There Ought to Be Shadows

By Krissie K. Williams

Moonstone, South Carolina. A town where nothing is what it seems... Marilyn Maxwell is an accomplished woman in all areas. But what people don't know is she has struggled with the demon of death since she was a child. After a personal crisis forces her to re-evaluate her life, she reluctantly decides to relocate back to her hometown of Moonstone. This decision sends her spiraling into a world full of conjure, celestial wonder, and the murky unknown.An insidious force has crippled the town she once left behind, and she must rush against time to stop it. Guided by Great Grandmother, her beloved spirit from the other side, she embarks on the most difficult journey she has ever had to undertake. Marilyn uncovers Moonstone's dark history—one that is filled with horror, deceit, and dread. In the end, she questions what is fantasy, what is reality, and who she really is.

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Quill & Crow Publishing House
• Release date: Jun 14, 2024
• ISBN: 9781958228326

Book preview

Chapter One

MARILYN

For a moment, I thought about surrendering to death.

It could work… It would be easier.

Instead, the natural urge we as living creatures all have filled my veins: the determination to claim my destiny. To live. To live… I read the letters imprinted on the inside of my brain as I allowed myself to fight for breath and unwillingly swallowed another gulp of bath water.

His strength was more focused now, pressing on the top of my head where I often parted my hair. I had only pushed myself up a little. Great Grandmother stood in my peripheral vision while the monster hovered over me, bent on extinguishing me from this Earth. I could see her outline in the mirror above the sink. She always appeared to me in a crisis. Lately, it seemed like she had been appearing a lot more frequently.

Bubbles formed around me from my splashing and writhing. I managed to get one arm out of the water. He was so intent on holding me under that he didn’t notice.

The razor I’d grabbed sliced the flesh of his right arm. Bright red blood ran down and dripped into the bathwater. To live…to live…I repeated it over and over in my mind. Unfazed by my movements, he kept pushing my head down. I cut him again, this one deeper into the sensitive skin of his inner arm. He released his grip on my head and slumped back against the toilet with wide eyes.

He seemed more surprised than angered by my actions. I caught him off guard. Silence fell. The light above the sink flickered a little. It had been doing that since the power outage the week before.

In a few short breaths, my destiny changed. The blood from his arm flowed more heavily now, scattering droplets on the tile floor. He grabbed a mint green hand towel I had purchased on sale and used it to apply pressure to the wounds. His eyes rolled back in his head.

Then he stood up, towel still in hand, and left. The wooden floorboards creaked beneath his heavy boots.

And so it was. The end of our marriage.

Chapter Two

MARILYN

I stood in the old mirror fastened to the bureau in my bedroom. Still wrapped in my towel, my skin was wet and flushed from the ordeal. Hands shaking, I struggled to comb the knots out of my hair. One knot refused to budge. Frustrated, I stuck my right hand into one of the drawers, searching for the scissors I kept underneath my socks. I grabbed them, and with a decisive snip, the knot of hair was no longer a part of me. There, I thought.

Is he coming back? I said out loud, half hoping that Great Grandmother would answer. Shortly after he left the bathroom, as I collected myself enough to climb from the old clawfoot tub, I heard the front door open and shut. Normally, there would be a tug and heave whenever we left to make sure the door was in place so it could be locked. Over the years, we’d meant to get it repaired. We never did.

Just like children. We talked about it but never got around to having them. There was always too much to do. It wasn’t regret I felt at the thought, but relief. There was always something more important. Another job. Another promotion. Another house. Another goal. Another success. I didn’t think I could have lived with myself if I had brought a child into this madness.

My mind drifted off to a memory of eight years ago.

So what do you think? I’d asked him on the sidewalk in the drizzling rain by the Spanish moss-covered palmetto tree.

Colby glanced at the property. The yard was unkempt. There was a beautiful, weathered wrap-around porch that lay in front of them. It was obvious there was wood rot on the trim work. It had always been a dream of mine to refurbish an antebellum home. The windows were single pane: there would be drafts on cooler days. He was turning it over in his head; I could see it in his face. He raised his eyes and kept studying the house. The storm drains needed to be replaced. It was going to be one massive migraine. One massive migraine and a series of hapless errors and unexpected expenses. We knew it.

Let’s do it.

I could tell by his tone that he wasn’t convinced it was worth it. But he was in. Hell, I won.

Two and a half months later, we found ourselves walking on battered floors over a series of weekends spent covered in various shades of gray and eggshell white paint. There were always handymen coming and going. In the summer, it seemed like the grass grew a foot overnight. There was always something that needed to be taken care of. And if we could focus on the house, we didn’t have to focus on our marriage.

But I loved that I could open the windows in the spring and inhale the sultry air. I wasn’t a garden expert, but I loved to go to the local nursery and buy big potted plants to set on the porch every year. I put fresh linens on the bed every week and sprayed the room with lavender. Occasionally, we would have another couple over for dinner and drinks. The dining room table could seat eight, but I never felt comfortable feeding more than four people at a time. I didn’t have good entertaining skills; I could do enough to get by. Salmon was always my favorite. It was simple to cook; I could toss it on pasta or serve it with rice and a vegetable medley. Colby never complained.

In the sixth year I lived in the gilded cage, Great Grandmother began to show up. It was around the time our fights started. My pair of beloved pearl earrings went missing. They were from a former boyfriend, Jax. He gave them as a gift to me for my thirty-fifth birthday. I only wore them on special occasions. It was the only gift from any of my exes that Colby allowed me to keep.

I don’t like that you still have them. It’s like I’m competing with a ghost, he said as he helped me put on my coat. We were on our way to one of his work functions. He shrugged his shoulders and grabbed his keys from their spot on the foyer table. Let’s go. A ripple of nerves went through my stomach. I could tell this would not be the end of the conversation.

I quieted myself in the car for fear of having another showdown this week. I’d barely survived the first two days, and it was only Wednesday. I didn’t know why I’d worn the earrings. Am I being passive-aggressive? I wondered as we drove down the darkened streets. Or was I simply longing for a time when life had been kind to me? Both were possible. Nonetheless, a month later, they weren’t in the gold tin box where I normally kept them.

Great Grandmother had moved my pearl earrings. I knew it, didn’t like it, and there was nothing I could do about it. It was her way of letting me know from her celestial space that trouble would soon be afoot. I shoved the idea out of my mind. I wanted to stay on autopilot, enjoying life and denying that the fabric of my marriage was tearing into strips, little by little, every day.

But there she was, always hovering in odd places at odd times, reminding me that something was about to go awry. I can remember it so clearly. Two days after my earrings went missing, Colby hit me for the first time. In the span of one and a half seconds, I became a battered housewife.

I was shoved into my new existence as a result of his disapproval that I accepted a new job offer. It was just that quick. Suddenly, I was like the young women I counseled at the community center’s general pseudo-therapy group as a part of their outreach effort. I could no longer afford to look down on them. Now, when they told their stories, I hung my head. Sometimes, I wished I could pursue a side conversation with one of them and ask them how they got out. Or beg them to tell me any tricks to try at home to deafen the violence. But instead, I held it all in, wearing various sympathetic facial expressions and telling them I would keep them in my thoughts.

Shaking off the past, I looked up. Great Grandmother sat in my bedroom chair, smoking a cigarette. Her long baby-blue nightgown fluttered up and down with the tap of her foot as she moved it back and forth. Her shock of gray hair gleamed. I wondered if that meant it was going to be a long night. I didn’t know if Colby was going to come back or what my next move should be. Should I gather some things and run while I have the chance? I had very few friends in this town, even fewer who would understand what I was going through. I needed to move quickly. I grabbed a bag from the closet and began stuffing it with anything I might need.

Great Grandmother stood up from the chair and raised her hand. You’re safe, child. He won’t be back. Go to bed.

Chapter Three

MARILYN

I sat in my silver Lexus SUV, sobbing. An intense panic attack seized me as soon as I pulled off the highway. There I was in my black pantsuit with a fastener firmly planted in my hair while streaks of MAC foundation slid down my cheeks. My hands shook. I gripped the steering wheel to make them stop and closed my eyes. I am surrounded by love and light, I repeated to myself in the rearview mirror as I breathed deeply. I am surrounded by love and light…

There weren’t too many cars in the parking lot. I noticed Cousin George’s blue pickup truck as soon as I pulled in. I expected to see him here; he was always kind to me. I could hear organ music playing inside the church. I was late for the service, but I wanted to be. If I had shown up at the house on time to ride with the rest of the family, I would have been forced to make small talk with Cousin Janet, and nobody wanted to talk to Cousin Janet. I found tissues in my purse and dabbed under my eyes, doing my best to fix the damage caused by my crying. It was now or never.

Christ Rock Church didn’t loom over me today as it had when I was a child. Its location at the edge of a field made it look even smaller. Unlike other places of worship, it hadn’t grown exponentially as time passed. They still had one service on Sundays and a weekly Bible study on Wednesdays. Bingo took place every other Tuesday evening. Aside from the outreach to the sick and shut-in, that was about it. Pretty boring, run-of-the-mill religious service stuff. The congregation was primarily composed of ordinary people, many of whom had never even crossed the county line.

It felt strange to be back home. I didn’t miss it. I’d hightailed it out of there as fast as I could the minute I got the chance. Even now, after I made the hard decision to come back, my guard was up. I could have started over in a different city after my marriage blew up, but that took so much effort. I would have to find a new job, make new friends, and get a new place to live. Too much effort. I didn’t need effort, I needed safety.

Great Grandmother told me to come back home. Her message was confirmed by a phone call from my mother. Uncle Niles had passed peacefully the night before. She told me not to worry about attending the funeral. I know you have quite a bit going on. They, umm…they all know about you and Colby, she said.

Mom, I’d appreciate it if you stopped telling people my business. The divorce isn’t final yet. If someone asks me about it…well, it’s a real trigger for me.

She paused. I’m sorry. I only told them you two were separating, not the reasons why. I figured it would be easier for you, so you wouldn’t have to field as many questions. It’s just that everyone is always asking about you and how you’re doing.

I knew they didn’t care about how I was doing; they were just nosy. It was part of the reason why I struggled with going to Uncle Niles’s funeral. Not to mention the ghosts of the past I was sure to encounter. I secretly hoped that I would not have to revive the amount of dead carcasses I left in the wake of my exit from this wretched place. Regardless, I decided to pay my respects to one of the few family members I trusted. I missed him. I felt guilty about losing contact with him over the past year, even though it was a difficult one. I barely resembled my former self now. Sustained trauma made me feel like I lost all of my soul. Sometimes, it comes back.

Mine will never come back.

If you blinked twice, you would most likely miss Moonstone, South Carolina. But it was a place of beauty, full of Spanish moss trees and old plantations dotting the map of the town. People still dressed for dinner and went to church on Sunday. They drank bourbon on the back deck and played chess. But it was also the kind of a place a person didn’t need to go to unless they had a reason to. Folks here were pretty tight-knit; they didn’t