Vivien Takes The Sage

Constance’s words settled over the living room like another layer of dust.

I took the fresh sage from her hand. The leaves were cool and slightly sticky against my fingers. Upstairs the low murmur of Ben’s voice had stopped; a door closed, then footsteps moved toward the guest room. Somewhere beyond that, Moira was still moving through the rooms she claimed to clean.

“I’ll burn it,” I said.

Constance’s smile returned, smaller and more private. “Good girl. Do it in the bedroom. After dark. And leave the door unlocked the way you did last night. The house responds better when you stop pretending you don’t want what it’s offering.”

She glanced once more toward the stairs, as if she could still see Moira through the walls, then walked to the front door without waiting to be shown out. The green dress swayed. The pearls caught the late-afternoon light.

“I’ll be next door if you need me,” she said over her shoulder. “Or even if you don’t.”

The door clicked shut behind her.

I stood alone in the living room with the sage in one hand and the weight of everything she had told me pressing against the residual heat still lingering between my legs. Ghost. Shot through the eye. Buried in the backyard. And still walking these floors in a short black dress that Ben looked at too long.

I carried the sage upstairs.

The hallway was empty. Violet’s door was closed. The guest-room door was closed. The master bedroom waited exactly as I had left it - three black shapes still arranged on the nightstand like offerings, the air still faintly charged with what I had done that morning.

I set the sage on the dresser and locked eyes with my own reflection. Flushed. Tired. Different from the woman who had moved into this house a week ago.

Outside, the light was beginning to soften toward evening.

I left the bedroom door unlocked.

Then I went back downstairs to wait for whatever the house - and the people it kept - decided to do next.