by Rick Hautala
“Please — have a seat,” Claire said. “Wherever you like. I want you to feel completely comfortable before we begin.”
“And what is it — exactly — that you plan to do?” Elizabeth asked, turning to look at Claire. She was standing by the door, her hands folded in front of her as she squinted and silently surveyed the room. She appeared to be taking slow, measured breaths.
Eyes widening, Claire looked directly at Elizabeth; then she shrugged. Her eyes twinkled in the soft light from the sconces. “What I want to do has very little to do with what might happen in this room tonight,” she replied with a hushed note of reverence. “If the spirits are willing, you will be conversing with them — through me. You see, I am a medium — a clairaudient. The spirits speak inside my head, and they use my mouth as if it were their own.” She laughed softly. “You see, I always felt as though my name, Claire, which means light, more or less predestined me to become a ... a messenger of the True Light. Spirits of the departed who haven’t yet passed on to the higher planes of existence use me as an instrument to speak to loved ones still here on the earthly plane.”
As much as she liked Claire on first impression, Elizabeth’s first thought was, Yeah, sure! She smiled thinly and asked, “Where would you like us to sit?”
“Wherever you feel comfortable,” Claire said pleasantly. “If you feel drawn or directed to a particular chair, please sit there. We can begin as soon as you’re feeling comfortable.”
“Sure,” Elizabeth said. She knew she wasn’t going to start feeling any more relaxed until all of this was over. She pulled out a chair for Junia, then sat in the one next to her. Her hands were slick with sweat as she folded them on the table in front of her and took a shallow, shuddering breath.
Claire walked over to the wall switch, a dimmer switch, and put the lights almost all the way down. The deadened quiet of the room increased as it got darker, and after a moment, Claire came over to the table and sat down directly opposite Elizabeth.
“Now, I don’t know exactly why you’re here, Elizabeth,” Claire began. “All your aunt told me was that you wished to contact ... someone — someone who is no longer among us. “
“It’s my dau —”
“Ut-ut,” Claire said, waving her forefinger in front of Elizabeth’s face. “The less I know about you and what you want, the more likely we are to get in touch with whomever you’re looking for. If you would, please place your hands on the table, palms down and fingers spread.”
Elizabeth did as she was told. Looking down, her hands were nothing more than dark, indistinct smears against the white of the tablecloth.
“Now just relax,” Claire said, her voice lowering to a lulling croon. “Open up your heart, and fill your mind with thoughts of the loved one you wish to contact.”
A ripple of chills danced up Elizabeth’s spine when Claire’s hands slid soundlessly across the table toward her. As they touched fingertips, Elizabeth was sure she felt a tickle of electricity pass between them. She told herself it had to be just static electricity in the tablecloth, or else her keyed-up imagination, when she saw a faint blue spark jump between their fingers.
“Now I want you to take several deep breaths, Elizabeth,” Claire said softly. “I can feel that you’ve been greatly upset lately, but I want you to forget everything that’s been troubling you. Clear your mind and open it to new, higher levels of awareness and love, and your heart will follow.”
Elizabeth labored to take several deep, even breaths, but all she was conscious of was the nervous fluttering sound her throat made every time she exhaled. Her body was tingling from excitement and expectation even as she told herself not to let imagination or wishful thinking carry her away.
Claire whispered, more softly, “That’s good ... that’s very good. Breathe deeply ... evenly. Now, as clearly as you can, I want you to say in your mind the name of the person you wish to communicate with. Not aloud. Just in your mind. Repeat it several times.”
Resisting the sudden, frightened urge to cry out, Elizabeth scrunched her eyes tightly shut to hold back the tears that were forming. She phrased Caroline’s name in three, distinct syllables and thought it repeatedly ...
Car-o-line ... Car-o-line ... Car-o-line ...
The rain continued to batter the side of the house, but as Elizabeth concentrated on her daughter’s name, the sound dropped even further into the background until it was nothing more than a lulling hiss ...
Like the wind in the grass, Elizabeth thought, vaguely aware that her mind was drifting. With a sudden start, she shook herself erect in the chair, thinking she had almost fallen asleep.
“Calmness,” Claire said softly. “Fill your heart with calmness and love. Open your mind so the spirits will feel welcomed.”
Is she just trying to hypnotize me? Elizabeth thought. Either this is a complete scam, or else this woman is a positive nut-case!
“The spirits won’t come to us if there is any agitation in the mind of anyone in the room,” Claire said. The musical tone in her voice drifted like a dancer in and out of Elizabeth’s awareness.
Bracing herself in her chair, Elizabeth slitted her eyes open and watched the hazy form of Claire across the table from her. She held her breath, expecting to see her do something, make some kind of motion that would indicate she was pulling a trick. But, in spite of her mounting suspicions, which could just be nervousness, she couldn’t deny the tingling charge she had felt from Claire’s fingertips. Even now, as she looked down at their hands reaching across the tablecloth and touching, Elizabeth could feel — if not an actual charge, at least the sense of a charge building up, like a thunderstorm brewing just over the horizon.
Elizabeth wondered if there was truly anything “spiritual” happening in the room, or if her expectations and suggestibility were making her feel things that weren’t there. Just as she and Pam had convinced themselves that a disembodied spirit named Max was controlling the Ouija-board pointer, she could be telling herself something was actually happening.
“Is there anyone here who wishes to speak with Elizabeth?” Claire asked. Her tone of voice shifted subtly, making the request sound almost like a command.
For several heartbeats, Elizabeth waited, wondering what would — or could — happen. What in the name of God was she doing here in the first place? This whole charade ...
Is that what it is? A charade?
... is just a waste of time.
Turning her head to the side, Elizabeth chanced a quick glance at Junia. She saw that she was slouching in her chair, her chin resting on her breastbone, her hands folded in her lap. Elizabeth couldn’t even tell if her aunt’s eyes were open or closed. She tingled with fear when she had the sudden impression that her aunt’s eyes were indeed open, and that she was staring unblinkingly back at her. For just an instant — an instant that crackled with fear ...
Like a thunderstorm on the horizon ... moving closer!
... Junia’s face shifted, transforming subtly into that of ... The old crone!
A quick sip of breath entered Elizabeth’s lungs like fire. Her arms and legs jerked with tension, and deep tremors shook her muscles. She was suddenly convinced that the old woman in her nightmares was a distorted vision of Aunt Junia, and she was filled with the paranoid fear that all along her subconscious mind had been warning her to beware of Aunt Junia!
“Let the spirits come,” Claire said, her voice no more than a sing-song whisper. “Let the spirits speak — through me — to Elizabeth.”
Elizabeth glanced quickly back at Claire, then at Junia. A chilled rush of fear swept through her as she strained to hear the sound of her aunt’s breathing and couldn’t. Her instant, panicked thought was that Junia had died and was sitting there, staring glassy-eyed and sightless at the table. The darkness of the room made it impossible to tell as Elizabeth leaned toward Junia, trying to detect the gentle rise and fall of her chest. Finally, she saw a faint stirring of Junia’s blouse and, sighing with relief, eased herse
lf back into her chair.
“Elizabeth is here, waiting to speak with you,” Claire said, apparently unaware of Elizabeth’s rising agitation. “She wishes to speak to someone ... someone who might have a message for her.”
Again silence and a hushed expectancy filled the room. Elizabeth heard a stirring sound, the faint rustle of cloth against cloth. She wasn’t sure if it was Claire or Junia, but she pushed aside her paranoid thoughts and, forcing herself to close her eyes again, filled her mind with her daughter’s name ...
Car-o-line ... Car-o-line ... Car-o-line ...
“I feel it,” Claire said. “I can feel it. There is definitely a presence here.” Her tone of voice lowered and hardened.
With her eyes shut tightly, Elizabeth thought Claire’s voice was coming from somewhere other than across the table; it seemed to be behind her, all around her, muffled by the walls and closed doors. Pinpricks of fear rushed through her, but she told herself not to open her eyes and look. She scrunched her eyes so tight she saw weaving light patterns blossom and dissolve in the darkness.
Car-o-line ... Car-o-line ... Car-o-line ... Come on, honey! ... Talk to me, baby! ...
Elizabeth was paralyzed by the memory of how Aunt Junia’s face had appeared dead and how it had shifted so subtly into that of the old woman in her dreams. Wave after wave of numbing cold rippled through her.
“There is definitely someone here, Elizabeth,” Claire said. “Someone who wants to reach you.”
Every time she spoke, Claire’s voice dropped down another register, until she now sounded more masculine than feminine. “There’s someone here who wants to see you ... Someone who has to talk to you.”
“Is it —”
Car-o-line ... Car-o-line ... Car-O-line ...
“Shush,” Claire said, her voice deep and resonant, almost dreamy.
Gooseflesh rippled up Elizabeth’s arms even as she told herself this was just the power of suggestion at work. It wasn’t reasonable — it wasn’t possible to communicate with spirits of the dead. This whole thing was just a performance, and she was being a gullible dupe!
Claire spoke again. This time her voice rose up high, like a little girl’s. “I ... want ... to ... “There was a strained effort with each word, as Claire struggled to speak, almost as if strong hands were covering her mouth and squeezing her throat.
But before Claire could say anything more, something exploded into Elizabeth’s awareness like a shotgun blast close to her head. It came so suddenly, so clearly, she honestly couldn’t tell if Claire had said it aloud or if the voice was inside her head. Each word was spoken with the precise tone of Caroline’s voice.
“... help ... mommy ...”
No! Impossible! Elizabeth thought. It can’t really be Caroline’s voice!
Her hands clenched into knotted fists, and she squeezed until her hands went numb right up to her elbows. Her pulse pounded in rapid, heavy, hammer blows. Sweat broke out on her forehead, and her breathing came fast and sharp.
That hadn’t been Caroline speaking! It couldn’t have been!
But Elizabeth was filled with the undeniable sensation that there was someone in the room besides the three of them. She didn’t dare open her eyes to look, afraid of what she might see in the darkened room. She certainly hadn’t heard anyone enter, but there was the feeling of a presence behind her ... above her ... surrounding her, and it was as real as Claire’s and Junia’s presence. She remembered having that same sensation at the aunts’ house — of unseen eyes watching her, glaring at her from shadowed comers of the room. Fear coursed like a raging river inside her.
Do it! she commanded herself, even as she trembled. Open your damned eyes and look!
Straining with the effort, Elizabeth forced her eyes open to narrow slits. She was shocked when that didn’t break or even dull the illusion that someone was in the room with them. Horrified, she looked over at Claire, sitting opposite her. She knew it could be, it had to be an illusion generated by the dark room and her wound-up imagination, but she was positive Claire looked ... different, somehow, as though she had shrunk in size and become much younger. She looked almost like a little girl.
“Help! ... Mommy! ... Help! ... “
The words came again, louder and clearer, but still Elizabeth couldn’t tell if Claire was actually speaking them aloud or if they were inside her own head. Her breathing was raw, stinging like razor cuts as each gulp of air shredded her lungs. Her body was trembling so violently that she expected to hear her chair and the legs of the oak table chatter like machine guns on the floor. Her hands felt welded to the tablecloth, and she was fearful that she wouldn’t be able to move them or to control her muscles no matter how much she wanted to.
“Mommy! ... Help! ... Mommy! ... “
“Jesus Christ!” The words formed in Elizabeth’s mind, but she had no way of knowing whether or not she had spoken them aloud. “Oh, my sweet Jesus Christ!”
“Help! ... Mommy! ... “
Is that you, baby? Are you here with me?
Elizabeth’s eyes bulged with each surge of her racing pulse. Pressure built unrelentingly behind her eyes, and she was convinced her head was going to explode. She looked frantically around the darkened room, trying to find something tangible to latch her terrified gaze onto, something to anchor her here in the real world and keep her mind from spiraling into blackness. She could feel a powerful force, gathering just outside the curtained windows of Claire’s “sitting room.” It was as though a huge and hungry beast was pressing its fanged mouth and hell-fire glowing eyes against the glass ... wanting her! Wanting to rip her to pieces!
“Help! ... “ wailed the voice. “Help! ... Mommy!”
Each time the voice spoke, it became more shrill, until it approached a whining buzz.
“Mommy! ... Help ... Mommy! ... “
Suddenly the room was filled with a shrieking scream that blotted out those two repeated words along with every other sound in Claire’s house. Every muscle in Elizabeth’s body contracted simultaneously. Her mind was a swirling confusion. She wasn’t even aware of what she was doing when she kicked back her chair and stood up. She doubled up, groaning with pain, and hunched over the table. Clenching both hands into fists, she brought them down time and again as hard as she could onto the oak table. Each blow crashed like an echoing cannon shot of thunder.
“Help! ... Mommy! ... “
The voice, screaming, filled the “sitting room,” spiraling higher and higher until Elizabeth was convinced it wasn’t a real voice at all; it was the eternal reverberation of her daughter’s screams as the pressing weight of the snowplow came down on top of her ... the terrified, final screams of her daughter that should have been blotted out forever when the gas tanks of both the snowplow and the family Subaru exploded.
Elizabeth looked up to see Claire and Junia staring at her with horror-filled expressions, and she realized that she was the one who had been screaming.
2.
An hour later, Elizabeth, Junia, and Claire were sitting in the living room with all of the lights on, sipping tea while Elizabeth tried to calm down. She felt a small measure of reassurance when she saw the love and concern in both women’s eyes, but her gut was still twisting with cold dread.
“I — I’m sorry I reacted like that,” she said, looking down at the floor, blushing with embarrassment. “I just don’t know ... what came over me.”
“I don’t know what to say,” Claire replied. Her knuckles were pure white as she raised her hand to her mouth. “I mean, I did sense the presence of someone there in the room, but I felt as though I couldn’t draw him — or her — in. Actually, just before you jumped out of your chair and started screaming, I was about to stop everything. I was convinced we weren’t going to get through.” She smiled warmly and tenderly at Elizabeth. “Believe me, dear, I had no idea you were feeling it so ... so strongly. I would have stopped sooner had I known.”
At a complete loss for words, Elizabeth shrugged and smil
ed thinly. Junia reached over and patted Elizabeth gently on the arm. Looking at Claire, she said, “This is so unusual. I mean, I always thought it was the medium who went into the trance.”
“Usually that is the case,” Claire said, “but —” She held her hands up helplessly. “I just don’t know. I’ve never experienced anything like this before. It could mean ... any number of things.”
Elizabeth shivered violently. In the prolonged silence that followed, she rubbed her shoulders and forced herself to ask, “Such as — ?”
Claire’s eyes jumped back and forth between Junia and Elizabeth. Finally, after taking a deep breath, she said, “I’m not entirely sure. I suppose it could mean that you are much more psychically attuned than you realize, or that you might have been in direct contact with the spiritual entity, and your mind just couldn’t handle it.”
Elizabeth shook her head back and forth as Claire spoke. “I don’t think so,” she said, her voice twisting up high and tight. “I mean, I never ... never —” She stopped herself, unsure of what she was trying to say.
“I just don’t want you to worry, dear,” Claire said, looking deeply concerned, almost pained. ‘‘I’ll grant you that you gave me quite a fright when you screamed like that. It certainly isn’t what usually happens, but if there’s something that’s been bothering you very deeply, you must understand, a seance could, I suppose, trigger a quite unusual reaction.”
At a loss for words, Elizabeth just nodded.
“I appreciate it if you don’t want to talk about your personal life, Elizabeth,” Claire continued, “but if there’s something bothering you ... “
“I lost my — daughter,” Elizabeth said. A sharp hitching in her throat almost made her choke. “She died about a year and a half ago, in a car accident.”
