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Evan groaned inwardly to himself. How the hell did Nogla convince him to even do this? He stood alone in his apartment, a few candles he'd managed to find lit around him, a circle of salt around him, and a few crudely drawn symbols were drawn on paper and taped to the carpet. Nogla had watched some show or another and would not shut the hell up about it, insisting the group try this summoning spell. Supposedly, this 'spell' was going to summon a demon and you had the power to ask it three questions about anything in existence. Or... Something like that. Evan hadn't been really paying much attention when Nogla was explaining it, to be honest.
Nogla insisted the guys try it, supposedly it worked for him. But he wouldn't tell what he asked this so-called demon. It seemed very fishy to Evan and likely just a ruse to creep out his friends. He was sure Marcel would be losing his shit right now. The poor guy had always been one to easily scare, especially with supernatural shit like this. Evan wasn't one to be superstitious so he was bullshitting most of the symbols Nogla told them to draw and the ring of salt looked more like a square of salt. Whatever, close enough, right?
He tried to remember the steps in his mind.
Candles? Check.
Salt? Check.
Symbol whats-its? Check.
Thirty minutes to midnight? Check.
The last thing to do was to light an incense and let it burn halfway before starting the summon.
Grabbing the incense from the nearby coffee table and the lighter next to it, Evan lit it and waited. He sat down cross-legged in the center of the salt square, letting the aroma of the incense wash over him. It was light and warm, with a powdery smell to it. Once it had burned halfway down, Evan began chanting the words Nogla had told him. At least, the ones he could remember.
"Hear these words, spirit. Hear my cries, spirit. something-something other side. Come to us something something. Cross now something divide." his voice echoed around his apartment like a breeze.
That was close enough, right?
A few moments later, his clock turned over to midnight. Supposedly, this was the time the demon would choose to reveal itself. So far, nothing had happened yet. A noise from his kitchen made him turn around only to see his cat slowly slinking into the darkness. The fucker must'v knocked something over. He made a mental note to check it out later.
As Evan turned back around, he was met with two sky blue eyes looking at him from behind a very worn looking hockey mask on the other side of his salt square. Practically jumping out of his skin, he jumped backwards, sending salt flying in every direction as he skidded over the line. A laughter filled the quiet of the room. A laugh unlike any he'd heard before, a hint of insanity held clearly in it. Slowly getting up, Evan saw a somewhat transparent figure staring at him. The hockey mask was the thing that stood out most about this, uhh, spirit? Demon? Ghost? The ghost wore a blue hoodie and loose black pants. He was looking at Evan with an unnerving curiosity.
"Who the hell are you ?" Evan mustered up the courage to ask after a long silence.
"I go by many names." The ghost said slowly and dramatically, using vigorous hand motions to emphasize his words. "El Diablo, Chupacabra, The Second Devil, Satan's Little Shit, the list goes on and on to be honest... But you can call me Delirious."
"Delirious? That's a ridiculous name."
"Well fuck you too. Do you always insult your guests?"
"N-no."
"That's a relief.. Sort of.. Not really."
"Anyways... You're supposed to answer three questions about anything right?"
"Sure, hit me."
"Uhm... Can you tell me my future?"
"Oh sure." Delirious stood, or rather, floated, over to Evan and threw his arm around Evan's shoulder. It was odd, he saw the arm around him but couldn't feel the weight of it. Delirious's voice got lower, almost to a whisper as he leaned in towards Evan's ear.
"In your future... I see... You being a little bitch."
"What?"
Delirious let go of Evan and laughed loudly. "Do you really think that shit works? Spirits can't tell you that crap. It's just a hoax. All we do is float around, scare a few grannies, and haunt some places every now and then. So whoever the fuck told you that shit was full of crap."
Evan felt somewhat disappointed. This wasn't how he'd been told spirits were going to be at all. "Can you possess people?" he asked.
Delirious thought for a moment before nodding. "Yeah, I suppose. It's real weird though. You get this tingly feeling and then you go numb. Then you watch as someone else controls your body. It's funny as fuck watching people freak out over it."
Evan shuddered at the thought. That must be a very unpleasant feeling, to say the least...
"Now I get to ask a few questions." Delirious said, poking Evan in the ribs.
"Shoot."
"Why the fuck did you half ass the summon?"
"Excuse me?"
Delirious pointed at the salt square, then to the symbols. "Okay those are totally wrong for starters. It's supposed to be a ring of salt not a fucking square. Who the fuck even taught you to make circles? Also what the hell are these symbols even? I can't even make out what you were supposed to be going for there, holy shit. Like, fuck, I know I write in idiot too but that's just ... awful penmanship. You should feel bad. And don't even get me started on the summoning itself. This whole thing is a fucking mess."
Evan's head spun as Delirious criticized his summoning paraphernalia. He was expecting questions more along the lines of "Who are you" or "Why did you summon me". Not a full rundown on everything he'd done wrong that night.
"Look, man. I didn't even think this whole thing would even work. My friend insisted a few friends and I try it. I just thought he was bullshitting with us to try and scare us." Evan said after Delirious had finished his rant.
"This isn't just some shit you mess around with. For the love of Christ, I bet you don't even know how to send me back, do you?"
"Send.. you back?" Shit... He hadn't even thought of that. Evan just figured Delirious could snap his fingers, or click his heels three times, or something and leave.
Delirious rolled his eyes and groaned loudly. "Great. Just fucking great."
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
A few days had passed since Evan had gained his new, err, roommate. Delirious was, in all honesty, a pain in the ass to live with. He was already dead so he never slept. He didn't have to eat either but still enjoyed using whatever ghost abilities he had to spoil the food Evan had. He especially liked to use that ability as Evan was about to take a bite of his food so he got a mouthful of rotten mess. Evan had to finally start leaving the apartment to eat. Lucky for him, Delirious was bound to the apartment so he couldn't follow.
This fucking ghost was going to drive him to insanity, he could feel it. It seemed like the only goal Delirious had in his miserable after-life was to make his life a living hell. And, boy, was he doing a hell of a job. Seven trillion nerves in the human body and that hockey mask wearing fucktruck was getting on every single one.
He'd tried calling Nogla about what to do with Delirious but his friend wouldn't believe him. He admitted to just wanting to scare everybody and thought Evan was just playing a trick to get back at him. Angrily, Evan had hung up on him mid-sentence. He felt like he was going to lose his mind any day now. Sitting down on the couch with a huff, Evan felt tired. Like he hadn't slept in a week. Delirious began to materialize from inside the couch cushion so only his torso, arms, and head were poking out.
"Y'know, I've been thinking." Delirious said, folding his arms across his chest.
"About what?"
"You never asked me those three questions."
"So?"
"So. Don't you wanna know?"
"Know what?"
"Y'know... Stuff."
"Fuck.. Sure, it's not like I have anything to lose.. How about... You. What happened to you? How did you die?"
"That's two questions."
"You know what I mean."
Delirious shrugged. "Alright then.." For once, he was silent before he replied. His blue eyes almost looked like he was in pain. "I was murdered."
This seemed to spark Evan's interest. "Murdered? Did you ever find out who did it? Or why?"
"Oh I know why. I made sure the bastard got what was coming to him too." he laughed. "Back in my day, several centuries ago that is, there was this fucker named Luke. Can't remember his last name for the life of me... No pun intended there.. Anyways, Luke was a real asshole, y'know? I mean, he was an overall nice guy but still an asshole.. Aah, he was one of my best friends, that crazy son of a bitch. Anyways, Luke and I got so hammered one night and ended up starting the biggest fucking bar fight in history. We fought each other, we fought other people, anything that dared step up to us last night. It was fucking great. Long story short, we get run out of town for being a public nuisance. We ran into this other guy, uhh, Sark I think his name was?" Delirious scratched his head as he tried to remember.
"I think that was it. Sark was a big guy, taller than you even. We ended up running onto his lands and broke up some shit. Turns out this Sark guy used to be a pretty infamous bandit and damn near sliced our heads off. By some grace of God, we managed to get away. A few cuts here 'n' there but nothing serious. So, a few days later we think we're in the clear. We're miles away from Sark's place and zero fucks to give to our surroundings. There was this one night where there wasn't a cloud in the sky, the stars were shining brighter than they usually did, and Luke and I had just set up a makeshift camp for the night. Midnight comes around and I hear a noise. Like someone's choking. I sit up and see Luke sprawled next to me, a rope around his neck and I'll be damned if it wasn't Sark himself. The fucker had been following us since we left his place. That's when the fucker cut my throat. But I don't think the fucker counted on me coming back as a ghost. Got the little shit when he was sleeping, same way he took out Luke."
"What did you do to piss him off that bad?"
Delirious laughed again. "Oh, y'know.. Stole some shit. We didn't think he'd fucking hunt us down though. The dude can hold a hell of a grudge."
Evan laughed, catching Delirious off guard and making him sink farther into the couch so just his head and barely his shoulders were poking through. "Honestly, I'm not surprised.."
Delirious laughed with him this time.
Once they had both calmed down, Delirious lifted himself up so he was floating a little bit above the couch seat. "Oh by the way. I need to confess something to you."
"What?"
"Well, y'know how you're supposed to be looking for a spell to send me back to the spirit world?"
"Yeah?"
"You're not gonna find one."
"What do you mean?"
"I can leave any time I want. I just enjoyed fucking with you the past few days so I just told you that lie."
"Are you fucking kidding me?" Evan wanted to punch Delirious but knew it wouldn't do any good. He'd just go through Delirious's transparent body and end up hitting something else.
Delirious's laughter echoed throughout the apartment as he disappeared into a small white cloud, leaving Evan alone for the first time in days. Something in Evan had snapped and he was sure, at this point, there was zero sanity left within him.
He'd just been played by a fucking ghost.