"You’re never supposed to do one of those alone.”
It wasn’t a suggestion or a piece of advice – it was a statement of truth, a hard fact. As I pulled out the dusty Ouija board from the back of my mother’s closet, I pushed her warning to the back of my mind and decided to throw caution to the wind. At eighteen, I was never really the type to heed my mother’s wisdom anyway. What did she know about spirits and Ouija boards, anyway?
I’d attempted to contact my grandmother before – multiple times, in fact. Her death had left painful scars in the hearts of my family, and though I’d never been close to her, I unabashedly refused to hide my morbid curiosity surrounding the ways in which people contacted the dead.
The only difference was that this time, I was going to attempt it by myself rather than forcing Annie, my fearful-yet-loyal friend, into pursuing contact with me as had been the case previously.
“Whatever, mom,” I had said to my mother, choosing to experiment with the board on my own rather than placing all of my trust into my well-meaning but ridiculously paranoid mother.
It was dark outside by the time I made it to my room with the board, having had to sneak it past the prying eyes of my grandfather, who had made it a point to heavily discourage me from any and all attempts to contact “the Other Side”. Though I disregarded his warnings in just the same way as I disregarded my mother’s, I’ll admit that his words were more formidable than hers.
The wind outside howled as I sat down on the floor of my bedroom, the cool wood firm against my bare skin. The sound of crickets outside my window were eerily unsettling tonight, though I chalked it up to nothing more than nervousness at the thought of attempting to use the Ouija without Annie or anyone else by my side.
The darkness of my room seemed to swallow me whole, and for a moment, I felt my heart rate quicken as if I had subconsciously detected a malicious presence in my room. The sound of the wind outside, paired with the unease slowly settling in on the room was almost enough to make me reconsider tonight’s task – almost.
I lit a candle in the next to myself, the small white flame dancing in the slight breeze my movements had produced. Aside from its light, the room was completely devoid of any brightness, and though I didn’t want to acknowledge it, I was growing more and more uneasy by the moment.
“Here goes nothing,” I whispered to myself, mostly in an attempt to remind myself that nothing had actually happened yet.
I followed the pattern of steps that I’d repeated so many times in the past. It was muscle memory at this point, placing two fingers on the planchette. The amount of hours I’d spent watching Youtube videos had tricked me into thinking I was a professional at things like this.
I slid my fingers over to the first word.
HELLO
I cleared my throat and took a deep breath, attempting to bury the sudden sense of fear that had unexpectedly wedged itself into my throat. It was too late to go back.
Too late.
I opened my mouth and uttered my grandmother’s name, fighting the tension building up within my muscles.
“Marie Gallagher,” I said slowly, my fingers beginning to shake on the planchette. “If you’re there..” I stopped myself for a moment before continuing. “If you’re there, if you’re able to communicate with me, show me a sign,” I said breathlessly, swallowing with extreme difficulty as I glued my eyes to the planchette.
A few seconds passed. Ten. Fifteen. Twenty.
Try again, a voice in the back of my head urged.
“Marie Gallagher, if you can hear me, send me a sign, say something to let me know you’re here,” I said uncomfortably, and almost immediately after I finished my sentence, I felt a shiver run down my spine. It was becoming colder and colder the longer I sat there, and I was overcome with the mixed feelings of suffocation and heaviness setting onto my shoulders.
I gazed down at the board and froze -- the planchette had moved.
Without my realizing it.
I froze in place and slowly moved my gaze to follow where the planchette had ended up.
GOOD BYE
I choked out a gasp and lurched backwards, kicking the board away from myself in a frenzy. “What the fuck,” I sputtered in confusion, wondering if my imagination had played tricks on me or if I had actually moved the planchette without paying attention to my actions.
“What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck,” I repeated in disbelief, sliding further and further away from the board until I had put five feet between it and myself.
The darkness grew more and more sinister with each passing moment, and I struggled to remain calm while digging my nails into the hardwood floor. In all my attempts at reaching someone on the other side, I had never been successful, and I had never been so flooded with fear, so overwhelmed by the feeling of heaviness that was now threatening to crush me under its weight.
For a split second, I thought I saw movement in the corner of the room, and my eyes darted across the darkness in an attempt to make out any shapes.
This was wrong. This was all wrong.
My breathing slowed as I struggled to calm myself down, my eyes still searching for the flash of movement I had glimpsed seconds ago. It was then that I realized that the candle I had lit in the center of the room to aid me in reading the board had been snuffed out – but not by me. The sound of the wind whipping trees around outside of my room was the only grip on reality as I came to a horrifying realization.
Something was in the room with me. Something I had invited in – without intending to.
A cold sweat broke out on my forehead as I slid further and further away from the Ouija board, short whimpers escaping my mouth as words failed me.
Then, something behind me shifted. There was a cold drift of air that ruffled my hair and I froze in place, my eyes growing wide.
A hand slowly rested on my shoulder.
Its fingers slowly tightened their grip, and the sound of the wind outside of my window abruptly subsided.
For a few agonizing moments, the only sound was the pounding of my heart flooding my eardrums, threatening to deafen me amidst the terror of the situation.
Then, she spoke.
“You should have never done it alone,” Marie whispered in my ear, as she slid her hand across my mouth.
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