VANISHED (#1 in the VANISHED series) #NaNoWriMo2019 ✔

s i x t e e n ✔

"But... I can't do this without you, Stel." Arielle's lower lip quivered, and biting down on it didn't help control the shaking. "You're the medium, you channel all the ghosts."

Steering them into the hotel parking lot, Stella grunted. "That Penny girl came for you, Ari. Not me." She parked, pulled out the keys, and dropped them in her lap. "You should go home. Don't pursue this, don't push forward. Come home where Mom can perform a cleansing or something. I haven't learned how to do those." She let out a weak, disheartened chuckle. "Since I've declined my destiny my whole life."

"Stel..."

"Look." Stella shifted to her, placed her palm on her upper arm and squeezed. "I'm no professional, far from it. But the second I embraced all this, everything became clear. Ghosts, the afterlife, all that crap... it's no joke. Mom told me to take it seriously, and now... I do." Her grip tightened and Arielle winced. "Listen to me. I don't dish out warnings, not about this. I usually instruct you to yell at me if my leggings make me fatter than I already am—"

"—Stella! You are not fat!"

"Don't change the subject!" She huffed, using her other hand to pinch the bridge of her nose. "We were wrong to push. I was wrong, and this has taken a wild and unpredictable turn. Jade... we can't get to her, and this trip to commemorate her has gone far enough. We visited the places she wanted us to, we got spooked like she would have loved us to be, we got fucking haunted, and now... we need to leave. Ditch the board like I told you to and go home."

A pool of dread jiggled in Arielle's stomach whenever she moved, and her lungs tightened every time she breathed. Every wheeze sounded like a scream yearning for her to think this through, but... she couldn't stop.

I've taken this so far already... there's no way I can turn back.

"I need actual answers, so I have to keep going. At each stop we make puzzle pieces appear, a landscape forms, and I'm seeing things, patterns, stuff like that." She gulped, already regretting her decision—but adamant on looking confident in front of Stella. If she didn't... Stella would use any tiny opening to change her mind. "I'm scared beyond belief, but... Jade is out there, and I have to make sure she's okay. What happens after death—"

"—is not something you can get answers to, Ari!" Stella grabbed both her shoulders this time and shook her. "Please, wake the fuck up! My mom couldn't see her, I can't see her—she's gone. That Penny chick lied, Jade moved on, and she's toying with us. If you look for ghosts again she'll find you, and that won't be good. Heck, she's probably latched on to both of us by now and..."

"She's a ghost. Dead. She can't hurt me." Paranormal movies and TV reality shows said otherwise, but as much as she'd convinced herself spirits were real and something waited after death, Arielle wouldn't believe the deceased had means to harm the living. And even with the flashes of her encounter with the suicide girl—the blood, the puddles, the blinking lights, the horror-vibe—she wouldn't believe it.

Ghosts can't kill.

"If you persist in thinking that... you're going to get yourself hurt." Stella's arms went limp as she released Arielle and exited the car.

***

Both girls were too stubborn to be talked out of their decisions. They ruminated and grumbled and kept their distances for a while, until Arielle declared she needed a shower, and Stella needed to pack.

When Stella called her mom and told her of the situation, she yelled so loud the speakers on Stella's phone sounded like they'd explode. But Stella reminded her that Arielle was an adult, she'd made her choice, and she wanted to pursue this adventure.