Charles Rowland week @charles-rowland-week - Tumblr Blog

room for one more troubled soul

A belated fill for Day 5 of @charles-rowland-week! This is set in the Dead Girl Detectives AU I wrote about in tell them I was loved, featuring ghost!Crystal, ghost!Niko, and psychic!Charles, but it works fine as a standalone. You can either read it below or here on AO3.

Prompt: AU

Rating: M

Warnings: Child abuse, homelessness, David-typical unpleasantness, canon-typical violence

Word count: 7.5K

Relationships: Charles & Crystal & Niko

Summary: After running away from home, Charles ends up captured by a demon who he’s pretty sure is going to kill him. It seems like a fitting end for a short, shitty life until two ghost girls show up and rescue him from David.

Or, how Charles Rowland—psychic medium, unwanted son, and runaway—becomes a part of the Dead Girl Detective Agency.

***

Charles is twelve when he realizes that his father doesn’t love him anymore.

His father has always been a storm cloud of emotions that hangs over the whole house. There’s usually anger, resentment, fear, and a strange sort of grief, but there used to be love too. Charles used to feel it, even as Dad was slapping Mum across the face or taking the belt to Charles’s back. He knew that Dad cared about them in his own way, that he wanted them—especially Charles—to be better. And he could always tell that he was sorry after he hit them, even if Dad never said it.

The love ebbs away so slowly that Charles doesn’t notice until it’s gone, until his father shoves him against the wall hard enough to knock the breath out of his lungs and send a framed family photo falling to the ground, where the glass cracks on impact. Charles stares at his father, hands raised to protect his face, and realizes that there’s no love left in Paul Rowland: just rage and the bitter disappointment of a man whose life is nothing like he expected. Dad isn’t even a little bit sorry as he pulls his belt off.

The hatred hurts more than the belt.

***

Charles is fifteen when he realizes that if he doesn’t leave, his father is going to kill him. He touches the coffee table in the middle of the living room and sees it clearly: a fist to the face, Charles reeling backwards, the crack of a skull against wood, blood soaking into the already-stained carpet. He stands there, frozen, until his father barks at him to demand what the fuck is wrong with him and Charles can only babble and excuse before scrambling away from the coffee table so fast that he trips over his own two feet.

That night, he sneaks out after his parents are asleep with nothing but but a backpack full of essentials, his cricket bat in case he runs into trouble, and the money he stole from his father’s wallet. He doesn’t need his powers to know that he’s never going to step foot back inside this house and that he’ll probably never see his parents again. He doesn’t know how he feels about that, so he doesn’t think about it.

For a while, he stays with his cousin, Liz. His uncle is cut from the exact same cloth as his dad, so she knows why Charles would need to run. But after a few weeks, Liz’s boyfriend starts making noise about how bloody inconvenient it is to have a teenager sleeping on their couch and eating all their food. Charles sees the writing on the wall, so he leaves before Liz has to make a choice. She’s his favorite cousin, so he doesn’t want to learn how she’d choose.

After that, he stays with a mate from school, Henry. That’s fine for a while, until Henry’s parents get it in their heads that what he needs to do is sit down with his own parents and tell them how he really feels about his dad beating the shit out of them, as if talking it out will help. He only has one set of parents, they tell Charles, and they won’t be around forever. Wouldn’t it be better to forgive and forget?

Charles leaves in the middle of the night without saying goodbye. He feels a little bad—Henry’s always been a good friend—but it’s only a matter of time before his parents call Charles’s, and that’s the last thing Charles needs.

He goes to London, because it seems like exactly the sort of place you should go when you’re trying to hide. In a city of millions of people, who will notice Charles? Plus, he’s always liked the city. His dad took him to a couple Arsenal games when he was a kid and it’s the only time he ever remembers Dad looking truly happy.

But London is a different place when you have nowhere to go. It’s winter and the shelters are full of other people needing a place to stay for the night. Plus, Charles keeps telling people he’s nineteen, but he knows he doesn’t look it. He’s not sure if he’s been reported missing—his parents probably wouldn’t bother, but Henry’s parents may have—so he’s not sure if anyone will be looking for him. Still, it seems safer not to linger in one place for long, even if that means being cold and hungry.

It’s the ghosts that keep him alive. London is full of them and once he gets to talking to a few of them, they help him find safe places to sleep. Janice, the ghost of an old lady who spends her afterlife knitting a child-sized sweater on a park bench, steals food for him sometimes. Charles doubts he would have made it a week here without them.

He meets David in the park that Janice haunts. He seems like a nice sort of bloke, a uni student who says he goes to school nearby. He buys Charles a sandwich and a cup of tea and listens when Charles talks about the father who didn’t love him and the mother who did love him, but not as much as she loved his father. He seems sympathetic, so much so that Charles gets the feeling that maybe he really understands. Other people, like Henry, have tried, but David seems to really get it. Charles has been so desperately lonely for weeks now, or maybe for the last fifteen years, and it’s such a relief to meet someone who sees him.

“Something’s off about that boy,” Janice says, eyeing David’s back warily as he walks away.

“Nah, he seems an alright sort.” Charles looks into his nearly-empty cup of tea. It’s the first hot drink he’s had in weeks and the warmth still lingers in his chest.

She makes a skeptical noise and he smiles at her fondly. Janice doesn’t seem to like most people. He’d be pretty sure she didn’t like him either, if she didn’t keep making sure that he doesn’t starve or freeze to death.

“Don’t worry,” he tells her, smiling fondly. “I’m a psychic, yeah? I can tell when people are up to no good.”

He sees David in the park a few more times. David’s always friendly and willing to lend an ear and a few pounds for a sandwich. It’s the fourth or fifth time that they see each other, that David mentions that his roommate just moved out and he has an extra room.

“It’s too fucking cold to be sleeping outside, mate,” he tells Charles. “You can crash for a bit, just until you get your feet under you.”

Charles shakes his head. “Don’t want to be any trouble.”

“You won’t be.” David’s smile is kind.

“I can’t pay rent.”

“Sure, because you don’t have a job. You need a good shower and a shave before you go looking for one. Let’s just get you back on your feet and then we can talk about rent.”

Charles is a psychic. He’s been able to read other people since before he could talk. And all he reads from David is worry and compassion, no hint of malevolence or ulterior motives. A shower and a shave sound bloody brilliant. Maybe it’s not such a bad thing to accept a helping hand. Once he gets his life together, he can pay David back.

“Maybe for a night or two,” Charles says hesitantly and David’s smile widens. It’s only later that Charles will recognize the triumph in his eyes.

***

David does let Charles out to shower and shave occasionally, but that’s only because he smells when he doesn’t. Charles isn’t sure how David can smell anything else over the reek of dead fish that permeates the entire flat. At least the remembers to feed Charles every other day or so and has gotten pretty good about bringing pitchers of water after the time Charles nearly died after not having anything to drink for two and a half days. Mostly, he leaves Charles alone in his little room, the door locked and the windows boarded up.

Charles huddles on the little air mattress in the corner and tries not to think of anything. He tries not to think of David slipping into his mind and using him as a puppet, being locked inside his own mind as his body traveled around the city without his say so. He tries not to think of the venom David spits at him: “sad excuse for a psychic” and “fucking useless” and “should have just left you to starve on a bench.” He tries not to think of how fucking cold he is; if there’s heat here, David never seems to turn it on. It feels like he’s still sleeping outside.

He tries not to think of the vision he had earlier when David grabbed his wrist: himself tied up on the ground while David stands over him, knife in hand.

David is going to kill him.

It’s probably been a month since Charles trailed David back to his flat, trusting as a sacrificial lamb, and realized the moment he stepped inside and saw David’s eyes turn black that he’d made a mistake. Charles has spent most of the last month terrified and furious with himself for being so stupid. He would think the fear would have dulled by now, like it used to when he lived under the constant threat of his father’s belt. But right now, he’s so scared, he thinks he might be sick with it.

Charles doesn’t want to die. He left home because he wanted to live. It seems so fucking unfair that he escaped his dad only to end up captured by a worse monster than Paul Rowland could ever dream of being. And now Charles is going to die here and no one’s ever going to know what happened to him, if anyone even tries to find out what happened to him. Most likely, he’ll just be gone, with not even a missing poster left for people to ignore.

He might be crying a little when the door opens, but he quickly wipes his cheeks on the filthy sleeve of his shirt before David steps inside. Rising to his feet on shaky legs, Charles faces the demon head on. If he’s going to die, he’s not going to do it cowering on the ground.

“Here you go,” David says in his mocking voice, wearing a smile so unlike the one he used to convince Charles to follow him home. Charles can’t believe he ever saw kindness there. He tosses a greasy paper bag on the ground at Charles’s feet. “Eat up.”

Charles doesn’t bend to pick up the bag, even though his stomach is hollow with hunger. He figured out weeks ago that if he acts like he wants something too much, David will take it away just to see him squirm. “What do you want?” He’s asked it before. It was one of the first things he asked when he realized that David wasn’t the harmless uni student he was pretending to be. He hasn’t gotten an answer yet.

David chuckles. “Nothing you can give me.”

“Then you can let me go, yeah?” It’s not begging, Charles tells himself. He already tried that. He tried fighting David. He tried escaping while David thought he was taking a shower. He tried stealing David’s phone to call 999. Nothing’s worked. But maybe he can try negotiating. He’s been told he can be pretty convincing.

Anything that might save him from ending up with a knife in his heart.

“And why would I do that?” David steps closer, still wearing that predatory smile.

“Well, I’m no use to you, am I?” Charles asks desperately. “So why not just let me go? It’ll save you money on burgers and chips.”

David clucks his tongue. “You know, maybe you’re right. Here I am, spending all this time and money on a pathetic excuse for a psychic who’s barely any better than a carnival fortune teller. What a waste of my fucking time.” He tilts his head, regarding Charles coldly. “Maybe I should just cut my losses.”

Charles swallows. He doesn’t need his powers to know he’s made another mistake. “Please.”

“Do you know why I’m here in London, Charles, instead of in hell where I belong, torturing souls for all eternity?” David’s voice drops to a whisper.

Charles shakes his head.

“There was a psychic medium and she was everything you’re not. Strong and fascinating and so, so powerful.”

“And what happened to her?” Charles’s voice comes out a croak.

“She died.” David runs a finger down his cheek in a mockery of tears. “And I took her to Hell, because she was a really bad girl, but then she went and escaped. And you know, Hell really doesn’t like it when you let a soul escape you. So I got banished too and I don’t get to go back until I bring her back too. That’s why I thought I could use you.”

“I’m not going to help you,” Charles growls. He doesn’t want to die, but he won’t stoop that low to save his own life.

“Oh, I know.” David scoffs. “You’re not nearly strong enough to be useful to me. Your powers are…” He kicks the bag at Charles’s feet. “A cheap, greasy burger to her Wagyu beef. You’re hardly worth the time it’d take to break your neck.”

Charles can’t help it; he flinches back.

David laughs. “But maybe you’re right. Maybe I can find something to do with you so you won’t be a complete waste of my time.”

As the door closes behind the demon, Charles sinks down onto the air mattress, hugging his knees to his chest in a vain attempt to stop himself from shaking.

***

Charles’s head is pounding, his thoughts slow and sluggish as he wakes. He doesn’t remember the last time he slept deeply, but he feels like he’s been asleep for a thousand years. His eyes are gritty, the inside of his mouth bone dry, and he aches all over. He tries to stretch, but he can’t move. The fog in his mind clears as fear rushes in and Charles’s eyes snap open to find himself tied up on the ground in the middle of his room. David is nowhere to be seen.

Frantically, Charles wriggles around, but the ropes don’t give. The last thing he remembers is eating the container of soup David brought him for dinner. He knew it tasted funny, but it’d been days since the burger and chips and he’d been starving, so he’d gulped it down anyway. There must have been something in it. How long was he unconscious? And where is David?

He doesn’t have to wonder where David is for long; the door opens and the demon comes in, the knife Charles saw in his vision in hand. Charles goes cold for reasons that have nothing to do with the icy chill in the air.

“What the fuck are you doing?” He wants to sound defiant. He just sounds terrified.

“You know, I’ve been thinking about our talk the other day.” David moves towards Charles in an unhurried saunter. “And I realized that I really haven’t been thinking outside the box about how I could use you to get back to Hell. I’ve been so focused on Crystal for years and I forgot that just maybe, I don’t need her at all. Maybe you’ll actually be less useless than you look, Charles.”

Charles can’t look away from the knife. “Sorry, not sure I can get you to Hell, mate. Unless you want me to stab you with that. Happy to try.”

“No, I think I have another idea.” David comes to stand by Charles’s head, twirling the knife casually. “You know, when someone dies, either Death comes and sweeps them off to a peaceful, boring afterlife, or Hell comes and snatches them away. Which do you think will happen to you?”

Hands pinned between his back and the ground, Charles tries frantically to loosen the knots around his wrists, but his fingers are clumsy with panic.

“You know, don’t you?” David smiles almost indulgently. “Your own father didn’t love you. You told me when we first met. We both know that there has to be something very, very wrong with you if your own father couldn’t stand the sight of you. You being born destroyed his whole life.”

“Fuck you,” Charles grits out.

“And you get angry sometimes, don’t you? Just like him. You think if I let you out of here, you’ll go on to have a perfect life with a nice wife and a couple of cute kids? How many black eyes will your wife have to cover up with makeup? How long will it take your kids to be terrified of the sound of your footsteps coming down the hall? You can fool yourself all you want, Charles, but I can see right through you. I can see the kind of monster you’ll become if you live.”

Charles closes his eyes. He can feel his heart pounding frantically against his ribs, like it knows it only has so many beats left and wants to get in as many as it can.

“We both know where you belong,” David croons. “And I really hate doing good deeds, but we both know I’m doing one when I put this knife in your heart and stop you from becoming just like dear old dad. And then when Hell comes to collect you, I’ll hitch a ride.”

The floorboards creak next to Charles’s head as David moves closer and Charles braces himself. He doesn’t have to open his eyes to know that David’s raising the knife, ready to plunge it into Charles’s chest, just like in his vision.

Hands grab Charles by the legs and yank. He yelps, eyes flying open in surprise, as he’s dragged across the ground, out of the range of David’s knife, which sinks harmlessly into the ground. When he glances down, he sees hands with pink-painted nails wrapped around his ankles. Behind him, David curses and Charles looks up to see the demon snatching up the knife, face twisted into a snarl. His eyes have gone entirely black.

David’s back is turned to the door, so he doesn’t see when a ghost steps right through it, book in one hand and the other hand outstretched. She’s about Charles’s age, wearing an old-fashioned sort of long light purple skirt and matching jacket, both embroidered with flowers, over a high-necked white blouse and an eye-shaped brooch at her throat. Her eyes are fixed on David, a grim look on her pretty face, as her lips move silently and a flame appears in the palm of her hand.

Charles doesn’t mean for his expression to give anything away, but it must, because David whirls around. When he sees the girl, he laughs. “Well, look who it is. I should have known you’d turn up, Crystal. You never like it when someone else is the center of attention. Still pining after me after all these years?”

“Hi,” a voice whispers in Charles’s ear and he turns his head, swallowing a surprised cry when he finds a girl’s face only inches from his own, her head and neck sticking out of the floor. Smiling, she says, “I’m Niko. And that’s Crystal over there with the fire. We’re the Dead Girl Detectives and we’re here to save you.”

“The Dead Girl…” Charles trails off as one of her arms phases through the floor and she hauls herself upwards like she’s climbing out of a pool. She’s wearing a short, bright pink dress with poofy sleeves and a giant bow tied around her waist. Bizarrely, she’s wearing a Hello Kitty backpack.

“Don’t worry, babe.” David takes a step towards Crystal, not even seeming to notice Niko and Charles, like she’s the only one in the room. “He means nothing to me. You’re the one I really want to drag kicking and screaming to Hell.”

“It’s been thirty-five years, David,” Crystal says. “Are you really not over it? This is getting pathetic.”

“Turn over,” Niko tells Charles and he complies, flipping onto his side so she can untie his wrists. “You’re Charles, right?”

“How did you know?” Charles tenses. The last time he thought someone was doing a good deed for him, he ended up locked in a room for a month.

“Janice hired us to find you. She was worried about you when you didn’t come back to the park.”

“Janice?” Charles nearly forgot about the cranky ghost on the park bench who stole food for him and knew the moment she clapped eyes on David that he was trouble.

“I’m sorry it took us so long to find you.” With a final yank, the ropes around his wrists come loose. “Can you untie your ankles? I need to help Crystal.”

Charles nods, sitting up with a wince to fumble at the ropes around his fingers. Crystal and David are still facing each other, Crystal with the flame in her hand and David wearing that same mocking smile. When Niko stands up, he turns that smile on her. Charles wants to punch it off his smug fucking face.

“Still keeping this one around, Crystal?” David asks. “I keep waiting for you to get bored of the sunshine and rainbows thing. You used to have standards for the company you kept.”

“I still do,” she says. “I’ve just raised them.”

“You know, I’m glad she’s here. Now, when I drag you down to Hell, we can bring your annoying little sidekick too.”

That seems to be enough for Crystal, who says another word in a language Charles doesn’t understand, making the flames leap off her palm and right at David’s face.

“Charles, you should probably run,” Niko says as David and Crystal lunge at each other.

Charles kicks away the last of the ropes and stumbles to his feet. There’s definitely a part of him that wants to bolt for the door. But these girls—the Dead Girl Detectives—came here to save him and leaving them to face a demon alone seems like a shit way to repay them. Not that they seem like they need his help. Crystal is throwing around fire with the skilled ease of someone used to it while Niko pulls a piece of chalk from her backpack and kneels to draw symbols on the ground. Charles may want to help, but he has no idea how.

Then he thinks of his cricket bat. Did David get rid of it, or is it still somewhere in his flat? Charles runs for the door, bursting out into the living area, which is bare of furniture and reeks of fish. He finds his backpack, jacket, and cricket bat by the door, right where he set them down a month ago right before he realized how badly he had fucked up by following David home. He picks up his cricket bat, examines it to make sure it’s undamaged, then rushes back into the bedroom to join the fray.

He finds Crystal fighting against a web of fire that’s surrounded her, pinning her to the wall, while David rounds on Niko, who is still focused on drawing a circle of symbols, her eyes wide as she hurries to finish. Charles crosses the room in two steps and hits David across the face hard enough to make his head snap around. Charles has taken a lot of swings with his cricket bat, but this might be the most satisfying one yet.

“I’m an ancient demon, Charles,” David says. There’s blood on his mouth and a burn on his cheek. “You can’t defeat me with a cricket bat.”

“Maybe not.” Charles shrugs. “But I’m going to try, aren’t I?”

He hits David again, this time in the stomach, and again in the head. A month worth of terror, grief, rage, and hopelessness seems to explode out of him as he just keeps hitting. David laughs and taunts him, but he stumbles with every hit, which is enough to keep Charles swinging. He wants to obliterate that smug, grinning face. He wants David to be half as afraid as Charles has been for the past month.

“Just like Dad, aren’t you, Charles?” David asks in a mocking voice and for an instant, it’s not the demon’s bloody face staring back at him, but Charles’s mum, looking at Charles with scared, betrayed eyes. Even though he knows it’s a trick, Charles’s swing falters.

It’s the opening David needs to reach out and grab the bat, yanking it out of Charles’s hand and breaking it over his knee. Charles stares in dismay as David tosses the broken bits of wood to the ground.

“Oops.” David steps on the remains of the cricket bat as he rounds on Charles. “You know, I think I’ve had enough of—”

A glowing golden string wraps around his wrist and David and Charles both look over to see Niko standing outside the circle of symbols, string in hand. With a flick of her wrist, David is yanked forward like there’s a hook in his chest. He stumbles into the circle, struggling against the string with all his might. It doesn’t look like much, but he seems as trapped as Charles was earlier. Charles will have to ask Niko how it works later, if they make it out of here.

“Ready, Crystal?” Niko asks.

“You have no idea.” Crystal strides to her side and takes her hand. Burns criss-cross her arms and torso, but they already seem to be healing. “See you in another decade or so, David.”

“Bitch.” David bears his teeth into a snarl. “This time, it won’t take me long to find my way back. And when I do, you and this dumb little cunt—”

Charles is about to pick up the shattered remains of his cricket bat and give beating the fucker to death another go, but then the girls begin to chant. A wind picks up around the room and David howls. He thrashes against the golden string, hurling himself at the edge of the circle, but he can’t escape. As Charles watches, wide-eyed, David begins to flicker in and out of view, like a candle guttering out. With one last scream loud enough that it seems to vibrate through Charles’s bones, the demon vanishes. The string falls to the floor, its golden glow gone.

“What happened to him?” Charles asks into the ringing silence.

“We banished him to another dimension.” Crystal snaps the book in her hand shut and hands it to Niko, who slips it into the Hello Kitty backpack. “Not Hell, because they’re not going to let him back there without me, but somewhere he’ll have trouble finding his way back from. Last time, it took him a decade. This time, I’m hoping for two.”

“Right.” Charles nods, like he sees demons get banished to other dimensions every day. “Brills. So he’s gone?”

She smiles at him tiredly. “As gone as David ever is.”

***

Look, Charles knows he probably shouldn’t follow Crystal and Niko back to their office. This is how he got into trouble in the first place, following someone home just because they were nice to him. But Charles is exhausted and when he steps outside for the first time in a month, he finds that London’s being hit by the bloody blizzard of the century, so he decides that if Crystal and Niko are going to kidnap and murder him, they’ve probably earned it. He just hopes they let him have a nap and a proper wash first.

When they arrive at the abandoned building they call their office, Charles doesn’t even look around for any signs of danger before he collapses onto the sofa and falls asleep. He’s not sure how long he sleeps. A few times, he’s vaguely aware of Crystal and Niko talking, but it’s never loud enough to drag him fully back to consciousness. When he does finally open his eyes, which are gritty and sore from sleep, he finds that it’s dark outside the window. Niko is sitting behind the desk, typing on a laptop, while Crystal stands at the window, looking out at the snow.

He glances around the office. It’s small and cluttered, every surface covered with trinkets ranging from crystal balls to old-fashioned clocks to a bobblehead Godzilla. The walls are covered in more posters of anime boys than he’d expect from a supernatural detective agency, but who is he to judge? There’s an overflowing bookshelf in the corner that seems to hold a mix of serious-looking, leather-bound tomes, mangas, and paperback mysteries. It seems like a home and Charles has to swallow down the knot of jealousy that rises in his throats.

Both Crystal and Niko look up when he groans and sits up.

“Good, you’re awake!” Niko smiles at him brightly. “How are you feeling?”

Charles rubs at his sore eyes. “Like shit, really. How long was I out?”

“Fifteen hours,” Niko says. “It’s okay, being kidnapped is tiring. We got you some sandwiches.”

“You’re a lifesaver.” Charles descends on the pile of sandwiches on the little table next to the couch, hardly even noticing what kind they are as he devours them. He’s vaguely aware that he’s in a room with the two fittest girls he’s ever seen in his life and he probably looks a mess—it’s been at least a week since David let him shower and shave the scraggly patch of hair that grows on his chin—but he doesn’t much care. He thinks he might be well and truly safe for the first time in months and he’s almost ready to weep with relief.

“Better?” Crystal asks after he eats three sandwiches and downs one and a half bottles of water.

Charles smiles sheepishly. “Better. Thanks for getting me out of there, yeah? Pretty sure I was well and truly fucked before you came along.”

“We know how to handle David by now,” Crystal says, like banishing a powerful demon is nothing. Charles guesses that for them, it might be.

“Well, thanks.” It occurs to Charles that he’s been crashing on their couch, probably getting in the way of them working their cases, for fifteen hours. One thing he’s learned from relying on the charity of strangers for months now is that it’s best to get out before they get tired of him. “Do you have somewhere I can have a quick wash before I go?”

“Go?” Niko’s forehead creases in a frown.

“Where are you going to go?” Crystal asks.

Charles shrugs, trying for a smile, though it seems stiff and false on his face. “Probably back to the park, yeah? Janice will be worried about me.”

Crystal doesn’t seem to be buying it. “I went to see Janice while you were asleep. She knows you’re fine.”

“Brills.” Charles bobs his head in a nod. “But I don’t want to overstay my welcome, do I? Sure you don’t need me underfoot.”

“We’re ghosts,” Crystal says. “If you’re in the way, we can pass right through you.”

“Not that you’re in the way,” Niko adds quickly. “You can stay here as long as you need.”

Liz said that to him when he first showed up at her flat. So did Henry and his parents. None of them meant it.

Niko presses on, smiling. “We don’t get a lot of guests. It’ll be like a sleepover! Except, we’re ghosts, so we can’t sleep. Or eat junk food. But we can stay up late with you watching movies.”

Charles looks away, unaccountably embarrassed. It’s nice of Niko to offer, but he can tell from the look on her face that she just feels bad for him. He reaches down to trace a finger over the swirls in the wooden table and a vision hits him.

An angry, shouting ghost, his face screwed up in a snarl. The table flying through the air, right at Crystal’s head. Niko shrieking in surprise as the table passes right through Crystal and splinters against the wall.

He blinks and the vision is gone. Crystal and Niko are right where they were an instant ago, both staring at him. “You should move that table,” he tells them. “Someone’s going to throw it at you and it’ll get smashed up.”

“You can see the future?” Crystal asks, like she’s surprised.

“Well, yeah,” Charles says. “I’m a psychic, aren’t I? Like you.”

“I’ve never been very good at seeing the future.” She shoots Niko a loaded glance. “More the present and the past.”

He shrugs sheepishly. “Only see a few seconds at a time. Not very useful.”

“You saved my favorite table.” Niko crosses the room to pick up the table, moving it behind the desk. “I think that’s useful.”

“Can you read people?” Crystal asks, watching Charles curiously.

“Yeah.” Charles grimaces. “Whether I want to or not.”

She nods. “I remember that. It was a ton of fun sitting in a classroom full of girls in 1916 and knowing how much they all hated me.”

“Been there, mate.” Charles remembers the last time he kissed a girl and realized she was thinking about his best friend. Or the time his favorite teacher handed him back a paper he thought he’d done okay on and Charles felt the utter contempt the man held him in. “Some days, I get why so many of us go become hermits in the woods. I would, but I’d miss spaghetti.”

Her lips twitch. “These days, I can only read the dead. They’re less noisy.”

“Sounds aces,” Charles says, then wonders if he’s put his foot in it. “I mean, not having to read everyone sounds aces. Not being dead. Sorry, that sounds rough.”

“I’ve been dead since 1916,” Crystal says. “You get used to it.”

“Did David…” He trails off, wondering if that’s a rude question. He doesn’t know the ins and outs of ghost etiquette.

Luckily, she doesn’t seem offended. “He didn’t kill me, exactly. The exorcism the school chaplain performed to try to get him out of me did.”

“And dandelion sprites exploded out of my brain,” Niko adds. “But that’s how I met Crystal, so it’s okay.”

Charles jumps as muffled shouting comes from one of the desk drawers. “What brains?” a squeaky voice yells. “We didn’t see any in there.”

Crystal pounds on the desk drawer. “Shut the fuck up in there, or I will drown you.”

“You always fucking say that.”

“Yeah, bitch. Maybe you should shut the fuck up, or we’ll drown you.”

Niko giggles. “They’re not so bad. They grow on you.”

“They really don’t.” Crystal looks at the drawer in disgust.

Charles stares. “The things that killed you are in that drawer?”

“Dandelion sprites,” Niko says.“They’re not so bad. They don’t really mean to kill people. That’s just what happens when they exit their host.”

Crystal rolls her eyes at the ceiling. “They’re toxic little shits, Niko.”

“They feed on attention,” Niko tells Charles, ignoring Crystal. “We keep them in the drawer most of the time, but we take them out sometimes so they can eat.”

“And they eat... attention?” Charles asks, bewildered.

“They seem to prefer negative attention,” Crystal says. “Otherwise, maybe they wouldn’t be such little assholes.”

“See?” Niko slides the drawer open, eliciting shrieks and protests from within, and pulls out a jar. Inside, two tiny figures, each no taller than Charles’s thumb, shield their eyes from the light. “These are Litty and her… well, we actually don’t know what they are to each other. This is Litty and Kingham.”

Litty catches sight of Charles and wrinkles her nose. “Oh, ew.”

“Really?” Kingham puts his hands on his hips. “You won’t let us out of this jar, but you’ll just let anyone walk into the office? Where has he been, snorkeling in a pile of fish guts?”

Charles should probably be offended, but he just grins. “Yeah, something like that.”

“Guys, don’t be mean to Charles,” Niko tells the sprites. “He’s our new friend.”

“Figures, the only friend you’d be able to make is one that smells like fish.”

“Okay, that’s enough sprite time.” Crystal plucks the jar out of Niko’s hand and shuts it back in the desk drawer.

Something like hope is kindling in Charles’s chest. He likes Crystal and Niko and they don’t seem to be in a huge rush to show him the door. Niko even called him a friend. “Look, you two saved my life. I owe you, don’t I? Maybe I could stick around for a bit? Use my powers to help out on cases where I can? I can read the living, which might come in handy sometimes, and I can see the future. And…” His mind races, trying to come up with a reason to let him stay. He remembers Niko saying, “being kidnapped is tiring,” like she knows from experience.

“I helped with David, didn’t I?” he adds. “Kept him busy with my cricket bat so Niko could draw that circle.”

“He did,” Niko says, glancing at Crystal. “I wouldn’t have been able to finish the banishing circle if he hadn’t distracted David.”

Charles has a feeling he has Niko convinced, so he turns to Crystal. “I’m pretty aces at defending myself. I can get another cricket bat and if you’ve got clients who want to throw tables at you or who won’t pay, I can sort ‘em out. I’ll have your back. And I won’t be any trouble. Promise.”

Niko leans down to whisper something in Crystal’s ear. Crystal nods and murmurs something back, then they look at each other for a loaded moment. There’s history in that look, two people who have known each other for many years and don’t have to say anything to communicate. Charles feels another twinge of jealousy. He’s never had anyone to exchange looks like that with. He’s never had anyone who cared to know him that well.

“We have a room we let living clients stay in sometimes, when they have nowhere else to go,” Crystal says after a long moment. “It’s not much and everyone tells us the hot water heater is worthless, but there’s a bed we can make up. It might be nice to have another psychic around.”

“And someone who can hit demons with a cricket bat,” Niko adds.

“You two deal with lots of demons?” He doesn’t see either of them taking on the forces of Hell, but they handled David and Crystal escaped Hell, so maybe he shouldn’t assume anything.

“Not as many as you’d think,” Crystal says. “Mostly, we help ghosts with any unfinished business that’s stopping them from moving on. It doesn’t involve many demons.”

“Except for David.” Niko wrinkles her nose with distaste.

Crystal mirrors the look. “David will be a problem for the rest of eternity. At least until we find a way to trap or banish him for good.”

“Well, next time he shows up, I’m happy to hit him with a cricket bat,” Charles tells her. “Just need to find a new one.”

“Ooh, hold on.” Niko picks up the Hello Kitty backpack and reaches into it. And keeps reaching. Charles stares in astonishment as her arm vanishes up to her shoulder. “I think I have something in here. I told you our payment from the Case of the Floating Lockers would come in handy, Crystal.”

“You let people get away with paying us anything,” Crystal says with a huff. “He promised us a cursed diamond and he paid us with—”

“A cricket bat!” Niko pulls the bat out of the bag and hands it to Charles. “Maybe we can enchant it so it won’t break so easily.”

Charles weighs the bat in his hands. It’s a bit battered, but so is he. It’ll do. “Thank you,” he says, swallowing hard. “Wait, how did this fit in that little bag?”

Smiling slyly, Niko opens the bag and shows him the inside, which is nothing but blackness. “It’s a magical void. I can fit anything in here. There’s a bicycle floating around in here somewhere. And at least one severed hand.”

Charles decides not to ask.

“I can show you how to use it later, if you’d like,” Niko says. “Crystal never got the hang of it.”

Crystal eyes the bag warily. “It doesn't like me.”

“But maybe you will,” Niko says.

Charles finds himself unable to do anything but smile at her. “That’d be brills, Niko.” He looks between them hopefully. “Does that mean I can stay?”

Crystal and Niko exchange another look. “Yeah, you can stay,” Crystal says. “It never hurts to have an extra set of hands around. And we’re not going to kick you out in the middle of a snowstorm.”

Niko claps her hands and to Charles’s surprise, pulls him into a hug. It’s a bit odd, hugging a ghost. She doesn’t feel so much like a warm, living body, but more like the memory of one. He can almost feel the silkiness of her dress under his hands, but not quite. “Welcome to the Dead Girl Detective Agency!”

***

One year later

“And that’s a wrap on the Case of the Creepy Monk,” Charles says as he steps into the office, soaking wet, hurting all over, and exhausted, but warm with the success of a successful case.

“We’re not calling it that,” Crystal says, closing the door behind her. Unlike Charles, she doesn’t have a drop of water on her. The perks of being a ghost, he supposes.

“You got a better name for it, do you?”

“Yeah, the Case of Charles Almost Getting Eaten by a Hellhound Because He Wouldn’t Fucking Listen To Me.”

“That doesn’t really roll off the tongue,” Niko says.

Charles’s mouth drops open in offense. “I didn’t nearly get eaten by a hellhound!”

“So it wasn’t about to rip your throat out when Niko banished it?” Crystal raises an eyebrow.

Charles considers. “Right, maybe a little, but better me than you, right? I’m the brawn. It’s my job to take the hits.”

“Because what we need is an extra ghost on the run from Death.” Shrugging off her coat, she settles down behind the desk.

“But you did a great job getting the monk out of the way,” Niko says brightly.

Charles smiles at her. “Thanks, Niko. Nice to be appreciated.”

“I appreciate you,” Crystal says. “Alive.”

Charles’s smile widens. “Love you too, Crystal.”

She rolls her eyes, but it’s her fond eye roll. Charles knows all Crystal’s eye rolls by now. “Just try not to get mauled by a hellhound.”

“Sure thing.” Charles spots a pile of mail on the desk. “Looks like the postman came, yeah? Maybe our next case is in here.”

“Hopefully one with no hellhounds,” Niko says. “Or creepy monks.”

“I preferred the hellhound,” Crystal grumbles and Niko giggles.

Grinning to himself, Charles picks up the pile of mail and starts sorting through. It’s pretty standard stuff: a love letter from a ghost from Brighton who’s in love with Crystal—that one goes straight in the bin—a flier from the local apothecary, a death threat from a ghost who blames them for his wife moving on without him—that one’s funny, since two-thirds of their agency is already dead. Charles tosses the death threat out, then picks up the flier under it and finds himself plunged into a vision.

A house on a quiet, tree-lined street.

Darkness.

A little girl with her back turned to Charles, standing in the middle of a room filled with bones. An enormous snake circling her, drawing back to strike.

Charles blinks and he’s back at the office, Niko and Crystal both watching him.

“What did you see?” Crystal asks.

Charles looks at the flier and finds a little girl smiling up at him. “Missing,” it reads. “Have you seen this girl? Becky Aspen, 10.”

“Charles, what is it?” Niko takes the flier from his hand.

Charles shakes his head, trying to clear the memory of darkness. He can practically feel Becky Aspen’s terror hanging in the air. “You two fancy a trip to the States?”

***

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