Tag: writing

Poetry of Crisis

April 25, 2026

I know right now a lot of people are having a difficult time. When I originally wrote this book of poetry, that was the case as well. Many of these poems reflect a period when I was searching and trying desperately to figure things out. So, I thought now seemed like a good time to post some of them.

*

Climbing


Some days seem dark,
and void of meaning,
wrapped in confusion and filled with missteps.
Others bring light,
and understanding,
a full grasp of what is and has been.
Progression tends to come in plateaus, periods of ascension,
then long, bleak spans of flailing that test us,
making us question and wonder if we are still climbing at all.

Pride


I swallowed my pride,
Because life taught me it was expendable.
And watched while others insisted keeping theirs.
I swallowed my dreams so others could follow theirs,
Insisting that they were more relevant.
I sacrificed my life’s path,
Because others felt mine was without consequence.
I bent myself to accommodate
Because others were louder with their desires.
I wiggled and molded until the mold broke,
Then I stopped,
And found myself again.

Incidentals


The nights are quiet,
the shadows long and twisting.
We walk a creaking staircase,
aware of steps uneven,
and unmeasured.
The landing is shaky,
but more stable as we walk deeper.
This hallway isn’t nearly so dark,
as the one beneath us,
nor nearly so long.
And the end is in sight.
This is our house,
unexpected, not smooth, at times unsteady,
but strengthening.
This is our house.

Milestones


Quiet milestones,
mark the road.
Not bright, or bold,
not flashy, or earth shattering,
but silent and steady.
Some missed, overlooked,
not looked upon at all until you’re looking backward.
A memory, an old photo,
a smile once forgotten,
that says simply and serenely,
everything’s changed from this moment on,
and nothing, definitively,
nothing will ever be the same.

Do You


Do you remember who I am,
Who I was dancing in the rain.
Who I am listening for your voice,
Who I was dreaming about what would be,
Who I am tending to our lives,
Who I was daring the fates to stop me,
Who I am remembering who I was.

Copyright © 2024 by Evelyn Klebert

Explanations

In this, her second poetry collection, Evelyn Klebert takes us down the intricate path of a personal journey. Life, with its particular struggles, pitfalls, and ultimately triumphs, clearly begins to mirror a universal path, the quest for answers that we all ultimately pursue. In this reflective, esoteric collection, we can all explore and seek some of life’s elemental mysteries and, hopefully, when all is said and done, emerge with some Explanations.

Cornerstone
Amazon
Excerpt

Writing When the World is on Fire

March 13, 2026

Not to extensively wade into the arena of recent newsworthy events, it is sufficient to say that most red-blooded sentient mammals might just be experiencing more than the usual amount of stress right now. And as a writer, currently wrestling with the unfinished first draft of a sequel novel, I could say I’m not just having a bit of writer’s block but rather a bit of writer’s paralysis.

So, I thought I’d write down a few thoughts on this topic and maybe share.

“Writing about a writer’s block is better than not writing at all.”
― Charles Bukowski

And, for anyone out there who has written a sequel, that in itself comes with its own challenges.

“Sometimes you shouldn’t be too consistent. Recognize that the world you’re writing for is not the one you wrote for originally.” ― Ellen Kushner

I found this quote about writing sequels, and it did resonate with me. The sequel I’m working on is the fourth book in the New Orleans Paranormal Mystery Series. This book follows: Gravier’s Bookshop, The Hotel Mandolin, and The House at Pritchard Place. Each book in this series focuses primarily on a member of the Breslin family, a New Orleans extended family, whose members all have varying degrees of psychic abilities. The novel I’m currently working on spotlights Jared Breslin, the youngest member, around nineteen, and is told primarily, though not extensively through his eyes.

Each book is a different paranormal adventure, often varying in tempo and style, and structure as well. As Ellen Kushner indicated in her quote, the world of the sequel is different from the one of the previous books. Playing with perspective with these different characters does create a different world view and consequently a different world.

“The world as we see it is only the world as we see it. Others may see it differently.”
— Albert Einstein

But coming back to my original point and dilemma, how does one get past writer’s block/paralysis?

“You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.” — Jack London

Good advice from Mr. London, but sometimes even finding that club feels like a monumental effort, though essential, without question. For me, long walks are helpful, writing in a different space, sometimes on a different medium (Notebooks can still be handy), a little meditation, reading someone else’s book. . . The list goes on and on.

“I don’t sit around waiting for passion to strike me. I keep working steadily, because I believe it is our privilege as humans to keep making things. Most of all, I keep working because I trust that creativity is always trying to find me, even when I have lost sight of it.” ― Elizabeth Gilbert

Elizabeth Gilbert is right, of course. Nothing beats having a work schedule for writing. I think writing is sometimes mistaken for a creative pastime or hobby that is flexible rather than being an actual job.

But the problem right now is unique, though maybe not as unique as one might think. Throughout history, writers have carried on through challenging and sometimes horrific circumstances. Through wars and humanitarian catastrophes, they’ve continued to endure and chronicle and create.

Where focus goes, energy flows ― Tony Robbins

I actually find this quote helpful. It is true. If we focus on the stress of things, of current events, or even our own lives, then the energy we have goes there. But if we manage to focus on our goals, writing or other projects, then that is where our energy goes, into creation rather than dissipating into stress.

I don’t know if this is helpful to anyone, but I do thank you for letting me bend your ear for a moment.

And now I’ll get back to work.

Poetry of Reflection

January 27, 2026

I am in a curious spot right now, caught between assessing, reflecting, working, and moving forward.

In the interim, I’ve decided to post some poetry from my collection entitled, Explanations. Wishing everyone peace during these turbulent times.

If

If I look at you through the filter of the past.

I only see what was.

If I focus on the mistakes you’ve made,

I trap myself next to you,

in pain,

in the past,

me that person who was hurt,

and you unthinkingly that person who hurt me.

If I triumphantly hang onto my wounds,

and won’t release you from your affronts against

me,

then we both are stuck in an ugly place,

where there is no hope for a better you or me.

If I look at you through the filter of the past,

I miss everything that you are now,

and that I have become.

Certainty

I cast a net into the ocean,

sure of what I’ll catch,

but time and fate and winds of change

bring back the unforeseen.

I mark a page in my journal,

confident of what my life will bring,

but twists and turns and stumbles unknown

lead down an unexpected road.

I see myself in a passing glimpse,

in a mirror that has hung

forever it seems in the same place.

And I say to my image “Who will you be

when I look again tomorrow?”

Quite sure and quite confident

that I have no idea.

Whispers

Can you hear them,

When it’s quiet?

Voices speaking softly.

Gently guiding,

Leading you along

To remember and See things clearly.

Can you hear them

When the world is roaring?

When the noise of life

Becomes deafening?

Then it’s so easy

To listen to louder voices,

Voices judging, pushing,

Demanding.

Can you see the difference

And where the difference leads?

One to peace, one to truth,

And the other spiraling down.

A Different Voice

All our lives we chase the dream,

that elusive thing we’re sure will bring us

happiness,

Wealth, success, admiration of strangers.

We strive and struggle and hope

that this will fill the dark void.

But the void only swallows,

and stretches,

and absorbs all the light.

In the darkness like a hungry child,

it cries more, and more and

more,

and never enough,

A ceaseless hunger,

Until fatigue and hopelessness takes us.

For how can never enough ever be quenched?

Perhaps a different path,

following a different voice,

where peace is never obtained at such a

steep cost.

The Eye

There’s a place outside of the storm,

or inside if you prefer.

It’s an odd view,

somewhat unobstructed,

ever so slightly removed from the chaos,

from the franticness,

from the rampant delirium.

It’s a calm perspective, where vision is cleared,

and profound thoughts are born.

The Anchor

How can your world change

in a moment, a simple breath?

What seems solid and dependable

simply slips away as though it were a phantom.

All its simple, dependable expectancies shimmer

into a memory.

Leaving you wondering where at all

is solid ground.

In a moment your world bends in on itself,

remolding and remaking in unrecognizable ways.

You become the anchor around which all else

reforms itself.

You are its constant,

against which the waves crash.

Copyright © 2024 by Evelyn Klebert

Explanations

In this, her second poetry collection, Evelyn Klebert takes us down the intricate path of a personal journey.

Life, with its particular struggles, pitfalls, and ultimately triumphs, clearly begins to mirror a universal path, the quest for answers that we all ultimately pursue. In this reflective, esoteric collection, we can all explore and seek some of life’s elemental mysteries and, hopefully, when all is said and done, emerge with some Explanations.

Cornerstone
Amazon
Excerpt

An Empath in the Woods (part two) – Halloween Month 2025

October 28, 2025

Well, I am wrapping up Halloween Month here at evelynklebert.com with part two of my short story, “An Empath in the Woods.” This tale was taken from a new collection of short stories, A Murder in the Village and Other Mystical Tales of the Ouachita Mountain, which will be released next month. So, stay tuned. I do hope you’ve enjoyed my pre-Halloween celebration. I will leave the stories posted for a while in case you’ve missed any. I hope you can take a little time to enjoy the holiday, and as always I sincerely wish everyone peace.

Take Care,

Evelyn

An Empath in the Woods (part two)

“Don’t get too close.”

“I don’t want to lose her or It,” she grimaced. “Half the population around here owns a red sports car.” She was meandering down Desoto Road, pretty much the artery of the Village. It was the only road that really connected anything around here, at least one side to the other, the East and West gates.

“Just don’t go so fast, lay back a bit. I don’t want IT to mark your car.”

Her heart clutched painfully at his words. “Why would it mark my car?”

“Bright yellow, Allie, not too inconspicuous,” he nearly growled.

“Sorry, I didn’t know I would be doing surveillance when I purchased it. Why didn’t we take your car?”

“My car is back home,” he answered. She didn’t question, just vaguely wondering if that was snowed in as well.

“I can’t go too slow. Traffic backs up, and the retirees around here aren’t, well, very retiring.”

“A lot of impatience,” he grumbled.

“A lot of dissatisfaction,” she murmured. The truth was, she had nothing to back that up, just a feeling. And then two cars ahead, she noted the red car taking a turn. “That’s one of the apartment complexes here.”

“Yep, makes sense,” he murmured. “Lots of people around, go ahead and turn in, but don’t get too close.”

“I—” She opened her mouth to protest but then didn’t. What could she say? She had no idea what they were doing or why. Allie made a quick turn and then a curvy, well-forested bend right before the rows of condos appeared. She almost said she had no idea where the It had gone when she noticed the red car had indeed parked on a row that faced the descent down to the lake. And then, rather quickly, the door opened, and the blond stepped outside. Just the sight of her ran a quick chill of fear down her spine.

He put his hand on her. “Park somewhere as though you live here.” Frowning, she pulled her car directly in front of one of the side rows of condos, then turned off the engine.

Her chest hurt, and her breathing felt strangely labored. “What now?”

“Just wait.” His hand was still on hers, but she didn’t push it away. The contact of this, yes, total stranger, felt strangely calming amid this bizarreness. Her eyes lifted again as she saw the woman standing beside her car, seeming as though she was looking for something. “It feels us,” he murmured.

“I don’t understand.”

“Just be still and calm,” he whispered. She bent her head down and tried to center herself, mentally erecting barriers as Dr. Crispin had taught her. “That’s good,” he said softly. And then she glanced up to see the tall blond unlocking the door on the unit on the end and going inside. As the door closed behind her, he said softly. “It’s all right. I’ve marked her.”

“You’ve marked her? What does that mean?” It was closing in, too much, too much external stimuli.

“It means when it’s time. It will be easy to find her again.”

Breathing deeply while trying to get hold, she looked over at him as though he’d lost his mind. “Time for what exactly?”

“Time to send It on its way,” he said grimly.

*

She’d thought to tell him to get the hell out of her car, but she didn’t. He suggested they go back to her house to talk. “It’s my experience that when you say you want to talk, you don’t do much of it.”

“You’re very hostile, you know,” he said placidly.

“You think? I wonder why that could be?”

But that wasn’t all that was going on. She tried hard to focus on driving, driving, and not driving off the road.

“What do they feel like, these attacks?”

“I don’t know. I guess like someone else would think of a panic attack.”

Dr. Crispin had looked down at her, tilting her head with her dark glasses in such a way that reminded her of her second-grade teacher, Miss Spell. And she was a pistol. “You’re not like anyone else, Allison. And you shouldn’t keep trying to be so.”

“I thought that was why I was here.”

“Now describe them to me.”

It seemed to start with the breathing, quick, panicked breaths, and then that vice-like pressure in her chest. She was thoroughly checked out by a cardiologist, and, of course, the prognosis was nothing physical. It must be emotional, and her favorite, probably stress. Yes, yes, there was stress in being the way she was.

He’d put his hand on her again, pulling her out of the cage of her mind. “All right?”

“Not feeling well,” she muttered.

“Pull over, I’ll drive.”

That probably wasn’t a good idea. She didn’t know if he had a license. She didn’t know who or what he was. But her hands gripping the wheel were starting to tremble. So, crashing was indeed becoming a relevant possibility. “Maybe,” she said.

He hadn’t moved his hand from hers. Strange, but stranger yet that she hadn’t asked him to.

“It feels like fear.”

“Fear?” She’d repeated. And she wondered if a good chunk of your training at psychiatry school was just learning to echo your patients in order to eat up time.

“Yes, fear like a blanket of it covering you, a living blanket covering, then suffocating you.”

She’d turned off onto a road, then pulled to the side, turning off the jeep. She didn’t speak, didn’t move, just concentrated on getting air because now that fear had exploded out of control exponentially. Her vision was blotching with great black spots swirling around. “That thing drained your energy a great deal.”

His hand tightened over hers. “I just need, just a minute,” she managed to get out. Speaking was definitely a challenge when you were having trouble breathing.

“Close your eyes,” he said calmly.

“Look—”

“Do it,” he said firmly.

Without many options, she did, leaning back on the headrest. Colors, so many colors everywhere, and that fear, ugly fear, swallowing her up.

“How long have you had these attacks?” Dr. Crispin had asked.

“Always, always, and never predictable.”

“You know, you feel so much, Allison, from other people. It’s not surprising your system just rebels against it all sometimes.”

“Try to relax,” he said. “Don’t force the breathing. It will straighten out.”

How did he know? She stopped herself. How did he know so many things? She remembered him saying something about things being more permeable there, but that was somewhere else. Not here. “Try to let your mind quiet, not so much thinking.”

“I can’t help that,” she whispered. So strange, she felt so sleepy all of a sudden, overwhelming, like she could barely keep her eyes open. And then he moved his hand away and got out of the jeep, coming around to her side and opening her door.

“Come on, you need to rest,” he said. She opened her eyes, thinking about refusing, thinking about resisting, but the truth was she didn’t have it in her. Not at all.

*

He was making a pot of coffee, Ryland Gray that was, in her house. And she noted distractedly that she was drinking a lot of coffee around him.

“What’s a shell?” She called out in the direction of the galley kitchen.

“You should be resting,” he called back. It was kind of gruff, like he was used to people following his orders.

“I want to understand what’s going on.” She snapped back a little too hotly. What was it about this man’s demeanor that seemed to aggravate her so? Besides all the strangeness surrounding him, and there was plenty of that to go around — plenty, plenty.

He rounded the wall separating the den from the kitchen and strode up to where she was reclining on the sofa. “You really don’t like to listen, do you?”

“Not to strangers, generally.”

“I thought we’d spent enough time lately not to quite be strangers.”

She straightened up a bit, feeling generally vulnerable just lying here like this. “I know next to nothing about you. Except your name is Ryland Gray and you’re some sort of hunter.”

“Tracker,” he said flatly.

“Oh well, that clears it up. Let’s be besties.”

That frown, that strange, curious frown he had, like he was looking at a disobedient child. “You’re too tired to soak anything in right now, Allie Beckett.”

“Tired?”

“Drained.”

Her turn to frown. “Drained, yeah, you mentioned something about that.”

He nodded slowly, looking at her oddly like he was surveying a chunk of farmland. “It drained your energy, pretty thoroughly.”

She crossed her arms in front of her. “And you know that, how exactly?”

“Your aura, energy aura, is diminished. And there’s quite a bit of yellow mixed in with everything.”

“Yellow?” she repeated under her breath. “And that’s about as clear as mud. So, what, you can see all this looking at me?”

“Yeah, you could too if you had a bit more discipline.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’ve spent too much time treating the symptoms of your gift instead of working to understand it. You must let it run free enough so you can direct it to work for you.”

Let it run free, indeed. He must be out of his mind. All that would do would let everything swallow her whole. Ridiculous. And then suddenly there was drowsiness, so maybe she would rest. One piece of advice that was actually useful.

*

“What does it feel like?”

“Being suffocated by fear.”

“It’s not your fear, you know.”

“I know it in my mind but knowing it and feeling it are two different things.”

Her eyes opened slowly, adjusting and noting the ceiling fan casually spinning over the queen-sized bed. And then it slowly sank in. She didn’t have a queen-sized bed. Hers was a double. She closed them again. She must be dreaming now.

“Not exactly.” The voice came from the direction of the doorway that she’d noted just a few seconds before, on her last attempt at surfacing.

“This is your room,” she murmured without even opening her eyes.

“Yes, from yesterday when you were at my house.”

Without really wanting to, she allowed her eyes to flicker open again. There was a lot of light in here, streaming in from a sliding glass door on one wall of the room, leading out, well, somewhere.

“There’s a porch out there and then a walkway down to a lake.”

“Well, that sounds lovely,” she mumbled, “but I don’t remember this room from yesterday.”

He’d dragged over a straight-back chair from behind a small pine-colored desk. Sitting beside the bed, he looked at her with concern. “I think there’s much you don’t remember from yesterday.”

“So, you’re saying this is a memory.”

“An elaboration.”

“A what?”

“It’s complicated.”

“No shit,” she couldn’t help it. These sharp comments just sort of flew out of her mouth. “Sorry,” she murmured.

“As I mentioned before, things are more permeable here. Time isn’t what you think it is, Allie.”

She drew in a deep breath. And strangely, she felt better, lighter than she had at her house.

“That’s why I tapped in here.”

“Your words, Ryland, they have no meaning for me, permeable, tapped in. That doesn’t correlate to what I know. It’s nonsense.”

He was looking at her oddly but not frowning. Was this progress? “When I say permeable, it means thoughts, your thoughts, are not as separate as where you live. Thoughts are energy forms, and energy here travels without as many impediments.”

She sighed, “So, in a practical sense—”

“In a practical sense, it’s easier to send energy, not as easy to steal it, and thoughts that you think are in your head are quite accessible.”

“Oh,” it felt like a fluttering in her chest.

“You’re receiving energy, Allie.”

“From you?”

“Some, and others. I put out a call for help. The thing, it hurt you.”

She looked at him dubiously. “How could it do that? It didn’t even touch me.”

“It didn’t need to. It was in proximity, very strong, built to be a parasite.”

She straightened up on the pillows just a smidge. It was so comfortable here on this lovely bed with some kind of woven afghan spread over her. She could just drift off, so peaceful. “You called it a shell.”

And there it was, the frown. “I didn’t want to get into all this now.”

“Might as well, Ry, do you mind if I call you Ry?”

“Yes.” He said rather stoically.

“Okay then, Ryland, tell me about this shell.”

“To tell you about that, I’d have to first tell you how people lose their spirits.”

*

A screen porch, rustic, odd, a screen porch just outside of his bedroom, or at least she thought it was his bedroom.

“Yes,” he murmured from somewhere as of yet unseen.

Allie sipped the warm mug of mint tea that at some point had been placed in her hands. The crocheted white afghan that had not long ago been warming her on his bed was now neatly tucked around her, and she was sitting in a rocking chair watching the snow coming down outside. “These transitions are confounding,” she muttered.

“You’ll get used to it,” he said, sitting down in a similar chair right next to hers.

“Will I?” she asked.

“If you decide to spend any time in this place. Time moves differently, more connected to thought.”

“So, I’m to gather that all of this took place a day ago.”

“You’re thinking too linear, Allie. It’s difficult to understand unless you let go of some of your constructs.”

“Gibberish again,” she murmured. “Fine, you said something about people losing their spirits, or at least that is the last thing I remember.”

“Okay, let’s see. That is a spiritual matter.”

“Clearly.”

He smiled. She had no idea what had made him smile. “You’re mind, your thoughts. They’re muddled but quick, and I like the way they somersault about.”

She took in a deep breath, trying desperately to convert this conversation into something she could work with. “Okay, so the spirit thing.”

“Yes, well, in a nutshell, we all have a spirit.”

She waited. Was she really going to drag everything out of him? “And?”

“And the spirit incarnates wherever it is with a plan, or rather, a path charted to learn from.”

“What sort of path?”

“Things, events, relationships, illnesses, teachers along the way, ups, downs, all of it patterned for its evolution.”

She chewed on this for a moment, a rather huge morsel to take in. “So, what, you’re saying everyone has one of these paths?”

“Mostly, yes, but then there is free will.”

Huge sip of mint tea that nearly scorched her mouth. “Free will?” she asked, because again, no elaboration.

“Yes, essentially choice. We all have a choice, or how could we evolve?”

Outside Ryland Gray’s screen porch, the snow had stopped falling, and she just quietly looked at the blankets of white covering the forest around them. “So, what exactly does that have to do with—”

“With the thing you encountered in the grocery?”

“Yes, I guess,” she murmured, feeling strangely as though threads were coming together.

“Well, let’s say you were a teacher, a math teacher maybe, and your student completely ignored your lessons. And after a while, wouldn’t even open their textbook, wouldn’t even try to do a math problem, then stopped showing up to school.”

Confounded a bit at the real-world analogy. “I’d be pissed.”

“Yeah, you would, but you’d also begin feeling like you were wasting your time.”

“I suppose. But other than report his butt, I’m not sure how I could force them to learn.”

“Yes, well, a person, such as you, is composed of a spirit, a soul, and a body. If the soul and the body go too rogue for too long, the spirit gives up and just leaves.”

“Leaves the soul and the body?”

“The body is left, the soul torn asunder, sort of ripped so to speak, not really wholly functional.”

She straightened up, profoundly feeling disturbed by these images. “And if that happens, what happens to the person who’s left?”

“They wander, aimlessly, a shadow of their former selves, until it is their time to die. And then their body dies and they with it.”

“And that’s it? That sounds terrible.”

“It is. It is in extreme cases but does happen. But then, those it happens to, those living without that divine spark within, become a cavern.”

“A shell,” she whispered.

And then he put his hand over hers. “Yes, exactly. Allie, like a shell at the beach that has been abandoned by its living inhabitant, until something else crawls inside it and takes over.”

Something else crawls inside it and takes over. His words sent chills throughout her as the visage of that zombie-like man in the grocery lashed treacherously across her mind. Panicked, she had to get out, away from here. Following a sudden impulse, she closed her eyes and concentrated intently on her own bedroom. Breathing deeply, when she opened them again, she was miraculously lying in her own bed, but this time Ryland Gray was standing in the doorway.

“That’s good, Allie. You’re beginning to get the hang of things. Now it’s time to get down to business.”

*

Like a shell at the beach that has been abandoned by its living inhabitant, until something else crawls inside it and takes over.

Just turning over the words in her mind made a chill run down her spine. So, she didn’t ask the obvious question.

“What has crawled inside?”

“That’s not fair. I didn’t ask you that. We’re on my turf now, and you’re not supposed to be able to read my mind here.”

Ryland Gray didn’t frown, not exactly — just kind of looked at her like he was indeed reading her mind and less interested in what words were coming out of her mouth. “Yep, well, the more time I spend with you, the more accessible I find you.”

She stared back at him, “Great, so are we done with all this house-hopping business?”

“Sure,” he said, making himself comfortable on her dark blue and beige plaid couch.

“Good, it’s disorienting.” She snapped back, now sitting in her grandmother’s rocking chair that she had dragged around from rental to rental for probably too many years.

“You know, you were the one doing the hopping around for the last several.”

“I can’t do that,” she muttered.

“You’d be surprised what you can do, Allie Beckett.”

“You said we needed to get down to business. What does that mean exactly? You’re not going to murder someone, are you?”

“I guess that depends on what you mean by murder.”

“Can I get a straight answer out of you, Ryland?”

He shrugged. “Sure, if that’s what you want.” Silence again, she wanted to kick him right in his plaid shirt, sometimes right out of her house. “You don’t like plaid? But your couch is plaid.”

“Stop it. And I used to like it more than I do now.”

Then he stood up and moved right in front of her. And she had to admit, with him sort of standing over her like that and glowering, or maybe he wasn’t glowering, maybe this was just stoic, unruffled Ryland Gray. In any case, he wasn’t really bad looking, sort of sexy in a lumberjack kind of way. “This thing that has crawled in that girl’s spiritless shell is quite dangerous, quite old, and doesn’t belong on this plane.”

“Plane? What does that mean exactly, dimension? Is that what we’re doing, some kind of dimension hopping? Your house, where time is different, where things are more permeable, where it’s snowing? Are you telling me that’s another dimension?”

“It’s a bit of a simplistic explanation.”

“Well, maybe I’m a simplistic kind of girl.”

“I rather doubt that Allie Beckett.” She thought she detected the slightest sparkle in his dark eyes, but maybe again that was just wishful thinking.

And then she sighed, sighed heavily, sighed audibly in a way that seemed to come from her very soul. “What do you want from me, Ryland Gray. I mean, really, what do you want?”

“I want to finish this job, and I need your help.”

“Job? This is actually some kind of job?”

“I was hired to find this thing and send it on its merry way.”

“Who the hell would hire you to do that?”

“No one from around here,” he said flatly. “But everything’s connected, and its presence is having reverberations everywhere.”

She frowned. “Could I get you some dry ice so you could be a bit more vague?”

There was a hesitation as she realized how poorly that remark had landed. “Dry ice?” A dark, heavy eyebrow shot up.

“Whatever! Look, you know where it is. You marked it. What do you need me for?”

“You have skills, Allie. You may not realize it, but you do. Why don’t we take a ride in your Jeep?”

“A ride? Where?”

“To check out where that thing lives.”

*

They were driving silently down Desota Blvd. again, and Ryland Gray sincerely wished there was more time, more time to prepare the woman next to him for all the changes happening in her life, more time to prepare her for what was to come in the future.

*

“What are you doing?”

His younger sister pulled her long ash-blond hair up into a disheveled ponytail, then unzipped her traveling bag. “I’m leaving.”

“Leaving? Permanently?”

“Not sure,” she answered, shoving a pile of t-shirts into the large duffel bag on her bed.

“Allegra, stop for a minute.”

She did, looking at him strangely, but the way she usually did, as though she was peering. “I had a dream last night. It’s time for me to move on.”

It was not news to him that her dreams were not ordinary, but instead usually prophetic in some way. “Why? I need a diviner. I can’t do this alone.”

She nodded, “Well, other things are calling me now, and that girl will be here soon.”

Now he frowned. His sister was indeed a very talented seer. The divining thing was a bit of a sideline for her. “That girl?”

“Yes, dear brother, the one who will help you. She’ll be much better at it than I am. And you two, well, you won’t want me around when things get going.”

“Allegra, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure, you do, Ryland, you just don’t want things to change. But whether you want it or not, change is coming.” And then she laughed softly, “And from what I saw, she’ll be a handful. But she’s definitely the one.”

“The one?”

“The one for you, Ryland.”

*

He was driving this time, and the woman beside him had fallen silent. He wanted to reassure her, but language skills had never been his strong suit. He could send energy, was very, very good at hitting his target with that, but at present, that wasn’t Allie Beckett’s problem. Her problem was inflexibility. As Allegra had said, “Whether you want it or not, change is coming.” That was the only constant in life.

“It’s not so bad.”

“What?” she said a little sharply.

“My life, the way I live. There’s always something new happening.”

“I don’t like new. I like things to be predictable.”

“Hmm,” he considered. “So, do you really like it that way, or do you think you need it that way?”

Her arms were crossed in front of her protectively, and she was a bit slumped in the seat, reminding him very much of a stubborn child. “Is there a difference?”

“Well, are you happy, Allie Beckett?”

There was silence, silence he could feel. Because, well, because she’d become much easier for him to see lately. He could see her aura, how the colors would fluctuate when she was upset. He could see images that flew through her mind at lightning speed, because she did have a quick and active mind. And he could see when his thoughts reached her, and she had no idea what to do with that. Like right now, he left her befuddled and confused. And to be honest, he kind of liked that.

“I don’t know, are you happy, Ryland Gray?”

He smiled, not so very surprised that she’d turned this around on him. So out of respect for who she was, he honestly thought about it. Lately, he’d felt content, content in his work, feeling as though he was contributing, being of service to the greater pool of humanity. But really happy? That was a consideration. Right now, right in this moment, driving down this long road with this particular woman at his side, filled with her inner conflicts, contradictions, the way she lashed out, the way she succumbed in her quieter moments. And he didn’t really understand why someone would want a banana-yellow Jeep, but he appreciated the fact that she did. Yeah, right now, for reasons other than those myriad ones he’d just articulated in his mind, he was kind of happy.

“Yeah, Allie, I’m happy.”

“You don’t look happy,” she smirked.

“Yep,” he said, turning the Jeep into the apartment complex. “That’s my resting face.”

As they pulled into the parking lot and he turned off the car, he reflected.

“She’s the one, you know,” Allegra had said. “But you won’t have an easy time of it.”

“I’ve never expected an easy time.”

Then, she patted his shoulder. “That’s what I like about you, Ryland. You always persevere.”

“So, how do we deal with this thing?” she asked, straightening up in the seat and peering forward toward the thing’s apartment.

“Well, Allie,” he said a bit methodically. “I have a plan, but it will take some trust on your part.”

“Trust, huh?”

“Yep, we’re going to have to travel to another place to get at this thing,” he said slowly.

“Another place?”

“One close, just a few fractions away, I think, but it won’t see us coming.”

She frowned, “Gibberish again, but okay, so then we’ll kill it?”

“I don’t think it can be killed, but if we’re lucky, maybe we can coax it to evolve.”

“Evolve?” she repeated, looking a bit confused.

“Yes,” he said quietly. “That’s not a small thing, and it’s what it’s all about.”

It took a moment, but then, a slight smile flickered across her lips. She liked him. She really did. He could feel it. And that was no small thing. “What do we do?” she asked.

“Take my hand, Allie Beckett. Then I’ll show you.” It did take a second, but then she did.

Copyright © 2025 by Evelyn Klebert

Halloween Month
KODAK Digital Still Camera

Coming Soon!!

A Murder in the Village and Other Mystical Tales of the Ouachita Mountains

At the foothills of the Ouachita Mountains, into their ancient heart, and even perhaps into nearby unexplored dimensions, slip into a series of supernatural short stories. Take a mystical diversion that could very well land you into a realm at the least unexpected and at the most horrifying. But what is clear is that no one, ever, will emerge as they were before.

An Empath in the Woods – Halloween 2025

October 24, 2025

Well, this month has certainly flown by. Already, this is the last paranormal short story I’ll be posting for Halloween Month, and it will be in two parts. This tale is called “An Empath in the Woods” and is taken from my new collection, “A Murder in the Village and Other Mystical Tales of the Ouachita Mountains.” I am actually hard at work on the final edits for this book, which should be released within the next several weeks. This story is about a young woman whose formidable psychic gifts are challenged when she encounters a mystifying stranger in the forest. I will be releasing part two in a few days. I do hope you enjoy the story, and thanks for dropping by.

An Empath in the Woods

It helped, at least sometimes, walking the trails.

“It’s like being a bug born without its skin.”

She couldn’t help but glare at the analogy. “Really? So, I’m the bug in this scenario.”

Dr. Crispin frowned, a curious woman originally from Romania, with short, curly, very reddish-brown hair, just into her sixties. At least that was what Allie surmised. She’d mentioned she’d be retiring in a few years, which wasn’t good news.

Where exactly was Allie going to find another psychologist whose side specialty was paranormal phenomena? She doubted Health Grades would be helpful. With Crispin, she’d lucked out, a recommendation from a yoga teacher. Oh yes, she’d tried everything, from yoga to meditation, to the conventional routes of medication for depression, but nothing seemed to crack this puzzle. Her puzzle, her problems, that was.

But back to the point—

“Yes, I understand your reluctance to embrace the visual. But think about it. Our skin keeps us separate, separate from our environment, separate from one another. Without it, things are much more painful.”

She did enjoy listening to Dr. Crispin’s accent, even if she didn’t always care for what she was saying. In a peculiar way, she found it soothing to her ragged nerves. Oh yes, back to the bug with no skin. “Could be messy, I mean, having no skin and dangerous, at least for the bug.” Her voice sort of drifted off. Were they really discussing this?

She’d frowned at her, Dr. Crispin had, but then that might have been her resting face. She was actually a lovely woman, with her vibrant hair, trim figure, and just below-the-knee fitted pencil skirts.

It made Allie feel dumpy. She’d shown up at the appointment in jeans and a well-worn button-down. It wasn’t as though she didn’t have nicer clothes, but she was in a funk, a slump, worn out with all this. She hadn’t even cracked thirty yet — no excuses there, except —

“So, how is your life going, Allison?”

“Oh, other than being a bug without my skin, just dandy.” A reddish-brown eyebrow went up.

Too much sarcasm? Dr. Crispin was no-nonsense, for someone dealing with ghosts, goblins, and what was the terminology again?

“Don’t forget, Allison, you are an extreme empath!”

That was it. No meds prescribed to dull the pesky awarenesses around her that did not belong to her.

“So, living in the Village, does the isolation help?”

Deep sigh, deeper than deep, soul-wrenching, good question. That’s why Crispin got paid the big bucks, and she was scrambling to make ends meet. “I would have to say the jury is out, because there are always things to feel — and always people, people somewhere.”

*

The trails, the hiking trails around the Village, did seem to ease things, sometimes that is.

It was October, already late October, the Halloween season approaching. Her year here would be up come January. At that point, there was a decision to make, whether to spend another year virtually in isolation or back to the city, Little Rock, where at least she could see Dr. Crispin more often. That was until she retired, and one more column of support in her unstable existence just vanished.

“Bad thoughts don’t help.”

“Bad thoughts?” she’d questioned.

“Negative, negativity lowers your energy vibration. Someone like you, Allison, can’t afford that.”

Yep, she was right. She had to get hold, desperately trying to drive away these “bad thoughts.” Everything around her was beautiful. Many of the trees were changing to their lovely Autumn shades of gold, yellow, some orange, and the occasional red. But red was not one of her favorites – she’d seen it too often under other circumstances.

The fallen leaves crunched beneath her hiking shoes as she meandered down the winding pathway deeper into the woods.

She breathed in deeply. There was a scent, a curious scent of burning leaves. Foolish, everything was so dry right now, so foolish to be burning anything. She glanced around. This particular hiking trail she’d been on before. It was far away from any of the subdivisions, just woods and a creek a little further down the trail.

But she wondered if it would be dried up. It felt like it had been over a week since there had been any rain.

An unexpected dizziness swept through her so strongly that she had to stop for a moment. As she peered upward, she saw the tall trees all around her reaching toward a cloudy sky.

So strange, when she’d set out from the small parking lot near the dog park, it had been the clearest blue with a few puffy white clouds. But not like this.

Then, another substantial sweep of dizziness hit her, as if she were swirling while standing completely still. Maybe she shouldn’t look upward. Maybe just head back now, but she didn’t move, just rooted to the spot.

“A bug with no skin.”

Something was definitely amiss, not the usual form of anxiety or bouts of depression that would spring on her inexplicably.

What she was feeling was different. She bent over, bending her knees, sort of awkwardly crouching down to the ground. It seemed silly, but then again, she felt desperate. Dr. Crispin called it grounding, putting her palms flat on the earth.

“The earth is filled with powerful grounding energy. It seems odd, but this can help you stabilize.”

Yes, Allie agreed, it did seem odd. And if she wasn’t alone, she’d never consider it, but desperate times —

She closed her eyes, breathing in deeply, indeed feeling a stabilization of the dizziness, at least momentarily. Deep breaths, deep breaths, she coached herself. So absorbed, that was the danger, she didn’t even hear the crunching leaves behind her, but there was something — a shift, perceptible, and a heaviness accompanying it.

She opened her eyes, then slowly turned around, and a few yards away, she saw the figure — a man dressed in a windbreaker, a red one.

She straightened up, shakily standing, suddenly feeling the sweep of dizziness passing over her again. He wasn’t moving, just staring at her — tall, brown-hair, tanned skin, beard, and mustache.

“I was trying not to disturb you.” He finally spoke, kind of flat, unemotional, definitely no signature Arkansas accent, didn’t move an inch, hands in his pockets.

“Oh, I had just dropped something, trying to find it,” she murmured awkwardly.

“I thought you might be grounding yourself,” he said rather casually.

What? That was an unexpected punch. She really didn’t think this was a mainstream thing, “grounding oneself.”

“Um, oh, well,” she muttered in confusion.

“Did you find it?”

“Find it?”

“What you dropped.”

A swirl of confusion swept over her. How did she get herself into these situations? “I was grounding.”

Expressionless, “I know.”

She drew in another deep, uncomfortable, awkward breath. “Yeah, well, it’s late, I think I need to get back.”

“It’s only 10:00, 10:00 AM, here I mean.”

Was this a bizarre conversation, or was it just her? “Here? You mean instead of in China?”

A strange sort of smile drifted across his face as though he appreciated the sarcasm. “No, I meant from where I came from, it was afternoon, around three.”

Why did it feel acutely as though she was losing air out of her lungs? She really needed to shut up. “Where you came from? And where was that exactly?”

The smile was staying. Why was that? “Not far. You see, I was tracking.”

“I don’t think it’s hunting season around here.” She crossed her arms in front of her. Again, why was she still talking to him? He could very well be unhinged.

“No, no, I don’t hunt animals.”

And he was silent again, not elaborating. “Okay, well, as I said, regardless of the time. I need to get going. You have a nice day.” And then she realized it. To get back, she’d have to walk right past him, the bizarre fellow in the red jacket. And it bothered her, worried her, but there seemed no help for it. Either walk past or make a beeline through the woods, which she was not going to do.

And it was true, she did need to get back. She worked online, several jobs online, one of which was freelance editing, a stack of articles she’d been putting off.

Allie steeled herself. She bent her head down and tried to give him a wide berth as she started to pass. Then it happened, the unthinkable. At least something she didn’t see coming. His arm shot out, and he grabbed her forearm as she was passing.

Direct contact, not exactly direct because she was wearing a long-sleeved button-down, but close enough. Extreme, it felt sort of like a sizzling brand burning through her shirt. She twisted in reflex, trying to pull away, but it was like steel. He was immovable.

“Let me go,” she rasped, because it was painful. She was feeling too many things, hot acid all over her. “Christ, where have you been!” she muttered frantically.

“Ssshhh,” he said calmly. “Be still for a minute.”

She didn’t want to. She was outraged and horrified simultaneously. What the hell gave him the right?

And then she heard the words, loud and powerful in her mind. “Stop.”

That silenced her, made her stop pulling every which way to get loose. Shocking, stunning, “Quiet your mind.” Was the command on its heels.

Her vision began to blur, dizziness, such swirls of dizziness. “We need to talk,” he murmured softly, before it all tipped into a gray blanket of mist.

*

“Allie,” whispers floating around her mind. “Don’t be so emotional. There’s nothing to cry about.”

But there was, always, so much pain around her.

“Why can’t you be like everyone else?” Her father’s pleas.

It wasn’t always possible to pretend. Not always.

“Allie, wake up.”

She opened her eyes and felt a chill instantly travel down her spine. And on top of that, she smelled smoke. Still dizzy and with a headache, she gingerly sat up and looked around. It was a room, a den, big rustic, larger than the one at her house, with a huge stone fireplace that was lit. “You can use the throw on the chair,” a disembodied voice, though familiar masculine tones, floated in. She glanced around. Beside her was indeed a wooden rocking chair with a beige woven blanket draped over it. She snatched it quickly. It was cold, much colder than it had been when she left her house.

And then the man in question made an appearance, the one from the woods, the one who’d grabbed her arm and now evidently had— “You know this is kidnapping,” she voiced aloud, not sure if she should have thought that through more, given her unexplored predicament. But she did tend to be on the impulsive side.

“I made us some coffee, a teaspoon of sugar, and some milk, right?” He asked, bringing in two steaming mugs from around a corner, probably the kitchen, but who the hell knew.

She pulled the throw tightly around her that she’d wrapped up in seconds before. “I don’t know if I want any.”

He stopped in front of the sofa, then abruptly took a sip out of one mug and then the other. “See, not drugged.”

“But now I have to drink after you,” she spat out.

He nodded, unconcerned. “Okay, I’ll go wash it down the sink.”

“No,” dang it. “I’ll take it.” She loved coffee, one of her few indulgences. She took it out of his hands, carefully, not wanting any direct physical contact. But taking the mug, she could feel an agitation passing into her fingertips, though not nearly as pronounced as when he’d grabbed her arm.

“I took a shower.”

She looked up at him blankly. “Good for you.”

Frowning, “To get rid of some of the gunk.”

What a bizarre thing to say to a stranger, but then again, what about this wasn’t bizarre? “Okay, not sure why I need to know that.”

He frowned, “Energy, Allie, negative energy. That’s what upset you when I took your arm.”

“Took my arm? You mean when you grabbed my arm, and I couldn’t get away.”

“Yep, I can see why it would seem that way to you.”

“Look, it didn’t just seem that way—” then abruptly another disturbing thought filtered in. She straightened up further on the sofa. “Wait a minute, when did you have time to take a shower? How long have I been out?”

He sort of mumbled. “You didn’t make the trip well.”

Recoiling a bit, in fact backing up as much as physically possible into the corner of this rather large, overstuffed green sofa. “Trip? What trip? Did you put me in a car? Did you drug me?”

“No, this place is in the woods, the Village, just on a different plateau.”

“Plateau? What gibberish is that?”

He frowned again, taking a sip out of his coffee mug. “Drink some. I put cinnamon in it. It’s soothing.”

She shouldn’t just to spite him, but she did, take a huge sip, and it was good, strong with a fleeting taste of cinnamon. Well, her kidnapper makes a good cup of coffee. Wasn’t that good news. “Look, whoever you are.”

“My name is Ryland Gray.”

“Okay, fine, Mr. Gray, I don’t know who you are, but I really need to go home. I’m not like everyone else. I have complicated, um, medical issues.”

“Yes, Miss Beckett. I am aware.” Beckett, Beckett, she hadn’t given him her name. Oh God, how did he know— “You really need to calm down, Allie.”

She swallowed on a dry throat, even though she’d just had a mouthful of coffee. “How, how do you know my name?”

And then he looked down into his mug, “Yep.” No elaboration.

“You won’t find the answers in there,” she snapped.

And then he looked up again. He had brown eyes, sort of brownish green and suddenly they didn’t seem quite as hard and cold as they were a moment before. “It’s complicated.”

She swung her legs around, putting her feet solidly on the wooden floor. At least she was still wearing her hiking shoes. “Am I free to go?” She asked with feigned courage.

“Sure,” he mumbled. “Be my guest.”

Standing up while still feeling wobbly, she braced herself. She would simply walk out the front door, find her way back to the trail and her car, and put this insanity behind her.

He stepped back a bit, out of her way, and she noted for the first time he was wearing one of those heavy flannel button-downs, red and black like some kind of lumbar jack over jeans. Red, too much red, she detested that color.

As quickly as she could manage, she stalked across the den to the front door, turning a rather large bolt and then flinging it open. And then she just stood there on the threshold after a gasp. Distantly, she could hear him moving just behind her, “Yeah, it happened while you were asleep. We’re about two months ahead of you.”

“Ahead?” she whispered in shock because everywhere she looked outside was covered in a layer of freshly fallen snow.

“But the good news is it melts pretty quickly here. By the morning, we can get out again.”

She stood there transfixed. It was so cold, but she was numb. “Have I lost my mind?”

“No, Allie Beckett. You’ve just traveled a bit.”

*

She wandered aimlessly around the den of Ryland Gray’s house in the woods, though exactly which woods and where was a pesky detail her mind couldn’t seem to grasp just at the moment.

Had he somehow driven her — without her being aware, while she was unconscious — so far away from her Village rental that wherever they were now, it was actually snowing.

“No,” he said emphatically.

She glanced across the room. Way across, because he was on one side, looking out a front window whose blinds he had opened, and she was way on the other side, staring out a sliding glass door that led onto a screen porch. She stared back at him. He wasn’t even looking at her. “No, what?” She asked with irritation.

At that, he turned around, still holding a coffee cup in his hand. He couldn’t possibly be sipping on that first cup of coffee still. “This is my second,” he said out of the blue.

And then she got it. Allie might be slow to the race, but she did get there, well, eventually. “Are you—I mean are you really—”

“Reading your thoughts? Yeah, kind of. That’s how I knew how you wanted your coffee, teaspoon of sugar and all that.” He stated rather matter-of-factly.

Oh God, that was right. She hadn’t even thought of that. “Wait a minute. I wasn’t thinking about how I wanted my coffee fixed.”

He frowned. Ryland Gray had a strange frown that kind of looked less like he was disappointed and more like the world was confounding. And he was a bit ticked off by it. At least, that was her take. “Yep, got me there, Allie Beckett. Just when I was starting to think you might not be too sharp, you get me in the side with a pocketknife.”

“What the hell kind of analogy is that?”

“A serviceable one.”

“The coffee, Mr. Gray.”

Eyebrow went up a bit. They were kind of heavy dark eyebrows. Evidently, this face had a bit more malleability than she’d previously suspected. “You want another cup?”

“I want to know how you knew how I take my coffee,” she nearly hissed back at him.

“Don’t get so testy, Allie. It’s best to be more laid back here. Things can be reactive.”

She put her hands on her hips. She really felt like spitting at him, but spitting at a kidnapper might not be the best avenue to take just now. “I don’t know what that means. I don’t know what nonsense you’re babbling about. Are you on some kind of meds?”

That frown again, definitely the resting face. “It’s more permeable.”

She let her hands drop from her hips, waiting for elaboration. But as she’d expected, none was forthcoming. “Oh well, thanks. That explains a lot.”

“So,” he said slowly. And it was a challenge to say such a short one-syllable word slowly. “You want some breakfast?”

Oh, God, this man was going to drive her bananas. “No, Mr. Gray, what I want is to go home.”

He nodded, “Yeah, Miss Beckett. But as I explained, we’re snowed in until tomorrow.”

Hands instinctively flew back onto her hips. “Did you explain that? I don’t remember you explaining shit to me about anything!”

Now there was a flicker of a smile. What the hell was wrong with this guy? “I think I told you not to be so upset, Allie,” he said with a frustrating calmness.

“That’s not explaining,” she mumbled, because it suddenly felt as though she was losing breath, and on top of that, she was dizzy. “I feel funny.”

At some point, he’d moved, moved quickly across the den, and grabbed her arm. She thought to pull away, but everything was spinning, colors spinning everywhere. “Take some deep breaths,” he said with authority.

“I-I can’t. I can’t get my breath.”

“You’re acclimating. It will pass. That’s why I wanted you to stay calm.”

“Acclimating? What does that even mean?” She could barely get the words out. It was such a swirl, a swirl of colors all around her, then other things, things pulsating and writhing almost.

He took her other arm with his hand and began to shake her a bit. “Don’t go there, Allie. Stay focused.”

Vaguely, she wondered what he’d done with his coffee cup, then she could see it in her mind. So odd, like a freeze frame backup. She saw him on the other side of the room, talking to her just moments before. But it was different because now she could feel what he was feeling. He was talking to her, but also looking outside, and also seeing masses of colors slashing across the room. And he was elsewhere, inside her memories, standing next to her in her apartment, examining things, and in Dr. Crispin’s office, sitting there listening closely to their private sessions.

“What the hell is this?” she whispered as she felt him scoop under her legs and lift her in his arms. Contact, so much contact. Usually, she couldn’t bear it. But it was different, so different even from the first time he’d touched her.

“It’s all right, Allie. I’m trying to help,” he murmured. And then a drape of gray passed over her as she lost consciousness again.

*

“You might have prepared her a little better.”

“I didn’t think she’d fight it so much.”

“That’s why you picked her because she’s a fighter.”

Her eyes opened slowly to the dim light of her bedside table. They hurt, her eyes, but she forced them to take in her surroundings. A white corner desk, an ash-wood tall dresser against the wall, and a bed surrounded by her light, fluffy, pastel-colored pillows. She drew in a deep breath that permeated throughout her. But not dizzying. She straightened up and glanced behind her. Yes, it was her ironwork sleigh bed. She was home, home, and profoundly, profoundly confused.

All a dream? Is that what he was trying to sell her? She glanced around, somewhat gratefully but equally confounded.

So, Mr. Ryland Gray was playing games with her.

She pulled her white faux fur bed pillow against her chest. It did feel good to be with her things, stability. And she could just let it be, let it be, and forget the insanity of the other stuff. It was like a gift, a parting gift, whatever he was after, whatever he wanted from her, just didn’t work out.

She leaned back in the bed drowsily. Sure, path of least resistance. Sure, maybe, then she closed her eyes, feeling entirely too exhausted to figure any of this out.

*

When she did finally get out of bed and checked the clock by her nightstand, it was early morning, just shy of seven, a little later than she usually got up. But when she looked at her cellphone, she was stunned. Allie had found something utterly disturbing. She’d lost a day. She remembered clearly that it was Friday morning when she was walking the forest trail by the dog park. But this morning was Sunday. An entire day had just slipped away.

Her head was throbbing painfully, so she was determined to not deal with this until after coffee and something to eat. And then she noticed she was wearing the same clothes, blue jeans, and a sweater she’d been wearing when —

She shut her mind down emphatically. No, no, she would not deal with any of this insanity, coffee, food, then a shower. Exerting great control over her mind, the one that was literally bursting forth with fearsome questions and uncontrollable emotions, she began to move. She wouldn’t backslide. Dr. Crispin had taught her how to maintain a degree of control. No matter what was happening, she wouldn’t allow herself to slide back into that dark time again.

*

Late morning, shuffling with distraction through the largely empty aisles of the only grocery right outside the gates of the Village, and by right outside, she meant a good six or seven miles away from her home. That was the rub of living in the secluded Village. It was indeed secluded and took a bit of time and driving to get anywhere.

It was a fact of life that one had to be a good planner here. It wasn’t like you could just pop over to the grocery for something you’d forgotten. She yawned. A piece of toast, coffee, and a hot shower had not cleared the cobwebs. She usually did her shopping early Saturday morning, way before the crowds dribbled in. Sundays were more dicey. The churchgoing group liked to hit the store early before the 10:00 a.m. service. And oddly enough, while no groceries, the large expanse of the Village, over 26,000 acres of the Ouachita Mountains, at least that was what the travel brochures purported, was dotted with so very many houses of Worship — every denomination to pick from, and some she’d never heard of.

But Allie wasn’t a churchgoer. She’d had enough of that, a mother who’d brought her highly emotional child to a congregation that seemed only too happy to pray over her for exactly what she wasn’t sure, except that maybe her well-meaning mother thought she was possessed by some aberrant evil of some capacity.

Another yawn, yes, this was going to be tough going, shopping the specials and buying for the week. Maybe she should have waited, waited, and done this tomorrow. But how she hated her inflexible schedule being interrupted, particularly after all those odd dreams.

Quite assuredly, the pieces did not fit together, not one bit, but the alternative seemed to be more than she could deal with just now. She pulled the grey hoodie that she’d pulled on over her black sweater more tightly about her as she moved her icy basket down the largely empty aisles. It was so cool this morning, a sudden chill in the air that had seemed to creep out of nowhere.

And then, abruptly, she stopped, stopped driving her basket past the pasta shelves. She had planned to make her grandmother’s spaghetti sauce and portion it for four days, because after all, she was just one person. But then it happened again, like a stabbing pain darting up her spine, a pain that wasn’t exactly a pain.

“It’s an awareness.”

“What does that mean?”

“You have to accept the fact that you’re like a radar for things other people can’t feel.”

“What kind of things?”

“Unfortunately, with you, I would suspect difficult things.” Dr. Crispin had explained with the expected detachment of a professional.

Her eyes rose slowly, canvassing the aisles. She was situated at this point about in the middle. Forward, there was no one, and as she quickly glanced behind, she noted nothing there as well. She took in a quick breath. Well, either it would pass or, if it was too intense, she’d simply abandon the shopping cart and get out of there. Otherwise, as she’d found in the past, it could turn quite detrimental to her.

Allie steadied herself, drawing in a deep breath, closing her eyes, and attempting to center as she’d practiced during her sessions with Dr. Crispin. Once she felt steadier and had regained her mastery, she slowly opened her eyes and immediately saw a figure standing at the front of the aisle. It was jarring because, besides being positioned in the middle of what would be her exit and staring her down, there was the face. It was an old man with a bony, gaunt face — not one that looked naturally aged, but instead with pale, crinkled skin tightly stretched across his skull. His eyes were wide and unblinking, giving him a zombie-like expression, as if he’d walked out of The Walking Dead. Instinctively, she stepped back, then felt a decisive stab in her heart region.

“Remember to see what is actually there, Allie. Not representative.”

“Representative? What does that mean?”

“Your brain and your eyes adjust to what you feel is the truth.”

“Could you be more opaque?”

And then Dr. Crispin had frowned in her disgruntled/disapproving manner. “Tell your mind to see what everyone else sees.”

Okay, okay, fine, Dr. Crispin, she mentally acknowledged. Centering herself, she sent out a pure, crisp thought to her mind. See what everyone sees.

It was blurry for a moment, as though her eyes were actively refocusing, and then she began to see the change. The old man’s face sort of melted, molding into something else. It took her breath, for a moment, such a sharp, radical difference. Not only had the features softened, but they were no longer a man but instead a woman, a tall, statuesque blond, maybe early twenties, very pretty in a beachy sort of way. The woman was now smiling back at her in such a welcoming way. But Allie couldn’t help but feel a lurch in her stomach, a lurch of nausea as the pain in her heart area only deepened. She was losing energy, clearly a drainer, but something else, something worse, somehow.

Without a thought, she flipped the direction of her basket around in the aisle, quickly moving toward the opposite end of the store. Once she was out of that thing’s sight, she ditched the cart and rapidly headed out the front door.

Her breathing was shallow, panicked. It was so strong, the feeling of darkness, much more potent than she usually felt. When she reached the door of her yellow jeep that she’d beeped open with her keys only seconds before, she was startled. In her panic, she hadn’t noticed anyone approaching, and she actually jumped as a hand closed over her own. Her eyes jolted up, staring into a familiar bearded face, one she’d decided was a dream even though the pieces didn’t add up.

“What are—” she started, not at all sure how to finish that question.

“Get in the car,” Ryland Gray said with steel in his voice. “We need to talk.”

*

They were sitting in the front of her banana yellow Jeep in the parking lot of the Piggly Wiggly, she in the driver’s seat and her uninvited guest, one Ryland Gray, who it was clear was no figment of her imagination, in the passenger seat. And oh yeah, he was saying nothing.

“Look, what is—”

“Sssshhh,” he snapped impatiently.

“Hey, you were the one who said—”

“Be quiet, Allie. Don’t you understand, be quiet around here?”

“Around here?”

And then he gave her a glaring look that did indeed silence her. She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel, wondering if she should make a run for it because this guy was clearly a bit nuts.

“Look,” he snapped out. “Is that It?”

Her eyes rose back to the front entrance of the grocery where that Woman Thing, whatever it was, had just exited the store. “Is that what?” she whispered.

“It’s a shell.”

Her eyes widened. “A what? A shell?”

He nodded slowly, his eyes fixed on the figure that had stopped a few rows over beside a bright red sports car. “Yep,” he said slowly. “Good work, Allie. You’re clearly raw at this, but excellent nonetheless.”

Her eyes watched dubiously as the woman/thing/shell, as he called it, climbed in and started her car. “Excellent at what?”

“Being a diviner.”

“A diviner, don’t they predict the future?” She muttered in confusion.

“No, not that kind. Like the stick that finds water, a divining rod.”

Now that image took a moment to soak in. “You’re comparing me to a stick.”

“Start the car,” he said abruptly.

“Why?”

“Because we’re going to follow it.”

Copyright © 2025 by Evelyn Klebert

Halloween Month
Link to An Empath in the Woods (part two)

Coming Soon!!

A Murder in the Village and Other Mystical Tales of the Ouachita Mountains

At the foothills of the Ouachita Mountains, into their ancient heart, and even perhaps into nearby unexplored dimensions, slip into a series of supernatural short stories. Take a mystical diversion that could very well land you into a realm at the least unexpected and at the most horrifying. But what is clear is that no one, ever, will emerge as they were before.

Emma Fallon – Halloween Month 2025

October 17, 2025

The third story that I’m posting this month is a short story called “Emma Fallon” which first appeared in a collection called The Left Palm and Other Halloween Tales of the Supernatural. Strangely, after I wrote this, the characters from this tale hung around in my mind for so long that their relationship evolved into a sort of prequel in The Alchemist’s Bride. I do hope you enjoy it and as always peace to all.

Emma Fallon

It bothered her how misunderstood she felt. How people, loved ones, friends, and yes, even fiancés didn’t get it, didn’t get her. She sat in the coffee shop just across the street from the high-walled cemetery. The day was overcast and cloudy — a perfect day for pictures. Her watch read just after ten. The office had been open for about an hour. She phoned in sick at work today. A weary sigh traveled up to somewhere around her throat. It was no secret that she had no business begging off work. She actually held several jobs, and it was her morning work as a receptionist in Dr. Clarence Marchand’s pediatrician office that she called in sick for. Later in the afternoon would bring her position at the department store at the Mall, which stretched into the evening. Then, on the weekends, there was the post at the circulation desk of the public library, and of course, there were also her classes. She took night classes several times a week, working toward a business degree — too much on her plate for a single woman of thirty-five with a bad marriage under her belt. Too much, particularly since her passion these days was photography.

She’d noted the gates of Lafayette Cemetery being unchained only moments before by a thin elderly man. Distracted, she wondered who worked in a cemetery and thought to herself cryptically, perhaps she should, given her pension for eclectic employment.

“Perhaps you should pick one track and stick with it.”

That would be Peter, Peter Reynolds, and her fiancé of just under two weeks now. He was a doctor that she’d met when he’d come to fill in for old Dr. Marchand one week. That was the first job, the one she was allegedly sick for today. Peter was younger than she was by nearly four years, which kept her from going out with him at first. It was one of those invisible lines she’d established at some indefinable point in her life. But then, he was particularly persistent, and after a while, another line was broken.

One of the things she liked most about him was that he was nothing like her first husband, except, of course, when he made statements like that.

“You sound just like Jack.”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to.”

Peter was quick to be sorry. And that was helpful, but she questioned marrying him in the future. And she questioned picking one track for her life, and mostly she questioned the odd restlessness within her that lately seemed to have become a permanent fixture.

Finishing her cup of coffee, she pulled on the lightweight cotton shirt she’d brought to wear over her sleeveless sweater, just in case it turned out to be chilly this morning. It was late October, almost Halloween in New Orleans, so that made the weather wholly unpredictable.

The streets around the cemetery were largely unoccupied. It was a Thursday morning, and this was not her section of town. This was the Garden District, a lovely area of the city that drew her more often than she liked to admit. What made it distinctive was its texture, its antiquated feel, and its removed aura that tended to convince one it belonged in another place — perhaps another time, wholly separate from anything around it. She’d toyed with the idea of asking Peter if they could move here once they were married. After all, what he would make as a pediatrician would far eclipse what she was managing to live on now. Of course, that would mean she would have to go through with the marriage. She was many things but not a gold-digger, not a mercenary. Marriage would have to be real, for love, not convenience, if it happens at all.

Her black leather boots clicked hard on the cement pavement as she rounded the corner of the old cemetery.

A breeze blew lightly through her thick blonde hair just as she walked beyond the iron gates that led inside. It was as one would expect and yet not. High trees stretched over tall, granite mausoleums, some in perfect condition while others damaged, weather and time-worn as expected. Leaves crackled, and distantly she smelled the dying embers of a fire. Nervously touching the small camera case around her neck, she attempted to clear her mind and concentrate. Pictures, pictures, she thought if she could sell some to a local magazine then finally, she might be on the right track.

“Perhaps you should pick one track and stick with it.”

“You sound like Jack.”

“Was that his name? I thought you said, Thomas.”

She’d laughed, “No, no you must be mistaken. It was Jack.”

Then he looked at her with eyes that said he wasn’t so sure but still reassured. “Sorry, didn’t mean to.”

Her feet wandered through their own volition. She’d been here before but never inside. In her ten years in the city, she’d never wanted to come inside before, until now — until this morning after the dreams, dreams of smoke, bitterness in her throat, smells that burned her nostrils like acid. And then she’d awoken, knowing that she must see inside, not wanting, but needing.

The long blue jean skirt she wore was straight and now felt confining. She should have worn pants, but she hadn’t. The skirt stopped her from taking the long strides she was driven to. Surrounding her, the crypts were large — large, tall, rectangular slabs of stone. They were so similar in construction, but the epithets were different: the 1800s, early 1900s, children, families — a child struck down by yellow fever. She took out the camera and began to take shots, shots everywhere, scattered, trees, tombs, broken slabs of stone, just randomly shooting, her fingers quaking as she soaked it all in.

What was it?

She looked up from behind the lens. Elusive but powerful, a pull, it bothered her. Worse than that, it was pushing her, stalking her.

She began to move rapidly but randomly down the uneven pathways between the tombs, reading the inscriptions, looking, feeling, and needing frantically something, something that was here. Her hands reached out strangely, desperately, her fingertips brushing lightly across the etched words, forgotten names.

This pointless action stretched on and on for endless minutes. That was until a feeling of foolishness nearly compelled her to stop. But then lightly skimming across a name delicately engraved on a cold, hard slab of rock, she hesitated, then jolted once it was absorbed.

Impossible, she whispered to herself, staring dumbfounded at what she saw. Again and again, she scraped her fingers along the letters —again and again in disbelief, until her brain soaked in what she saw. It was a coincidence, of course, a name a common name, but hers, her name: “Emma Fallon, Died October 20, 1900.”

*

“Emma, you just called him Jack. His name was Thomas.”

She nodded, her mind, or rather her memory, hazy. Then she murmured, “Thomas Woolery.”

Peter was looking at her oddly as though she was making no sense, none whatsoever. “Woolery? But your name—”

“Of course,” the fog was beginning to clear now. It must be those pills he’d prescribed for her to help her sleep, to help her sleep dreamless sleep. “I went back to my maiden name. Why would I keep his?”

“Of course,” he cut her off. His flat expression told her that he was satisfied. He did have a pragmatic mind, a physician’s mind. Things had to make sense to him. “And Jack?”

She rubbed her temples, trying desperately to clear out the cobwebs. “It was his middle name, Jackson. Sometimes I called him Jack.” She didn’t know why she’d lied. It probably wasn’t at all necessary. But the truth, the truth, would have been less palatable to her young fiancé. She had to make allowances for him. He was young in so many ways. The world to him was what he could touch, see under a microscope, and could be explained. To her, it was something different, filled with half chances, mist, incomplete tasks, fractures — not so certain, not so tangible, and not at all as controllable as he would have liked to think. She didn’t know who Jack was. It wasn’t her ex-husband’s middle name. It wasn’t a name she was even particularly comfortable uttering. And she had no idea why for a few moments, she was convinced otherwise.

*

A breeze brushed by her, and it seemed to whistle, whistle directly into her ears, causing pain.

There was a distinctive tap, the tap of a boot on the partial cement walkway that ran along the front of the tombs. She closed her eyes, still feeling the pain in her ears, her head, fingertips still connecting to the tomb, the tomb of a woman who bore her name yet died so long ago. And the tapping, light tapping, was only getting closer. She willed her hand to move, to leave its position connecting with the cool granite, but it would not. So, instead, she willed the tapping to pass her by. No doubt it was close, as it had grown distinctly louder. But again, averse to her wishes, it did not. It simply stopped. Somewhere along the infrequently trodden pathway, it had simply stopped.

She forced her eyes open. Vision was blurry and distinctly out of focus — no doubt the breeze, the chapping wind that felt as though it had dropped in temperature, sometime during the last several moments. She breathed in deeply, extending her other hand and grasping the first, forcing it away from the inscription. There was no point now, no pictures today, she told herself. Something had gone awry and nothing more was possible now. She turned on her heel to leave but then stopped abruptly, jolted. Only a few yards away he stood, a figure, a man quietly watching her.

She didn’t intend it, but the suddenness, unexpected shock, sent her eyes into direct contact. A man, bearded, fair, her age, perhaps older, in a trench coat standing there. There was no mistake, just watching her directly. She pulled her light shirt around her more closely, dropping her eyes and readying for a quick departure, when his voice abruptly caused her to halt. “I must know before you leave here if you’re all right.”

Against her volition, the voice sent her eyes upward again meeting his. She realized he’d taken another few steps toward her, and her immediate response was to back away. But there was nowhere to go. Behind her was the cold, hard surface of Emma Fallon’s tomb. “I’m fine.” There was a perceptible tremor in her voice.

And then he stepped closer, with, she believed, an expression of kindness on his face. She noted for the first time he was wearing a turtleneck sweater and blue jeans beneath the open trench coat. Odd wardrobe, after all, it was only October. October in New Orleans was not especially cold weather by any means. “Are you sure? You look a bit distressed.”

“No,” and then she shrugged, “that’s not unusual. I usually look distressed.” Impulsively, she’d decided to diffuse the awkwardness by taking on a bit of a flip tone.

An amused smile spread across his face, and she thought of Peter and how he was much too literal to appreciate such peculiar moments. “Well, if that’s true, it is unfortunate. A lovely lady like yourself should not be so often upset.” She detected no particular accent, but he did have a specific way of phrasing words that suggested intelligence or perhaps culture.

“I didn’t say I was upset, just that I looked so.”

He nodded, “No, you didn’t say. But it is more than clear that you are.” She hadn’t realized when he’d taken that final step, the one that brought him directly in front of her. The one that enabled him to quietly reach up and graze her cheek with his fingertips, “So pale,” he murmured. “Have you had a fright?”

The sound was loud, loud enough, so perhaps he should have heard her heart hammering, hammering in fear, or hammering in surprise, of which she wasn’t at all certain. Details seemed to be becoming blurred. “No, why would you say such a thing?”

And then the smile, a slight smile that traveled up into blue-gray eyes. “Because it is clearly written all over you, all over your lovely face. That something terrible has brushed by you.”

She deliberately stepped to the side, since there was no place to escape backward. “I have to be going,” she managed to get out.

But the stranger’s eyes were no longer on her. They were focused on the tomb that now lay exposed. And to her complete bewilderment, he reached out his hand, almost tenderly brushing the inscription as she had done herself moments before. “Emma Fallon,” it came out in a heavy whisper, his deep voice wrapping around the name in an odd way. And then his eyes were on her, not so kind, not so soft, now remarkably piercing. “Have you heard about Emma Fallon?”

She stood there, struck dumb for a moment, staring at him with puzzlement, “Heard?”

And then he nodded, “Oh yes, so many stories about this young woman. As you can see, she died fairly young.”

For a split second, her heart slammed in her chest. She’d been so captivated by the name she hadn’t considered the dates. “Really?” was all she said, feeling in the moment a strange, inexplicable paralysis creeping into her flesh.

“Oh yes, young, but a busy life. Some say she was a mystic,” and then his eyes narrowed as he focused in on her again, “but others not. Others say she was a witch.”

She felt his bold stare and suddenly experienced an odd coursing of strength that seemed to gravitate up her spine. She straightened up and frowned at him explicitly, “Really? A witch? With a long nose and a black cauldron?”

And then the stranger smiled again, appreciating, she was quite sure, her sudden burst of spunk. “Well, perhaps not exactly that kind of witch because I have heard she was quite beautiful. No, I think more so the kind of witch that casts spells, charms, perhaps beguilements.”

“Sounds lovely,” her voice was dry. She wondered in this odd moment exactly what was going on here. Was this strange man trying to flirt with her or planning a mugging? At this bizarre instant, either scenario seemed plausible.

He dropped his hand from the tomb. “I see you’re not one for fancifulness.”

She folded her arms in front of her, feeling oddly more vulnerable in the wake of that observation. “Well, life doesn’t always leave you enough time for fancifulness.”

A thoughtful expression crossed his somewhat rugged face. It was odd. She couldn’t truly decide if he was handsome or not. There were sharp planes along his cheek bones that defied that description, but there was also an appeal, something dancing at times in his eyes that could only be interpreted as charming. “Pity,” he offered, “when life denies you such enjoyments.”

Again, she felt taken aback by his words. Truly, if it weren’t for his pleasant manner, she would have sworn he was criticizing her. “Well, as I said before, I have to be going.”

“Going where?” he asked softly but pointedly.

“Work, I’m late for work,” she lied. After all, she had the morning off. She’d called in sick. But the idea of lingering, continuing this very odd conversation, seemed completely intolerable and out of the question.

“I see,” he responded again softly. It was odd how the tone of his voice had become so quiet, soothing, almost wrapping around her when he spoke. “Did I tell you how Emma Fallon died?” Again, a breeze blew near them, the temperature dropping perceptively, or perhaps it hadn’t. Perhaps it was simply all in her mind. She was now realizing, in this foreboding moment, that she shouldn’t be here. And that all of this was possibly a terrible mistake. She said nothing but took a step backward, feeling her booted leg brush up against the last resting place of Emma Fallon. “It was an unfortunate end, you see. But many said she deserved her fate. I don’t know if that’s true. What do you think? Does anyone really deserve to die, or to die the way she did?”

“I need to leave now,” she murmured, leaning against the tomb, the cold hard surface of the tomb.

“Yes, I know,” bending in so close to her, she could feel his warm breath. “But first, I’ll tell you how she died.” His eyes widened, and she could feel their glare like a tangible stab holding her in place. “You see, her husband murdered her.” He lifted his hands in the air in front of her, his strong, long, capable hands. And then he continued in a heavy whisper. “He killed her for betraying him with another man. Witch or not, sorceress or not, she couldn’t stop him.”

Her vision began to blur before her, a swirl, as she felt his hands go lightly around her throat. “As you can well imagine, Emma, he strangled her completely and without hesitation crushed the life out of her.” She didn’t know if he’d tightened his grip or what caused all reality to spin and then abruptly disappear into blackness.

*

“You don’t talk about him much.”

“Who?”

Peter frowned a bit, and again, she questioned the reasons that they were together. It was not the first time that she thought perhaps it was convenience, timing, or weakness. And as a person, she found him, well, to put it nicely, not formidable. Not like, “Your first husband, Thomas Woolery.”

It took a moment for her consciousness to absorb that name. It was there, certainly well-placed in her memory, attached to some face that now seemed to be fading with each passing instant. “It was so long ago.”

Again, confusion and then suspicion passed across his still-youthful features. “How long?”

She shrugged, “I don’t remember exactly, years. I’ve lived here in the city alone for years.”

His brown eyes narrowed, “But you’ve only been working with Dr. Marchand for a few months. What did you do before that?”

She’d smiled, trying to smooth things was her strength in this relationship. “Peter, why all these questions? If you had doubts about me, shouldn’t you have considered that before we got engaged?”

“Why are you so secretive?” he’d asked.

It bothered her, irritated her, actually, all the probing. She had answers, neat little answers tucked away in a file in her mind somewhere for such occasions, but now it seemed like such an effort to get to them. “Look, I’m just not feeling well, a headache. How about we do this another time?”

And then he nodded, said sorry, and dropped it. Like she knew he would. And a day passed and another with no more inquiries, and then there was this day.

*

She awoke to dimness, flickering shadows on a white brick wall, and a chill so powerful that it felt as though the season had changed. Her head throbbed as she sat up on the short pink satin settee. A heavy knitted, ecru-colored afghan was tightly wrapped around her.

She glanced about trying to somehow absorb what she was seeing — another chair, small table, bookshelf all light in color, and the fireplace across from her — the only light in the room.

For a moment, she wondered if she was dead. If, indeed, she had been murdered by the stranger in the cemetery, then she dismissed the possibility. It was a nice room, but there had to be more substance to heaven than a pleasant room. “What makes you think you’re bound for heaven?”

The voice behind her was startling. She pulled the cover more closely to her, briefly fearing that she’d been kidnapped and that there were more horrors to come. Then, as he rounded the small couch, he commented dryly, “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Without glancing at her, he crossed to the fireplace, squatting in front of it, stoking the flames. He’d divested himself of the trench coat and pushed up the sleeves of his navy-colored turtleneck. It was a striking shade against his light-colored hair. He turned to her suddenly, shooting her a wry glance. “Are you reading my mind?” she murmured absently.

“Wouldn’t be the first time, love,” he shot back, returning his attention to the fireplace. Her head began to throb, and her vision swirled a bit. “Concentrate Emma, you must anchor yourself here.”

He was now standing in front of the fireplace, poker in his hand, staring at her with a palpable intensity. She straightened up with an unexpected burst of extreme irritation. “What the hell are you talking about?”

And then he smiled, dropping the dark silver poker down to the brick hearth. “That’s better. Use your anger. It will help you regain your place.”

She flung the blanket off her, standing up. “Are you out of your mind? What does that mean, my place? Who are you?”

He stood before her quietly, moving no closer, with no laughter in his eyes now. Charm all dropped away, rather perfectly unvarnished. “That’s a very good question, Emma. Who am I, who indeed?”

Again, the swirl in her head, voices, phantoms, images melting away in the dim firelight. “How do you know my name?”

A slight smile, “Emma? Emma Fallon, same as the woman on the tomb, same as the witch, the sorceress.”

She felt shaky again, losing ground as if the breath had just been knocked out of her. “She died young. Her husband murdered her,” she rambled, grasping, grasping for anything.

He shrugged, issuing a quick laugh, “Yes, well, I’m sure he would have liked to from time to time. But then again, it wasn’t an untroubled road for either of them. You see, they didn’t make it easy on each other.”

She breathed deeply, again feeling the swirl in her head but trying to ignore it. She picked up the woven afghan from the sofa and wrapped it around her shoulders. “It’s cold in here.”

He nodded, “Yes, can’t be helped. But there is the fire.”

A trembling was going on inside her, her mind, her heart, and throughout the layers of memory peeling away. “I need to go home.”

“Yes, of course you do, Emma. But what you need to decide is where exactly home is.”

She looked up at him with confusion, feeling acutely, not for the first time, but for the first acknowledged time, the feeling of familiarity that accompanied this individual. “I have to go home to Peter.”

“Really?” he said with exaggerated emphasis. His face hardened perceptibly at the mention of her young fiancé’s name. “Really, Emma? And exactly what sort of life do you think you’ll have with young Peter?”

“Uncomplicated.” The answer slipped out before there was thought.

And he laughed in response, “Yes, well, that’s true enough.” And then he moved closer to her. “It would be uncomplicated, but for a woman like you, wouldn’t that be—” and then he brushed her cheek lightly with the back of his fingertips. “Dull?” he whispered.

She looked at him squarely, feeling an odd mix of being compelled and irritated at the same time. “Who are you?” she asked directly and with no hesitation this time.

“Time to remember, Emma,” he coaxed softly with that voice, that tone, that compelling, soothing intonation, “remember your first husband.”

“Thomas,” she murmured, feeling mesmerized, “Thomas Woolery.”

He sighed with a bit of exasperation. “Thomas Woolery was my tailor.” Then, with a steely voice, he commanded, “Remember Emma.”

And then, it came with almost an audible crack, although it was all in her mind. There was a deluge, a flood of color, sounds of music, laughter, dresses of satins, and muslins that cascaded across the floor. And him, his eyes, blue-gray colored. “Jack,” she expelled in a gasp.

“Good girl.”

Then she turned to him with a genuine anger that exploded like a volcano. “You bastard!”

He smiled broadly, laughing, “Ah huh, remembering too much, I see.”

She felt the power of who she was course through her body once more and felt more than inclined to slam him with anything she could put her hands on. “How dare you!”

“You said you wanted time apart.”

“I meant I wanted to go to the country, not to another century.”

“How is the future, my love? Is it a brave new world? Is it that much better without me around?”

She dropped the blanket on the floor and crossed to the fireplace, resting her hand on its walnut-colored mantle. “Simpler, Jack, so much simpler.”

He frowned. Evidently, she’d made a direct hit. “And that is so much better?”

She reveled in the freedom that was coursing through her now. How confining it was not to truly be oneself. “Did you miss me at all?” she asked, a little kinder than he deserved.

There was no smile, but the lights had returned, the dancing lights in his eyes. “If I hadn’t, I would have left you there. With your young baby doctor.”

She smiled, now beginning to feel the slightest degree of validation. “He’s a pediatrician, and you’re jealous.”

“I didn’t expect you to take up with the first silly bloke that approached you.”

She looked away, “It’s your own fault. You made me forget everything and planted all those silly, false memories. I should have known. Couldn’t you have made my past a bit more exciting?”

“Then you would have never wanted to come home,” he stated flatly.

And she crossed her arms, truly beginning to absorb the enormity of what her dear, loving alchemist of a husband had done. “I didn’t say I wanted to.” He moved in front of her, slowly placing his hands on either side of her face. “Trying to strangle me again?” she whispered.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, dearest. Come home with me. I’m tired of all of this. I need you.”

“And?” she waited expectantly.

With emphasis, he capitulated, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have sent you away. I just wanted or rather hoped it would help you appreciate more what we have.”

She looked away, but he gently tilted her face back to him, “That was a nasty touch, the tombstone, Jack,” she murmured.

He nodded, “Trying to jolt your memories. I suppose, in hindsight, it was a bit extreme. But be honest, Emma. Do you really prefer the future?”

She shook her head reluctantly, “No, not really. It’s a lot of work. But at least I had the vote there.”

He smiled with genuine appreciation, “Yes, well, give it time.”

Her husband pulled her closely into a warm embrace, and she knew that this time the wild swirl around them would be the one that took them home.

Copyright © 2009 by Evelyn Klebert

Halloween Month 2025

The Left Palm and Other Halloween Tales of the Supernatural

Halloween is the time of year when that veil between worlds is thinned, and you can just catch a quick glimpse into the realm of the unknowable. In this collection of short stories, Evelyn Klebert takes you to a place where ordinary life splinters into the sphere of the paranormal.

The journey begins with one woman’s unstoppable quest for vengeance against a supernatural creature in “Wolves” and continues in an old historical graveyard where a horrifying discovery is uncovered in “Emma Fallon.” In “The Soul Shredder,” a psychiatrist’s unusual patient opens his eyes to a disturbing new view of reality, while in “Wildflowers,” a woman strikes up a supernatural friendship with impossible implications. And in “The Left Palm,” a fortuneteller in the French Quarter receives a most unexpected and terrifying customer.

Cornerstone
Kindle
Audible
Excerpt and Book Trailer

The Alchemist’s Bride

Enter the mystical world of 1883 historic New Orleans.

From a young age, Emmeline Lescale has been raised as an outsider by her aunt’s family on the lavish estate of Belle Coeur in Vacherie, Louisiana. Ostensibly an orphan, she is treated as an unpaid servant. But in her twenty-fifth year, with her eyes on a dismal future, something radically changes.

Her father, a renowned physician who has ignored her existence most of her life, suddenly insists that she come to live with him. And New Orleans in the 1880s seems like no place for a proper young lady, especially when her father is embroiled with a mysterious young doctor whose interests venture deeply and dangerously into the world of the supernatural.

Jack Fallon, the protege of Emmeline’s father, lives a life filled with secrets. His home, deep in the French Quarter on Bienville Street, is much more than meets the eye. And before too long, he draws Emma into the crosshairs of an existence that questions the nature of reality itself.

Cornerstone
Kindle
Excerpt and Book Trailer

The Dance – The Short Story

August 11, 2025

Why do I write short stories?

While in the midst of deep edits for my long-form novel, The Alchemist’s Bride, I am at the same time completing another short story collection of paranormal stories centered in the Ouachita Mountain region. And the fact that I seemed to be pulled back time and time again to the short story format made me wonder exactly why that is.

“In a rough way, the short story writer is to the novelist as a cabinetmaker is to a house carpenter.” -Annie Proulx

“Find the key emotion; this may be all you need know to find your short story.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald

“I’ll give you the whole secret to short story writing. Here it is. Rule 1: Write stories that please yourself. There is no Rule 2.” – O. Henry

If you look up quotes about the short story, undoubtedly you will get a thousand different perspectives, and not so surprising some completely contradictory. Perspective, Perspective, Perspective!

Personally, I began my dance with short story writing many eons ago. Actually, my first dive into the literary genre was in high school. I was out of school for some weeks with a nasty case of the shingles when I decided to pick up my pen. I crafted a rather long, winding sci-fi/detective tale using my closest schoolmates as characters, something that will never see the light of day again.

After that, it was some years later that I wrote my first story collection, Breaking Through the Pale, then Dragonflies came next, and so on. And interestingly each collection I crafted came between the writing of several novels, as though I had to shift gears a bit. The truth is that some of my novels came directly from short stories. The novel The Broken Vow was a sequel to the short story entitled “Wolves.” The book I’m working on now, The Alchemist’s Bride, is a prequel and inspired by characters created in a short story called “Emma Fallon.” And I am also developing a full-length sequel to a short story called “The Wizard.”

So, the literary genres do intertwine and overlap, at least in my experience. For me, I find short story writing to be a field of experimentation. Sometimes it’s a brief glimpse of someone’s life. At other times, it’s a deep dive into a character moment, perhaps a pivotal juncture or decision in a life. It can be so many different things, just like the quotes above. But it’s always refreshing, unpredictable, and a lovely place to fly home to.

Catch Up on the Werewolf Saga – EBook $2.99

July 11, 2025

With the recent release of The Story of Enid: Vol. 2 of The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf, I have put the eBook version of Vol. I, The Broken Vow, on sale for $2.99 at most eBook retailers for a limited time. So, if you’re interested in catching up on the adventures of my favorite werewolf, Ethan Garraint/Etienne/Geraint, I hope you check it out.

The Broken Vow: Vol. I The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf

In the heart of every man there is a history. In the heart of every monster there is a story. In this first installment of “The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf,” Ethan Garraint is on a vendetta that begins in the heart of the Pyrenees with the fall of Montségur and leads him to the streets of New Orleans nearly five hundred years later. But the person he chases isn’t really a man anymore and Ethan has been a werewolf for almost a millennium. With the aid of a gifted seer, he is on a blood hunt that will culminate in a journey that crosses the line between heaven and earth and ends somewhere in between.

Kindle
Excerpt and Book Trailer

The Story of Enid: Vol. 2 of the Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf

What happens when your one true love reincarnates, and you just happen to be a werewolf?

Ethan Garraint is an old soul. He has been alive for hundreds of years, battling countless challenges and foes along the way — not the least of which was living through the genocide of the Cathar people at Montsegur, a society that wholly embraced him despite his lycanthropic nature. But in Volume 2 of The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf, he faces a dilemma that brings his past and present full circle, merging them both.

In The Story of Enid, the sequel to The Broken Vow

Long ago, before he was Ethan Garraint, before the Cathars, before he became a werewolf, he was a man living in a land where enchantment ruled. He was a Knight known as Geraint who served a King. And it was then that he met the one woman who would own his heart.

“There was someone for you once.”

“Yes, a long time ago.”

“Someone very special to you that, I think, perhaps you still mourn.”

“She was my wife.”

“And she left you.”

“Not of her free will, but yes, most do.”

When one realizes that a long-lost soulmate has been reincarnated, it poses some complications. When you have been a werewolf for nearly a millennium, the complications explode exponentially. Ethan Garraint understands that he should stay far away from Erin Holt, but she is in his city, New Orleans, and possibly in danger. And the truth is, he doesn’t want to stay away. He only wants to remind her of the lifetime they lived long ago, when they were more than lovers, when they became legend.

Kindle
Excerpt and Book Trailer

The Story of Enid – Just Released!

July 1, 2025

I am very excited to announce that The Story of Enid: Vol. 2 of The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf has just been released! It is now available at Cornerstone Book Publishers, Amazon, and Kindle and will soon be available at most other online retail booksellers. And to celebrate its release it is currently 20% Off the retail price at Cornerstone Book Publishers.

It has been a long journey to bring this book to publication. When I first wrote its prequel, The Broken Vow, the seeds for The Story of Enid were already in my mind. I was able to craft its first incarnation on the Kindle Vella platform but am very happy it is now out in a book format.

I do hope you take some time to check out the adventures of my werewolf Ethan Garraint and his lady love.

Peace to All,

Evelyn

The Story of Enid: Vol. 2 of The Clandestine Adventures of a Werewolf

What happens when your one true love reincarnates, and you just happen to be a werewolf?

Ethan Garraint is an old soul. He has been alive for hundreds of years, battling countless challenges and foes along the way — not the least of which was living through the genocide of the Cathar people at Montsegur, a society that wholly embraced him despite his lycanthropic nature. But in Volume 2 of The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf, he faces a dilemma that brings his past and present full circle, merging them both.

In The Story of Enid, the sequel to The Broken Vow

Long ago, before he was Ethan Garraint, before the Cathars, before he became a werewolf, he was a man living in a land where enchantment ruled. He was a Knight known as Geraint who served a King. And it was then that he met the one woman who would own his heart.

“There was someone for you once.”

“Yes, a long time ago.”

“Someone very special to you that, I think, perhaps you still mourn.”

“She was my wife.”

“And she left you.”

“Not of her free will, but yes, most do.”

When one realizes that a long-lost soulmate has been reincarnated, it poses some complications. When you have been a werewolf for nearly a millennium, the complications explode exponentially. Ethan Garraint understands that he should stay far away from Erin Holt, but she is in his city, New Orleans, and possibly in danger. And the truth is, he doesn’t want to stay away. He only wants to remind her of the lifetime they lived long ago, when they were more than lovers, when they became legend.

Cornerstone
Kindle

The Story of Enid – Excerpt

June 19, 2025

I am very excited to announce that my new book, The Story of Enid: Vol. 2 of The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf, will be released at the beginning of July. And just as a little teaser, I am posting an excerpt from the book. I hope you enjoy. 🙂

The Story of Enid

What happens when your one true love reincarnates, and you just happen to be a werewolf?

Ethan Garraint is an old soul. He has been alive for hundreds of years, battling countless challenges and foes along the way. Not the least of which was living through the genocide of the Cathar people at Montsegur, a society that wholly embraced him despite his lycanthropic nature. But in Volume 2 of The Clandestine Exploits of a Werewolf, he faces a dilemma that brings his past and present full circle, merging them both.

In The Story of Enid, the sequel to The Broken Vow

Long ago, before he was Ethan Garraint, before the Cathars, before he became a werewolf, he was a man living in a land where enchantment ruled. He was a Knight known as Geraint who served a King. And it was then that he met the one woman who would own his heart.

“There was someone for you once.”

“Yes, a long time ago.”

“Someone very special to you that, I think, perhaps you still mourn.”

“She was my wife.”

“And she left you.”

“Not of her free will, but yes, most do.”

When one realizes that a long-lost soulmate has been reincarnated, it poses some complications. When you have been a werewolf for nearly a millennium, the complications explode exponentially. Ethan Garraint understands that he should stay far away from Erin Holt, but she is in his city, New Orleans, and possibly in danger. And the truth is, he doesn’t want to stay away. He only wants to remind her of the lifetime they lived long ago, when they were more than lovers, when they became legend.

Excerpt:

She stood across the room from him, face pale, greenish-brown eyes wide and unmistakably filled with fear, but fear of what exactly he could not discern at the moment.

“Erin.” Ethan stood up. Nearly imperceivably, and, no doubt, only caught by him because he was watching her so closely, she stepped backward a fraction of an inch. Ah, it was clear that she was fearful of him for some reason. Cautiously, he moved around the desk. She held her ground, though, still watching him with those enormous eyes filled with shadows. Once he reached her, he couldn’t stop himself from gently placing his hands on her arms. “What’s happened?”

She was breathing deeply. He could feel the rhythm in his skin, his blood. Strange how he was so connected to someone whose real flesh-and-blood company he’d actually spent so little time in. But then again, this was a spiritual connection, a fact that Brother Guidrade had so repeatedly drummed into his head. It defied logical sensibilities. It simply was.

And then she closed her eyes, sighing deeply and slumping forward a bit so that her head was resting on his chest in what he could only describe as emotional exhaustion. “It’s going to sound ridiculous.”

He pulled her closer into his arms, stroking her lovely auburn hair that he’d become so fond of. “Ridiculous things can have their moment,” then he added, “Tell me, Erin.” However, admittedly, he had that pesky precognitive sense that he already knew.

“It was a dream but a very realistic one,” again, a deep sigh that he was not comfortable with. The thought that their entanglement had become so burdensome to her weighed on him considerably.

She pulled her head up and looked into his eyes in a way that startled him, not fearful now, not tired, but seeking deeply. “You were in it.”

He let his hands drop. Why, he couldn’t say. Perhaps he was a coward. Maybe he’d idyllically hoped they could spend these few days together unencumbered by the truth. “And?” he said because he had no choice.

“There was something with you in the dream, a creature. Well, actually a kind of wolf.”

He bravely held her gaze, though now he understood her initial fear. “I see.”

“You said it was your constant companion.”

And then he smiled. He couldn’t help it. What a benign thing for him to say. “Well, what do you think, Erin?”

She looked confused, “What do I think?”

He stepped backward, leaning against the desk but still watching her closely. “Yes, sorry, what do you feel might be a better question.”

She crossed her arms in front of her. Though he had an inkling, she had no idea she’d done so. “I-I don’t know. It was just a dream. It doesn’t mean anything.”

He watched her closely, feeling the jagged nuances of what she was wrestling with. Her modern sensibilities told her to ignore what her genuine innate senses were telling her. It was somewhat painful to witness how the mores of a world determined to ignore the old ways ostensibly split its inhabitants apart. “Erin,” he spoke softly so as not to further agitate her. “I need you to stop and take a moment. Try to forget what you think you should say, and use your senses, your inner self. And tell me what you truly feel.”

Her eyes widened a bit in confusion. He felt the battle within her. When she was younger, when she had no sight, she was not under such scrutiny, such pressure to suppress her very real and tangible gifts. But once she gained her sight, she was forced or perhaps even forced herself to quickly conform to a world that gave no credence to such abilities. Essentially, she had buried part of herself.

“I-I don’t know.”

He frowned because that was not at all what he felt. She did indeed know but was afraid to say. He reached out and grabbed one of her hands, pulling her closer to him. “It’s all right,” he murmured. “You know, I was foolish to believe it would take a backseat and remain hidden from you.”

Hesitantly, she spoke, “It? What does that mean?”

“Dreams, you know, aren’t meaningless. The spirit within us takes flight in dreams, leaves behind our earthly form, and explores other dimensions and realities, revealing truths we cannot easily reach in the physical world.”

“Ethan, you’re scaring me.”

“You don’t have to be afraid, Erin. You just have to open your mind to other possibilities.” And then he squeezed the hand that he held in his own. “Now, tell me, my dearest one. What do you feel?”

She looked at him almost sadly, and it pierced his heart deeply in a way that he had not thought was still possible. How was it that she could so easily reach him when others were wholly incapable of breaching the ice built up around his emotions through centuries of his protracted existence? “You hold the key to each other, one that is unique and cannot be denied.” They were words from the Cathar Master, still so poignant and relevant now.

“I,” she stopped herself, so frightened of letting go.

And then he took the other hand in his, perhaps to give her strength, perhaps to provide him with some. “Yes,” he said softly.

“It’s real,” she murmured.

“Yes,” he repeated. He wasn’t looking at her. He was looking at those lovely, gentle hands he held clasped in his own.

“How can that be?”

And then he looked up into her beautiful eyes that seemed in this moment as though they would engulf him. “Well, it happened long ago when the world was still filled with magic and demons. Although it still is, though much better hidden, one might say.”

She shook her head, “I don’t understand.”

And then he laughed at the twisted sort of perversity of the moment. How did one deliver the news to his lover that he was not a man but a sort of devil? “I am a werewolf, Erin. It’s that simple.”

And then there was something else in her eyes, a fire that he remembered from long ago and was very glad to see in some respects. Very deliberately, she pulled her hands out of his grasp. At this moment, he realized this would be much more complicated than he had anticipated. “Ethan, that’s simply impossible.”

She realized, granted not for the first time, how she despised feeling as though she was not in control of things in her life, not in control of her decisions. It was a scar, she supposed, from that huge expanse of time when it felt like everyone else in the world was making decisions for her. That very frustration prompted her to get on that plane from Arkansas and come here alone to New Orleans. And that frustration was now pushing her to whole-heartedly reject this preposterous assertion that the man in front of her had just made.

Werewolf, indeed, did he think she was so naïve to swallow any ridiculous thing he might throw her way? Did he think she was so swept up in this romantic spell, this fog she’d seemed to be operating under, and simply embrace any laughable delusion he decided to feed her?

She didn’t stop to think that it indeed had been her dream.

She didn’t stop to think that the memories she’d recovered about their relationship before she regained her sight were in her head, her mind.

She was frustrated and, in a rage, born of a life that had left her largely powerless.

He hadn’t said anything. He was just looking at her, still casually leaning back against his desk. It reminded her of the first time she’d seen him in the French Quarter, watching her from across the street, with no expression, just waiting, waiting for what she couldn’t imagine.

“Aren’t you going to say anything?”

“What would you like me to say?” he responded rather flatly.

It felt a bit like a punch. She wasn’t at all sure what she’d expected but not this. “You do understand how ridiculous that sounds. Werewolves? They’re imaginary, made-up stories.”

“Old stories from long ago.”

“Yes,” she said a little shakily. It felt like she was losing ground, though she didn’t know why.

“Where do you think those stories come from? Those old legends?”

“So, I suppose you’re going to tell me vampires exist as well.”

“I spent a good amount of time with one when I was a priest at Chartres Cathedral in France.”

She took a quick breath that felt oddly painful. “What? When?”

He stood up straight but did not walk forward even an inch toward her. “It was around 1350.”

“1350? Do you really expect me to believe—” Then she stopped, almost choking on the words.

“Do I expect you to believe me? Evidently not, though I assure you that it is wholly and sadly the truth.”

“I-I can’t just accept this. I—” And then she felt the room begin to spin, actually quite purposefully spin all around her in a cataclysmic motion.

It made her feel sick. It made her want to drop to her knees, but somehow, somehow, she didn’t.

When it finally, thankfully, stopped, she was somewhere else. She was in another room, a cold room made of stone.

Copyright © 2025 by Evelyn Klebert