Chapter Seven
Seven
We’re gathered again in the parlor of the main house, the same room where the table read took place.
With no sunlight streaming through the atrium-like windows, the difference between then and now is literally like night and day.
The oppressive darkness outside steeps the room in shadow that’s barely alleviated by the lit candles on the sideboard.
Their flickering wicks cast a meager glow that skims the patterned walls and the dead butterflies in frames that fill it.
Outside, live insects continue to screech at full throttle.
Maybe it’s the gin, but I at first think it’s the butterflies that are screaming, begging to be freed from their glass boxes.
I approach one and stare, searching for the lone flap of wings or the wriggle of an antenna.
There’s nothing, telling me it is the gin talking.
The martini has made my brain deliciously fuzzy.
I look to Violet, who appears completely sober, making me wonder if she drank as much as I thought or if I’m just the lightest of lightweights.
The table in front of us has been turned into a makeshift spirit board, with twenty-eight paper squares placed in a large circle. It looks just like the one mentioned in both Daisy’s diary and Ronan’s script, right down to the YES and NO squares.
“I wanted to use Scrabble tiles,” Brad says. “But that wasn’t invented until the thirties. To remain era-appropriate, I came up with this.”
“Why not just use a Ouija board?” Susie says.
“Those did exist, although very few mediums used them.”
Even so, I would have preferred a setup different from the one in which the women of New Avalon allegedly summoned the entity that later destroyed them.
Especially now that we’re dressed like those women.
The old-fashioned clothes coupled with the candlelight make it feel like we’ve traveled back in time a hundred years, to the night of that first, ill-fated séance.
Not a good idea, in my mind. Even though I don’t think anything bad will happen, I see no point in creating a scenario in which it could.
And I’m not the only one who has trepidation about reenacting the scene. Before taking a seat at the table, Julianne says, “Maybe we should just use a Ouija board. Why tempt fate, right?”
“Are you scared?” Susie says in a taunting way that makes me think sleepovers with her must have been hell. If she even had any growing up. Child stars like her probably didn’t do sleepovers. Still, if she had, I’m certain she was first to put shaving cream in a sleeping girl’s hand.
Julianne squirms. “I’m not scared. But I come from a very religious family. And while I’ve gotten away from all of that, I was taught at a very early age not to engage with the spirit world, even in jest.”
“But there is no spirit world,” Heather says. “When you die, you die. There’s no lingering between this world and the next. As for mediums, they’re just scam artists who make money off grieving people. Always have been, always will be.”
“What about Mrs. Semple?” Violet says, coming to her character’s defense. “She didn’t charge anyone to be here.”
Heather shrugs. “That we know of.”
“Unfortunately, participation is mandatory,” Ronan says. “If you believe, great. If you don’t, then simply think of this as a character-building exercise. Nothing more.”
“But if we contact an evil spirit,” Julianne jokes, “I want it to be on the record that I thought this was all a bad idea.”
There’s a slight quiver in her voice, suggesting a small part of her believes it could happen.
I, on the other hand, do not.
“Ghosts aren’t real, Mare,” my father constantly insisted when I was five. “There’s no reason to be afraid.”
The rest of us join Julianne at the table.
Violet is on my right, seated directly in front of the letter A.
Between us are letters B through F. Slightly to my left is the G, followed by the NO, situated right at my elbow.
The alphabet continues around the table, flowing past Julianne on my left, then Heather, then Susie.
At her elbow sits the other full word in this scenario, YES.
In a departure from this afternoon, Ronan doesn’t join us at the table, choosing instead to sit with Loretta in a corner so dark I can barely see them. It’s just the five of us actresses at the table, sitting evenly spaced, like points on a pentagram.
“How is this going to work?” Susie says, staring at the circle of letters in front of us.
Brad holds up a drinking glass full of water. “You’ll be using this. According to Reddit, it works better than a planchette. Too much pressure from one person will tip the glass over. Now, to show you there’s nothing funny about it—”
He lifts the glass to his lips and tips it back, emptying it in two gulps. He then places the glass upside down in the center of the table and instructs all of us to put two fingers on its bottom, just like Mrs. Semple told the others to do in Daisy’s diary.
All of us obey, placing our index fingers on the upside-down glass. Satisfied, Brad takes a seat in the corner opposite Ronan and Loretta, all but vanishing into the shadows.
“Violet, I think you should lead this,” Ronan says from his gloom-covered seat. “That’s how it is in the script.”
“I’m not sure…” Violet trails off, noting the expectant way Ronan looks at her. This no longer feels like a parlor game. It feels like rehearsal. “Well, I suppose I could try.”
Ronan nods, pleased. “That would be a good idea.”
“I think Marin should do it,” Susie says with a smirk that may be intended as friendly but doesn’t appear that way in this light.
Shadows rest in the hollows of her eyes, even as the glow from the candles trips along her glossed lips.
It gives her a sinister look. Like a vampire planning to sink her teeth into my neck.
“I don’t think I should,” I say quietly.
Violet, sensing my discomfort, swoops in to rescue me. “I’m happy to do it first. I think Ronan is right that we should try to follow the script.”
“I just thought Marin would appreciate getting the experience,” Susie says as she continues to stare at me. “Being new to the group, it makes sense that Daisy would want to impress the others.”
“I like that reasoning,” Ronan says, oblivious. “Marin, take it away.”
Everyone at the table looks to me. Even Violet. The expectation is like a weight on my shoulder than I’m eager to shake off. Still, I muster the energy to close my eyes, lift my face to the ceiling, and say, “Is there a spirit present?”
Nothing happens.
Of course.
Because this is a stupid idea that we’re only doing because we don’t want Ronan to know we think it’s stupid. At least that’s my reason. It could be different for the others, who keep their fingers still against the glass, waiting for something that won’t happen.
“Try it again,” Ronan instructs, ever the director. “Put more meaning into it. Sound like you believe this is possible.”
I close my eyes tighter this time, as if that will help. I try to clear my brain of all doubt and self-consciousness as I tip my head back and solemnly intone, “Is there a spirit present?”
A moment of nothingness follows. I remain completely still, eyes clenched shut, my two fingers on top of the glass. Just when I’m about to open my eyes and give up, I feel it.
The glass.
It moved.
Not a lot. Just fraction of a millimeter. But I felt it happen. An infinitesimal nudge that no amount of gin could have made me hallucinate.
The others at the table felt it, too, because when I open my eyes, I see all of them staring at the glass, as if mentally willing it to move farther. Across from me, Violet catches my eye and gives an encouraging nod.
“Spirit, was that meant to be a yes?” I say, this time never taking my gaze off the glass.
It moves again, this time a full-on nudge noticed even by those not seated at the table. Behind me, Brad gasps. On the other side of the room, I see Ronan emerge from the shadows. He swoops in close, eye level with the table.
Astonishingly, the glass moves yet again. Almost a full inch this time. Where it intends to go, however, remains unclear. It sits closest to me and Violet, apparently on its way to one of the letters between us. A through F.
“Spirit, if this is your doing, please make your presence known.”
The chair Ronan had vacated suddenly lurches forward, its legs scraping along the parlor floor. By the time it’s done, there’s a good foot of space between it and its former resting place against the wall.
Dumbfounded, I look at the others, trying to see if one of them was behind it. None of them look suspicious. Not even Susie, whose vampiric expression has melted into something resembling awe. I feel the opposite. A sticky tingle of fear on the back of my neck that I haven’t felt in twenty years.
This can’t be happening, I think. This can’t be real.
But the chair moves again, this time sliding halfway across the room. I continue to watch it. Although it’s hard to make out in the gloom, I think I see something tied around one of its legs. I squint, looking closer, as what’s attached to the chair comes into focus.
A length of needle-thin fishing line.
I follow it to its source—wrapped around Brad’s ankle. With a single shift of his leg, the chair moves yet again.
“Stop!” I say. “Everyone stop. Especially you, Brad.”
He looks up at me, clearly busted but reluctant to admit it.
“Stand up and take two steps,” I tell him. “Go on.”
Brad rises to his feet carefully enough to not budge the chair. But when he takes his required steps, it drags along with him. Violet stands to get a better look at the now-obvious fishing line stretched between his ankle and the chair. “Hold on. All of this is fake?”
“Just the chair,” Brad says. “The glass was all you.”
“I didn’t move it,” Susie says.
“All of you moved it, whether you intended to or not,” Brad says. “It’s the same way a Ouija board works. Tiny, almost imperceptible muscle movements guide the planchette to where the group subconsciously wants it to go.”
“Which means that, too, was fake,” Violet says.
Ronan approaches the table, hands raised in both apology and surrender. “Don’t blame Brad. It was all my idea. Since the whole point of you being here is to experience what the women of New Avalon went through, we thought that should also include a semi-spooky séance.”
Violet narrows her eyes at him. “Are there any more tricks up your sleeve?”
“Just some low-tech stuff,” Brad admits. “Drawing ominous footprints on the sidewalk. Making strange noises in the woods.”
“Like scratching?” I say, hoping that at least explains what I’d heard in my cottage.
“I was going to go with howling,” Brad says. “I raided the studio’s sound effects archive.”
“Here’s a suggestion,” Heather says, pushing away from the table. “You could just have rehearsals like normal directors do. I didn’t sign up for this middle school sleepover bullshit.”
“Actually, you did,” Ronan says. “When all of you accepted your parts, signed your contracts, and came to this island, you were quite literally signing up for this.”
“Maybe I changed my mind.”
“I think Ronan is right,” Violet says. “While I don’t like being deceived, I do see the value in this. To become these women on-screen, we need to also become them in real life.”
It hits me that all this trickery might be for my sake.
As if Ronan and Loretta, having no guarantee I’ll be able to legitimately act the part, decided to put me through the real thing with the hope that I’ll summon memories of the experience once cameras start to roll.
The thought leaves me feeling both insulted and, oddly, grateful.
Ronan assured me he had my back. Maybe this is one way of doing that.
“I agree with Violet,” I say. Even though I don’t believe in any of this, I know it’s my job to appear like I do. Fake it till you make it, remember? “I think it could be good for our characters.”
“Or we could, you know, just act,” Heather says.
“Fake or not, I still don’t think it’s a good idea to mess around with things like this,” Julianne adds. “It could lead to bad karma.”
Violet, whom I’m certain has weathered her fair share of on-set disagreements, replies with a calm nod. “I suppose we should defer to those in charge.”
“You all know where I stand,” Ronan says before turning to the producer watching from her shadow-cloaked corner. “What do you think, Loretta? It’s your call.”
Loretta leans forward, her face emerging from the shadows like someone peering through a curtain. Although she appears to give it some thought, I can tell from the dark look in her eyes that her mind is already made up.
“I think we should continue,” she says. “Having seen the faked séance, I’m curious what happens during a real one.”