“Oh come on, guys, she’s just joking,” Jillian said. “Go ahead, Alyson. Tell us the rules. We’ll play along, for now.”
“First I need to speak with Marie. To do so, we must sit seven inside a circle, linking hands.” Alyson moved from the shadows to a chair at a large round table sitting in the room. She waved her guests over.
Jillian looked around at her friends. “We came all this way. The least we can do is help with the séance. It might even be fun.”
They stood around shuffling their feet, not wanting to look as creeped out as they felt. Marty breathed deeply and took Jillian’s hand. “Sure, let’s do it,” he said.
The six guests sat nervously around the table holding hands and waiting for Alyson to speak. Her eyes reflected the redness of the tablecloth and took on a strange, inhuman glow in the candlelight. Jillian felt Veronica’s hand shaking and gripped it tighter in her own.
“We'll begin by calling Marie back to us,” Alyson said. “If she wants to return, one of us must go to the spirit world to bring her back.”
“Which one?” asked Marty.
“The spirits will decide. Not everyone can enter their realm. The living must be invited.”
Veronica leaned over to whisper in Jillian’s ear. “You’re the most popular girl in school. I bet they chose you.”
Jillian giggled and kicked her under the table. “Shhh. We’re supposed to concentrate or something.”
Alyson had her eyes closed and began to chant, “Marie, come forth from the darkness. Come to us.” She repeated this several times. Jillian decided to get in the spirit of the occasion and repeated it with her. Soon all seven of the teenagers were chanting for the spirit of Marie to join them.
A cold draft blew through the room, carrying the smell of burnt incense from a side table. Jillian shivered and glanced at the shut window. A flash of wispy white appeared and disappeared before she could process what she'd seen. Was her mind playing tricks on her? There was nothing but darkness outside now. What had she seen? Everyone at the table appeared to be in some sort of trance as they continued to chant for Marie. Everyone except for her.
Marty and Veronica gripped her hands tight, leaving them clammy and damp. She felt restless inside her own body and yearned for release. And then, to her surprise, she was released and floating above the table. A pleasant sensation of freedom overtook her. Warily she looked down to see the bodies below her, seven of them, to include her own. Shock hit her and she tumbled back to her own body, feeling once again the sweaty palms of her friends and the hardness of the chair.
The room was silent now, except for Jillian’s breathing. Her friend’s heads were lowered and their eyes were closed. Jillian felt a strong desire to once again float free of her body; a desire which overtook her common sense and, without thought to the consequences, she concentrated on the earlier chant and called out to the dead spirit of Marie.
The release happened once again and she floated above her own body. This time she was ready for the experience. But she was nowhere near ready for what happened next. Alyson rose to her feet while the others dropped their heads on the table sleeping, or dead, she couldn't be sure which. “You,” Alyson said in the deep voice of a male. She pointed above the table to Jillian. “You are the one to cross over.”
Jillian struggled to find a way back to her body but there was a force blocking the way. The window opened and spirits called out to her from outside the room to join them in the realm of the dead. This was a trick. Whatever Alyson's game was, she had cheated. Jillian cowered in a corner of the ceiling, feeling the power of the other side pulling at her flimsy being. She felt trapped and panicked, as a moth against a window pane.
A lonely spirit appeared, hovering above the table. The shimmery appearance quieted Jillian's heart and the pull from outside lessened. She recognized the translucent form of Alyson’s dead sister. The ghostly being reached a hand towards her. The innocent gesture brought a heart-wrenching grief to Jillian and she felt an unexpected urge to comfort the dead girl. To wrap her arms around death and join with it. Jillian moved towards the ghost.
A faint warning whispered in her ear, telling her that to embrace death would mean her own existance would cease to be. In that moment, Jillian knew she wanted to live. Her life flashed before her eyes; the life of her future, not of her past. She would never trade her life for that of Marie's.
In the next few seconds, the hard chair pressed into her legs and she felt the sometimes painful but wonderfully familiar weight of her physical body.
