Speaker 1: Calarogu Shark Media. Hello and welcome to Romance Weekly and
Halloween Possession. This is episode three, White Noise. My sister
could tell something was wrong with me. You're glowing, she said,
over breakfast at the Hawthorn Inn, and your hair keeps
standing up. I laughed it off, but I knew she
was right. He was changing me on a molecular level.
It had been a week since that night in the
museum basement. Seven days of careful distance, of never being
alone together, of touches limited to accidental brushes that sent
electricity shooting through my entire body. Seven nights of dreams
that weren't entirely my own, where I couldn't tell if
I was experiencing my phantasies or his. The electromagnetic connection
was getting stronger. I could feel Ethan from across Salem
now a constant pulse at the edge of my consciousness
when he was upset. My chest tightened when he was aroused,
which was disturbingly Often I'd find myself pressing my thighs
together in the middle of interviewing witnesses, my body responding
to desires he was trying to suppress three miles away.
Earth Ta Mara, Lily waved a hand in front of
my face. You're doing it again, that thing where you
stop mid sentence and your pupils dilate. I'm not He's
thinking about you, isn't he? She grinned. God, that's hot. Inconvenient,
but hot. It was more than inconvenient. It was maddening.
I'd conducted three interviews about the missing women, and each
time I'd had to excuse myself because Ethan's hunger had
bled through our connection at the worst possible moment. Do
you know how hard it is to ask serious questions
about someone's disappeared daughter when you can feel phantom hands
on your skin. How are things with Marcus? I asked,
desperate to change the subject. Lily's smile softened into something
I'd never seen on her before. He's teaching me to
control it, the static thing. Yesterday I lit a candle
with my fingertips. That's dangerous, I know, But Mara, for
the first time in my life, I feel like I
make sense, Like all the weird things about me, the
way electronics die around me, how I always know when
someone's lying. The dreams that come true, they're not flaws,
They're just me. I reached across the table and squeezed
her hand. The spark between us was gentle, now controlled.
I'm glad you found him. Have you noticed they never
touch each other, Ethan and Marcus. I hadn't, but now
that she mentioned it, maybe they're not. They're both straight,
Marcus told me. But their electromagnetic signatures are oppositional. They
can't touch without creating a kind of repulsion. It's why
they work well together. They literally can't get too close.
Must be lonely, Lily studied me. Is that why you
won't sleep with e because you're afraid of being lonely? After?
I won't sleep with Ethan because it's dangerous. The connection
makes you a target. I know. But Mara, she leaned forward,
You're already glowing like a nuclear reactor. How much more
obvious could you be? My phone buzzed, Ethan kneed you
at the witch house. Found something about Rebecca. My body's
reaction was immediate and embarrassing. Just seeing his name made
heat pool between my legs. Lily laughed, Your face, oh
my god, your face right now. Shut up. Use protection,
she called, as I grabbed my jacket. Electromagnetic protection, I
mean the witch house was Salem's most famous haunted building,
all dramatic angles and dark history. Ethan was waiting in
the garden, and my breath caught, like it always did.
He wore a black henley that clung to his chest,
worn jeans that hung low on his hips. His hair
was messier than usual, like he'd been running his hands
through it. You look tired, I said, haven't been sleeping.
His eyes met mine, and I felt the truth through
our connection. He'd been dreaming of me, dreams so vivid
they felt like memories, dreams that left him aching and
hard and desperate. I forced myself to focus. What did
you find? He led me inside, careful not to touch me.
The house was closed to tourists today, and our footsteps
echoed in the empty rooms. Rebecca left something hidden in
the walls. In the upstairs bedroom, he showed me where
a pane had been pried loose. Inside was a journal,
water damaged but readable. October fifteenth, I read aloud. The
connection is getting stronger. I can feel him all the
time now, when he breathes, I breathe when he wants.
I want. I'm losing myself, but I can't stop. It
feels too good to stop. My voice faltered. I was
reading my own experience in a dead woman's words. Keep going,
Ethan said quietly, October eighteenth. Something's wrong. There's another presence
in the connection, Ancient hungry. It's using our bond like
a bridge. He thinks if we stop touching, it'll go away,
but it's too late. I can feel it in my
bones now, in my electromagnetic field. It's rewriting me from
the inside out. I looked up at Ethan, E that's you.
I tried to save her. His voice was raw. I thought,
if we broke the connection October twentieth, last entry, my
hands shook as I read. It's in me now. I
can feel myself coming apart, one electron at a time.
He says he can stop it, but he'd have to
the rest is too damaged to read. He'd have to
completely merge electromagnetic fields. Ethan finished, create a circuit so
strong it could burn out the parasitic presence. But but
the merger would be permanent, two electromagnetic signatures becoming one.
We'd never be able to separate. We'd feel everything the
other feels forever, every emotion, every sensation, every thought. I
set the journal down carefully. Rebecca said no. She said no.
He paused. The night she disappeared, she came to me.
The thing was already pulling her apart. She begged me
to save her, but when I told her what it
would mean, she chose dissolution over permanent connection. That's horrible,
is it? He moved closer, and my skin prickled with static.
Would you want that to be permanently linked to someone?
Never have a private thought again, never be able to
leave the space between us? Crackled, I don't know, Liar.
He was close enough now that I could feel his heat.
You're terrified of it. I can feel your terror from here.
Stop breeding me, I can't. His hand came up, hovering
near my cheek. That's the point. I already can't stop
feeling you, and an even haven't even what you know?
What I did the one thing we'd been avoiding, the
thing that would take our connection from manageable to consuming,
The thing my body had been screaming for since the
moment we met. Show me, I whispered, Show me what
happened with Rebecca, All of it, Mara, I need to
understand for the investigation. We both knew. I was lying,
but he raised his hand anyway, palm toward me. I
matched him, our hands an inch apart. The air between
them shimmered, and then I was in his memory. Rebecca,
beautiful and terrified in this same room. Her electromagnetic field
was different from mine, cooler, more controlled. She was saying
she loved him. But I could feel through Ethan's memory
that it wasn't real. It was the connection talking, the
electromagnetic pull masquerading is emotion, but with me, I felt
his comparison, couldn't help but feel it. With me, it
was different. The pull was there, yes, but underneath it
was something else, something that had started the moment I'd
walked into that Victorian house before we'd ever touched, a
recognition that went beyond electromagnetic signatures. The memory shifted. Rebecca
was dissolving, her body becoming static, reaching for him. He
tried to save her, pouring his own energy into her field,
but without the full merger, without her consent, he could
only watch as she came apart. I gasped and pulled
back to the present. Ethan's face was inches from mine.
That's why you won't tell me, I said, You're afraid
you'll have to watch me disappear too. I'm afraid, he said, roughly,
that I won't give you the choice that if you
start to disappear, I'll force the merger. I'll make you stay,
regardless of what you want. You wouldn't, wouldn't I His
hand dropped to my throat, not touching, but so close.
I could feel the heat. Do you have any idea
what it's like feeling you every moment, knowing exactly how
wet you are right now, how much you want me
to stop? Yesterday when you were in the shower, I
felt it what you were thinking about what you were doing.
My face burned. I'd touched myself thinking about him, not
realizing he could feel it through our connection. I had
to leave the house. He continued walk into the ocean,
just to shock my system with cold. And it didn't help,
because I could still feel you coming, could feel you
thinking about me while you I kissed him. I knew
it was stupid, dangerous, exactly what we'd been avoiding, but
I couldn't stand the space between us for another second.
The moment our lips touched, the world exploded. Not like
before with the handholding. This was deeper, more intimate. I
could taste what he tasted, feel what he felt. The
kiss existed in multiple dimensions, the physical pressure of mouths
and tongues and the electromagnetic merge that made me feel
like I was kissing myself and being kissed at the
same time. His hands tangled in my hair, and everywhere
he touched my skin lit up. I could feel his
desire like a living thing wrapping around me, pulling me under,
but I could also feel his his desperate need to
protect me warring with his need to possess me. Mara.
He gasped against my mouth, and I felt how my
name moved through him, the way it had become a prayer,
he said in the dark. I pressed closer, my body
fitting against his, like we were made for each other,
and maybe we were. Maybe this was what electromagnetic compatibility
really meant, not just attraction, but recognition, every cell in
my body singing yes, this him, now please. His hand
slid down to my waist, and I could feel both sensations,
his palms on me and my body under his palms.
It was dizzying, intoxicating. I wanted more, I wanted everything.
We can't, he said, But he was walking me backward
toward the bed. If we do this, I know the
connection will solidify. You'll never be free of me. I
know the thing that took Rebecca will lock onto us.
I know we fell onto the bed and the contact
sent shock waves through both of us. I could feel
his heart racing against mine, or maybe it was mine
against his. The boundaries were dissolving. His hands were under
my sweater, and the skin to skin contact created feedback
loops of sensation. I felt what he felt when he
touched me, which made me feel more, which he then felt,
an endless spiral of pleasure. God Mara, He breathed against
my throat. You're like touching lightning. I arched against him,
and through our connection, I felt his control shutter. His
mouth was on my throat, my collar bone, the swell
of my breasts, every kiss existed twice, the sensation on
my skin, and the taste of me on his tongue.
I was drowning in it, in him, in us. His
hand slid between my thighs, over my jeans, and the
pressure made me cry out. But I also felt his palm,
felt the heat of me through the denim, felt his
desperate need to remove every barrier between us. Please, I gasped,
not sure what I was begging for, everything, nothing him.
That's when the windows shattered, not broke, shattered. Every window
in the witch House exploded inwards, simultaneously, showering us with glass.
Ethan rolled us off the bed, shielding me with his
body as the room filled with wind that shouldn't exist
through our connection. I felt it the thing Rebecca had
written about, ancient hungry and focused entirely on us. Finally,
a voice that wasn't a voice whispered through the electromagnetic field.
Too ready to become nune, run, Ethan said, pulling me
to my feet. We ran, our hands clasped the connection
between us, singing with terror and arousal and power. Behind us,
I could feel the entity following, drinking in our combined
electromagnetic signature like it was ambrosia. We burst out of
the witch House to find Lily and Marcus waiting with
a car running get in. Marcus shouted the grid's failing
all over Salem. As we dove into the back seat,
I realized we were still holding hands. Ethan's fingers were
interlaced with mine, and breaking the connection felt impossible. The
entity had done. Something welded us together somehow. I can't
let go, I said, I know. Ethan replied, it's feeding
on the connection, using it as a conduit. Lily turned
from the front seat, her face pale. There's something else.
Three more women have been reported missing, not dead, just gone.
All in the last hour. It's accelerating, Marcus said, speeding
through Salem's narrow streets. Halloween's still a week away, but
it's not waiting anymore. I looked at Ethan, our hands
fused together by something beyond electromagnetic attraction, and realized we'd
crossed a line we couldn't uncross. The entity had us.
Now we were marked, claimed, connected in a way that
would either save us or destroy us. What do we do?
I asked. Ethan's thumb stroked over my knuckles, and even
that small gesture sent waves of heat through me. We
figure out how to kill it, or we become its
next meal through our joined hands. I felt the truth
he wasn't saying. We were already being consumed. Every moment
we stayed connected, it fed on us, but breaking the
connection might scatter us like it had scattered Rebecca. We
were trapped together, and despite the terror, despite the danger,
part of me was glad. How's that for losing myself
in October