I was miserable and used to complain how much I missed home. I was mad at my mom. So mad. I didn’t understand why Mom couldn’t make it work with Dad. They fought all the time and it was Mom always doing the yelling and I thought if she could have just stopped maybe they could have made it work.”
Sawyer lowers his head and it’s like the world quit breathing.
“I was at Mom all the time, every second, telling her it was her fault she and Dad split. Telling her it was her fault Lucy cried all the time, and then one day, Mom broke. We were in the kitchen and I was at her like I always was and she bowed her head and cried. I never saw her cry before and it scared me. Bad. Then she kept crying. She cried in her bedroom, she cried in the bathroom, cried in the shower. She kept crying. She broke and I realized I was to blame.”
“Oh, Sawyer.” Sylvia breathes out, and Sawyer shuts his eyes like her sorrow for him causes him pain. I get that. Pity doesn’t make anything better, but often makes it worse.
“Mine would be when my mom died,” I say while I keep my eyes on Sawyer. He finally opens his, and I see the raw gratefulness that I took the spotlight away from him. “She didn’t want to go through the last two rounds of treatment. She barely wanted to go through the two rounds before that, but she did, for my dad.”
My throat constricts and my palms grow clammy with the memory. I wipe my hands along my skirt. “My mom was life. When she walked into a room you could feel the breeze on your skin, taste the honeysuckle of a summer’s day, and smell the roses in bloom. She lived and she loved and she laughed and then she was sick. So sick. We all knew she was going to die, but instead of dying with a smile on her face, doing what she loved the most, she died weighing eighty pounds, so sick she couldn’t even eat. Her skin and muscles so sensitive that my touch brought her pain. Watching that, seeing her, seeing my father fall apart … that was hell.”
I close my eyes as I try desperately to erase the images of her so weak, so broken, and there’s a touch. My hair lovingly tucked behind my ear—just like my mom used to do. When I open my eyes, I see Sawyer loving me.
“My grandma told me that I’m going to hell,” Sylvia says in a whisper. “In front of my mom, in front of my dad, in front of my brother and sister, in front of my aunts and uncles, in front of all the people who are supposed to love me. She told me that I’m a sinner, and if I don’t repent, I’m going to hell.”
“Your grandma is going to be seriously shocked when she dies and finds out God loves gay people,” I say, and Sylvia laughs. Really laughs, and soon Miguel does and Sawyer, too.
“If a residual haunting is remnants of the bad,” Sylvia says. “Maybe that means that the only thing that we carry with us when we die is the good.”
“Amen,” Sawyer says. He and Sylvia share the type of smile that best friends do. “I’m fine with all the bad being left behind.”
Miguel glances around. “I don’t know about everyone else, but this place is heavy. Since we got here I feel like something’s watching me. Something bad.”
I like ghosts, but it’s as if there’s something sinister hiding in the shadows.
“It’s because of the energy surrounding us.” All of Glory’s warnings are on repeat in my mind, and I wish I hadn’t left my cell in Miguel’s SUV as there’s a part of me that believes she’s texting me right now, calling me, cautioning me that I’ve stumbled upon the danger she was desperately terrified of. “If it’s a residual haunting then we’re feeling the effects of its negative energy, and I know exactly what we need to do to cleanse ourselves of it.”
“Is this going to include some sort of crystals with weird chanting?” Sawyer asks with a cocked eyebrow that tells me he’s half serious, half joking.
“Oh, I heard Glory Gardner does those,” Sylvia says. “Aren’t you friends with her?”
“Yes.” It’s unsettling how not one of them has ever mentioned Glory to me before, but it’s in this