Page 11 of Ghost in the Night

I think of all the images I’ve seen of the slave trade, the way people were kept on ships, in chains, and families torn apart …

I shudder, my feet unable to stay still as I pace in place. No wonder it feels so heavy here. That type of pain never leaves the air.

“Even to this day,” Asher says, waving at the ground, “you don’t have to dig far before you come across a bone or a skull. The people buried here were abused in death as they were in life, and they are not at peace. They suffered a grave injustice and are angry about their mistreatment. That type of anger evolved and turned them into what the Gullah people call hags or haints. Malevolent spirits thatcause ill or misfortune to the living. There is not one house in this square that hasn’t experienced some type of haunting, strange accident, or misfortune.”

He turns in a slow circle, pointing to all the homes around us. My heart starts racing. We’re surrounded by ghosts!

“Anyone who has lived and died here stayed long after,” Asher says. “LOTS of activity! People have captured photos of ghostly entities walking through the square or floating in and out of homes. Like that house, 432 Abercorn Street, where a famous homicide took place in the late 1950s …”

My stomach ties itself in a large knot and twists into a cramp. I touch my side and lean into the pain. Robby notices.

“You okay?” he whispers.

I clear my throat. “Yeah. Fine.”

But I’m not fine. We’re standing on ancestors, on our history, and they’re mad. So mad they turned into something scary. Is that what Grandma is turning into? Maybeshe’s mad that Daddy and I haven’t been cleaning up the way we should.

I bow my head and say a quick prayer.

I’m sorry, Grandma! Promise, I’ll get to cleaning as soon as we get home.

“And that is the Arnold House,” Asher says, carrying on with stories. “During the Civil War, they used the basement as a makeshift hospital. Many soldiers died on the operating table. Today, soldiers are seen walking through the halls as if ready to report for duty. There’s even a story about ghost soldiers practicing drills on that very grass.”

Adults start taking pictures with their phones, and I almost forgot my whole take-a-picture-of-a-ghost mission. I grab my camera and snap a few shots of the square.

“What about that house over there?” one of the adults asks.

Asher glances over at the white abandoned house on the corner.

“Oh, right. Yes. That’s the Myers House. Originally owned by Henry and Elizabeth Myers in the 1800s. It’ssaid that when Henry went off to war, Elizabeth waited by the downstairs window for him to return. When she learned of his death, she died of a broken heart right by that very window. Years later, when another family moved in, Elizabeth was seen walking the halls. But the house has been vacant for a long time now.”

“Uh, hey … I think I caught something in the square?” the blonde woman squeaks loudly, holding her phone up. “I’m not sure. Is this an orb?”

On the screen is a snapshot she took of the dark square, lit only by a few streetlights. But in the corner, I see something that looks like floating round white lights. I gasp.

Orbs!

Asher leans over to examine the photo and nods. “Yup. Definitely activity.”

As the tour group gathers around the woman to get a glimpse of her photo, my stomach fills with butterflies. I grip my camera tighter. Is this it? Is this finally the moment I cop a shot of a real ghost?

I start clicking away, turning in a circle, holding my breath. The houses are really beautiful … except for that one onthe corner. The Myers House, Asher called it. The looming white mansion stands out and not just because of the wire fence around it. It’s missing half its windowpanes, at least the ones that aren’t boarded up. And—

Wait. Did something just move in there?

I mean … I thought I saw something. It could be a weird trick of the streetlight. I hold my breath and zoom in. Maybe if I get a little closer—

Asher claps his hands, and I jump with a screech.

“Moving along! Next stop is …”

On the ride home, Lena and Daddy laugh over some silly inside jokes, and I scroll through photos from the tour, examining each picture like a forensic scientist from a crime show. Robby munches on saltwater taffy Lena picked up for him.

“Want some?” he asks, his mouth full of gooey candy.

“No, thanks,” I mumble, focused on my camera, the battery at 5 percent.

“Man, some of that stuff was really … dark. I’m going tohave nightmares. I just know it. I don’t even watch horror movies. Sometimes I read horror comics, but then my mom takes them away.”