When it came to Halloween parties, Jemma decided, bigger was far from better.

Two fifty-plus gatherings in a week were enough. Apparently three of the firm Davies Worth & Koseck's senior partners were huge Halloween geeks and loved to try to outdo each other. Which meant for Jemma rubbing elbows with people she didn't know, enduring subtle ass-grabs and thigh-pinches in the Sexy Witch costume foisted on her at the last minute by her new supervisor and assorted cronies. Feeling on display and somehow forced to perform drained the enjoyment from the luxury door-prizes, gourmet finger-food and liquor.

Give her a girls-only with her closest friends from high school and college any day and twice on Sundays. Renee might be slower than a sloth when it came to renovating her starter house, but after days of shiny glass-and-steel work environment there was something comforting in its squeaky floors, rattling windows and flailing-in-the-wind back door. The potluck dinner devoured earlier, they stretched out on the family room floor, pitcher of fresh strawberry daiquiris, snacks, and a pan of the state's best hash brownies on the low coffee table. Work and money woes commiserated over, the conversation now turned to a more personal nature.

Namely, men.

"-son-of-a-bitch made a whole new profile to get around my block." Becky swirled her daiquiri, frowning into the wine glass as if she could discern the future. "Again. I can't believe that loser!" She tossed back the rest of her drink, dabbing pink froth from her cat's-mask whiskers with a napkin.

"You're not alone." Kirsten's witch costume was not sexy; the warts and uni-brow were custom made. "Had to get the cops involved with my last one." She rummaged through a can of Planter's Mixed Nuts, digging out the cashews.

Anita propped her chin on her hands and her elbows on her Harley Quinn hammer. "Come play for my team!"

"No, thanks. I'm a Marvel girl."

A raspberry from Anita, laughter from the rest. Jemma raised her own daiquiri glass. Anita topped it off from the pitcher. Becky reached around Anita, slid a brownie onto a napkin. Jemma opened and closed her hand in a "gimme" gesture; rolling her eyes, Becky passed the brownie on, claimed a second and studded it with cashews.

"Wennay stih ousigh?"

"What?" Becky stared, brownie paused halfway to her mouth.

Jemma chewed, swallowed, wiped away crumbs with her rag doll costume's sleeve. "Renee still outside?"

"Yeah, building the fire."

"Don't know why we still do this," Anita burst in. "It's a morbid tradition, you know? Writing letters to the dead on Halloween." Jemma looked at her. Anita's tone was joking; her expression wasn't.

"Because it's our tradition. Same as that." Kirsten tilted her head toward the kitchen.

Anita scowled. "For fuck's sake, trying to summon the Wickedest Man in the World? With a fucking Ouija board? Christ, we're not kids anymore. Or wanna-be Wiccans."

"It's important to Renee and she's our friend," Becky said in a low voice. "As well as our host. You knew this would be part of the evening, Anita. And Renee wanted to be a ceremonial magician before she started the coven."

"My point is, we haven't been into that shit in years, so why are we still –"

Jemma silently groaned. Becky's habit of correcting what she viewed as missteps in etiquette and Anita's bullheadedness was going to lead to a fight – if something didn't intervene. She glanced at Kirsten. Kirsten glanced back at her.
"Hey, Jemma," Kirsten said a little too loudly, "Any luck on lately?"

Jemma shot her a wry smile. "Not that good. A couple dates a month or so ago. Nothing serious." She'd never had problems getting a date between boyfriends, and until recently never had problems finding a boyfriend. A trait that stirred just a spoonful of envy at times into their little clique.
She had to admit it made a good distraction, though. "I miss Dennis."

"Three years is a long time," Becky said sympathetically. "I kept expect you two to announce your engagement, you know?"

Jemma shrugged. "Yeah. Toss me another brownie….?" Becky obliged; Jemma caught it mid-air and took a bite. "Lately I came up with a sure-fire filter," she said moments later. "If he asks if I was named after 'that cartoon', it's a pass."

Kirsten gave her a thumbs-up. "Holding out for Dragonriders of Pern fans."

"Be glad you weren't named after some Mary-Sue necromancer vampire hunter –" Anita began

"—who had sex at least four times –"

"—in twenty-four hours –"

"—with multiple men—"

"And never fucking washed!"

Jemma fell back on the floor, laughing. The chorus of their old in-joke struck her as particularly hilarious this time, enough to bring tears.

"Beck, remember when we thought that was sooo hot?" Kirsten asked.

"Yeah, when we were all dumb virgins."

Jemma scrunched up a random napkin and wiped her eyes. "Ignorant virgins," she corrected. "Caught up in fantasies –" A cashew bounced off her forehead

"You, especially. Vampires, werewolves….if it was a monster, you wanted to fuck it."

"I wanted the perfect demon lover," Jemma replied loftily. "Dangerous, sexy, untamed but under my control of course, and able to give me knee-trembling, river-squirting, strike-me-blind orgasms….You know. Like the rest of you."

Suddenly she wished she hadn't said anything. Whether it was echoes of last spring's break-up, her streak of bad luck at dating, the pot and booze, or just plain old horniness, that teenage self's impossible dream sounded pretty damn good at the moment.

Hazelnuts and cashews rained down on her. "Shut the fuck up, McIntire!"

Squealing laughter, Jemma sat up and began returning fire.

The back door banged open. For a heartbeat all four went alert, then relaxed as they recognized the sound of Renee's boots on the kitchen linoleum. "Pit's all set," she announced, striding into the family room. She had a Pocket Dragon hanging like a light saber in her Ben Kenobi robe. "Last call before the Attempt."

Anita rose, ducking her head out of Renee's sight to hide her grimace and headed down the hall for the bathroom.

Candlelight from the kitchen counter, the decorative shelf and around the Ouija board itself provided the only light. The board was set square in the middle of the round dining table; the patina of polished wood contrasted with the plastic glow-in-the-dark planchette. Tendrils of smoke carrying scents of sage, mugwort and charcoal wafted up from incense burners.

"I already set the wards," Renee said. "You won't need to help."

Becky and Jemma exchanged looks; apparently Renee had noticed Anita's lack of enthusiasm earlier this evening. Or even further back, Jemma mused guiltily. How long ago had they stopped believing and started humoring Renee?

Becky raised an eyebrow, waggling her fingers at the Ouija board. Jemma shook her head. Nada, she mouthed. The only reason Renee even continued with her pet obsession was the occasional weirdness that resulted. Things that couldn't quite be dismissed as coincidences or circumstance. Over time they'd realized that the difference happened before a session even began. What separated a night of cramped calves and vague embarrassment from something else was Jemma's feeling of not-quite-right, of the normal world slightly off-kilter. Jemma referred to it as her "fifth and a half-sense". It hadn't shown her a ghost, saved her life or done anything else impressive enough to rate being a sixth.

They claimed their seats, Anita sliding last into hers, and placed forefingers on the planchette. Renee gazed around at all of them, and began.

"By the Watchtowers in the North, East, South and West, may only those of benign intent speak to us this night. Aleister Crowley, we call thee. Edward Alexander Crowley, we ask for your presence…"

The combination of hash brownie and strawberry daiquiri was taking effect. Following Renee's voice grew harder; Jemma's sense of time began to slip. How long had they been sitting here? Ten minutes? Twenty? An hour?

The planchette jerked to the left. Jemma jerked upright, time-distortion gone in a frisson of fear.

In a smooth, rolling motion the planchette picked out letters.

HELLO LADIES

"Aleister?" Renee's question was nearly a shout. "Aleister?" Jemma didn't blame her. They'd never received this clear a response before. Ever.

ALASTOR

"Alastor who?" Becky asked thinly.

JUST ALASTOR MY DEAR

The world slipped sideways. Jemma looked around the table at her friends. Becky's face was waxy, Kirsten's eyes huge, Anita's face was perfectly blank and Renee… Renee's expression contorted in several different emotions before settling between exhilaration and panic. "Why are you here if you're not the spirit we asked for?"

BOREDOM

Anita snorted. "Right. Like we can help with that. Renee, this is BS, I've had enough –"

"I can, Al." The board dominated Jemma's sight. What possessed her to speak was, in part, the desire to keep the peace between their little group…but mostly the need to bring them all back to the here-and-now, their nice, safe normal lives of work and bills and broken hearts.

"Be my demon lover – the knee-trembler, river-maker of my dreams. Ravish me for a year and a day."

Violently the planchette shout out from beneath their fingers and zig-zagged across the board side to side, up and down its length, gathering speed. It made a circuit of the board this way three times before it raced to the center, spinning on its point, and then abruptly stopped.

Silence.

"That's enough," Anita said quietly. "Gonna get me a little fresh air."

"Wait, I have to tell it goodbye –" But Anita was already stomping out the back door.

No one spoke as Renee gingerly moved the planchette over the board's GOODBYE and recited her ritual farewell. Or as they trooped into the back yard to the waiting fire pit. Anita was already in a lawn chair, staring out into the darkness. Renee lit the wood with the Pocket Dragon and sank into her favorite camp chair. There was a cooler to one side of the fire pit. Jemma opened it and grabbed a Mike's Hard Lemonade before claiming her own chair, incidentally and conveniently edging away from everyone else.

"What are your plans for Thanksgiving, Renee?" Kirsten asked.

"Not sure yet…"

Jemma picked up the notepad and pen stashed under her camp chair. There wasn't enough light to write by, really. But she supposed penmanship didn't matter as much as intent. She doodled crosses and boxes, trying to think of something to put down besides what she did every year: I miss you, Grandpa.

Her pen moved across the paper. She angled it toward the fire to read.

I miss my friends.

She shoved the notepad between the chair and her thigh, twisted the cap off the Mike's and drank deeply. That was the real problem, wasn't it? They were drifting apart. Normal, after all. None of them would see twenty-four again, let alone sixteen, so why were they trying to maintain their friendship with things they'd done a lifetime ago?

Habit, maybe. Or fear. In any case, she wanted to think about it as little as possible. Like she wanted to think as little as possible about what had happened in the kitchen. Jemma pulled free the notepad, tore out her page and tossed it into the fire.

Hours later, Jemma slipped into the kitchen. At some point Kirsten and Becky began rehashing old post-graduation gossip of the girls all of them cordially detested in high school. As a result, the awkward silence was broken, wounded feelings bandaged and they'd talked like they had in their high school sleepovers. In a fit of prudence and foresight Jemma refrained from a third (or more) Mike's and graciously yielded to Renee the last of the hash brownies Anita fetched out. Well past "tipsy and a maybe little high" into "drunk and definitely stoned" Jemma wanted to stake her claim on the comfortable part of Renee's sectional couch for crashing. She was in no shape to drive back to her own apartment.

She glanced at the clock on the stove. Three A.M. The witching hour. The white numbers flickered in the dancing candlelight.

Jemma halted. But Renee blew out the candles…

The candle above the Ouija board was lit.

Someone had relit it for atmosphere during a bathroom trip, Jemma told herself. And just forgot to mention it. Her gaze dropped to the board itself.

As though it felt her attention, the planchette began to move

JEMMA

She couldn't breathe.

My name. It knows my name it spelled my name it knows who I am -

The planchette moved again.

I ACCEPT

Jemma slammed her fist down on the board. The planchette bounced and flew off the table. The candle toppled. Jemma smacked her hand against the wick, yelping in pain, and staggered against a table chair as the kitchen plunged into darkness. She lost her balance, the linoleum slick under her shoes, and dropped to the floor. Her head struck the wall and that new torment pulsed in time with the agony in her hand.

"So, we have a deal, then?"

She wasn't really hearing those words. Her inebriated, over-tired mind was making them up in her poor abused skull. Just as it had made up her name and that two-word message on the board. Her teeth chattered; she felt like was sitting in a snow drift. She wanted, needed to stand up but her body wasn't listening.

"Yeah, sure." Her voice was a wispy croak. "Um…would you mind?" She raised her good hand. Everything else was imaginary, why not someone to help her off the floor?

"Of course, my dear."

A strong grasp caught up her injured hand – her right hand - and brought her smoothly to her feet. Ghostly green light flared where her skin and her benefactor's touched, all but blinding her. Jemma had the impression of a palm narrower than it should be and nails sharper than normal. Of a presence taller than her, the sound of faint radio static and the precise click of a cane. Of a gleaming, golden, too-wide smile.

The light winked out. Jemma was alone in the dark, empty kitchen.

"What the hell just happened?" she whispered. "What did I just do?"

5