She wanted Riley to see her, too, to have some other human being know she wasn’t nuts, she wasn’t losing her shit completely, as Nate had said.

She just didn’t want to hear her voice. No, she didn’t ever want to hear that sound again.

“Please, Hattie,” Helen said. “Let us know you’re here.”

Prove I’m not crazy.

Prove I didn’t imagine you.

Come back.

The planchette twitched to life under her fingers.

Helen had found a section in one of the library books—Communicating with the Spirit World—about Ouija boards. The book warned to be very careful—that using a board was like opening a door and you could never be sure what might come through.

“Be clear of your intentions,” the book had said.

But what were her intentions?

To make contact. To learn about Hattie. About this place. It was more than intentions: it was a need, a compulsion that she felt pulling her along, begging her to work harder, to find out all she could by whatever means necessary, even if it meant talking to ghosts with a Ouija board.

“Is that you?” Helen asked Riley as the plastic zigzagged around the board. “Are you moving it?”

“No,” Riley whispered. She was studying the little clear window on the planchette, noting which letters it rested on for a moment before swooping off to the next.

“B-C-A-W…,” Riley read out. The planchette slid almost off the corner of the board closest to Riley, Helen having to stretch to keep her right hand on it. The temperature in the room seemed to drop. The planchette looped back to the alphabet and continued to spell. Now Riley and Helen read in unison.

“O…F…U.” The planchette sketched out a final large circle and then settled on the image of the moon in the upper right corner and was still. There was a damp, rotten smell in the air that clung to the back of Helen’s throat.

“That doesn’t spell anything,” Helen whispered.

Riley repeated the letters again, trying to pick words out. “B caws…of u,” she said. “Holy shit, Helen, she means ‘because of you’!”

This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be real, could it?

The damp rotten smell intensified.

“Be wary when using a spirit board,” the library book had warned. “Remember that spirits, like the living, can easily lead you astray.”

Riley spoke again.

“Because of who, Hattie? Because of Helen?”

The planchette slid swiftly left, stopping at the word Yes.

“What’s because of Helen?” Riley asked.

The planchette moved quickly now and they read the letters together: C-O-M-B-A-K.

“ ‘Come back,’ ” Helen said quietly. Her mouth was bone-dry and her voice sounded creaky to herself. “You came back because of me?”

Yes.