Work Text:
Joel had the perfect plan to prank Jimmy. Bring an Ouija board to the upcoming bad boys sleepover, pretend that there’s a ghost, and scare Jimmy. Sounds easy enough. He even told Grian about it, who swore to play along, saying it sounded hilarious.
So when the day of the sleepover arrived, he packed his bag with the Ouija board hidden in the back, as well as various other pranks he could pull. The best part of it all, was that the sleepover was at Jimmy's house, and if executed properly, Jimmy would be too frightened to fall asleep ever again. Well, he didn't want that to happen, that was a bit much. But as long as he was frightened for a couple minutes, Joel would be happy.
What Joel hadn't accounted for, was for there actually being a ghost.
The sleepover started as all their sleepovers usually did, jumping on Jimmy's trampoline and trying to do flips. One successful flip happened in the 30 minutes they spent on the trampoline. Then, they ordered pizza and played mario kart. And Grian definitely didn't hijack Jimmy’s controller midway through. He would never! The next couple hours were spent playing games such as “Never have I ever” and “Truth or dare”, true sleepover classics.
And then, opportunity struck. While Jimmy was packing away the Uno cards, Joel grabbed his bag and pulled out the Ouija board, as well as the weird little pointer thing that was used to choose each letter. He lay them out on the floor and waited until Jimmy turned back around. When he did, he let out a sigh, but sat down next to them anyway. Step one, complete. Now he just had to pretend to be getting possessed and make a weird sentence like “I’M GOING TO EAT ALL OF YOUR TOILET ROLL” or “I’LL RIP A HOLE IN YOUR TRAMPOLINE”. Sounds petrifying.
“Joel why are we doing this?” Jimmy asked, hands fidgeting with the hem of his shirt.
“Jim, do you really not wanna know if your house is haunted?” Joel asked, putting on a show of disappointment, knowing that the blonde would cave regardless.
“I- sure.” He huffed, leaning forwards to the Ouija board intently.
Joel’s hands found their place on the disk, but before he had a chance to move it to the first letter, the disk seemed to move by itself, dragging Joel with it.
“A” Chanted Jimmy and Grian.
Now Joel was getting rather worried.
“L”
“W”
“A”
“Y”
“S”
“Always? Always what?” Jimmy asked, and his question was about to be answered, for Joel’s hands were moved over to the W.
“W”
Joel locked eyes with Grian, who was holding back a laugh. But Joel wasn't, because he was scared too.
“A”
“T”
“C”
“H”
“I”
“N”
“G”
As the letters progressed, Jimmy started to get even more scared, and so did Joel. The thought that there was actually something haunting Jimmy’s house right now scared him. It scared him a lot. Grian was none the wiser, laughing as though this was all just a prank. And to Grian he probably thought it was, he didn't know that the prank had gone wrong.
Joel pulled his hands away from the disk as soon as he could, holding them close to his chest as he inched away from the Ouija board.
“You guys don't actually believe this, do you?” Grian laughed, reaching for the board himself. “Alright I want a turn.” His hands found the disc, but almost as soon as his hands made contact, the disc shot across the board, a message so fast that nobody could decipher it.
The look in Grian's eyes was one of pure terror, and he pulled his hands away from the disk, leaving it hovering over a weird symbol that looked like it was made of two Ls and two dots.
“Joel, you weren't faking it either?” Grian asked in a panic. Joel could only shake his head as a response, the words dying on his tongue.
“I’m not gonna take my chances with that.” Jimmy huffed, in an “I told you so” sort of way. He covered his hands with his sleeves and put both the board and the disc into the nearby bin, hopefully to never be seen again.
Yeah, Joel wouldn't be jumping at the chance to come back to Jimmy’s house after that.