Dedication

For Julia, even though she prefers Hamlet

ACT 1

in thunder

1

THE CHARM’S WOUND UP

The Ouija board was Lily’s idea.

Maria warned her not to go through with it, but Lily didn’t listen. She went onto eBay while Maria was at soccer practice and bought the prettiest board she could find. A “genuine antique,” she called it.

Only when she showed it to Maria and Brandon that night she pronounced it “gen-you-wine,” showing off the Southern drawl everyone teased her for. Soon after that they opened the bottle of cheap white wine left over from Delilah’s eighteenth birthday party, and every five minutes either Brandon or Maria would utter the words “gen-you-wine an-TEEK!” and collapse into giggles.

Lily pretended to take offense the first few times, but by her last Styrofoam cup of Chardonnay Lily was adding an extra I to every word she said. “Sit” became “See-it.” “Drink” was “dree-enk.” When she started calling Maria “Mariah,” like Mariah Carey, Brandon confiscated her cup.

Maria had been worried about Lily all day. She wasn’t normally this loud, or this giggly. And Lily never drank—she didn’t even like to take her painkillers. Normally she sat at the edge of the party sipping seltzer and watching their friends with her hawk eyes to make sure no one spilled anything on their plush dorm-room carpet.

Part of Maria wanted to declare the evening over, escort Lily back to their room, put her in bed, and keep an eye on her for the rest of the night to make sure she didn’t do anything else out of the ordinary.

But Maria couldn’t focus on Lily right now. Not with that Ouija board sitting next to her.

This board was the real deal. Maria could feel it. It wasn’t any of that plastic Milton Bradley crap. This board meant business.

It was after lights-out in the dorm, so the three of them kept their laughter to whispers. Everyone was supposed to be in their rooms tucked into bed by ten p.m. if they didn’t want to get written up by one of the dorm monitors who prowled the halls.

None of the staff ever checked the old dining hall, though. Most of the students never ventured here after dark. There were rumors about the room. Scary stories the younger kids whispered about at sleepovers.

Maria had seen enough to know those kinds of stories were usually bullshit. The truth was a lot scarier than anything little kids could imagine.