Page 37 of She Haunts Me Still

“I’m not exactly her type,” he replies dryly. “Look—Saskia’s a good actress who happens to excel at rapid line memorization. But she’s not the most grounded person, to put it mildly. It doesn’t matter, though—you won’t need your understudy because you’re gonna nail your performance,right?”

Mallory exhales through her teeth, thinking of Hendrix’s comments. “Right.”

Ezra slides off the bed, crossing to his desk. “You’re better off keeping your distance from Saskia, anyway. Trust me.”

“What? Why—?”

“As for everything else you just said,” he continues, “I think we should go to the source, don’t you?”

Mallory tips her head. “The source?”

“If Lily was exhumed and reburied as you said, her spirit is probably restless as fuck.” Ezra rummages in his desk before tugging a few objects loose. Mallory has to squint for a moment until she realizes. The candles. The lighter. The knife. Chalk.

“Last night, when we were under the stage,” he adds, “you made contact. Maybe we can try again. See if Lily will tell you what she needs to be put to rest.”

Mallory hesitates. “What if that’s not what she wants?”

“Only one way to find out.”

Mallory nods, swallowing her trepidation. She bends to fetch the ribbon of hair she always carries in her bag now and hands it to Ezra, who lays it on the wooden floor. He arranges the candles in their usual formation and lights them. She takes the opportunity to glance around the newly lit room, registering his wooden bureau, his long coat hooked on the door, the frames hanging—

“What’s that?” she murmurs, approaching the wall at the head of his bed. She examines the divots in the plaster, the way they disappear underneath the edges of an indie film poster. “Are those…scratches?”

Ezra doesn’t even glance up from where he’s drawing the circle. “Maybe. It was like that when I moved in.”

Mallory studies the markings. Five of them in a row, as though someone had dragged their nails through the wall. But the more she inspects them—the jagged edges, the depth of the cracks—the more it appears the wall wasn’t damaged by nails at all.

They look more like claw marks.

She looks back at Ezra, primed with more questions, but her planned interrogation evaporates when she registers his contemplative expression.

“What are you thinking?” Mallory prompts, kneeling beside him.

“We’re asking new questions,” Ezra says, “so I think we need a new offering.”

She glances at her hand, grimacing. “More blood?”

“Yes, but…I think it should be from both of us. A joint offering.”

This surprises her. “What do you mean?”

He watches her carefully in the candlelight. “Do you trust me?”

When he first asked her that question, it felt like a reluctant leap of faith to say yes. But here in his room, in the aftermath of the pain he doesn’t let other people see, the words are easier to say.

“I trust you, Ezra.” Something flickers in his eyes. As though he didn’t expect her to say it so confidently. Or say it at all.

Wordlessly, Ezra brings the knife to his own hand and pricks the tip of his finger. He barely flinches as blood pools on his skin. His nonchalance strikes her as unexpectedly sad; she realizes how easy it is for Ezra to be wounded without showing it. She wonders what it must have taken for him to learn that, wonders if it could ever be undone.

“May I?” he asks, reaching for Mallory’s hand.

She extends her palm despite her unease, watching as he cuts into her middle finger, releasing a pearl of blood. It stings,but she doesn’t wince, either. Perhaps because she feels safe with him, even like this. Maybe he feels safe with her, too.

“Here.” Ezra guides their bleeding hands above the candles with a gentle squeeze. “Just a drop or two.”

Mallory doesn’t respond, transfixed by the liquid splattering over the wax, the way bleeding alongside Ezra is as intimate and breathless as a kiss. The way he can slice open her skin and it somehow feels like being held. The idea is disquieting, intoxicating, turns the room into a blur of copper light and contradictions.

“That should do it.” Ezra’s blood drips slowly down her knuckles. “One more step.”