Total pages in book: 55
Estimated words: 52976 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 265(@200wpm)___ 212(@250wpm)___ 177(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 52976 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 265(@200wpm)___ 212(@250wpm)___ 177(@300wpm)
Mrs. Shaheen comes right up to my face, causing me to shut up and take a step back. For a moment, nothing happens. She peers into my eyes as if searching through a window to see if someone’s home.
Maybe that’s exactly what she’s doing.
Seeing if someone’s home.
And then: “Is he here now?”
I blink. “W-What?”
“Is he here now? With you? Somewhere in there?” She squints, her thick eyebrows pulling together.
“I don’t know what you mean, Mrs. Sha—”
“Oh, I think you do.”
You can’t play innocent forever, Griff. She knows.
No, she doesn’t.
Yeah, she obviously does.
“Did you bring him with you?” she asks. Then her eyes flash with fear. “Is the soul of Westley Harmeyer hiding behind your stoic face right now …?”
Boo.
Okay, maybe she does know.
I’m about to answer when she at once turns angry. “You won’t trick me this time, you wily, wicked spirit. I won’t accept you needing me to divulge information for another phony digital art project of yours. Hypothetical neighbors? Pfft … Client confidentiality, my ass.”
“Mrs. Shaheen, please—”
She raises her voice. “Tell me the truth. Now. You need my help, don’t you? That’s why you really came!”
“I just need—”
“You’ve gone in too deep with the wicked spirit of Westley Harmeyer. He’s consuming you, isn’t he? The boy is eating you alive from the inside out!”
What the—? “No, no, it isn’t that, it really isn’t that at all. Please, I just—”
“You need me to save your soul! Admit it! Admit it, afflicted child! You need me to save your soul!!”
“I need you to save his!!” I finally shout back.
She shrinks away from me at once, like my words just showered her in ice. Her stony eyes affix to mine in a mixture of defiance and fear. The room grows cold and silent. I might have just shit my pants.
Way to go, Griff. You broke the woman.
“S-Sorry,” I say. “I, uh … I misspoke. I’m not quite myself lately.” Of course not. You’re both of us. “I have the wedding in just a few more days, and my fiancé’s eccentric dads are coming into town, not to mention my own overbearing parents who won’t leave things alone, and I just …” I let out a defeated sigh. Hey, you’re not giving up already, are you? “I’m sorry. Truly. I’m truly, very, very sorry that I disturbed you today. I’ll just go home.” I turn to leave. Griffin!
I have my hand on the door when she says, “Wait.”
I stop and glance at her over a shoulder, worried of what she might say.
She’s holding her cane like a wizard who’s about to conjure some kind of protective force field against me. Maybe that’s exactly what she’s doing.
But her voice is soft when she says, “You’ve been dancing with the dead for nearly two years. Since that fateful day you sought my advice … since that fateful day I foolishly told you how to invite a spirit into your living body. That is true, is it not?”
There is something about the solemnity of her tone that unsettles me. “Yes,” I finally admit.
“Griffin.” Her voice trembles with fear now. “I may have told you how to do it, but you never gave me the opportunity to explain the consequences.”
“Consequences …?”
“And you’ve been dancing with the dead for nearly two years now. Tampering with the gateway between us and them. Do you even know what could happen if that gateway broke? And with Halloween approaching …?”
She takes another step back and nearly trips, then rights herself and lifts her cane even higher, as if ready to shield herself from some attack I might be planning.
It’s as if I’ve become dangerous to her.
“M-Mrs. Shaheen …”
“You must end it. You must end it at once. Cast the spirit out and never invite it in again. Let the spirit rest, otherwise it will never rest.”
“He’s good,” I suddenly find myself saying. “He is a good person. I promise you, he’s meant me no harm. I am every part of me right now when I tell you that, not him. He’s a good person.”
“No lingering spirit is good,” she spits back, almost hissing. “That is why they don’t move on when they die. The bad ones, at least. They linger, Mr. Griffin James, they linger to feed on the living. It is your soul that it feeds upon. It is your soul that is the cost for its greed.”
“Westley Harmeyer isn’t bad.”
The mention of his name has her gripping her cane with both hands now.
I’ve never seen her this afraid. This is no act.
I take a step back from her. “I-I’m sorry.” I lift my hands in surrender. “I … I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“You are the one who should be scared, child.”
I stare at her for a while, utterly shaken to my core. Even West remains quiet, as if not even occupying my body, a silent presence.