Bitter Spirits by Jenn Bennett

going?” he asked Aida.
    She stopped in front of a nearby lot with a half-constructed house. Cement steps built into the hill were still framed in timber, flanked by two freshly bricked posts on either side.
    â€œLet’s wait for the taxi here,” he suggested.
    She didn’t turn around to look at him. Her silence was confusing. Maybe he was wrong, but the way she’d reacted to Florie’s obnoxious chattering was as if—well, that couldn’t be right. She wasn’t jealous, was she? Because that’s damn well what it seemed like in the heat of the moment, but maybe it was only what he
wanted
to believe.
    Frustrated, he stared at the fog clinging to the trees and the roofs of houses across the street. “That was interesting.”
    â€œI’m not sure what got into me. I’m sorry if I embarrassed you.”
    â€œFlorie’s smashed. She won’t even remember it in the morning. She never does.” He reached in his tuxedo pocket and held out the silver knife in his palm. “What is this?”
    Her fingers brushed his as she took it. They looked at each other for a moment, then her gaze broke away. She rummaged around in her bag, retrieving a small silver cap. “It’s a military snake bite kit. I think it once belonged to a British pilot.” She screwed the cap over the blade. “Lancet is here and the other end holds medicated salve.”
    â€œA lancet,” he repeated, still confused. “Why were you holding it when you called up Florie’s husband?”
    â€œBecause even though I can send ghosts away without help, I need to enter a trance state in order to call a spirit who’s left this plane.”
    â€œWait. If they leave this ‘plane’ after death, where do they go?”
    â€œAcross the veil to the beyond.” She made a vague sweeping gesture. “Look, don’t ask me to tell you the meaning of life or the one true religion or what happens to souls once they’ve crossed over, because I don’t know. They won’t tell you if you ask them, either. All I know is that I can call most of them back from wherever they are to communicate with their loved ones, as long as they haven’t been dead too long.”
    â€œSo you need to be in a trance to do that, but what’s the lancet got to do with it?”
    â€œLots of ways to enter a trance, but since I don’t usually have time to meditate, the fastest way for me is pain.” She twirled the lancet in her fingers, then palmed it, showing him. “I can hold it onstage without anyone noticing it.” Her big eyes blinked up at him. She pointed the capped lancet at her thigh. “I prick myself here.”
    â€œJesus! You injure yourself every time you call up a spirit?”
    â€œIt’s not bad, and I like helping people. Provides some resolution to the past.” She slipped the lancet into her coat pocket and retrieved her gloves. “Besides, it pays the rent, you know?”
    She was tougher than he imagined. He studied the silhouette of her face beneath the brim of her cloche. The upturned tilt of her nose echoed the curved front of her bob, curling ever so slightly against her cheeks. She caught him staring and turned away, testing out the concrete steps. Finding them solid, she ascended one step, then another. She toed the wooden board housing the third step.
    â€œThis wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when I was telling you about wanting to do séances,” she said with her back to him. “I’m sure you feel like you’re doing me some big favor by getting me this high-paying gig, but I don’t need help arranging work. And it doesn’t matter how much money people throw my way—if they don’t take me seriously, I might as well be dressing up in a jester suit and tap-dancing.”
    Why was she so agitated? “Look, I wasn’t trying to do you a favor—”
    â€œAnd I