Page 290 of Sigils & Spells

He squinted as if doing the math in his head.

I let him take a moment to decide his age and said to Tex, “You are not as old as him, but sure you are not as young as me.”

“Twenty-one, Darlin’. Ask anyone.” Tex offered as he winked.

I wanted to poke his— “Wait, why aren’t your eyes all red and glowing?”

“Gee, Andy. You don’t look a day over nineteen.” He folded his arms and glared at me.

I folded my arms and glared right back and said, “Gee Andy, you voted to murder me, remember? Sorry if I could care less what you think at the moment.”

He threw his arms up and said, “She thinks I’m a monster. Don’t you?”

I shrugged. He didn’t look like a monster. He looked like a sweet, artistic, and lost soul to me.

Finley warned, “Andy.”

That sweet, artistic soul looked every bit like a monster within the blink of my eyes. He moved so damn fast I would have jerked, flinched, something, but I froze like any good deer trapped by headlights as Andy, the piano playing, tuxedo wearing, monster turned into my worst nightmare.Nosferatu. The black and white movie version. I couldn’t even scream. I could, and did, piss myself. I felt that and then I felt nothing at all.

CHAPTER4

I heardthe sheets rustling and opened my eyes. I looked up and at the man sitting on the bed next to me. Finley. He pushed the fallen lock of my hair back and tucked it behind my ear. He had a sweet smile on his handsome face and I failed to keep my own lips from curling up in response.

Finley said, “Andy’s a bit sensitive.”

“Noted.” I pushed up to a sitting position and looked down at myself. I was clean and in a t-shirt and underwear. “How did–”

“I took care of you.” He tilted his head. “I’ll always take care of you. If you let me.”

“What about the others?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Despite how it looks, we do want this.” He pointed between us. “This connection to…reality, I suppose. I’m not sure what she did to us, just that it affects us the same in some ways and differently in others.”

I nodded. “I’ve always had…imaginary friends, so this isn’t strange to me. The fact that you are grown men; however, and that one of you wants to kill me is…new.”

He chuckled. “Well, Andy wants her back. Tex and I.” He shook his head. “We want you.”

His eyes turned red and his features harsh as he spoke beyond my shoulder and said, “You are not welcome here!”

I could feel her presence in the room. I needed to do something about that because the mild-mannered, handsome man that was being gentle with me a moment before was taking on that same monster-like feature that Andy had.

I got up and ran out of the room. I had one thing that I picked up on impulse today, sage. I noticed it and my gut had clenched. It was more than I wanted to spend, but I had read many books and watched a variety of videos on how to smudge as a means of clearing a space of unwanted energy.

I accidentally set one of the apartments I had lived in on fire once trying to cleanse the place of unwanted energy. Turns out, that doesn’t work for the living the same as it does for the dead. Well, sort of. We did have to move after that, but ultimately, once Carmella had another man and another place to stay, I was with her again.

I gathered the sage and a glass bowl. I crumbled the sage leaves into the bowl and as I did, I pulled one thing into my mind. I set my intention to remove the female spirit from that room, from my house. I lit the sage and acknowledged I only had my hands so I moved my hands over the smoke and once those were cleansed, so to speak, I pulled the smoke toward me, going through the rituals the best I could remember them from the texts I had read.

I stood and beginning in that kitchen space, I used my hand to fan the smoke and spoke my gratitude as well as my request to remove the female energy from my home.

By the time I got to the bedroom, the bowl was hot, burning my palm, and the sage was almost gone. I could not see Finley, but I trusted my intentions not to harm him. I had not gone to the basement as my goal was to get to this room since that was where I seemed to find her. In my bedroom.

Once the sage was burned completely and I had no more smoke to spread, I put the bowl on the sink counter and looked at my hand. “Shit.”

I ran my red and swollen hand under the cool water from the sink. It should have burned a lot worse and sooner, but it was as if this house no longer wanted that woman in it either. As if someone or something was also carrying this bowl with me. Only, there was no sign of Finley or Tex for the rest of the evening, the next day, or even week.

At the end of the week, I finally carried a load of laundry to the basement. A space I had been dreading since arrival. I turned on the lights, but it was still dark, shadowed. I was afraid to smudge this space since the last smudging left me feeling alone.

The washing machine sounds filled the air and I placed the basket on the dryer next to it.

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