Page 43 of Purrfectly Haunted

“He’s often in the old parlour on the first floor,” Lana says, throwing a banana in the blender. “He likes it there because that’s where we allow guests to be raucous and have a drink.”

“In the notes you say he’s nonsensical. What do you mean by that?” I ask.

She grins. “You’ll see. He’s.. a lot.”

James throws an orange peel that has been lying on the table at her. “Oh come on, stop being so cryptic.”

She cackles. “He’s the most harmless of my ghosts.”

“But the most annoying,” mumbles Shirley in her coffee.

“More annoying than a prostitute who can control our bodies and an old man showing us his ball sack and asshole?”

Lana and Shirley nod as one.

“He’s very... talkative,” Shirley says. “He often makes an appearance during parties, and the guests think he’s a visitor, too.”

I like the idea of a simple ghost who will just talk to us instead of trying to set us on fire or drown us.

“Earl Lynch regretted summoning him to the house, but the ghost is as slippery as an eel, and he had a hard time getting him to leave. It’s in his journal. Then old Fergus died not long after anyway, and so the Nobleman is still haunting this place.”

“How did the earl get the ghosts to leave?” I ask, intrigued.

Lana’s finger hovers above the button of the blender, waiting. “Well, something about a complicated ritual. I tried to find it to kick the ghosts out myself, but no luck. The earl’s books have all been lost to time, or probably burned. How have you been doing it, if I may ask? I know it’s probably an ExorSquad secret but...”

I shake my head. After last night, I feel like both women have become my friends, and I don’t see the point of hiding what I can do to them. Everyone in this room will believe me, they have seen the uncanny.

“It’s me,” I blurt out. “I think I’m...” I hesitate. I am what? A medium? That just sounds absurd. “I’m different? I can see all spirits, even the ones other people can’t see.” James is looking at me with a little smile, urging me on. “I’ve been... asking your ghosts to leave, and they do? I think they were prisoners here, and happy to be free, at last.”

Lana stares at me, hand still frozen above the blender.

“Did a ghost spook you last night at the club?” Shirley asks.

I nod, swallowing thickly. The entity who talked to me wasn’t even one of the worst ones. He was just a guy in a club, looking for drugs. Pretty harmless. But I do my best to avoid talking to spirits. What would happen if they realise I can see them? What would happen if some of them decide to stick around? No locked doors can keep ghosts at bay. And after what happened two days ago, when the Warrior entered James’ body, I have reasons to fear the power of the dead.

“Aw, Ewan,” Shirley says, standing up and hugging me.

I let out a shaky breath and hug her back.

At last, Lana turns on her blender, and the noise fills the kitchen. When her green mixture is ready, she pours it into a tall glass and takes a sip, grimacing. “The earl talked about people like you in his journal,” she says at last.

I blink. “He did?”

She nods. “He met a woman with your ability one night. He was jealous of what she could do, his emotions bled all over the pages. He was a nasty man, Fergus Lynch. Where he required difficult rituals and sacrifices to pierce the veil, she could just see it all, at all times. It drove him mad with envy.”

My mood darkens. “He was a fool. There's nothing to be envious of.”

“I believe you,” she says, twirling the thick liquid in her glass. “I was thrilled when I understood they were ghosts in my house, at first. But the fuckers can turn out to be pest, don’t they?”

“They sure can,” says James, reclining in his chair. “The Warrior tried to possess my body the other night. And let me tell you, it wasn’t a pleasant experience.”

I blush, recalling what happened after the possession, when James asked me to share my body heat with him and well... after that, things got a little out of hand.

“That’s quite the talent for a ghost hunter,” Lana says to me. “ExorSquad must be thrilled to have you.”

“They don’t... They don’t know I’m different,” I say. “I wasn’t sure myself, up until this week.”

“I’ll admit, we were wholly unprepared for your ghosts,” James says. “But I’m glad Ewan is on my team.”