Written by Kelsey Smith
Illustrated by Sarah Cheng
"My parents tried to hide the fact that there were ghost sightings and paranormal activities, but they needed to whisper a little quieter if they didn’t want me to know."
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There’s a chair at my grandma’s house. Not too long ago, give or take half a century, my great-great-grandmother Maude died on it in her sleep after eating some cornbread. Through the decades, family members got rid of it by giving it as a “gift” to other relatives who were unaware of the problems it had. For some reason that I will never know, my grandma kept that chair.
She displayed it in the front of the house where everyone could see it when they walked right in the door. Its green velvet sprouted around its body like rotted moss, making it the antique misfit among the other mid-century furniture. Every relative was unnerved by it, except me and my cousin. We were actually kind of fascinated by it.
My parents tried to hide the fact that there were ghost sightings and paranormal activities, but they needed to whisper a little quieter if they didn’t want me to know. Knowing that there was a real ghost in my Grandma’s house, I decided to do something with my cousin Gabby when we were seven.
I kept a black and white photo of Maude close to me while we set up a stakeout one summer weekend. She wore a frilly dress that brought out her freckles and had her wavy hair pinned up in that old-timey style that you would see in movies from the forties. I never officially met Maude in my life, living at least, but somehow I felt some connection to her. As if we were kindred spirits.
“Ready?” Gabby placed the fresh cornbread on the chair.
“Ready.” I jumped behind the couch and laid on my stomach. Gabby plopped down next to me as we looked and waited.
The last time I slept over with grandma, my hands and feet went cold when I went to get a glass of water in the middle of the night. I knew I saw Maude sitting in the death chair. I told Gabby, but she didn’t believe me. She said ‘Big girls don’t believe in ghosts.’
“How long is this supposed to take?” Gabby groaned.
“She’ll be here. I read somewhere to summon a ghost you offer them something they liked when they were alive.” I checked the chair again. Still nothing. And it was already ten o’clock. The sun left a long time ago and the moon scooted into its place.
Gabby nibbled on some cornbread. She said with her mouth full, “TJ, there’s no such thing as ghosts. It’s just the death chair.”
I kept my mouth shut. Gabby had changed since I saw her last summer. We used to go on all kinds of adventures. Hunting for fairies in Grandma’s garden in the morning and trying to trap jackalopes in the evening. Gabby, not me, led the way. Though she didn’t believe in anything now - Ghosts, Santa Claus, and even me.
We waited for a couple of hours, but sleep was catching up to us. I propped my arms to keep my head up. Though Gabby wasn’t doing as well. Her hair flowed over her eyes like a waterfall. I elbowed her. “Don’t fall asleep. Maude’s going to be here any minute.”
Gabby turned over and grabbed a blanket that was hanging down from the couch’s arm.
I sighed. I had to stay awake. Maude could come any second. The success of the whole stakeout was resting on my eyelids not closing. But my eyelids got heavier and heavier and heavier until they shut tight.
The sun tickled my toes as it crept through the windows when I woke up.
Dang it, I thought, I fell asleep.
I crawled out from under the couch to peer at the bait we left. The cornbread was half-eaten, little pieces scattered across the faded velvet.
“Gabby,” I poked her cheek, still fresh with the cornbread she ate last night. “Wake up! Half of the cornbread’s gone.”
Gabby perked up and wiped the crumbs under her lips. She looked both ways and popped out from the couch.
“No ghost,” Gabby smirked. “Looks like I’m right.”
“Wait,” I came out and took the cornbread. “We both fell asleep. And we have one last night until you leave tomorrow. Come on. Please.”
“Ok. Sure.” Gabby snatched the cornbread from me and chomped it down. “Though if you want to catch a ghost, we need more cornbread.”
The whole day, we prepared. We made more cornbread with Grandma. Got the butter and lathered it all over. I read somewhere ghosts liked butter. I even got an old video camera from the garage. To take a video of the ghost of course. Hopefully, ghosts could be seen in videos.
For good measure, I chugged down some Whataburger sweet tea after dinner. A lot of it. I couldn’t sleep through another stakeout. Ghosts came in the middle of the night. That was the rule.
I placed the camera near the kitchen door, right within the line of sight of the death chair. I pushed the button for the video to start, and I set the cornbread right in the chair’s center like it was a little present and slid beneath the couch. Goosebumps rolled down my arms in waves. The caffeine was working.
Gabby bumped me with her bony elbow. “You’re scared.”
“No.” I crossed my arms. She was right. I was a little scared of seeing a ghost, but the bubbles gurgling in my stomach stirred a feeling that made me feel like a Ghostbuster.
My eyelids weighed themselves down. It had been four hours and nothing. The conditions for a ghost sighting were prime. Maude should have been here ages ago. I pressed my hand against my forehead to keep my sight. I had to stay awake. I had to prove to Gabby I was right.
Gabby patted me on the back. “Take a nap. It’s going to be a while. I’ll keep watch.”
My head slowly found itself bouncing up and down. It told me that Gabby’s reaction was odd for the day, but it also said that Gabby finally believed in me. I listened and laid my head on the floor, shutting my eyes.
A sound creaked and I jumped awake. Something moved in the darkness, but I couldn’t tell what it was. It was as if something not from this world was moving through the room like a shadow. Suddenly, my hands and feet got cold, and my mouth soured as fear settled on my tongue. I breathed.
It’s Maude, I thought.
I bumped my head on the couch, but the pain didn’t matter as I bounced out from the couch to the chair. The cornbread was half-eaten. But Maude was not present.
“The cornbread’s been eaten!” I told Gabby. “Where’s Maude?”
I ran to my camera and stopped the video. I opened it and fast-forwarded it to the end. It wasn’t a video of Maude’s ghost or any ghost. It was just a video of Gabby stuffing half of the cornbread into her mouth. I gripped the sides of the camera and threw it on the floor. Gabby stood in the kitchen doorway, eating a piece of cornbread smothered in butter.
I picked up the camera and squeezed the words through my teeth. “Gabby? Why are you in this video?” I showed her the video of her eating the cornbread and she laughed.
“You believe anything. I was just messing with you. The death chair is just the death chair.” She threw me her piece of cornbread and walked away giggling.
I stayed away from Gabby that day. Her parents picked her up later in the afternoon, but I had one more night at grandma’s before my parents picked me up in the morning.
I made the mistake of barely eating dinner, so much my stomach woke me in the dead of the night by letting out a lion’s roar. So I trudged to the kitchen half asleep like a zombie. I took a bite into the cornbread, but it brushed against my tongue as if it were sandpaper. When I opened the fridge, the butter wasn’t there. Then, my hands and feet grew cold again.
I turned and a faded version of a woman stood right next to me, holding the butter and a knife. She wore the same frilly dress and had the same freckles as Maude did in the old picture of her.
I gripped the handle of the refrigerator door. It was Maude.
Maude offered the butter and the knife to me. She said nothing.
I took it and squeaked, “Thank you... Maude.”
I smeared the butter on the cornbread and handed her half. Maude smiled and headed back to her chair. She stared out the window watching the night, and as she nibbled on her snack, she vanished, leaving the chair empty and the cornbread half-eaten.
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