Unraveling Isobel (14 page)

“I know what we can do.” Nicole got up and began rummaging through the duffel bag she'd brought. She pulled out a flat board and then flipped it over so we could all see it was a Ouija board. She shook it back and forth.

“I don't know,” Jenni said. “I'm not sure that's a good idea. I mean, here.” She looked over at me and blushed. “Sorry.”

I shrugged. How could I be mad when I was thinking the same thing? Playing with a Ouija board in this house seemed like running through a tinder-dry forest playing with a flamethrower.
Bad plan. Maybe later we could try juggling carving knives or swim with sharks while wearing fish suits.

“Don't be a scaredy-cat.” Nicole plunked back down and put the board right in the middle of our circle.

“Wait a minute. I think Jenni's right,” I said.

“I think it would be fun,” Brit insisted, scootching up closer to the board. I did my best not to roll my eyes. Brit would agree with any plan Nicole had, up to and including the cliché of jumping off a bridge.

“Sam? What do you think? You aren't scared, are you?” Nicole asked. Sam looked back and forth between all of us.

“It might be fun,” Sam said slowly, sounding like she thought it would be as much fun as being dragged naked through a pile of broken glass. From what I knew of her so far, though, she had the spine of an earthworm; no way was she going to stand up to Nicole.

“Majority wins!” Nicole declared. She dropped the plastic triangle onto the board. “Okay, everyone touch their fingers lightly on the planchette.”

“I really don't want to do this,” I said.

Nicole leaned back and crossed her arms. “It's your place. What
do
you want to do?”

My brain scrambled to come up with something. “We could watch a movie,” I suggested.

“I thought you didn't have any DVDs,” Brit reminded me.

“We could see what's on cable.” It wasn't my fault that this crappy island didn't have a decent rental store. Back home in
Seattle I didn't have to buy DVDs. We could rent or download them like normal people. “Or we could play some other kind of game.”

“A rousing game of Monopoly. That sounds exciting,” Brit said with a snort. “Maybe later we could play with our Barbies or pretend to be veterinarians with your stuffed toys.”

My eyes narrowed. She shouldn't be messing with Mr. Stripes. Making fun of a girl for her plush zebra was hitting below the belt. “Fine. Let's play.” I put my fingers on the planchette.

Sam, Brit, and Nicole joined me. Jenni shook her head when we looked at her. She sat hugging her knees. Nicole closed her eyes, and Brit immediately did the same.

“Spirit world, hear our voices. Join us now,” Nicole said in a low voice.

Nothing happened. “Aren't we supposed to ask a specific question or something?” Sam asked.

“It's polite to give them the chance to talk first,” Nicole huffed as if she were the Miss Manners of the undead.

The tips of my fingers started to tingle. The planchette began to quiver. It slid slowly over to where the numbers were listed across the top.

“It's moving!” Brit hissed, in case the rest of us were incapable of noticing it for ourselves.

The planchette hovered over the number one, then slid to the number two, paused, and then went to the number three and stopped.

“So it's just counting?” Brit asked.

The planchette shook and repeated the number sequence. This time faster. Our eyes met over the board. No one said anything, and we waited to see what would happen. Then it repeated the numbers again.

“Spirit, can you tell us who you are?” Nicole asked.

123

123

123

123

I didn't know much about the afterlife, but so far it seemed like those in the spirit world tended to repeat themselves.

“What is the point of this?” Brit grumped. “Let's ask it something.”

“What do the numbers mean?” I asked. The triangle didn't move.

“Ask something interesting. Who will I marry?” Brit tried.

The triangle didn't move. It looked like Brit was headed for spinsterhood. I kept that thought to myself, since she didn't look like the kind of person who could handle the truth.

“Spirit, can you tell me? Who is my destiny?” Nicole asked.

The triangle didn't move at first, but then it began to slide across the board. I noticed this time that there was no tingling in my fingers. It felt different somehow.

The planchette slid over to the
N
, pausing for a beat, and then moved toward the
A
. I looked up from the board to Nicole.
She was smiling. I glanced back down. I couldn't tell for certain, but it seemed to me that her fingers looked tense. She was moving it. I was sure of it. I knew exactly what it was about to spell out. I pressed my fingers down a bit more firmly, and the triangle paused, unable to finish its journey to the
T
. Nicole's eyebrows crunched together. I could feel her trying to pull it forward without looking as if she was doing it.

“What's it trying to say?” Sam asked.

Nicole and I were locked in a fierce battle of finger strength. Our eyes met. The planchette shook underneath all our fingers. She would pull it closer to the
T
and I would pull it back. No way was she going to spell out Nathaniel as her destiny.

“Anyone else notice how cold it's getting in here?” Jenni said. She rubbed her hands up and down her arms.

“It is cold,” Sam said. “Check it out, I can practically see my breath in here.”

“Would you focus?” Nicole snapped.

The tingling returned to my fingertips. In fact it moved passed a tingling. It felt like a low-level electrical shock. Sam hissed and pulled her fingers back. The planchette began shaking, then bouncing on the board. Suddenly it shot out from under our fingers and flew against the wall. We all jumped back.

“What the hell was that?” Brit asked, her voice sounding high and screechy.

“There's something here,” Nicole intoned, her voice low. “Can you feel it?”

I wanted to say no, but my tongue was completely dry. I could feel something, and I was certain it wasn't anything Nicole was doing. The room felt like there was an electrical charge in the air, as if lightning were suddenly going to break out in the middle of my bedroom.

BANG!

We all jumped and whirled around to face my bathroom. The door to the bathroom was closed, but it sounded like someone had kicked the tub.

BANG BANG.

Jenni looked like she wanted to cry. Brit had her hands over her mouth.

BANG BANG BANG
.

It was quiet for a beat. I was just about to say something, but then it started again.
BANG. BANG BANG. BANG BANG BANG.

“It's counting again. One, two, three,” Nicole said. Her face had gone white.

“Make it stop,” Brit said to me.

“I'm not doing anything,” I said, pointing out the obvious.

BANG. BANG BANG. BANG BANG BANG
.

Even Nicole looked shaken now. “Someone should go check it out.” The rest of the group looked at me. Figures. It might be my place, but talking to the dead hadn't been my idea. Why was it no one expected Nicole to do any ghost busting?

I stood up. The banging stopped. I took a couple of shuffling steps toward the bathroom, but it stayed quiet. I could hear the girls breathing heavily behind me. My hand reached out. I hesitated before touching the doorknob. My heart was hammering a thousand beats per second. I made myself count to five, and then I grabbed the knob.

I flung the door open. I saw the mirror directly in front of me; only, instead of my own reflection, it flashed Evelyn's face. Her hands were squeezing either side of her face, and her mouth was open in a scream. The mirror fell off the wall and shattered on the floor. Everyone screamed.

Chapter 19

S
am kept screaming. I stood in the door of the bathroom staring at where the mirror used to be. There was a
plink
as a piece of glass slid down in the sink. Pieces of my reflection lay in the broken shards on the floor. I could hear someone running up the stairs toward my room.

Jenni jumped up from the floor and bolted. She flung open the bedroom door and ran straight into someone. She started screaming again and swinging her arms wildly.

“Hey, easy.” Nathaniel grabbed her arms. She was still screaming. He held her by the shoulders and shook her. Her screams cut off when she realized who had her and she began to cry. She backed up and collapsed onto the window seat.

“Oh, Nathaniel, thank God.” Nicole flew across the room and threw herself into his arms.

“What happened?” Nathaniel stood there with his arms out while Nicole clung to his chest. He saw me, and then something else caught his eye. “You're bleeding.”

I followed his gaze down and saw a shard of the mirror sticking out of the top of my foot. A slick of blood was pooling on the floor. Nathaniel pulled Nicole off of him and passed her to Brit. He went down on one knee in front me as if he were about to propose.

“What is going on in here?” Dick burst through the door. Jenni and Sam were both crying to beat the band.

I opened my mouth to try to explain, but at that moment Nathaniel yanked the glass out of my foot and I let out a yelp instead. Nathaniel grabbed the box of Kleenex next to the bed and pressed a wad of tissues down on the cut. He handed me the mirror shard.

Nicole took a step forward and kicked the Ouija board under my bed before Dick could see it. “We were goofing around and the bathroom mirror broke.” She gave Dick a sweet, innocent smile, and when he looked around the room, she glared at the rest of us. Brit managed to pull it together first. She scrambled up off the floor and stood next to Nicole.

“I guess the sound of the glass breaking scared us,” Brit said. She nudged Jenni, who was still crying on the window seat. Sam let out a shrill laugh that sounded way more manic than reassuring.

“How did you break the mirror? Were you playing football up
here? We could hear you banging around all the way downstairs.” Dick gave one of his hearty fake chuckles.

Nicole pressed her palm on Dick's chest. “Oh, Mr. Wickham, playing football?” She laughed as if that was so silly she could hardly stand it. Nicole had a booming future as a society wife ahead of her. Ass kissing was an Olympic sport for her.

Dick looked at me and waited to hear my explanation. I didn't like the idea of going along with Nicole, but admitting we were playing with a Ouija board wasn't going to make the situation better. I shrugged and looked away.

“I think you're going to need stitches,” Nathaniel said. “This cut is pretty deep. Do you want me to take you?”

“I want to go home,” Jenni said. Her lower lip was shaking and she wasn't able to look directly at Nicole or Dick. “I don't feel well.”

“Me neither,” Sam squeaked.

“Maybe we'd better call it a night,” I mumbled. I guess I didn't have to worry any more about how to spend the rest of my slumber party. Jenni and Sam started grabbing their things off the floor and stuffing them into their bags.

“I could go with you to the clinic,” Nicole offered. I wasn't stupid enough to imagine for a second that she cared about my foot. She would spend all her time throwing herself back into Nathaniel's arms.

“I'll get my keys and meet you downstairs.” Nathaniel stood. His sweatpants had a dark maroon splotch of blood on the knee.

Dick brushed past me as if I weren't even standing there and looked into the bathroom. “I'll get your mom to come up and clean the room.”

“I can do it,” I mumbled. “Nicole, you don't need to come, but maybe you could give everyone else a ride home?”

“That would be great,” Dick agreed, clapping Nicole on the back.

Nicole's mouth pressed shut. She had no interest in being everyone's chauffeur, but there wasn't any easy way to refuse.

I pulled on my oversize gray sweater and rummaged in my drawer for a pair of thick socks while the girls gathered their things. I managed to get my socks on, but a red bloom immediately appeared over the cut on my foot. I stuffed a few handfuls of tissues into my sock to stanch the bleeding. Then we filed out quietly, Dick following us down the stairs.

“Everyone's leaving?” my mom said, coming out from the kitchen. She looked confused.

“There was a bit of roughhousing and a mirror got broken,” Dick said, taking the glass of wine from my mom's hand. “A few of the girls are feeling a bit shaken up.”

My mom looked down, noticing the bloodstain on my sock. “Isobel?”

“It's nothing,” Dick said. “Nathaniel's going to take her down to the clinic and get it checked out.”

“I'll get my purse.”

Dick caught her by the arm and pulled her close. “No need
for everyone to decamp on me. The cut's not bad. Nathaniel can handle it. If there's a problem, he'll give us a call.”