Page 62 of Specters & Spotlights

“Elise,” Kevin murmured from above, perched near the rafters. “We’re not alone.”

She smiled faintly. “We never are.”

The sage in her hand was fresh, dried lavender tucked in its center, bound with deep red thread. Elise turned it slowly, absently, as memories rose like ghosts of their own.

She had been here before. This same theatre. Her first touring production. God, she’d been so young.

Back then, she was still finding her rhythm as a traveling wig mistress. The job itself wasn’t the problem—it was the ghosts. Especially here, where more than a few things went bump in the wings.

This theatre had been a particularly difficult experience in those days. There had been whispers—real ones—rising out of the plaster walls like steam. Words that made no sense slithering just out of reach, like static through an old speaker. She’d frozen in place the first time it spoke. She didn’t even remember what it had said—only the way it had made her feel. Cold. Seen. Elise hadn’t known it then, but she’d brushed too close to the Whispering Wall.

And then there was the Seamstress.

The ghost that hovered, just out of sight, just close enough to meddle. Elise’s wig corner had become a war zone. Hairnets went missing. Lace fronts curled. Stitching gave way for no reason at all. Zippers failed. Threads unraveled. It wasn’t only frustrating—it was humiliating. People noticed. They didn’t say much to her face, but she could feel the speculation settle on her like lint. She was developing a reputation for having bad luck, and theatre folks were a superstitious bunch—that was a hard label to overcome.

Elise… was crumbling.

And Cici—ever the tether to something solid—showed up.

No warning. A last-minute standby flight, a knock at the stage door, and her familiar voice saying, “I brought reinforcements.” Elise still wasn’t sure whether she had been referring to the spell books or the cookies she brought.

They’d broken into the building at 2 AM. She remembered the way the fluorescent hallway lights blinked once, like they were startled to see them. Cici had set the salt, burned the herbs, and recited something in a language Elise only half understood.

And just like that, the Seamstress had quieted. She didn’t vanish, but she backed off—retreated into the walls and folds of time. Elise had never forgotten the way that felt. Like someone had finally stepped in to stand between her and the dark.

This time, Elise was alone. But not helpless. Not that fragile, wide-eyed girl who had nearly packed up her kit and gone home all those years ago. No—she’d grown steadier since then, in both hand and heart. She could do this.

She closed her eyes for a moment and pictured the way Cici had described her spell all those years ago, like a gossamer web woven between worlds. It wasn’t meant to trap the Seamstress, just keep her from pressing too far into the living realm. But if a spirit was stubborn enough—and Elise suspected this one was—it could pull at the edges of that magic until the weave began to unravel

And now, it seemed, the weave was fraying.

The Seamstress didn’t feel as strong as she had been that first time. Not yet. But her presence was unmistakable, hot and prickly.

Elise knew she couldn’t replicate what Cici had done. She didn’t have that kind of magic. Her strength came in different ways—through care, through stubbornness, through quiet persistence.

So instead of spells, she reached for something far less certain.

She was going to try to reason with the ghost.

It sounded absurd when she said it—even just in her mind. But there was something inside her that insisted on trying.

“Talking to ghosts like they’re grumpy coworkers,” she muttered to herself. “Sure. That’s perfectly normal.”

Elise approached the costume rack with a quiet sort of reverence, the way one might approach a shrine—or a sleeping dragon. The air felt charged, just faintly, like the prickling tension before a thunderstorm. She could feel the Seamstress there, clinging to the gowns and coats like static. Not visible, not tangible, but present. Like the lingering scent of smoke that seeps into velvet and never quite lets go.

“Let’s keep this civil, okay?” Elise murmured under her breath.

She set her bag gently on the floor, crouching beside it like she was unpacking a picnic basket rather than a ghost-busting arsenal. The lighter clinked against a jar of salt as she rummaged through the contents. She pulled it out and struck it. The flame flared, then calmed into a steady glow. She lit the sage and let the edges smolder.

With her free hand, she reached for the miniature Ouija board tucked between a protective charm and the scrap of paper with the hand drawn sigil from Cici. The board was tiny, maybe the size of a notecard, with a laughably dainty planchette no bigger than a thimble.

Kevin materialized at her shoulder, arms crossed and eyebrow raised. “Planning to summon a dollhouse spirit?”

Elise gave him a sideways glance. “It’s portable.”

He smirked, drifting to perch just above the mirror’s edge, the very picture of bemused disapproval.

She settled herself cross-legged on the floor in front of the rack, careful to keep the sage’s curling smoke drifting away from the costumes. She glanced once—pointedly—at the nearby smoke detector, then angled the bundle farther from its line of sight.