The Seance Read Online Free PDF Page B

menu’s barbecue and beer. I’ll get the plates out as soon as I get some of the boxes off the chairs so we can use the parlor.”
    â€œI’ll help,” Ana said as they all walked deeper into the house. Suddenly she let out an exclamation as she pulled something out of a box. “Look, it’s a Ouija board.”
    â€œI never throw anything away,” Christina admitted sheepishly.
    â€œWhy would you even consider throwing this away?” Ana demanded. Picking up the Ouija board, she walked over and sat in a wing chair and stared at it raptly. “Oh, my God, remember? We used to have so much fun with this thing.”
    Christina found herself feeling strangely irritated, wishing she’d thought to stick the damn thing somewhere out of sight, or, that she’d gotten rid of it altogether.
    She groaned aloud. “We had fun because we were kids who knew the answers we wanted to hear, so we pushed it around to get them,” she said.
    â€œWe’ve got to play with this sucker again,” Ana said, entranced, and obviously unaware that Christina was nowhere near as anxious as she was to dredge up past fun and games. “Don’t you remember? We had so much fun. Sometimes you’d wrap a towel around your head like a turban and call yourself Madame Zee, and we’d have a séance. It was so much fun. But this guy…” She patted the Ouija board affectionately. “We asked it so many questions. It was great. We have to play with it again.”
    â€œWhy? I know what I’m going to be when I grow up,” Christina said. “And we are all grown up, in case you haven’t noticed.”
    â€œSupposedly,” Mike threw in skeptically.
    â€œGrown up—not dead,” Ana said with mock impatience. “Let’s ask it something.”
    â€œI don’t want any answers to any questions—prophecies can be self-fulfilling,” Christina said.
    â€œMaybe you don’t want any answers,” Dan said. “But I want to know if I’m going to have to be a fluffy all my life.”
    â€œFluffy?” Ana giggled. “Don’t you mean ‘fluffer’? And don’t you have to be a girl for that? Or maybe not, these days.”
    â€œCute, shorty, very cute,” Dan said dryly.
    â€œA lot of the entertainers at the parks call playing a character being a ‘fluffy,’” Christina explained, unable to hide a smile. “Dan is in the running to play Zeus in a new show, but in the meantime…”
    â€œIn the meantime, I’m Raccoon Ralph,” Dan said.
    â€œRaccoon Ralph?” Ana said, and burst into gales of laughter.
    â€œIf we were still kids, I’d be bopping you on the head right now,” Dan said.
    â€œThank God we’re not kids, then,” Ana said.
    â€œEnough of that,” Mike said, suddenly serious. “You two need to be careful,” he said.
    â€œWe’re just teasing each other,” Ana told him, frowning.
    Mike shook his head impatiently. “I wasn’t talking about you and Dan. I’m talking about you and Christie. I was watching the news earlier,” he said. “They were warning women to be careful. There’s been a murder.”
    â€œA murder?” Christina asked.
    â€œAre you talking about the woman they found along the highway?” Ana asked.
    Mike nodded. “You must have heard about it, even down in Miami,” he said to Christina.
    â€œI did. But it was just one woman, right?” Christina asked.
    â€œYeah, but it’s got a lot of people around here worried. The killer is a copycat of the Interstate Killer,” Mike told them.
    â€œI saw it on the news earlier, too,” Ana said. “It sounded like they don’t know if they really got the right guy to begin with, right?”
    â€œI don’t think anyone is admitting that yet,” Mike said.
    â€œCan it be the same guy?” Christina