There was something magical about going back to a place I hadn’t stepped foot in since childhood. Those early memories felt hazy, like a feverish dream, an entirely different world than what I’d gotten used to in Oceanside. Smoking joints and drinking Modelo on the beach had been my teen years, but when I was little? My world was those deep green forests that seemed to go on forever, full of fairies and unicorns, my little kid brain bursting with so much imagination that my dad thought I’d never manage to settle down and just exist in the real world.
He wasn’t wrong. The real world was boring and involved office jobs, stiff collared blouses, and way too many uncomfortable shoes. It also involved getting to retire to Spain — hence why I was driving back to my childhood home, while my parents finished the process of selling their house in Southern California to retire luxuriously on the Spanish coast.
I could have gone with them, sure. But choosing to stay and finish my last year at university was responsible and very adult, as my dad would say, which I needed to start acting like considering I was on the verge of no longer being a college student.
It was a long drive up north. My butt was sore, my back hurt, and my chubby kitty, Cheesecake, was absolutely livid to be back in the car for the second day in a row. Not even the fries I kept tossing him from my fast food bag were keeping him placated any longer. I drove through a world awash in wet grays and soaked dark greens until, finally, I passed the Welcome sign for the town of Abelaum, population 6,223 — or 6,224 now, thanks to me. The downpour became a drizzle, and the watercolor world deepened its tones until the forest took shape: tall pines surrounded by a thick undergrowth of ferns and saplings, with mushroom caps sprouting pale and ghostly among their roots.
I should have stayed at the house to unpack. Instead, after hurriedly hauling my boxes into the living room and making sure Cheesecake got his food and water, I got back into my car and made the short drive into town, to Main Street. Right in the corner shop of a three-story brick building, I met my best friend of nearly fifteen years, Inaya, in Golden Hour Books.
Her Golden Hour Books. My best friend had made her dream a reality and was the proud owner of the cutest damn bookstore I’d ever seen.
“Almost finished,” she said, her fingers flying over her laptop keys. Her hands were adorned with delicate gold rings that shone brightly against her deep brown skin, the rings bejeweled with little bees and flowers that matched the cute floral patches stitched on her pink jacket. She was the brightest ray of sunshine I’d seen since passing San Francisco, and I felt warmer just being in her presence.
“No rush, girl, take your time.” We’d originally agreed to meet later that night, but I’d been too impatient to see her and too eager to shirk off the tedious task of unpacking my entire life from cardboard boxes to wait. I felt guilty now that I’d popped in on her when she was in the middle of cataloguing such a large new shipment of books.
I picked up one of the stacks she’d finished inputting and balanced them carefully against my chest. “Should I take these to the back?”
“That stack is as big as you!” She laughed. “You don’t have to do anything.”
I couldn’t exactly see her around the book stack, and my glasses had slipped down my nose. But I insisted. “To the back?”
“Yeah, there’s a yellow cart back there,” she said. “Thank you!”
Unfortunately, gravity and I had always had a strained relationship — pretty toxic, actually. Between my untied boot laces, slipping glasses, and too-large book stack, I tripped over my own feet halfway to the back and sent the books flying.
“Everything is fine!” I called as Inaya loudly burst out laughing. I scrambled on my hands and knees to collect the books — until my fingers brushed over the cracking leather-bound cover of a thin volume and I jerked back in shock. The book was cold.
I turned it over curiously. The lettering and filigree design on the front looked as if it had been burned into the leather, and the words were foreign to me: Latin, if I had to guess. I pulled out my phone and typed in the search engine for a translation.
It was Latin, and it read: Magical Work and Conjuring.
“Find something good?” Inaya’s voice made me jump. There was a sound in my ears like the distant roar of waves through a long tunnel, and my stomach felt hollow, like the sensation of falling.
“Yeah, check this out. This one looks really old.” I handed the book over to her, and there was a jolt as it left my fingers: a tiny rush of fear that made me want to snatch it back. Inaya opened it, frowning.
“Wow.” Her eyes went wide as her fingers moved reverently over the page. “This isn’t a printed book. This is handwritten.”
I got to my feet and leaned against her shoulder so I could see. She’d opened the book to the center. On one page was a sketch of a bizarre mutated zombie dog, ragged and skeletal. The other page was covered in rows of neat Latin text. It reminded me of an explorer’s journal, like something Charles Darwin would have carried around as he explored the Galápagos — if the Galápagos had been filled with monsters and magic.
“I think it’s a grimoire,” I said softly. She glanced at me in confusion, so I explained. “A book of spells and rituals, like the Key of Solomon. An original like this is rare. Really, really rare.”
Inaya shook her head as she shut the book carefully, a wry grin on her face. “Sounds like it’ll be right at home with you then. Do you want it?”
“Inaya, that thing has to be priceless! I have to pay you something —”
She ignored me as she carried the book toward the front counter. “Consider it part of your bridesmaid’s gift,” she said. Moving with the utmost care, she pulled out a roll of brown paper from beneath the counter and wrapped the book, finishing it with a bit of tape and a bow of twine. “All these books were donations from the Abelaum Historical Society, so don’t worry about money. These volumes had just been sitting in storage.” She held it out to me and I took it delicately into my hands, as if she’d gifted me a holy relic. “A creepy book for my favorite creepy girl. Now, I think we could both use a break. What do you say to some coffee?”
“She just dumped you? The week before you move and she’s just like, peace out, good luck, bye?” Inaya shook her head, pink nails tapped irritably on her coffee mug. “You have a really bad habit of dating assholes, Rae.”
I nodded with a heavy sigh. The sting of Rachel dumping me because I’d chosen to move out of state was still potent, needling into my side like a thorn. I hadn’t exactly thought we’d be together forever, but our shared interest in the paranormal and urban exploration had managed to gloss over our deeper issues for the six months we’d dated.
Inaya added quickly, “I love the post-breakup haircut though! So mod. Very 60s. It suits you.”
I brushed a hand over my hair, smiling widely at the compliment. It was a lot shorter and darker than the last time she’d seen me — I’d dyed my naturally reddish brown hair black and cut it into a blunt bob the same night Rachel broke it off. It felt good. Fresh. A clean slate.
“I feel like I can call myself a Library Goth now,” I joked, pushing my black-rimmed glasses a little further up my nose. Inaya raised an eyebrow skeptically. “Nerd Goth, maybe?”
“You’re still my Ghost Girl Goth, honey, no matter what you do with your hair,” she said with a giggle, and we sat in silence for a few moments as we sipped our coffees. The shop we sat in, La Petite Baie, was just next door to Golden Hour Books. The decor was a pleasantly eclectic mix of local artists’ work, odd bronze sculptures, and a variety of cushy chairs and upcycled tables. Inaya and I had taken two seats by the window, where we could look out and see the forest pressing close against the opposite side of the street.
“How are you liking being back in the cabin?” Inaya said, taking a sip of her latte. “Have you seen your old ghost yet? What did we used to call him?” She thought for a moment. “Oh yeah, the Nighttime Cowboy!”
I smiled at the nickname we’d given to my childhood ghost. I hadn’t thought of it in years. “I haven’t seen him yet, but we’ll see how the first night goes.” I tapped my chin thoughtfully. “Maybe I’ll set up a few thermal cameras, and see if I can finally get a full-body apparition recorded.”
“How’s that going, by the way? The ghost vlog?”
I giggled at Inaya’s apt description of my “ghost vlog,” even though the question made me wince internally. “Oh, you know. The channel is growing.”
“You caught anything big lately? Apparitions, or…”
“Caught some disembodied voices. Orbs.”
“Oh. That’s cool.”
That’s cool. Yeah, that underwhelmed response was exactly what was going to happen with my vlog audience soon too. The internet just wasn’t the place for genuine paranormal investigations; not when all the other “paranormal” channels were pretending to summon The Midnight Man and using special effects and mediocre acting to draw in an audience looking for instant gratification. In comparison, my lengthy recordings and vague electronic voice phenomena captures were boring.
I needed something big. Something shocking.
I needed something real.
But spirits operated on their own time, not mine, and continually coming away from my investigations of “haunted” locales with nothing to show for it was frustrating. The time and effort I’d been dumping into my passion would soon have to go toward finding myself a “real” job. Ad revenue from the channel wasn’t going to bring in enough to keep me going on my own, not once my parents sold the cabin they’d given me a year to stay in while I finished school.
“I’m sure you’ll be able to find some good places to record up here,” Inaya said, snapping me from my mental pit of despair. “All the legends in this town…girl, it must be a treasure trove for you.”
I nodded. Growing up in Abelaum was like getting raised surrounded by ghosts; not real ones, necessarily, but ghosts of the past. Once one of the most lucrative mining towns of the Pacific Northwest, boarded-up mining shafts could still be found throughout Abelaum’s surrounding forests. Dozens of its original buildings were still standing, carefully restored and maintained by a passionately dedicated local historical society.
There was a lot of history to be found here, and with history, came tragedy.
“Oh shit, have you seen Mrs. Kathy yet? She still lives just down the street from your place,” Inaya said. “Remember how angry your dad was when she told us about the whole tragedy of ‘99 thing?”
“Girl, that story got me addicted to horror, of course I remember! Honestly though, who goes and tells a story like that to their first-grade class?” I put on my best imitation of our former teacher, making my voice high-pitched as I wagged my finger at an imaginary room full of kids. “Oh, children! Do you want to hear about the miners who were trapped in the flooded mine and ate each other to survive? If cannibalism doesn’t give you brats nightmares, what if I tell you about the monster who lives down there too?”
“The old God.” Inaya air-quoted with her fingers, shaking her head. “She believed it though. Mrs. Kathy was batty.”
“She did not…”
“Uh, yeah, she did. Don’t you remember all those fishbones and silver spoons she hung around her house? She told my mom it kept away the evil eye or some shit.” Inaya shrugged, finishing off the last of her latte. “I love this town, but people can get really weird when they live out in the woods for too long. Mrs. Kathy wasn’t the only person who believed those old legends.”
“Speaking of legends…” I tapped my fingers on my cup, trying to look innocent. “Is that old church still up there? Near the shaft that they pulled the last three miners out of?”
“St. Thaddeus? I think so.” Inaya frowned. “I doubt Mr. Hadleigh would let them demolish it. He’s really protective of those historical sites.” Seeing my look of confusion, she said, “Kent Hadleigh is the head of the Historical Society. Super nice, super wealthy. I’m in some of the same classes as his daughter, Victoria. I’ll introduce you on Monday.”
I mouthed an “oh” at her explanation, my brain still focused on the fantastic potential of a hundred-year-old abandoned church with a tragic backstory. She didn’t miss it and narrowed her eyes.
“It’s condemned, by the way,” she deadpanned. “The church is condemned. Like, not safe to go inside.”
“Oh, sure, sure.” I nodded quickly. “Old, probably haunted, abandoned church? Wouldn’t even think of going inside it.”
Inaya sighed. “You’re crazy, girl. You’re gonna get yourself into real trouble one of these days.”
I laid my hand over my heart in mock offense. “Me? Get into trouble? Never.”
