“The Voice Between the Lines”

The first time I heard her voice, I was halfway through writing a sentence I hadn't thought of yet.

"The lamp’s light flickered, casting shadows like regret on the hotel’s faded wallpaper."

I stared at the words on my laptop screen. I hadn’t written them. At least, not consciously. But there they were—my fingers on the keys, my breath shallow, as if I'd caught someone whispering behind me.

I live alone. That’s important to note.

Ghostwriting isn’t as glamorous as people think. For every bestselling memoir by an actor who can't spell “memoir,” there's someone like me—a freelancer in a hoodie, eating ramen over a glowing screen, churning out thrillers, romances, or memoirs I’ll never be credited for.

I ghostwrite for the dead, too.

Not literally. Usually. But publishers sometimes buy a dead author’s “lost manuscript” and need someone like me to reconstruct it—based on scraps, notes, or nothing but the illusion of their voice. I’ve rewritten six posthumous “novels” by people who haven’t breathed in decades. It's a niche, but it pays.

The job that changed everything came on a Thursday.

It was an email from Ellison Graves Literary, subject line: CONFIDENTIAL PROJECT — GHOSTWRITER NEEDED URGENTLY.

The agent, Clive Graves, wrote with all-caps urgency and a flair for the dramatic. He claimed to represent the estate of Isobel Lark, a gothic novelist who died in 1987 under mysterious circumstances. Her cult classic The Hemlock Hour had recently gone viral on BookTok (of all things), and the estate wanted to release an unpublished manuscript Isobel had allegedly been working on before her death.

There was only one problem: it was incomplete. “Scattered fragments,” Clive wrote. “But they believe you can stitch it together. You have a reputation.”

I almost declined. I was tired. Behind on bills. Haunted by my last romance novel. But he sent a retainer check with more zeroes than I'd seen in five years. So I said yes.

The file came by courier the next day: a box of yellowed pages, notes in faded ink, and a black cassette tape labeled “ISOBEL – DRAFT” in curling, feminine handwriting.

I didn’t have a cassette player.

I played the tape at the library. It was mostly silence—until about fifteen minutes in.

Then I heard her voice.

Isobel Lark spoke slowly, like she was reading through fog.

“The house breathes... and beneath its floorboards, something waits. A hunger wrapped in memory.”

Then nothing. A long inhale. Then:

“To write is to haunt yourself, again and again, until you forget which ghost was yours.”

I sat there, chilled. I couldn’t tell if it was brilliant or madness. Maybe both. Maybe that's the price of being memorable.

When I returned to my apartment, I started assembling the manuscript—matching fragments, outlines, and cryptic notes. Her handwriting looped like ivy. I spent hours reading The Hemlock Hour and her other work, letting her style bleed into me.

At night, I’d dream of her house: the crumbling Victorian on the cliff’s edge, the red ribbon in the attic, the girl who disappeared.

The manuscript began to take shape. And then… strange things started happening.

One night, while writing a scene where the protagonist discovers a letter from her drowned sister, I typed a sentence that stopped me cold.

"She was waiting in the mirror, just behind the reflection, mouthing my name with dead lips."

I didn’t write that.

Or rather—I did. My fingers moved. But the thought wasn’t mine.

I tried to delete it. The backspace key jammed. My screen flickered. Then, without warning, the file closed. When I reopened it, the sentence was gone.

But I felt her. Not metaphorically. Not poetically. I felt someone else’s awareness brushing against mine like pages turning without hands.

From then on, every time I wrote, I heard her. Not always words—sometimes humming, sometimes breath. Sometimes a name: “Mara.”

I checked her biography again.

Isobel Lark had a daughter. Mara Lark. Died at age eight. Fell from the attic window of their house. Accident, they said.

Except Isobel never wrote again after that. She stopped speaking publicly. Three years later, she took a bottle of sleeping pills and walked into the sea.

Halfway through the second act, I started seeing red ribbons.

At the bodega, tied to the freezer handle.

On the subway, looped around a stranger’s wrist.

Outside my door, dangling from the doorknob like a warning.

I didn't tell anyone. Who could I tell?

The voice got louder when I tried to stop writing. Silence made it stronger, like it was filling the vacuum. One night, I unplugged my laptop and threw the manuscript into a drawer. I lit candles. I meditated. I went to bed early.

At 3:17 a.m., my computer turned on by itself.

The unfinished chapter was open on the screen. Five new words blinked at the bottom.

You are not done yet.

I screamed. I threw the laptop across the room. It didn't break.

That was when I realized: this wasn’t possession.

It was collaboration.

I gave in.

I wrote for fourteen hours a day, possessed by a rhythm I didn’t fully understand. The novel flowed—dark, lyrical, fevered. It wasn’t my voice, but it was coming through my hands.

Isobel’s words. My structure.

It was the best thing I’d ever written.

When I finished the last chapter, a kind of silence settled. Heavy, relieved. Like someone exhaling after a long-held breath.

I saved the file. I backed it up. I printed it out.

Then, and only then, I lit a match and burned the original pages and notes in the sink. Not out of anger. Out of respect. It felt... ritualistic.

And the voice stopped.

I sent the manuscript to Clive Graves with shaking hands. He responded the next day:

“Brilliant. Uncanny. It is her. My God. You’ve captured her. Advance copies will go to print immediately.”

Three weeks later, The Hemlock Mirror hit preorders.

It outsold her original by tenfold.

I received a single copy in the mail—no note, no return address.

I opened it, flipping to the dedication page.

I hadn’t written one.

But there it was:

For Mara, who never left.

— I.L.

I closed the book and didn’t sleep that night.

Now I sit here, typing this, unsure if it’s a confession, a warning, or an obituary for my sanity.

They say ghostwriters are invisible. That’s the job. That’s the deal.

But what if the ghost isn’t a metaphor?

What if the ghost is the one writing back?

All I know is this: the red ribbon is on my doorknob again tonight.

And a blank page waits, blinking.

Ready for me to begin.

Again.