first floor are all open and the cool autumn wind rushes in. I shiver and the smoke of the sage stick blows into my face. My eyes burn and I wonder if that is the spirits I’m tossing out fighting back.
I raise my hand and it shakes as I move the smoke from inside of Lucy’s room toward the window. “I wish you well someplace other than here. You are not welcome here anymore. It’s time for you to move on, and I am ordering you to leave.”
Doing what I ask, Sawyer follows up behind me with a burning sage stick in hand. He mimics me, doing what I do, saying what I say, but his words are weighted with disbelief. I’m betting on sage being sage and my belief being enough to cast everything but my mom out.
Lucy watches us from the doorway, a mixture of perplexed and curious. I hold the bundle of smoking sage to her. “This is your room, Lucy. You have more power over it than I do. Can you help drive the ghosts away?”
She holds her hands behind her back as she walks in, but then takes the sage and does exactly what I tell her to do, saying exactly what I tell her to say and with each step she becomes emboldened, as if taking control of her world and circumstances.
“Are the ghosts gone yet?” Lucy asks me.
They should be. “Yes.” I leave the room and head to the kitchen to find the shell so I can put out the burning sage.
Lucy follows behind me. “Where will the ghosts go?”
“I believe they go to heaven,” I say. “If that’s where they decide to go.”
“Why wouldn’t they want to go there?”
“I don’t know, but God gave us free will. He’s not going to force us to go anywhere we don’t want. It’s up to us to make the choice.”
“If the ghosts choose to go to heaven and can go to heaven, why don’t they go to heaven when they die instead of staying here?”
In the kitchen, I grind the sage stick out into the shell. “I don’t know.”
Lucy glances over her shoulder then does a conspiratorial lean into me. “Why did your mom stay?”
I put the shell on the table and crouch in front of her. “I think my mom knew how badly my dad and I missed her so she stayed to make sure we are okay.”
“Don’t you want her to go to heaven?” she whispers, and guilt rushes me. Shouldn’t I?
Lucy angles in so close I can feel her body heat. “By doing this are we sending your mom away?”
“She should be fine. I told her to hide on the third floor.”
“But doesn’t smoke travel up? Isn’t that why we have to stay low to the floor if there’s a fire?”
My heart skips several uncomfortable beats.
The front door of the apartment opens and my forehead furrows, causing a slicing ache through my skull. I force myself to my feet and spot Sawyer walking through the foyer, waving the sage, muttering words. Then he turns up the stairs. The world tilts.
“No,” I whisper as my heart pounds in my ears. “Mom.”
I race for him, but I feel slow, like I’m stuck in wet sand and being pummeled by waves. Sweat beads along my forehead, along my chest, and my breathing becomes labored.
“Sawyer!” I meant it as a yell, but it comes out just above a whisper and I grasp the railing as he starts waving the burning sage at my door. “Sawyer, stop!”
A loud pop in the middle of the staircase. Loud enough that I jump. Loud enough that Sawyer spins, almost causing him to lose his balance.
A glint of white blinds me, and I blink to find Mom sitting on the middle of the stairs. She inclines her head as she looks at me then at Sawyer. My mouth dries out as a combination of panic and hope spreads through me. Will he see her?
He’s staring in that direction, so intently, but his eyes are moving, roaming, scanning and I deflate. I’d give close to anything if anyone else could see her because then I’d know for sure that I’m not dying.
“The sage is hurting me.” Mom winces like she’s in pain. She flickers in front of me and my heart tears in two.
“Put out the sage,” I say.
“What?” Sawyer asks.
“Put out the sage!” I yell. “Put it out! Put it out now!”
Sawyer fumbles with the shell in his hand, but does