Page 22 of A Spark of Something (A Librarian’s Guide to Witchery #1)

U nlocking the library front door, and frowning as the alarm countdown started, Jahla quickly walked in and shut it behind her. Punching in the code, she turned off the door alarm. Her frown deepened as she looked up into the still dark library.

Heading up the stairs, Jahla set her bag down on her desk. After flicking on the lights above, she went straight for Ollie’s office. What she found was a locked door.

Biting her lip nervously, Jahla headed back the way she came, eyeing the obviously powered down elevators, before taking off up the stairs to the second floor at a jog. Jahla kept going up, her brows raising as her heart started to pick up pace on finding the third floor ceiling lights on. She was about to head back towards the stairway that would lead her up to Ollie’s home, but stopped on hearing a quiet, monotone Meow.

Looking to the right, she hesitated for a moment, before approaching the still locked Rare Books section. “Red?” she rasped in question as she reached the doors.

Meow! The cat called loudly this time, the sound clearly having come from the other side.

“What…on earth…” She swallowed, her fear grew along with her confusion. “Red…I-I need to check on Ollie, but after, I swear, I’ll go get the key and let you out!” she promised.

Jahla took off toward the back of the third floor at a run, but her panic only increased as she spotted the door to the stairway that led up to Ollie’s living quarters wide open.

Ollie woke with a start, his eyes going wide. As he uncurled, he couldn’t help but wince while his body protested being kept curled up for so long. With his back against the door, he stared blankly into the darkness of his house as his heart thudded away in time with his pounding head. Ollie’s eyes felt grainy, which was likely a mix of crying and barely sleeping.

He jumped at a hard knock on the other side of the door, the sound vibrating against his back. It didn’t take him long to realize that was what had woken him up…and moments later, his addled brain finally heard the frantic voice coming with the pounding.

“OLLIE! Are you there?! Please, Ollie! Please, answer me!” Jahla cried, before threatening, “I swear, if you don’t answer me, I’m going to break the door down…or call…the police! YES, I’ll call the police!”

Ollie jumped to his feet at that, quickly unlocking and then opening the door.

“Ollie, what the hell?!” Jahla croaked with a sigh. Standing there with her hand raised, as if to knock again, the woman’s eyes widened as she took him in. “You look…like shit. Wait?! Have you been crying?! Are you okay?! What happened?!”

He stared at her, keeping it together for a split second, as the night before came rushing back through his mind, before he burst into tears.

“Ollie!?” Jahla squeaked as the man threw himself at her. Wrapping her arms around the small man, as he began to sob, she hesitated for a moment before running her hands over his back. “It’s okay…Ollie… I’m here. Whatever it is, it’s going to be okay.”

She hoped she wasn’t lying, as she had no clue what was wrong. But all of this was wrong… Ollie…didn’t cry. Sure, the man could be dramatic, and he fake cried sometimes…but the only time she had ever seen him really cry was when he’d been dumped. But even that had been quiet. Just this silent acceptance of pain for the shitty people who had stupidly left him without realizing what an absolutely kind-hearted, adorable fluffball of love they had willingly let go of.

But this…this was different. This was…fear. Ollie sounded afraid. The man was sobbing…and shaking. Something had him terrified…

“Ollie…are we…in danger?” she asked gently.

“I-I—” The man hiccupped. “—I don’t kn-know.”

She tensed at that. “Let’s… Let’s talk inside, but first, give me your keys, I need to go let Red out.”

“NO!” Ollie screamed as he tugged from her arms. The man backed away from her while shaking his head frantically. “No, y-you ca-can’t.”

Her eyes widened at the odd reaction. “Ollie…what is going on?”

The man let out a whimper. “I…” His bottom lip trembled. “I-I… That ghost…”

“What…?”

“I-I saw…more. I saw more ghosts!”

Jahla’s stomach dropped at how sure his voice was. Horrible memories began to resurface of when her grandmother had first started seeing things that weren’t there. When her hands started to shake, she clenched them into fists.

“Ollie…ghosts aren’t real.”

“I know!” he cried. “I know that, and that’s what I believed! But… Maybe…I still do…” Ollie got a strange, far-off look in his eyes. “B-but, so much happened ye-yesterday. There was the ghost here, the others that I saw outside. Th-they were everywhere.

“And then I-I ran into Noble after freaking out. And he was really…sweet…and odd. B-but he believed me, and we had sex, which was really great, but then I did something wrong, like I always do…but maybe I didn’t, as he asked for my number, and then we came back here, and he stayed for hours, talking and reading books on ghosts. It was…g-great…” Ollie let out a soft, sad laugh. “I-I even wrote down the nonsense that we found. But then he left…and th-things weren’t great. My cat, or whatever it is…started acting weird, and I fo-followed him… And Jahla, there was this book on my—on one of my shelves. It glowed. I’d never seen it before, and…” The man’s gaze met hers. “Then h-he…spoke.”

She swallowed. “W-who spoke, Ollie?”

Ollie let out a soft, hysterical laugh. “My cat…” The man’s face crumbled, his tears falling fast again. “My c-cat spoke, Jahla… Cats don’t speak, so, you know, I-I ran and I locked the door. And then there was that first gh-ghost again, so I yelled at it and ran again, and now…” He licked his lips. “Now you’re here.”

Heart clenching, Jahla blinked rapidly as tears tried to form. “Ollie…” she rasped.

“I know you don’t believe me.” He sobbed softly. “But…I can… I-I can prove it. Red…he…” The man gasped, pushing past her.

“Ollie, wait!” she pleaded as she spun around, but her words failed her. Wincing, Jahla wordlessly followed after her friend as her worry grew.

On reaching the Rare Books section, Ollie started shifting through his keys, which were clanging together noisily as his hands shakily flipped through them.

Her friend swallowed hard on finding the key. With clear hesitation, Ollie unlocked the doors, but oddly, the man froze once he'd pushed them open.

Red was right there on the other side of them, sitting and looking as normal as he ever was.

Meow.

For some reason, Jahla swore the sound was slightly mournful.

Ollie swallowed audibly again, before demanding, “Speak… Y-you spoke last night. I-I heard you. D-do it again!”

The cat remained sitting there silently, his head tilting slightly.

“Don’t… Don’t you dare pretend!” Ollie cried. “I-I heard you!”

“Ollie…” Jahla said slowly, wincing when the man flinched as she lightly rested her hands on his shoulders. “Ollie, you are going to come with me…” She sniffed as her tears threatened to once again break free. “We are going to close the library. I will send a text to the others that it will remain closed today and…I am going…to take you to the hospital.”

“No!” Ollie shouted as he spun from her hold, pointing down at Red. “He talked! I’m not lying! I’m not! I swear,” the man repeated almost desperately. “I-I sw-swear, he talked! He did!” He spun again towards Red. “Talk! Speak! Say anything! Please…please…” Ollie sobbed. “Please, show her I’m not insane…please…”

And in some sort of fucked-up twilight zone shit, Red cleared his throat and…spoke. “Clearly, I went about this wrong.”

Jahla stared, her eyes widening as she whispered, “Impossible…”

“For a natural cat, yes,” Red responded, as if everything were normal.

She swallowed hard, as all the light in the room seemed to be swallowed up. “I think…I think…I need to…sit dow?—”