"Is it over?"
Charlize stood in the wrecked bedroom, dazed, still trying to convince herself this wasn't some drug-induced fever dream.
If not for the chaos around her—splintered wood, overturned furniture, curtains tangled like seaweed in the wind—she might've written it off as a hallucination.
Christian didn't look up. He was still clutching the Polaroid camera, a photo in one hand and a worn contract in the other.
"What were you expecting?" he muttered.
"A romantic exorcism? Bit of pottery and a tearful goodbye like in Ghost?"
Moments ago, the air had cracked open with her name—Alexis—spoken in full by Christian like it was both a command and a curse.
Then came the whirlwind. Not metaphorical, either. A real one.
It slammed into the bedroom like a freight train, screaming through the walls, ripping apart drawers and memories.
Charlize had never been to the Deep South, but she imagined it felt something like this during tornado season—violent, surreal, terrifying.
Over it all, the screams. High-pitched, inhuman. Not just sound, but something that crawled into your chest and gripped your heart.
The Rambo and Terminator posters she'd never bothered to take down flared with strange light—like the past was protesting its own irrelevance—and then, just as fast as it started, everything went still.
She'd blacked out. Now she was back.
"She's asleep again," Christian said, holding out the photo.
"I sealed her in this."
Charlize took it without thinking. Then frowned.
"This… isn't me."
The girl in the photo was stunning. Slender frame. Haunted eyes. Something almost angelic, but off. An otherworldly kind of wrongness, like she didn't quite belong in the frame.
"That's because it's not you. It's Alexis."
Christian's tone was matter-of-fact, but beneath it was fatigue. He ran a hand through his hair, eyes scanning the wreckage like he'd seen it a thousand times before.
"I tweaked the camera. The film too. Special stuff, let's me capture what's not supposed to be seen. But my power's limited. I can't force a ghost to appear. They have to let themselves be seen."
Charlize narrowed her eyes. "So… you got her to sign the contract. Made her agree the photo was of her?"
"Exactly," he said, nodding.
"When I snapped it, you showed up—because you were the anchor. She was riding you, so to speak. I needed her to take ownership of the image. Only then would her presence fit into the photo."
"But I saw myself when you first took it," Charlize said slowly.
"So why didn't she?"
Christian exhaled, almost smiled.
"Because people never really see themselves clearly. Photos, mirrors—they're never the same. And for the dead? It's worse."
"Their sense of self is fractured, twisted up in denial. Alexis didn't even know she was dead, not really. Her memory's fogged, her ego paper-thin. So when I told her it was her, she believed me. Maybe she wanted to. And that belief? That's all I needed."
Charlize stared at the photo. The girl inside stared back.
Christian continued, his voice low and even.
"You also played a role—maybe without meaning to. When I took those shots of your body, you didn't call out the inconsistencies right away. That hesitation helped. If you'd immediately said, 'That's not me,' Alexis might've started questioning things. The whole plan could've unraveled."
Charlize exhaled slowly, nodding. She got it.
Her silence hadn't just saved the moment—it had helped sell the illusion. Still, a flicker of guilt stirred in her gut.
"I almost ruined it," she said quietly.
"I knew something was off from the beginning, but my instincts as an actress kicked in. I doubted the contract, doubted you, and you used that."
Christian gave her a dry smile, half-amused, half-resigned.
"I'm not blaming you. Hell, this was always going to be rough. Partnering with someone untrained to trap a spirit? That's high-stakes guesswork. But your instincts didn't wreck things. If anything, they helped. You kept Alexis just uncertain enough to fall into the trap."
He looked over at the cracked wall, eyes distant.
"When she looked at the photo, I was ready to pivot. Had a Plan B if she saw through it. But your subconscious belief? That carried through. She saw it as herself, and that's all I needed. She signed."
Charlize's brows rose. "Plan B? What was it?"
Christian hesitated, then pulled a small, weathered scrap of paper from his coat pocket. Yellowed, jagged at the edges, rough to the touch.
Symbols were scrawled across it in dark ink—jagged, unnatural things that made Charlize's stomach twist just looking at them.
"This," he said.
"What is it?"
"A binding sigil," he replied.
"Old magic. Nasty stuff. Written in a dead tongue no one speaks anymore—only whispered in rituals and scratched into stone in places you don't want to visit. This little scrap connects to something bigger. Something called the Hollow King."
Charlize's eyes narrowed.
"Hollow King?"
Christian nodded grimly. "A force that deals in lost souls, twisted deals, and forgotten names. Calling on it... You don't do that lightly. Plan B meant tapping into its power, forcing Alexis into submission through brute-force binding. But it takes a heavy toll. On both of us."
She looked down at the sigil, unsettled. "Sounds like something you don't walk away from clean."
"You don't," he said. "That's why I'm glad we didn't need it."
Charlize folded the note carefully, almost reverently.
"Still… better to have it and not need it, right?"
Christian chuckled, but there was no humor in it.
"Welcome to ghost-hunting."
A long beat passed. Then something clicked in Charlize's memory.
"Wait—back to Plan A. You told me to prep something. The anthill?"
Christian arched an eyebrow. "Yeah. I told you to set up an anthill. You forget already?"
She blinked, then rubbed her forehead as realization dawned.
"Right. After we confirmed the ghost was Alexis, we split up. You brought the gear, and I…"
"…asked you to prep an ant nest," he finished.
"Something old-school. Nature's way of cleansing the space. Ants are drawn to lingering energies. If they gather or scatter in certain patterns, it tells you what's still hanging around."
Charlize stared at him. "That's a weird trick."
Christian smirked. "That's exorcism. Weird tricks and sleepless nights."
----
References-
Ghost - It is a 1990 American supernatural romance film directed by Jerry Zucker from a screenplay by Bruce Joel Rubin.