Chapter 28
Since Annabelle vetoed my bicycle suggestion and I didn’t dare suggest a horseback ride, we walked back to Abaddon. We made it slightly ahead of Yasmin’s six thirty deadline. I opened the gate and held it for Annabelle.
The smell of something delicious filled the house. We stepped up to the porch, but just as I opened the door and Annabelle started to walk through it, Yasmin appeared, wearing an apron that said “Witch, Please.”
“You’re early!” She pointed back out the way we came. “Out till six thirty!”
“But—” I poked my head in and sniffed, detecting the aroma of roasting vegetables.
Miranda appeared from inside the kitchen, also wearing an apron that looked like an immaculate addition to her elegant pantsuit. “We’re eating outside. Why don’t you two go around the house.” She herded us back out the door but made it seem polite somehow.
I shrugged and guided Annabelle around the side yard. She let me put my arm around her waist, and we walked side by side past the wood pile to the back garden, where a small crowd had formed.
Adam spotted us first. He raised his arms in the air and shouted, “There they are!”
Annabelle’s mouth dropped open. “What’s all this?”
In the backyard, Rebecca and Sara chatted with Pete, who looked as grumpy and strange as ever.
Mike and Sage were on the lawn, setting up yard games, while Adam and Tyler watched.
Nate emerged from the kitchen door with plates and utensils, which he set on the outdoor table.
They had moved the kitchen table outside next to it and put every chair in the house around the two tables.
“Oh my gosh, you really are here!” Rebecca squealed. She bustled over to me and Annabelle, leaving Sara to finish her conversation with Old Pete.
I reintroduced Rebecca as the person who gave me an excellent haircut.
She was giddy at the prospect of meeting a ghost come to life. “I love ghosts. I watch those paranormal reality shows all the time. Ghost Hunters ? Love it.”
Annabelle’s expression fell. “Hunters?”
“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean that as offensive to your kind.”
“I don’t think I have a kind. I’m just me.”
As we talked, Sara extracted herself from Pete and joined us. I reintroduced her as the lead singer of the Thursday-night jam band at Helga’s. Sara peered at Annabelle, squinting. She crossed her arms and said, “Hmm.”
Rebecca stage-whispered, “She’s having a hard time with the whole ghost thing.”
“I’m not convinced this isn’t a mass hallucination,” Sara said. She got an elbow in the side from her wife and added, “But in any case, it’s nice to meet you properly. We brought brownies.” Sara pointed at a platter on the table.
Annabelle smiled. “Thank you for coming. I’ve never had a brownie.” She peered at the brown mass but didn’t seem eager to try it.
From the grass, Mike let out a shout as Sage completed a tricky frisbee catch.
“Is that—was he here? Last night?” Annabelle asked.
“Yes, that’s Mike,” I said. “He helped me get you home.”
She nodded, her expression reserved. “I see.” She approached Mike and Sage, clasping her hands behind her back nervously.
They spent a few minutes talking, solemn looks on their faces, and then the mood shifted.
Adam and Tyler showed Annabelle how to toss a beanbag into the hole of the cornhole board, and she joined their game, cheering everyone’s tosses regardless of who was on which team.
I stood at the railing and watched. Pete thrust a low-quality beer in my hands, mumbled something, and then wandered off.
After a few rounds of increasingly competitive cornhole games, Yasmin emerged from the house. She clapped her hands and announced, “Dinner time! Everyone, come eat!”
We all found places around the tables. Everyone made sure I sat next to Annabelle, and that she had the best seat, next to the food.
Yasmin clinked her fork on her mug. “Before we eat, I’d like to say a few words.
” She launched into a witchy prayer that mentioned the earth and the moon so many times I lost count.
When she got to the parts about healing energy, I zoned out.
But Annabelle held my hand under the table, and my leg brushed against hers, so although my stomach growled, I was content. Finally, we ate.
The food was delicious. Yasmin and Miranda, with Nate’s help, had made roasted chicken and vegetables, mashed potatoes, pasta salad, and asparagus.
Mike supplied biscuits from a can and sodas for the kids.
Miranda told us her lemon bar recipe was so famous it had won awards in the 1970s.
Conversation flowed freely, with Annabelle fitting in among the strange ensemble perfectly.
The kids had spent time before the ritual peppering Annabelle with questions, so now it was Mike and the Johnsons’ turn.
She told them stories about the island before the United States regained it, describing how people at the fort and in the small town survived the harsh winters and fondly recalling the gatherings of Anishinaabe fur traders that arrived with the seasons.
Eventually, scrutiny returned to me. Mike asked, “What about the house? I thought you got an offer on it.”
Yasmin studied her nails.
I sighed. “Seymour Anderson gave me an offer, yes. But he also ... walked in at an awkward moment while we were bringing Annabelle back. His offer went down by a million because he says the property is cursed, and I have a feeling that’s an insult, given how much the Montclair property went for.”
Mike frowned. “That’s ridiculous. Shouldn’t he be raising his offer to get you on board? You’re the one with the house. Does he want it or not?”
“He doesn’t want the house; he wants the land. Besides, it’s a haunted dump,” Pete said.
We all looked at Pete, aghast. “It is!” The strange old man cleared his throat. “Electrical aside. And that doesn’t mean it has to stay that way.”
Miranda clucked her tongue, and the rest of the group looked everywhere but me.
“Pete’s right. To make Abaddon into a home, you’d have to do so many things.
” I shrugged. “I don’t even know what all you’d need to do.
Decorating? Drywall? Yeesh.” I remembered my vision of the garden as a gathering place, full of people and life.
The impromptu party Yasmin had thrown was close to being what I imagined, but not quite.
“Besides, no one wants to live in a haunted house,” Annabelle said. “Witches aside, of course.” She added a smile, but no one else did.
There was a moment of silence. It was broken by Adam, who spoke around a mouth full of mashed potatoes. “That’s not true! People love haunted houses. Otherwise, why would they make a whole ride at Disneyland?”
We all laughed, but what he said stuck with me. The vision of the garden hadn’t left my mind the whole night—it juxtaposed itself on top of reality in a way that was confusing but felt, strangely, comfortable.
Maybe I was just a witch late bloomer. The spells that Yasmin learned at four might come to me when I got to Miranda’s age.
I turned to Nate and asked, “Could you put up string lights? Maybe out into the garden?”
He stroked his chin. “Of course. Might take me an hour or two, though.” He craned his head back to see the electrical panel he’d worked on with Old Pete, then started mumbling to himself.
I laughed. “Not right now, man. But someday.”
***
After dinner, Sage hooked up their Bluetooth speakers, and we cleared a space on the deck large enough for a makeshift dance floor. The kids did TikTok dances to songs that were popular when I was their age, and they dissolved in giggles when Miranda and Pete tried to imitate the moves.
Sage’s playlist included a song that I instantly recognized as Call Me Kate Kane by Ivan’s bassline and Brooke’s scratchy vocals, but I didn’t know it.
“What is this?” I asked. Sage showed me their phone—it was a new single, the one they released with Stephani on guitar instead of me. “Huh.”
Sage took their phone back. “It’s not terrible, but it’s definitely not my fave.”
I expected to feel angry or jealous. But I gazed at Annabelle and the people gathered on my porch and felt nothing but contentment. “Yeah, it’s catchy. Pop. Not their usual style.”
Sara and Rebecca Johnson swayed in an approximation of dancing for three songs, looking into each other’s eyes and sighing.
Then they left for the night, taking Tyler home.
Soon after, Mike, Adam, and Sage departed, leaving me with Old Pete and the weird people I’d started to think of as family.
Miranda, Yasmin, and Nate gathered around the table, nursing beverages. Annabelle and I joined them.
“What do you think is going to happen tomorrow? Will you go back to being a ghost?” Nate asked, his fingers intertwined with Yasmin’s on top of the table.
She kicked him.
“Sorry.”
Annabelle smiled, her usual mask back in place. “It’s a good question, Nate. When Agatha and I discussed it, she wasn’t sure if I would return to the world as I was or if I would ... dissipate.”
“Dissipate?” Pete echoed. “You were a ghost. Now you’re not a ghost.”
Annabelle nodded.
Nate picked up the thread from there. “But it’s only for last night and today, then you’ll dissipate? Why would a ghost dissipate after being real and getting a girlfriend?”
He looked at me and Yasmin for answers. She looked away, and my vision unfocused, my mind replaying the word “girlfriend” over and over.
“I think,” Annabelle said, “that whatever happens tomorrow, I will be grateful for my time here. And grateful to all of you for summoning me.” She looked around the tables, where we’d squeezed nine adults, three kids, and a giant spread of homemade food and dessert.