Balores.There’s no doubt in my mind.
Alice the ghost did say someone bad was with us. I had thought about this conversation afterward and assumed incorrectly that the unfriendly other presence was Kit. Balores wasright there. Watching me. Waiting. A shiver runs over my body as I quickly twist around, afraid I’m being watched again.
No. I’m fine. I’m sitting at the counter in my kitchen with the curtains drawn. I am alone, and no one can see me.
I wonder if I can edit him out of the video? Not that it’s not incredible that I caught a demon on video, especially an awfully evil mid-level one who wants to possess me, but if people see it, they’ll probably say it’s fake, and I don’t need all of those negative trolls in the comments ganging up on me.
But…engagement.
It’ll be fine. I’ll leave it in. I continue to edit the video, staying up late and almost forgetting to eat dinner, despite my stomach’s angry reminders (dinner got eaten, just not until eleven o’clock). I end up posting the video at two thirty a.m., not bothering to care about the algorithm, with a note about how sorry I was that this was later than expected and that I’ve been oh so busy and taking a mental health break—I should probably take anactualmental health break soon. That’ll be good. My subscribers will have something to wake up to, andnow I can focus all my energy on the contest video. I go back to it but shake my head and close my laptop. I need to have a fully awake mind for editing this one.
Instead of going to bed as I should, though, I go to my phone. When the screen brightens, my lips twitch. I had changed the lock screen to the photo of Kit’s spray paint ghost. Why? Because I like to suffer.
I swipe my phone open and go to Google. I type inKit Mitchell, Sacramentothen change my mind and writeChristopherinstead ofKit. I find an obituary from ten years ago, a black-and-white picture of a smiling Christopher Mitchell at the top. I notice the white scar above his lip before I focus on his eyes. It amazes me how even in picture form, his eyes are just as distinctlyhisas they are in any body I have seen him inhabit, including my own.
I scan the obit, but I don’t see any information I don’t already know. It says he was known as Kit by his family and friends, that he died of heart complications, that he is survived by his mother, father, brother, sister, and nephew. He was twenty-six. Worked as an Integration Engineer at a tech company. Enjoyed art, hiking, fishing, and spending time with his friends. He was happy. He was human. They’ve included a few of his drawings and paintings at the bottom of the page, ranging from sketches of people in the park to paintings of dragons. All beautiful. He was talented.
I swipe out of the obituary, knowing I should stop while I’m ahead. But I don’t. I descend into the past and go to Facebook, thinking I’ll have a better chance of finding him there than on Instagram. I find his profile after a few mis-clicks. His profilepicture is the color version of the one they used in the obit. I click on it so I can look at him again. As always, I can’t focus on anything but his eyes. My chest aches, but I ignore it as I swipe in an attempt to get out of the picture. Instead, I end up swiping to the next picture.
It’s of him and a woman with a blonde bob. I tap the picture to see if she’s tagged. She is. Jenna Hodgkins.Jenna. That was the person he almost called on the day he died. An ex, he said. She’s pretty.
I exit the profile picture and scroll through his page. It takes a while to get through all the messages posted on his wall after he died. There’s a lot. Paragraphs and photos filled with memories of a well-lived, short life. He was loved. Finally, I reach his own posts. There’s not a lot, mainly tagged pictures of him at parties or out at bars or concerts with friends. A lot with Jenna. I scroll for far longer than I should. There’s one from thirteen years ago where I can clearly see stitches in his lip, so it must be from right after that fishhook got caught and pulled through it. There’s one from fourteen years ago of him at Disney World. I take note of the date: August thirteenth. August’s birthday.
Hang on.
I chuckle wetly with my hand over my mouth. That would have been August’s fifteenth birthday. We went to Disney World to celebrate that year. Her dad paid with his divorced-dad-guilt money. Were we there at the same time? It’s not like that would have mattered at all, considering he was twenty-two. Even if we were in the same vicinity, he wouldn’t (and shouldn’t) have looked my way, but that means…that means we breathed the same air at one point.
I go through his Disney photos, his face young, clearly a little drunk, and happy. Most of the pictures are with a group of his friends. There’s one where Jenna, hair longer than that profile picture, is kissing his cheek. They must have dated for a while.
Jealousy sparks through me. It shouldn’t, I know. This is an ex from ten years ago, even more for him. But they had been dating since college, and he broke up with her because he knew he was going to die, not because he didn’t love her. And, well, Iamjealous, because this woman got to know him first and got to know him as a human. She got to exist in her own body while he was in his. She got to have him in a way I never can and never will. She hadhim. I will never have him. I’ll probably never even see him again.
Which is the way it should be. I’ve fallen for a demon. I haven’t fallen for this man in the photos. I don’t know this man. I know my Kit. My demon. It’s pathetic, really. Someone pays attention to me, and I’m over the moon.
I sigh, because I know whatever was between Kit and me was more than that. But it’s over. I finally force myself off of his profile and go sleep in my bed and, as I have every night since he’s been gone, feel pitifully alone.
thirty-three
. . .
On my next day off,I take a trip into the city. It’s been a while since I’ve been to New York. When we were in high school, August and I used to ditch school every now and then to sneak away to the city for the day. We’d usually wander around or hang out in a park or coffee shop (once a bar, but August was sweating profusely the entire time, so we just drank sodas, despite securing fake IDs). Though, there was one time we came and found this incredible bookstore with the stacks up to the ceilings and every shelf was an absolute mess. Looking for anything felt like a treasure hunt. But a worthwhile one. We spent the entire day there sifting through books and each coming out with armfuls of treasures.
I smile slightly, despite my heart being squeezed in my chest. God, I can’t even imagine what she would say if I told her about Kit. She would one, believe me, because she always believed in things like this, even more sothan I used to. And two, she would laugh her ass off. Of course, I would develop a massive crush on the demon possessing me.
Soon enough, the train pulls into Grand Central. I have the route mapped out on my phone, since I’ll need to take a train down to Greenwich Village, which will involve me walking about ten minutes west to find the 123 trains. I emerge onto the streets and am immediately overwhelmed by everything around me. Cars are honking, tourists are crawling, residents are speed walking, people are everywhere. I’ve never been here alone, not without August or Meggie or a random ex-thing to hold my hand. I take a deep breath. I’ll be fine.
I keep that thought process as I pass Bryant Park, and immediately disregard it as I have to cross into Times Square to enter the station. I should have taken the shuttle from Grand Central instead of walking. It’s approaching lunch hour, and people are swarming around me suddenly, like they grew out of the concrete. I weave through the crowds and run down into the station, quickly pushing my way through the turnstile and navigating around even more people until I find my train. The train comes nearly right away, and I take it down to the village and walk the rest of the way to the shop.
The shop is long, skinny, and dark with thick purple curtains hung over the windows. The tables have an assortment of sage, crystals, and spell books. I approach the woman behind the counter. She has short dark hair and a large silver hoop in her right nostril.
“Hi,” I say. “Can you point me to your…charms? I guess?”
“Is there a specific one you’re wanting?”
“Yeah.” I pull up the photo on my phone. “This one. Notthe regular pentagram, but the one inside the little squiggly thing.”
She raises her eyebrows but declines to make a comment. “Over here.” She leads me to the back corner where an assortment of faux leather bracelets and necklaces with various charms are hung from black metal hooks stuck directly into the wall. “The ones you want are here.” Her fingers brush the metal charm on the far end. It’s identical to my tattoo. “But, if you’re interested in any other sort of protection or influence, maybe you should have a glance at the others. There’re cards with a description of each charm.”
I spot them on the table below. “Thanks,” I say.
