The Ouija Board

As John stared up at the luminescent stars on the ceiling above his bed, he was conflicted. He tossed and he turned but he couldn’t help experiencing flashbacks of the day going through his mind.

John and his friend Simon had found a Ouija board in the back of Simon’s garage earlier that day whilst looking for the tennis rackets. As Wimbledon was all his father was talking about at the minute, John, desperate for his fathers attention, asked his best friend and neighbour if he had any. Normally Simon’s mother never let him into the garage, but on this occasion, she was so busy with work that she just waved the boys away. She was a barrister and was trying to prove a guilty man innocent. The trial consumed her and Simon wasn’t sure if it was a ‘go away’ wave or a ‘go ahead’ wave. The boys high fived and took it to be the latter. They grabbed the remote control that was kept in the coat stand by the door and opened the garage.

‘Man, I can’t believe all the junk you have in here!’ John said to his friend.

‘I know, right?’

‘Your parents must have kept every item they ever owned!’

Simon turned on the flashlight on his phone he had received from his parents for his twelfth birthday last month. That was the general guideline on the street, not to let the kids have a phone until they were twelve. John had the money ready and everything for his phone, but his birthday wasn’t for another six weeks.

‘Wow!’ Simon said as he flashed the light on an old box he thought he saw a racket handle protruding out of.

‘What?’

‘It’s a Ouija board!’

The boys looked at each other, then to the board, and back to each other. Simon picked it up and blew the dust off the box.

‘You want to try it out?’ Simon asked enthusiastically.

‘Ok,’ John said with less enthusiasm. Even though he was only eleven, John believed in spirits and the afterlife…despite all the horror films Simon had been making him watch whenever he slept over.

Simon was the natural leader of the two. John looked up to him and didn’t want to be seen as a wus so he went along with whatever Simon decided on whatever topic he decided they were into. Simon was into zombies and werewolves, whereas John just wanted to talk about superhero’s and harry potter. Simon was the most popular boy in school since he moved to the town six months ago. Somehow, maybe because they were neighbours, he was naturally drawn to John as his wingman to go around pulling pranks on everyone. John just liked the attention.

The pair left the garage carrying an old, battered box containing a Ouija board…. a far contrast to tennis rackets.

‘Let’s do it in my room!’ Simon insisted.

‘Ok,’ John swallowed hard.

 

With the Ouija board set up, the dial, which both boys had eight fingers on each, was placed in the middle.

‘What do we do now?’ John asked innocently.

‘Now we play!’ Simon said with a grin from ear to ear.

The boys asked numerous questions, each of which the board answered, both swearing that they weren’t moving the dial. In Johns case he was telling the truth, but he wasn’t so sure Simon was.

Finally they came to the last question of the evening, it was a question Simon asked and one which left John tossing and turning, flashbacks plaguing him.

‘Is John adopted?’ Simon asked the board.

‘That’s not fair!’ John protested, but just as he was doing so the dial started to move. ‘You’re moving it!’ John whined.

‘No I’m not!’ Simon swore.

The dial moved to the word ‘yes’.

John immediately let go of the dial and got up off of the floor.

‘You moved it!’ John accused Simon, rage pulsing through his body like a bolt of lightning. He pointed his index finger at his so called ‘friend’ and shook it vigorously, too angry for words. He stormed out of Simon’s house and jumped the fence into his back garden.

As he passed through the kitchen, his mother preparing dinner as usual, he stormed through the open plan living space and ran up the stairs, banging his bedroom door shut. He sat on the edge of his bed and buried his face in his hands. He began to sob.

Quickly wiping his eyes when he heard the faint knock of his mother wondering if he was ok, he simply said, ‘yea’. His mother knew her son and entered his bedroom tentatively. She saw the red eyes of her baby boy and wondered what had him so upset.

‘Simon!’ John answered.

‘What did he do now?’ Johns mother, Mary, sighed. She knew that Simon was bad for her son because in the six months that he had befriended him, John changed his superhero posters to those of zombies. He put all of his collectable action figures in boxes that were kept under his bed, replacing them with statues of skulls and monsters and stopped reading comic books.

‘I can’t say!’ John replied, tears seeping from his eyes unbeknownst to himself.

Mary sat next to her son and put a warm arm around him. He buried his face in her shoulder and sobbed uncontrollably, his body convulsing with every breath. Mary stroked Johns hair and simply said, ‘ssshhhh, everything will be alright!’

Suddenly, out of nowhere, John told his mother everything; from Wimbledon, to the tennis rackets, to the garage, and, finally the Ouija board.

‘Oh sweetheart, why can’t you find a new friend? Someone who actually likes the things you do?’

‘Am I adopted?’ John spat out without warning.

Mary stumbled for words. She wasn’t expecting the question and was sure as hell not ready to answer it appropriately without her husband, Dave, by her side.

‘It’s a simple question mom!’ John stated the obvious, ‘am I adopted?’ he asked once more.

Mary burst into tears and nodded her head. ‘We were going to tell you but….’

John stormed out of the room and locked himself in the bathroom. The Ouija board was right. He presumed it was just another way for Simon to trick him into insecurity, but…it was right!

‘John honey,’ Mary knocked softly on the door after she composed herself, ‘are you ok?’

The dialogue in Johns head was running wild. There were two voices, each tackling the other.

‘Are you ok? What does she mean are you ok? You just found out that you have been lied to for your whole life!’

‘She could have a very valid reason for not telling you!’

‘Valid reason, pphhaaa! Who lies to their child for almost twelve years?’

The conversation went back and forth in that manner for over an hour, all the while Mary was sitting outside the bathroom door, on the cold, hard laminated floor, facing her own daemons.

‘Honey,’ it was Dave. He was home from work. ‘I’m home!’ Under normal circumstances, a waft of whatever cuisine his beloved decided to make that day would hit his nostrils gloriously, but today he couldn’t smell anything. He questioned if his sense of smell had been affected and wondered if he should do an antigen test. ‘Honey?’ he asked with trepidation.

‘We’re up here!’ Mary’s kind, sweet voice croaked from all the crying that had taken place in the past hour.

Dave bound up the stairs, two at a time, and ran to his wife’s aid. ‘What’s wrong Hun?’ he asked sitting beside her and put his arm around her, kissing the top of her head.

‘He knows!’ she simply said.

‘Who knows what?’

‘Our son was playing with a Ouija board that Simon found in his garage and the little git had to ask if John was adopted. The same little git moved the dial to indicate ‘yes’!’

The blood drained from Dave’s face. Suddenly there was no thought of food, it was John who consumed his thoughts. He massaged his temple with his free hand and didn’t need to be told that Mary had confirmed it.

‘Poor guy!’ Dave commiserated with his son. He himself wanted to tell him years ago but Mary forbid it. Her reasoning behind it being that he was ‘too young!’ or ‘it’s just not the right time!’

‘I should have listened to you!’ she simply said and began to weep.

At that very moment, the lock to the bathroom door turned and Mary fell back as John opened it. ‘Sorry!’ he said with sincerely, helping his mom up until she could sit up on her own again…he was such a nice boy.

‘Would you like to talk buddy?’ his father asked him in an upbeat tone.

John nodded.

It took three goes, but Mary, a heavy-set woman, finally managed to get up off of the floor, wiped away her tears and presumed that an interrogation was to be expected.

John had lots of questions, but before he could ask them his father sat him down on his bed, Mary beside him, and got on his honkers in front of the confused boy.

‘When we got married fifteen years ago,’ his hand instinctively travelled over Mary’s, ‘we always said we wanted kids. After three miscarriages, ‘he stopped and wiped a tear from his eye, Mary doing the same, ‘we decided that we wouldn’t survive another so we gave up on the idea…. that was of course until your aunt Gladice got herself pregnant by, presumably a known convict, and planned to have an abortion. We asked her after much deliberation, if she would consider having the child and have us raise it…raise you.’

John gasped. ‘Aunt Gladice was my mom?’

There was much speculation in the community as to the demise of aunt Gladice. It was a small community where everyone knew each other’s business. Some thought she died, others that she was incarcerated, but none knew of how John came to be.

‘Yes son!’ Dave bowed his head.

‘But wasn’t she in prison?’

‘Yes son!’ Dave repeated.                                                                                      

‘Wha…?Bu….?Ho….?’ John shook his head in disbelief and started to cry again.

‘The day you were born was the happiest day of our lives,’ Mary finally found her voice. ‘Aunt Gladice was in prison at the time, but you were born in a hospital, right in front of us…we saw you being born and your dad cut the umbilical cord. It was magical! Aunt Gladice never even held you, she just let us have you…’

‘She just gave me away?’ John stood up and pulled at his hair with both hands.

‘To be fair son,’ John smiled, ‘it was the best thing to do for all parties involved. If she was to hold you, she would have fallen desperately in love with you…just as we had! She was in no fit state to be a mother and we wanted you more than anything!’ he wiped a tear from his eye with his right index finger.

John nodded, trying to comprehend what he had just heard. ‘What ever happened to aunt Gladice?’ he asked curiously.

‘She’s passed!’ Mary bowed her head, ‘she died in prison from an overdose.’

John nodded again. ‘Can I have some alone time?’ he asked his parents who very respectfully nodded and slowly exited the room.

John spent the next hour laying on his bed, throwing a miniature football up in the air, catching it, and throwing it up in the air again. As far back as he could remember, aunt Gladice was the outcast of the family. All he knew about her was that she was his mother’s youngest sister and that she was a troubled soul. He had never actually met the woman, and only knew about her because of all the shame she put on the family.

When John heard the gentle knock on his door, he sighed and said ever so softly, ‘come in.’

As his parents entered the room, they did so timidly. ‘How you doing champ?’ his father asked with slight enthusiasm in his voice. His mother looked at her husband who shrugged his shoulders and put his hands out in front of him, palms up. How could they be sure how their son had received the news.

‘None of this is your fault baby!’ his mother coddled.

‘What would you like for dinner?’ his father asked. ‘We were going to get a pizza! You up for that?’

John stopped throwing the ball and sat up in his bed crossing his legs like a Buddha. ‘So who’s my father?’ he dived in feet first wanting answers.

‘We don’t know!’ his mother said as she looked towards the stain on the rug. ‘Aunt Gladice was a very promiscuous lady!’

‘Will he ever come looking for me?’

‘No baby,’ Mary sat on the bed and put her hand on Johns leg. ‘Is that idea bothering you? That you might be taken away?’

John nodded, the tears rolling down his cheeks like water flowing into a lake from above.

‘No ones ever going to take you!’ his father promised. ‘We even have your adoption papers to prove it! Your ours…for your sins…’ he winked at his son who cracked a smile. ‘So then…pizza?’ John nodded and put the ball on his pillow.

When John went to bed he stared up at the luminescent stars on the ceiling. He tossed and he turned but all he could see were flashbacks of the Ouija board when its dial moved its way to ‘yes’. He was finding it hard to trust that Simon hadn’t moved it. After all, it would be something Simon would be capable of. He kept thinking how one little prank changed his world. He couldn’t get that out of his mind.

Johns parents had reassured him that nothing was going to change, but he decided as the clock turned 2 am that he needed to find a better friend…preferably one who wouldn’t orchestrate the shenanigan’s that his question to the Ouija board created. He turned on his bedside lamp and reached under his bed pulling out one of many large cardboard boxes full of collectables from the marvel franchise. He liked the DC franchise too, but the box that came to his hand first was full of marvel apparel. He lifted up the limited-edition iron man action figure that was mint in box and smiled. He placed it on his bed and quickly rose, tearing down all of the posters that seeped into his dreams, planning on putting the old ones back up in the morning. When he sat down, the walls clear, he picked up iron man again and lay down…never again, he said as his eyes closed, the picture of the Ouija boards dial lingering over the word ‘yes’ was engrained in his mind for eternity…never again.