Chapter Nineteen
NINETEEN
THE TABOR FAMILY MEMORIAL LIbrARY has Frankensteinian walls of limestone and aged brick covered in thick ropes of ivy. They climb in a lattice of green pockmarked with patches of sweet-smelling honeysuckle that wrap around the long ivory columns framing the entrance.
Once inside, the large main room is reminiscent of wandering the stacks in Pine Grove while my mother studied for her master’s degrees—an education in the sciences her revenge against the delusion of magic that stole her husband.
My chest warms as I breathe in the musty tang of old books, trailing along the towering red oak shelves, fingers thudding against the spines of clothbound texts. I bypass the central desk and head toward the back of the main floor.
Earlier in the week, Daisy, Sam, and I ventured down to the Village for Cheerwine floats from Bada Bing’s Soda Shoppe and a pop into West Market Vintage.
“So, how’s the first week going?” Daisy had asked over a rack of crewnecks.
I held a black and gold Wake Forest Tennis Club crew up to my chest and frowned. “I guess it’s been fine.”
In reality it’s been overwhelming. I don’t know what I was expecting, but Black Mountain Academy is nothing like my old school.
There was no week of throwaway assignments and busywork while students get acclimated to their new schedule.
Every one of my classes started intensely from the very first day.
My only saving grace is that my Exploration of Medium in Fine Arts course has been everything I dreamed of.
Creamy new supplies and sectioned units and structure. Our first class module is ceramics.
Sam walked up holding a pair of green Sambas. “Yeah, it’s a little extra the first few weeks. Especially as a transfer.”
Daisy nodded. “I already have a chem lab test coming up next week, and I want to blow my brains out.”
“That’s not funny,” Sam said, as they leaned against a cement pillar and adjusted their glasses.
Daisy’s cheeks grew pink. “You’re right, sorry. I have a chem lab test coming up next week, and I’d rather be hit by a semi. Gun violence is not a joke.”
Sam sighed, shaking their head, “That’s not—I’m… what? Suicide shouldn’t be a joke either Daze.”
“Oh! OMG, yeah, that too. Sorry, Sam is right. I’ll try to stop saying that kind of thing from now on. But Harper,” Daisy said as she eyed me through a sheer bodysuit, “what else is going on?”
It hasn’t stopped being unsettling, the way Daisy seems to see right through me.
“I don’t know,” I said, shrugging. I did know, but I wasn’t sure how to put it into words.
“Harper,” Daisy chastised, prodding me with her deep brown eyes.
“It’s just…” I plopped down onto the bench behind me. “She’s haunting me.”
“What?” Sam squeaked at the same time Daisy said levelly, “Gigi?”
“Yeah,” I sighed. “Not literally, obviously.” Sam looked relieved, and Daisy just shrugged as if she wouldn’t mind if it were in the literal sense.
“The campus—every corner of it is filled with her. The gates, the brick road, the fountain, the quad, and every place I’d never been before, but now I’m constantly wondering if she stood there too; if she sat at those desks, if she felt the things I feel.
I can’t get out of my head long enough to actually experience any of it. I know that sounds crazy.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Daisy said, putting her hand on my shoulder. “Life after death is so fucking weird. Someone doesn’t have to be a ghost in order to linger. Though maybe she is always around you, attempting to tell you something. Have you tried speaking to her?”
I thought back to the forest and the apparition and shivered. “I don’t know,” I said. “Sometimes I wish I could just forget her.”
I regret the words the second they’re out of my mouth. That’s not true. I could never forget her, and I’d never want to. I just wish I didn’t have to be in so much pain all the time.
It’s a festering wound that I’m afraid I’ll succumb to. It feels like my tenuous control over the static in my veins is the only thing stopping me from completely imploding. And who knows how many people I’ll hurt if that happens?
You’re inherently attuned to the divine celestial, Cancer, but your gifts are suppressed by your inability to be present in your day-to-day. Open your mind and heart to the world around you. Allow yourself to accept a push from the universe when you’re too scared to take the jump on your own.
Click here to review your natal chart.
Okay, so maybe I spent the $4.99 on the premium app—but even when the stars refuse to talk to me, I find that I still want them to. Even if it’s stupid. What could Gigi hear that I can’t?
Like I predicted, the letter wasn’t enough, and I’m hungry for more of her. Desperate to eke out every possible connection to her I can get since she hasn’t returned to my dreams at all. I’m not sure if this means she’s abandoned me, or if it’s proof that it was all in my head in the first place.
Surely, if the other side is real, if she can see just how much I’m struggling, she’d come back to me…
But she hasn’t. So that’s why I’m in the library today. In search of answers about Gigi, about the witches, about whatever I can get my hands on.
The back of the main room is an eerie sort of quiet, with slants of mote-dotted light streaming in from dusty skylights, and rows and rows of wood tables with bronze desk lamps and armchairs covered in worn, red upholstery.
The wooden floors groan with each step I take, and I find myself nearly tiptoeing to the set of spiral stairs leading to the research basement when someone whisper-shouts my name.
I pause, turning in a small circle.
A light tap on my shoulder.
“Oh shit!” I say, jumping as I turn around to find Lucas’s amused expression.
“How do you always manage to do that?!” His hair is a disheveled mop, and his eyes are a darker shade than usual, perhaps from lack of sleep.
His pressed button-down is only half tucked into his pants, and his tie is loose around his neck.
Anxiety unfurls in my chest at the state of him, the instinct to worry about him apparently ingrained in me from all those summers past.
“Sorry,” Lucas says with a chuckle. He shifts the stack of books in his hands to his other arm. “Didn’t realize you were so easily spooked.”
“Yeah, me neither,” I sigh. “Hey, you okay? Are the migraines back?” I watch his eyes round out and I picture all the days he spent curled into a ball at the base of the old sycamore, a picnic blanket thrown over his head and a bucket within reach.
Sometimes they would last on and off for days, and in the end, he looked kind of like this—an apparition of himself.
“Oh, uh, yeah, I’ve had a pretty bad bout of them recently. But it’s all good now. How’d you know?”
He ducks his head and picks a speck of lint from my shoulder.
“I just know you, I guess,” I say, peeking at the spines of the books he’s holding. “That’s an impressive stack of—” I read the title of the book on top, The Carolina Gold Rush, “—mining literature? You got a project coming up or something?”
“These?” he asks, glancing down. “Nah, I’m working for Mr. Hyde this year, helping him with some research, and he asked me to come check these out.”
Mr. Hyde is a stocky man with a harsh combover and a perpetually sweaty head. He’s the assistant football coach and the sociology teacher, two things that seem to be in opposition to each other.
“Huh.”
“Yeah.”
“… Cool…”
The vibe between us is no longer familiar but charged with something new and awkward.
He uses his free hand to rub the back of his neck. “Sooo, anyway, what are you up to today? Studying already?”
“Actually I was on my way to check out the yearbook archive. Daisy said something about them being in the basement when she gave me a tour of campus.”
“Oh, really? Yeah, I know where they are, if you want me to show you? I volunteered in the library last year.”
I raise my eyebrows in surprise.
He ducks his head as if he’s embarrassed.
“My dad was vying for headmaster and wanted me to get involved with the school. Show a strong family unit passionate about academics, you know? Especially after the accident. Town politics and all that got thrown off without Uncle Jo, and it was—” he cuts himself off, running an uncomfortable hand through his hair.
“It’s been over two decades since a Matsoukas sat at the head of the school and not just on the board. ”
Heat floods my cheeks. In all this, I’d never stopped to consider the implications of Headmaster Matsoukas being Lucas’s dad. “Oh yeah,” I say. “How is that, by the way?”
“Having a dad who’s also headmaster? You know, it has its perks and its downsides. Mostly perks though, if I’m honest.” He lifts his chin now, pride and mischief playing on his face.
I laugh, shoving his shoulder playfully. “Yeah, I’m sure it can’t be too bad having your name on a building.”
It’s so easy, forgetting it all, falling back into this pattern. But I’m reminded of the things that have changed when Lucas’s lids lower and his mouth quirks to the side.
This time when he speaks, his voice is noticeably deeper.
“I missed this,” he says, and I freeze, captivated by his eyes.
Around us the ambient noise of buzzing fluorescent lights and turning pages fades away. When he smiles, the edges of my vision begin to undulate.
And just as quickly as the spell was cast, it’s over, and he’s dropping his stack of books off behind the checkout counter and leading me down the rusted-over stairs.
I rub my eyes with the back of my hand.
The basement is home to cluttered shelves and piles of books and papers littered haphazardly across the stained, blue carpeting, and I decide that I’m glad I ran into Lucas and that he was willing to come with me because this place gives me the creeps.
“The archives for both the school and the town are down here. We’ve also got a microfiche with documents and newspapers from Earnest. The school gets some kind of historical grant for working with local historians.”