first I thought something had changed. People saw me. They heard me. For the first time in a whole year.” His eyes grew sad. “Then I passed a newspaper stand and saw that it was November first. I put two and two together.”

  He looked up at me. “I wanted to go see my dad. Almost did, too. I wanted to tell him what had happened to me, and that I was sorry. But then I thought about how traumatic it would be seeing your dead son a year after his car accident, so I didn’t. I ended up just sitting in a park all day. Doing what I did every other day. Watching the people go by.”

  “That must have been hard,” I said. “To finally be a part of it, and yet still be on the outside.”

  Caspian nodded.

  “And then the next day? It was the same again?”

  Another nod. “Back to being a ghost.”