“So who are you trying to contact?” Tianna pushed her hair back.
Hanna turned and smiled at her, eyes misting. “Skinanbone.”
“Skinanbone?” Tianna asked.
“My Chihuahua, may he rest in peace.” Hanna reverentially placed a tiny black dog collar with silver studs on the table near the Ouija board. A small gold heart and dog license tags were attached to a metal clasp near the buckle.
Then Hanna and Sylvia each took a book of matches and started lighting the candles. Wicks sparked and wisps of smoke made serpentine patterns in the air. The flames bent sideways each time they caught the breeze from the fan.
Trudy sadly pointed to a picture on the piano of a Chihuahua wearing a red sweater. “That’s Skinanbone.”
“What happened to him?” Tianna asked as Hanna turned off the lights.
Sylvia pulled out her chair and sat down. “Another dog just grabbed him up and stole him away.”
“That’s horrible,” Tianna said.
Trudy pointed to a corner of the room and whispered, “Hanna still hasn’t been able to clear out his things.”
A red pillow sat next to a comfortable chair. Dog toys were piled high in a basket.
“That’s where Skinanbone slept while I watched TV,” Hanna added as she joined them.
Sylvia nodded. “They always watched the nightly news together. They both loved weather.”
“Shall we hold hands and begin?” Hanna had a solemn look. “We do the séance first,” she explained to Tianna, “and try to call up his spirit. Then we use the Ouija board and see if he has anything to communicate.”
Tianna nodded and Hanna clasped her hand tightly, then Sylvia grasped her other hand and their circle was complete.
There was a moment of silence. Tianna wasn’t sure what to do.
Hanna looked up, took a deep breath, then closed her eyes and whistled, loud and long. “Here, Skinanbone,” she called. “Here, boy, come home to Mommy.”
Tianna bit her lower lip and glanced around the table. Sylvia’s eyes were closed and her head was back, lifted toward the ceiling in total concentration, and Trudy gazed upward with a hopeful expression.
“Say something, Trudy,” Hanna urged. “He was always close to you.”
“Come here, Skinanbone.” Trudy spoke dramatically. “Your mommy’s been crying for you.”
Tianna could sense how much the women missed Skinanbone. Maybe she could make them feel as if they had contacted him. It would be her thank-you for such a tasty and generous dinner. That was the least she could do.
She concentrated on the dog collar until it lifted into the air to where she imagined Skinanbone’s neck might be if he were standing on the table. Then she jiggled it from side to side as though the dog were shaking his head.
Hanna’s eyes burst open. “Skinanbone!”
“Is it really him?” Sylvia asked, and opened her eyes. “Oh, my.”
“What?” Trudy looked from one woman to the other.
“Look,” Hanna shouted.
Tianna wiggled the dog collar again.
“He’s back,” Trudy declared. “Praise be.”
“We miss you, you sweet little puppy,” Hanna said in a babyish voice. “How is doggie heaven?”
Tianna concentrated again. This was harder to do, but finally she made the dog collar fly from the table in a natural arc as if Skinanbone had leapt from it. Then she moved the collar over to the doggie bed in the corner and used her power to press into the red pillow below the collar to make it look as if tiny paws were walking over it.
“Hanna, look!” Trudy motioned with her head.
“What?” Hanna asked.
“His box!” Sylvia shouted. “Look at his box!”
Tianna focused, trying to make the tiny paw prints circle the way dogs do before they settle for a nap.
“He always made me dizzy when he did that,” Trudy said in a wistful voice, then she sighed. “He was such a sweetie.”
Tianna slipped deeper and deeper into herself as she concentrated more. She made the collar rush to the box of dog toys, then tried to make it appear as if a very small dog ghost had bitten into a ball and was dashing away with it.
The women squealed.
“He wants to play,” Hanna exclaimed happily.
Suddenly the voices of the women became fainter, then Tianna’s vision blurred and the room seemed to shift as though she were hovering over it and far away. Reality wrinkled, and it was as if Tianna were looking at everything through pebbled glass.
She blinked and shook her head, but that didn’t make things move back the way they had been before. She could no longer hear Hanna, Sylvia, or Trudy. There was only a rushing sound like wind or water.
At last the glass rippled and broke apart, and she was alone in a cold and murky place. It was like being in the middle of nowhere, but something about it was familiar, as if she had seen it before. She felt on the verge of recalling some important memory.
Then the air around her stirred and a white cloud formed from churning mists and came toward her. A girl about her age floated in the delicate vapor. She sensed something good about her and thought perhaps she was some kind of guardian angel, one that had no wings.
The girl looked at Tianna with frightened eyes, but the fear only made her beauty more divine. Tianna wondered if she had known her once in this life before something tragic had happened and she had passed on to the other side.
“Go,” the girl mouthed, and waved her hands as if warning Tianna away.
She looked behind her. Where could she go? Nothingness surrounded her. She wondered if she had broken into heaven, but then behind the girl a black-night shadow formed. Crimson waves shimmered from the dark form, and Tianna knew it was more likely she had fallen into hell. There was something unholy about the dusky shape, and the cold emanating from it. She began to shiver.
The black vapor twirled, then swept toward her. The girl tried to stop it, but the demon shadow twisted around her and shot at Tianna with a speed that made the air vibrate.
Tianna shrieked and screamed again, knowing it had her.
Then she felt warm hands touching her cheeks. She shook her head, and suddenly she was back in Hanna’s living room and everyone was staring at her.
Sylvia held her arm and Hanna patted her face.
“Don’t be scared,” Hanna said, “Skinanbone was a loving little pup.” There were tears in her eyes. “He would never, ever hurt you. I promise, dear.”
“You’d love him if you ever met him in real life,” Trudy added.
But Sylvia continued to stare at her oddly. “Tianna has some kind of special power,” Sylvia remarked.
“What do you mean?” Tianna asked in a shaky voice.
“We’ve never been able to make contact with Skinanbone before,” Sylvia said. “But tonight we could because you’re here.”
“And what happened, dear?” Hanna asked. “You were in a trance or something. We had a hard time waking you.”
“Mediums always do that,” Trudy said. “You know that, Hanna. They have to go into a trance to call up the dead.”
Tianna’s heart beat rapidly, and she wondered if she had actually made contact with the spirit world. She glanced about her. The shadows in the living room all had a bloodred cast now and a strange texture as if they were solid and warm.
She knocked back her chair and rushed from the room.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
TIANNA CAUTIOUSLY ENTERED her apartment and looked around. A sudden scraping sound startled her. She glanced at the window and thought she saw a face staring back at her, but quickly realized it was only the limb of a tree. The twiggy branches continued to grate across the glass. She shut the door and flicked on the light. Everything seemed normal, but she couldn’t stop the shaking of her hands.
Footsteps in the hallway made her alert. She listened carefully to the voices, but the people didn’t sound as if they were trying not to be heard. She pressed her ear against
the wood anyway. They walked right by. Fear was clouding her thinking and making her too edgy. She tried to convince herself that she would be secure here for the night. At least she hoped she would be, but she wondered if she could ever feel safe anywhere again.
“What am I going to do?” she said aloud, trying to give herself comfort, but the tremor in her voice only made her more afraid.
She considered what had happened in Hanna’s apartment. It felt as if she had lifted some kind of barrier and uncovered another world. She shuddered. The shadow had felt completely evil.
Slowly she took off her boots and wiggled her toes. Maybe that other world was the dimension she belonged in. Could it be that Mason and Justin were only trying to take her home? She shook her head. She didn’t think so.
The bed looked inviting. She needed to lie down and sleep. She felt exhausted, but she was afraid to stay in this tiny, enclosed space. It could too easily become a trap. She stared at the dark shape of the hulking tree pressing against the window. Maybe that was a possibility. She opened the window. The screen was already gone. She looked down. It rested in the lawn under the bluish light of a security lamp. She must have crawled in through this window the night before. She leaned out now and looked up.
It felt safer to sleep on the roof, and she thought she could use the tree to crawl up there. Within minutes she had rolled a pink blanket and the bedspread into a tight ball, then tied them to her backpack, swung both onto her back, crawled out the window onto the branch, and used the tree limbs to climb to the roof.
Her body began to unwind. It felt safer here under the stars. She curled into her blanket and rested her head on her backpack, gazing up at the moon. She noticed that it was on its waning cycle and almost dark. Her heart started beating rapidly. She didn’t understand why the ebbing moon should fill her with such a growing sense of urgency, but it did. She felt that there was something important she was supposed to do, but she couldn’t remember what.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
TIANNA WOKE WITH the gentle feeling of sunshine warming her face and an opulent deep turquoise sky over her head. She stretched and smiled, recalling yesterday. As horrible as the day had been, it was still a sweet pleasure to be able to have some memory of her life before this moment.
The aromas of biscuits and coffee drifted up to her, and she wondered idly what Hanna was fixing for breakfast. She thought about last night. Now, in the daylight with a soft breeze caressing her face, what had happened in Hanna’s apartment seemed unreal. She tried to recall how dead scared she had felt, but the feeling of terror had slipped away in her slumber. Maybe she had fallen asleep at the table after all and only conjured the girl in her dream. She had been in a torpor from such a big meal. She had probably dozed off. Maybe she should try again and see.
She rolled up her blanket, grabbed her backpack, and crawled down the tree. Everything inside the small apartment looked the same. She shut the window behind her and threw her bundle and backpack on the bed. She wanted something to eat, but first on her list was a long, hot shower. She stepped into the small bathroom, turned the spigot, stripped, and climbed under the luxurious spray.
It felt too dangerous to stay in Los Angeles, and fortunately she had enough money to buy a bus ticket, so as soon as she dressed, she was going to leave. She didn’t know why Justin and Mason wanted her so badly, but she didn’t need to stick around and discover the reason.
She turned off the water and stepped out. There were no towels in the bathroom, so she pulled the sheet from the bed and wrapped it tightly around her. She sat in the sunshine cascading into the room and worked a comb through her hair. She thought again about the strange sensation yesterday of going into another dimension. She was more curious than afraid now and wondered if she could make it happen again.
Maybe it was part of her power. She tried to ignore the compulsion to return to that other world and focused instead on untangling her long black hair. It could be risky. Last night Hanna had been there and she had pulled her back somehow, but now she was alone. What would happen if she couldn’t get back to reality?
She flipped the comb aside. Why was she hesitating? It wasn’t like she had anything to lose. She couldn’t recall her family or her friends, and just possibly what had happened to her had something to do with that other place. More than anything she wanted to remember so she could get back home. It was worth a try. Besides, how was she going to learn how to leave that realm unless she went there and came back? She’d only stay for a moment. It had probably been a dream, anyway, so why wait? Find out now.
She stared at the wall. The wind sighed and brushed through the tree branches outside and made spangled sunlight sway back and forth across the apartment in a mesmerizing way. She concentrated and tried to use the same mental energy she had used last night to put the paw prints in Skinanbone’s pillow.
Soon the gray-green paint bubbled. Then the plaster buckled and crumbled away, exposing the laths. The thin boards snapped and a swirl of dust climbed into the air. At last her vision blurred and the world seemed far away, as if she were looking through gritty textured glass. It wavered, then shattered, and Tianna was no longer in the small apartment but back in that other place.
Almost immediately she saw the same girl floating toward her. She didn’t look as frightened as she had the night before, but something still seemed wrong with her.
“How did you get here?” the girl whispered, and looked behind her as if she were scared the shadow cloud might appear again. She seemed weakened and languishing, as if this dreary place was stealing her strength.
“Are you all right?” Tianna asked.
“You shouldn’t be here,” the girl warned her, and Tianna had the impression that something bad was happening to her. Her eyes, so bright the night before, looked joyless now.
“Where am I?” Tianna looked at the gloomy mists roiling around the girl. Were they sucking energy from her?
The girl started to answer, but then the fear crept back in her eyes. “Leave!”
“I’m not sure I know how,” Tianna answered, and realized she had made a foolish mistake. She had never really believed she’d be able to get back here, and now that she was, she didn’t know how to go.
“You can’t stay,” the girl insisted.
“Why not?” Tianna glanced nervously around her, but she didn’t see anything to suggest danger, and she wanted to find out if the girl knew anything about her past. Maybe she held the key that could unlock Tianna’s memories.
The girl seemed panicked now. “Don’t you feel it? It knows you’re here and it’s coming for you.”
“What knows I’m here?” Tianna asked, and at the same moment Tianna felt her body collapse under a heavy weight that filled the air with a pernicious chill.
“Leave!” the girl repeated harshly.
“How?” Tianna rubbed her arms against the cold.
The girl shrugged. “If I knew, I wouldn’t be here.”
“How did you get here?” Tianna asked, and reached for her hand. “Maybe we can escape together.”
The girl jerked her hand back. “It’s too late for me. Just save yourself.”
The air closed in tightly and Tianna started to tremble as dread spread through her. She didn’t see anything, but then she heard a loud whoosh and the shadow funneled into the murkiness.
The dark form hovered briefly, undulating as it grew. Tianna felt awestruck, unable to pull her eyes away. The strange cloud was beautiful in its own evil way, like a fierce approaching storm. Then suddenly it soared at her as if it had a will and a vicious human intent to destroy her.
“Run!” the girl urged. “Go. Don’t let it catch you.”
“Where?” Tianna looked around her. Everywhere appeared exactly the same. It was like being in the middle of the ocean without a sun. She dashed away, wanting to scream, but her mouth felt too dry.
The sheet she had wrapped around her hampered her speed. She had only gotten a little way when hands rea
ched from the shadows and held her tight.
“No!” she screamed, struggling against the warm arms circling her.
Suddenly, it was as if a veil had ripped between the two worlds and she was back in reality. Sunlight glared in her face.
She glanced around, still filled with panic, and was surprised to see that she now stood in front of the apartment building. When she had run from the menacing cloud in that other realm, she must have somehow changed location in this world as well. She was about to start back to the apartment when she realized someone’s arms were still wrapped tightly around her. Her head whipped back to see who held her.
“Derek!” she shouted, and realized suddenly that she only had the sheet covering her.
“You were out here running like crazy,” he explained, and released his hold. “You didn’t hear me when I called your name. I figured something was wrong, so I caught you. What were you running from?”
She felt grateful and embarrassed at the same time. He had pulled her back and saved her from the shadow. She tightened her hold on the sheet, and Derek didn’t bother to take his eyes away.
“I thought I heard a woman scream that someone had taken her purse,” she lied. “So I came outside to help.”
“Like that?” He smirked.
“I sleep in the nude.” It was the first thing that came to mind and it was also the worst thing to say. She rolled her eyes at his silly grin. “Look, in an emergency you don’t have time to put on clothes.”
He snickered. “Get dressed. I’ll give you a ride to school.” He pointed to a blue Ford Escort parked at the curb.
They started walking back to the apartment building. Her knees still felt shaky and twice she cast glances behind her just to make sure the shadow hadn’t left its world and followed her here. She wondered what it was.
Then she stopped suddenly and eyed Derek suspiciously. “How did you know where I live?”
“I asked Michael,” he explained.
“Michael knew?” She felt surprised and elated at the same time.