Work Text:
ONE
"I'm still mad at you."
"It was an accident, Neve. Do you have it?"
"Yeah, because I'm prepared, unlike some of us."
"Okay, Jesus, I'm sorry, I promise it won't happen again."
She looks at him, rolls her eyes, then turns back to the house the two of them are walking toward. It's large, a Victorian painted a deep green with white siding, but Colonial-style columns frame the door. Not an unusual house to see around the city, but she still finds herself looking at it skeptically, knowing what lies beyond its pretty exterior.
"It's almost All Spirits Day." He notes and she turns to look at him again, frowning.
"I know, I see it on the calendar every day." She replies and he sighs. "I'm well aware of what time of year it is."
"We're going to be a lot busier next week." He says and she rolls her eyes again. As if he doesn't know that she knows that. "I just want to make sure you're ready. This time of year can be very draining on a person and—"
"Yeah, I know, I know. I've been at this longer than you think." She says and, after a hesitant moment, he nods, then walks up the front steps and looks down at her.
"Coming?" He asks and she narrows her eyes, then follows him up the steps, all the while mumbling to herself.
"Think I can't do my job, you're the one who forgot an essential part of the practice you claim to be an expert in." She says everything under her breath, making sure he won't hear her. "Started this fucking practice and then forgot how to do your own goddamn job."
"Having some trouble catching your breath back there?" He asks and she cracks her knuckles, then shoves her fists into the pockets of her jacket so she doesn't do something worse with them. Like push him down the steps.
He knocks on the door and she carefully schools her expression into something neutral, something that doesn't say "I'm considering homicide but refuse to be haunted by someone as annoying as the person I would like to kill," and says instead "I enjoy my job, my life, and my coworkers."
By the time the door is open, she thinks she looks entirely neutral, possibly even happy, about being here. The look on the woman who opens the door's face, however, proves that she's likely still scowling.
"Mrs. Evelyn MacKenna?" He asks and the woman nods. "Excellent. I'm Alexis O'Connell, and this is my partner—"
"Neve McKinnon." She cuts in before he has the chance to say her name for her. She can hear his inhale, sharp and annoyed, but she ignores it, trying to make her grimace into more of a kind and comforting smile. She's never been particularly good at either, but at least she can try to pretend. Fake it til you make it, right?
"Right…and you're the people I called?" Mrs. MacKenna asks, looking between the two of them skeptically. Alexis and Neve turn to look at each other, then back at her.
"Yes," Alexis says and Mrs. MacKenna nods slowly, then pastes on a smile.
"Well, then, come on in, please." She says. The two of them follow her inside, but Neve grabs his arm, his sleeve mostly, and tugs.
"She did…call us, right?" She asks and Alexis looks down at her.
"Yes, she did." He confirms and she narrows her eyes at him. "I never said I was the one who answered the phone, though."
"Damn you." She replies and he winks. She drops his sleeve and shoves him away from her. "Stop letting everyone else do your dirty work. People won't trust us if someone older answers the phone and then kids show up at the door."
"We're both legal adults, Neve." He whispers back. "We're…young adults, but legal adults nonetheless."
"I hate you." Neve hisses, before turning back to the woman, who's stopped in front of an arched doorway and is now looking at them, still as if she does not trust the two of them.
"The problem has mainly been in here." She says and Alexis nods, mask of professionalism fixed back onto his face.
"And can you describe it a bit for me?" He asks and Mrs. MacKenna nods.
"Yes, um, gusts of cold air, things falling off the desk or their shelves, a few books have even been damaged." She says and Alexis nods once again, doing a better job of looking pleasant and kind than Neve ever could. She decides to busy herself with pushing past the woman and into the room, intending on looking around. She knows very little about the history of the house, just that the front room was once a waiting room for a doctor's office, then became a home in the mid-sixties, with countless owners over the years.
She doesn't get to look around though, because the second she's in the room, a thousand voices slam into her like a truck. She grips the edge of the desk.
Dying, I'm dying, I'm dying.
Why won't anyone play with me?
I'm so lonely…I'm so lost…I should end it all…
I'm so cold…I'm so, so cold…
There's something evil in this house. In the name of the Lord, I—
"Neve." A hand on her shoulder blade, the heat of someone else behind her.
"It's loud." She says, quietly. "Is it crowded?"
"Not very. How many voices are you hearing?"
"Too many to count." She can't get many words out, not through all the noise in her head. Alexis' voice is barely audible over the din, like lights buzzing. "Hard to focus. Hard to…speak."
"Is everything in your bag?" He asks and she nods. "Alright. Can you pass it to me?" Carefully, she loops the bag over her shoulder, handing it to him clumsily.
I don't deserve to live, not like this.
You evil bitch, I'll kill you!
I miss my mom. Is she coming back?
And then, blissful silence. She looks up, only to see Alexis' eyes on her. Thank you, she mouths and he nods, then begins to remove everything else from the bag.
Incense, both sticks and cones. A glass jar and a long, wooden burner. Matches. A few crystals. Two tarot decks, his worn from years of use, hers still almost pristine. A small glass spray bottle, half-full of a slightly yellow liquid. And a few sprigs of dried herbs.
The supplies.
"At least I remembered." She says, just loud enough for him to hear. Mrs. MacKenna hovers in the doorway, watching. He glares at her as she picks up the glass jar and the cones and moves toward the window. Alexis must tell Mrs. MacKenna to close the door, because it shuts loudly enough for her to hear it through her headphones.
The room is a deep teal color, with large, arched white bookshelves along the wall across from the door and an overstuffed chair under the bay window, where Alexis is standing, before pulling the curtains closed. This works better mostly in the dark.
The crack in the door is just slightly too wide, so she takes off her coat and shoves it against the bottom, tucking it into the space between the door and the wooden floors, before setting the stick of incense, now in its burner, on the floor. She strikes a match and lights the incense, watching the tip catch and flare and burn before blowing it out, white smoke rising toward the ceiling. By the window, Alexis has lit the small cone of incense and plopped it in its glass holder.
She takes the sprigs of herbs and ties them together with a length of twine from her pocket, then looks at Alexis as she loops the herbs over the door.
"Is it getting any quieter?" He asks, loud enough for her to hear, now back by the desk, shuffling his cards. She plucks one ear of her headphones off.
I'm going to be stuck here forever.
"Just one voice. From somewhere in the corner by that bookshelf." She says, gesturing to the bookshelf by the desk. Alexis looks that way, then nods. "Can you see them?"
"Yeah. They look…pretty dejected." He says, then takes his cards over. "Neve, can you come talk us through this?" She walks over and smiles in the general direction of where Alexis is looking, pulling her headphones down around her neck.
"Hey there. Can you hear me?" She asks.
Who are you?
"I'm Neve. That's Alexis. We're gonna help you get out of here, get somewhere comfortable."
How?
"Do you see these cards in Alexis' hands?"
"They're nodding."
"Okay. He's gonna spread them out on the floor in front of you, okay? Some of them are gonna pull you to them, a physical tug. He'll read what's on them, which will give us an idea of how we can help you get out of here, alright?"
Okay. I still don't understand, though.
"That's alright. Can you…?" Alexis crouches down and spreads the cards on the floor, their worn, red and yellow backs in a fan on the wood. After a moment, three of the cards slide away from the rest of the spread. "Thanks. What do they say?"
Alexis picks up each of the cards and looks at them. The Hermit, the four of swords, and Death, all reversed. They're suspicious of what's coming next. They're imprisoned and exhausted. But they don't want to go.
"You need to go, though. You'll be happier elsewhere." Alexis says, then looks at Neve. She repeats the words, to no response.
"Can you get mine?" Alexis walks back to the desk, taking his deck with him, and brings her cards back. "Thanks. Maybe my cards will give you something more." She shuffles her deck, then fans them out in the same way as his.
After a moment, three cards come away from the fan. She picks them up and looks at them. Five of spears, two of cups, and The Heirophant.
"You've tried to leave before but it hasn't worked?" She asks.
Yes.
She looks at Alexis and nods. His eyebrows go up. They've had a few trapped Spirits before, but they've always been more willing to go. Usually people who died of natural causes, or murder, who weren't ready to go yet.
"Do you know how you died?"
No. I was alive one day and then I wasn't.
"When did you die?"
What's today's date?
"It's the 24th of October."
I died today. It was my 28th birthday.
"Oh."
"What?" Alexis asks and she looks at him. "What are they saying?"
"It's their death day." The opposite of a birthday, a death day will typically make a Spirit harder to remove, seeing as it's what's tying them to the world. "And their birthday. Happy birthday." Alexis slumps and Neve stands and retrieve the crystals and the glass bottle from the table. "Hey, I'm gonna bring these over here, okay? I want you to touch the crystals." She walks back over.
Silence.
"Are they still there?" She asks and Alexis stands and looks around the room. He looks back at Neve and shakes his head.
"Gone." The room smells like frankincense and patchouli. The incense by the window has stopped smoking, but the one by the door is still burning, the tip orange, the smoke white. The ash has fallen into the tray. "I think…you released them by acknowledging their birthday."
"I hope so." She inhales deeply, then brings the crystals back to the desk and tucks them away in one of the pockets of the bag, then adds the spray bottle to another pocket. He brings the cards back and they pack everything up in silence. The incense by the door burns down and she picks up the holder and blows the ash into the room.
She picks up her jacket and pulls it on, soft, worn corduroy on her fingers, then dragging over her arms.
They exit the room together, letting the smell of incense follow them.
"Do call again if you have any further problems, ma'am." Alexis says as Mrs. MacKenna shows them to the front door. She nods and the two of them walk down the front steps and back to the sidewalk, where Alexis' car waits for them.
"Oh, hey, can I take next Wednesday off?" She asks and he frowns.
"Why?"
"I just need it off. At least the evening." She says, taking her bag off her shoulder and drops it in the backseat carefully, before opening the passenger side door and sitting down.
"Fine, yeah, you can have the evening of the 29th off. Unless we get a massive case that day, then I'll need you." He says, sitting down beside her. She reaches into the pocket of her jeans and pulls out her phone, slouching down in the seat beside him.
"So you don't forget everything again?" She asks, pulling her headphones back up on her ears and connecting them to her phone.
"Jesus, Neve, it was one time!" Is the last thing she hears before she blasts music into her ears for the drive back home.
TWO
He's settling in for a nice, relaxing, slow night, after a hectic weekend and start to the week. Two cases each on Saturday and Sunday, three on Monday, a staggering four yesterday, and one early this morning, so many he had to go and replace their incense and every windowsill in the house was cluttered with crystals and tinctures and herbs when he woke up this morning. Neve dashed through the house, making sure everything was in the weak October sunlight.
Now, he folds laundry he's needed to fold since last Wednesday, but has been too busy to, telling the cleaner who comes once a week not to worry about coming in today. It's a perfectly relaxing evening.
Until the phone rings.
"I'll get that." He says, calls up the stairs, in the general direction of Neve's room. He picks up the receiver and presses it to his ear. "Hello?"
"Hi there. Have I reached Alexis O'Connell?" The voice on the other end asks.
"You have, yes. How can I help you tonight?" He asks. It's too late, really, to be taking work calls, but he doesn't want to disturb Neve any further. "We aren't taking cases tonight, but we are free the rest of the week." Except for the ten am case in the morning and the four pm case in the afternoon tomorrow.
"My name is Evelyn Green, I'm the curator of the Bloomwood Anthropology Museum." The woman says. Neve comes down the hallway and Alexis beckons her closer. She crowds up beside the phone, her ear pressed to the receiver beside him, smelling bright and floral. "This year, we're opening an exhibit on Halloween night," they both wince, "about funeral history and ghost stories. We'd like someone to come in on opening night, just to make sure nobody tries to…return to their belongings before they go back into storage. We don't need you to cleanse us, just to keep an eye on the area." Neve frowns and looks at Alexis.
"How exactly would we be of help? We primarily remove the Spirits from their locations, rather than keep them out." Alexis says.
"Well, we'd like you to come in during the day, before we open, and set up a few incense burners in some spots and then keep them replenished through the night, just to keep us entirely safe. Some herbs also couldn't hurt, I'm sure. We'll have a lot of high-profile guests that night, so it's essential that we keep them all safe." Evelyn Green clarifies and Neve continues to frown, looking confused.
"Right…let me speak with my associate, and then I'll call you right back, in twenty minutes at the latest." He says, then hangs up.
"I don't like this. Keeping people away from the things they died in, or the ways they honored and respected the deaths of their loved ones? Not how I work, Alexis." Neve says and he nods.
"I know, I don't like it much either, but this is a high-profile job. And it seems simple. Then, when the night is done, we put out all the incense, we take away the herbs, and we let the Spirits take back what they deserve. We can complete the job and stick to our morals at the same time." He reasons and she rubs at the side of her jaw, her dark nails against pale skin. She picks at a spot on her chin, then groans.
"Alright, fine. We can take the job." She says and Alexis nods, then redials the number.
"Alright. You look nice." And she does, in a tight sleeveless purple turtleneck and a long, black lace skirt.
"My friends are taking me out for my birthday dinner." She says, looking down at herself. "I really hate this job, but I'll take it. I need to finish getting dressed." She starts to turn away, but he stops her, reaching up and smoothing down her hair carefully, fixing a curl that had falled out of the place, then nods. He picks up the receiver and dials back as Neve walks back upstairs. The call connects. "Hello? Miss Green? Yes, this is Alexis O'Connell. We'll take the job."
THREE
It rains on All Spirits Day, like it always does. There hasn't been a sunny All Spirits Day in Bloomwood for seventy years, not since the Spirits came back and started inhabiting the city along with the living residents. Whether it's correlation or causation, Neve doesn't know, but it makes for the right atmosphere as she and Alexis hurry into the museum on the morning of All Spirits Day.
Alexis closes his umbrella while Neve shakes her head, her hair coated in a fine layer of rain, like dust. Alexis fixes his jacket, then looks at her.
"I know you hate this, I hate it too, let's just get it over with." He says and, begrudgingly, she nods. Paste on a smile, act like she enjoys the idea of keeping people away from their own funerary objects, and be normal.
As normal as you can be when you speak to the dead.
Honestly, as they walk into the museum, she's surprised they even called a Spirit Medium. Most of the general public consider Spirit Mediums and Spiritualists as jokes or liars, even after all this time. The rich and powerful, who thrive on perpetuating the idea that Spirits are harmful or dangerous are the ones perpetuating this idea, primarily, so they're the ones who tend to call the most, to be rid of the things crawling around in the dark. It's problematic, because Spirits aren't dangerous, just lost in the space between this world and the next, but it's also the reason Neve gets paid.
So, she's learned to accept it.
The museum is split into two halves; to the left, a rotating exhibit, currently displaying several cases of jewelry on purple and black velvet backers, with a few conference rooms toward the back. To the right, is a large, entirely white room, with people moving items in and out through the side hallway. Directly ahead of them, behind a large, gray marble desk, is a tall woman, her blonde hair streaked with gray, in a black pantsuit.
"Miss Green?" Alexis asks, and the woman looks up and nods, looking mildly confused. "Alexis O'Connell, we spoke on the phone. This is my associate—"
"Neve McKinnon." She cuts him off. It's becoming a habit.
"Yes…we spoke on the phone about your exhibit tonight." Alexis says and the woman nods, still looking confused, then comes out from behind the desk.
"My apologies, I just assumed you'd be…older. No bother, please follow me." She says, leading them toward the larger exhibit room. Inside, Neve pulls out her notebook and a pen. "I'll let you have a look around the room and get comfortable with the layout. I think we'd like a stick of incense in every corner and at all major entrances, so that's ten, as well as a few sprigs of herbs above every doorway, making that four, as we have two entrances into this exhibit room and two entrances out of the museum."
"How many guests are you expecting tonight?" Alexis asks while Neve writes down the direction that Miss Green has given them.
"We're expecting about forty-five, as well as having ten museum attendants, the both of you, and myself. So that makes it…fifty-eight people?" Alexis nods slowly, then looks at Neve. "Well, have a look around, familiarize yourself with the space, and then we'll see you back here at eight-thirty to set-up."
"Yes, thank you." Alexis says, and Miss Green nods, then walks out of the room, her heels clicking on the highly polished floors. When she's entirely out of earshot, Neve turns to Alexis.
"She's gonna fuck her entire museum over." She whisper-yells at him and he nods. "Ten pieces of incense burning at once? Over several hours? It's gonna look like there's a fire in here, not to mention the waste from the ash. And there's not even anybody here." The room is entirely silent, apart from the people moving pieces in and out, adjusting cases, and setting up signage.
"I know. Clearly, Miss Green has no clue how Spiritualism works. Let's look around and see what we can do. The herbs over the doorways are fine, but maybe we can," he clicks his tongue, "lower the amount of incense so that nobody gets…overwhelmed."
"Can I chew her out after we're done?" Neve asks and Alexis makes a face like he's considering it.
"We'll see how the night goes." He says, then the two of them walk through the empty exhibit.
Neve sketches a brief idea of what the museum looks like, pressing her notebook against the wall, then marks the places where they'll hide incense burners ("There aren't even ten corners, there's four!" She'd complained under her breath. Alexis snickered.) and where they'll hang herbs over the doorways, then makes a note of the kinds of incense that will be best for this, what will smell the least overpowering, and what will cause the least alarm among the visitors of the museum.
Frankincense, lavender (last resort), jasmine, myrrh.
"Go for the jasmine and frankincense. We'll put patchouli on before we leave." Alexis says and Neve startles. "Sorry, thought you heard me."
"No, I didn't. Didn't know you were still back there." She says and he hums out an 'mm-hmm', before walking away. "Well, now you aren't." But she notes down what he said, despite herself.
When they walk back into the lobby after having decided where to put the incense and what herbs to use, Miss Green looks up from behind the desk and smiles at them.
"Is everything sorted?" She asks and Alexis nods.
"Actually, we have a couple of follow-up questions. How long does the party go?" Alexis asks and Neve readies her pencil.
"Well, the exhibit opens at nine, there's a guided tour that lasts an hour beginning around nine-thirty, so I'd say we'll probably be winding down around eleven." Miss Green says. Neve scrawls down the words.
"So, we'll be here at eight-thirty to set up, as previously discussed, then we'll return around ten forty-five to clean up." Alexis says and Miss Green shakes her head, the corner of her mouth upturned.
"No, no, we'd like you both to stay for the entire party, just to make sure everything stays as it should and to keep the incense burning through the night." She says.
"The…entire night?" Neve asks and Miss Green nods.
"Yes, of course. That won't be an issue, right?" She asks. Neve shoves her hand in her pocket, clenching around her pen. Three hours, tuned into the surrounding area, trying to keep rich people safe? Like she cares that much about the rich.
"Not at all, no." She says and Alexis frowns briefly, looking at her, before turning back to Miss Green.
"Of course not. We'll be back this evening." He says. The two of them turn back toward the door.
"Oh," Miss Green says and they both look at her. "It's a black tie event. We'll see you tonight." She gives them a wave and a smile that could be described as wicked.
Alexis pulls his umbrella out of the stand by the door and Neve shoves her notebook back into the bag on her shoulder. They walk out of the museum, into the pouring rain, smashing down on the pavement, so fast and hard it's almost impossible to see through it. They turn to each other and Alexis raises the umbrella up over both their heads.
"Shit." He says. And whether he's talking about the rain or the job, it's not clear.
"Shit." She agrees. And whether she's talking about the rain or the job, it's not clear.
FOUR
In the evening, the museum looms. It's a plain, gray building, with a ramp and a set of stairs outside, a large banner with a photograph of a woman in Victorian mourning clothes and the title of the exhibit, Days Gone By: The History of Mourning, in large, white letters on the side of the building. Beside him, Neve groans quietly.
"We'll be fine." He says, patting her gently on the shoulder, then starting up to the front of the building. After a moment, he hears her footsteps behind him, slightly damp from the rain, though it's stopped by now.
Inside, they nod to Miss Green before walking into the exhibit. It's completed now, though the lights are all off, giving an eerie quality to the coffins and mourning clothes tucked away in their glass cases and raised high on their platforms. He shivers, then extends a hand toward Neve.
She lays two burners and their respective sticks of incense, one frankincense and one jasmine, into his hand and he takes them toward one half of the room, bypassing mannequins looming feet above him and poorly-lit black-and-white photographs. Seeing Spirits isn't frightening, not anymore, not after six years, but a humanoid form, hovering several feet in the air, or a dark, almost human face in an old photograph, lit with nothing but a light from a hallway? That's what scares him. Neve would call it pareidolia. He calls it common sense.
He places one burner in the west corner, laying the stick of incense along it, then repeats the action in the north corner. They place burners at each entrance as well, then ask a staff member for a ladder to hang herbs over each entrance, both into the museum and into the exhibit.
"Thank you both, so very much." Miss Green says. Neve looks down at her from where she's standing on the ladder, Alexis on the floor, holding her bag. "We really appreciate this."
"Of course, it's no problem." Alexis says as Neve descends the ladder, just so she doesn't say something first. "Do we really need to stay the whole night, though? I imagine you all can light incense perfectly fine…"
"Oh, sure, but our guests would prefer we have professionals on site for an event like this." Miss Green says. Alexis pulls at the sleeves of his jacket, uncomfortable. "Plus, I'm sure an exhibit like this is right in your area of interest."
"Yes, of course. Makes perfect sense." He says and Miss Green nods, then turns to acknowledge a staff member behind her. Alexis turns to Neve and she frowns.
"Oh, and, may I ask, what scent of incense are you planning on burning?" She says. Neve looks back at Miss Green.
"Frankincense and jasmine…?" She says, slowly. Miss Green nods.
"Hmm. That'll smell lovely, I'm sure." Miss Green says, then turns back to her staff member. Neve looks back at Alexis and shudders.
"Are you starting to feel…suspicious?" She whispers and he nods, before opening the bag for her. She drops in the twine and scissors in her hand and takes it from him, looping it back over her shoulder.
"We'll watch out for each other, though, right?" He asks and she nods, looking serious for the first time since he's known her. Usually, she lies somewhere between angry or sarcastic.
"Whether I like it or not, I've got your back." She says, patting his shoulder, then walking back toward the exhibit. He watches her go, just for a moment, then reaches into the pocket of his trousers and rubs the edge of his house key over his thumb once, twice, thrice, before following Neve.
They finish lighting the final stick of incense right as the doors open for the exhibit, then squirrel themselves away in the bathroom across the hall.
Inside, in a white-tiled room, Neve presents her wrists to Alexis, dark purple veins under her thin, pale skin. From one of the pockets of her bag, now sitting on the counter, he pulls out a glass vial and unscrews the cap. He shakes the vial until the liquid inside is slightly cloudy, then turns it upside down and rolls the top across Neve's wrist, before she repeats the process for him. A mixture of coconut and patchouli fills the space. He watches Neve rub her wrists together, shake her hands once, then press her wrists to her neck.
"What?" She asks and he shakes his head.
"Nothing." He presses his own wrists together, forcing his attention back on the situation at hand. He tucks a sprig of rosemary into the pin on his lapel, a thin, gold cone. Rosemary: smells good, and keeps the wearer's aura clear and neutral. Easier to see a Spirit if you're not nervous.
Which he isn't, at all. It's just that something about Miss Green's instistance that they stay the whole night, even though staff members can replace incense sticks in a building that isn't even haunted, is too new to have any sort of Spiritual presence, makes him suspicious. Maybe there's more to the story tonight, maybe they wanted a show, but Miss Green could have told him these things if she wanted to. Neve touches his shoulder.
"I've got your back. Whatever happens tonight, I've got you." She says and he nods, exhales, and gives her the best approximation of a smile he can manage.
"This time of year is just draining." He says, a half-truth. She nods. They leave the bathroom and walk into the exhibit.
FIVE
She's focused on the tour, on the misinformation being presented by the guide, when he touches her arm. She jumps, then looks over her shoulder.
"Jesus," she mumbles, then looks back at the guide.
"Something is wrong." Alexis says and she nods.
"I know. Hair jewelry wasn't actually used like that, it was—"
"No, not with the tour." He says and she turns to him.
"What?" She asks and Alexis inhales slowly. "Are you okay?"
"I don't—no, I don't think so." He says, then looks at the incense. "I think that I have been…drugged." She frowns, then looks toward the exit and takes his arm.
She drags him out of the exhibit and into the lobby, then toward the front door.
"Is everything alright?" Miss Green asks. Neve looks at her over her shoulder, standing in the doorway of the exhibit room, a look all-too knowing on her face.
"We've got a business call we need to take care of. We'll be back soon." She lies, the words slipping out easily. Miss Green hums, then turns back toward the exhibit and walks inside.
Together, Neve and Alexis step out of the lobby and into the rain, ducking under the side of the building together, pressed close to the wall.
"Okay. Take some deep breaths." She says, dropping his arm. He complies. "Why do you think you've been drugged?"
"Miss Green, she handed me two glasses of champagne, insisting they were a special kind, one meant for you and one for me. I didn't want them, but I took them anyway. I left one of them on a table somewhere in the exhibit, but accidentally drank a bit of one. It took a moment to kick in, but something is wrong." He says and she nods. That would explain the look on Miss Green's face.
"Do you feel sick at all?"
"No. Foggy. Less…in control." He says and she nods, trying to figure out what could have been slipped into his drink. It could be a mint extract, maybe a lavender, possibly a— "You're pretty, Neve."
"What?" She asks, looking at him. His head is cocked to the side, the rosemary on his lapel wilting slightly.
"You look so nice tonight." She looks down at herself. She's wearing a black jumpsuit with a silk button-down under it, shivering in the rain and autumn chill. "You're always so pretty."
"Alexis," she begins, but he steps forward and tucks her hair behind her ear. She freezes.
"You're so smart, too. I can't believe you wanted to work with me, of all the people you could have chosen." He says, finger tracing the shell of her ear. She's still frozen to the spot, her ears hot despite the cold. "I like you so much."
"Alexis," she repeats, pulling back slightly. He doesn't move his hand, though, instead pressing his palm to her cheek. "Alexis, you're not in control of yourself, stop."
"Neve…" he says, borderline whispers. The rain makes it hard to hear him, drowning out his voice in sharp, hard plips on the concrete and metal around them. "God…"
"Hey, listen to me." She reaches up and pinches his arm. He hisses and pulls back. "Did the champagne taste weird at all?"
"No, I don't think so. But I've never had champagne, so I don't know what it's supposed to taste like." He says and she exhales, feeling annoyance creep into her, even though she shouldn't be annoyed at all. He's not in control, not entirely himself. He reaches up and touches her face again. "You're just so pretty…"
"Alexis," she says, for a third time, before he cuts her off, by leaning forward and kissing her. He tastes like champagne, obviously, and something warm, like cinnamon or clove or…allspice. Of course. Allspice and jasmine, a recipe for disaster, especially with so much of the jasmine in one small room.
Allspice and jasmine create a truth serum, essentially, lowering someone's inhibitions until they do the things they've been stopping themselves from. It's not common knowledge, someone would need to have done their research to know to combine the two. And if Miss Green is the one who gave him the drink, who gave him two drinks, then she's likely the one behind it. And—
In the pocket of her overalls, her phone rings. She pulls back from Alexis to wrangle her phone out of her pocket.
"That's our alarm to light new incense sticks." She says, looking at her phone, then back up at him. His cheeks are red as he stares at her mouth. "Come on, we need to go inside."
"Right." He says, then starts toward the door, hands shoved in his trouser pockets. She follows a few moments later, after pressing her fingers to her lips.
SIX
The following day, with the sun shining down brightly, she opens the door of the museum.
"Hello?" Miss Green asks, behind the desk. "Can I help you?"
"Hi. Neve McKinnon. You drugged my partner?" She says and Miss Green gives her a confused smile.
"Excuse me?" She asks, still with that confused smile.
"Alexis O'Connell? You gave him a glass of champagne last night at your exhibit that was spiked with allspice, mixing with the smoke from the jasmine incense we burned." Her smile falls now. "So, Miss Green, why'd you do it?"
"I didn't." She replies and Neve raises an eyebrow at her. She rolls her eyes and exhales, harsh and angry. "Fine. I knew the building wasn't haunted, I just wanted to knock you two down for a little while, show you the dangers of something like this. You're both far too young to be involved in a business so grisly as this."
"Don't spin this like you're worried about us. Alexis has been seeing the dead for six years, I've heard them my entire life. We're more experienced in this than you. You only wanted us for a night because you had rich patrons crawling around this museum and they're scared of nothing more than death." Neve shoots back and Miss Green inhales. "Also, most of your information about your own exhibit is wrong and perpetuates the idea that death is frightening and that Spirits, or "ghosts" as you decide to call them, are dangerous. Fuck you and your museum, thanks for drugging my partner." She walks away from the desk, then turns over her shoulder. "You're gonna get more Spiritalists on your bad side than your good for this stunt."
She walks back home, even though it's a twenty minute walk, but it helps her calm down. Last night, Alexis fell asleep the second they got home and hasn't woken up yet. It's just after one pm now. They got back at midnight.
But it's sunny, like it always is after All Spirits Day, still cool, breezy, dead leaves swirling on the sidewalk. Business will slow down now, since the veil is falling again, since people will stop coaxing and antagonizing Spirits with their games and holidays. She wraps her jacket tighter around herself as she walks through downtown Bloomwood and toward her and Alexis' townhouse.
Once she's inside, she looks in the living room, only to see Alexis still asleep on the sofa. She looks at him for a moment, before hanging up her coat and kicking off her boots, then walks into the kitchen. It's time to take matters into her own hands.
SEVEN
He smells peppermint. It's strong, somewhere near him, maybe right under his nose. His eyes are dry as he tries to open them, burning slightly from the peppermint. And then he gets his eyes open and there's Neve, sitting in front of him, holding a glass jar under his nose. There's a steaming cup of tea on the coffee table in front of her, along with a glass of water.
"Why are we back here?" He mumbles, his throat dry. "Weren't we at the museum?"
"You were drugged by Miss Green for stupid, selfish reasons, I'll explain later." She says, then helps him sit up. His head doesn't spin, but he feels heavy and weak and achey. "Are you okay? You've been asleep since midnight."
"What time is it now?" He asks. She picks up her phone and checks the time. Her nails are painted gray now, instead of dark blue. When did she do that?
"It's just after two." She says and he wipes his eyes clumsily.
"Jesus. I was asleep that long?" She nods. "It's probably a good thing cases will be slower the next couple of weeks, then."
"Yeah." She says, pressing her lips together. He narrows his eyes at her.
"Did I do something…weird while I was drugged?"
"Miss Green drugged you with allspice, intending to mix it with the frankincense we were burning, but didn't seem to realize you were by the jasmine. She was trying to knock us both out. Instead, she lowered your inhibitions." She says and he nods, somewhat confused. "You, um…you kissed me."
"Oh, god." He presses his hand to his mouth. "Neve, I'm sorry, I—"
"The thing is, I know you wanted to, because allspice and jasmine make you do things you've been stopping yourself from." She says and he looks away from her. Her hair is piled onto her head in a knot, curls spilling out of it wildly. "The thing is, if you'd just talked to me about your feelings instead of keeping it bottled inside, we could have prevented you kissing me while drugged and soaking wet."
"Is that why I feel so filmy?" He asks. She laughs weakly.
"Yeah, you got pretty wet while we were outside. I was mostly under something, but you were just standing in the rain. Do you want me to help you upstairs so you can shower?" She asks and he nods.
Carefully, she helps him stand up, then slowly up the stairs, then into the bathroom. Her hands look dry, her knuckles red and wrinkled. She goes into his bedroom and brings back clean clothes and sets them on the counter, before crossing her arms over her chest. She's wearing a sweater and jeans, back to the way she usually looks, and something about it makes him smile. Even in a time of crisis, she remains the same as she always is. It's the strangest point of comfort.
"You're on your own from here." She says and he gives her a weak approximation of a smile. "But if you need something, yell. I'll be across the hall, door open."
"Okay. Thank you." He says and she nods, then walks out of the room and down the stairs.
After a moment, while he's getting undressed, he hears her footsteps come back up the stairs and pass by the door, then walk into her room. He leaves the door cracked open as he showers, very slowly, scrubbing himself clean, until his skin is red and raw and burning. He gets dressed equally as slowly, then walks out of the bathroom and to her room.
"I didn't die." She looks up. She's sitting on her bed, reading a book with a pink cover.
"Glad to hear it." She replies, shutting the book and setting it down. He walks into her room and carefully sits on the bed beside her. She hands him the glass of water and he sips it slowly. "You still feeling alright?"
"Yeah, just tired." He says and she nods. "Did I do anything else…weird last night?"
"You found my driving abilities really funny, which is fair." He can't help but laugh. "You called me pretty a lot, told me I was smart, too."
"Both objectively true."
"Hmm. Um…you muttered something about peanuts before you fell asleep on the couch, in your suit. I don't know what you said, but I heard "peanuts" and "video game" and chose not to question it." She looks at him like she hopes he knows what he was talking about, but he shakes his head.
"Well, I'm allergic to peanuts, so…I don't really know what I was talking about." She scratches her scalp and smiles at him. "I'm sorry about kissing you. I shouldn't have done that." He says and she shrugs.
"It's alright. I didn't exactly stop you." She says and he raises his eyebrows.
"You…didn't?"
"Well, to be fair, I was thinking about all of the reasons Miss Green would have drugged you, so I also don't think I was kissing you back. Mostly, I was just angry." She says and he nods, then hides a yawn behind his hand. "Tired?"
"Very." He replies and she shifts on the bed, then pats the space beside her. "Neve—"
"I've kissed you, half-heartedly, mind you, I don't mind if you nap beside me for a bit." She says and he exhales, then lies down beside her and closes his eyes, head on the pillow. He really is so tired, eyes heavy and warm, body aching and tired and relaxed. She smells nice beside him, like the remnants of expensive perfume and something like lotion his grandmother might have worn, and it makes him even more relaxed, nostalgia lacing its way into his sleep-addled mind.
"You said something last night, before I got drugged, or maybe while I was, it's all very blurry, about hair jewelry?" He says, mostly into the pillow.
"Oh. They had some hair jewelry on display, but they were presenting it as this strange, occult thing rather than something very normal. They actually did that a lot." He hums, prompting her to go on. He's always enjoyed listening to her talk about things, not that he'd say it to her. Maybe he can now. "They had lots of mourning clothes on display, but didn't talk about the stages of mourning or how they were different for men and women, and also didn't talk about the reason we even have mourning clothes, Queen Victoria. And the "spirit photography" bullshit…" She keeps talking and he smiles, eyes still closed, as she rants about the photographs they had on display, very clearly faked. They scared him then, but now he's relaxed.
And then, very carefully, she leans down and brushes his hair out of his face, and presses a kiss to his forehead, right before he falls asleep.