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Sadie took several breaths, reeling the anger back in, even though she ached to demand answers until she received one. She needed to understand why she could see these things.
“I can stay a little longer if you need me to,” he continued. “You can put on one of your movies unless you prefer to focus on your screenplay. I don’t have to meet Charlie until later.”
“Stay. A movie sounds good. Then you can keep Charlie off my back while I figure things out.”
He chuckled. “Ease up on her.”
“I’m only kidding.” She smiled. “For the most part.” But really, she didn’t want to be alone right then and if Charlie wasn’t working, Sadie would’ve begged her sister to come over. Something about how she was the only one experiencing these things was bothering her more than anything. And she needed to know why. It would still be hours before she could dream again—if she could force herself to fall asleep now, she would.
Once Sadie turned on a psychological horror film for Skyler, she started working more on her screenplay to distract herself until she could fall asleep. She glanced over at Skyler, thinking about how she used to do this same thing beside him when they were in high school. Those moments weren’t that many years ago, but on some days they felt like a lifetime. As wonderful as it was that Skyler had Charlie back, Sadie didn’t have River. Only the possibility that a remnant of him was here, maybe even his spirit.
She jotted everything down in her notebook that had happened in the last few days, trying to piece things together as Skyler finished the movie. Only there were more questions than answers.
“If you need me, call me,” he said as she let him out onto the porch. “But at least give me enough time to shower. I smell like shit from digging. Honestly, I’m not sure how you sat beside me the whole movie.”
“I don’t care if you smell like a barn.” Sadie smiled, wrapping her arms around him and resting her head on his shoulder. “Thank you.” She then shoved him away. “Now go entertain my sister.”
As soon as Sadie shut the door, she eyed the planchette, coming up with an alternative. She collected it along with the notebook and candles, then took off into the woods. The quiet pounded in her ears, seeming louder than anything she’d ever heard before, like a haunting sound within itself. She stopped in the center of the circular formation of trees, directly beside the hole where Skyler had dug.
Sadie placed the two candles next to her, lighting the wicks of both. Their flames didn’t flicker, only stood still, reaching toward the sky as if there was no breeze at all. But she knew there was, hidden in a place where she assumed everyone else could feel it except for her.
Resting the notebook before her, she set the planchette atop it. “I’m alone now,” she called. “Maybe that’s what you wanted. Maybe now you’ll answer me if you’re here.”
Along the ground, shadows wove between one another, running their lithe forms up the trees, but not a single one trailed their fingertips over the planchette.
“River?” she asked, praying, tears pricking her eyes.
When she sighed, about to go back inside, his scent returned, and two shadowy hands ran up her thighs to her arms, and she couldn’t feel a single thing. But oh, how she wished she could, her body trembling for it. The darkened fingertips fell beside hers to the planchette. And she waited while holding her breath for the triangular piece to move, for words to form.
But then the shadowy fingers drifted away, the page remaining blank. “Why can’t you just write a single word?” she murmured. “Why?” Her voice grew louder as the shadow left her, disappearing into the ground before she could even try to run after it.
Sadie’s shoulders fell, and she scooted to a nearby tree, pressing her back against the trunk. The silhouettes didn’t leave—they lingered around her as they’d started to do when she was in the woods.
She decided to stay out there until the night captured the day, when the sounds of the woods escaped their silent prisons. To see if maybe there would be a spark of the place from her dreams.
The sky darkened from blue to gray as though facing the same mood she was currently in. Sprinkles fell, the raindrops becoming heavier, pelting her skin. But she couldn’t hear their sounds, couldn’t hear the thunder boom after the bolt of lightning lit up the sky.
“All right, maybe I’ll budge for now.” She snapped up her things from the ground and booked it for the cabin. The shadows followed her, and she caught glimpses of the dead animals along the ground once again, her stomach churning at what it could mean. By the time she broke through the woods, her clothes were soaked, her wet hair sticking to her chin and neck.
Sadie halted in front of her home, the silhouettes clinging to the cabin, roaming across one another over the outside walls like snakes.
Even though her eyes widened, even though her heart pounded a tad bit more, fear didn’t course through her. Nothing had hurt her. Yet.
As she stepped onto the porch, she skimmed her finger over the wood, tracing a silhouette but only feeling the hardness of the boards.
The night started to descend, the noises of the woods sneaking out, the rain’s music singing. Sadie opened the door—not a single shadow followed her inside, only the smell of River greeting her.
“Stop disappearing!” she shouted, but no shadow came forth.
Water dripped from her body as she peeled off her wet clothes. She put on a fresh pair of pajamas, then lit a few logs in the fireplace.
The notebook she’d brought was ruined, so she grabbed another and placed it on the coffee table with the planchette atop it. Once the rain stopped, she would return to the woods and try one more time to have a spirit or shadow answer her.
But the rain didn’t let up, even when it was close to midnight, so Sadie sat on the swing chair outside beneath the overhang, waiting, the planchette and notebook in her lap. She’d tried to sleep, to enter that place, yet she couldn’t.
Sadie’s eyes finally became heavy, and she closed them briefly until movement beneath her fingertips roused her. She opened her eyes to find the planchette sliding across the paper. As shadowy digits wrote, she remained still, black letters forming against the white sheet.
Meet him.
