Mike and I had just discovered to world of mail order. We were thrilled to find out that things you couldn’t buy at stores you could get from an add in a catalog. I watched the mailbox every day for a month. Then one day the mailman delivered the books that I ordered.

I ripped open the envelope, and ran up the stairs to my room. The first book was a book of charms-mostly things to make the person you admired fall in love with you. That was nothing I cared about. How could you ever be happy with someone, if you had to force them to love you?

The next book contained spells from ancient Egypt. This one had a lot of things you could do if you were really mad at someone. No one could stay angry enough at anyone to fill their house with disease or even insects. I had waited all that time just for this?

I turned the page. “How to Raise the God of Wisdom.” That looked promising. I wondered what the God of Wisdom might look like as I read through the titles on the other pages. Probably the god would look like the picture on the mummy case at the Science Museum.

Raising the God of Wisdom was the only spell worth trying. A girl can never have too many friends.

Our house had come with a ghost. I thought we were on friendly terms. At least the ghost appeared every time I brought some of the other kids that lived down street up to the attic to see him.

After the kids had run out of the house, I’d go back upstairs and thank the ghost for showing himself. Then I’d apologize for the kids running away. I wouldn’t want people to run away every time they saw me, so I guess we were friends.

I read over the directions carefully. This would take awhile. You had to start when the moon was at the correct phase, let the mixture set until the moon was at the next phase, and then wait until the moon had changed again.

The calendar on the wall had all the moon phases printed on it. I consulted with the book and then double checked the calendar. I could start next Tuesday.

The ingredients would be hard to come by. Where would anyone get a heart of a raven, or a hair from a bat? When you cook in the kitchen and lack an ingredient you find something close and use that instead, so that is what I did.

Months later, I looked at the contents of the baby food jar. The time had finally come to say the words. Would it work? There were many substitutions. Perhaps, I substituted too many of the ingredients.

The moon was in the right position. This had taken many months. Maybe, I’d lost track of the changes of the moon. Probably, this would not work at all.

The moon lit the inside of my room, so I had no problem reading the words from the book.

The instant I read the last word, something started to appear right in front of me. It was black. A twisted head started to materialize. The head’s shape resembled a horse’s skull, but the nose was narrower.

“In Jesus’ name: Be gone!” I yelled. “In Jesus’ name, be gone!”

The black form vanished. My first grade Sunday School teacher was right. “If you ever meet a demon, say in Jesus name be gone.” It worked!

I turned around, and jumped back in terror. Behind me, stood a hooded shadow of a man. For a moment I thought I could make out the lines of a ghoulish half resemblance of a face. He grinned at me.

“In Jesus’ name: Be gone!” I yelled again, as I backed up toward the bed. “In Jesus’ name, be gone!”

I could see my desk, the window, as the moon shined through the gray and white shadow. “Oh, you scared me.” I said. “You’re just the ghost.”

The shadow did not answer back.

“You are, just the ghost?” I asked trembling. “Aren’t you?”

I blinked trying to focus on the spot where the translucent shadow was. A solid black free form shape that blotted out the moon, shifted and changed patterns. The shape moved quickly past the closet and out of sight.