Chapter 14 – Elise #2
Around her, the room felt lighter. Still tinged with worry, but steadied now by something warmer.
Nick rested his chin on her shoulder dramatically. “Can you tell them to take requests?”
“I haven’t tried,” Elise said. “But I think they take vibes.”
The call for places rang down the hallway.
Everyone stood, gathering water bottles and costume pieces, but the moment lingered just a little longer.
And in the silence that followed, the faintest chords floated in from the pit. Something soft. Something familiar.
Kevin grinned down at Elise from the rafters. “Told you they had good timing.”
After the curtain had fallen and the last of the cast had trickled out, Elise was finishing her post-show tidy-up when Graham appeared in the doorway, soft-spoken and deliberate.
“I won’t keep you,” he said, hands tucked into his coat pockets. “I just wanted to say—Nick and I agree. You shouldn’t be here alone.”
Before Elise could bristle, he raised both hands.
“Not because we think you need saving,” he added quickly. “We just… don’t want to take any chances. The Darcys are united in this.”
A dry, whispery voice drifted from across the room: “Oh, and I’m just set dressing, am I?”
Elise laughed under her breath. “Kevin would like to register his objection. But I’ll tell him not to take it personally.”
She could see Graham trying to work out whether she was kidding. “Should I apologize to him?”
She smiled. “Probably. But he’ll get over it.”
Graham’s eyes crinkled, but the concern was still there. “Nick told me you’ve got him staying over tonight. I’m glad. Didn’t want to… intrude. Zombie Haiku can wait.”
“It’ll be worth the wait,” she teased.
He stepped back, half-turned to go. “Be careful tonight, okay?”
As he passed, his fingers grazed hers—barely a touch, but it shimmered in the air between them. A spark. A promise.
Elise stood there long after he’d gone, her pulse humming in her fingertips.
The theatre slowly emptied—laughter echoing down the corridor, zippers zipping, doors clicking shut—but Nick stayed rooted beside Elise, chatting a mile a minute while she wound curlers into the freshly dried rain wig.
“You should’ve seen him,” Nick was saying, eyes wide. “He pulled out a ukulele and just—boom—serenaded me in the middle of the lobby. Full-on rom-com moment. I didn’t know whether to kiss him or crawl into the nearest potted plant.”
Elise snorted. “Please tell me you kissed him.”
“Oh, obviously. I’m not that dense. But listen, if we get serious, I’m insisting on a duet clause in our dating contract. I can’t have him upstaging me like that.”
She laughed, her fingers moving automatically through the rollers. “You’re unbelievable.”
“Thank you, I try.” He kicked his feet up on a trunk and leaned back, studying her. “Okay, serious question time. Ghost stuff.”
Elise gave a half-smile, already bracing. “Of course. Naturally.”
She didn’t think she’d ever get used to this part—the sudden shift from normal conversation into interrogation. Even friendly questions had a way of poking at the edges of things she’d spent years trying to keep quiet. But this was Nick. And this was a part of herself she was trying to stop hiding.
One question at a time, she told herself. She could handle that.
He squinted. “Can you turn it off?”
She shook her head. “Not exactly. But the tattoos help dull it—like putting a dimmer on a light.”
“Do they talk to you?” he asked. “Tell you their secrets? Beg you to solve their mysterious deaths?”
“Very rarely. Most of them aren’t that… aware. They’re like echoes—loops of memory.”
“Are they—okay, this is important—are they naked?”
Elise laughed. “No! They show up however they felt most like themselves. Clothes and all.”
“Thank goodness. I don’t think I could handle a naked ghost chorus.” He grinned, then grew more thoughtful. “Can they, like… interact? With physical stuff?”
“The powerful ones can,” Elise said. “But it takes effort. Emotion. Focus.”
“Can they follow you?”
She shook her head. “Most can’t. They’re tied. To places. To objects. To unfinished stories. Kevin’s tied to a pocket watch and this theatre life. They’re all bound to something.”
Nick fell silent for a moment, then said, “So… your ex. He wasn’t… bound to that street corner, was he?”
Elise’s fingers stilled over the next curler.
“No,” she said, quietly. “He shouldn’t have been there.”
Nick looked at her, brows drawn. “But he was.”
She nodded. “I don’t know how. Kevin doesn’t know either. And that… scares me.”
The air shifted slightly, heavier now. Kevin hovered nearby, unusually subdued.
Nick, ever attuned, caught the shadow in Elise’s face and gently steered them toward calmer waters.
“So, this friend we’re about to call—Cici, right? She’s the same one who turned that one cast party into a full-on moon ritual with glow sticks and tequila?”
Elise couldn’t help but laugh. “Yes. Cici thrives in chaos. She’s the best kind of uninvited guest.”
“I think she and I would be dangerous in the same room.”
“She’s already claimed you as a favorite.”
Elise finished pinning the last curl into place and surveyed her handiwork with a satisfied nod. As she started tidying up the space—wiping down the chair, returning the brush to its drawer—she glanced at her phone.
11:00 PM.
“Showtime,” she said softly, more to herself than to Nick. She tapped the screen and pulled up Cici’s contact.
The call connected almost instantly—Cici’s face blooming to life on the screen, framed in moonlight and a halo of frizz.
Her long dark hair was pulled back with a vibrant scarf the color of marigolds.
The glint of silver hoops lined both ears, and a woven choker sat snug at her throat, a tiny crescent moon charm resting at the hollow.
“Hey,” Elise said, then paused. “Wow. You look exhausted.”
“I am exhausted,” Cici said flatly, then lifted something up to the camera. “But not too tired to introduce Chaos.”
A tiny black kitten blinked into view—fur like shadows, eyes like polished marbles.
Nick gasped theatrically. “She’s perfect. Tell her I would die for her.”
“She knows,” Cici said solemnly. “She feeds on devotion.”
The kitten pawed lazily at the screen before squirming out of frame. Cici sighed and adjusted the phone. “I wish I could be there, but feeding these gremlins every two hours is a prison of my own making. Remember last time I showed up at that haunted wreck of a theatre uninvited?”
“Vividly,” Elise said.
Nick looked between them. “Last time? You’ve been here before?”
Cici set the kitten down, her face turning serious. “It was years ago. Elise and I cast the calming ward to keep the Seamstress spirit from spiraling.”
“Oh. Wow.” Nick’s voice dropped slightly.
“Let’s hope this one’s not quite so… dramatic,” Elise said.
Cici adjusted the angle of her phone so they could see the circular table in front of her—lined with flickering candles, a bowl of salt, sprigs of rosemary, and a tangled chain of copper wire.