“Did you see him?” Marcia’s glassy eyes still brim with dull wonder. She’s so far gone, I wonder if she even knows who she’s talking to. “Did you see my son?”
“Yes.” I wipe the last fleck of vomit from the corner of her lips and comb her hair out of her face, but she doesn’t notice. She stares at the ceiling, not seeing it, enraptured. Adriano’s pink and black graffiti loops across the walls.
Everybody has chores in this house. My responsibility right now is to tuck Marcia into bed. Her sleeping bag comes up to her chest, her fingers gripping the nylon lip. But she’s not here. Her eyes drift toward some far-off point beyond the roof, in the sky, as far as outer space for all I know. “I…I held him…in my arms. He was here…in my hands. I felt him.”
I leave her like that, lost in the cosmos with her ghosts. “Sean,” I hear her say from over my shoulder as I step out of the bedroom. “I’m here…I’m here, baby…Stay with me…”
Stephanie is on door detail. I hear her ask You wanna get haunted? every time someone knocks to pick up their Ghost to-go. If business keeps growing at this pace, we’re going to need a drive-through window.
Adriano is spray-painting the living room. The click-clack of his aerosol can echoes through the room like a pinball. This symbol looks like a spiraling sun.
Someone found a ratty couch and dragged it in. Tobias is sprawled across its tattered red velvet cushions, his legs slung over the armrest like a king lazing on his throne. He looks almost skeletal, his eyes hollow and his flesh gray. So pale—and the poor guy can’t even grow a full beard.
Melissa’s on the floor at his feet, head pressed against the armrest, drifting. It’s impossible to get Tobias alone these days. He’s scheduling séances by the hour now. We all have to clear the living room whenever there’s a session, unless we’re invited to participate.
“Marcia’s all settled,” I say. “You got a minute?”
“For you? Always.”
“Is there anywhere we can be alone?”
“Now you want to be alone with me.” It’s not a question. He isn’t asking. The little dig is in his voice. “Whatever you want to say, just say it. We’re all friends here.”
I point to his chest. “You’re bleeding.”
“Huh? Oh…” Tobias glances down at himself and notices the blood. He absentmindedly frowns but doesn’t do anything, content to keep on bleeding through his shirt.
A perfect circle of blood with three wavy lines.
“I’m worried about you, Toby…Don’t you think this is all getting a little out of hand?”
“Seems like everything’s coming together.”
“But…what’s the plan?” Even I know I’m parroting all the parental conversations I’ve ever had with my own family, mimicking their authority.
“You mean, like, my five-year plan? What’re my goals for the future?” There’s nothing he needs from me. Not anymore. “I’m a conduit, that’s all…I’m just opening doors for others.”
“So you’re just going to keep playing haunted house out here forever? Is that it?”
“Why not?”
“What if the cops show? Shut this all down?”
“There are plenty of empty houses where this came from.”
“Toby, I’m serious.” I’m trying hard to keep my frustration out of this. “How long do you think you can keep this up? Honestly?”
“As long as supplies last.” He scratches his stubbly neck, fingernails raking over dry skin. “Don’t worry. You’ve always got an open invite. Whenever you want to get haunted, just ask.”
“This can’t last.”
“Says who?” He’s taking pity on me. Poor you, he’s thinking, you just don’t see it yet. “I’ve found my calling, Erin. And look who’s answering! It’s amazing, don’t you think? Ghost is starting to spread all on its own now. Marcia is proof of that. Soon there will be more.”
“Aren’t you worried about what you don’t know? What the long-term side effects will be? What if it gives you cancer or brain damage or destroys your liver? What if we can never walk down the street again without seeing every last phantom that doesn’t have a house to haunt? I don’t want to be stuck inside this house for the rest of my life.”
Tobias looks at me with a withering smile. “You’ve read the Bible, right? Jesus and the final supper? Eat, for this is my body? What if—hear me out—what if the body of Christ wasn’t what we’ve always believed it to be? What if his disciples ate something else?”
“You mean a mushroom?” I say it to shoot him down, to illustrate how absurd Tobias sounds right now. If only Amara were here.
“Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood,” he recites, “you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.”
So Tobias is quoting scripture now. This is new.
“How can that not be a mushroom? I mean, what even is manna from heaven?” He sits up, excited now. The abrupt movement sends Melissa’s head skidding down the armrest. She hardly reacts. She’s haunted right now, her mind off and wandering the halls with her ghost, whoever it is.
This isn’t how I expected our conversation to go. Tobias is pushing into uncharted territory, and I have absolutely no idea how to drag him back. This goes way beyond Silas.
“Tobias.” I soften my tone, hoping to break through to him. “I want to help.”
“That’s great. I can use your help around the house.”
“No—I mean help you. You need help. This is getting way too big too fast.”
“Why?”
“Because…” Because this is crazy. There’s no way this can last. It could kill you, just like it killed Silas. But I don’t say any of these things. I just stand there, wordless, trying to fight my way through the fog in my brain because I haven’t dosed on Ghost in…
In…
How long has it been since my last cap? I can feel the tremors in my hands, withdrawal rattling my bones like somebody shaking a prescription bottle.
“Come with me.” Tobias springs up from the couch with a sudden surge of energy. Melissa doesn’t move.
I follow Tobias through the hall. He’s drifting on a current of electricity that I can’t quite match. “We need to find a job for you,” he says. “We just have to figure out what’s best.”
“I’m not doing chores, Tobias. I’m not your fucking house cleaner.”
Tobias stops abruptly and points down the hall to the front door. “Then just go, Erin. I’m not keeping you here. You’re free to go whenever you want. So go.”
He’s stalemating me. Making me choose. Get haunted or get gone. I can feel the need brewing within my body, the downright ache of it all. I can’t leave the house.
I want to get haunted.
My silence admits defeat. Once Tobias realizes he’s won, he says, “There’s something I want to show you. Something special. I’m trusting you with this, okay?”
“What is it?” I can’t stop myself from feeling the sudden surge of curiosity, no matter how much I try to resist it. Resist him.
Tobias heads for the kitchen. He’s talking to me but he might as well be talking to himself. “We tried baking the mushroom in chocolate, but that just diluted the dose. Tea wasn’t strong enough, either. The gelcaps were my idea.” I can hear the pride in his voice. I don’t like it.
The kitchen is far more cluttered than I remember. Tobias has set up a slipshod bake-sale operation. There’s a padlock on the upper cabinets. The basement door, too. Rows of cookie sheets line the entire counter. Spread out evenly across each metal tray are dozens of mushrooms, stems shriveled and curled into little question marks.
“You got yourself a real Martha Stewart vibe going on.” It’s meant to be a joke, but it’s true. This feels like a cooking demo. All Tobias is missing is a camera crew.