Page 3 of Love At First Fright

Rosemary unlocked the door to her building and pulled a small glass vial of salt from her pocket.

There was a ghost she occasionally saw drifting in and out of the apartment opposite hers.

He grumbled whenever someone walked past him, and once or twice Rosemary had seen him stick out a leg as if to trip someone.

Thankfully, he was faded enough to no longer be corporeal.

Rosemary didn’t see him as she entered her apartment, but just before she closed the door she sprinkled a trail of salt across her threshold, just to ensure he wouldn’t be able to come in.

Salt, lavender, rosemary, sage. All had the ability to either soothe or ward off ghosts.

In her research for a previous folk horror, Rosemary had spoken to an Indigenous North American park ranger who swore by obsidian, too.

That’s why she lined all her clothes drawers with little bundles of dried herbs, often gifted to her by her friend Dina, who was a kitchen witch.

They made her clothes smell lovely and had the added benefit of warding off any unwelcome spirits.

Most of the ghosts Rosemary had seen weren’t malevolent, though; they were often people who had passed away before their time, and who wanted to linger in this world, by their loved ones’ sides, a little while longer.

Rosemary surveyed her empty apartment. Up until yesterday, it had been full of moving boxes that she’d taken to a storage locker until she found a new place.

It hadn’t originally been her plan to move out during the shooting period for the film, but the stars had aligned when she realised her lease was up within a week of the shoot starting.

Good real estate was hard to come by in Brooklyn, and even a grumpy-old-man ghost wasn’t enough to make someone move out of an apartment with a built-in washer-dryer and floor-to-ceiling windows.

But Rosemary was heading to England, and would stay there until the shoot ended in a few months’ time.

She couldn’t afford to pay rent in an apartment she wasn’t using.

It was strange, seeing the empty walls with their slightly bleached rectangles where her vintage horror movie posters had hung. Her entire life in New York had been condensed down to fifteen medium boxes and a ten-square-foot storage locker. She wasn’t sure if she should laugh or cry.

As she changed into the pair of comfy sweats lying on top of her open suitcase, Rosemary waited for the sadness to kick in.

She was supposed to be upset about leaving New York, wasn’t she?

She’d built a life here over the last three years.

Made friends here, wrote three novels here.

She’d come here because New York was the place where all writers made themselves, or so she had believed.

There were people she’d miss, she was sure of that, and moments she would recall with fondness.

But the city had also suffocated her. Some days she felt boxed in, only able to breathe when she went for a walk in the park to catch a view of the sky that wasn’t bitten through by skyscrapers.

The sky where she grew up was so wide it could swallow you up, and she missed that feeling of being small, but not lonely.

A thought tickled the back of her mind: she didn’t have to find a new apartment when filming was over.

She could find somewhere else, maybe somewhere with more nature, and do it all again.

Georgia didn’t feel like home anymore, even with Dad still living there.

It hadn’t been home since her mom had died.

Rosemary had tried with New York, she really had.

She’d been desperate to make this place feel like home, but in all this time, it never quite had.

Home, for Rosemary, was being with her friends.

So how could she be at home when her friends were an ocean away?

Rosemary tucked herself into bed, pulling the blinds shut on what could be her last-ever New York night.

She flipped open her laptop and forced herself to write a few paragraphs.

Tonight, as it had been for the last few months, writing was like milking a pig.

Her next book, a possession horror about a monk in a rural monastery where they lived by silent prayer, was due in two months, and Rosemary was way behind.

She should have been reaching the final climax of the novel by now, but she was still trapped in the first third.

She couldn’t bring herself to tell her agent or her editor, even when they sent her those gentle “just checking in” emails.

She had always written a book in a year, that’s what they expected of her. Rosemary couldn’t let them down now.

Writing used to be fun, but now it was inextricable from stress.

This book needed to be written, but the previous book was in copyedits, whilst the subsequent book needed to be researched and planned out.

She felt like a conveyor belt, always churning out words, never stopping to breathe.

Rosemary would think about breathing when this book was done.

Her phone buzzed.

On the screen the caller ID photo popped up of her, Immy, and Dina—her two closest friends, who also both happened to live an ungodly distance away from her, all the way in England. Rosemary answered the group call.

“You’re both up late,” she said, by way of hello.

“It’s the twins, they’re struggling to sleep through the night, and it’s my turn to check on them.

” Immy yawned. Immy had taken to motherhood like a duck to water, and Rosemary was glad she had someone like her husband, Eric, who very much viewed parenting as a fifty-fifty experience, and who also sent Immy off for a spa day every month.

“And it’s a full moon tonight, so I’m waiting until midnight and then I’m going to do some moonbathing on the balcony,” Dina said.

In the background Rosemary could hear Dina’s fiancé Scott call out hopefully, “Will the moonbathing be naked?” followed by Dina’s chuckling laughter.

God, she missed her friends, she hadn’t been back to see them since the twins were born nearly a year ago.

She kept meaning to go back to England but between book tours and signings and working on her new draft, the best part of a year had flown past. She couldn’t wait to see them soon.

“Anyway, we wanted to check on you.” Dina added, “How did the event go?”

“It was good, the other guys were exactly as expect—”

“—like shrivelled-up balls of misogyny?” Immy muttered.

“Screw them, you’re more successful than both combined anyway. Where’s their movie?” Dina added.

“Thanks for the pep talk, guys, but I’m okay, really. I’ve finished saying my goodbyes to this old apartment, and I’m psyching myself up to meet he who shall remain nameless.”

“Ah, yes, the horrible and insanely hot actor. You know I think I’ve read a fanfic that starts like this,” Immy said.

“Well, this isn’t one of your fics, I’m not going to swoon the moment I see him,” Rosemary said, picking at a piece of lint and avoiding eye contact even through the screen.

“Uh-huh.”

“Sure.”

“You know, it sounds like you two are trying to matchmake me. May I remind you that I’m not interested in that kind of thing. Besides, I don’t think I’m Mr. Action Star’s type.”

Immy groaned. “But I’m so good at matchmaking! Look what happened last time.”

Dina cackled, her engagement ring sparkling as she ran a hand through her curls.

“I’ll tell you what,” Immy persisted, “watch this clip—I’m gonna share it in the chat—and if you honestly tell me you don’t think he’s hot, then I’ll shut my mouth and this is the last you’ll hear from me about it. Deal?”

“Deal,” Rosemary replied. How hard could this be?

Her phone beeped, and a moment later she had the video loaded on her screen, sharing it between the three of them. Even with their faces tiny in the corner of the screen, she still felt the joy you can only get from friends, seeping into her limbs, bubbling happily inside her.

“Ooh, I’ve seen this clip already,” Dina squeaked, and Scott popped his head into the call and waved hello. “Is this the video where he kisses the living daylights out of that dairymaid?” He chuckled.

“The very one.” Dina smiled, pressing a kiss to his temple before Scott ducked out of view again.

“You two make me all soppy.” Immy yawned.

Rosemary rolled her eyes and pressed Play.

This clip was from that one period drama he’d been in, made a few years ago by the looks of it. Rosemary had never watched it, too scared to hate how he portrayed the character. The clip had been shared online millions of times, titled “Ellis Finch Best Movie Kisses Part 1.”

“How many parts are there?” Rosemary asked, worried.

“At least ten.” Immy grinned.

The clip was cut in such a way that most of the dialogue was cut out.

It began with Ellis Finch, complete with button-down billowing shirt that hinted at the packed muscle and dark hair beneath, striding boldly across a sunlit meadow.

Wrapping a firm, tanned arm around the heroine’s waist, he drags her close.

Rosemary thought he would kiss her immediately, but that would clearly be too rudimentary for Ellis Finch, or rather, his character.

Instead, he tucks a loose curl behind her ear, his thumb caressing her eyebrow, her cheek, her lips, before his hand strokes down to her neck and finally— finally— he kisses her.

Kisses her like he is a man starved of all touch; like this is the final kiss before an execution (she hadn’t seen the film, so perhaps that was the case); like he’d never known love until he held her.

Heat shot through Rosemary and settled deep in her belly as she watched the clip, transfixed.

She was acutely aware of every minute movement of the kiss, of Ellis’s rough grip around the dairymaid’s throat—not aggressive, but carnal in a way that was possessive yet gentle.

It made her shiver. For a split second she allowed herself to imagine what it might be like to be on the receiving end of a kiss like that.

To have those hands pressed gently around her throat. To be faced with so much… need.

“Well, what do you think?” Immy asked, interrupting the thought.

Rosemary had to swallow, her mouth suddenly dry.

“She can’t even answer, so clearly she agrees with us.” Dina smirked.

“Fine, fine,” Rosemary stuttered. “I will admit he’s somewhat attractive, if you’re into that earthy, rugged sort of thing.”

“Earthy. I’ll take it.” Immy laughed, her laugh quickly transforming into a yawn. “I think I’m gonna try and rest now. Sleep while the babies are sleeping and all that.” She smiled.

They all said their “love yous” and “see you soons” and said goodbye. It would be barely any time before they were reunited in person anyway; Rosemary was going to stop by Dina’s magical London café once she had arrived and checked in—Dina had a bespelled herbal tea that would cure her jet lag.

As she lay in bed that night, her room emptied around her, suitcases finally packed, Rosemary was aware that this was one of those Big Life Moments ? .

Just like when she’d left Georgia to come to New York, telling herself that this was the place that successful authors lived, now she was leaving her life here to fly halfway across the world to help produce the movie adaptation of her own book.

Moving to New York had been a childhood dream; she wanted to make it big in the book world or die trying.

Rosemary had wanted to be in New York so badly that her high school yearbook had her down as “Most likely to move to the Big Apple.”

Getting a movie made of her book—and before she even hit thirty—was definitely one of those author pipe dreams. Similar to when she saw her book on the New York Times bestseller list; it didn’t feel real yet.

Rosemary wondered when it would. When they read through the script at the studio perhaps?

Or maybe not until they arrived on set at the old English mansion where they would be filming?

She flicked off her light and sank down into her lavender-scented sheets.

“Please let this movie be a success.” She whispered it aloud, to whomever or whatever might be listening.

It wasn’t just the deadline for the novel that kept Rosemary up at night.

So few books that had their film rights optioned were made into films; the studio was taking a chance on her work.

What if horror fans hated it, or what if readers of her book thought it was a terrible adaptation and wrote her off?

If Rosemary wanted the chance to have more of her books made into movies to launch her career in Hollywood, then When the Devil Takes Hold would need to be a box office hit.

And to do that, everything needed to be perfect.

Which was precisely why Ellis Finch was haunting her.

He wasn’t right for the part, and she was terrified that he was going to be the reason the movie would be a flop. The weight of it all was drowning her.

Even with all the anxiety-tinged thoughts bubbling through her, Rosemary fell asleep, her dreams filled with Ellis Finch’s face, the strength of his arms wrapped around her waist, pressing kisses to her neck, and lower.