Ghost Eaters

by Clay McLeod Chapman

Branches they bore of that enchanted stem, Laden with flower and fruit, whereof they gave To each, but whoso did receive of them And taste, to him the gushing of the wave Far far away did seem to mourn and rave On alien shores; and if his fellow spake, His voice was thin, as voices from the grave…. —ALFRED TENNYSON, “THE LOTOS-EATERS”

“Sean.” Marcia lets go of my hand to reach for her ectoplasmic newborn, to take it in her arms, to embrace her boy. “Sean, baby, baby…Mama’s here…” Marcia lowers herself onto her back, pulling her son down like a cloud from the sky and bringing him to her chest. “Mama’s here.” She’s smiling, truly smiling, the ecstasy radiating across her face as she cradles her son. The wet knot of ectoplasm struggles in her grip, the fluctuating coil reminding me of a maggot as it wrestles against Marcia’s loving embrace. But she won’t let it go. “Sean…” Then the tendril of ectoplasm ruptures and spills all over Marcia’s face—nothing but bile now, the partially digested remnants of her last meal. The look of ecstasy on her face never diminishes, though. Marcia is still blissfully lost in her haunting, her hands still holding on to the negative space of her son. “Sean, my baby…” Tobias turns to me. It’s the first time he’s looked at me during the session, a grin playing across his face that might as well say, Told you so. “You mind cleaning up, Erin?”

They don’t even call the neighborhood Shady Acres anymore, can you believe that? It’s called Greenfield now. Like changing the name is all it takes to wipe its history clear. You can take the tombstones away, but that doesn’t mean the graves aren’t still buried below.

The following books proved invaluable to me during the writing of this novel: Superstition by David Ambrose, Mushrooms and Mankind: The Impact of Mushrooms on Human Consciousness and Religion by James Arthur, Strange Frequencies: The Extraordinary Story of the Technological Quest for the Supernatural by Peter Bebergal, Bone Parish by Cullen Bunn, Junky by William S. Burroughs, Altered States by Paddy Chayefsky, Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places by Colin Dickey, “Dead Means Dead” by Steve Foxe and Michael Dialynas, The Day of St. Anthony’s Fire by John G. Fuller, Fungi edited by Orrin Grey and Silvia Moreno-Garcia, The Return by Rachel Harrison, Japanese Ghost Stories by Lafcadio Hearn, Magic Mushrooms in Religion and Alchemy by Clark Heinrich, “The Voice in the Night” by William Hope Hodgson, Night Parade of Dead Souls: Japanese Ghost Paintings edited by Jack Hunter, Pet Sematary by Stephen King, “A Thousand Deaths” by Jack London, “From Beyond” by H. P. Lovecraft, Fruiting Bodies and Other Fungi by Brian Lumley, In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado, Bright Lights, Big City by Jay McInerney, Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Calling the Spirits: A History of Séances by Lisa Morton, Ghosts: A Haunted History by Lisa Morton, “On the Haunted Lives of Girls and Women” by Rachel Eve Moulton, “The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar” by Edgar Allan Poe, Psilocybin and Mushrooms Cultivation by Henry J. Powel, Common Phantoms: An American History of Psychic...