Chapter 15
Sable
There’s a person on my lawn. Several people, in fact.
Too many for my liking.
The sun set a few hours ago, and the night was cold and quiet with that distant tick, tick, tick in the background until I heard the first hoot. At first, I thought it was an owl or bird of some kind.
But then I heard something even worse: men laughing.
And I saw them. Eight frat-looking bros carrying cartons of alcohol, followed by a mini entourage of giggling girls, all looking about my age. Some are dressed in miniskirts, while others have opted for a more casual look of jeans and a sweater.
They hoot and holler, and get closer with every passing second until I can make out the additional equipment they’re bringing: industrial lights, lawn chairs, and big speakers.
I watch the long driveway from the spare bedroom on the second floor, grinding my molars as one of the men downs a can of beer then throws it onto the overgrown lawn.
More people trickle in behind them, bringing with them cartons of things that will end up as trash sprinkled around my house. They must be the ones who’ve been destroying my family’s manor.
Abso-fucking-lutely not. They can fuck right off.
I storm out of the room and stomp down the grand staircase, not bothering to avoid the broken steps.
Like hell are they about to do more damage to this place. I may not need to worry about selling it anymore, but this is still my manor. If I’m going to be stuck here, it’s not going to be a pigsty.
I barrel through the open doors and place my hands on my hips to make myself seem bigger than I am. I’m fully prepared for a showdown with these Chads. Except none of them so much as looks up at me.
“Fuck off,” I yell. “All of you.”
They keep walking toward the house as if I’m not even here. Just flat-out ignoring me.
My eyes harden on the guy who threw his trash on my lawn. “I told you to get lost, fuckface.”
I whip my head round to the sound of a chuckle behind me.
Lynx leans on the rickety doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest, wearing a shit-eating grin I’d wipe off for free. “I don’t think they can hear you, dead girl.”
I swing my gaze back to the driveway just as a woman walks right through me. All of them do. They move past like I’m a… ghost.
My fingers tremble at my sides. I’m dead, I remind myself. I buried myself two days ago. Humans can’t see me.
I’m invisible, just like I was when I was alive—just like it’s always been when I’ve been under this roof. My lungs squeeze, and the stone in my stomach turns into a boulder.
I glance behind me as a feminine voice reaches my ears.
“Who are you? You look ready for a ren faire.” One of the girls in a pair of jeans, sneakers, and a coat grins up at Lynx. Something unsettling that I’d rather not name sits heavy in my chest, and images flash in my mind of him focusing his attention on someone else.
The thought unsettles me because once he’s gone, I’ll go back to being alone.
At least now he doesn’t have much of a choice but to interact with me. Not that I want it. But it’s… it’s nice sharing my misery with somebody else.
Behind them, harsh floodlights turn on, blinding the part of the house with the main living room.
Lynx regards her with an arch of his brow, wholly unamused. “I could ask you the same thing.”
She tips her head to the side, matching his stoic aloofness. “Get me a drink, and I’ll be willing to answer three questions.”
“I prefer being told for free,” he deadpans.
I stop listening after that.
More people keep coming through. One right after the other. It’s like the gates are open and every person from the nearest campus is showing up.
Music suddenly blares in the background, some crappy rap song that was making the rounds online before I died. Everyone immediately yells their approval and starts joining in.
I glare into the manor, too in my own head to listen to the heated discussion between Lynx and the girl. I could scream, and the only fucking person that would hear me is the demon that got me into this mess in the first place.
But that’s exactly what I want to do: scream until my vocal cords feel like they’re being ripped out. Until my mouth goes dry and the windows rattle from the force.
Instead, I don’t make a sound. I shove it down and let the feeling claw up my throat.
More people walk through me, into the house. It’s like an endless stream of people that would leave me trampled if I weren’t mist. So I stop being a haze and focus every ounce of energy on taking form.
The next person to enter the house knows he’s not welcome. The color drains from his face as he stumbles through me, turning the same shade of blue that paints the sky before a storm. Whatever joy he felt melts from his face, and the power rush it gives me almost makes me feel human.
That’s how I haunt people.
I’m dead but not useless. If these assholes want to come wreck my house, then so be it. They’re fair game too.
I storm through the wall, barreling through every person I pass. One by one, they shift, feeling my presence. Their throats bob, and they blink hard, glancing around like there’s a violent breeze they can’t find.
And I find him: the first asshole who thought it was a good idea to throw his shit away on my lawn.
Dirty-blonde hair, zero useful thoughts behind his gray eyes, and a red jersey belonging to a sports team I never cared for.
I’ll call him Connor.
Tonight is an opportunity, and I would be a fool to let it go to waste. So when I slam my body against Connor’s, and his phone goes flying out of his hand, I make sure he doesn’t get the chance to grab it, kicking it out of his reach and into another room while he’s none the wiser.
I snatch it off the floor and use the dark room to my advantage, weaving between people with the phone in my grip. Sweat beads along my forehead as I focus on keeping hold of the device—it feels heavy enough to rip my fucking arm off.
Chills tear up and down my spine as I race to the opposite side of the house, away from the party and the people and the loud, incessant thrum of music.
It doesn’t matter how much distance I cover, I can still feel it vibrating through the foundations.
Hear their grating laughter as they sing and dance and do shit I never got to experience.
I was supposed to be like them. I should’ve had friends, and gone to parties, and smiled ear to ear at the promise of a good night.
I shouldn’t be stuck in this crumbling house.
Instead, I’ve stolen someone’s phone with a half-cocked plan.
I don’t know what exactly I’ll do with it yet. Maybe there’s something on Reddit that will solve my situation. Or an Etsy witch who might be the answer to my prayers.
Except once I make it into a spare bedroom and unlock the phone—no passcode, thankfully—growling when it slips from my grip a couple of times, that’s not what I search for. When my fingers fly over the screen, it’s my sister’s name I’m typing.
The press had something to say when it was her birthday. There can’t possibly be anything further, but I don’t trust either of my parents. They’ll never miss an opportunity to lift themselves into a position of power, even if it means using my sister’s corpse as a stepping stone.
I need to know whether they did it again—whether they used Ella as a publicity stunt to have another five minutes in the limelight, to remind people they’re still around, that an Eldrith still holds power.
I stop breathing entirely as the screen loads, imagining everything they could’ve said. Best-case scenario, they say nothing. The worst case?
My stomach sinks into the floor at the headlines that appear at the top of the screen, and my fingers tremble as I click on the first link. Red-hot fury pumps through my veins with every word I read.
They did talk to the press. Only it wasn’t about Ella.
They were discussing me and my “troubling” disappearance; the days they’ve spent trying to reach me.
The rage bubbles and boils until I can hardly breathe. Why the fuck were they trying to reach me—
I’m a drug user? Excuse me? Calling me a problem child, I can understand. A runaway? Sure, that’s what they called me all the times I disappeared off into the basement.
But an addict? Not once have I ever touched anything because I spent every minute of the four years after the Feds came trying to keep Ella alive. Even once she was gone, I steered clear.
This would’ve been the first time they’ve reached out to me since they were imprisoned. They spoke to Ella but never me. And now they’re looking for me, and when I don’t answer, their very first assumption is that I’m on a bender?
They told the reporter I’ve stolen Ella’s ashes so they can’t bury her with the rest of the family—as if I’m some kind of monster who’d steal human fucking remains.
If they’d spoken to her, they’d know that Ella didn’t even want to be buried in the crypt.
She wanted to follow in Grandma’s footsteps.
They don’t know her—they don’t know either of us.
I expected them to use Ella’s death for fucking clout. But this? Turning me into the villain in their story to garner the world’s pity?
What did I ever do to them? How am I always in the wrong when I haven’t done a single thing? What sins did I commit to deserve any of this? I was just a child. I didn’t know what I was doing wrong. I didn’t know how to be like Ella. Why wasn’t I ever enough for them?
I run my fingers through my hair. They’ve filed for an appeal. They—what if they get out? What if they’re granted parole? I don’t know how any of that works.
If they win the appeal, that could mean they get the manor, right? Because they’re my next of kin. And I’ll be stuck here with them.
There’s no stopping the scream that was brewing in my chest. It rips right out of my throat with a force that could generate shock waves and send this decrepit house toppling from its frame.
White-hot tears burn my eyes, and I can’t stop that either.
The energy inside me builds and builds until it feels like it’s going to consume me from the inside out.
I throw the phone across the room. It shatters into pieces as the aggravating music pumps in the background, and the cold trickles through my coat, and the musty, cloying air stains my lungs, and that fucking phone—the cracked screen is frozen on the article.
So I scream, and I yell, and I cry, and I wrap my fingers around every object that has the misfortune of being near me. I let out every swallowed retort, every broken promise, every time another crack tore through my heart.
The world already decided I was trouble. So I might as well be.