I’ll make sure he doesn’t sleep tonight either. Waiting for him in the darkness of his bedroom I hear Nakia come in. They argue about something, raising their voices until they ring down the hall. She hasn’t got groceries, she hasn’t gone shopping in a month. She screams that she goes to school all day and he lies around in his tighty whities and smokes weed, and he can buy the groceries. Footsteps storm past, and her door slams shut further down the hall. The water is running in the bathroom. Caleb is getting ready for bed.

            It’s so strange being in his bedroom, standing in front of his unmade bed. Has it really been less than a few weeks ago that I’d slept in this bed beside him? I’d curled next to him under the covers in this very room….my face is turning red. Humiliation and anger are at war inside me as I stare down at the jumble of sheets in front of me. My gut is churning, the cobra is unwinding again.

            Caleb staggers in and flops on the bed. He shuts his eyes and rubs at his temples. For a few seconds he stares at the ceiling and then he shuts his eyes and jams a pillow over his face, as if it will somehow stop me from touching him. I can wait.

            The neon alarm clock numbers hypnotize me. They change so slowly, the minutes crawl by and turn into hours. Time stretches into infinity, ponderous and slow. Sliding past fluidly, unable to touch me. I stand there, my body completely still, insides pulsing with raw hatred. Rage spreading slowly over me like a cancer. My arms tingle, the palms of my hands itch. I long to close my hands around his throat, to tighten my fingers around his wind pipe. I need to. But it isn’t time yet.

            Caleb thrashes, he doesn’t sleep for hours. He keeps the pillow jammed over his face. Finally, when the clock reads 3:15 and outside the bedroom window the sky is turning an unnatural twilight hue, Caleb rolls sideways and the pillow slips off. It falls to one side, landing on the hardwood floor with a soft thump. He doesn’t move.

            Watching him, standing over him like this…it makes me feel strong. It gives me savage satisfaction, warmth that burns in my stomach like embers flaring to life. Feeding the darkness, making it grow. He is not handsome in his sleep. He dreams violently, one leg twitching now and then, his mouth open wide. I reach out and run my finger tip down his left cheek, smiling as my skin makes contact. He snorts in his sleep, jerking his head to the side and I draw back.

Reaching out again I drag my fingers down his neck this time, and Caleb jerks awake with a gasp, his eyes popping open wide and white in the dark. He stays frozen, rubbing at his neck, looking around in the dark. I can see him perfectly, every detail of his face. Three days stubble on his cheeks and chin, hollow, scared eyes ringed with bruises, pale face. Sweat beads on his forehead. He’s mumbling, and for a second I think that maybe he’s praying until I catch the words,

“It was just a dream, just a dream, just a dream.”

I lean forward and brush his cheek again, and he cries out and lurches backwards, thrashing under the covers. He jumps out of bed and the white bed sheets are wrapped around his legs. He staggers and then pitches forward, hitting the hardwood floor with a crash and a groan. Caleb doesn’t stay still for a second, he starts crawling towards the door, mumbling desperately to himself. He’s so pathetic.

I reach down and snatch at the sheet wrapped around his legs, grasping it, feeling the texture of the cotton as I wrap my fingers around it. It feels so good to feel. I yank on the sheet with both hands, and Caleb is pulled backwards, kicking and screaming. He puts his hands out, clawing at the floor, trying to stop himself as I pull him back into the room.

He’s screaming in wordless terror. The skin of his palms and fingertips scrape across the shiny floor boards, making squeaking, rasping sounds. After a second the sheet unravels, releasing his legs. Caleb’s feet finally find traction on the floor and he scrambles up and runs, slamming the door in my face. I sigh in disappointment, shut my eyes and melt through to the other side. For a moment it hits me, fiery pain in my stomach. I double over with a low groan, and I know he hears it.

He’s running down the hall, panting and swearing. After a minute the pain ebbs away, and I follow him slowly, noticing that Nakia’s door is open a crack and there’s a blue eye peering out. She‘s probably wondering what on earth is going on.

Caleb collapses on the couch, shaking all over. His face is as pale as death. After a moment of heavy breathing he reaches for his cell phone on the coffee table and punches a number into the key pad violently. His hands won’t stop shaking, even when he holds the phone up to his ear.

I can hear the other end ringing again and again. He rocks forward and backward on the sofa, making the springs squeak, biting his nail anxiously. He looks relieved when the ringing breaks off and a tiny voice from the other end says, “Hello?”

“Mom! It’s me! I need to come over!”

Silence. I creep closer until I can hear her voice, sounding tinny and far away on the other end.

 “Is she giving you trouble again, the ghost?”

“I…yeah, I guess so. Look, I don’t want to talk about it, just let me sleep there for a couple nights.”

More silence, in which Caleb continues to rock anxiously. “What if you bring her?” the voice says, and Caleb’s brows draw together and his mouth turns down in an angry snarl.

“It doesn’t work that way. Don’t be stupid.”

“You clearly have no idea how it works,” his mother snaps. “If you did, you wouldn’t be in this situation right now.”

“Don’t get smart with me. You’re my mom, you’re supposed to just help me.”

“You got yourself in this situation. I warned you again and again not to hang out with those boys. They’re a bad influence on you…”

He interrupts her. “Those boys helped me more than you ever did. They helped me cover this thing up, and you won’t even let me come over. I’m being tormented here.” He darts a look around the room, searching with wide eyes. Does he know or guess that I’m listening to the conversation?

Her voice says, “I can’t have you bringing an evil spirit into my home.”

An evil spirit? I look down at myself, at my white cashmere sweater and blue jeans, at my short, grubby fingernails and pale, freckled arms. I’m not an evil spirit, am I? I’m just me, I’m Breanne. I haven’t changed, I’m just pissed off. A pissed off spirit. If anyone is evil, it’s Caleb.

“It won’t come with me.” Caleb has switched from angry to pleading now. “Please, you have to let me come over. I can’t do this, I’m going crazy.”

“No,” she says firmly. “I’m sorry to say this, but no. I can’t chance it. You made your own bed, dug your own grave and now you have to lie in it.”

His voice boarders on hysterical. “Are you kidding me right now? Are you seriously leaving me at the mercy of an evil spirit? What if it kills me? What if it kills me in my sleep and you come and find me dead? It will be your fault! Will you be happy then?”

Her tone is firm. “Don’t you yell at me, boy. I’ve helped you enough already! I’ve helped you too much! You killed a girl and now you’re living with the consequences, as crazy and unexpected as they may be. I helped you with the credit card and now I’m done. I shouldn’t even have done that. Do you know how much trouble I’ll get in if the police catch you? I’m basically an accomplice. I’d go to jail. Do you want your mother to go to jail?”

He growls, “No…”

“Here’s what you do, take salt, ordinary table salt and spread it in a ring around you. If you have a cross of any kind, a necklace, an earing, two sticks of wood nailed together…whatever, keep it on you.”

His body relaxes a little. “Will that work?”

“I have no idea. It all sounds ridiculous, but so does a ghost, right? Try those things, I’ve heard of them working before.”

“Alright,” he says. “I’m gonna go get the salt. Can you stay on the phone with me?”

Her voice is soothing now, “of course. Of course. Go find the crosses too, do you have any?”

“I have a gold one on a chain,” Caleb says. He stops at the entrance to the hallway, fear evident on his face. “But it’s in my bedroom. That’s…it’s where she attacked me. What if she’s still there?”

It would be really funny to reach out and tap him on the shoulder right now, in a kind of “I’m right here” gesture, but I restrain myself. I want to see him spreading table salt all over the rug like a total nut job. It will make me happy to watch his slow descent into madness.

“Okay,” his mom’s voice says. “Don’t bother with the cross yet. Just do the salt.”

Caleb walks into the kitchen, treading cautiously. Like he’s afraid the floor boards might collapse at any minute and the house will swallow him alive. That would be a neat trick, but unfortunately it’s not something I know how to do. He reaches the cupboards without being swallowed and finds the salt shaker.

He holds up the little white container and stares at it. “Now what?”

“Now go to wherever you want to stay for the rest of the night, bring whatever you need with you. Pour the salt out in a circle on the floor and stay in that circle until the night is over. Get some rest.”

“And that will work?” His voice is hopeful.

“I hope so.”

“Okay, thanks. I’ll talk to you later.” They say goodbye this time, and Caleb snaps the phone shut and stares at the salt in his hand. He takes deep breath in through his nose, puffing out his chest and says, “All right. Let’s do this.”

He goes to stand in front of the couch and flicks open the salt container. When he turns it upside down it comes out too fast, sending the gritty white salt everywhere. He curses and tilts it back slightly, then walks backwards around the side of the couch, leaving a white trail in his wake. He stands on the couch to do the back, sticking his arm down between the couch and the wall. When he turns around and closes the circle he looks triumphant.

“There, that’s done,” he mutters, and chucks the salt container onto the floor. He climbs onto the couch, leans out over the circle with his feet still planted firmly inside and flicks the light switch off. Caleb curls up on the couch, grunting as he jerks around trying to get into a comfortable position. At last he lies still, and after a few minutes his eyes droop shut.

The salt looks bright in the darkness. It looks harmless, just a ring of white grit. Ingredients I used to put into cookies. Will it really keep me back? Will it keep me from crossing the line? I take a cautious step forward, my heart beating hard and fast. Stretching out my hand I walk forward. What will it feel like? Will it burn? Will I walk into a wall and be sent flying backwards?  My fingertips pass over the salt, then my hand, then my arm. Cautiously I stick my toe over the line, wincing a little. Nothing happens. Finally I step over the salt, and stand with both feet inside his circle of “protection”. It doesn’t work.

Laughing softly, I turn and study Caleb’s face in the dark. Should I wake him? Or should I let him think it’s worked? The clock on the wall tells me that it’s five in the morning. There isn’t much time left until the sun comes up anyways. Let him have a few hours of sleep. I want him to wake up in the morning feeling triumphant, like his stupid salt circle has worked. And I want Nakia to see the salt, I want her to know he’s slowly cracking. Maybe she’ll finally realize she has to go to the police.

So I leave him. Walking into the kitchen I settle in to stand at the sink and stare out at the forest. I stand that way till dawn, looking out at the dark trees that sway together in the wind, at the silver moon that presides over the landscape. Time doesn’t effect me as much anymore. I don’t get sick of standing in one spot. My legs don’t get tired.