POA ch007 — We are Here

Summary: You are here.

Author's Notes: And now it really begins.

Content Warnings: Possession, manipulation, loss of bodily autonomy, emetophobia, ouija boards, brief mention of internalized transphobia.

Under Henry, Ash, and Naomi’s fingers, the planchette begins to move. It scrapes softly and assuredly across the surface of the spirit board.

Henry is not moving it. Or, at least, he doesn’t think he is.

“Fuck you,” Ash spits.

“It’s not me,” Henry insists.

The planchette stops on the ‘W.’

“Give it a rest, Ash,” Henry sighs.

“Wh— I’m not moving it!” Ash’s voice pitches higher with every syllable.

The planchette shifts again, traversing the center of the spirit board. Ash’s fingers slip on the smooth wood, nervous sweat making them lose their grip.

E.

“We,” Naomi reads out.

“Naomi?” Henry says. “You’ve had your fun, n-now stop it.”

Naomi scowls. “Why would I move it? It must be one of you two.”

With a grunt of frustration, Ash rips their hands away from the planchette.

The planchette slides again, unerring in its course.

A.

“This isn’t funny, Henry.” Ash’s voice edges from frustrated to angry. “Just, just stop it now.”

“I’m not doing anything!” Henry insists, voice coming closer to a panicked shout. “It has to be Naomi.”

Leveling him with a stern look, Naomi draws her hands back from the planchette.

Now, only Henry is touching it.

It pauses its motion. Cheeky.

And then moves again.

R.

Cold shock trickles down Henry’s body like freezing rain. Am I the one moving it? He thinks, in panic. He hadn’t meant to. He doesn’t want to.

“God you ass,” Ash spits again. “I knew it! I made you promise, and you still pull this shit?”

Henry tries to stop. He can feel the muscles in his shoulders, arms, fingers, and wrists tensing to move the planchette.

I want to stop, Henry thinks. I don’t want to move it.

But his muscles tense. The planchette moves.

E.

“Are,” Naomi recites.

“Guys, I— I swear, I’m not—”

Ash tsk’s, rolling their eyes. They don’t believe Henry. The cold-wet shock crystallizes like an icicle in Henry’s back. They don’t believe me. Please, I don’t want it to move.

Naomi darts her eyes between the movement of the planchette and Henry’s anguished face.

H.

Just stop it, Henry commands himself. Just stop it now.

His body does not listen. The planchette shifts again.

“Stop!” Henry shouts. “Whatever is doing this, just, just, stop it! Let me go! I’m not moving the thing, I— urgh—”

Henry tries to rip his hands from the wood, but he has no control over his arms. Desperate, he leans his torso back, trying to pull his hands by the shoulders. His muscles feel about to split in two, peeled apart like string cheese.

Despite pouring all of his strength into pulling away, Henry’s fingers leave the wood for barely a moment. He has but a half-second of relief, a half-second to hope that whatever force is controlling him has relinquished its hold— and then his chest and stomach muscles are no longer his own, either. They tense of their own accord, and he lurches forward to make contact with the wood once more, as though magnetized. As soon as his fingers touch, they move it.

E.

Ash and Naomi exchange twin expressions of horror.

Henry grunts and squirms and groans and pulls, trying to get himself to stop the movement. He succeeds only in slowing it; his muscles, rebelling against him, achingly inch the planchette from the ‘E’ downwards. Henry glances at his friends wildly as his shock splinters, giving way to all-encompassing panic.

Something is very, very wrong.

“Hen,” Ash pleads, voice breaking on the nickname, “Stop it.”

R.

“I can’t, I—” Henry cries.

Ash lurches across the spirit board and seizes one of Henry’s arms. Naomi does the same, on the other side. Despite the strength of his friends, even they are not enough to stop his hands from moving of their own accord, sliding the planchette slowly — oh, so slowly — back up.

E.

“Here.” Naomi says. “We — are — here.”

The message is complete. And, with that final letter, Henry is unexpectedly released. His stolen muscles are returned to him even as the few he’d retained control over continue to reel back from the spirit board. Like a taut rubber band, Henry snaps himself backwards and throws himself to the ground, bringing Ash and Naomi with him.

Henry pants, his heart pounding. His stomach lurches, rebelling against him, too, but this time in a perfectly human way. He launches himself towards their kitchen trash just in time to vomit up the leftover pizza. His arms are trembling with exertion and adrenaline. He is covered in sweat.

Henry heaves once, twice, three times ineffectually before the nausea subsides. He wipes his mouth with the back of his still-shaking hand and collapses onto the floor. His heart is beating out of his chest. Will it be the next thing to act against me?

Henry pants. When he finally finds his words once more, an apology tumbles out.

“I’m sorry,” Henry pants, “I—

“Henry, are you—” Naomi begins.

“I’m fine,” Henry insists. He takes stock of his body: it appears to have returned fully to his control. He wiggles his fingers, examines his arms. Swallows. His muscles flex when he does, his hands return to his side.

“That’s… good to hear,” Naomi continues, “but that wasn’t what I was going to ask.”

Henry stares at the two of them. They keep their distance.

“What?”

“Are you… um. Are you still, you know, you?”

“What?”

“The spirit board said ‘we are here,’” Ash says. “Who’s… who’s we? Who are you?”

“I’m me,” Henry insists. “I’m Henry. Henry Choix.”

Henry leans forward. He wants a hug, he wants to wash his face, he wants to collapse into bed.

Naomi and Ash scoot backwards.

“Guys?”

“Why did you move the planchette?” Naomi asks.

Henry feels dizzy. The room, the faces of his friends, swim before him. He presses his face to his hands.

“What? I don’t know. It was like I couldn’t control my hands.”

“But now you can?” Naomi presses.

“Yes!”

“Hold up two fingers, then.”

Henry holds up two fingers. Naomi huffs, relieved.

“Okay,” she says.

Henry chokes out a small sob. He tears his eyes away from her, and faces Ash. Henry knows the feeling of Ash’s hugs so well and desperately needs one. His skin is crawling with gooseflesh and cooling sweat. He feels wrung out.

“Ash?”

“Tell me something only Henry would know.”

“Um.” Henry sniffles again, and wipes his nose. “Your parents recently moved to Indianapolis, but you’re from Maine originally?”

“Anything could know that,” Ash presses each word out like they’re worried about wrinkles.

“Anything? What are you guys talking about!” Henry throws his arms out and finds they’re shaking again. “I had some— some kind of fit, or, or something.”

Naomi sniffs. “I think we can all agree it wasn’t just that. This is… something else.”

“You always make yourself overnight oats for breakfast in the mornings,” Henry says to Ash, “With cinnamon and maple syrup. You made me bring some back when I visited my cousins in Ottawa last summer, since the stuff they sell here is shit.”

Ash’s gaze softens, only slightly. Henry scrambles around for other things to say.

“You pretend to like chocolate, because who doesn’t like chocolate, but secretly you despise it and you always buy milk or white chocolate when you can get away with it. It got to the point where your parents got you tested for a chocolate allergy as a kid. You— when you’re drunk, you have a truly impressive rant about how ‘chocolate-lover propaganda’ has brainwashed our society into thinking chocolate is tasty when it actually isn’t, and—”

Henry hiccups a breath. Ash’s mouth wobbles. Naomi puts a hand on their arm and meets their eyes imploringly. Henry stops, a brief aftershock of nausea twisting his stomach. When he recovers, he looks to Ash again.

“Ash, I’m— I don’t know what’s happening to me,” Henry says. His throat muscles are sore and straining. “But I think it’s still me?”

Ash meets Henry’s gaze and nods, once, firmly. Then they scramble to their feet, whirl around, and disappear into their bedroom, slamming the door behind them.

Henry and Naomi both flinch at the noise.

Henry starts to stand, but his vision goes black and fuzzy as he does. He plants a hand against the wall.

“Woah, woah!” Naomi says, and shoots up— to keep Henry from falling, or to keep him from going after Ash, or both. Henry isn’t sure.

“Leave them, for a bit,” Naomi says. “You should go and get some rest.”

“It’s not possible. It’s not possible,” Henry insists. “I-I mean, you’re a physicist. Ghosts, spirits, possession— it doesn’t happen. It doesn’t exist. It must have been some kind of…. some kind of psychotic fit, o-or something. It can’t have been—”

But Naomi is not listening to him. She is not making eye contact. Instead, she is staring at the spirit board and the candles, dripping wax onto the floor.

“I need to sleep,” Henry says lamely. “This’ll… this’ll all make sense in the morning.”

…

Naomi guides him to his room and brings him a glass of water. Henry scrolls on his phone for a while, his mind racing. He can’t rid himself of that foreign sensation, the moment of realization that despite his thoughts, his body was acting of its own accord.

Even the memory of it brings bile to his throat once more.

From downstairs, Henry hears the muffled sounds of Ash practicing their latest cello piece. Ash’s room sits just below Henry’s, and the notes reverberate soothingly through the floor. The sound of low and melancholy Brahms lulls Henry first to calm and then, despite the early hour, to sleep.

He wakes with a groan and rolls over just in time to see Ash sheepishly closing his bedroom door. Henry grumbles something sleepy and incoherent.

“Sorry,” Ash murmurs. “Didn’t think you’d already be asleep.”

“’M not anymore,” Henry mumbles back. He sits up and flicks his bedside lamp on. When he glances at his phone, it’s only 11 pm. He rubs his eyes. Even with just a couple hours’ sleep, Henry already feels remarkably better. The sickening feeling that his limbs aren’t his own has faded, nothing more than a strange and unpleasant memory.

“Are you alright?” Henry asks Ash.

“Feels rather like I should be asking you that,” Ash says, and perches on the edge of Henry’s bed.

“Feeling better now,” Henry replies. “You seemed really upset, though.”

“I… was. I— Henry, I’m sorry I told you to go and join that stupid study,” Ash apologizes, looking properly miserable. They wring their hands in their lap, head bowed.

“You couldn’t have known this would happen,” Henry said. “Of course, I don’t blame you. Not for any of this.”

“I… thanks. I’m sorry for getting so upset, earlier, too,” they continue. “Feels like I have too much to apologize for, lately. E-even suggesting the spirit board. Jeez, what a bad idea.”

“Why did you?” Henry says. “I’ve never known you to be particularly interested in, like, occult stuff?”

“Yeah.” Ash bites their lip. There’s something fluttering within their expression. In all the time they’ve known each other, Henry’s learned a great many things about both of his friends: how they take their tea, what foods they dislike, their pet peeves, the particular cuss words they volley at the washing machine when it stops working.

But Henry has never seen this expression on Ash’s face. Guarded and flickering. Haunted. A feeling Henry now understands on a visceral level.

“What is it?” Henry asks softly.

Ash opens their mouth, and then bites their lip.

“I’m… worried that you won’t believe me,” Ash explains. “I know that, after what we saw tonight— you’re more inclined than ever to believe a story like this. But.”

Ash inhales deeply.

“Okay, so,” Ash begins, “This was… when I was a kid, okay? I’ve never actually told anybody but my parents about this, but. Well. That didn’t exactly go well. Basically… the back of our house in Maine, it was sort of on a hill, pressing up against a bit of forest. Not, you know, full-on forest, but the closest you get in the suburban US, right? And I was… upset.”

Henry is desperately curious to ask Ash why, but refrains. His tongue feels caught in his mouth, loath to interrupt Ash’s story.

“I, um, ran into the woods one night. I played there a lot, but mostly on the edges. There were loads of thorny bushes and shit like that. B-but my dad and I would sometimes walk deeper into the woods, to a small pond. We’d find cool bugs, water-striders and pill bugs and worms and stuff. That was always fun. So I, um, I ran there that night. It was a full moon. Not that I believe in werewolves, or anything like that,” Ash lies. “but— weird, isn’t it? That this would’ve happened on a full moon?

“Anyway, I ran all the way to the pond. It was crystal-clear, reflecting the moon. I plopped down in the mud beside it. I was crying, and my tears made little ripples in the pond. I remember just sobbing.”

Again, Henry wants to interrupt, but something stops him. He takes Ash’s hand, instead, running his fingers along Ash’s many rings, stacked on their thumb and middle finger.

“Again, the reason why is— well, we can talk about it later, maybe. It’s not important for the, um, supernatural stuff. It was more to do with, um, my realizing that I was non-binary, so. I tried to come out to my parents that night, but I freaked out. They’re great about it, as you know, but I was so scared. They even bought me my first cello to make up for it. So. Um. Anyway.”

Ash’s face pinches, and Henry rubs his thumbs into the thick muscle of Ash’s hand, massaging it gently.

“Right.” Ash continues, recovering. “So anyway. I was terrified. But I, um, gazed into the pond, and wiped away my tears, and when the surface had stopped rippling, I— I heard something. Sort of. It was barely there, but it just very quietly whispered to me, I choose you.”

I choose you.

I choose you, Henry repeats.

“Nobody was there, so I thought I’d imagined it. I mean, it was just a whisper, like something carried on the wind. But it was oddly calming, too, for a moment. I felt comforted. But only for a second, because then I looked at my reflection in the pool. Right here,” Ash gestured above their shoulder, by their right ear. “And I saw something.”

Henry twitches.

“I can’t even quite describe it, but it felt like something was looking back. I felt, um, eyes, and a sensation — like a hand on my shoulder.”

Henry rips his hands back from Ash’s, startled. He does a double-take, half-convinced this all must be a prank on Ash’s part.

Ash looks deathly serious.

“I felt that too,” Henry says, his tongue unstuck.

“Oh, god,” Ash whispers. “Well. I don’t know what it was, and I didn’t see it again until—”

“Until I came home from the lab,” Henry breathes. “Fuck, Ash.”

“I know. A-and I thought, even then, maybe I was imagining it. But it felt so real, I was absolutely convinced that there was something there. Not fully there, maybe. But it was real. Oh, god, it was real.”

Ash falls silent. Henry has no idea what to say.

“I believe you,” Henry begins. “’Course I do. Um. I’m sorry you experienced that, it sounds terrifying.”

“Hah. Thanks,” Ash says. “Thought I was over it.”

“Yeah.” Henry winces. “Sorry for bringing it all to the surface again.”

“Sorry for convincing you to join the study.”

Silence.

“D’you really think there’s something there?” Henry asks. “Some… entity? Or entities? Watching me, controlling me?”

“I— Honestly? It’s terrifying, but I really, really do.”

…

Henry can’t fall back asleep that night. He tries, tossing and turning. He can’t stop feeling that loss of autonomy, his limbs moving of their own accord. Like he was nothing more than a puppet. He can’t stop seeing Ash’s terrified face, retelling their story.

Could the same thing really have found Ash, all those years ago, and Henry, now?

Yes, Henry’s mind whispers.

Henry lurches out of bed and flicks on the light. He pulls out a spare notebook and flips to a blank page. Henry takes up his pen.

“Alright, motherfucker,” Henry snaps. “If there’s really something there, give me a goddamn message. Write something. Do it.”

Poll 

Image Descr.: A screenshot of a poll at the bottom of a Patreon post, with two options. Option One — Write 'hello'. Option Two — 'Do Not Write Anything'. Initializing... Polling... eighty-two percent, write 'hello.' Eighteen percent, 'do not write anything.'

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Points of Articulation is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is written and created by Hannah Semmelhack, with beta-reading by Fiona Clare.