Arc II, Chapter 52: The Séance Part Two

“We’re not here to trap you,” Kimberly said. “Honest. We know something strange is happening here, and we think that you do too.”

Geist’s face didn’t budge.

“Strange?” he said. “This isn’t strange. I suspect that things have always been this way. The only people who know for sure are conspirators. Are you with them?” he paused only for a moment. “Don’t answer. Don’t tell me you’re on my side. I’ll forego that reassurance if it spares me another round of lies. Do you want to know what is strange about Carousel and my family? I’ll never stop telling that story as long as I live. To silence me, they’ll have to kill me.”

He scratched his forehead, right next to the gash where Lillian Geist had beat his brains in.

“Now, get on with your questions. Before you ask, I will not be going with you to the supposed Centennial,” he said.

Kimberly took a breath. “You think we’re here to bring you to the Centennial?”

He sat down on the broken bed in the room and leaned against the headboard for support. “I am not a fool. I read in the paper that the Centennial has returned. I knew it would only be a matter of time before you all tried to pry me down the hill. You are nothing if not predictable.”

“No, we’re not—” Kimberly started to say, but Antoine put his hand on her shoulder.

“You said ‘supposed’ Centennial,” Antoine said softly. “Is this not the real Centennial?”

Jedediah began to laugh heartily.

“My father was successful as long as I knew him and for many years before I was born, but I doubt even he could have founded the town before he even knew his letters. They reported it would be the Centennial three years ago, too. I guess they didn’t expect me to lock myself in my house the whole week through. Thought they would try that trap again.” He let loose another round of laughs. “They could never pull this sort of nonsense when my family was alive. My relatives were a bit slow on the uptake, but even they knew basic math. A Centennial in 1989, and again in 1992. They must think they are hilarious. No, no, they throw their Centennial Celebrations to twist the knife. They know I am their prisoner, and now they flaunt it.”

He was aware that the Centennial date was off in some manner. It didn’t sound like he knew about the continuity loop, but he did know they had thrown it before. I had the strongest urge to ask who he meant when he said, “They,” but I didn’t want to derail the conversation just yet. I would save that question.

“You say your family wasn’t aware of the strange nature of Carousel?” I asked.

Jedediah thought for a moment.

“What they knew and what they chose to believe, I couldn’t say. You spend your life having the red carpet rolled out for you; you might be afraid to stray from it, too. Even if the carpet leads somewhere horrifying, you push the thought away. You want to believe that you are just that capable, that well-loved, that beautiful, that lucky. You’ll walk the red carpet until it leads you off a cliff. I don’t blame them. As much as I tried to convince them that there was something wrong, that we were playthings to some conspiratorial oppressor, to Dyrkon, I never did have proof. We Geists were larger than life but not larger than death.”

Jedediah was aware. Lillian was aware that something was wrong, but she coped by going along with it and playing her role as the beauty queen that the town of Carousel had laid out for her. It sounded like Jedediah took a different route.

“Let’s start from the beginning,” Antoine said. “Can you tell us about growing up as a Geist?”

Jedediah chuckled.

“I had an ordinary childhood,” he said. “I know that is hard to believe, but it’s true. My family was successful, and no one had breathed a word of any Geist Curse until I was already grown. We summered in the Carousel Hills on Lake Crescent. We took ski trips to Snowblind in the winter. My father worked incessantly, but I thought all fathers did that, so I was content. My mother was my best friend back then. She was quite pleased with that. Carlyle and Steven wanted to grow up so fast, but I agreed to be her little boy. She was the one who taught me to ride my bicycle and how to dress my scraped elbows. My brothers were older than me by a decade. They wanted little to do with me at that age, so I was socialized with the help’s children. Nothing untoward happened until… until I was twelve.”

As he spoke, images appeared on the red wallpaper. Flashbacks. I saw him dressed up all proper, chasing frogs by a pond next to one of the Geist Mansions, though it was too small to be the one that burned down. I saw him watching his brothers talk to girls through an ornate glass window. At the end, I saw him sneaking through a hallway in darkness.

He paused. I wanted him to continue, but before I could ask him to, Kimberly spoke.

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“Your mother,” she said. “She passed, right?”

Jedediah nodded. “When I was fifteen. I was alone in the world after that.”

She looked at us suspiciously, and it was only then that I realized what was odd. As he spoke, there was no flashback footage of his mother—none whatsoever.

Without prompting, Jed continued.

“It was hard enough after I was twelve, but without her, I was alone with my secret and no one to talk to. I chose to believe it was all a dream,” he said.

“What was all a dream?” I asked.

The flashback returned to the dark hallway, to young Jedediah Geist walking slowly toward the sound of whispers.

“The meeting,” he said. “It was the first time I ever saw Silas Dyrkon in the flesh. I had seen posters with his name and those mechanical contraptions on street corners before for tourists. I knew of the man, and I had heard the stories, so when I saw him, I recognized him. He was striking, intimidating.”

Jedediah continued talking, but the flashback immediately took me aback. It was Silas Dyrkon. Actually seeing him was a shock. He was a tall man who could have been a celebrity by his looks and poise. Not the image I had of a banker. He had dark hair and piercing eyes. The mannequin in the Silas the Showman boxes was clearly modeled after him, but they did not do the man justice. He glanced down the dark hallway in the direction of Jedediah, but he said nothing. Wasn’t looking at Jedediah. He was staring right at me. That meant he was looking right into the camera.

He smiled a devilish smile and then returned his attention to the man I knew to be Bartholomew Geist. My heart nearly jumped from my chest.

He had looked at the camera.