Melissa sauntered over, Lucy growling at us and shaking from her arms.

Jess scowled at the dog. “Your dog needs a Xanax,” she said.

Melissa patted Lucy fondly, and she responded by nuzzling her head against Melissa’s chest. “No more than any of us. She’s just honest about it.”

“What’s that?” I pointed to a small cardboard box under Jess’s armpit.

Jess shifted the leash and held the box out. Melissa shrank back quickly and inhaled, pulling Lucy closer to her, who responded with a squeak.

“Isn’t it badass?” Jess said with a smile.

“Where did you get that?” Melissa said, taking another step back. In the darkness of the neighborhood, I could see her eyes were wide as her hands clutched her neurotic dog.

It was a Ouija board, with a picture of two hands on a triangular planchette and a board with numbers and letters.

“They sell these things everywhere. Del gave me the idea. He was kidding, but I thought it would be worth a try,” Jess said. “They’re used to communicate with supernatural things, and maybe we can ask it if there’s something, you know, nefarious hanging around Liz.”

I leaned forward and peered at the board. The picture looked innocuous enough.

“Well, it’s worth a shot, I suppose,” I said.

“Great!” Jess said. She sidestepped onto my front lawn and plopped down, crossing her legs as Duffy settled in next to her. She started to open the box.

“What? Now? I thought we could, like, schedule it,” I said as a pit of nerves began to rise into my throat from my stomach.

“No, thanks. That is not something to mess with. I was taught that Ouija boards were a direct line to Satan himself. And that’s one thing that I agree with my parents about,” Melissa said. Her hand stroked Lucy’s head over and over again like a worry stone, white hair flying all around her. “I won’t do it.”

“Buzzkill. What if it works?” Jess said. She flopped back on the lawn, arms spread out wide.

“You guys, that”—she glanced at the board and shielded Lucy with both hands—“is dangerous. Y’all know most of what my parents taught me to fear was harmless, like birth control, or Halloween costumes, or weed. But the Ouija board was the one lesson that I think we should all listen to.”

Melissa reached down and picked up the Ouija box with two fingers and tossed it across the lawn. It lightly bounced and spilled open, the planchette with its legs in the air like an animal playing dead.

Jess jolted up and reached for it. She started to unfold the board. “Well, I’m not scared.”

“I’m leaving,” Melissa said, and turned on her heel, beginning to walk back home.