The door handle was at it again. Clarke gave up on trying to ignore it in favor of her Vivaldi-assignment and tossed her reading glasses aside with a sigh. Forming cohesive arguments was next to impossible when that noise was slowly driving her crazy.
Well, assuming she wasn't already.
She pushed her books and papers aside and just sat cross-legged on the bed, her eyes burning a hole on the bedroom door. For the past half an hour or so the handle had pressed itself down and popped back up over and over again in a leisurely pace. She knew from experience that if she were to open the door, there would be no one on the other side.
Which was a good thing in a way, seeing that she lived alone - the perks of being an only child of an upper middle-class family. Leaving home for college six-ish months ago had felt like a weight dropping off her shoulders, for a multitude of reasons. She had unpacked her things with considerable enthusiasm, hung artsy posters on the walls and pushed furniture around until the muscles of her arms ached. She loved the quiet and the independence. Emphasis on the word 'quiet'.
It was dumb. Clarke had never really paid mind to the spiritual and the occult stuff, but no amount of logical thinking could shake the feeling that she wasn't alone in the apartment. Nor could it do away with the little knocks and scratches, the mirrors that would fog up for no reason, the faucets that would turn on by themselves. Well, it could but the rental agency had sent a guy to check for rodents and a (very condescending) plumber to have a look at the faucets. Nothing.
It would have felt more like A Beautiful mind-type situation if she didn't have proof she wasn't imagining all of it, but last week her mother had mentioned the door handle when they'd been facetiming so it couldn't be all her imagination. Besides, psychologists were more expensive than candles and incense or whatever the hell one is supposed to repel ghosts-slash-demons with.
There was a certain threshold at which sheer annoyance would override Clarke's stubbornness and absolute lack of spirituality, and here it was. She had papers to write. The ghost needed to go.
Fueled by that specific brand of determination that comes with a late-night decision, Clarke reached to grab her mac from the nightstand and flipped it open. Before logging on Skype, she glanced into the mirror and ran a hand through her blonde hair and adjusted the couple of pins keeping her bangs off her face. As much as Clarke liked to seem like she wasn't even trying, she hated video chatting when she didn't look put together.
The friend she was going to call, Octavia, was practically always online. They used to go to the same high school. Octavia had been the token weird kid, always carrying old books around and learning Latin. Nowadays she made pocket money by giving people tarot and aura readings online. Even though Clarke didn't really share her passion for the occult, she'd always respected it. They both had their quirks. If anything Clarke was dreading the smugness that would no doubt ensue as soon as she'd ask for Octavia's assistance in spiritual matters
Octavia was online, as expected. She replied quickly to Clarke's call and her surprised face appeared on the screen.
"You're actually calling me? Is your house on fire or something?"
Clarke grinned back at her. "Well not exactly, but there is sort of an emergency thing going on." She lifted the computer and pointed the web camera at the door, so that Octavia could see the handle. "Are you seeing this?"
"What, the moving handle?"
"Thank god, I'm not losing my marbles"
"If you're saying stuff like 'losing my marbles' something's definitely wrong. Why are you showing me this?"
Clarke cradled the laptop awkwardly in her arms and stood up, walked up to the door and wordlessly yanked it open, pointing the web camera up and down the empty corridor.
"Oh," Octavia said.
"Tell me about it," Clarke sighed as she plopped back down onto her bed, the door securely closed again. She didn't really like being in her room with the door open these days.
"And that's not the last of it." She took a deep inhale, the words felt reluctant to crawl up her throat and into the daylight. "I think… I think there's something inhere."
Octavia nodded and pursed her lips sympathetically as if Clarke had just told her that the roof was leaking. "No shit? That must be a persistent one if you're actually willing to admit it exists."
"It's annoying," Clarke deadpanned. "There are lights and faucets going on and off by themselves. My stuff is moving around."
"I dunno, you like to wander around in your thoughts."
"Yeah, but it happens when I sleep. There are random hot and cold spots, but they usually fade out pretty quickly. Also noises, like knocking and scratching on the walls."
"Hmm. That's textbook poltergeist behavior. If it started when you moved there it might have come with the house."
"What, I moved into a haunted house? Or more like, a haunted apartment. This building was built for students, like, seven years ago. I have a plastic mat, Octavia."
"Well it's also possible that you brought it, but it's only active now that you're living independently. Psychological things like life changes have an impact on the spiritual world, after all. Have you felt any kind of negative energy? Like, a heavy presence that feels hostile?" Clarke tried to imitate Octavia's suddenly extremely serious expression and tone despite of the bizarre topic.
"Well no, not really. I mean I do feel kinda jumpy when I'm in the house alone, but I guess that's a given. And sometimes I feel…" Clarke was hesitant to admit the next part, because it was one of the reasons she was suspicious about her mental state. "Sometimes I just feel like I'm being... watched."
Truthfully, she was probably reacting to all this like your average white horror movie protagonist precisely because there really wasn't anything malicious to the presence. It sort of felt like having accidentally adopted a stray cat. A really loud and inconvenient one - which wasn't exactly out of line with what she knew about cats anyway.
She didn't say anything about the piano. The piano was too intimate and difficult to make sense of to be shared over Skype in the middle of half-playful banter.
Octavia giggled. "Maybe some gentleman of the past has a crush on you!"
Clarke flipped her hair. "Can't blame 'em."
"Seems to me like someone's trying to get your attention," Octavia said more seriously. "Now if you're sure there isn't hostility in your living space, it's probably safe to try and reach out to the spirit. I mean, it usually does take a bit of a sensitive person to recognize the quality of the energy. You're pretty dense."
"Oi!"
"Just telling the truth, sweetie-pie. If you won't take this thing seriously, I can't guarantee what the results will be."
Clarke spread her arms. "I've called you up about it, haven't I? The definition of seriousness here."
"I can send you my Ouija board," Octavia offered.
"Don't they sell them in Toys'r'Us?"
She rolled her eyes. "Yeah but those are shit. Just don't break it, I'll send it to you. You shouldn't use it when you're stressed about school or anything, by the way."
"Oh please, I'm stressed about school because this thing won't let me study."
Octavia huffed, but looked a bit hesitant.
"Clarkie, do yourself a favor and don't read stories about it online. Most of them are fake anyway. Follow my instructions and you'll be fine."
For the first time during this strange conversation the hesitation in Octavia's voice sent ripples of uneasiness running down Clarke's spine.
"What? What can go wrong?"
"Well," Octavia said slowly, "it is said, that when you communicate with the spirits, you're inviting them into contact with you."
"Yeah. They said that on Paranormal Activity."
Octavia squeezed the bridge of her nose. "You also need to stop using mediocre Hollywood movies as your main point of reference."
Clarke grinned. "Never. You still have my address? I'll pay the postage."
ooOoo
The board reached her next week. It was just a simple wooden board that had all the alphabets, numbers, and 'yes', 'no', and 'farewell' written on it with fancy calligraphy. What made it so much better than the one from a store, Clarke had no idea. But what do I know, she thought. It could be carved out of the cross Jesus was crucified on or something. There was no telling when the occult elitists were concerned.
There was also a planchette that the spirit would be moving, and a piece of paper with instructions, courtesy of Octavia. Clarke unfolded it and read out loud:
"More people will bring more energy and help the spirit, 3-8 is ideal. You're probably gonna do it alone, that's doable if you focus. Light white candles around and put out electric lights. Sit comfortably so that you can move your hand freely. Concentrate and move the planchette in circular movements until someone picks it up, this might take awhile. Be polite. Ask as specific questions as possible. Don't interrupt the session and don't let anyone else interrupt it. If there's a knock on any door DON'T OPEN IT. There are just 3 important rules:
1. Don't do it in your house. You don't want to invite anything unwanted into the place you sleep in.
2. Be serious. It's not a game and it won't work if you don't believe in it.
3. End the session by saying farewell. If something goes wrong and you feel threatened, force the planchette to farewell.
Good luck."
Clarke had to scoff at the crypticness of it all. She was no Psychology major, but she was still pretty sure the force of belief behind it was most of the effect.
Rare enough, she was greeted with complete silence. Lately her little roommate had been more active than ever, like it wanted to assure Clarke that confrontation was needed.
There were the usual annoying things and then there were the nighttime incidents. Clarke's eyes would snap open every once in a while and her heart would pound loud and insistent in her chest and there would be something lingering at the edge of her memory, some words perhaps, like a dream that slips away before you get the chance to rehearse it well enough to recount it.
The latter stuff might have been unfair to blame on the ghost, though. Maybe she was just jittery, all things considered.
Clarke started her first Ouija session by breaking the first Big Rule: she had no other place than her home to do it in. She figured that since the thing was in her apartment to begin with, it would be easier to contact there. After cleaning out coffee mugs, papers and candy wrappers, she spread the board onto her coffee table. Then she got the candles from the cleaning supply closed (she always had some lying around since she visited her father's grave frequently) and closed the curtains.
"I wonder if this is just for dramatic effect," she mused as she lit the candles one by one. She had chosen an unremarkable Thursday night to mess with the spirit world, so there wouldn't be any crazy parties going on in the building. It was 10pm in October, so it was fairly dark outside already. No dramatic thunder, just the usual downtown white noise. Driving cars and barking dogs and whatnot. Clarke wasn't a coward, but she did possess some sense of self-preservation; she wasn't going to tempt fate by doing it at midnight on Halloween or something.
With the mood lighting set up Clarke sat cross-legged on the floor and tried to relax even as tension creeped persistently up her spinal cord. All the hassle and sleepless nights came down to this. She couldn't quite shake off the feeling of irreversibility surrounding what was about to take place.
"Alright then. Let's jam."
Clarke placed the planchette on the board, laid two fingers on it and started to slowly drag it across the surface in circular movements. She knew she was supposed to focus, but she wasn't sure on what. Eventually she just settled on staring at the board dully.
Maybe four minutes in Clarke was starting to feel silly. She was like those Southerners who call the priest to do an exorcism when a person gets ill instead of taking them to the hospital. What rational being whips out a Ouija board because of some noises and malfunctioning electronics? The ticking of the living room clock was uncomfortably loud, and it could be heard there was a game on in one of the neighboring apartments. It was all just too damn banal for otherworldly beings to be roaming about in this overpriced crappy apartment in New York.
Just as Clarke decided it was about time to call it a day, there were footsteps. She would have pinned that one on the upstairs neighbors if it weren't for the hairs standing up that the back of her neck. They weren't lazy or rushed footsteps, the kind she was used to hearing. They were slow, deliberate.
And then, air, like someone gently blowing against the back of her neck. Clarke's shoulders jumped up. Her throat was suddenly dry as a desert.
"Um… Hello? Anybody there?"
After a little pause the planchette stopped. She could have moved it with little effort if she tried, but some other force was unmistakingly holding it in place. The planchette shifted slowly to 'yes'. Right, then.
"Oh. Well, uh, welcome. Thanks for showing up." The planchette was back to circling the board now, as if it was waiting for a question to answer.
"Have you been here with me for a while now?"
Yes.
"Oh. Okay, I see. Why are you here?"
This time the planchette moved over to the alphabets. Clarke tried to beat down the fluster and the holyshitthisishappening and focus. She read the letters out loud:
"L-I-V-E-H-E-R... You live here? Did you live here before I did?"
Yes. Considering the short lifespan of the building and the implications it came with, Clarke decided to change the subject. Probably a bad idea to start with 'so how did you die and why did the agency guy fail to mention this to me?'.
"Can you tell me your name?"
Yes.
"L-E-X-A. Lexa." Well at least there was nothing threatening about that. Sounded fairly modern. "My name is Clarke."
I know, said the board.
"I suppose that makes sense, since you live here with me."
The planchette went back to making circles. Clarke chewed the inside of her cheek contemplatively. "Do I know you somehow? Like, from when you were alive?"
No.
"How long have you been around?"
Always.
Clarke was starting to feel more and more uneasy.
"Not to be rude or to make you feel unwelcome but, why are you acting up? Were you trying to get my attention?"
Yes.
"Well now you have it. Will you leave me after this session?"
No.
"Why?"
Shoulder.
"Shoulder?" Clarke pulled down her sweater to check on her left shoulder. Nothing. Her right shoulder, however, had a faint bruise on it, barely the size of her thumb and mostly yellow. She hadn't noticed it before. "You mean this bruise?"
Yes.
"What about it?"
A kiss.
"You did this, Lexa? It's a kiss?"
The planchette flew to 'yes' so quickly it knocked over one of the candles and fell off the table. Clarke scrambled to get it back on the board.
"You… kissed my shoulder? Why'd you that?"
The planchette stopped being coherent and started to make an infinity symbol.
"What are you trying to tell me, Lexa?" The movement only fastened and Clarke started to feel like panicking.
"I'm gonna end this session now. It was nice talking to you, Lexa. Goodbye."
She had to use two hands to force the planchette over 'farewell'. As soon as she did, the hold the other entity over it disappeared. It didn't really make Clarke feel better though. It was there, it was always there. It had just lost the means of direct communication.
Clarke threw the Ouija board back into the package it came in (but kept the planchette away from it), grabbed her cellphone, pulled her sneakers on and burst out of the door.
Once she reached the park she had to stop to get some breath. Her running habit had dwindled into something that barely resembled a casual hobby since she moved out and she was being slapped in the face with the extent to which her athleticism had suffered as a result. Though that was probably the least of her worries as of now.
She slumped onto a bench, her lungs ablaze, and dialed Octavia's number with shaky fingers. Being out in the open calmed her nerves a little bit, but not by a too large a margin.
"What's wrong?" Octavia's voice answered from the other end. She knew that Clarke hated talking on the phone and he wouldn't call her if it weren't important. Clarke could make out faint chatter and something that sounded like live music in the background.
"Just something that happened with the board. Is this a bad time?"
"It's fine, I'm at my cousin's wedding. At least I'm getting an excuse to not talk to grandma."
"Alright. So I did the thing, and something responded."
"At first try? That's amazing!"
Clarke sighed, still out of breath. "Well it clearly wanted to talk to me. Anyway that joke you made about it having a crush on me? You may not have been that off the mark. I mean, I have this bruise, and it said that it's a kiss."
"Slow down. A kiss? Damn."
"Should I be worried?"
"I don't know Clarkie, he's taking direct interest in you and he's capable of hurting you to some degree. Did you ask his name?"
"Lexa. Which I presume to be a feminine name, but I didn't ask for pronouns or anything. Anyway does that say anything to you?"
Octavia sounded hesitant. "Well, it's not any of the famous demons like Zozo so that's good. Doesn't ring a bell."
Clarke rubbed the back of her neck. The whole chain of events was still kind of a mess in her head. A cold breeze blew right through her sweater. She should have grabbed a coat. "You still didn't tell me if I should be worried," she pointed out.
"Did you end the session properly?" Octavia asked.
"Yeah, I kinda freaked out when the planchette just made infinity symbols."
"Infinity sym-" Octavia's mouth clicked shut audibly.
"Octavia?"
"Are you sure it wasn't an eight figure?"
Clarke hadn't thought of that, since number eight had been written on the board anyway. "Well I don't know which way the thing was facing!"
"Clarke," Octavia's tone was unnervingly serious. "An eight figure means that something is trying to get out of the board."
This time it wasn't the wind that made Clarke shiver.
"Great."
ooOoo
My friend was feeling kinda down about her writing so I thought she could use some encouragement. Let's hope she lets me post the other half of the story!