Page 18 of Espíritu

Yadriel knelt beside the bench, setting down the old guitar case and pulling a worn canvas pouch from his bag.

Julian and Maritza instinctively moved into place on either side of him, standing like a pair of human privacy screens.

“I really don’t want to explain to a cop why my boyfriend’s waving around a bloody knife,” Julian muttered, glancing around.

“Then keep your body between him and the BabyBjörn brigade,” Maritza whispered back.

Julian snorted but nodded. Fair enough.

Maritza pulled out her phone and angled it like she was texting, ready to flash a distraction if anyone wandered too close. Julian squared his shoulders, scanning the area with exaggerated nonchalance.

Even though they were surrounded by life—the distant rumble of skateboards, the warbling of mariachi trumpets, the whirring of hydraulic pumps on a lowrider—the quiet area by the water felt set apart.

Yadriel laid a simple cloth on the ground and placed a small ceramic bowl in its center. From the pouch, he poured a splash of clear tequila from a nip bottle, followed by a dark vial of chicken blood. The scents mixed in the air, sharp and earthy, oddly grounding.

Julian knew he was supposed to be a lookout, but watching Yadriel prepare the ritual was magnetic. There was something about the way Yads moved when he was doing magic—careful, focused, reverent. He looked different in that moment. Not just confident but also powerful.

Like this was what he was made for. Julian couldn’t help but grin. He’d fallen for Yadriel once in a cemetery. Apparently he could keep falling for him anywhere.

Yadriel struck a match. The flame caught on the third try, and he dropped it into the bowl. Julian held his breath.

“Te invoco, espíritu,” Yadriel whispered to the flame.

For a beat, nothing happened.

Then a soft whoosh. The offering lit with golden fire, casting gentle, dancing light. The flame shimmered more than burned, like sunlight rippling across water.

Julian stared, heart full and heavy all at once. Brujería at work. And damn if it wasn’t kind of beautiful.

The air thickened, the charge of magic stirring the hairs on Julian’s arms. And then there was a soft, almost imperceptible sigh as the fabric of reality folded, allowing the past to bleed into the present.

A figure materialized on the bench by the water’s edge. The spirit looked like a memory struggling to maintain its shape. Edges blurred and features softened to the point of near transparency.

Bartolomé had a ghostly, rugged charm. He looked like he had walked straight out of an old black-and-white movie—scuffed leather jacket, high-waisted pants, and tousled hair with streaks of silver. His eyes held a kind sadness, as though he’d seen too much, and Julian couldn’t help but notice the thin scar along his jaw.

He had that musician vibe—long, calloused fingers and all—as if he were still holding on to the feel of his guitar even in death. There was a glow about him, a glimmer that trailed behind, as though he were made of music itself, flickering and unfinished, waiting for an ending that never came.

In his hands, Bartolomé held a ghostly guitar, the same one Yadriel had brought, which was in his lap.

“Whoa,” Julian breathed.

“Hey, Bartolomé,” Maritza called gently. She sat down next to him and Julian moved to stand on his other side.

“Hello,” the spirit replied, his voice a rustle of leaves. A sound that felt both there and not.

“Got something for you.” Yadriel offered the packet of stale pan. “Lita sent it.”

“Ah, how kind of her.” Bartolomé’s smile was a mere quiver of light, but it was sincere. He took the offering, crumbling the bread between ethereal fingers, which impressed Julian because it had taken him a whole day to move crumpled-up paper when he was ghost-ish.

Ducks waddled over, eager for the unexpected feast as they let out happy quacks.

“Man, ducks really love this stuff, huh?” Julian said, watching the birds squabble playfully over the pan. A chuckle escaped him, tension shedding from his shoulders.

“Doesn’t take much to make ’em happy,” Bartolomé agreed, his attention torn between their company and the simple joy of feeding his feathered friends.

The ducks glided over the shimmering water, oblivious to the spectral figure feeding them. Bartolomé’s form wavered like a candle flame caught in a gentle breeze, his gaze fixed on the little fleet of birds.

“Your abuela,” he began with a sorrowful nostalgia that rippled through the air, “we’d sit here for hours, just like this. She understood the beauty of quiet moments.” His eyes, though faded, held an ocean’s depth of memory.