Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/8336227.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence, Major_Character_Death, Rape/Non-Con,
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M, Other
  Fandom:
      Starfighter_(Comic)
  Relationship:
      Abel/Cain_(Starfighter), Deimos/Praxis_(Starfighter), Abel/Ethos_
      (Starfighter), Cain/Deimos_(Starfighter), Abel/Cain/Deimos_(Starfighter),
      Abel/Cain_(Starfighter)/Undisclosed
  Character:
      Abel_(Starfighter), Cain_(Starfighter), Praxis_(Starfighter), Deimos_
      (Starfighter), Ethos_(Starfighter), Phobos_(Starfighter), Keeler_
      (Starfighter)
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe, Paranormal, Dark_Magic, Demonic_Possession, High
      School, Suicide, Abuse, Drugs, Sex, Demon_Sex, Underage_Sex, Underage
      Drinking, Trauma, Underage_Rape/Non-con, Blood_Magic, Dark, Psychic
      Abilities, Psychic_Violence, Angst, Psychological_Trauma, Occult,
      Witchcraft, Underage_Drug_Use, Rough_Sex, Violence, Mental_Instability, I
      Don't_Even_Know
  Stats:
      Published: 2016-10-21 Updated: 2017-03-14 Chapters: 33/? Words: 118175
****** The Otherside ******
by violetnyte
Summary
     AU: Even though a brush with death changed everything for him, Ethan
     just wants to be a normal high school kid -- but there's nothing
     normal about being dragged into a world of dead things, dark magic,
     and terrible danger. Now something's taken an interest in him, and
     Ethan's problems are about to become the least of his worries as a
     demon called Cain takes over his life.
***** Prologue *****
When I was fourteen years old, I slipped on the deck of my father’s boat and
struck my head on the railing. I don’t remember what happened next, but
everyone says that I fell into the water and wasn’t breathing when they finally
pulled me out again. Everyone says I looked dead, flopped unbreathing and limp
on the deck of my father’s boat. I don’t remember this, but they tell me it
happened.
Obviously I didn’t die, I’m not dead. I have to be alive, this has to be the
part of my life that’s real - this is still my life. But once it started
happening, after it kept happening, I wondered if I maybe had died that day on
the boat. If maybe the boy who went into the water wasn’t the same boy they
pulled out again. I know that sounds crazy. All of this is going to sound
crazy, but if you could see what I see, you’d start to wonder, too.
The first wasn’t long after that day on the boat, three months later to be
exact. Not to the day or anything, but after my birthday so I was fifteen years
old when I saw my first ghost. My grandfather, actually, standing there at the
edge of the cemetery as we buried him. I didn’t see him for very long, and I
honestly didn’t even know what to think about seeing him.  At the time I told
myself it was nothing. A mistake, some other old man with withered cheeks and
hollow eyes, with parchment paper skin and wispy white hair. But then it
happened again, and it kept happening, and I started to wonder about that day
on the boat, the day they say I went into the water and wasn’t breathing when
they pulled me out again.
See I think that was the day all this started. I think that was the day
something happened to me, in that time between when I wasn’t breathing and was,
something besides scaring my mother and splitting my skull. Something happened
to make me different, so the boy they pulled out of the water wasn’t the same
boy who went under.
I’m telling you this now so you’ll believe me when I tell you that I’m not
crazy, that I really do see this stuff and it’s real. It’s more than just the
ghosts, the dead people, the stuff that’s not there but yet I see it. Everyone
says it’s not real but it’s right there, and I see it. I’m telling you this so
you’ll believe me when I tell you I need help, and not the kind of help that my
mother tried with doctors and medication until I started lying better about it.
I don’t need that kind of help, because I’m not crazy.
I know you can help me. You have to help me. I see this stuff, and I don’t know
why or what it means, but I just know that last week was the first time
something saw me back. Something looked back at me and knew I could see it, and
now I’m scared. I heard a voice last night that wasn’t mine, wasn’t my mother’s
or my father’s, wasn’t the television or the computer or the neighbors. I heard
something calling for me. Something’s coming for me, I think. Something knows
who I am, what I am. I don’t even know what I am but it does, and it’s calling
for me.
I know you can help me. I need you to help me. I don’t know enough about what
this is, what it means, what I see or what sees me -- and I know you do. Please
don’t ask me how I know, how I got your name or this address. Just tomorrow
when I knock I need you to open the door. I need you to let me in. I’m not just
a dumb kid looking for trouble. I’m a scared kid in a lot of trouble, and I
know you can help me. You have to help me, please. I don’t know where else to
go or who else to ask. Just open the door and talk to me, tell me I’m crazy or
tell me I’m not. I need to know if this is real like I think or if I really am
crazy. Thanks. -reliabel5 (Abel)
***** Chapter 2 *****
“Did you leave the letter yesterday?” Aidan whispers. He’s pressed almost
entirely into my back as we stand there in the alley listening to the drip from
the guttering.
I glance up at the faded brick and boarded-up windows to the high roofline
above where a grimey satellite dish juts into the sky. I can’t believe people
live here, and I can’t believe I’m standing in this alley with my best friend
in our school uniforms. The navy blazers and crisp khaki pants feel like big
red targets in such a rundown neighborhood. I know we shouldn’t be here, and I
know I shouldn’t have brought Aidan, but I was scared to come alone.
I’m even more scared when I knock again and no one answers, nothing happens.
The warped steel of the door is wedged tight into the jamb, and the knob
doesn’t turn at all when I try. A square of thick glass woven with metal
provides no view at all of what lies beyond the door. Rusted bolts secure an
equally rusted letterbox to the inset niche of the doorway, and I peek inside
again to see the envelope with my letter is gone.
“Yeah,” I say to Aidan. “I left my letter.”
I didn’t let Aidan see what I wrote, but he knows exactly why I’m here. We’ve
been friends since the third grade, ever since my mom and his mom started
playing bridge together on Saturdays at the country club. He’s the type of
friend to keep a secret, but I’m not sure he believes me. What I wrote in that
letter, about the boat and everything I see, he knows the story, but I’m not
sure he believes me. No one believes me, but I think the person on the other
side of this door might.
Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe no one’s here. I knock again, louder, almost hurting my
knuckles with the furious pounding.
“Hey!” I shout, loud as I dare. “Hey, open up! Please! I’m the one who wrote to
you!”
Aidan grabs my arm. “Ethan!” he hisses. His round eyes go even rounder in his
round face.
He was pudgier as a kid, faintly freckled and full of dimples, but puberty
eased out some of the awkwardness and turned him out okay. He’s got this curly
blonde hair that’s so pale it’s nearly milk, and I know of at least two girls
in school with crushes on him now.
I kind of had a crush on him when we were thirteen, but mostly because I was
starting to realize what was wrong with me. Before I ever fell from the boat, I
mean, and became even more wrong than ever. No, back then I was just realizing
how much more I like Aidan’s dimpled cheeks and pasty-pale chest when we’d go
swimming together at the country club. I was supposed to watch the girls in
their bikinis, but I spent too much time watching my best friend.
Much as it’s mean to think I don’t find Aidan so attractive anymore, it’s a
relief not to have an awkward crush on my best friend. Sometimes though, I
wonder if maybe I shouldn’t have tried going for him after all.
“Ethan,” he hisses again. I let my mind wander, with him so close and pressed
against me in the narrow brick nook. “Ethan, let’s go. No one’s here.”
I wonder if he thinks I’m being crazy again. He’s too sweet to ever say it, but
I wonder anyway. “You can go,” I say. “I’m going to wait. Maybe he’s not just
here yet.”
“You don’t even know this person,” Aidan says. “You can’t trust the stuff you
read on the internet, Ethan. I know you’re good with computers and the black
web--”
“Dark web,” I tell him. “It’s called the dark web, or deep web, and it’s just
parts of the internet you can’t find on Google. You always act like I’m
breaking the law just looking at it.”
“It’s where you can hire a hitman or buy drugs or talk to pedophiles, you mean.
You’re going to get in so much trouble if your parents ever figure out you
spend all that time online looking at that stuff.”
“I’m not trying to hire a hitman. That’s not the stuff I look at. I just want
answers.” I kick at the door in frustration, but the leather toe of my Oxfords
don’t make a dent.
“Ethan…”
The look he gives me is one I hate. It’s that one where he doesn’t believe me
anymore, where he thinks he already knows all the answers and doesn’t
understand why I don’t accept it. It’s the same look I used to get from my mom
and my therapist, before I started lying better about it.
Suddenly we both hear it. Aidan flinches and grabs my arm to tug me back a
step. The metal-on-metal slide of the lock is followed by the steel door
snapping open a few inches. I only see darkness and the glint of a heavy chain.
“You wrote the letter?”
The voice is husky, warm, shiver-inducing and just what I expected.
I swallow dust and terror. “Yeah.”
“And him?”
I tilt my head some to try seeing past the sliver of darkness and then look at
Aidan’s terrorized expression. “A friend,” I say.
“He stays. You come in.”
Aidan grabs my arm again. “Ethan,” he whispers. “Ethan, don’t do this. Let’s
go.”
“Okay,” I say to the darkness. And then to Aidan, “Okay. It’s okay. Wait here
for me.”
Aidan looks up and down the alley. “Here?” he asks. He’s already pale enough
without going white-faced with fear on me like this.
“Or go wait in the car. Circle the block or something, I’ll call you when I’m
done. Okay? Please,” I beg him. “Please, Aidan.”
“God, Ethan, just be safe.” His arms go around me in a fast hug before he steps
back. He’s got these big brown eyes, puppy dog eyes, and they’re full of worry
as I square my shoulders and face the steel door.
The door closes enough for the chain to slide back, and then it opens again. I
step forward into the darkness, and before my eyes can adjust the steel door
slams shut. A man’s shadow steps around me and works closed the lock and chain.
He’s tall, broad-shouldered and strong through the jaw, with a short shag of
inky-black hair. Darkness swathed one side of his face as he turns to look at
me, and as my eyes adjust further to the dim light I see it’s an eyepatch he’s
wearing. The eye watching me is dark and knowing, like it can see right through
me. I shiver, even though the air is warm.
Heavy scents of incense and melting wax threaten to choke me. Across the room I
see glimmering candles set into a bowl of blood-red glass rocks, and the
strange lighting flickers over all the shadows that make up the small entry.
There’s a dark curtain swept across the back part of the room and another
curtain guarding a doorway to our left.
“This way,” he says. I follow him through the curtain to find stairs. We go up,
up, and up. I count the floors and feel my stomach roll as there’s one too
many. I counted three floors from the outside, but there’s four landings.
He stops at the top and looks at me with that same piercing gaze. “You are
certain about this?”
There’s a slight accent to the words, something mysterious in a way that’s
suiting, a way that should be cliche but isn’t. Everything about this is what I
expected and yet so awful, so real, not crazy just like I’m not crazy but maybe
I wish I was. It’d be easier if I was.
My hands start to shake and sweat. “You read my letter?”
“I read your letter,” he says.
I shiver again, that voice of his seeping into my bones like cold autumn chill.
“Then you know I’m sure.”
He nods and leads me down a short hallway to another curtain. His hand presses
on the fabric but doesn’t whisk it aside. I see flickering light escape along
the floor and wall as the velvet curtain sways. “It is not too late to leave.”
“I’m sure,” I tell him. “I want to know.”
“I was afraid you would say that.” He pushes the curtain aside, and the room
beyond is everything I expected to find and worse.
Spread across the wooden floor are russet lines and symbols, an unmistakeable
pentagram drawn in what I fiercely hope isn’t but know for sure is blood. Old
blood, obviously old blood, everything about it looks old and worn. A long
table runs along the far wall. Bones, candles, books, silver knives and bowls,
all manner of things like this is some Halloween display. It’d be hokey, it’d
seem fake, if not for the fact I know I counted three floors but walked up four
flights of stairs.
“Go in,” he says.
I shuffle into the room. I’m scared to step on any part of the giant pentagram,
so I have to edge along the wall toward the table.
“You can sit,” he says. It’s only when he gestures that I see the two folding
chairs leaned up in the corner. Just the two chairs, like he was expecting to
do this, and I don’t even know what to think about that.
I take one, pop it open, and sit. He comes over and does the same. I look up at
the light fixture and then feel my mouth go to dust again when there isn’t one.
The room flickers as if a huge candelabra should be up there swinging, but
there isn’t one. There are no windows, no lit candles, just all this flickering
light in a room I know shouldn’t exist.
My knees start shaking. I have to put my equally shaking hands between them and
clench everything together to stop the trembling. I think about the boat, the
water, everything I’ve seen and that voice calling to me the other night -- I
think about all that, and I am so scared.
He crosses his long, lean legs and rests easy in the chair. He’s wearing
perfectly normal clothes, just boots and jeans with a tight black shirt that
shows his strong biceps. He’s possibly one of the most handsome men I’ve ever
seen, and that kind of thinking makes heat rise in my face. I feel so
impossibly young and stupid in that moment, sitting there in my school uniform.
I know what I look like. I’ve got big blue eyes and my mom’s pretty face, a
soft tousle of bright gold hair, my biceps aren’t bulging with muscles but are
just sleek and pale, I’m not as small as Aidan but no one’s ever going to
expect me on the football field. I look young. I am young. I know he’s looking
at me and just seeing a dumb rich kid, a perfect fish out of water, but that’s
not my fault. I don’t know what happened to the boy that fell off his dad’s
boat, but I’m the kid they pulled back out and got to breathing again. I’m the
kid sitting here knowing that if anyone’s going to have answers for me, it’s
this handsome one-eyed man in a room without shadows.
“So, your letter,” he says.
When he says nothing else, I just have to nod and say, “My letter.”
He watches me for a long moment and then shifts to recross his legs in a
different casual fashion. “This room,” he says. “Is it bright or dark?”
“Bright,” I tell him. “There are no shadows, not even under the table or under
you. Nothing in this room has a shadow, and nothing in this room casts light.”
A slow, lazy smile spreads over his face. “No shadows,” he agrees.
I pull my lower lip into my teeth. “So it’s real? I’m not crazy?”
He laughs, low and chuckling so that I shiver again for the rumbling sound of
it. He’s only sitting there, watching me with a strange, knowing smile and
looking at me with a piercing eye that seems to see everything.
“You could be crazy. How is it I would know? But, these things that you see.
That you see them, it does not make you crazy. I see them, too, and know many
others the same. You had to know already, to have written such a letter and
left it for me here.”
The breath I release is one I have held for so long. Perhaps it’s the breath I
held going into the water when I was fourteen. I laugh some, so relieved that I
could cry, and rub at my face. This is happening, this is real, if nothing else
I know that I’m not alone anymore.
I start to explain, and it turns rambling from how nervous I am. “I saw online,
I saw that this place, you, people talk about the kind of stuff that happens
here, the kind of stuff you can do, about talking to the dead and curses, or
breaking curses, and I just thought if anyone could help it would be this
place, you, so I just...”
I see the man look confused at first, and I stop talking once he starts to look
angry.
“Who is it that says these things?” he demands. “Who has told you these things
of me?”
“I - I don’t know, the internet. Forums. Internet forums.”
He stares at me, and I brush a hand against my side to feel the reassuring
rectangle lump of my phone. I told Aidan I would call, and Aidan knows where I
am. Then again I counted three floors and went up four flights of stairs.
“Forums,” he repeats.
“Yeah. Um, occult forums. A lot of them are obviously fake, um, or voodoo type
stuff, Santeria or Wiccans, but this one, I just … I felt like it was right. It
looked right, when I got here. I felt it was right. I knew you could help me.”
“You felt drawn here,” he says. He nods, satisfied with that answer when he
wasn’t before. Suddenly I wonder if he even knows about the internet, and I
feel an anxious burst of terror that he might not know about something so basic
as the internet.
“Tell me of this that saw you back,” he says. “Your letter told of something
that saw you.”
I nod and tuck my hands into my knees again. “I saw a man, a dead man. Car
accident, I think, because he was in the street, and he was all beat apart and
bloody.” I shudder and close my eyes, feeling sick all over again. My
grandfather died in his sleep, so it was parchment paper skin and wispy white
hair, dark-staring hollow eyes. Not everyone dies so peacefully as Poppa.
“Normally they never see me. They don’t seem to see anything, they’re just …
there. Not even where they died, I don’t think, I don’t know, but this one was
in the street. I tried not to look. I didn’t want to look, but I saw him
staring at me.” My palms itch with sweat as I rub them on the khaki press of my
knees. “I crossed the street, and his head turned to keep watching me. But I
don’t - I don’t think it was him. I’m not sure. It didn’t seem like him, the
dead guy, I mean--”
He holds up a hand to stop my rambling, mercifully stopping me from needing to
explain further. “Something used this dead man’s eyes to see you.”
Cold terror crushes my chest. He says it so casually, as if offering me a
perfectly reasonable explanation. I don’t understand any of this, what it means
that I see the dead or why he would say something used a dead man’s eyes to
watch me cross the street. I wish I was only crazy. I wish so desperately that
I was only crazy.
“Tell me of this voice. The one that calls for you.”
It takes me a moment to unglue my tongue from the dry roof of my mouth. “What
should I say?”
“Does it call by name?” he asks, tone sharp.
“No. No, not my name. It’s not even words, or at least, I don’t think I
understand them if they are. Or I mean I can’t tell you what it said. Just that
I heard it calling for me. I - I’m sorry I can’t explain it any better than
that. I didn’t understand the words, but I understand what they meant.”
He nods slowly. “I will tell you now, and this is important so hear me well.
Never give the truth of your name. What it is you were called, before you knew
to call yourself, it is powerful. Hold it close and guard it well. Is this
understood?”
“Yes,” I say. “I think so. I mean, It’s like the internet, um, a username. How
I signed my letter?” He really doesn’t know about the internet, I can see by
the way brows draw tight. I swallow nothing and say, “Understood.”
“If this voice that calls you were to call you by name, you would answer,” he
says. “Is this call one you want to answer?”
I hesitate before shaking my head. “No. I guess not. I don’t want anything to
do with this. I want - I want it to stop. Can you make it stop?” I lean forward
some, hands clutched between my knees. “Can you make me normal again?”
He laughs, and there is no kindness in it. “No,” he says. “If that is the help
you ask, go ask someone else. You are as you are. I am not to change that, and
you must know this of yourself. Is this understood?”
My shoulders sag with disappointment, but I nod. “Am I in danger? That voice I
heard, this call I heard, what is it?”
One of his shoulders lifts and then falls with wanton disregard. “Without
knowing, how can I say? You should not have come here. I will help you to
forget these things, so you will not know them any longer. That is best, I
think, than what you ask of me. I cannot take this from you, is this
understood? It is yours now. But I will help you forget it.”
“I don’t understand,” I say. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“You wish not to see such things, not to hear such a voice call you?”
I nod eagerly, and I see him smile in a way that is neither kind nor cruel.
“It will cost,” he warns. “What you ask of me. It will cost.”
“I don’t care,” I say. “Anything. I just want it to stop. I don’t want anything
to do with this stuff.”
He smiles again in that same way, so I don’t know if he’s mocking me or sad for
me. “You do not even know what it is you deny.”
“You’re right. I don’t. And I don’t want to know.” I’m deciding this as I say
it, but I know it’s true. “I just wanted to know if it was real. Now I know I’m
not crazy, but, I think I might go crazy if I have to keep seeing dead people
everywhere and hearing voices. Once I saw something, I thought I saw something,
like a - a double-vision, of a woman walking only I saw her and I didn’t see
her, and I just - I don’t want to see anything like that ever again. I want to
be the kid that hit his head and fell. Please, I want to be him again.”
The tears are messy, embarrassing, and I hate them. I hate myself for crying
like this. It’s all this relief and fear pouring out of me, so that I bury my
face into my hands and hunch low on the folding chair. I’m such a dumb kid and
know it, but I want to be a dumb kid.
I want to worry about midterms and college admissions. I want to worry about
trying to tell my mom I’d rather ask Aidan to prom than Stacy Gershwin, instead
of having to worrying about lying to my mom that everything’s fine, I’m not
crazy, it was just stress and now I’m okay. I don’t want to lie awake anymore
so scared of what I might see, what I might hear, and what it means. I don’t
even want to know why anymore. I just want it to stop.
A hand rubs over the hunched line of my back. It’s the man’s hand, warm and
strong, so that I feel a weird flutter that stifles my tears.
“I will help you,” he says. “Ach, you are young. I will help you.”
I stop crying, embarrassed, and peek up from between my fingers. He straightens
away from where I’m sitting and nods, firm and precise. As I watch, he walks to
the table and pushes aside a stack of books.
“I have money,” I think to say. “If this is expensive. I can pay you.”
When he smiles over his shoulder at me it’s with kindness, finally, so that I
feel absurdly guilty for my tears. I pull upright and wipe at my cheeks. I
start to smile, but that lasts only until I see him turn around holding a knife
in one hand.
“Go to the center,” he says. He nods at the pentagram on the floor, and I am
paralyzed with fear.
Somehow I get to my feet. I step gingerly over the red-mud stains that must be
blood, old blood, so much blood to have made this, and he is standing there
with a knife watching me with that one dark eye. Worse is the pull I feel that
tells me where the exact center of the star is, so that I stand precisely with
my feet together as if magnetized. I hold my hands straight down at my sides. I
don’t tremble, because I can’t move. I lock into place.
He approaches with the knife and bowl but does not cross the sweeping curve of
the circle. He walks along it instead, just outside the faded lines. “Are you
certain this cost is one you will pay?”
It is only because I can feel the vibration in my throat that I know it is my
voice that answers. “Yes.”
“Are you certain this desire is one you want granted?”
“Yes,” the vibration says again.
I am without fear, without thought, without anything other than watching him
circle. My eyes don’t move, nothing in me moves except my lungs and heart, but
yet I see him walk the circle all the same. He walks the circle around me and
then comes forward along one of the slanted lines of the star.
“Look at me,” he commands.
I look. I see his hand lift, the hand holding the knife. I feel nothing, no
fear, no concern, no flinch of pain as the knife descends into my eye. There is
darkness and wet dripping, this room without shadows fading. I am nothing, I am
nowhere, I am under the water again with my head a brilliance of split skin and
agony, I am not that moment because that moment is not me and never was, oh I
am none of these things and all these things and dizzy with it, oh I am none of
these things and nothing, I am nothing, there is nothing.
I wake with a scream. I strangle the sound into quiet as soon as I realize it’s
happening, as soon as I realize that I am awake. I don’t remember sleeping. I’m
in the room without shadows lying on the floor, the ceiling above so simple and
strange with all the light that shouldn’t be seen.
As I lift my head and try to make sense of things, I see him sitting in the
corner on the folding chair. His legs are crossed so casually as he watches me.
Even the eyepatch seems to be staring, and it’s the closest thing to a shadow
in the room.
Memory lashes like a whip, and I slap a hand over my face. I blink several
times and feel frantically for anything missing, anything stabbed. I rub at my
eyes until tender technicolor blooms over the red-black glow of my closed lids.
“Easy,” he says. The word is thick, not just from his nothing accent. I swallow
nothing, there is nothing. I've forgotten nothing and remember everything.
I bolt to my feet. “Is it done?” I think to ask. I scratch dry palms over my
khakis and look down at the bright red lines crossing the floor. Bright without
shadows, and my loafered feet shuffle against the floor. I feel no different,
but something’s happened, he's done something. 
“It is done,” he affirms. He walks to the curtain and casts it back.  “Go home.
Do not look close at things you do not wish to see. Try to forget, Abel.”
I leave, I run down three flights of stairs, I burst out the warped metal door
into the fading twilight and see it’s been two hours since I left Aidan. Two
hours, and three flights of stairs, my hands are shaking as I call him. I'm
going to forget all about this. 
“Ethan!” he bursts. “Thank God! Okay, where can I pick you up?”
“Um, same place. Same place, I’m here in the alley --” I hang up and run to the
street. I bounce anxiously until Aidan’s rambling old sedan putters up to the
curb. I maul open the car door and throw myself inside.
His eyes are as round as his nose. “How’d it go?”
“Fine. Fine -- I think, I don’t know yet. He did something, it’s fine.” I push
my feet into the floorboard of the passenger seat and sink down low with my
arms crossed. “He said he’d help me, so, I guess I’ll just wait and see. We
don’t have to talk about it. It’s fine.”
Aidan drives me home, he stays for dinner, we go to school, I don’t see one
dead thing for the rest of the semester except a splattered bug on his car’s
windshield. Until the dead cat starts talking to me, everything’s fine.
***** Chapter 3 *****
Up until now I haven’t seen one dead thing, not one strange thing, nothing bad
happened but failing a chemistry midterm and passing the retake, nothing scary
except college applications and lying on my boring essay. I bet if I’d written
the essay about this dead cat, Harvard might at least want to interview me.
Aidan’s against me trying not to cry. I’m trying not to scream.
The dead cat says again, “Hey, kid.”
I know it’s the cat talking. Don’t ask me how I know it’s this dead cat flopped
up against the side of the road that’s talking. I just do, I know it’s the cat,
so I’m trying not to scream while Aidan sniffles and acts like he isn’t broken
up just as bad at this cat that got hit by a car.
“Should we call someone?” Aidan crouches down a little closer, too squeamish to
really look at the stiff-still black lump of fur. “The driver didn’t even stop,
this sucks.”
I don’t know what to say, but then the dead cat gets to its feet. I clutch my
coat in silence as this dead cat starts moving, but Aidan scrambles back with a
gasp. He covers his mouth and stares right at the dead cat like he can see it
too.
“Hey, kid. I know you can hear me.” The cat prowls forward with its tail
flicked up and dodges underneath Aidan’s hand. One of its front legs doesn’t
bend right, it bends too much, and I think I might be sick. I might be crazy
again, except Aidan’s still trying to pet the not-so-dead cat.
“Oh, it’s alive! It’s alive!” Aidan laughs and chases the cat up on to the
sidewalk. He might be watching this once-dead cat run around, but he can’t hear
it. No way he can hear it. “Kitty, here, I won’t hurt you…”
“Meow,” says the cat. “Fucking meow, go away, hiss --” It swats at Aidan’s hand
and then darts over to me.
I feel shattered bones moving beneath soft fur as the cat rubs into my ankles.
“Pick me up,” the cat demands. I keep standing there not moving, gloved fingers
knotted tight into my coat. “Hey, kid, pick me up. Look how fucking cute I am.
Don’t you want to -- dammit!”
A streak of black twists through my legs and scrambles up onto the hood of a
parked car to escape Aidan. I keep staring at the way the cat’s front leg bends
too much, the way one side of the cat looks flatter than the other as it turns
and twists in a mockery of living flesh.
This cat is dead. This is a dead cat, and it’s talking to me. First dead thing
bigger than a bug I see in four months, and it wants to talk to me.
“Ethan, help me,” Aidan says. “I think it’s hurt. We should get it to the vet.
It looks like someone’s pet, did you see a collar?” He starts closer to the car
with his hands out, murmurs and coos flowing from him to keep the animal calm.
The cat’s head swivels toward me. Ears flicking, tail twitching, pupils massive
and gleaming. It lifts a paw to its face and darts out a delicate pink tongue.
“Tell your friend to fuck off.” The cat checks Aidan’s progress between
washings of its tongue over dense black fur. “Get rid of him so we can talk.”
My breath is ice that cuts from me in white puffs. “Let’s just forget about
it,” I say to Aidan. I cannot believe how calm and steady my voice sounds.
Maybe not as calm as I think, since Aidan turns to me with a worked knot of
concern over his face.
“Let’s just keep walking. Let’s forget about this. I’m going to keep walking,
just forget about it -- let’s, let’s just --” Definitely not as calm as I
think, the more I listen to my own terrified rambling. I turn sharply and move
quick so what starts off as walking turns into full-out running.
I don’t want to talk to a dead cat. I don’t care how cute it thinks it is, I’m
not talking to a dead cat. Four months without anything worse happening than a
D on my chemistry midterm, and now a dead cat wants to talk to me. It’s not
fair. It was too good to be true, what happened in the room without shadows, I
knew it was too good to be true. I knew this couldn’t be over just because I
wanted it to be over.
“Ethan! Ethan, wait. Ethan --!”
“No!” I shriek and pull my hand away from Aidan when he tries to grab me. It’s
a lot of awkward tumbling before we latch into each other to keep from falling.
I start pushing him away yelling, “I won’t! I won’t!”
That cat’s nowhere in sight, it’s just my best friend staring at me with big
round eyes because I’ve gone crazy again. Four months of being so normal it
hurt, because I knew this was going to happen. I just knew it was too good to
be true.
I hit a trembling fist into his shoulder even though he’s just standing there
letting me push and shove at him. White fogs from my lips as I pant, sob, shake
harder and try not to keep crying because I don’t want to be crazy. I don’t
want to talk to a dead cat, especially not one that wants to talk to me.
“I don’t want to,” I sob. I let go of Aidan to claw the tears off my cheeks.
“Ethan, we won’t,” he says. “You don’t have to. You don’t have to, okay?”
I don’t see the dead cat anywhere. Just nice cars and nice houses, two nice
kids standing here on the sidewalk puffing white clouds into the cold. I wipe
my nose into my palm before searching my pockets for a handkerchief. Aidan
beats me to it and offers a monogrammed white square, because we are such nice
kids and not at all the sort that go around talking to dead things. I blow my
nose and sniffle.
“Sorry,” I say.
He’s wide-eyed as he watches me. “It’s okay,” he says. He waits some, turns an
anxious glance back to where we were, and then pats at my arm. “Ethan, it’s
okay. Um, I saw the cat, too,” he offers. “The cat was real.”
“The cat was dead.” I say it blunt and hard, voice thick from crying, and Aidan
frowns worriedly in that way that so clearly says he doesn’t believe me. It’s
the same worried look my mom gave me, when it was doctors and tests and then
lying to make her think it all worked.
I know it’s crazy, but I keep insisting. “It was dead. It is dead. That was a
dead cat.”
His lower lip gets pulled into his teeth. “Okay,” he says. “Well, I saw the
cat, it didn’t seem very dead when it got up and started meowing --”
I clap my hands over my ears, scrunch my eyes shut, force the words out around
the scared lump in my throat. “It was dead!” I shout. “Dead! I’m not talking to
it! I won’t!”
Such a terrible silence follows. Finally Aidan’s fingers brush the arm of my
coat, the gesture more heard than felt, and then he gently tugs my hands off my
ears. “Okay,” he says. “Well, the cat’s not here anymore. I don’t think it
wants to talk to you either.”
He’s trying to be nice. Poor dimple-cheeked Aidan is trying to be nice to his
crazy best friend, and I won’t stop screaming about a dead cat. I breathe deep
and open my eyes. Still no dead cat, nothing dead or out of place except these
two nice kids trying to walk to the clubhouse for lunch on a cold Saturday. I
stare around for a bit, each shadow a suspect to suddenly become a lumpy,
misshapen dead thing meowing for attention.
“So, it’s okay,” Aidan says. “Ethan, it’s okay.”
“I’m going home.” I turn, shove my hands into my pockets, and then start
walking. I need to forget about this.
Aidan keeps pace with me. I know he’s going to say it, even before he timidly
offers a smile and gets up the nerve to confront his crazy best friend again.
“Um, Ethan? Your house is the other way.”
“I’m taking the long way,” I tell him. I’m not going near where I found the
dead cat, or where the dead cat found me -- I know without anyone needing tell
me that whatever was calling to me four months ago is back. It found me, it’s
in that dead cat, and I’m going home to forget about it.
Aidan decides to come home with me, but he doesn’t say anything about it at
first. I realize it when he keeps with me rather than take the turn down his
own street. I stop walking and sniffle my cold, stuffy nose at him.
“Aidan, will you go home?” I ask. “Can you just go home? Please. I’m sorry.”
Growing up, Aidan was the kid who never wanted to be home. After school,
weekends, holidays, Aidan would walk over and kick around my driveway until I’d
run out to play or invite him inside. We’re too nice of kids for it to be an
afterschool special kind of reason, it’s just that Aidan has two little half-
sisters and a mom who was always busy chasing after them.  
Unlike my mom, who redefines the word helicopter parent. She’s like a fighter
plane, zooming over me loud and fast, not hovering so much as knocking me full
of concern and then rushing off to the next harmless disaster in her life like
making sure the school ice cream social has enough napkins. Her love is
viciously affectionate at best, absently neglectful at worst. Maybe absently
affectionate and viciously neglectful, if I turned out crazy, so I hate making
her think I’m crazy. If Aidan comes home with me, she’s going to know by his
worry that my good streak is over.
I just wanted to explain it, or have it explained to me, and Aidan went along
with ouija boards and seances and everything else from books and the internet
until my mom yelled at him for encouraging me. My mom yelling is her nose
twitching while she talks softly about how she isn’t mad, just disappointed,
and that she understands but wants you to be different anyway.   
My father yells the same, only he is mad about it, and he really yells. I don’t
tell him anything I see, I don’t tell him much of anything at all. He’s rarely
home, or I try not to be when he is. I hunch my coat tighter against the brisk
grey day and wipe my nose with the back of my hand.
“Aidan, I’m sorry. Can you just go home?”
“Oh.” He shrugs. “Yeah. Or, I could get my car if you wanted to go somewhere.”
I watch a patch of shadow under a car for much too long without saying
anything. Assumptions bloom into the silence, and I see them on Aidan’s face
when I finally think to look at him again. “I’m going home,” I say. “Just -
- forget about it. Forget about it, okay? I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Now I’m the patch of shadow under the car for him to stare at too long. I had
four perfect months of assuring him the letter really did work and I was
totally fine, nothing dead anywhere. Now I’m screaming about a dead cat that
Aidan knows he saw get hit by a car.
He saw it same as me. He must have seen it get hit, go flopping over limp and
dead. It was dead, he has to know it was dead I can’t be crazy. I’m not going
to talk to anything dead.
Finally Aidan pulls in a breath and nods. “Okay,” he says. “Sure, Ethan. Don’t
worry about it. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
We exchange waves and go in separate directions through the neighborhood. Once
I think Aidan can’t possibly see, I break into a run. I just want to get home
before anything else dead finds me. I went into that room without shadows to do
something so incredibly nightmarish that I’m still having nightmares about it.
I wanted it to work, I’m going to forget about today.
Soon as my house gets in view I slow into a quick walk. I need to catch my
breath. I don’t want my mom to know I ran home again because of something dead.
On the porch I take longer than I need to get out my keys. I push inside and
love the sickly-sweet floral waft of potpourri just because it’s home.
No one has ever died inside my home, it’s only as old as I am. My parents
bought it to put me in, which is always a nice thought even when everything
else is falling apart. I rest the back of my head against the door. I’m home.
Nothing’s ever died in my home, not even a goldfish or a plant.
“Ethan?” my mom calls.
I pull my head off the door as she walks into the foyer carrying a black lump
of fur with bottle-green eyes. My mother in her crisp tailored white linen suit
is carrying a dead cat with a smile on her face. The cat twists to the floor
and darts to me.
“Hey again, sweetheart,” the cat says. “Miss me?”
“I don’t want a cat,” I say. “Mom, I don’t want a cat.” I don’t look down at
the creature rubbing against my ankles.
“Oh, come on,” says the cat. “Look at how fucking cute I am. How can you not
want this? Which is your room -- is it upstairs?” The cat leaps away from me
and heads for the stairs.
“I heard him meowing outside and thought he might be hurt,” my mom says. “But
he seems to get around fine. I already contacted the rescue Shelley co-
sponsors. They’ll come pick him up on Monday, Ethan, surely you can put up with
one lost cat for that long.”
“Yeah, princess, don’t be so greedy,” the cat says. He wraps around the railing
halfway up the stairs.
I stare at my mother because she has betrayed me. She brought a dead thing into
our home -- I couldn’t get an iguana for six Christmases in a row, and she’s
decided to bring a dead cat inside to play animal rescue with. I couldn’t even
keep the goldfish I won at the school fair in the second grade, and she’s
decided we’re keeping reanimated roadkill.
“Meow, meow, motherfucker, let’s go,” says the cat. “Get into your room so we
can talk.” The broken leg is less noticeable as the cat scrambles up the rest
of the staircase. He looks less dead inside my nice, clean house.
I take my shoes off in the entry and then go upstairs because this is a
nightmare. I don’t know what else to do except go to my room. I don’t have to
talk to the cat just because I’m in my room. If the cat wasn’t real -- wasn’t
talking to me -- I’d go to my room anyway.
Maybe this is a new kind of crazy. Maybe I really am crazy and spent two hours
wandering an abandoned building while Aidan circled the block in his car. He
was willing to do seances and anything else, he went with me to drop off the
letter. The cat doesn’t look that dead anyway.
The landing at the second floor extends over the foyer as a bridge of wasted
space. As a child I could watch through the bannister as my parents fought in
every room but their own. The master bedroom anchors the other end of the
chasm. Memory seeps into the architecture of the house, so I spend half the
time nostalgic and the other sickened.
My room is NASA posters, little league trophies, a neatly made bed in a well-
organized square of some nice lie that my parents want me to be. I try to go
along with it because I don’t have anything better. I’ll take things being nice
and fake if the alternative is dead things talking.
“Boring.” The cat hops up to my desk and bats several pens out of their orderly
lines. He pushes one to the floor. “What kind of teenager are you?”
I sit on the bed. I push toward the center. I try not to look at the cat as he
wanders over my desk and steps up onto my closed laptop.
“So, kid, let’s cut right to it. I know you can hear me. Stop dicking around
and let’s talk.” The cat settles into a statuesque sit with his tail curled
around his feet. “What’s your name?”
“E--”
I slap a hand over my mouth, shove my knuckles against my lips and shake my
head.
“Eek, how scary. A talking cat -- get over it,” he says. “Yeah. I’m dead. The
cat’s dead, I’m dead -- everyone's dead or dying, that's life. What’s your
name, sweetheart? Let’s be friends.”
The cat rises up and springs gracefully onto the bookcase. From there he
crosses along to reach the headboard and then down into the pillows.
“I’m -- you.” I get the words out around my hand. I don’t want to remember
anything of that strange nightmare after I crossed the curtain, but I do
remember everything. I can’t forget one word of the warnings I received from
the only person who told me I wasn’t crazy, even if I desperately right now
wish I was crazy instead of whispering at a cat -- dead or not.
“I, you, me, yeah. That’s the idea,” the cat says. He saunters closer on tip-
toes and walks right across my lap. Up close it’s easier to see the bent twist
to the cat’s leg and the broken lumps along its side. Definitely dead, this cat
has to be dead.
“I’m not telling you my name,” I say. “You - you can call me something else.
Um, Reliabel-five -- just Abel. My name’s Abel.”
Laughter tumbles from the cat as an eerie series of rumbling purrs. “That’s not
your name.”
I don’t know why he’s so fixated on my name when he had to have heard Aidan and
my mom both using it, but then I remember all those warnings. I set my hand on
the cat’s spine as he arches toward me. I manage one stroke over the dense
black fur before pulling my hand away. I don’t want to pet a dead cat. I don’t
want a dead cat for a pet. This can’t be happening.
“It’s what you can call me,” I insist. “I’m not telling you my name.”
“You’ve been talking to someone,” the cat accuses. He turns in a tight circle
atop my thigh, paws poking into muscle and claws catching into the weave of the
khaki fabric. “Who the fuck have you been talking to about me?”
“No one. I just met you.” I try to push the cat off my lap and get an ear-
flattened hiss for the trouble.
“I’ve been trying to get your attention for a while now, ever since you caught
mine,” he says. “I had to be clever about it.” A sound like a bucket of rocks
tumbling shakes out of the dead cat as it -- he -- laughs. “Meow, meow. I’m a
fucking riot.”
Dimly overlaying the sharp-tongued and distinctly masculine voice is the treble
trill of a cat, so I feel crazy again and put my hands over my ears. “I don’t
want to talk to you.”
The cat paces sideways off my lap with that bent leg tangled all the worse for
the feigned casualness of the gesture. “Too bad, princess, we’re talking. Are
you really going to deny me?”
I slide from the bed and back toward my desk. “I know you used the dead man’s
eyes to watch me. You - you called for me.”
The cat sits on the spot of rumpled comforter where I was just sitting. He
licks his paw again, scratchy tongue grooming in methodical strokes. The cat
drags his paw over his crinkly whiskers and round-cheeked feline face. “Yeah,
no shit, you stubborn fuck. Been calling at you for a while. I don't like being
ignored."
“What are you? Who are you?” I ask. “Are you a ghost?”
Shattered glass and clattering stone form another loud laugh from the cat. I
look to the door worriedly but don’t hear my mom calling. It’s a big house, a
big stupid house my parents bought to put their new baby into like that would
fix everything wrong with them and their marriage.
“Yeah, kid, I’m a ghost,” the cat says. “Is that how you want to do this? You
gotta help me to like, move on, or whatever.”
“Okay,” I say. “How do I do that?” Anything to get rid of this dead thing that
wants to talk to me.
The cat looks to be smirking as it watches me, long tail still flicking. “I
need a body. You need to kill someone.”
“What? No!”
“I won’t be that picky. Just male, between 20 and 30, must be good looking.
Brunette preferred although… maybe I’ll go blonde. No gingers though, and
nothing messy. Keep it clean. No headshots.” The cat settles its paws and
hunches down into a black loaf.
Each breath is thick as I stand there staring at this - this dead thing. Cat,
ghost, voice -- a dead thing, talking to me. A dead thing is telling me to kill
people.
“No,” I say. “No. I won’t.” I grab one of the pencils off the desk and hold it
in a tight fist.
I know Aidan saw the cat. My mom carried the cat in her arms. What if I’m just
crazy, and my mom comes in here to see I’ve stabbed this cat to death? I’ll be
shipped off somewhere so nice and expensive, so that my mother will fret and my
father will simmer resentment in oppressive waves.
“I won’t kill anyone,” I say. “Find someone else to help you. I’m just a
highschool kid. I’ve never even been in a fight.”
“You’re a necromancer,” the cat replies. “Why else do you think I’d be talking
to you?”
I move closer to the door. I don’t know what that is, but I don’t want to know
anything about it. I'm not going to be a necromancer. I'm not going to talk to
dead things anymore. Talking to the cat was a huge mistake.
“Relax. It’ll be easy.  You’re pretty enough. Just lure some perv to a hotel
room and choke him out when he’s busy fucking you. Choking’s a good one. Nice
and clean.”
I close my eyes. This has got to be a dream. This cannot be happening. I am not
going to talk to dead things or become a prostitute serial killer. I turn for
the door and then open it before the cat can do more than meow and hiss a
quick, “Fuck wait!”
“Mom!” I call. I move into the landing. The cat weaves past me and escapes down
the hallway toward my parent’s room and the office. I go to the center of the
open overlook and call again, “Mom! Mom, are you home?"
I don’t hear her, so I go for the stairs while juggling out my phone. I fumble
it through my fingers and the phone swan dives to a clattering death. Down each
stair it goes until coming to a full stop. I hurry down after it and snatch up
the garbled mess of a broken LCD and cracked screen.
“Mom!” Screaming it now, because I don’t want to be so crazy that I hear voices
telling me to kill people. I can’t be that crazy, I can’t do that to her, and I
tried everything I could not to do this to her but if I’m hearing voices that
want me to kill people then clearly I’ve failed.
I run out to the garage and see her car’s gone. I pull my phone from my pocket
but the screen is nothing but teal and green vertical bars beneath a spiderweb
of broken class. I shove the useless rectangular lump back into my pocket and
then go to grab my bicycle.
A rich kid like me ought to have a car by now, but my father disapproves so
strongly of everything I am that he gets a perverse pleasure from denying me my
own vehicle. I guess it’s snobby of me to expect one, because I could go get a
part-time job to buy my own, but with my luck I’d end up with dead coworkers
and a dead boss all trying to talk at me about killing people, because I’m
definitely just crazy.
I assault the kickstand with my foot and then swing into the seat. I hear the
cat yelling through the close door, but it’s indistinct rage that I leave
behind. I didn’t grab my coat again -- I didn’t even grab my shoes, so it’s
just my socks digging into the textured grip of the pedals. The cold cuts
through me as a frigid sting, but the harder I pedal and the faster the wind
flies over me, the warmer I feel.
I fly down the sloped hill toward the stop sign and then blow right through it
without slowing or stopping or even looking. I don’t want to see anything, I
don’t want to see anything dead. Momentum carries me partway up the next hill
before I lift from the seat and pump a hard, fast rhythm to keep going. I’m not
going to talk anymore to dead things, and I’m certainly not going to kill
anyone.
I don’t want to see anything dead on the way to Aidan’s house, so I don’t look
at anything other than the street in front of me. I need his car, I need to go,
I need someone to tell me I’m not crazy or someone to tell me what to do if I
am. No, doesn’t even matter, I don’t care why this is happening. I just need to
know what to do. Literally first living person I find -- my mom, Aidan, the
handsome man in the eye patch, whatever they tell me to do, so long as it’s not
kill people.  
Sweat flicks over my brow and gathers under my shirt against the small of my
back. I grip into the handlebars on my bike and go faster, racing down the
street with my heart pounding. Wind cuts into my face, tugs at my hair, and
whips tears from my eyes. It’s so cold without my coat, but I’m burning.
I lean hard into the turn to avoid slowing as I turn onto Aidan’s street. I’m
almost there. I see Aidan’s house, I see Aidan’s car. I see it much too late,
swerve hard and miss, and cannot believe my best friend just hit me with his
car.
***** Chapter 4 *****
“Abel. Abel, hey. Fuck, I told you not to make this messy.”
The voice sounds to have been calling for a while. I recognize it, I think.
“Kid, come on, you can do this. Get them pretty blue eyes open.”
That dead cat is the first thing I see. He’s about all I can see, staring
bottle green eyes and black nose close. Beyond that is the sideways tilt of the
street.
The cat speaks again to say, “Abel, hey -- sweetheart, you awake?” A furry head
bumps into my forehead.
I think I hear something else, but it’s all buzzing except for this cat’s dead
voice that isn’t a cat at all. I don’t think the buzzing is really buzzing
either, but thinking is rather hard. I just got hit by a car.  
“You’re dying, kid. I’m sorry. Trust the dead thing on this one,” the cat says.
He bumps into me again, insistent and hard. “Tell me your name, Abel, your real
name. You don’t have much time.”
I’m pretty sure I can hear Aidan, which makes sense. He hit me with his car -
- no way. That’s all I can think, Aidan hit me with his car, this is really
happening.
He will be in therapy forever. His life is over. He will never be able to
handle the fact that he just vehicular manslaughtered his best friend. He
barely kept it together when we watched someone’s lost cat get hit by a car,
and now his best friend is the one flopped over against the road not moving. I
have made this the worst day in his life.
It was completely my fault. I flew right past that stop sign and cut the turn
tight so that I went right into his car. Doesn’t even matter that I deserved it
because Aidan’s going to implode under the guilt of killing me. He already gets
picked on enough at school, now he gets to be the boy who killed his best
friend.
I wonder if they’ll have a school assembly. Oh, my parents are going to have to
have a funeral. That big empty house they bought for me, it won’t even have me
inside it anymore, just painful memories seeped into the walls. They’ll
probably sell the house. My mother is going to cry.
“I don’t want to die,” I say.
All I can see are these bottle-green eyes, these dead eyes with pupils so black
as midnight, the fur a dense dark abyss of eternity, everything gone except
this.
“I won’t let you,” the cat says. “I’ve been looking for you too long just to
watch you bleed out in fucking suburbia.”
“What’s your name?” I ask. “I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.”
“You can call me Cain, if you’re going to be Abel.”
“That’s not your name.” I’m barely even too-bright buzzing now, barely even
broken limbs and blood. I see this bright glow and darkness, it’s one and the
same of bottle-green everything. “What happens if I tell you my name?”
“Lots of things. Your shrieking little friend won’t have to live with the fact
he killed you, for starters. You’re not going to like the rest, but you’ll be
around for it.”
“Am I going to regret telling you?”
“Definitely,” he says.
There’s a low, chuckling laugh that makes me feel warm. A rough rasping streaks
through the cold oblivion I’ve become, what little I have left besides this
voice. It’s the velcro-scratch feel of the cat’s tongue. The cat licks again at
my cheek. I hear a rumble, feel a vibration, it’s warm, dense fur pushing
against me.
“Don’t die, kid. Don’t die a stupid stubborn fuck.” It sounds almost like
pleading. “What do you really have to lose?”
“Ethan.” I tell the cat. “My parents named me Ethan.”
The dark bright glow comes closer, becomes everything more than it already is
everything. “Sorry, Ethan,” the voice purrs. “You’re really not going to like
this.”
My eyes open without having closed, and I see again the sideways tilt of the
street. From within me comes a rumbling that shakes through my shattered bones.
Agony rips over my muscles as my limbs contort back into shape. I stifle a
scream only because I need to draw breath, and I feel my fractured ribs
straighten out with a distinct crack-pop cringe-inducing horrorshow of a sound.
Only once that’s happened can my lungs spasm into breathing with a ragged-hot
rhythm, but I still can’t scream. Nothing seems right, every inch of my body is
a broken stranger returning to me as glittering shards of pain.
I hear above that Aidan’s hysteric, “Stay there! Girls stay in the car!” Him
screaming at his little sisters, that explains the high-pitched shrieking.
It’ll all just been buzzing before.
It didn’t hurt before either, and now I shudder and retch from the sheer
onslaught of just how much this hurts. I claw at the asphalt to get onto my
hands and knees and see blood, I see so much blood, it’s over my hands and
soaked into my shirt, there’s a puddle of it in the street where I’m trying to
crawl upright. There’s a dead cat, too, some stiff-still lump of black fur that
must have chased me down.
Aidan’s knelt beside me, phone in hand with the call to nine-one-one still
going even if he’s given up on listening. He’s twisted around to look at the
car and his two little sisters who were screaming about how he’s just murdered
someone but have now switched to just incoherent squealing because I’m a dead
thing moving around.
“It’s fine,” I say. “Stop your screaming.”
Or rather it’s my lips that move, my throat that vibrates, but the voice is not
mine. It’s the dead cat, Cain, inside me speaking this way. This dead thing
that found me is using my body. I didn’t want to kill anyone, but I’m the dead
thing. I can’t believe this is happening.
Aidan has the exact same sentiment all over his face as he snaps around at me.
Tears blot and dribble over his cheeks as he stares at me, sorrow and panic
giving back to sudden fear and then cold, desperate horror the more I move
around. His trembling fingers press to his lips as he chokes on a hard sob.
I shove up from the street, all the wrong ache and numb fading as my body
contorts the broken parts back together. I stand there and roll my neck as
vertebrae settle into place. I remember the cat’s pleading, this voice
belonging to someone begging me to live --
Cain?
“Yeah,” I say. Or, he says. My body again, now in use by Cain -- the once dead
thing that called to me, this reanimated roadkill of a cat. This voice telling
me to kill people, has become me.
Aidan rushes to his feet because I’m on my feet. “Ethan, oh my God. Oh, my
fucking God --” He’s trying to cry through his shock, but it’s just him shaking
and tears tumbling fast and thick. “Maybe - maybe you should sit down. The
ambulance will be here, I - I called nine-one-one, the ambulance is coming..."
“All’s good here, sweetheart.”
Cain speaking again, from within my body and surely he sounds like me to Aidan,
just like how the cat sounded like meowing and I could even hear it, the
overlaid treble trill of a cat tangled together with a brash, masculine voice.
I only hear him, Cain, I hear him use my body to say, “I’m fine as can be.”
“I just hit you with my car! Oh, my God, sit down -- you have to sit down.
You’re bleeding!” Aidan decides to grab for me. He takes the bold step of
snatching my hand, but Cain pulls my hand away. I’ve lost control of my body. I
don’t even know what to do. Cain’s inside me, moving my dead body around -- but
I’m still here.
Am I dead?
“No,” Cain says.
My head turns to take in the scene of the accident. My bike’s twisted into the
front of Aidan’s car with a bent tire and snapped chain. I’m a good twenty feet
away, with Aidan and the cat. I’m covered in blood. My brows are thick with it
as I scowl, as my body does all these things without me.   
“You should go to the hospital,” Aidan says. “Ethan? Ethan, please, sit down.
Okay?” He pulls at me. “God, I am so sorry -- I swear I didn’t see you. I
didn’t see you until --”
Cain pulls the other way. “I’m leaving,” he says. “Don’t worry about it. Fuck,
is the bike wrecked?”
I get closer to the car. Aidan’s two little sisters are staring at me from the
backseat with huge eyes and pointing fingers. I crouch down and jangle the
broken bicycle. I stand and kick at it instead, scowling. I turn and start
walking, shoulders hunched against the chill cut of the wind.
“Ethan?” Aidan calls after me. His voice grows shrill and terrified. “Ethan!”
“Fuck off!” Cain shouts back. “I’m fine!” In my voice, just like how Aidan
heard the cat meowing, he’s going to hear my voice shouting. I am so fucked.
This can’t be happening.    
Can you hear me?
Cain’s voice grumbles under my breath. “Yeah.”
Am I dead?
“No, shut up.”
My gaze flicks back over my shoulder to where Aidan’s gone to corral his
sisters, because the oldest is halfway out into the street. They’re ten and
eight, always a handful, and screaming and shrieking about how cool that was,
now that I’m not dead. Aidan turns to stare after me with tears smeared all
over his face, and then I look away. I’m walking fast through yards to take the
most direct path home, or at least I hope I’m going home.
I hear the soaring wail of the ambulance siren. I hug along fence lines and
cross through the drainage path between yards. Aidan’s going to tell them where
I live. If Cain doesn’t realize that, then I’m not sure I should tell him. Or
he can read my mind, but I don’t --
I stagger to a stop beneath a power line pole and sink into a crouch. My arms
go over my chest as I hunch to pant and shiver. Now that I’m not moving, it’s
splitting torture as my broken body beats and breaths. My forehead goes into my
arms with a groan.
“Fuck,” Cain whispers. My eyes close, my fist clenches, I’m not sure I can feel
the pain as intensely as Cain does, but I’m really not sure of anything. I’m
not really sure if I am anything.
I sit there breathing hard and shivering for a while longer. Gradually I settle
more comfortably into my own body, or Cain does into mine, but either way it’s
easier to be in this strange moment.
Maybe I should go to the hospital, maybe I should try talking Cain into finding
the ambulance or at least talk him into going back to Aidan. I was just struck
by a car. My ribs, that horror-snap twist of them mending together, I think
about that and how much blood I left behind for Aidan to stare at and cry. I
might puke, I even heave and gag as I recall striking the car, colliding into
metal and bone shattering, pain -- what is happening? How am I not dead?
Help me, where I am -- am I dead? Am I dead? Did I die?
“Stop it,” Cain grits out. My teeth are clenched. I’m shaking, shivering,
trembling so wretchedly that it’s nearly spasms. “Abel, stop it. Calm the fuck
down.”
I want my body back. I want my body if I’m not dead then how come I can’t move,
how come you’re --
“Shut up!” Cain hits a fist into the dirt. “Abel, just shut the fuck up.”
….my name is Ethan.
“I’m calling you Abel. You’re calling me Cain. We’re not using real names,
haven’t you learned fucking anything?” He breathes hard through the shaking
until it lesses, until I become calm so my body does as well.
“I’m not any happier about this than you are, princess,” Cain says. “When I
said I wanted a body I didn’t mean yours. What good are you to me like this?”
I don’t know. I don’t know what that is. I don’t know --
“Shut up,” Cain snaps. He opens his eyes and leans back into the pole, so I see
the stretch of hazy February sky above the undulating rooflines of the
surrounding neighborhood. His voice softens, sounds more like my own without
the sharp bite of his anger. “I know you don’t know, kid. Just shut up for
now.”
He sits there for a while longer in my body, fist clenching and unclenching so
that I pay attention to the rise and fall rippling waves of suffering torment.
I only see where Cain puts my eyes, and he just keeps looking at the sky and
then closing his eyes through the worst of the anguish. I guess it’s not easy
getting my near-dead body put back together like this.
I don’t hear the wail of the ambulance siren anymore. I wonder what Aidan’s
thinking, what he must be thinking. I bet that dead cat’s still back at the
crash scene, too, so that he’s going to start questioning his own sanity except
for his little sisters squealing and shrieking about him killing me. How am I
going to explain this? Am even going to be able to explain it? As in, will I
get my body back? Am I dead? I must be dead. I can’t move, Cain has my body,
this dead thing that’s found me and taken my body doesn’t seem in a hurry to
give it back.
“Abel, you’re fine,” Cain growls. As my fingers flick over my cheeks, I feel
tears that don’t seem like mine -- or don’t seem like Cain’s, rather. They are
mine, not his, that’s right. I’m making better sense of this now I think. He
says again, “You’re fine.”
I don’t really think this is fine.
“You’re not dead. What more do you want?”
My body back, I guess. My life back, I want my life back. I want to be normal.
I want you to go away.
Cain chuckles. Low, dangerous, and not all amused. “Too late. You’re my bitch,
now. That’s what you get for giving your real name to a demon.”
My shoulders push against the pole for leverage and support as I stand. My head
rolls limp and heavy with a groan as I set a hand against the pole as well,
turning into it like a drunkard clutching the wall. My knees quiver as Cain
grits back a hissed curse and swallows, because I think both of us are fighting
queasiness at the dizzying roil and heave of the ground. I’m fighting panic as
well, because did Cain just refer to himself as a demon?
I think I understand more of this now, I think I’m making better sense of
what’s me and what’s him, even if I don’t know what he is. He can’t be a demon.
I can’t be a necromancer. None of this can be happening, I would rather just be
crazy. Crazy and in shock, so that I’m up and walking around like this despite
being hit by a car. It happens, people can do all kinds of unnatural and weird
things while it still being real and not demons and necromancers and handsome
men in eye patches, those are clearly just my delusions, my hallucinations, I
am obviously crazy. I am a crazy seventeen-year-old developing schizophrenia or
acute psychosis or any other whispered thing to make my mother cry again.
“Abel,” Cain groans. “Abel, calm down. If you fight me then we’re both going to
get fucked up worse than we already are. I’ll give your body back, just get
your shit together.”
You will? You’ll give it back?
“Yeah, sure. Just shut up.” Cain pushes off from the pole and staggers forward.
Each step falls into place with less weaving and swaying the further he walks
in my body -- as he walks. He’s got control of things, so I try to stay calm
like he says.
He does get steadier, seems stronger and more sure of how to use my feet to get
moving. I fade further, become just observations on what’s happening as Cain
starts walking again. It’s between yards and around fences, shoving through
hedges and walking along the top of a rock-walled garden. I’d bet anything this
was the path Cain took as a cat trying to chase me down.
All my suspicions prove correct as Cain wanders to my street and there’s two
police cars waiting. They’re parked crookedly at the bottom of the drive with
the officers nowhere in immediate sight. I might hear Aidan shouting my name, I
might hear the police shouting my name, except I’m not sure Cain can hear my
name so I can’t really hear anything at all. It’s still confusing, but I try to
be calm about it.  
“Well, fuck,” Cain says. He stops and looks at my house, at the police cars.
“I’ll let you handle this one. Remember to stay calm.”
What?
I only thought it hurt before, but a split-second shatter of brilliant agony
spreads over every nerve just like striking into the front of Aidan’s car all
over again. I feel cold air suck into my lungs with a gasp, and then I feel
more -- such small things, so many things I was missing without realizing it,
indescribable and insignificant pieces of myself that latch into place as if
magnetized.
My eyes open without having closed, and it’s me who blinks the wet sting of
tears and gasps again in a way that’s shuddering and desperate. I crouch down
and then set a hand into the grass of my neighbor’s yard. I lean forward
struggling to catch my breath, struggling to catch my balance, my body my own
again to move as I want.
I have to stay calm. I latch onto that before confusion can rip me apart again.
I need to stay calm and focus on everything that’s me, everything I can feel,
everything that’s mine and not dead, not this dead thing I know is still with
me -- still inside me.
Got it, kid?
Cain, that’s Cain, his voice inside my head now whispering at me all rough and
near-amused, mocking even though I think there’s a hint of concern there as
well. I have a sense of him, in this so-strange way where now our positions are
reversed. I’m the one moving and he’s only this whispering voice. I need to
stay calm about this, which is almost asking the impossible except I just got
hit by a car and now I’m up and walking around fine. I painfully am aware of
just how possible the impossible has become.
“Cain?”
Right here, sweetheart, he says. There’s a laugh to it that rumbles around
inside me almost pleasantly, almost feels warm. He's calm about this, at least
one of us is calm about this.   
“What should I do?” I turn my head some toward the sound of my name -
- definitely Aidan screaming for me, echoed by the drifting call of a male
voice I don’t recognize. One of the police, or the paramedics, everyone trying
to find me because I just got hit by a car.
“Cain, what do I do?”
Whatever the fuck you want, princess. It’s your shitty life that I just saved.
Have fun with it.
“That’s not very helpful,” I mumble.
I pull the bloodstained fabric of my shirt away from my body and look down the
neckline at the smooth, entirely normal-looking skin of my bare chest. I feel
along my head where there’s dried blood sticking my hair into stiff clumps, but
I can’t find any spots that are tender. I find the bumpy scar from where I hit
the railing on the boat years ago, but I don’t find from where all this blood
spilled. It doesn’t hurt much, that’s nice at least, I can’t believe how much
it doesn’t hurt. I can’t believe I’m not dead.
“Thanks,” I whisper softly. “Cain? Thanks. I didn’t want to die.”
Yeah, no shit. Dying sucks.
I sigh, square my shoulders, and walk toward my house. I don’t know what else
to do except find the people are trying to find me -- all these living people
who are going tell me what to do. I need to find Aidan, find the police, find
the paramedics who I’m going to confuse so terribly because I’m covered in my
own blood but unharmed, unbroken, undead.

***** Chapter 5 *****
“I don’t know,” I say again. “I don’t remember.”
It’s all I’ve been saying, the entire time, because I think if I say it long
enough they’ll start to believe me. I sure try my best to sound believable, or
at least I try to sound like I’m not lying. I don’t want to explain that a
demon called Cain healed my body and is now inside me making lewd comments
about the nurse’s ass.
The nurse rips opens the velcro of the blood pressure cuff and types some
numbers into the computer. I’m asked again now I feel, to which I say, “Okay,”
because that’s all I keep saying. Just simple things, that I’m okay or that I
don’t know. I’ll be cooperative because I don’t want to know what happens to
crazy teenagers who don’t listen to police and EMTs and doctors who all want to
know just what exactly happened to make Aidan scream at the 911-operator that
he killed his best friend, to please hurry, send an ambulance, he’s so sorry
but please hurry.
I’m certainly not dead or dying now. I want to tell the nurse to put the blood
pressure cuff back on me just so we both can feel the hard beat of my blood,
the steady in-and-out puff of my breath. I’m alive, I’m a living thing with all
my limbs under control, my voice speaking only what I want to say.
I’m trying not to say anything crazy. I know this is a crazy situation, because
Aidan and his sisters must have explained about how I came flying around the
turn on my bike, how I collided with the car head-on and then all that limp-
limbed flopping and rolling into the pavement. All that blood on my clothes,
except I’ve been stuck into a hospital gown now. They let me wash my hands,
scrub my arms clean of crimson smears. I want a shower but I’ll settle for
getting my hands clean at least.
I’m taken for tests, loaded into a CAT scan, they take blood, Cain bitches
about everything, I try to ignore him even though that’s just about impossible.
I tell them I don’t know why there was blood, why I showed up bloody without a
scratch on me. I say I don’t know what I did, why I ran away from Aidan -- I
say I don’t remember, and that I’m okay.
The police found me first, or rather I found the police first, when Cain gave
me back my body. I wandered up to the police cars and found one of the officers
waiting. He radioed to the others, I stood there quietly and told him I was
okay. I cooperated, I’m too nice of a kid not to cooperate with the police. I
heard Aidan but didn’t see him, didn’t really get a look at him, just heard him
rushing up as they were packing me away in the ambulance.
Worst part is when my mom shows up. I tell her just the same, that I’m okay, I
don’t know what happened, she starts to cry -- she’s been crying. I wonder if
Aidan called her or the police. I sit there with my hands pressed between my
knees, being quiet and cooperative because I don’t want to be the kind of crazy
they need to keep longer for observation. I just want to go home, but I’m too
scared to say anything more than what nothing I’ve already said.
My mom rubs her hand between my shoulders as she stands next to the exam table
and listens to the doctor try to explain this. They can’t explain it, of course
they can’t, because you just need one look at Aidan to know he wouldn’t be
capable of pulling a prank like this, nor would he want to, and I’m certainly
not known for my practical jokes. I’m known for being crazy, so I’m not sure
why everyone seems so surprised that I’ve turned into something impossible to
understand or explain.
It’s just my mom in the room with me now. I pick at my cuticle so I don’t have
to look at her, but I can still hear her delicate sniffling as she tries not to
cry about her crazy son being so crazy they can’t even diagnose him.
I get a hug from her, rather than a lecture. “I’m glad you’re okay,” she says.
“Ethan, honey, I’m glad you’re okay.”
I nod into her shoulder and put my arms around her.
Your mom’s kind of hot for an older broad.
I try to ignore Cain’s voice. I don’t want anyone to know I’m hearing voices -
- hearing a voice, Cain, he’s still inside me even if I’m the one controlling
my body again. All these impossible things that have to be real, because
nothing’s wrong with me according to all these tests. Cain doesn’t show in the
CAT scan, he’s not a dark spot in my brain, not some tumor they can cut away.  
Since nothing’s wrong except everything, I get to leave. My mom has a fresh
change of clothes for me. I get dressed in the bathroom and try not to look at
the dried blood in my hair. I slip out of the hospital gown and get wrangled
into socks, underwear --
Nice dick.
“Cain, please. Don’t,” I whisper. I glance at the door, because my mom’s just
on the other side of it waiting for me. “I don’t want to talk to you.”
Tough shit. I’m talking to you anyway. What else do I have to do?
I close my eyes and finish getting ready without letting Cain see anymore of my
body, even though I guess he’s already seen everything. I guess he sees
everything, like how I saw everything when he was the one in control of my
body. I don’t want to think about that, because it’s just so crazy, but it
happened or my hallucinations are becoming impossibly real.
I finish getting dressed and go with my mom out to the car. I turn around in my
seat some to watch the hospital disappear, and then I stay turned around over
the console to look out the back windshield. I’m looking for dead things.
Surely I’m going to see a lot of dead things around a hospital.
“Ethan?” she asks. “Everything okay, sweetie?”
“Yeah.” I turn back around. I sink down into my seat some. It’s only once I
reach into my pocket that I remember. I turn around again and pluck the
hospital bag with my stuff in it from the backseat. I find my pants and dig the
rectangular lump out of the pocket.
“Mom? Mom, I broke my phone.” I wait until she’s at a red light and show her
the shattered LCD screen. “Can we get me a new one?”
She glances at me with a careful expression. “Now?”
“Um, yeah. I guess. Yeah, now,” I say. “Can we stop at the store on the way
home?”
“No,” she says. “Honey, no, you need to go home and rest, okay?”
It’s her patronizing, my-son-is-crazy tone that lets me know that things are
not okay. Nothing is okay about what’s just happened, but since I wasn’t hurt
and seemed calm they’re letting me go home.
“Okay,” I say anyway. I try to sound appropriately meek, proportionally
disappointed, not too eager and not too defiant. I try to sound normal,
whatever normal should sound like for someone who just got hit by a car and was
covered in blood but doesn’t have a cut or broken bone or bruise to show for
it.
My mother glances over again. She doesn’t say anything more for the drive home
and neither do I. There’s no police this time at the bottom of the drive, no
Aidan screaming for me, not even a dead cat, just my mom pulling her car into
the garage and then leading me into the house.
I still want a shower to rinse the dried blood from my hair, except now I know
that Cain’s watching everything I do so it’s too weird. I take the shower
anyway and get griped at by Cain for how much I close my eyes, how I just scrub
shampoo into my hair, stare at the tile rather than look at myself, and hurry
out of the shower and into clothes without looking at too much in particular,
especially not my naked body.
Your parents must be loaded. What’s your dad, a lawyer? Wealthy banker? This
house is top-shit swanky.
I hate Cain’s running commentary on my life. I try to ignore it as best I can
as I get changed into pajamas. I get settled into bed, and it’s just like being
sick as a very young child. My mom brings over my laptop, the television
remote, a glass of water, some slices of toast. She fusses to bring me extra
pillows and even digs my grandmother’s ceramic bell from the china cabinet to
set on my nightstand. I don’t know why she bothers, since I can’t ring the bell
hard enough to summon her if she leaves the room. I guess her mom did this for
her when she was sick, so she does it for me when I’m sick, and I’m too nice of
a kid to tell her it doesn’t make me feel any better.
“Thanks, mom,” I say instead. I open my laptop and try to look painfully
normal.
My mom runs her hand over my damp hair with a frown on her face, worried and
disappointed all in one stress-inducing expression. I try not to look at it. I
click on random emails I’ve already read before starting to compose one to
Aidan.
She moves to the doorway to watch me, so I type and do my best to look okay.
Sure I was just hit by a car, but I’ve crashed my bike before coming down that
hill. There’s a scar on my knee to prove it. The doctors said I was fine,
nothing broken, nothing bruised. Not a scratch on me.
I write an email to Aidan to explain my phone’s broke. I even say I dropped it
down the stairs before the wreck. That’s how I refer to it, just the wreck and
then swiftly say I’m okay. What else am I going to say?
Sorry I hit your car, I write that. Delete it. Bring it back up with a quick
control-plus-zee flick.
What’s this? How are you doing this?
I glance up at my mother, still standing in the doorway. Slowly I finish typing
the rest of the email without really pulling my eyes off her long. I don’t want
to look at the screen, can’t say anything to Cain while she’s watching me. It’s
probably suspicious I’m watching her, but in all fairness she’s the one
standing vigil over her crazy son.
This is a computer, isn’t it? I’ve heard of these. Do you have the internet?
I’m not going to think about how crazy that is. Everything in my life right now
is literally the worst thing to ever happen to me. Right now I am sitting here
writing an email to my best friend apologizing for fatally colliding with his
car, and the reason I’m alive to do so is because a demon calling himself Cain
has taken up residence inside my body.
But everything’s fine, I tell Aidan. I went to the hospital, and now I’m home.
I send the email and then just click and drag rectangles around on my desktop
wallpaper. Periodically I type a few random words into the search bar before
deleting them.
“Ethan,” my mom says.
Tell her to fuck off.
“Is there anything you want to tell me, sweetie?”
Tell her you’re --
“I’m fine, mom. Really. It’s okay.” I smile. “I feel totally fine.”
Her expression isn’t one that believes me, but I’m sitting there clean,
unbroken, completely alive and totally fine. Doctor-verified that there’s not a
scratch on me, so that no one can explain it and now Aidan must be going crazy.
I check my email and there are three, all from Aidan, various ways of him
asking if I’m okay, telling me he’s sorry, and first asking and then just
declaring that he’s coming over. By the time I’m reading them, though, the
doorbell rings. My mother turns from the doorway and disappears into the hall.
So about getting me a different body. It needs to be --
“No,” I whisper.
You want me inside you forever? I’m not going back into a cat, Abel. No fucking
way.
“Please, no. I’m not killing anyone.”
I sink low into the bed and just know that Aidan’s about to burst into my room.
I keep my eyes on the door and make sure to hush to Cain just as quiet as I
can. I’ve tried thinking the words, but he can’t hear me unless I can hear me -
- which makes just as much sense as the rest of this.
Got any enemies? Rival … blonde kid, or something. Shit, your world is getting
too complicated. I miss the days of relentless slaughter.
“I’m not killing anyone.”
I’m curled down into the extra pillows my mom brought when Aidan does in fact
explode into my room. He’s loud enough to drown out whatever Cain might say in
return.
“Oh my God, Ethan! I’m so fucking sorry --” He’s already sobbing, maybe he
hasn’t stopped crying since the moment he saw me swerve straight into his car.
He rushes at the bed to hug me, and there’s a weird pause before I pat at his
back in return.
“I’m fine. Aidan, I’m okay. See?” I try to get him off me so I can spread my
arms out, push the blankets down to show that I’m unbroken, unbruised, nothing
wrong with me except Cain’s voice inside me.
The voice telling me to kill people, but at least Aidan doesn’t have to try
living with the fact he killed his best friend, and my mom doesn’t have to bury
her son. So, it really is okay. I’m okay with this.
I get my arms around Aidan, squeeze him close like when we were young. Before I
started to realize I didn’t like girls, that I liked hugging Aidan a bit too
much. I couldn’t make him live with having killed me -- I’d be okay with dying
otherwise, except for making my mom cry. Making her wear black -- she hates
wearing black. I remember her telling me the day of Poppa’s funeral, during
those last few hours when everything was truly normal.
Aidan backs off enough to look at me. He scrubs his face with his sleeve and
then shucks out of his coat. He slings his coat over my desk chair. “Yeah,” he
says. “Yeah, my mom -- your mom -- everyone said you were okay, but --”
He saw me, he must have seen me bleeding and broken. He was right there when
Cain clawed my battered body up from the crimson-soaked pavement. I stare at
him. He saw the dead cat. He saw me dying. He saw the cat get up, he saw me get
up.
I don’t want to sound crazy. I don’t want to ask. I’m scared to say anything
too strange now that there’s a voice inside me telling me to kill people.
Something incredibly suspicious, wrong, and unnatural just happened because no
one can explain this except maybe me and Cain -- more Cain than me -- but I’m
definitely not going to say anything crazy to doctors or my mom or even Aidan.
How about this dude? Get me his body. I bet even you can take him in a fight.
“No,” I say. Almost shout it, really, because I am not going to kill Aidan or
let Cain take over Aidan’s body. I’ll keep Cain inside me, if that’s the
alternative. I’ll - I can’t, I’m not going to kill anyone. I’m not going to
kill Aidan especially.
“No?” Aidan echoes.
I shouldn’t have said that, so I have to think quickly. “Um, no, I’m okay. At
the hospital they checked for anything, but I’m totally fine. Not even a
bruise.”
Why not? Sure, he’s not much to look at, but I’ll take what I can get.
Aidan shakes his head. He looks to the door to check for my mother before
coming up to sit cross-legged on the bed with me. “Ethan, I know what I saw,”
he says. It’s difficult and thick for him to say. “I saw your femur sticking
out of your leg. I saw so much blood -- your chest, your head, I saw -- I heard
you gurgling-- God, Ethan.” He shakes his head again and can’t say anything
further.
It’ll be easy. Do you have a belt or anything else to choke him with? Nothing
messy. I can’t piece together anything right now. You won’t even need to hide
the body. I’ll put it to use right away.
I’m not going to listen to Cain, and I’m not going to kill Aidan.
Aidan rubs at his cheeks and curls then his fingers under his chin. He’s quiet
as he looks at me expectantly, because he wants me to confess so he doesn’t
have to ask.
I bet you’re hot for him. Is that why?
“Yeah,” I say at last. It’s an answer that suits Aidan and Cain both. I don’t
dare keep quiet any longer, because that’s just as suspicious as saying
something crazy.
“How?” Aidan looks to the door and then shifts closer. He whispers, because I
was whispering. “Ethan, what happened?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “But I’m okay now.”
I figured you for a flamer. Well go for it, kid. Tap that ass.
I look anywhere but at Aidan. I wish I could tell Cain to shut up.
He’s cute, if you’re into fucking teddy bears. I knew a man once who fought a
bear. I don’t think he fucked it, but he was a crazy cossack so anything’s
possible.
I’ve been staring at anything other than Aidan and trying to ignore Cain for
too long, because I hear Aidan whisper as if repeating himself, “Ethan? Ethan,
you can tell me. If something happened, you know you can tell me.”
I’m not going to tell Aidan about the demon inside me who wants his body. I
told him about the letter and everything I was seeing, but I can’t get him
involved in this. I shake my head and then push my hands over my ears, because
I am so frightened to hear Cain tell me anything else. I told him my name, he
took over my body, I don’t want to kill Aidan.
“I won’t kill you,” I tell him. “Aidan, I won’t --”
Abel, you dumb piece of  --
“What?” asks Aidan.
It’s all these things at once before everything pushes and pulls in a sideways
shiver where I go away without moving at all. I don’t have breath to cry out
for the agony of being ripped aside, because my voice belongs to Cain again, My
body belongs to Cain, he thrusts into everything I was so that I am nothing and
he says, “Nothing,” for me.
“For hitting me with your car,” Cain says. “I won’t kill you for it. No hard
feelings.” He shrugs with lazily self-assurance that says he could manage carry
through his threats, even using my wimpy body.
“What?” asks Aidan again.
Cain is doing a horrible job at being me.
“You heard me. There’s nothing much else to talk about, hm?” My hand goes
against Aidan’s thigh. I lean in closer. I look at his lips.
No. No, Cain, don’t. Don’t.
It’s his low rumbling chuckle, a purring-growl sound that puts wide circles
into Aidan’s eyes. He just stares with a slow-growing expression of horror as I
rub my hand over his leg and move closer. I press my lips into his and hum
brisk, thrumming approval. My body is hard and wanting, my heart is heavy and
throbbing.
Cain, no, not Aidan -- please, don’t do this.
I gasp, Aidan gasps, he pushes but I pull. “Ethan?” he squeaks. His face is
bright-red, I pull him against me even though the door is still open, my mother
is somewhere in the house, I can’t do this to Aidan, I can’t do this thing that
I’m doing.
I kiss him like I’ve always wanted to kiss someone, like I’ve always wanted to
kiss any pretty boy on TV or on the street. All the times I jerked one out
thinking of just some generic man or maybe some specific one -- all those
imagined desires, none of them match the reality of kissing Aidan.
My fingers push through his hair as I bend him to me and he flutters, sighs and
clutches back so that I’m shocked and Cain laughs ominously.
Don’t do this to Aidan, he’s my best friend. And my mom’s home, you’re going to
get caught -- Cain, please, don’t do this.
Distracting me is just how much my body is responding, how eager Cain is for
this -- that Aidan seems eager for this. I’m horrified, this is a nightmare, I
can’t believe this is happening.
Cain pushes him into the bed. “Fuck, I haven’t gotten laid in so long,” he
groans.
“What?” Aidan scrambles back, but my hand reaches out and snatches his arm.
Fear flashes over his expression, and I feel Cain shift as I do. We both react,
and my hand snaps away, I let him go, I am not going to do this to my best
friend.  
“No!” I shriek. It’s a husky-dry spit of a sound. “No! Won’t! I won’t!”
I stagger off the bed. I fall to my knees and dry-heave, clawing at the carpet
as I writhe and moan. Chaos burns the echo of Cain and I overlapping each other
with vicious, destructive discord. I hug my hands over my head and hunch into
my knees with a hard shudder.
I don’t want my mom to hear, I need to stop screaming -- but I wasn’t
screaming, I was quiet, I am being quiet. Aidan heard just because he’s right
here. He also saw me bent and broken in the street, he did all that seance
stuff with me before my mom made him stop, and he knew about the letter. Still
I’m not going to let Cain get him involved in this, even though Aidan’s already
thick in this mess.
I feel Aidan’s hands against my back. It’ just one more rough-tumble shatter of
sensation that makes me shiver and choke on my own saliva, on each panted
breath, because Cain and I are fighting for control. Something snaps so that I
flinch, Aidan flinches, and I clench my fists against the shock of fitting back
into my own body.
Fuck, okay! Chill the fuck out, sweetheart.
“You leave him alone,” I say to Cain.
“Ethan?” Aidan whispers. He hasn’t started screaming for my mom yet, he’s just
knelt here next to me with his hands on my shoulders, our thighs pressed close,
he’s pressed close and trying to comfort me with the slow rub of his hand.
I kissed him. He’s my best friend, and I kissed him. Cain kissed him. Cain, as
me, so Aidan thinks it was me -- he thought it was me and kissed me back.
I jump to my feet. This can’t be happening. “I can’t believe you did that. Why
did you do that?” I’m demanding this of Cain, I need him to answer me. I grip
my hands into my hair, like I could possibly grab Cain. “Where’s the cat?” I
ask suddenly. “Aidan, where’s the cat?”
“I - I guess I hit it, too, I don’t --” He’s too bewildered for words. I just
kissed him. We were kissing, I kissed Aidan.
I’m not going back in the cat.
“Well I’m not killing Aidan! Or fucking him!”
From the floor, my best friend watches as I go completely crazy on him in ways
that are probably terrifying. I don’t blame him for looking scared when I’m
standing here talking to myself about killing him and/or raping him. He’s still
kneeling on the floor but now he’s leaned back from me. His eyes are wide,
round and staring.
Abel, calm down.
He doesn’t sound calm, this demon doesn’t sound calm even though he’s trying to
tell me what to do. I stagger and think I might gag again, think I might really
vomit, it’s an all-over sensation of clammy where I’m hot and freezing. I grip
into the bedpost and vibrate like I’ll rip in two, which is exactly what it
feels like in that moment.
Abel! Calm the fuck down.
“No! I’m not! You shut up! Just shut up!” I put my hands to my ears, but he’s
inside me now. This demon is inside me and wants me to kill Aidan, or wants me
to fuck him, and I don’t want to do either. “I won’t do it! I won’t! I won’t!”
Aidan runs to the door, disappears through it. He’s probably in the hall
checking from the overlook for my mom, so I expect to hear him start screaming
for her. Instead Aidan rushes back inside and gets the door closed. He has no
survival skills, he would absolutely be the first to die in a horror movie, my
best friend is a total idiot to get himself alone in this room with a crazy
person like me.
“Okay,” he tells me. He takes hold of my wrists to pull my hands off my ears.
“Ethan, it’s okay, you don’t have to. We’re not going to. I really don’t want
to either,” Aidan says. He smiles with a short, nervous laugh.
I brace for Cain to say something, but he’s silent. I let Aidan tug my hands
off my head. I stare at him, shoulders heaving as I catch my breath, as I fight
against sobs. Aidan gently pushes me back into the bed.
“It’s okay, Ethan. You don’t have to,” he says. He watches as I crawl back into
the bed, and he doesn’t sit on it with me this time. He fiddles with the
ceramic bell instead and doesn’t look at me.
Finally Aidan sets the bell down and picks up the television remote. He finds
literally the first channel that isn’t a commercial and makes us both suffer
through a procedural drama neither one of us knows anything about. It’s
awkward. He sits in the desk chair, I stay on the bed, Cain doesn’t say
anything. It’s painfully awkward.
I hear the soft sigh that indicates Aidan’s about to say something. He’s waited
for the show to end, even though neither one of us possibly could have been
following it. Aidan gets up from the desk and comes to set the remote on the
bed next to me.
“I’m not gay,” he says.
“I am.”
Knew it.
To his credit, the surprised, “Oh,” is completely appropriate for the moment.
Of all the millions of ways I thought I might ever come out to anyone,
especially Aidan, this has got to be somewhere firmly along the spectrum of the
worst.
Aidan bites at his lip for a moment before asking, “Are you sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh. Um, okay.” He shrugs. “Well, um --”
“There’s a demon called Cain inside me who made me kiss you. I didn’t want to.
I wouldn’t, um, I don’t like you that way. Not that you’re unattractive, or
anything, just --”
You are the dumbest fucking necromancer I have ever met.
“No, no, I - I get it,” Aidan rushes to say. “Ethan, I - I get it. It’s okay.”
Which means he doesn’t believe me, but I’ve scared him so badly that he just
wants me to shut up and not say anything else crazy about demons and killing
him. He stares at me, I stare at him, we both have to look somewhere else, and
it’s so fucking awkward I want to cry. I can’t believe I kissed him. I can’t
believe any of this is happening, except it is. It’s all happening.
I bring my knees up to my chest. “I hate you,” I whisper to Cain. “Get out.”
“What?” asks Aidan. He sounds confused and devastated, so it’s obvious he heard
me. I wasn’t quiet enough, or I’d forgotten he was there, that my voice
actually made noise enough for him to hear me.
I shake my head and press my forehead into my knees. “Not you.”
Surely you don’t mean me, sweetheart? I thought we were going to be friends.
I grip my knees tight, just this ball on the bed for Aidan to stare at, I’m
sure he’s staring at me again even though I just see the red-black press of my
closed eyes.
“You should go, though. Aidan? Just, leave. Tell my mom I’m asleep.” I unfold
from my knees and shift down into the bedding. I don’t look at Aidan as I roll
over and pull the blankets high over my head.
“Oh. Um, okay. Sure. Hey, Ethan? I won’t tell anyone. Um, what you said. About
--”
“Okay,” I say. I interrupt him quick, because I don’t want to know which crazy
thing I said or did that he plans to keep secret. I don’t want to know what
bothered him the most, the kiss, that I’m gay, that I talked about killing him,
that I tried to explain about Cain but Aidan doesn’t believe me. I’m too crazy
to be believed, even after everything I know he saw.
“Sure, Aidan, thanks. See you later,” I say. I tuck deeper into the bedding.
I hear Aidan get his coat and then go to the door. “Bye, Ethan,” he says
quietly.
I don’t say anything back, I’m going to pretend to be asleep. I ignore Cain,
ignore my mother when she comes in to check on me, I’m not going to leave this
bed to kill anyone or get laid or do anything else Cain wants. Maybe I really
will sleep, just to bring to a faster end what has been the worst day of my
life, and that’s when I first start to think maybe I’m the one who needs to be
killed.  
 
***** Chapter 6 *****
I spend Sunday hanging around my house with my mother, which is weird and
suspicious because I’m used to having the house to myself. She’s always finding
excuses to be busy, same as my father, because neither of them wants a divorce
even though they’d probably be happier for it. I don’t want to die, but I think
everyone is going to be a lot happier for it. Even if my mom will have to wear
a black dress she hates at my funeral. So long as Aidan isn’t the one to kill
me, I think it’ll be okay.
That’s about what I’ve decided by the time my mother asks if I’d like to go to
the store now to pick out my new phone. I don’t want to go, but I get in her
car, we drive to the store, I turn over my phone with the busted LCD-screen, I
get a brand new phone and pretend to be excited that it’s the latest model.
Does this thing have the internet? Look at something else. How many times are
you going to look at the settings?
I ignore Cain, even though he won’t shut up. I send a text to Aidan letting him
know I got a new phone, and he texts back immediately something enthusiastic
and normal, like yesterday’s awkwardness never happened. I stand there messing
around with the phone while my mom finishes paying for everything.
When she’s done my mom sets her hand on my back to get my attention. She’s been
touching at me all day like I’m a small child that she needs to keep track of
and not a teenager. “Do you like it?” she asks. “Is it the one you wanted?”
I’m reminded of all the times she’d buy me a new toy just because I’d be crying
too much about my parents fighting again. New toy, ice cream, my mom would do
lots of things to try assuring me everything was okay and our lives were normal
and nice.
“Yeah. Thanks, mom.” I flash her a smile.
Ask your mom if she’ll buy you a gun.
We leave the store, and I play with my phone in the car rather than look out
the windows. I don’t want to know what I might see. I don’t want to know if I’m
still going to see dead people everywhere now that I have one inside me. Aidan
and I text back and forth about which phone I got, if I’m going to jailbreak
it, if I’m going to school tomorrow, and I tell him I don’t know to most his
questions. That’s all I want to say to anyone anymore, is that I just don’t
know. Someone who isn’t Cain needs to start telling me what to do, because all
Cain wants to do is kill people and fuck.
Who else you got? Anyone you hate enough to kill for me? Look, I’ll even do the
actual killing if you just keep fucking calm while I’m in control.
I wait until we’re back at the house, until she’s tucking her keys back into
her purse as we walk into the kitchen from the garage. I try to sound casual
about it, appropriately hopeful but not too eager, maybe a little bored,
painfully normal. Just as normal as I can sound.
“Mom? Can I borrow the car?”
Oh, we going out?
She looks at me with a soft, worried frown.
“I’ll be home before dinner,” I say. “I want to go to the bookstore.”
Boring.
“You should have said something while we were out,” she says. “I would have
taken you.”
I shrug. I try to look innocent about this, like there’s nothing suspicious
about me wanting to borrow her car even though I never have. Aidan’s been
driving me everywhere since he turned sixteen, because his grandparents bought
him a car for his birthday. It wasn’t a new car, he’s just got that old sedan
that rumbles but hasn’t ever broken down on him.
Are you old enough to drive? I know how to drive. I know all about cars. Give
me control again, I’m great at driving.
I have my license, I took Driver’s Ed, there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to
borrow my mom’s car except I know she’s going to refuse. I can see it all over
her face. She’s thinking of a good excuse to give me that isn’t the truth,
which is that she’s too concerned about me being crazy to let me go anywhere.
Finally she just says, “Maybe not, sweetie. You need your rest.”
I don’t, but that’s okay. I’m not going to fight her on it, I’m not going to
steal her keys out of her purse or hotwire the car like Cain suggests. I
haven’t said a word to Cain, and I’m not going to, even though he won’t shut
up. I’m going to ignore him. I’m going to behave myself and be a good son to my
mother, because I made her cry yesterday, and I think I’m going to make her cry
a lot more pretty soon.
We sit together in the livingroom to watch nothing in particular. I’m thinking
of what to do, if I really want to do this, if I even can kill myself with Cain
inside me. I don’t want to kill anyone, especially Aidan, so I might have to
kill myself if that’s the only way to stop Cain. I don’t really want to,
because it’ll make my mom cry and Aidan’s going to miss me, but I don’t want
the alternative to be more of Cain taking over my life. Not if he wants me to
kill people. Not if he’s going to try kissing Aidan again, or if he’s going to
kill Aidan, or do really anything with my body again.
That’s how it is when my father comes home. My mom and I both look to the front
door as it opens, but I sink lower into my side of the sofa while she gets up.
My father’s wearing a suit and dragging his luggage set, because he’s been out
of town on business, and I just need one look at him to know my mother already
told him all about my unexplainable adventure to the hospital.
I slide even lower onto the sofa and pretend to fiddle with my phone. I pull up
a new text to Aidan and just type and delete gibberish while my parents start
their fight. Like most fights they begin with terse politeness and frigid
matrimonial affection, a stiff kiss on my father’s cheek before my mom asks
about the trip, asks about dinner, starts whispering about me.
Now would be a good time to steal the car, you know.
“How much more therapy does he need?” my father demands. Not whispering, so
that my mom tries to hush him, and then the fight starts in earnest.
Are they going to do this right in the foyer when I’m sitting not twenty feet
away? I glance over the top of my phone at where my parents are faced off
against each other about me. I’m an only child, center of their parental
universe. They only have me and this house that they share, I’m the only thing
keeping them together. If I die, they’ll sell the house. They’ll get divorced.
“Maybe if you were home more often,” my mom snips.
“Don’t start in on that again. You’re not blaming this on me.”
I glance to the staircase. The trick now is moving out of hearing range without
them seeing. Without my father seeing me, because he’ll want to say something
to me. I never like what he has to say about me to my face. It’s bad enough I
have to hear what he says to my mother about me.
Your dad’s a dick. Mom’s kind of cute. You look a lot like her.
I wish I could get out of hearing range of Cain.
I’m being pretty patient about this whole thing, but we need to talk about
getting me a body. Much fun as watching your fascinating life has been, I think
we’d both be a lot happier about this if we weren’t sharing this body.
I have to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from saying something to Cain. I
glance over at my parents and then scoot off the end of the sofa. I walk
quickly to the staircase and can still hear them arguing, so I rush up the
stairs two at a time to reach my bedroom.
I close the door -- I don’t slam it, I actually make sure to be quiet. I go to
my alarm clock and turn on the radio. Classical music drowns out the sound of
my parents fighting, and I flop onto the bed and drag one of my pillows over my
head.
How about just a stranger? Pick someone up at the bar. Pretty thing like you,
it’ll be easy. And I’ll be quick about it, if you keep your shit together long
enough for me to figure out how to get your scrawny body turned lethal. Does
your mom have a bunch of cooking knives? Is your dad into hunting?
“I’m not killing anyone.” I mumble into my comforter. “Why do I have to kill
someone for you?”
Isn’t it obvious? You really are the dumbest necromancer I’ve ever met.
“I don’t even know what a necromancer is. I don’t know anything about this. I
don’t know anyone who does. I --” I pop my head up and roll onto my back. I do
know someone who can explain this, or at least will tell me he understands, so
I’ll understand it somewhat better.
I sit upright and grab my phone out of my pocket. I fire off a quick text
telling Aidan to come pick me up, because I know he will, and then I rush to my
closet to hunt up a hooded sweatshirt. I also dig the earbuds out of my new
phone’s box and jam them into my pocket.
Yeah, no shit, you’re dumber than bricks.
I turn off my radio and hear my parents arguing. My dad, I hear my dad yelling,
because my mom never yells. She gets softly fierce and will bite her words at
my father, but she won’t raise her voice like he does. I hate hearing him yell
at her, because more often than not it makes her cry. I hate seeing my mom cry.
Ever since I was a little boy, I’ve hated seeing my mom cry.
I wait until Aidan texts me back that he’s on his way over, I wait until he
texts that he’s out front, and then I run down the staircase.
“Aidan’s here! I’m going out!” I call.
Maybe if I’m quick about it they’ll be too distracted to care, but I don’t
think they hear me anyway. I don’t really want them to hear me, I just want to
leave, and I know it’s wrong to rush into the garage without actually making
sure my mom knows I’m leaving, but this is normal for me. This is my normal
life where my parents fight if they’re in the house together, and those are the
times I won’t be in the house.
Aidan usually waits at the street, at the bottom of the drive, but he’s pulled
all the way up to the curve under the portico this time. I hurry to his car and
yank open the passenger door to throw myself inside.
He stares at me and then flicks his eyes to where my dad’s car is parked in
front of the garage. “Hi,” he says.
“Go to where I delivered the letter,” I say. “And, please don’t say anything.”
I pull the hood up, sink low in the seat, get myself tucked away so that the
only thing I see is my lap, nothing visible even from the corner of my eye
thanks to the hood. I pull out my phone so Cain will have something to look at
rather than try to ask where I’m going.
“Ethan, I’m not sure --”
“Please,” I say. I peek around the edge of the hood at the front door. “Aidan,
go, before my mom realizes I’ve left.”
“Um, Ethan, if your mom --”
“It’s fine,”I say quickly. “Aidan, it’s fine. I’m sorry about yesterday, but I
just really need you to shut up and drive right now. Please.”
He shifts the car into gear and putters forward while still looking over at me
half-terrified, half-concerned. I get to where I can only see the screen in my
lap again. Cain can’t hear me think, so long as I don’t say anything and don’t
look anywhere he won’t know where I’m going. At least, I’m pretty sure that’s
the way it works. Since I’ve been thinking all day about Cain without him
saying anything about what I’m thinking, I’m pretty sure that’s the way it
works.
I pop open a private browsing session on my phone and type into the search bar
‘ways to kill people and not get caught.’
What’s this? Is this the internet? Fuck, yeah. Wait, that one. I was reading it
-- hey, move the text back where I can see it.
I’m going to have to reformat my phone just to be sure this can’t be used
against me in court someday. I hope Aidan can’t read the screen. My thumb rests
against the side of the phone to let Cain keep reading. I can’t say anything
with Aidan in the car. After a while Cain gets bored and declares he already
knows how to kill someone without getting caught, so I type into the search bar
‘porn’ before he can ask where we’re going.
What, no way! Wait, yeah that one. Fuck, yeah.
“Ethan?” I hear Aidan ask.
This is great. Your world is great.
I don’t say anything, but I go back to the search and type ‘demon’ instead and
pull up images of horned red things with bat wings. Cain’s laugh makes me
squirm and shiver in my seat, because it’s all that shattered rock rumble of
the dead cat’s laugh only inside me.
This is a riot. Is this supposed to be me? Wait, go down further.
I hope Aidan’s looking at the road and not my phone. “Ethan, I want to go in
with you this time. I’m going to find parking, okay?”
“Fine,” I say. If I protest, Cain’s going to know something’s wrong. “That’s
fine, sure.”
Look up people we can kill. Find me a body -- is there dating on here? I heard
you can find people on the internet to fuck.
I go into the app store and download the first search research for dating. I
create a profile using the name Abel Kane just so it won’t look too obvious and
I can’t think of anything better. I put my age as eighteen first and then
change it to twenty-one. I don’t dare go older than that. For the profile pic I
start flipping through my photo stream with Cain offering way too much
commentary on just which picture he thinks is best. I find one where my head is
turned, where I'm not much more than blonde and slim, a photo Aidan took using
my phone that barely looks like me at all.
Profile created, I start swiping through pictures of potential matches.
No, ugly, ew, fuck no, maybe, is that a chick? Sure, maybe, no, no, fuck no, no
--
“Ethan?”
I realize the car’s parked and quickly exit the dating app. I pull open the
music player and pull down a playlist out of my account, because I’m not
trusting the cell service inside the building. “Sure,” I say. “Okay, just a
minute.” I dig the earbuds out of my pocket. I plug them into my phone and then
nestle each speaker into my ear.
“You do all the talking,” I say to Aidan. “I can’t hear anything you say, okay?
Don’t talk to me.”
“What? What do I say? Ethan, what --”
I put the volume up enough that I can’t hear him. I get out of the car without
looking at anything other than my feet.
Hey, where are we? What are you doing?
I tuck my phone into view and pull back open the dating app.
No, enough of that -- where’d your friend go? Oh, we’re moving -- turn down
that fucking music.
Aidan has his arm looped through mine to get me into walking, because I won’t
look anywhere but at the phone screen.
Abel, this isn’t cute. You’re up to something. Don’t make me fight you again.
I swipe through pictures on the dating app even though Cain’s not paying much
attention to it anymore. Aidan can probably see what I’m looking at, but I
can’t hear if he says anything about it. I have the music blasting into the
earbuds so the only thing Cain’s going to hear is silly pop music, even as
Aidan brings me to a stop. I feel brick against the back of my sweatshirt as I
lean into the wall with my phone.
Abel, you stupid motherfucker, what are you doing?
It’s not long at all before Aidan pushes me forward - no, a different set of
hands, pulling me forward into the building. Beyond the rectangular outline of
my phone I see the shuffling of feet -- my sneakers, Aidan’s sneakers, polished
black leather shoes, and then a set of navy boat shoes peeping out from tan
suede pants that rush right up to me. A slim hand darts out to grab the cord
dangling over my chest, and I look up with a gasp at the same time as the
earbuds get yanked out of my ears.
“-- get a look at you,” he says, this person staring right at me. He’s got a
pretty, heart-shaped face with wisps of chin-length platinum-blonde hair
framing it. He’s dressed in normal clothes, bright colors, unlike the handsome
man in the eye patch and then this one other person now in the room with me who
are both in all black.
Where the fuck is this? Who the fuck are these people? Is that -- oh shit.
I don’t want to look at anyone or anything, but I can’t help but look
everywhere, at all three of these strangers, and I feel Aidan press close.
Besides the man in the eye patch, there’s a shorter man standing back with his
arms crossed just watching me from behind a dark sweep of bangs. It obscures
nearly as much as his face as the eye patch, but what I can see is delicate but
dangerous.
Run. Abel, get the fuck out of here.
I feel my eyes going wide, same as I feel the vibration that seems to start at
my toes. I can’t take in everything at once, so that I look everywhere and
nowhere and know that I shouldn’t have looked up from my phone at all. My
breath picks up into panic. Cain’s fighting me for control, so that my hands
twitch and I sway.
“Oh, dear,” says the blonde. He has hold of my shoulders now. “Whatever’s
possessing you is trying to come out to play, I think.” He puzzles a frown at
me before looking to the others. “Well, I guess we’re doing an exorcism.”
Goddammit, run. Abel, don't do this!
“You are not doing it here,” says the man in the eye patch.
“Of course we are. Hi, I’m Phobos,” he says to me. “Don’t tell me your name.
Let’s go --”
Aidan grabs onto me as I stagger. I can feel Cain struggling inside me, it’s an
awful sensation of getting ripped in two as I fight him back so that neither of
us has control. I have no idea what anyone says or does or even what I say or
do, because my body is only half-mine as I fight Cain.
Abel! Abel, you idiot, you fucking son of a bitch liar!
I think if I try to tell Cain to shut up, if I try to tell Cain to behave, I
think it’ll be my voice forming the words or I think I might throw up instead.
I think I hear Aidan, I think I hear the man in the eye patch because he has
that distinctive accent and low, calm voice that’s certainly better than the
furious, shrill beat of Cain trying to take my body from me.
You said you didn’t know anything about this shit, and now here you’ve taken us
straight to the one fucking person --
I scream, I know it’s me screaming, because I can feel the vibration in what
I’m pretty sure is my throat. I’m nothing but agony, nothing but clutching and
yanking pieces of myself back together as Cain tries to take them, if these
people know what to do with me then I want them to do it. I’m not going to let
Cain stop this. Everything and nothing, everything hurting, I’m not going to
give up and let Cain take over.
Abel! Abel listen to me. Listen to me, kid, this isn’t going to work the way
they want it to, you need to get out of here.
Other voices, too, I can hear the alto-soprano sweetness of the blonde saying,
“Put him in the center!”
It’s pitch black in this room, it’s bright without shadows in this room,
there’s a coppery sheen on the floor in the shape of a pentagram. I’m being
carried, my body is thrashing and not even mine or maybe mine so much that I
can’t control it even though I think Cain stopped fighting me. Is that my voice
shouting and wailing, so that everyone else has to yell?
This pretty blonde stranger who knew I was possessed, he seems to know what to
do about Cain. He’s bossing everyone around, hurrying around everywhere,
jumping over the lines on the floor with elegant, well-practiced ease. “Deimos,
get the knife!”
No!
Cain’s loudest of all, he’s right inside my head.
Abel, make them stop!
I have no idea how Cain thinks I’m going to accomplish that considering what a
mess he’s made of this for me. I have no idea where I am if not in control of
my body, because the convulsing flail of limbs and shrieking that’s being set
on the floor isn’t something I can do anything about it seems. I barely even
feel part of this, so that maybe I’m actually Aidan standing in the corner with
both hands over his mouth and tears streaming over his cheeks. Oh, maybe I’m
nothing, because it seems strange how much I can see clearly everything and
nothing, like I’m not even inside my body anymore. I hear a voice, I hear
voices, I hear Cain the most, and he sounds scared.
These idiots, these fucking idiots! This isn’t going to work, fuck! Abel,
sweetheart, I’ll find you. I’m not going to let --
My eyes snap open, even though I’m not sure they were closed. There’s a
silence, a stillness, I become so silent and still. I see the ceiling, I’m in
my body, I see shadows move over the room, shadows move over my eyes, shadows
moving in this room without shadows, so that I have a crystalline moment of
pure terror.
And then I sit up, calm and controlled, no longer twitching or shrieking, I’m
very calm now as I sit up to look at the shadow-filled room. I feel so calm
even though I am terrified. Everything in this room is a shadow. Grey shadows,
a black and white world, intangible like smoke, I don’t understand what I’m
seeing, it’s the room and everyone in it but so wrong.
The silvery glint of a knife pulls my gaze at a shadow that moves away from me
-- a person, it’s dark, wispy shade of a person who steps back with this knife
in hand. I hear sounds, these rhythmic sounds that are like the cadence of
speech but incomprehensible.
On the floor around me is a brightly-glowing scarlet pentagram, the only
splotch of color in the whole world that I see. This can’t be real. I must be
hallucinating without an hallucination. I am so frightened as I get to my feet
and it’s silent, the shuffle of my sneakers on the floor is just a mute
nothing. It feels like being in a dream. I put my hand out and try to touch the
arm on the shadow holding a knife, but my fingers wisp through it like smoke.
I think these four shadows I see in the room with are people. One of them is
Aidan, one of them is the bossy blonde who called himself Phobos, I can guess
who is who by the posture, the size, the positioning, I think these shadows are
supposed to be people. I think they just stabbed me to death trying to perform
the exorcism, because I think I might be dead.
I hold out my hands. I’m not a shadow. I’m my mother’s peaches-and-cream skin,
a length of heather-grey sweatshirt sleeve. I pull my phone from my pocket, and
of course there’s no service, of course the screen is a scrambled disaster of
multicolored pixels, of course none of this makes sense.
Abel?
It’s such a soft, barely there whisper that makes my heart leap. “Cain?”
Yeah. Hey, sweetheart.
He sounds ragged, raw, somehow hurt even though he’s just a voice inside me and
I don’t feel hurt at all. I don’t feel anything except fear.
“What happened? Cain? What happened? Are you okay?” I shouldn’t care if he’s
okay, but it’s just the way he sounds. I ask it without thinking.
One thing at a time, kid. I need to find you first.
“I’m here. I didn’t go anywhere. I’m in the same room, but everything’s wrong.
Am I dead? Did I die?”
Probably not. Can you leave that room? I think I found you, but I can’t cross
the threshold. You need to come outside.
That makes as much sense as anything. I’m careful not to step on the glowing
pentagram lines as I walk around the room to try understanding all the shadows
better. I find the table, and some of the murky shapes glitter with strange
symbols, but I don’t look too close as I walk along the wall to find the
corner.
From there I feel around and swiped my hand through insubstantial nothing until
I feel fabric. The curtain, I think, so I leave behind the glowing pentagram
and the people I can’t see or understand. It’s probably a bad idea to listen to
Cain, but once again he’s the only thing telling me what to do, and I think he
was right about trying to stop this. I hope he knows what he’s doing. I
certainly don’t.
I try to remember the layout of the building. It’s a lot of strange wandering
through this nightmare until I find the stairs. Everything’s that grey haze,
walls seem to gently undulate, it’s like the whole world burned to ash and I’m
walking in the ruins. I’m scared to touch anything, scared to put my feet on
the floor.
“Cain?”
Here, sweetheart. You’re doing great, keep going. I definitely found you. Come
on outside.
I feel around at the entry and put my hands into the flickering white flame of
the candles. I don’t smell the incense and realize I don’t smell anything at
all. As I try, I realize I’m not breathing -- I am silent and still, no pulse
and not breathing.
“Cain, I think I’m dead.”
I hear him laugh.
Come outside, Abel.
I find the door, but it takes me a minute to understand how to get through it.
I don’t want to think about how it’s mostly moving myself through an
impossibility of smoke and shadow. I understand all the curtains now, because
it’s both disconcerting and uncomfortable to the point of pain to get through
the door.
A hand closes over my arm and pulls me closer. “Hey, sweetheart,” says a voice.
Not in my head, no, this demon isn’t inside me anymore. He’s bottle-green eyes
and black fur, he’s a young man with a curved smirk on a handsome face -- a
demon, I know it’s Cain looking down at me. He’s color and substance in this
shadow-world, tufted dark brows above dark eyes -- not green, those were the
cat’s eyes, his eyes are dark mirrors for me to get lost in staring.
“You have a body,” is all I can think to say.
He laughs, and I watch with fascination as the sharp glint of his toothy grin
takes shape once he’s done laughing at me. I can’t believe how normal he looks,
this demon doesn’t have horns or bat-wings, he has shaggy black hair, a blunt
set of attractive features, dusky-tan skin, a black leather jacket, he’s
wearing a red shirt, jeans, combat boots. I keep finding new things to stare at
as we stand there in wherever this place is where he has a body and everything
is wrong.
“Welcome to the Otherside,” Cain says. “Fuck if I know how I’m getting you out
of here. You’ve really fucked us now, princess. I hope you’re happy.”
I’m not, at all. I don’t think I’ve ever been unhappier in my life, because I
think Cain might be right about everything, and I think I’m going to have to
start listening to him.
***** Chapter 7 *****
Cain draws a line through the shadows that glows. “So over there is your
complicated fucking world, and then there’s the Otherside over here. That’s
where you are now.”
“Okay,” I say.
He rocks back on his heels. I cannot take my eyes off Cain, but he’s also the
only thing I can see besides shadows and nothing, wispy grey smoky things that
resist me either a lot or a little. We’re crouched together in what I guess is
the alley outside the building. I’ve kept the door at my back as much as I can,
because I don’t want to get lost here.
“Shit here in the Otherside likes getting into your world, and your world is
always trying to get shit out of the Otherside just as much as it’s trying to
put it back,” Cain says. He taps at the line he drew on the ground. “There are
times and places where the division between here and there is less. Nothing’s
better than the moment of death for crossing, and no one’s better at getting
across or getting things across than a necromancer.”
“Oh. And that’s me?”
He chuckles. “Yeah, kid, that’s you. Most the stuff over here is dead.” He
shifts to his feet and looms over me before I start to stand and he takes my
arm. I can’t tell if he’s helping me up or making sure I don’t run away on him.
Cain takes my chin in his hand and turns my face some to scrutinize me. “You’re
going to be a fucking beacon for anything feeling ambitious. You were for me,
first time I saw you.” He caresses my cheek as he lets go. The brusqueness of
the gesture makes it a shove.
“How the fuck am I getting you home, kid?” He scowls and stomps his boot into
the shadows at our feet. “Want to tell me why you thought it was a good idea to
get a demon hunter involved in this?”
“Who?” I ask. “A what?"
Cain shoves his hands into his pockets. “Deimos, that little shit.”
“I only knew the man with the eye patch. He told me not to talk to you or tell
you my name before and then … something, he stabbed me, in the center of the
star he stabbed my eye so I’d stop seeing dead people.” I can’t think of any
reason not to tell Cain all these things.
He shrugs. I shouldn’t be surprised that Cain looks at me like he’s going to
kill me or fuck me, considering what I know of him. Nothing about this makes
sense to me, but Cain is so calm about it that I feel calm. At least Cain
doesn’t look at me like I’m crazy.
“He’s some fucking magician or sorcerer. Witch, wizard, whatever your world
wants to call self-righteous assholes like him these days.” Cain takes hold of
me again, he turns me around with his hands like he’s inspecting a purchase. He
holds out my arm to check the length. It’s extremely concerning, but I’m not
about to try escaping from the only thing that can talk to me and explain this.
“Nothing ever dies around you. Nothing ever tries to kill you,” Cain says.
“Your life is boring.” He runs his fingers through my hair until he finds the
scar from the boat rail. “No wonder you’re a shitty necromancer.”
“I don’t know what that means,” I remind him.
“What kind of gods do you know?” he asks. “What spirits and demons?”
“I know you,” I say. “Um, I know about God and stuff but my parents aren’t very
religious. I guess I’m kind of a - an atheist, if anything… I like science.”
He turns me to face him and then lets go. There’s a grin on his face, but it
seems more predatory than friendly. “Perfect. You know me. Keep it that way.”
I barely even want to listen to Cain. I nod at him and say, “Okay. Sure.” I
have no reason not to listen to Cain anymore, especially if he’s going to be
the only thing talking to me anymore.
And then I hear something besides Cain. I hear the cadence of words that I
don’t understand but know is speech. It’s almost like pressing my face into the
bars of the hallway overlook watching my parents fight, hearing the angry tones
but not the distinct and specific hatreds.
I can’t help but turn my head, despite just having been nodding at Cain that I
wouldn’t listen to anything else. I almost think I recognize the voices. “Do
you hear that?”
“Ethan,” snaps Cain. I haven’t heard him use my name since that first time I
told him. “Ethan, look at me.”
I turn back to him quick enough that I catch him in between scowls, in a moment
where he’s tensed to grab me again but doesn’t look angry. He looks scared.
Soon as I’m facing him again, he does snatch my arm into his fist.
I won’t look away from Cain again. Between him and a voice I don’t know, I at
least think Cain has reasons to want me around. I need to kill people for him,
apparently. “Sorry,” I say. “I’ll ignore it. I just thought it sounded
familiar.”
Ethan!
I stare at Cain. I don't turn toward Aidan's voice even as I hear him again
calling my name.
“Okay. Now it’s my name,” I tell Cain. “I'm not trying to listen but I hear my
name.”
He gives a low, throaty chuckle and pulls me against him with a mean-seeming
smirk. “Guess you might go home without me,” Cain says. “If they’re going to
pull, I suppose I can push.” His expression is surly and mocking as he tucks me
into his arms and bends close.
Kissing Cain is nothing like kissing Aidan. Here in this strange nothing of
shadow, Cain is fire and air against me, a hot devouring force that makes my
fingers curl and body shiver. I don’t know if it’s because he’s a demon or if
it’s because he looks like he’s just walked off a punk rock album cover, I
cannot believe how normal this feels, how eager I am to kiss Cain.
Until he bites me, pain searing sharp with his teeth as I whimper and jerk. I
shove at Cain but he’s solid against me, nothing wispy or insubstantial about
him. His hands are iron bands keeping me against him as blood fills my mouth,
his mouth, he kisses me as he bites me. I hit my fists into his ribs and chest
until he lets me go.
“Ow! Cain!” He’s between me and the door, and I stumble to keep from stepping
on top of the glowing line he scratched in the ground. I retreat further and
press my fingers into the split wet line of my lip. “You bit me!”
Cain smirks and steps forward to easily take hold of me again even though I
squirm and struggle to resist. His thumb rubs a rough rasp of pain across my
lip before he leans in to kiss me again. The velvet caress of his tongue flicks
into the jagged bite. I think I might gag on the thick taste of blood and
saliva that collects in my mouth.
My lip grows cold and then numb, it feels swollen as Cain pushes his tongue
into my mouth and kisses me in those punk rock idol ways again that don’t hurt,
where his teeth don’t cut into me. Arousal pulses between my legs even as no
blood beats in my veins, so that I’m dizzy with the impossibility of what I’m
doing kissing Cain like this.
Cain presses his hand between my shoulders to draw me closer to him. His leg
fits between mine so that I grind into him, desperate in ways that are shameful
but he’s a demon, that has to be why I crawl and moan against him like this. I
push my lips into his, the swollen hot urgency of my lip where the split line
no longer hurts. I rub and rut a stiff jutting cock against Cain’s leg as we
kiss.
He pushes me into the wall, I turn my head to say, “Wait,” even before he’s
pressing up against me again.
“Relax, sweetheart,” he says.
Cain’s hand circle my waist, they unclasp my pants, and when he reaches under
the waistband of my underwear to take hold of my cock I make the most dreadful
noise. My lashes flutter as I shift my legs apart and thrust into Cain’s hand.
I can’t let this happen, I can’t let him fuck me, I have no idea what I’m doing
but I need Cain inside me right now. I claw at the wall of shadows that keeps
me pinned here with Cain and roll my hips with wanton disregard for what I’m
doing. My body is a stranger to me, an undulating creature of want and desire
that bends pliable into Cain’s touch.
“Cain,” I plead. I have no idea what I want, just that I want something enough
that I could choke on tears if I wasn’t so silent and still in this shadow
world.
Fire traces my thighs as Cain strokes me, and his mouth pants ardor against my
neck and ear. This can’t be real, this can’t be happening, everything is burnt
ashen shadow except for Cain. He’s a hot throbbing cock nestled into my ass,
he’s the thrust of a finger, the curl of a gesture, I can’t believe this is
happening.
My voice sobs, “Wait,” without tears, without the ragged burst of my breath. I
think this should hurt but it’s just desire that I feel, arousal sharp and
keening, sensation that whips along my body as Cain thrusts into me. He’s
inside me, when he rocks forward I feel his cock pushing in and out of me, he’s
fucking me, I can’t believe this is happening.
“Stop, Cain --” I thrash hard and moan as Cain pumps his hand over my cock
again and every nerve in my body ignites. Molten pleasure sets my protests into
whimpers because fuck this feels amazing even though I want it to stop I’m
desperate for it. I’m desperate for him, for Cain.
My knees shiver, my whole body shivers, I am pinned so helpless between Cain’s
cock and his hand, his hips and thighs, his whole body against me. I’ve never
done this before. I’ve never had sex before. Cain using my body to kiss Aidan
was my first kiss, and now Cain’s fucking me, I’m filled with Cain inside me
and abusing a rhythm into me that’s possessing and rough.
Orgasm hits me with agonized intensity. It’s unrelenting pressure and motion
from Cain, he’s still fucking me, saying, “Oh, fuck yeah,” as I spurt and
thrash and bite back wails. He has to hold me up, he shoves my skinny body
harder into the darkness around us, surely I’ll have bruises after this.
Cain’s teeth close over my skin, they cut into my neck to pull a low moan from
me that sharpens on each snapped thrust of Cain’s hips. It’s a racing frenzy, a
harsh tempo between us, this demon called Cain latches into me and bucks into
me over and over. I’m helpless and undulating, thrust adrift into nothing, it’s
so intense I could be screaming but I can’t even breathe.
I feel him turn jittery and urgent, his cock beats deeper inside me. Cain
starts to come with a groan. It’s slick heat inside me, Cain doesn’t slow down
as he snarls and moans. His cock pulses and pounds, it’s all I can feel, he’s
so deep inside me so I’m starting to fill and flow. I dry-heave a sob and jerk
against him, away from him, I can’t get away. I need more and want less, he’s
everything in that moment, in so many moments I’m nothing but this.
It’s so hot that I’m burning, it feels like racing on my bike again. As if
wind’s ripping tears from my face I shudder beneath Cain. He bites down and
shivers, “Ethan,” into my skin.
“Please,” I cry. I grab at him, I twist, I shove for his lips and buck hard
against him. It’s blood and come between us, my seared open lip feels smooth. I
taste the scar of my lip as Cain growls endearments and thrusts, he pins me
into this dark shadow of his world.
“Abel,” he says. It’s a groaning half-laugh. We kiss again and it’s blinding,
agony and desire so that I scrunch my eyes closed. “I’ll find you,” he
whispers. Cain makes it sound like a threat just as much as a lover’s promise.
I don’t understand until I’m gone, he’s gone, I snap away into elsewhere,
pressure lifts and everything changes.
I open my eyes and see a bright ceiling, so bright without shadows. I’m lying
on the floor in a way that seems peaceful until I draw my first breath. Another
beat of my heart slams into the fast-expanding gasp of my ribcage. Someone
shrieks and jumps back, so that I see motion and not much else.
The pain hits me as a lash of arousal. I quiver and jerk in strange ways as if
I’m still getting fucked, but it’s just me on the floor in the center of chaos.
My underwear is stuck to my half-stiff cock with come and sweat rings the back
of my neck as I breath fast and thrash. I roll to my hands and knees. I claw my
fingers into the floor and see the glowing red lines of a pentagram.
I run my tongue into my lip and feel the bump of a scar. I remember the taste
of blood, the lustful frenzy of fucking Cain that’s left my body sore and
tender, flushed and sated -- I shiver and twitch at the memory of Cain moving
inside me, his cock filling me and fucking me. Agony rips into my stomach as I
feel again at the scar on my lip. Saliva rushes into my mouth as I choke and
find the first sob. I hurt in ways and places I didn’t know could hurt.
The bossy blonde starts to speak with a lifted lisp of a gasp. “He’s back! He’s
here! I’ve got it now, he’s here!”
“Shut up,” rasps a stranger. It’s the small man holding the knife, the one Cain
called a demon hunter. Deimos looks at me and then eyes my crotch in a way
that’s mortifying and creepy at once.
I rub at my face and push aside tears. “I want to leave,” I say. My voice is a
raw wound, the words barely enough to cut the air. I look up to find myself in
the center of the room, the center of attention, the center of the pentagram. I
need to find Cain. I need to get away from these people before they send me
over the line again.
I get to my feet and tug the hem of my sweatshirt down over the front of my
pants. “I’m fine now. I just want to leave,” I say. I do a great job at
sounding calm. I don’t sound like someone who got fucked by a demon and crossed
back from the Otherside.
Aidan’s in the corner still with both hands over his mouth, tears streaming
over his cheeks. I can tell by the way he’s staring that he can’t see in this
room without shadows. I bet for him it’s like for me on the Otherside, or maybe
he can’t see anything at all so it’s just darkness entirely. He doesn’t move
and looks everywhere and nowhere at the sound of my voice.
I stare down at the pentagram and the glowing red lines, and I bend over my
knees with a sudden dry retch. I grip my hand into my thigh and fight against
puking. I wipe my mouth into my shoulder and swallow the flooded terror of spit
and tears. It’s like I just left, like I didn’t leave at all, I don’t
understand anything about this but Deimos is still holding that knife.
I need to find Cain and get away from these people. I force myself to
straighten upright. I dart for Aidan and make him scream when I grab his hand.
Deimos moves toward me with quick, sure steps that say he can see in this room,
and he still has the knife.
The man in the eye patch steps forward to get between us. He holds up his hand.
“Let him go. He is only a child,” he says.
“Necromancer,” the demon hunter retorts. He still has the knife, I push Aidan
sideways toward the curtain. “Crossed over and back. Shouldn’t have tried
exorcism.”
“Yes, thank you for stating the obvious. I'm aware I fucked up on that
decision.” The bossy blonde called Phobos stares at me as well with a wild
gleaming smile. He skips forward and throws out a hand as if we’re going to do
introductions, even though I’m clearly trying to flee. “Sorry about that.
Praxis didn’t tell me you were a necromancer. That explains everything,
although not quite as much as it should.”
I hate him so viciously for saying it like that, like it really doesn’t make
perfect sense to him. It was his idea to do this to me. He thought he knew what
to do -- and Deimos still has the knife, and Cain knew about Deimos. I push
against Aidan to urge him toward the doorway.
“We’re leaving. I’m fine now,” I say. I don’t think I sound very calm. I think
my voice is shaking along with the rest of me, and I think that I might
collapse if I stop moving or let go of Aidan’s hand. I need away from these
people. Coming here was a mistake -- I don’t want to get involved. It’s bad
enough that I need to find Cain, or that he’s going to find me, I need to leave
this place and these people who know what I am.  
“Look at his lip,” says Phobos. “Deimos.” He says it like summoning a dog. His
fingers snap some to help emphasize the command before he points at me.
Deimos ducks around the man in the eye patch and that’s when I shove Aidan into
the curtain. I hush to him, “Run!” and drag him down the hall toward the
stairs. The hand holding the knife gets through the curtain first followed by
the rest of this intense small stranger who looks ready to stab me again to
stop me from running away.  
“Ethan --”
“Don’t say my name! Just move!” We stumble down the stairs together and once
past the landing Aidan doesn’t need my hand to guide him. I would fall down the
stairs just to get to the bottom faster, I would shove him into a tumble if I
thought it would help.
A hand grabs mine and it’s Deimos without the knife. I scream anyway and slap
at him to get free. Aidan slips on the stairs as he turns and rushes back. He
snatches the man’s ankle so that Deimos jerks back and falls. He tugs me down,
too, we both go crashing. I’m up first and so is Aidan, he’s gone even as I
jump over Deimos and keep running.
I tear after Aidan through the curtain into the entry, where the heavy scents
of incense and wax choke me with relief. Blood-red stones sit in a bowl with
white candles, and sunlight cuts into the room as Aidan slams through the door.
I follow him out into the alley and can’t believe it’s daylight, grey murky
February overcast but still bright and perfect.  
We run for the car, Aidan shrieks curses at his keys before getting it unlocked
and then started, I’d tell him to drive safe except it feels like I’m dying now
that I’m not running for my life. I feel ripped up and bleeding, beaten inside,
I keep thinking of Cain sliding in and out so slick and fast. I can’t believe
that he fucked me.
My fingers skip and shiver over my lip. Aidan swerves the car into motion as I
tackle the sun visor to flip open the mirror. A vertical red line marks my
mouth, and I watch in the mirror as this terrified-looking boy stabs his tongue
into the smooth bump of a fresh scar. Without anyone needing to tell me I know
this is how Cain’s going to find me again, now that I’m his. I feel at the scar
on my lip and then scratch through my hair until I find the one on my head, the
one from hitting the boat rail when I went into the water. 
"You can't think I'm crazy still," I say to Aidan. "You have to believe me now,
right?"
"Yeah. No, Ethan -- I believe you." He lets out a shaky breath like a sob.
"Fuck, I don't know what I believe anymore, but I don't think you're crazy."
 
***** Chapter 8 *****
Over my hips and thighs I expect to see bruises but find only smooth pale skin,
nothing looking hurt about me to explain all the ache. My reflection in the
mirror is a scared-looking kid, someone slim and blonde drowning their way out
of a too-big hooded sweatshirt. I clean the inside of my underwear with some
paper towels, wash my face and hands, stare at my face in the mirror for much
too long because of the vivid red scar that crosses my lip. It’s the only mark
on me from what Cain did, or else I’d think the whole thing never happened.
Aidan’s waiting with our drinks once I squeeze through a group of teenage girls
in line. He hands me a paper cup and blows into the plastic lid on his coffee.
Heat presses through the cardboard sleeve into my palm as I grip a soy latte
with my name scribbled onto the side.
We wander away from the cafe and into the rest of the bookstore. From my pocket
comes the beep of my phone, and I bet it’s another text from my mom. I told her
I’d eat dinner with Aidan, she told me to come home, I haven’t looked at my
phone since because I’m not going back. I can’t go home yet. I can barely
tolerate the bookstore. On the drive over here, I told Aidan more or less
everything without actually saying what I did with Cain, because there is no
way I’m going to admit anything about how this scar got on my lip.
Aidan pulls a book from the shelf and flips through it with one hand. I lean
into the shelves next to him and turn the cardboard sleeve around on the cup.
Aidan sets his coffee on the shelf so he can look at the book with both hands.
I’m not sure what useful information he thinks he’ll find when we both already
looked up ‘necromancer’ on our phones while waiting in line to get coffee. I
doubt a book on the shelf of the local suburban mall is going to have more to
say on the subject than the entire internet.
I take a sip of my latte and curl my fingers against the warmth of the cup. I’m
staring out of the aisle at nothing when someone pokes around the corner and
says, “Hi!”
It’s that bossy blonde called Phobos, standing there in a navy pea coat trimmed
in white, tan suede pants that are slim and fitted, he looks too entirely
normal. There’s even a small messenger bag slung across his shoulder, some
plush leather thing I’m certain is designer label like the rest, so he looks
nothing at all like someone who just chased me around a bright glowing red
pentagram.
Phobos flops out his hands to show they’re empty and then lifts them up further
like it’s a stick-up, like I’m the one who’s threatening. I glance to the side,
glance over my shoulder, I’m looking for Deimos or anyone wearing all-black
holding a knife.
Aidan shuts the book and looks ready to throw it, so that Phobos lifts his
hands and says again, “Hi! Hi, sorry, yeah, I followed you. Or, I traced you -
- don’t worry. Deimos and Praxis aren’t here. It’s just me.” He looks me over
in a way I don’t like, appraising and judgmental, just because he’s dressed
like a model and I’m slouching in a sloppy hoodie and jeans.  
“What do you want?” Aidan asks.
“To talk,” he says. “I just want to talk.” Phobos tugs a creamy-thick scarf
from out of his coat and then works open the painted-wood toggles. His cheeks
are pinked from the cold, like he came straight inside the store to find us
since apparently he knew where to find us and how, so there’s not much point in
trying to run.
Aidan glances at me, I give him a shrug in return, so that he nods and looks
back to Phobos. “Okay. So talk,” he says.
“Maybe not here,” Phobos says. “Although we’re in the right section for it.”
His smile starts off bright and then slowly fades when neither Aidan nor I make
any effort at returning it. We’re exchanging another long, silent look where I
just end up shrugging.
“Here or not at all,” says Aidan. Apparently he has stronger feelings about
this than I do, or at least a better awareness of not wandering into dangerous
situations.
Phobos sighs. “Fine. Let’s find a place to sit.” He slides out of his coat and
puts it across his arm as we wander back to the cafe. It’s entirely too normal
as he stands in line for a drink while Aidan and I find a table. We get one
near the back corner and sit together to guard it while waiting for Phobos to
join us.
I make sure to look at everyone in the cafe, but none of them are the right
size and shape to be Deimos with that knife again. Anyone that Cain recognizes
just has to be trouble, so I immediately distrust Phobos by association. Beside
me Aidan fidgets with an unopened sugar packet and watches the back of Phobos’
head.
Presently Phobos comes to take the empty seat at the table carrying a large
blended concoction of sugar, whipped cream, and assumably coffee. “I know it’s
silly to get something frozen when it’s freezing outside, but I love these
things,” he says. “They’re so good.”
His lips close over the straw, and I watch as the line of drink inside
disappears up into his mouth. Aidan stares at him looking horrified by the
cheerful casualness of the gesture. After a bit Phobos stops with a wince and
says, “Ooh, brain freeze. Okay.”
He looks between the two of us and then resettles into the chair. His ankles
cross delicately as he repositions and says, “Okay,” again like he thinks we’re
going to make this easy. He glances to me. “Abel,” he says. “That’s what Praxis
said to call you, right?”
I shrug and say, “Sure.”
“Well, Abel and friend. I’m Phobos, if you didn’t remember our very brief
introduction when I totally didn’t peg you as a necromancer. Clearly I’m out of
practice.” He snorts and shoves the straw back into his mouth, huffy about it
like I’m personally to blame for his mistake. “I think it was probably the
sixties last time I actually ran into a necromancer. Ugh, my hair back then. I
don’t even know what I was thinking for that whole decade. Anyway you crossed
to the Otherside, right? Can you do it again? Without Deimos, without the
exorcism I mean, could you?”
There’s a lot of emphasis with the way he asks it, and I feel somehow insulted
as if I should be able to retort that of course I can, I’m a necromancer.
According to Cain there’s no one better than me at this kind of thing, except I
don’t have a clue what I’m doing, and I’m pretty sure I just heard him mention
a decade there is no way he could have been alive for.
Aidan puts his hand on my arm, even though I’ve only shifted around like I want
to say something. “You said you just wanted to talk.”
“And I’m talking. I’m the only one talking, you two are just sitting there
looking terrified.” Phobos gestures with his drink around at the cafe. “Is this
not pleasant enough for you? Do we need to do this in a woodland forest with
fucking butterflies and frockling baby deer? Come on. How dangerous do you
really think I am?” He taps his foot impatiently and frowns at us like he
wishes he was the one with the knife.
“Are you a demon?” I ask.
Phobos bursts into a long, snickering laugh. “M-me?” He cackles loud enough to
draw glances from neighboring tables. “No, honey, but that’s cute. That’s
really cute. Ask me another.”
“What are you?” Aidan asks. He’s quick with it, like he had the question ready.
“Not a demon,” Phobos says. He smirks again as if we should be laughing at the
same joke. “Although you asking means Deimos was probably right. I hate when
he’s right.” He eyes my lip as he sips down more of his drink.
We sit in matched silence as Phobos stabs around with the straw to better mix
the whipped cream into the icy dwindlings of his drink. “Look, I don’t want to
make this sound like a threat, but if you don’t help me then I’m going to have
to keep helping Deimos. And I don’t think you want that, because I’m pretty
useful -- case in point, I’m the one sitting here having found you while Deimos
is still probably trying to talk Praxis into throwing a handful of sticks on
the floor for a dowsing. I’m even giving you a bargain -- all I want is to
cross into the Otherside. I’m not asking for the moon.”
Aidan grips into my arm so I won’t blurt anything out, and that’s probably for
the best. I’m tempted to offer to kill Phobos, surely that will get him across,
but with my luck it would just summon Cain into his body instead. My stomach
churns uneasily at thoughts of Cain, because of how empty I feel without him
now. He said he was going to find me, but I’m not sure he can. I think he would
have done it already, if he could, or at least if it was going to be easy for
him.
Aidan glances over at me, but I shake my head. Cain didn’t mention knowing
anything about Phobos, even though he seemed to recognize Deimos, so I’m not
sure what to think.
Aidan looks to Phobos. “Abel’s not doing anything for you.”
Phobos swirls in last floating bits of whipped cream and drawls out a long
suffered sigh. “I was so afraid of that. Let’s not talk about how much Deimos
is going to want to kill you. Ew, tragic.”
“What?” Aidan straightens in his chair. I clutch at the paper cup in my hands,
although most the warmth has leached out of it now.
Phobos nods at my lip. “Because of your demon problem. I wish demons were as
pretty and nice as me.” He laughs in a way that is certainly pretty but not
nice at all, because he’s laughing at us. Me, specifically, because I never
should have said anything about demons.
“There’s no problem,” Aidan says. “We’re fine now. Abel’s fine. He doesn’t need
any help from you.”
“I think maybe he does,” Phobos says. “Soon as all those sticks point Deimos in
the right direction, he’s going to come looking for you. When that happens, I’d
really appreciate the two of you not blurting out anything about me being here.
If not, whatever. No hard feelings. Deimos doesn’t trust me anyway.”
“Then why should we?” Aidan asks.
Phobos laughs and brings his messenger bag around from the back of the chair
without looking and reaches into one of the outside pouches. “You know, good
point. You probably shouldn’t. I wouldn’t trust me.”
Aidan glances at me, but I shake my head again. He says, “We’re not going to,
then. We’re not going to help you.”
“Right? That was pretty obvious.” The crisp white rectangle of a business card
goes across the table. Phobos scoots it in front of us with one slim finger and
then taps at it. “But this is me, in case you change your mind. Ignore the
Deimos half.”
Aidan and I both lean forward to look at the card without touching it. ‘Equinox
Investigations’ is emblazoned along the top of large, curling font and beneath
that is a logo of black and white circles overlaid to form a small slivered
crescent. Contact information forms two squat pillars of text in either bottom
corner on the front of the card, but for Deimos there’s an email address, ICQ
number, and a pager number. I think that’s ridiculous until I look to see
Phobos just has Twitter and Instagram accounts listed. There’s not a phone
number or mailing address printed anywhere on the card.
“I cannot believe you have business cards,” I say aloud.
“I know, right? Aren’t they great?” Phobos snatches the card up to admire it
for a moment. He flips it around between his fingers and then offers it out
again. “Here, take it. I already have a ton of them.”
Aidan gingerly takes hold of the card and pulls it in closer for inspection.
“This is the person you say wants to kill Abel? I can take this to the police.”
He glances over at me briefly before looking to Phobos. “I’m going to tell the
police about this.”
“Sure,” Phobos says. “You do that. Literally no one has ever thought to do
that, ever. No way that won’t work. You’re so brilliant to think of it. What a
perfect thing to do. Of course the police will believe you that a man named
Deimos is going to kill to your friend to stop a demon from crawling its way
into this world now that it’s found a necromancer stupid enough to listen.”
He stands slings into his scarf and coat. The wooden toggles loop the pea coat
closed as Phobos works them with nimble, slim fingers. “But you don’t need my
help, of course. The police are going to help you.” He laughs and snatches up
the empty drink cup. He slurps noisily at the last few drops of moisture and
then pauses to laugh again, cruel and mocking.
Aidan jerks to his feet and I stand up with him, because I’m genuinely
concerned that my shy, awkward best friend is about to snap and throw a punch
at Phobos. I grab Aidan’s hand to keep it down at his side instead of going
into Phobos’ face, because I’m pretty sure mall security will come kick us out
if we start a fight here in front of the entire bookstore cafe.
“See ya around,” Phobos says. “Good luck with Deimos. I’m going to pretend we
never spoke like this when he drags me with him to come kill you. Holla at me
you change your mind though.”  He gleams a smile at us and wiggles his fingers
in a wave.
I sit and tug Aidan with me, but he stays standing to watch Phobos leave before
slumping down next to me again. He sets his elbows on the table and then leans
his face into his hands with a groan. “Ethan, please don’t be offended, but I
wish you were just crazy.”
“No. I get it.” I kick at the center post on the table and then pull my phone
from my pocket. “My mom wants me home.”
“Yeah, mine too,” says Aidan. “Are you going to school tomorrow? Am I?” He
glances at the rest of the cafe and looks for too long at someone who ends up
being an Asian girl with short hair when she turns around and takes off her
coat.
I shrug and start to pick apart the cardboard sleeve of my cup. More than ever,
I wish Cain would pop up with some sarcastic remark and then tell me what to
do. If he’s so certain he can use my body to kill someone, then a great time to
do it would be when someone’s trying to kill me because of him.
Aidan and I sit there until the cafe and the bookstore both close, and then we
sit in his car with the heater running for another half-hour before leaving. He
drives slow past my driveway so I can look for my dad’s car to be gone, but it
isn’t. Both my parents are home.
I flip down the visor to look at the scar again in the mirror. I still haven’t
thought of what I’m going to say when she asks. I know she’ll ask. I slam the
visor into the roof of Aidan’s car and sink low into my seat. I’m going to
sound crazy again, soon as I leave Aidan’s car and go inside my house. I’ll
have to say I don’t know how I got this jagged red mark on my face. It doesn’t
hurt and I’m fine, but she won’t let me leave it at that and neither will my
father. It’ll be another unexplainable thing about me, something new for my mom
to cry about.  
“I can’t go home.”
“Okay,” Aidan says.
He puts the car into gear so we leave, because if I’m not going home then he
won’t either. I turn to look back at my house, my nice quiet house, because the
front porch light but none of the other lights are on in the house. Usually I
leave all the lights on, I like to turn them on as I walk through the house at
night when it’s empty. I tend not to to turn them off again as I leave, but my
mother or cleaning lady will get them off again while I’m at school or out with
Aidan or just elsewhere.
“Where do you want to go?” Aidan glances over at me briefly.
I think of going to a cemetery, because I need dead people to be a necromancer,
but I feel like if it were as easy as that Cain would have told me just to dig
him up a corpse. I might have been crazy and stupid enough to do that for him.
I think of Cain hobbling around in a half-flat dead cat, and his insistence
that however I kill his body for him that I keep it nice and clean.
“Where’s somewhere with a lot of dying people?” I ask Aidan. “Not dead people,
but people about to die.”
It’s a testament to exactly how much he no longer thinks I’m crazy that I see
him thinking about it. His fingers tap at the steering wheel for the red light.
“Old folks home?” Aidan switches the direction of his turn signal and checks
quickly before turning right out of the neighborhood instead to avoid the long
light.
“Old people aren’t really actively dying.” I slump an arm into the door and
rest my chin on my hand. “They’re just likely to die.”
“Hospital,” Aidan says. “Dying people get taken to hospitals, nearly everyone
actually dies in hospitals these days.”
“Yeah.” I look out the window at the passing ramble of gateways into
neighborhoods and dense-packed stretches of shops fighting for attention on
turns. “And the morgue’s full of bodies.”
“Ethan, you can’t steal a body from the morgue. We are not doing that,” Aidan
says. “There’s no way we can do that. We would get caught so fast.”
“Yeah, I know.” I think a morgue would be the same as a cemetery anyway, even
if the bodies would be in better shape. “But I’m not killing anyone.”
“Um, yeah.” Aidan glances over at me. “Yeah, Ethan. We are definitely not going
to kill anyone.”
Aidan drives us out to to the half-closed shopping center out on the edge of
town that has a huge parking lot. It’s the best place to come try jumping curbs
on a bicycle or to spin donuts in the snow with a car, or sometimes just to sit
because we can’t go home.
For the next three hours we sit and talk about ways to get me a dead body
without killing anyone or doing anything else illegal, and then Aidan falls
asleep while I stay up looking at stuff on my phone until the battery dies.
Once it’s morning enough to be awake I tell Aidan I need to buy a new phone
charger, I’m not going to school so neither is he, and that we’re going to the
pet store to find something to kill.
***** Chapter 9 *****
“I’m not sure I can do this,” Aidan says.
We’re staring at a wall of cats too cute to kill, these adoptable creatures in
cages stacked behind the glass. I set my hands into my thighs as I lean over
and look at the paper tag that describes the sleeping cat, how he’s friendly
and sweet. All of the cats have cute names, cute descriptions, they’re too cute
to kill but I’m going to have to kill one of them if I want to find Cain.
“Yeah, I know,” I say to Aidan. “Let’s see what else they have.”
I find two ferrets, some rabbits, assorted mice and gerbils, hamsters and
guinea pigs, there are lots of cute things to kill in the pet store. Aidan
looks over the glass terrariums with turtles and snakes, spiders and scorpions,
all the things that aren’t very cute but I still don’t really want to kill. I’m
not even sure there’d be any point to this, if Cain’s even around for this to
matter, because it’s just silence in my head even though he said he’d find me.
Aidan and I end up back at the wall of cats, looking them over like one is
going to be less cute somehow, like this can be any less horrible than what it
actually is.
“Maybe the oldest one,” I say. “Not one of the kittens, for sure.”
“Let’s ask which one of them is feeling sad,” Aidan says. “Let’s find a
suicidal cat to throw under my car.”
“I don’t think you have to run it over for this to work.” I realize too late
that Aidan’s being sarcastic and have to bite at my lip when he turns to look
at me with an incredulous stare. I feel at the scar with my tongue and then try
to straighten out my features into something of a smile. “Sorry,” I say.
He sighs and has that expression again, the one that I hate, even though I know
he believes me so it’s the wrong kind of pity. He’s my best friend and wants to
help, but I’m doing something crazy right now. I might not be crazy anymore now
that he knows that it’s real, that I’m not making any of this up or seeing
delusions, but I know Aidan thinks I’m acting crazy when he sighs again and
says slowly, “Ethan, I’m not going to help you kill anything.”
“Okay. Well you don’t have to, I’ll do it. I'll do the actual killing. It
doesn't matter which one, I guess. Let’s get that one.” I point at the friendly
and sweet cat who’s asleep. He’s supposedly two years old, neutered, good with
kids according to the paper tag. They’re all great according to the labels,
because it isn’t like the pet store is going to advertise a bunch of asshole
cats to adopt.
Aidan shakes his head. “I’m not doing this,” he says. “We’re not doing this.”
“But you’re eighteen and I’m not. I need you to fill out the paperwork,” I say.
“That’s all, I’ll do the rest myself. Come on, Aidan -- please?”
This has got to be the weirdest argument I have ever had with Aidan. He shakes
his head again and says, “No way. Ethan, no way.”
I can see by his expression that he means it, this isn’t going to be one of
those times he’ll just go along with whatever his best friend wants to do. An
entire childhood of me always deciding what we’re going to do, because
literally every single time I’d ask Aidan he’d just tell me he didn’t know,
whatever I wanted to do was fine. Except now I don’t want to play tag with the
two older boys down the street or ride our bikes to the clubhouse, we’re not
little kids anymore and one of us fell off a boat in the summer before tenth
grade and went crazy. I want to kill things so I can talk to them, because
apparently I’m a necromancer and not crazy or maybe still acting crazy.
It’s daytime, we’re in this pet store, there’s a strip mall parking lot outside
full of Mommy minivans and Executive coupes and practical hybrid cars in sleek
colors and shapes. There’s too many normal things, too much of this is normal
for Aidan to go along with my crazy plan to find Cain.
“Fine,” I say. I turn and look at the collars and leashes on the rack behind
us, fiddle with one to make the bell on it chime. “Fine. I’ll think of
something else.”
He sighs and says, “Ethan.” Aidan gets closer even though we’re already
whispering. “I don’t think you should try summoning a demon anyway.”
I glance around even though the store is barely open. We sat in the parking lot
waiting for it to open, and then we both agreed to wait further until we saw
someone else go inside. Like it isn’t suspicious enough already that we watched
the employees pull up to park and unlock the doors.
“I’m not having this conversation here,” I tell him.
“Then let’s go,” he says. Aidan grabs my hand and makes it halfway to the door
before remembering to let go. I’m pretty sure the old lady at the cash register
is watching us, but I don’t blame her because of the way we both almost run to
the car.
I slouch into the passenger seat, Aidan sets both hands on the wheel. “It’s
freezing,” he says. He holds a hand to the vents to feel the air start to blow
warm and then hot.
“I’d rather Cain be a cat again than inside me,” I say. “I think he’s easier to
handle that way. He was mouthy but harmless enough as a cat, right? I just want
to ask him some questions about Deimos, or, maybe he can keep Deimos from
killing us. I don’t know.”
“Ethan.” Aidan needs a minute to compose his thoughts. He notches the air
controls to turn up the defrost and then sits watching the slow melt of white
into clear on the windshield.
“Ethan,” he tries again. “He’s a demon. A literal demon. I think it’s probably
a really good thing that you can’t hear him anymore.”
“But you saw the cat,” I say. “Cain was the cat. And I saw him, on the
Otherside, he looked totally normal. We don’t even know what makes him a demon,
or what it means that he is one. Cain asked me what gods I knew. Gods, Aidan,
as in plural. He asked what gods or spirits did I know -- what kind of question
is that? Shouldn’t he know? If he were, you know, a fire and brimstone demon in
hell or something."
Aidan closes his eyes and lifts his fingers from the steering wheel without
saying anything, because this is the weirdest argument we’ve had in ten years
of being best friends. He’s trying not to yell at me, because we’ve never
yelled at each other, never really had many fights between us.
Finally he’s calm enough to look over at me again, mouth turned down and brows
peaked with concern. “I thought you didn’t want to get involved in this stuff.
Didn’t that Praxis guy make it so you couldn’t see dead people anymore?”
“Yes, no. I don’t know. Not anymore.” I kick my foot into the floor mat and
gesture for Aidan to go. “Come on. Let’s just leave.”
The wipers run over the windshield a few times to clear the rest of the clingy
matte cold before Aidan backs us out of the parking spot. “Well now where?” he
asks. “Do you want to go home?”
“No,” I say. 
Aidan drives as if we’re going somewhere anyway while we both think it over.
It’s not until he says my name again that I realize he’s still on about Cain.
“Ethan, necromancy and demons and - and whatever else, it’s just not something
I think you want to get involved with anyway, no matter what it means.”
We’re stopped at a red light, and Aidan taps his fingers on wheel while he
waits. “You said Cain made you kissed me, and you were talking to yourself -
or, to him, I guess, about how you weren’t going to kill me, so, I just think -
- it’s a good thing you can’t hear him anymore. I mean… I’m really glad you’re
not dead, but it’s for the best he’s gone now. And I definitely don’t think you
should kill anything to bring him back.”
I murmur something noncommittal but not rude, because I don’t want to fight
with Aidan. I lean my shoulder into the door and pull the hood up on my
sweatshirt to cushion my head against the window. After a while Aidan gets
tired of waiting at red lights and takes to the highway. We start a loop around
the city but for once he doesn’t try to weave around all the other cars. He
just sits in the far right lane and puts up with braking and slowing for
everyone in his way.
Aidan turns the wheel some to start to get around a semi and has to wait
instead for a motorcyclist to zoom past. I eye the flashy red sport bike and
get a glimpse of a flapping blonde ponytail under the equally flashy red
helmet.
“That's a nice bike,” I say to Aidan. “Do you think my mom would ever let me
get one?”
“Not for long. She would sell it or give it away to keep you from driving it,”
Aidan says. “Promise you’ll let me ride it before she finds out though, if you
decide to get one.”
“Sure,” I say. 
He chuckles some as he switches lanes to drift past the long trailer and then
the cab of the truck. He flicks on the radio and asks what I want to listen to,
but I say I don’t care. I’m not trying to sit over here sulky and sullen as if
we really did have a fight, it’s just that all my ideas on what to do involve
death and demons. Aidan’s right not to listen to me, because I just want to
listen to Cain again. 
Traffic starts to clog things up more and more as we get near downtown. Coming
around the curved corridor of sound-dampening wall that lines the highway we
get stopped by a long snarl of red brake lights. It’s stop and go as Aidan
scrolls around radio stations.
“Let’s get lunch,” Aidan says. “Where do you want to eat?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “Wherever I guess.”
We pass two more exits at a slow-crawling inch. Eventually we come to a stop
beneath an underpass and don’t budge for a while. I keep looking out the window
at the rumbling shadow of the bridge overhead, and all I can think is what
would happen if it were to suddenly collapse. I’d have so many dead bodies
around me, unless I died too.
By the time we crawl forward again to get clear of the underpass, I’ve realized
my best chance at getting a dead body is to use my own. I should probably be a
lot more concerned about how easily I think about suicide, but I spent way too
much time thinking it already so I just kind of feel resigned about it. Which
is probably why Aidan should start making the decisions about what to do, so
it’s a good thing I’m sitting over here silent and sulky as if we’ve been
fighting.  
Aidan has to stop again and then it’s a lot of shuffling as two police cars
squeeze past. Cars stream into the resultant gap and Aidan gets aggressive at
last as he cuts off a sluggish box truck and pretends not to see a jaunty
yellow hatchback flashing its blinker.
I realize Aidan’s goal is the next exit, but traffic wants to go the other way.
As we get closer through the dense line of everyone going the same way except
us, I see the flashing swirl of blue-red emergency lights.
“Oh, there’s a wreck,” Aidan says. “Damn.”
He has a better line of sight as he waits to dive forward into a spot about to
open. He’d been wedging his way into the left lane, but now he spins the wheel
the other way to curve back.
“Is there an ambulance?” I ask.
“Mmm… I can’t see,” he says. He’s distracted trying to both look to answer me
and to also check before switching lanes again now that he knows the exit ramp
is blocked by the wreck.
I roll the seat belt strap over my arm and shoulder and slide a hand over the
latch. I wait until we're only moving by inches and then snap open the buckle.
My hand fumbles over the car door when Aidan yelps and hits the gas first by
instinct. We jolt forward before he brakes hard, and I get the door open amid
the back-and-forth jerking.
“Ethan!” He tries to grab for me, but I’m already out of the car and dashing
into traffic. I’m not sure if I really hear him shriek my name again after me
or if I just know that he does.
No one wants to slam their car into a kid running across the highway, and
everyone’s pouring along in a stream of slow braking anyway. I just make sure
the drivers see me before darting in front of their cars, and soon as I hit the
safety of the shoulder I start running.
I have no idea what I’m going to tell the police if they try talking to me. I
think I just need to get near, in case there’s anyone hurt, dying -- am I
really doing this? Am I hoping to find someone dying? I come down from my run
into a jog and then slow to a walk when I get in sight of the wreck. I didn’t
have to do anything about the dead cat except stand there on the sidewalk while
it got hit, but am I really hoping that this car accident has proved fatal?
They’ll take the dying body to the hospital anyway, that’s what ambulances are
for. Aidan was right, Cain was right, my complicated world is full of safety
and rules, protocols, dead and dying people all end up in hospitals.
There’s an ambulance and police cars, orange cones and flares, a tow truck
getting into position and much further ahead the long shattered skid of a
beautiful red bike so I start to walk quickly again. I need to get on the other
side of this police car before I can see what’s going on at the parked
ambulance with silent spinning lights. I’m coming up on the backside of the
crash where a bulky green pickup is swerved into the back of a utility van, and
none of the accumulated unharmed bystanders interacting have long blonde hair.
I’m noticed by a police officer who starts to come toward me. Soon as she gets
near I ask, “Is she okay? The motorcyclist, is she okay? My girlfriend has a
bike like that, I saw and thought maybe it was her...” I stop walking and point
briefly before deciding to lower my hands.
I cannot believe I just voluntarily ran toward the police after having become a
quasi-runaway. I haven’t heard from my mother yet, so I’m fairly certain she
hasn’t reported me missing. I’m too nice of a kid for her to think that I’m
doing anything worse than ignoring her -- she probably went to bed and woke up
thinking I came home late and left for school early. Eventually the school’s
going to notify her I skipped, and that’s when I expect my phone to start
blowing up with texts and calls. When I ignore her then, that’s when she’ll
file the missing person's report.
Regardless I try to look harmless and worried -- it’s a harmless enough lie to
claim I recognize a motorcycle, saying it's my girlfriend means I get to look
breathless and weird. The cop doesn’t seem angry with me for being here,
either, especially since I’ve stopped moving and am being cooperative. I’m
definitely going to cooperate with the police. I'm a harmless bystander,
concerned about my made up girlfriend, I hope I don't sound obviously gay or
anything.
The cop smiles some. She’s stockily put together with a sloped shelf of a chest
and bursting hips straining under the swath of her uniform pants. She looks
about my mom’s age, and the smile I get is actually pretty reassuring even if
it means no one died here or is dying. I try not to be disappointed.
“We have a male driver involved here,” the cop says. “Don't worry. Your
girlfriend’s fine.”
I’d only seen the ponytail and the flashy red bike, I hadn’t paid much
attention to the driver. I’ve somewhat ironically used the wrong gender. I look
past the cop at what of the wreck I’m close enough to see.
“Oh. Okay, thanks.” I have no idea what else to say. There’s no awkward follow
up where I say that I actually meant to say boyfriend, because that would sound
suspicious and probably crazy. I should consider myself lucky that I can just
turn and walk away now, but I keep standing there just staring at the cop.
My phone starts to pulse with a ringtone that makes me dig it out hastily to
make sure it isn’t my mother. Since it’s just Aidan I answer with, “Um, hey.”
“Ethan!” He squeaks my name with enough fear and relief that it sets my stomach
into churning. I hear the whisk of cars in the background, and he shouts to
make sure I’ll hear him. “Where did you go? Are you okay?”
“Um, yeah. I'm fine. I went to look at the wreck.” I turn to look at the
stretch of moving cars flowing past the blocked ramp. Behind me the tow truck
starts to move with a steady warning beep and the soft grinding protest of
beaten together metal.
I glance back at the police officer before seeing what’ll happen if I start to
shuffle down the shoulder again toward the highway. She doesn’t seem likely to
stop me as I move further away. “Um, where are you?” I ask Aidan. “I’m
walking back.”
“I pulled over, I’m parked on the shoulder,” Aidan says. He sounds painfully
relieved. I hear the car door open and then shut, his end of the conversation
gets a lot quieter. “I’ll wait for you here.”
“Okay. I’m coming back.”
“Yeah. Okay. I’ll wait here.”
It’s weird to stay on the call now that we’re done deciding what to do -
- usually we’d just hang up, but he doesn’t so I don’t either. We’re more
inclined to text or chat online or hang out in person, neither of us likes to
spend long on the phone. Most of our calls are under a minute. I know because
my mother asked me about the phone bill once, when I was twelve or thirteen,
back when I only ever gave her the simplest, stupidest things to worry about,
and she couldn’t understand why I had pages and pages of one and two minute
long calls. I started texting more after that.  
“Um, do you see my car?” Aidan asks.
“Not yet.” I glance back the accident scene and don’t see the cop anymore. I
walk a little quicker and then break into a soft jog. “Now I do,” I tell Aidan.
“I see your car.”
“Oh, good,” he says. “Okay. Yeah, I think I see you.”
Still neither of us hangs up, so I’m jogging with the phone against my ear and
must look completely ridiculous. I slow to a walk and get further away from the
moving cars. Last thing I want to do is get hit. I glance over at the traffic
and then get the phone shifted so it isn’t creating a blind spot.
“Do you want to get burritos for lunch?” Aidan asks. He’s turned around in the
driver’s seat to watch out the back window. As I get closer to the car, I can
see the worry plastered all over his face.
Even as I’m walking around the car toward the passenger side we keep the call
going, so my reply of, “Sure,” makes a weird echo since I say it with the door
open. I hang up, tuck the phone into my pocket and say, “Yeah. I could do
burritos,” before closing the door.
Aidan hangs up as well, gets settled and buckled before turning off his
hazards. He puts the car into gear and flips his blinker for the merge
back onto the highway. He breaths deep and sighs, focused back on the traffic
and driving but I bet he’s thinking of what he really wants to say.
I try to beat him to it like I usually can. It’s one of the reasons we have so
few fights. I’m better at figuring out what Aidan needs to say before he
actually has to say it, and neither of us is shy about apologizing. “Sorry. For
running off like that, I’m sorry. You know, the wreck, I just thought --”
He cuts me off with a quick, “Yeah. Yeah, Ethan. I know. It’s fine.”
It doesn’t sound fine. It sounds like I scared the hell out of him, and he
looks quietly pissed about it. I try again to apologize, but he cuts me off,
sharper, punctuating it with a sideways glance. “It’s fine,” he insists. And
then he turns mumbling as he adds, “Just -- don’t do it again. We should stick
together, okay?”
“Sure,” I say meekly. “Okay.”
After the stretch of a little awkward silence between us and some bland alt-
rock on the radio, I lean over to spin the dial around looking for a top 40
station. Aidan gets us out of the traffic on the highway and into the calmer if
no less densely packed local streets.
“Is it this shopping center?” he asks. He slows down but hesitates over his
blinker as we creep nearer the turn-in for the parking lot.
“Um, dunno. I’ll look.” I pull out my phone and then I hear this small, faint,
barely-there voice that I’m probably imagining because it is just almost
nothing.
Abel?
“Cain?”
I whisper, but it doesn’t matter when Aidan’s right here in the car with me and
I’ve just sat upright like a dog hearing someone at the door. Aidan looks over
at me, but my attention’s wholly focused on this otherworldly hush of the demon
who found me at last.
Hey, sweetheart. Miss me?
I’m reminded of when he was trying to find me on the Otherside, how he sounded
so raw and ragged. Cain sounds even worse now, I can barely hear him, he sounds
battered and hurt even though that seems impossible. He’s just a voice -- but
not a voice inside me, I realize.
“Where are you?”
Stuck in a dead body. You’re a shitty necromancer.
“How are you stuck?”
Can’t move. I told you to keep it clean.
“But I didn’t kill anyone,” I say. “I - I didn’t kill anyone. Where are you?”
What part of stuck in a dead body didn’t make sense to you, princess? Does it
sound like I know more than that? You’re the fucking necromancer, you stupid
piece of shit, stop asking me questions and fix this.
I cannot believe how awful he sounds. I don’t mean what he’s saying is awful, I
mean the harsh pant of each hard-fought sarcastic word. Cain sounds like he’s
in agony. I blundered my way into a huge mess by running toward the accident
scene and then immediately running away again. I have no idea how to help Cain.
I have no idea what I’ve done but clearly I’ve done something, and I have no
clue how to fix it without asking Cain a lot more questions.
It’s only when Aidan says my name that I remember he’s even in the car. He’s
got me held by the shoulders actually, the car’s parked, he’s crawled halfway
across the console to grab me. I turn my head some to look sideways out the
window at the shopping center.
“Ethan,” he says. It’s that tone that tells me he’s been trying to get my
attention for a couple snaps of my name already before resorting to shaking me
like this. He does it again, digs his fingers into my arm and shakes me.
“Ethan, look at me.”
“It’s fine,” I say to Aidan. “I’m fine.” I lift my arms to try breaking his
grip, but Aidan doesn’t let go. I see he’s locked the car doors, although that
won’t keep me from simply yanking the lock open before jumping out again if I
want. Not that I want to, and the more Aidan tightens his hold on me the less I
try getting him to let go.
“Are you talking to yourself, or is it Cain?” he demands. He looks terrified.
“Cain,” I say.
What?
It sounds like a groan, pained to the point of losing the heavy drip of
sarcasm. I draw in a long, shaky breath and try to smile reassuringly against
the weight of Aidan’s stare. “Nothing, not you. I meant -- I’m not possessed
this time. Cain’s not inside me. I’m not sure where he is, neither is he, but
he’s not here. He’s not me.”
Who are you talking to?
“My friend, he knows about you. We were about to get lunch.”
“Ethan.” Aidan’s fingers dig into my arms. “Ethan, please, stop it. Stop
talking to him.”
“He hears me just if I say something. There’s not … like a special way to talk
to him or anything.”
I squirm and push gently enough about it that Aidan lets me go, he trusts that
I’ll cooperate. He slowly sinks toward his side of the car again, still staring
with such a look of horror and fear that I start to feel horrified and scared.
“I need to go back to the wreck,” I say. “I think - I think I put Cain into
that motorcyclist’s body on accident. We need to see if the body’s still there
or if it already went to the hospital.”
Are you being serious right now, Abel?
Aidan’s expression says something similar, except he jams the keys back into
the ignition and churns into life the purr and rumble of the old battered
sedan. I see Aidan shudder and swallow. His hands grip the steering wheel with
his foot still on the brake even though the car’s in gear. My fingers itch to
reach for the seat buckle, the door handle, but I just promised I wouldn’t go
running off again without Aidan. He looks ready to refuse though. I bet he’s
thinking about that cat we both saw get hit by a car, that half-flat dead cat’s
body that Cain made run around, and how I’m asking him to help me get a human
body up and running around just the same. At least I didn’t make him help me
kill anything.
“Okay,” Aidan says finally. He eases the car into motion. “Okay, let’s do
this.”
***** Chapter 10 *****
Aidan circles and circles to find somewhere to park as near as he can to the
accident scene. He keeps a hand on my arm as he drives slow and reaches over
every time that he brakes. It’s kind of like the sudden stops where he sticks
his hand out like that’s going to keep me in place if we crash. It’s always
kind of cute when he does it, but I don’t think it’s cute now. I think the last
time I saw him look this scared we were single digits still.
“Okay,” he says. He lets me go and shifts the car into park. Aidan looks over
at me before saying, “Okay,” again and taking the key out of the ignition.
He gets out of the car without taking his eyes off me, and I decide to keep
sitting there. He glances around some but doesn’t turn his head from me as he
quickly walks around the back of the car. He is terrified to take his eyes off
me now that I’ve started talking to Cain. I wonder if he thinks I’m going to
become Cain again, try to kill him or fuck him again. I keep sitting right
where he left me, exactly how he left me, so he knows I’ll cooperate. Only once
he’s in front of the passenger door do I reach for the handle, but he beats me
to it.
The door swings open as if Aidan were my chauffeur or maybe more accurately my
bodyguard. He steps back so I can get out of the car, and he seems ready to
grab my arm or maybe just tackle me if I try to move too quickly away from him.
I decide to take hold of his hand, as if we were still stupidly small, and I’d
feel silly except for the way it obviously makes him feel better. He is just so
scared that I’m going to run away on him. He keeps a tight grip on my hand as
we stand on the curb waiting to dart across the street for a better look at the
accident scene. His brows are together, his mouth is turned down, Aidan focuses
intently on watching the cars as he looks left, right, left again, back to the
right, once more to the left.
“Okay. After this truck. Ready? Now,” he says. “Let’s hurry, okay?”
I think he might cut off the circulation to my fingers as he clamps down on my
hand and pulls me after him into the street. I match his awkward burst of a
fast-jog to get across to the opposing sidewalk. There’s not a car anywhere on
the road coming at us, but we run anyway.
Aidan walks me a little ways down to where the ramp is in sight. I cup the side
of my hand into my brow to block the crisp chill daylight and stare at the
normal-enough looking wreck. The pickup’s been hauled away, but the utility van
has puttered into the shoulder or been dragged there.
I see the mom-cop mill around with another police officer pointing at the road
or gesturing. The motorcycle is still there but no sign of the driver, no
silent-spinning ambulance lights just more cops and emergency crews to get the
road cleared. As we watch someone starts pushing broken glass aside with a
broom. In a few more hours it’ll be like nothing ever happened.
At my side I hear Aidan say quietly, “The body’s probably at the hospital by
now.”
“Yeah. Yeah, I know,” I say. “I know.”
I don’t know what else to say, because Cain’s going to hear it. He’s going to
know just what a terrible mess of things I’ve made. I don’t blame Aidan for
being scared. This is an incredibly scary thing that I’ve done. I am terrified
to admit to Cain that I’ve lost the body I found for him, or rather I guess
I’ve lost the body that he found me in.
I drop my voice to a whisper. “Cain?”
Yo.
His rasping weak voice cuts through me even though he’s soft about it, barely
audible and so faint it scares me. He doesn’t even sound sarcastic anymore. I
can’t stop thinking about after Cain took over my body he kept looking at the
sky and clenching his fist with everything hurting.
I speak quietly, murmuring the words as gently as I can. “Cain, I don’t know
where you are. You’re not here. Or, I do know where you are -- you’re probably
at the nearest hospital. Um.”
I pull my hand free of Aidan so I can get out my phone. He glances around to
make sure no one except him is near as I start talking to a voice only I can
hear. I tap quickly to search on the map for the nearest hospital but already
know that’s not good enough because there’s three total with two nearly
equidistant from where I’m standing by the wreck.
“I’m sorry,” I say to Cain. “I didn’t mean to - to have it be like this.”
I told you to keep it clean. Big messy wreck with police and shit ain’t clean.
“I know. I know, I’m sorry.” I switch apps on my phone and start typing
searches into the browser to try finding a news article on the wreck. “What
happened though? Why are you stuck? Can you move at all?”
There is such a long pause that I see Aidan lose interest and start messing
around on his phone. I lean forward on the pedestrian safety rail along the
sidewalk and peer down at the crash site like that'll possibly help me help
Cain.
I fucking hate you.
There’s no heat to it, no anger. I don’t know how to interpret the sulky
silence that follows, and I’m not finding anything on my phone to help me
either. I feel at the scar on my lip with my tongue and try to fight the
panicky urge to keep apologizing to Cain. I’ve never heard someone sound this
tormented and hurt. I’ve really fucked this up and know it.
I stick the phone back in my pocket and turn to Aidan. “I need my laptop.” I
look back at the car and squint against the afternoon sun. “I need my laptop
from the house.”
“Okay,” says Aidan. “Sure.”
I start for the car, but he snatches my hand again before I get too close to
the curb. He doesn’t say wait for me like when we were little kids, but I wait
for him anyway. I let him decide when we’re going to dart across the street,
too, so he can look back and forth carefully and check that it’s clear.
Back in the car Aidan checks his phone before starting to drive. He glances in
the rearview mirror at the blue-red flash of the police lights. “What are you
going to do?” he asks me.
I shrug and glance out the window at nothing. “Find out who that motorcyclist
was, I guess, and try to get information on the crash. I need to figure out
which hospital has Cain.”
Aidan gets quiet and focuses just on driving for a while. At last he asks,
“Want to grab something to eat on the way?”
“Yeah,” I say softly. “Sure.”
His desire to ask me what kind of food or where we should stop is nearly
palpable, but he’s quiet. We’re both quiet. I’m still looking out the window,
even though what I’m really doing is trying to listen for Cain.
If it hurts him to talk I don’t want to keep pestering him, but I don’t know
what to do if he won’t answer my questions and has stopped telling me what to
do. I don’t know what it means that he says he’s stuck and can’t move, but it’s
obviously not a good thing. Nothing about this is good.
“I’ll stop for gas,” Aidan decides. “We can get sandwiches at the same time.”
I murmur something agreeable and shift to get comfortable against the door. I
know Aidan’s sitting over there thinking of what he really wants to say. I’m
sure it’s something about Cain, about the crash and the body. I can probably
guess what he wants to say. I should have listened to him in the first place,
even if I didn’t kill anything to bring Cain back.
Aidan turns into the gas station and circles to get in position at one of the
pumps. He hops out to swipe his card and punch through the options on the
payment screen but abandons that effort soon as he sees me getting out of the
car. He’s halfway around the car and coming at me like it’s going to be a
tackle, so I get deliberately way too slow and reassuring.
“I’ll go inside to get the sandwiches,” I say.
He looks less ready to tackle me but doesn’t stop coming toward me. “It’s
fine,” he says quickly. He doesn’t grab my arm but looks like he wants to, even
though I’m standing there passive and cooperative.
There’s not much puppy-dog about his big, brown eyes as Aidan glances between
the pump, the car, me, and the gas station with its big wrap-around windows. He
looks more like an attack dog, my new fierce bodyguard who is terrified of
letting me out of his sight. He hastily feels at the lump of the keys in his
pocket and then shifts his hand over to feel at the rectangular bump of his
phone as well.  
“I’ll get the sandwiches. You pump the gas,” he decides. “Stay with the car.”  
“Okay.” I take a step away from him only so I can get closer to the pump. He
takes a step back toward the gas station with matched caution. I glance aside,
shuffle, get nearer to the pump and take the nozzle off the handle.
Aidan looks between me and the gas station again like he’s regretting this
decision. He tries to keep an eye on me as he heads inside, and then those big
windows let us trade stares as he gets in line to order us lunch while I stand
there listening for the click of the nozzle once the tank’s filled. Posters and
advertisements clog up the windows, so Aidan’s not subtle at all as he goes up
on tip-toe and leans funnily to make sure he doesn’t sight of me.
Once the tank’s full, I go tell the payment screen there’s no need for a
receipt. The nozzle clatters back into place, and I get back into place as
well. Hopefully it’ll reassure Aidan all the more to see me get back into the
car to wait for him. I’m sitting down, I’m buckled, the doors are locked.
I lean forward to better watch Aidan as he’s at the register trying to pay
without taking his eyes off me and the car long. He juggles the bag holding our
sandwiches into the same hand that’s holding a soda and then digs out his
phone. I see him glance up to check on me before he looks down at his phone and
moves his thumb over the screen. He checks on me again and then lifts the phone
to his ear.
“Shit.”
Break a nail, sweetheart?
Nice as it is to hear Cain regain some of his sarcasm, I’m short with him as I
snap, “No. Shut up,” because I think I’ve figured out why my phone’s been
silent all day. By now the school definitely would have contacted my parents
about me skipping, and the only explanation for why my mother isn’t blowing up
my phone with worry is that she already knows where I am.
I think quickly and try to recall if I’d seen Aidan using his phone, but of
course he has been. Suddenly him deciding to leave me with the car while he
goes inside makes sense, because if our positions were reversed then I wouldn’t
be sitting here waiting for him. I’d be walking back with the sandwiches, and
he wouldn’t have enough time to make a phone call where I can’t hear him talk.
I yank open the lock and shove the door open. I told Aidan I wanted my laptop,
that I needed to go to my house to get it, and I’d bet anything that Aidan’s on
the phone with my mom right now telling her to move her car, get out of the
house, make it look safe so they can make it a trap. Get me inside, get me away
from Cain even though I don’t even know where he is yet. I’m on the sidewalk
when Aidan first shouts for me, so I break into a run.
“Ethan!”
His second shriek is closer, so much closer, and I try to skid to a halt before
he barrels straight into me. The soda goes flying out of his hand as he lowers
his shoulder to take me hard in the chest. The bag holding the sandwiches sails
into the air. Aidan slams me into the grass behind the dumpster like he’s
expecting a fight, but I’m passive and go down easy for such a full-body
tackle.  
Aidan’s hands clench into my sweatshirt. “Okay!” I yelp. I squirm only because
he’s trying to wrangle on top of me to pin me down. “Okay, I’m sorry. Sorry.”
His fingers are trembling as they snatch and bunch the excess fabric of my
hoodie. “Fuck,” he breathes. Aidan leans in for a moment to stare close at my
face, and I wonder frantically what he thinks he’s going to see.
He pulls back and then shifts to crouch on his heels without letting me go all
the way. “Fuck,” he says again. He watches the soda roll further down the
sidewalk as he catches his breath and smears the tears off his cheeks. “Ethan,
I’m not stupid. I was making sure your mom wasn’t at home first. I’m covering
for you. I - I’ve been covering for you. You don’t have to run. I’m not going
to turn you in or anything."
He claws together more of my sweatshirt before finding my hand again. “I’m
sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I started texting my mom last
night. I didn’t want her to worry, you know? I told them -- my mom, your mom, I
just said I was with you. I said we’d gone out of town, that you wanted to and
I - I said I went along to keep you safe. Which is kind of true, I guess.”
He looks frustrated, scared, I’m genuinely sorry for him that his nice best
friend isn’t just crazy. I’m not crazy, I’m not a delinquent. I’m something
nightmarish and unexplainable. I speak to demons, I see dead things, talk to
them, bring them back, I don’t even know what all I can do except Aidan knows
I’m not crazy or lying, I’m not making this up.
His parents divorced when he was six and his mom remarried two years later,
whisking him into a new school, new house, new town, new dad, new little sister
-- and me. A new best friend. An entire childhood of being best friends who
spent a lot of time just hanging around studying and doing homework, two nice
kids our moms didn’t have to worry about much. Of the two of us I always got
into more trouble -- simple, stupid problems like minute long phone calls,
giggling a bit too loud while pretending to be asleep during sleepovers,
sometimes scraping my knee or maybe just spending too much time on the
internet.
Now I’ve run off from everyone except Aidan, and he keeps a firm hold of my
hand so I won’t do the same to him. “Yeah,” I say. “Okay, sure, no -- I’m
sorry. I won’t run. I just, I thought -- I’m sorry.” Cautiously I get sitting
upright without letting go of Aidan. I think he’d tackle me back down again if
I tried to free my hand.
Aidan shakes his head and gets to his feet. He pulls me up with him and looks
me over with concern in case I smashed anything on myself in the fall. He
squeezes my hand before letting go. He picks up our fresh-flown lunch and the
shaken-rolled soda. He brings them back to where I’m standing and offers me a
sandwich. I roll back the somewhat smushed together wrap of paper to get a big
bite. Aidan watches me just holding the plastic bag with his sandwich still
inside.
“Come on,” he says. “I need to move the car from the pump.”
I speak around a mouthful of lunch. “Okay.”
He waits for me to start walking back before following. I get back into the
passenger seat and he climbs into driver’s side. Aidan glances back to check
the nozzle’s out of the car and the gas tank is closed before he starts up the
car. The locks jolt into place as he rolls forward.
“D’you want your sandwich?” I ask.
“In a minute,” he says. “Don’t open that soda.”
“I won’t.” I keep eating my sandwich to prove to him I’ll cooperate again.
“Sorry,” I say. “You promise you’re not going to turn me in?”
“Yes. Yes, I promise. Ethan, it’s fine. We're going to get your laptop.” He
checks to make sure I’m buckled, the doors are locked, he has us moving. His
hand hovers near my arm anyway. “But you’re not trying to get a body out of the
morgue.”
I’m silent except for chewing. Aidan drives to the office complex near the
country club and parks there to eat his half-exploded meatball sub that didn’t
quite survive the takedown. We decide to open the soda outside the car and it's
salvageable.
“What if Cain can get the body moving?” I ask. “Would you help me sneak him out
then? He could be stuck in, um, the cabinet. The metal drawers, you know?” I
gesture a bit because I’ve seen cleaned up bodies covered in sheets lying on
rolling tables in morgues -- on television, in movies, I know real life is
different, but it's got to be something similar even if it's different. 
“How would you get down there?” Aidan asks. “They have cameras. There are
people everywhere to see you. The doors are locked. Ethan, no. Absolutely no
way, I’m sorry. You just can’t, okay? We’re not doing that.”
When I shrug and murmur he frowns, Aidan looks over sharply when he waits at
the light. “Ethan?” he prompts.
“I don’t know,” I say. “I just don’t know, okay? I don’t know what I’m doing.”
Yeah, no shit.
I snort softly and then have to rub my face to keep Aidan from seeing my smile.
It shouldn’t be funny, but Cain’s snarky commentary is better than sulky
silence. I wait in vain for him to say something more, like maybe how I can fix
this for him.
Aidan turns into the neighborhood and winds his way toward my house at a slow
crawl. “I don’t see your mom’s car,” he says.
“It could be in the garage.”
We stare at my house from the bottom of the drive. “I’ll go up. I’ll go get
it,” Aidan says. We’ve been sitting with the engine running and the heater
going full blast for a while. “Ethan, if I go get your laptop, do you promise
to stay with the car?”
“What if I see my mom?”
Aidan hesitates with his hand over the keys before he unbuckles from his seat.
“Sit here,” he says. “If you see your mom, then take my car at least. Don’t try
to go on foot.”
I unclasp my seat belt while meeting his wide-eyed scared stare. We traded
ghost stories once when camping, just some stupid tent in my backyard, with the
house sitting empty so we thought we heard noises. I think that was probably
the last time I saw Aidan look this scared, because if I was going inside to
check then he’d come with me. He didn’t want to wait alone in the tent.
“I’ll go with you,” I say. “We should stick together.”
“Okay,” he says at once. He jerks the keys out of the car. He’s out the door
quick and comes around to get me by the arm. “Let’s hurry though. You don’t
want to get caught.”
“Yeah.” I stare at Aidan for too long thinking of how it felt to kiss him. The
scar is bumpy under my tongue as I feel at it, chew nervously at the bitten-in
red mark. I think about kissing Cain and feel heat rush into my face. “Thanks.
I won’t run again, I’m sorry.”
“Sure,” Aidan says. “I’m on your side in this, you know.” He hesitates and then
hugs me, he puts his arms around me and pulls me in tight. We stand there past
the point of being awkward before Aidan remembers to let go. By the red-cheeked
look that he doesn’t give me, I wonder if he’s thinking about kissing me as
well.
The surge of anger I feel for Cain making this awkward makes me second guess
helping him at all, but of course I poke my way into my quiet, empty house to
get my laptop. Aidan washes his face at the sink and borrows clothes of mine to
change into while I hastily pack. I get my laptop and charger, up-end my
backpack on the bed and shove aside all my books to start cramming in socks and
underwear, fresh shirts, my toothbrush and deodorant.
We end up running back to the car and laugh with giddy relief about it as Aidan
starts up the car and floors it forward over the curb. Even the grinding metal-
on-cement protest and extra bouncy turn of the wheel sets us into nervous
giggles.
It doesn’t help I can hear Cain ask, What’s so fucking funny?
I tuck myself into the passenger seat and dig up a pair of knit gloves from
what all I’d shoved into the backpack. I try to whisper since Aidan’s still
chuckling softly as he spins up the radio as we make our getaway.
“Nothing, we’re okay. I have my laptop. I can find out where you are now.” I
don’t get anything back from Cain, so I keep murmuring as I tug on the gloves
and rub grateful warmth for my fingers. “I’ll look on the internet for you.
I’ll find you there. I have more than enough information to dox you.”
“Ethan?” Aidan’s gone quiet, he’s swapped a relieved smile for a worried frown.
“Yeah,” I say quickly. “Sorry. Talking to Cain. Um, I need wifi, so --”
"Okay. Sure." Aidan sighs but doesn't say anything more. He keeps his eyes to
the left before turning right out of the neighborhood again, he hates waiting
at that light. He has to make two extra turns later to go south for the
highway, but still he’d rather keep moving than risk sitting stopped for long.
I tap my fingers impatiently on the lid of my laptop before lifting it open to
at least logon. 
Since Phobos found us at the bookstore, Aidan pulls into the parking lot of a
shopping center across town with enough open wireless networks in range that I
can connect to one and start looking. I tug off the gloves, and Aidan keeps the
heater going now that the car's already warmed up. On my laptop I have access
to the sites my phone can't find. Aidan sets the parking brake, locks the
doors, and then unbuckles to scoot closer. He leans in to see over my shoulder.
Gruesome photos of motorcycle crash scenes scroll over the screen as I try to
look for only the absolute most recent. I use lists of the best gore message
boards on the dark web and check the newest posts on each. Aidan murmurs about
how gross it is while I try not to look at anything too closely once skimming
for pictures or a location, anything specific to narrow the results. 
“No way,” Aidan says. He sees the link and description as I quickly click into
the photo set to confirm. “Oh, no way.”
It’s a handful of crooked cell phone photos taken from the front end of the
crash before the police arrived on the scene, before the ambulance arrived, the
raw reality of my complicated world laid bare. It’s not even that brutal of a
photo, no blood in sight, the bright splotch is a flashy red helmet with a
blonde braided ponytail curled on the pavement, a small gold curl in a shaky
picture. A horrible freak accident, this nightmarish truth of human fragility,
the motorcycle driver decapitated and it’s no wonder Cain can’t move. I didn't
get him a body at all. 
***** Chapter 11 *****
Aidan hands me two round pink pills and a microwave popcorn bucket with a
bottle of water resting inside. Looped into the crook of his elbow is a plastic
shopping bag full of other supplies from the convenience store. He dumps the
bag into the back floorboard and then takes the water bottle out of the popcorn
bucket that I’m just holding in both hands.
He twists off the cap some before nudging me with the partially-opened bottle.
“Here,” he says. He watches to make sure I swallow the medicine, drink some of
the water. My stomach cramps dangerously but accepts defeat now that my lunch
ended up splattered into the parking lot already.
In between finding the photos of the accident site and then trying to explain
to Cain, I choked on the words and it was a good thing we were stopped. Even if
Aidan did try to keep me in the car at first when I bolted into the door, but
soon as I started retching he almost shoved me into the pavement trying to
help.
“I’m okay,” I tell him. “I feel okay now.”
“Do you want me to drive, or…?”
I shake my head some. I drink more of the water and rub the back of my hand
over my sweat-slicked forehead. “I don’t know,” I say. “No, not yet.”
Aidan slides my laptop into his lap and brushes his finger over the trackpad to
make sure it stays awake. He clicks cautiously on a few things before simply
closing the lid. “Can you ask Cain about Deimos now?” Aidan glances over at me
as he packs away my laptop.
“I think it hurts him to talk. He’s being sulky, um, I can try though, I guess.
Cain --”
I can hear you, dumbass.
“Oh, right.” I pull my lip in to chew it, and Aidan comes closer to set a
reassuring hand on my arm. “Um, at the exorcism. Did you see the pretty blonde
with nice hair? The bossy one, Phobos, he said Deimos would want to come kill
me because of you. Because you’re a demon. What do I do about that?”
Nothing. You get me a body, and I’ll handle Deimos if he comes around, all
right? Listen up, Abel. Here’s what we’re going to do.
I press my knees together as I sit forward, my shoulders straighten. I’m ready
for Cain to tell me what to do, and I hear the strengthened rally of his voice.
He’s snapping the words at me in an assertive-brusque growl that’s masking his
pain better than the sarcasm and anger he tried before.
I’ve been thinking it over, and the situation’s critically fucked. I’m throwing
in the towel on this one. I’m going back to the Otherside. No point in sticking
around for a mess this big. Good try, though.
His sarcasm is full-throttle, but I’m just so disturbingly relieved that Cain
isn’t truly stuck in a headless corpse. I run my tongue over the scar on my
lips and stir in my seat. “I can’t kill anyone. Cain, I - I couldn’t even kill
a cat. I just can’t kill anything, I’m sorry. Is there another way I can bring
you across? Or can you come inside me again?”
I hear Cain’s deep, rumbling chuckle and shiver as I realize just what I asked.
“N-no,” I stammer. “That’s not what I meant.” I remember Aidan’s listening,
realize Aidan’s watching, look up to see Aidan staring and feel my nerves turn
molten fire with embarrassment.
Relax, sweetheart.
Cain purrs the words at me so that I squirm and shudder, gasp and moan as my
scar seems to blaze and grow numb all at once.
You’re close, kid. You’re close. I’ve found you, but this one’s too messy. Try
another. No witnesses, no police. Keep it clean.
“No, I can’t. Take me instead.” The words slip out of me, I can’t stop them.
“Take my body instead. Would that work? Take me. I’ll kill myself, will that
work?”
“Ethan, no!” Aidan vaults across the middle console and grabs my shoulders.
He’d be loud enough to drown out Cain if the response wasn’t just a ruefully
amused laugh. Bruises cut into me as Aidan shakes furiously to get my
attention. “Ethan, you are not killing yourself! Ethan!”
It’d probably work, but you’d be a dumbass to try it.
“Okay!” I yelp. “Okay, okay, I won’t. I won’t.” I hold my hands up defensively
and look reassuring enough that Aidan stops trying to cut off the circulation
to my arms. I look him squarely so he knows I’m talking to him and not Cain. “I
won’t.”
Aidan’s brow crushes together as he keeps his hands on me, he actually strokes
at my forehead like he’s feeling for a fever. “You’re not killing yourself.”
It’s remarkable how stern he sounds, considering how terribly I have terrified
him. We are so beyond ghost stories in tents now.
“Ethan?” he prompts. I’d been looking out the window listening for Cain, my
attention drifting enough that he noticed. “Ethan, look at me. You are not
killing yourself.”
“Cain says it’s a bad idea anyway. I won’t.”
Chalk-white devastation floods Aidan’s face as he stares at me. He chokes a
swallow that makes me think I might need to offer him the popcorn tub, the best
thing Aidan could find in the convenience store in case I got sick again while
he was driving.
“What are you going to do?” he asks me. “Ethan? What’s Cain telling you to do?”
“I don’t know. Cain says he’s going back to the Otherside. I need to kill
something else, or, I mean, find another dead body. Um --” Each word that I
utter makes Aidan flinch and squirm as if struck. I feel bad he has to listen
as I ask Cain, “What kind of rules are there? How soon after them dying can I
show up? How close do I need to be? Can I just walk up and down the hospital
hallway maybe? Sit in the waiting room? I’m not sure I can get into the I.C.U.
or the O.R. but --”
No. Fuck that. Miraculous recoveries aren’t clean, and it hurts like a
motherfucker to piece a body together.
“You did it to mine.”
I did it for you. There’s a difference.
Knots twist through my stomach at the tone Cain uses, snarky-soft something
that makes me think about kissing him, the scar, worse -- I think immediately
of Cain fucking me. I curl my knees into the passenger seat with me to try
escaping Aidan’s clutches a little. It works enough to get him slowly eased
back to his side of the car. He doesn’t take his hand from me, he keeps it on
my back in a way that suggest he’s ready to dig in for a fistful of sweatshirt
if he needs to.
I try to speak quietly. “You have a body on the Otherside. Can I bring it
across?”
Aidan wants me to talk to him again. I can tell by the way he strokes a hand
over my back and calls my name, but I turn my head aside so he knows I’m
listening for Cain. As I wait I drink more of the water and shake the
condensation from my fingertips.
I finish the water and toss the empty bottle into the backseat. “I’m okay if
you want to drive,” I say. “I think I’m okay now.”
“Okay,” says Aidan. He doesn’t move toward the wheel but instead keeps his hand
fisted into my sweatshirt hood. “What are you going to do?”
I shrug, which is at least genuinely honestly even if it’s not helpful for
Aidan. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.”
I do. Get someone alone, choke them out quick. Simple and clean. That’s how you
do it. I’ll handle the rest.
“I can’t. I won’t. No, I’m not killing anyone for you. I can’t do that.”
From Cain I get a furious snarl that’s like nails on chalkboard, like nails
raking hot coals over my heart, I push my forearm against the glovebox and
hunch into myself with a moan. Aidan grabs the popcorn tub and frisbees it to
floorboard between my ankles. I scrunch my eyes shut until Cain’s anger is less
intense, less palpable over the flare and burn of the scar he left me with.
When he speaks again it’s a measured warning full of dark promise, dire threat.
I could compel you, Ethan.
The breath leaves me in a rush. I know he could. I gave him my name. I gave him
my body. He owns me now, this demon. “Don’t,” I whisper. “Please.” The laugh I
get from Cain is rumbled cruel amusement, playful torment like when he fucked
me, and I wish Aidan wasn’t in the car within literal arms reach.
I press my body against itself, bury my face in my knees. I ball together
around the hard-pounding throb from the scar and my cock. I remember everything
about Cain fucking me and feel the overwhelming desire to find him, I need him,
I need to find Cain. If that means killing --
“No! No, I won’t. I don’t want to. I’m not killing anything!” I clamp my hands
over my ears and curl tighter. “I don’t want to!”
I’m sobbing when Aidan tugs me apart, gets the top half of me pulled into his
lap. “You don’t have to,” he tells me. “You’re not going to. Ethan, you’re not
going to kill anything.”
I never should have started listening to Cain. I knew it’d be like this. I
don’t know what else I thought to expect, I don’t know why I thought to do this
at all. I feel possessed again except my body is mine, Cain’s just a voice I
can hear -- not in a voice in my head except I can’t make him stop.
You dumb stupid kid.
Cain’s seething anger caresses smooth the jagged cuts he ripped into me, his
snarky raw roughness affectionate in its familiarity. It has to be because
Cain’s a demon that the rolling heat of his voice sets my nerves on fire.
Sure, why not. Why the fuck not, sweetheart. We do it your way. We do this the
hard way, because fucking Princess Abel can’t kill anyone. You are the dumbest
fucking necromancer.
A warm huff follows, an ethereal sigh like sparks and hot smoke escaping a
vent. I’m not sure if there are words tangle into the exasperated noise. I
hiccup a sob into Aidan’s thigh, press the hem of my sleeve into my eye to stop
crying. The grey fabric comes away dark and wet in a long oval.
“I don’t want to be a necromancer.”
Tough shit. I don’t want to be dead. You ready to stop sniveling and get to
summoning?
“No,” I mumble. Aidan’s hands tighten over my back. I’m whispering this into my
sleeves, I know him only hearing my half of every conversation makes it awful.
“Tell me what to do though.”
***** Chapter 12 *****
“This is such a bad idea,” says Aidan. “Tell me we aren’t going to do this.”
“I’m doing this,” I say quietly. I clench my hands into the beach towel
currently taking up space in my lap and stare forward out the front windshield
at the dark-rippling water. Aidan has the heat going full blast in the car
because I’m sitting in a pair of swim trunks and flip-flops, the temperature
outside is somewhere just above freezing, and I’m about to go fishing for
trouble in a very literal sense.
Aidan rubs his hands into the steering wheel and then rests his forehead into
the plastic curve. His eyes close as he sighs. “What if it doesn’t work?”
He pulls his head off the steering wheel and looks out at suddenly and grabs
his phone out of the console. I lean toward him and put a hand on his arm to
drag the phone screen nearer until I see he’s looking up how to give CPR.
”This is such a bad idea,” he says. He scrolls over the screen as he reads the
article, looks at the pictures. His eyes are intense on the small screen, he’s
going to memorize every word like prepping for a test.
“Most of Cain’s ideas are.” I offer Aidan a smile, but it’s not surprising he
doesn’t return it. He ignores me as he taps into another article on his phone.
“This’ll work though. I’ll be okay.”
Aidan’s expression twists, but he doesn’t say anything. He thumbs off his
phone’s screen and then tosses the device back into the console. He looks out
at the choppy waters of the lake and sighs. “Are you doing this no matter
what?”
“Yeah,” I say. “I’m doing this.”
“Okay,” he says. Resigned, like that was the answer he expected. “Then let’s do
this.”
Aidan grabs two fleece throw blankets out of the shopping bags in the backseat
and rips the price tag off one before tossing it at me. I pull it around my
shoulders as I stare at the water and try not to think about how cold I’m about
to be soon as I step out of the car. I try not to think about what I’m doing,
so I can focus on doing it.
“Whenever you’re ready,” Aidan says to me. He’s arranged the extra towels and
other blanket in the back, he’s popped open some instant hand warmers and has
them sitting piping-hot ready. I try not to think about how cold it’s going to
be outside the car.
I curl the blanket under my chin. “Yeah, okay. I’m ready.” I keep sitting there
a minute longer before grabbing the door handle and bursting into action.  
The cheap flip-flops snap into the bottom of my heels as I dash over the
pavement and then down the wooden pier. Aidan catches up to me when I’ve tossed
the towel and blanket both aside, climbed over the rail, and started lowering
myself down into the water. My shivering turns violent as the icy cut of the
water line finds my toes, ankles, the rest of my legs, I force myself to let go
of the wood and fall into the frigid lake. It sucks the breath from my lungs,
pulls a yelped curse from me. I shiver, my teeth chatter, I try not to think
about it.
“You okay?” Aidan asks. He sits with one arm braced through the rail and
dangles his feet and other arm toward the water. My chauffeur turned bodyguard
turned attack dog is now pulling double duty as a ladder and lifeguard.
Swears whisper over my shivering lips as I huddle into the submerged support
beam, the slimy-slick wood somehow marginally warmer than the surrounding dark
water. I force myself to let go and stutter my arms into the water to paddle
from underneath the pier.
“It’s so c-c-cold!” I nearly crush my tongue on my chattering teeth as I speak.
I try not to think about what I’m doing. I plunge under the water to check the
depth and know it could be deeper, have no idea if this is going to work, feel
terrified and rocket back to the surface.
Icy tendrils drip from my hair when I resurface, and I wipe a hand over my face
to clear my eyes. “I’m not sure I can do this,” I call to Aidan. I jerk my
limbs to tread water, I’m shivering so impossibly hard that it’s all I can do
move in ways that aren’t spastic twitches and flails.
Aidan leans toward me looking relieved. “Okay. Give me your hand, I’ll pull you
out.”
I shake my head. “No. No, I have to do this. I can do this.”
I drift back from the pier, swim out a little ways until I hear Aidan call
nervously after me. He grips the rail as he stands. It’ll take a swan dive and
several hard breaststrokes for him to get to me now, but Aidan’s always been a
better swimmer than me. It’s oddly reassuring to think about all the times I’ve
gone swimming with Aidan, seen Aidan swimming, I know he’s a strong swimmer.
My parents have a lake house, couple hours away, where they keep the boat,
where Aidan and I spent a lot of time in the summer, I should have made Aidan
drive me out there. I could have done this during the daytime had a lot more
privacy than this lake in the center of town where people go jogging in the
mornings, where teenagers make out on the playground equipment, and where
apparently I’m going to summon a demon from the Otherside.
“Okay. I’m going to do it.” I take several deep breaths and then slip under the
water. I hear Aidan call after me just before cold oblivion rushes into my
ears, so I miss the words. Knowing him it was ‘okay’ back or maybe ‘be careful’
or possibly ‘hurry’ because I might freeze to death before I can find Cain.
I dive with a hand outstretched until my fingertips brush the mud and muck at
the bottom of the lake. I pull my hand back and try to forget exactly where I
am, try to think only about Cain. The cold crushes my chest, it’s so cold it
hurts, and I try not to count the seconds as I hold my breath. I don’t think
this is going to work, I don’t see how this can work, Cain couldn’t be serious
when he suggested this as an option. This has to be punishment for not wanting
to kill anyone.
The first uncomfortable twinges I can relieve by letting a trickle of bubbles
escape, but it doesn’t seem long at all before panicked pressure builds and
builds. My body twists and thrashes, my lungs feel like bursting, I claw into
the mud as I struggle not to let natural buoyancy take over. The cold helps, it
makes it hard to move, my eyes open and then scrunch close. It’s so impossibly
dark under the water, there’s nothing to see except my own panicking limbs, all
those bubbles.
I need to focus on finding Cain and not pay attention to the desperate jerk and
shudder of my cold, submerged body. If Cain can’t find me, is Aidan going to be
able to find me? How long is he going to wait before jumping in after me
anyway? I told him to wait twice as long as he thinks this should take and then
to wait a minute extra to be sure, but he knows I can’t hold my breath more
than a minute anyway. He’s a better swimmer than me. It’s pitch black under the
water, Aidan’s going to have a hard time finding me.
I don’t need Aidan to find me, though, because I’m going to find Cain. Except
I’m not sure this is going to work. I told Aidan it would, promised him this
would work, I have to believe this is going to work. Cain said he’d find me,
and how can I be hard to find? I’m right where I said I would be -- alone,
dying, submerged in darkness, oblivious to everything that isn’t this moment
and my thoughts of Cain.
And then I hear him, I hear this beautiful soft voice that makes my heart leap.
Gotcha.
Suddenly I don’t feel cold anymore -- I feel hot. Heat flows over me, a warmth
that starts at my lips and spreads. I reach desperately, strain my hand into
the void with the same desperation as my lungs strain for air, and then I feel
a hand clasp into mine.
Breaking to the surface is like all the lights going on at once. First thing I
hear once the water drains from my ears is Aidan, shrieking. Black void takes
shape into shadows, city lights, the choppy break of the water. Cold air slaps
my face, I choke mouthfuls of the lake over my chin and rake hard with my lungs
to snatch at the chill.
“Quit your screaming!”
The rumble and vibration of Cain’s voice sears into my chest, traces into the
spots on me he’s holding. I’m cinched under his arm, pulled into him, this
can’t be happening. I can’t believe it worked.
Cain tugs me along as he swims, it’s his same body as I saw on the Otherside
except he’s wearing nothing but water. I feel nothing but water and Cain, not
even the cold. It has to be because he’s a demon that it’s hot where Cain holds
me.
That or I have hypothermia, I think I might be half-drowned. All I do is cough
and choke trying to breathe as Cain swims back to the pier where Aidan is
waiting.
“I remember you,” says Cain. His brusque rude tone borders on hostile. “You’re
the friend too good to fuck.”
White gleams all around the frightened circle of Aidan’s eyes. His hands
tremble as they snatch fistfuls of me away from Cain. He hauls me into the
railing. I drape half my body over it trying to hold on with the numb weight of
my arms.
Aidan notches his foot into the wood and vaults over. He pulls me onto the pier
and gets the towel around me, envelops me into the blanket, I’m moving on my
own enough to nudge blocky-cold feet into flip-flops even if it takes three or
six shivering attempts.
Half this shaking isn’t me, I realize it’s Aidan shaking me and hissing softly,
“Ethan, go to the car! Go back to the car!”
“C-Cain,” I shiver. I’ve started to shake and shudder, I think that means
circulation’s returning. Aidan frisks his hands over my arms, my back, trying
to rub warmth into me even as he’s trying to shove me into motion.
He gets me moving forward despite the way I keep twisting to look back for
Cain. I stare over Aidan’s shoulder at where a completely naked Cain climbs up
the side of the pier. Aidan glances and then turns his whole head to start
staring. His fingers grip into me with a gasp.
A sneering toothy grin spreads over Cain’s face as he strides toward us,
completely unabashed to be nude. He stalks likes a panther approaching prey. He
looks demonic, a handsome devil of a young man, some punk prankster dripping
wet and shivering. I can’t believe he’s shivering. I can’t believe this worked.
“Fucking freezing out here,” Cain says. He looks to the parking lot where the
old sedan’s advertising loudly that it’s warm and waiting. “That your car?”
He barely waits for the affirmative stammer from Aidan. Cain slings his arm
around my shoulders to drag me forward. Aidan grabs hold of my hand like it’s
going to be a fight only until he realizes Cain’s taking me to the same place
he wants me to go anyway.
“Backseat,” I tell Cain. “Towels there.” It’s teeth-chattering cold again,
wracking shivers with pins-and-needles replacing the leadened numb. I assault
the uncontrollable waver of my hand toward the door handle only to have Cain
beat me to it. He throws open the car, shoves me inside, and then immediately
follows in after me.
Hot air fills the car, I hear Cain groan appreciatively and remember that he
was shivering. What kind of demon shivers? I find myself staring at him, I just
cannot stop staring at Cain and not just because he’s naked. I am mesmerized by
the way his fingers flex and bend to pick up the towel off the seat. Blunt-
edged nails cap the slender lengths of dusky-tan skin. Shouldn’t a demon have
claws? Cain only has fingers, normal human-looking fingers.
I slowly remember to rub the towel into my hair only because Cain does it with
the other towel. I’m already wrapped in a blanket, but I remember as well to
stop dripping water into the second blanket and offer it to Cain. “Here.”
The driver door flies open long enough to let Aidan tackle the seat like he’s
expecting to fight. He grabs at the keys and the wheel, one in each hand. The
door closes after him. He stares at us both in the backseat and lets out a held
breath. “This is Cain?”
“Yeah,” answers Cain. He rubs the towel down from his hair to let it drape over
his shoulders.
Aidan’s works together another calm breath and then nods. “Okay,” he says. He
turns around long enough to fasten his seatbelt before deciding he doesn’t want
to keep his eyes off Cain either.
With all the doors closed the car goes dark again except for the glow of the
dash. Aidan has the headlights off, the car’s idling at a low purr, Cain’s dark
eyes surely cannot be glowing either as he watches us both just stare at him.
Cain shifts and says, “I’ll drive.”
“No. No, nope. I’ll drive.” Aidan snaps around in his seat and throws the car
into reverse. I see him look wildly to double-check that I’m in the car, and
then he jerks us back with a loud squeal of rubber on pavement. He wheels hard
to the right and starts to brake but not all the way. The car’s still rolling
as he shifts into gear. “I’m driving,” he says firmly. “This is my car, I’m
driving.”
Aidan glances back in the mirror to check on Cain, but he’s lost interest now
that we’re moving and the matter established. This demon I pulled from the
Otherside simply sits in the backseat of my best friend’s car, entirely too
real, not wearing more than a blanket and towel.
***** Chapter 13 *****
Cain’s dark eyes gleam in the passing streetlights as Aidan drives anywhere
that’s not letting a demon behind the wheel of his car. I huddle into the
blanket, get cozy with the hand-warmers to coax feeling back into my numbed
fingers and toes. My reflection in the dark glass of the window is pale,
tremulous, I’m a drowned-looking cold thing lumped into the back of Aidan’s
car.
Suddenly Cain leans into the middle console. Aidan grips the wheel like he’s
expecting a fight as he glances over, but Cain only reaches for the volume on
the radio. He cranks the vapid pop music and then starts spinning the tuner to
scroll the digital indicator through stations. He finds static, a commercial
for a car dealership, country music, rap, another commercial, and then settles
on rock music. Cain next starts messing with the air vents, he pokes the dome
light on and off, he adjusts the audio balance between the speakers. He hits
the eject button to get a long-forgotten CD spat at him, and then he
immediately feeds the disc back into the slot.
“Huh,” Cain says quietly. He’s scowling at everything like it annoys him,
amuses him, like he’s trying to figure out my complicated world just as much as
I stumbled around trying to feel shadows and smoke on the Otherside.
He flops into the backseat again, and I’m horrified on Aidan’s behalf at the
casual way Cain sprawls wet and naked across the leather grain of the seats.
The towel and blanket barely keep him decent. I try not to stare, but of course
I’m staring at Cain. Even Aidan’s trying to stare in the rearview mirror. It’s
impossible not to stare at Cain, especially he starts watching me back.  
Streetlights pass over Cain’s face, and I have to be imagining that his eyes
stay bright each time it gets dark. He’s scowling, half-annoyed but starting to
smirk and smolder as we sit staring at each other in the quiet dark backseat of
the car. His hand reaches out to grip my chin as he did before, when we met on
the Otherside. I wonder how different I look to him, if I look different at
all, because he looks exactly the same to me. I don’t know what on Cain I want
to stare at the most, but with his hand holding my face I find myself focusing
on the dark entirety of his eyes. I become obsessed with looking for the shaded
difference between pupil and iris.
Cain runs the edge of his thumb over my lower lip, and it’s a touch that traces
fire. I shift closer to him, feel pulled toward him by the caress. I feel the
warm skin of his leg against mine as I abandon my half of the backseat to get
nearer to Cain.
My fingertips brush over the back of his hand, they circle his wrist and glide
along his arm. He’s just all this warm, damp skin for me to feel. I move an
entranced gaze over his face, his glistening wet hair, I watch my own hand as I
touch Cain’s shoulder and then neck. Cain cocks his head to the side some as I
feel the thrum of pulse at his throat. I can’t believe that he’s really here in
my warm safe living world.
I watch the rise and fall of his chest, as mesmerized by that as anything else
about him. I keep my fingers on his pulse, stare at the smirking set of his
lips. I tell myself I can’t really hear each soft breath and heartbeat beneath
the noise of the radio, I tell myself that it’s only my imagination that Cain
seems to get closer and closer because he’s not moving.
I’m the one moving, I’m the one pressing against Cain for a kiss. The scar
flares, small sounds of desire pour from my throat, I make the most terribly
lewd moan when Cain kisses me.
I see the close-up gleam of Cain’s eyes before his lashes close, my lashes
close, I’ve started this tender, warm kiss between us that ignites into flame
when Cain responds. His touch is a match tossed into the hapless kindling he
put inside me. I’m burning, hot hard burning for Cain.
I grip my left hand into Cain’s shoulder, curl my right hand against his wet
hair. He strokes a callused palm over my knee, sets a hand into my lower back,
uses his touch to guide the way I spread into his lap. He kisses me with a
sultry eagerness that’s pure sin because he’s a demon, his touch is a poisoned
addiction that saps my strength and numbs my thoughts.
I’ve forgotten all about Aidan until he slams on the brakes. I collide into the
back of the empty passenger seat and then nearly crash foreheads into Cain. I
yelp, Cain snarls, the car rocks to a halt amid Aidan’s startled, “Oh fuck!”
“No, nope. No way,” Aidan says. “Not happening.” He throws the car into park
and then twists in his seat. He glares at Cain -- my sweet, shy best friend
looks ready to start throwing punches as he glares down Cain.
I trust nothing about the sardonic twist of Cain’s mouth, but I’m almost too
frightened to look at him at all. I can’t believe I was kissing him. I can’t
believe my dick’s this hard just from kissing Cain. I can’t believe I want Cain
to fuck me again so desperately that I climbed on top of him in the backseat of
Aidan’s car.
Aidan’s hand closes over my arm. “Get in the passenger seat.”
I should explain, in case he was more focused on driving than watching us, but
Aidan pulls like he’s just going to drag me off Cain if he must. He gets a
second hand on me to try getting more of me away from Cain faster. He’s frantic
to get me away from Cain, even though Cain’s not putting up a fight at all.
There is indescribable danger in the lazily-frustrated and half-amused way this
demon watches these two dumb kids scramble around scared of him.
I have to look away from Cain before I can actually start moving away from him
as well. I should explain this to Aidan, except, I’m not sure at all how to
explain that I’m crazy enough to want to fuck a demon.
I clamber between the seats and then reach back to get my towel. I try to flash
Cain an apologetic, sheepish smile, but when his brooding glare shifts to me I
nearly swallow my own tongue. I want him like I’ve never wanted anything in my
life, and it’s terrifying. My desire is an unmanageable beast within me clawing
to get free.
Meekly I face forward and get the towel under me to spare Aidan’s seats from my
wet swim trunks. I can’t risk looking at Cain again. I barely want to be in the
car with Cain anymore. Now that I’m not looking at him -- not touching him -
- it’s easier to think about things that aren’t Cain.
Once Aidan has me in the front half of the car with him, he starts to snatch at
our belongings. He wants more things away from Cain, I guess, and not just me.
My backpack gets moved into the floorboard of the passenger seat along with one
of the shopping bags. As the crinkle of plastic and fabric hits my ankles I see
it’s the one holding my sweatshirt, jeans, and sneakers.
Since I’m too scared to look back at Cain, I watch Aidan and find him no less
easier to observe. He looks as desperately scared as I feel, probably for the
same reason, maybe for entirely different reasons. I wonder if he didn’t really
believe me about Cain, even after everything, because certainly everything
about this is unbelievable.
Aidan touches lightly at my knee. “Get dressed.” He murmurs to slip the words
beneath the background blaring CD mix. He glances toward Cain and then doesn’t
say anything else as he pulls away from the curb. When he switches turn signals
to avoid waiting at a red light,  I realize he’s just driving again without a
destination in mind.
I look down at the shopping bag and grab handfuls of fabric, I tug into my
sweatshirt first and then next warm socks from my backpack. I try to tell
myself everyone in the car’s already seen me naked at some point or another,
but I still feel shy about stripping out of the swim trunks to get slipped into
clean boxers.
I’m tugging my jeans into place when Cain’s left hand grips the back of Aidan’s
seat. His right elbow goes into my seat’s headrest as he leans forward. He
takes up an exorbitant amount of space within the confines of the car. The
lights of the dashboard illuminate his sharp scowling expression in strange
soft ways. I scoot nearer to the window, because I can’t keep my eyes off Cain.
Cain looks out the front windshield at the spread of city, and then he just
starts watching Aidan drive. Understandably this makes Aidan incredibly
nervous, and I don’t blame him in the least for looking more and more panicked
the longer that Cain keeps silent.
Finally Cain asks, “How much longer until we’re there?”
Impatience flattens his mouth and sets a downward pluck into his dark brows.
He’s looking to me for the answer, because somehow Cain still thinks I’m going
to know anything. “Uh, um.” I find my mind entirely blank of anything except
the truth. “I don’t know. We’re just, um, driving.”
It makes Cain chuckle, and his brusque laughter draws a smile over my face. I’m
cognizant of the way my cheeks wrinkle and my lips spread, but the gesture
doesn’t seem fully formed -- it doesn’t seem to be entirely my doing. My body
wants to behave in strange ways around Cain. I want to throw myself into his
arms again. I dig my fingers into the seat cushion instead.
“Just driving, huh?” Blunt-edged nails snip playfully at the back of my neck.
The strain of my body’s desire for Cain is torturous. I manage a nod. “Y-yeah.”
Cain smolders a sideways glance to Aidan for a moment before shifting the full
of his attention back to me. “Hot shower and a bed sounds real fucking great,
don’t you think?”
Snarky, sarcastic, like he’s mad I’m not already thinking about these things. A
squiggly line between his brows draws my attention, and it takes nearly every
ounce of willpower I possess not to reach out and try smoothing the creased
skin.
Within me worry takes root and blooms as Cain speaks again, as he shifts
further into a braced lean. It has to be my imagination that Cain seems
exhausted. “What’s the matter, sweetheart? Scared to take me home to meet Mommy
and Daddy?”
He rumbles a soft, mocking laugh that doesn’t make it any easier for me to pay
attention to what he’s asked, how he’s asked it. Not helping either is the slow
pluck of his fingers, the irresistible lure of Cain being this close. The tight
clench of my fingers into the seat cushion slowly eases. I move a hand toward
Cain. I’ve forgotten about Aidan again, forgotten about everything except Cain.
I remember the raw, ragged strain of Cain’s voice earlier calling to me from
the ruined body of the motorcyclist, how tormented and hurt he sounded.
I sweep the tentative caress of my touch over Cain’s hair, behind his ear, his
cheek, I cup his face with both hands. The tender warmth of a pink-tinged blush
fills me, and my lips part in anticipation of a kiss. When I lean toward Cain,
though, I catch a glimpse of the way Aidan’s staring. His knuckles are stark
white against the wheel. He's ready to plow the car into oncoming traffic in
order to keep me off Cain.
My heart’s pounding as I pull my hands from Cain. I settle them into my lap, I
knit the fingers together. “I can’t go home,” I say.
“Why not?” Cain demands. “That house was swank.”
The up and down hunch of my shoulders can’t give him much of an answer, nor
does the way I start slouching. I look at my hands rather than face Cain’s
likely anger. I’m not prepared to articulate just all the reasons why I no
longer fit into the place my parents made for me. I’m too scared to even admit
how much the idea of going home frightens me and fills me with despair.
“His parents think he’s crazy now thanks to you,” says Aidan. “That’s why he
can’t go home. You’ve ruined his life.”
It’s blunt and quick like the swing of a bat, so all I can think about is the
little league game where Aidan hit a homerun. It’s the dumbest thing to
suddenly think about, but I remember the searing heat of the day, the pinging
crack of the aluminium bat, the soaring little white dot, the look of dazed
disbelief on Aidan’s round face as he had to run around all the bases. Slow,
pudgy, awkward little Aidan, who only joined the team because his best friend
wanted to, winning for us the last game of the season. I remember bouncing up
and down inside the dugout screaming encouragement as loud as one eleven-year-
old can scream, and I wonder if I started screaming like that now if Aidan
would understand.
Aidan keeps going. He is nowhere near around all the bases yet. “Dartmouth,
Stanford, MIT, CalTech -- none of them are going to take him now. His grades
aren’t the best anymore, he’s been out of his mind crazy because of you messing
with his life. You want him to kill people, and now there’s someone trying to
kill him because of you. So where’s the first place they’re going to think to
look? His house, maybe at school, and where are the two places his parents are
going to keep him just as soon as get their hands on him? His house and school.
Assuming he isn’t just hospitalized right away, that’s a possibility, he’s
still a minor.”
“You’ve really messed this up for him. Just, everything. His whole life.
Totally fucked.” The light ahead turns yellow, and Aidan slows slightly before
deciding to burst through the intersection instead.
I hear Cain say, “Huh,” just as quiet and strange with it as when he was
exploring the stereo system on the car. Then Cain’s hand tousles my damp hair,
he pushes from a hard forward lean.  
I turn my head some to watch peripherally as Cain settles into the backseat
again. Cain drapes his arm over the rear deck of the sedan. “I said I’d handle
Deimos,” he sneers. Noticeably he offers no apology or explanation for the rest
of Aidan’s accusations. I’m still trying to process them, and they were about
me.
Aidan says nothing further, neither does Cain, I’m terrified of opening my
mouth and making this somehow worse so I stay silent as well. The radio
compensates but can’t make it any less awkward and tense. I keep my eyes on my
lap, on my hands. Entirely too much awkward emptiness occupies my thoughts
until I think to get out my phone. Hopefully it'll help distract me from
thoughts of Cain, of how much I want to kiss him. There is a terrifying depth
of want within me regarding Cain that I'm not prepared to think about.  
After a few minutes I realize Cain’s going to see the glow in my lap and
hastily thumb off the screen before he can ask to use the internet again. I
turn some to peek at Cain and then turn further as the cautious glance turns
into staring. Once we’re at a red light Aidan can’t skip, I reach my hand over
and gently pat at his leg. I nod my head toward Cain, because I’m pretty
certain he’s fallen asleep. His head’s rolled into the crook between his
shoulder and the headrest, the blanket’s pull across him like he put it there
on purpose, and he’s stopped scowling at everything. 
Though that line’s still between his brows, that line I wanted to smooth with
my touch. I can too easily see for myself that he’s not bruised or bleeding
anywhere, but I know he’s in pain. I just do, I know Cain’s hurt. He somehow
looks all the more exhausted asleep. I don’t think any of this has been easy on
him either. 
A different red light, Aidan’s turn to reach over only he’s not being gentle
about it. He’s trying to push me, shake me, and I realize I’m turned around in
my seat staring at Cain. I’m clutching the back of the seat, my cheek’s rested
against the headrest, and as I startle out of that position I feel my
expression rearrange. I think Aidan just caught me literally sighing over Cain
like he’s a hurt puppy.
“Stop that,” Aidan hisses at me. “Ethan, he is a demon.”
“Okay. Okay, I know.” I fight Aidan off me and sulk low into my seat. I shift
to where I can’t see Cain and then look out the window.
My gaze settles on the side mirror, at the slivered reflection of the car’s
interior. I wonder if Cain’s okay. He’s not usually this quiet. I can’t believe
he’s sleeping. I pull my eyes from Cain’s shadowed reflection. Aidan leans
forward to check if the intersection is clear and catches my eye. We swap
mutual apologetic smiles. 
He reaches to turn down the radio and then instead shifts the audio to the back
speakers. He fiddles with it while keeping an eye on Cain in the rearview
mirror. Once he’s happy with the volume he asks me, “Where do you want to go?”
I shake my head some and say, “I don’t know. Somewhere, wherever. You can’t
drive all night.” 
“I could maybe,” Aidan says. The squared, determine set of his mouth tells me
he’s serious. “I’ll stay awake and drive. Let's stop to get coffee."
I smile some and comb the rapidly drying fluff of my bangs to one side. “You
are not driving all night," I insist. "We should stop somewhere. Cain’s right
that a hot shower and bed sounds nice.”
Aidan shakes his head. “We’re safer if we keep moving.”
“Cain said he’d handle Deimos,” I counter.
Disapproval twists the stubborn set of Aidan’s mouth. When he glances over at
me, though, his expression softens into that pitiful one where he’s realized
I’m crazy. “Okay,” he says. Quiet, placating, and he sets a comforting hand on
my knee. His hand stays there as he drives.
We’re done talking about what to do, apparently. Aidan’s realized I only want
to do what Cain wants to do, because I’m crazy enough to listen to a demon. I
didn’t even have to explain to him that I’m crazy enough to want to fuck a
demon, too, because I’m pretty sure he’s figured that out as well. He’s figured
out I’m sitting over here having lusty gay thoughts about this hot naked man
currently asleep in the backseat of the car, and I wish it was just that
simple. I wish Cain wasn’t a demon. I wish so desperately I didn’t have to be
crazy.
My gaze drifts to the side mirror and the dim reflection of the car’s interior.
An entire childhood of getting to tell Aidan what to do because I could be
trusted with it -- I was faster, tougher, smarter, bolder, more outgoing, more
popular. I was always getting new toys and attention and best of all, I liked
Aidan enough to be his fiercely loyal best friend even though he was such an
awkwardly shy and timid kid, bullied sometimes when I wasn’t around to stop it,
always picked last when I wasn’t there to pick him first.
That day he hit the homerun, my mom took us out for ice cream afterward. I
couldn’t shut up about how cool it was, how great it was. Aidan mumbled
something about how he wished his family could’ve seen it, and that made me
realize that my mom always drove us since Aidan’s mom was busy with his baby
sisters. Three seasons of little league, and I never once saw Aidan’s mom at a
game or practice, never saw his stepdad or half-sisters. We ate ice cream in
silence after that. We played video games the rest of the day. Aidan stayed the
night. My parents woke us up fighting. I remember being embarrassed, angry,
feeling betrayed that my normally quiet and empty house was being filled with
their problems.
It was the first night I saw Aidan’s expression soften with sudden
understanding that his all-star perfect best friend’s life wasn’t so perfect
after all. That night Aidan whispered to me about the kind of fighting his
parents did before getting divorced, and he told me he was too happy about the
lack of bruises on his mom to ever complain about feeling left out of her busy
new life.
My parents wanted me to fit into the place they made for me so much they
ignored the actual shape I wanted to be. I’m the epitome of square peg, round
hole. That round, normal life with NASA posters, straight-As, asking pretty
Stacy Gershwin to prom, little league and Ivy League, a life I lost in the
careless instant I slipped on the deck of my father’s boat. Me hitting that
rail, going into the water, it killed the boy my parents wanted me to be, the
one they think they can still make me into if they squeeze hard enough.  
But Aidan’s mom, she wanted to make a place for him but just didn’t have the
time. She was too busy fixing things, too busy getting out of a bad marriage
and into a good one, and Aidan’s such a good kid that he did the work for her.
He found a place for himself outside of the happy domestic chaos of his mom’s
new life -- he found me, and he found a place at my empty house when his was
too full of the family he’s half-and-step part of anyway.  
I turn my face from the window. I look away from Cain’s reflection to focus on
Aidan, until he notices and glances over with a worried, encouraging smile.
“Okay?” he asks. He squeezes my knee when I don’t say anything right away, when
I just keep staring at him. “Hey, you okay?”
“Yeah.” Belatedly I drag my eyes off Aidan, force myself to stare out the
windshield at the hood ornament. I don’t say anything else or elaborate,
because the truth is that I’m not okay. I’m not okay at all with the
realization that I’m ruining Aidan’s life.
 
***** Chapter 14 *****
There’s a logic puzzle about a farmer needing to cross the river with a fox, a
chicken, and a bag of grain. He can only take one thing on the boat with him,
and left unattended the fox’s going to eat the chicken, the chicken will eat
the grain, it’s a classic puzzle. I can’t remember the solution.
Someone has to go inside the store to buy Cain clothes. As the naked one, Cain
stays inside the car. Cain cannot be left alone with the car, and Aidan doesn’t
want to leave me alone with Cain. Equally unpleasant for Aidan is being left
alone with a demon, even one sleeping like Cain. I’m not sure if it would help
Aidan decide what to do if I explained about the river crossing riddle.
I end up being sent inside to negotiate the midnight megamart crowd alone.
Aidan stays to guard over his car and Cain alike. We text continuously to
reassure the other it’s okay. At first I pretend to need help eyeballing Cain’s
size before we settle on medium. Then Aidan asks if I’ll get him a bottled
coffee. Flavor options and then a long series of mutual OKs about nothing
follow.
Aidan is painfully relieved when I return to the car. He’s left it running for
both the heat and the music, anything to keep the status quo with Cain asleep.
The front seat and floorboard overflow with the shopping bags even before I
squeeze underneath and around them to make the crowded situation worse.
“Got it?” Aidan asks. He helps get me a little less buried by transferring a
few things into the back behind his seat.
“Yeah.” I glance at Cain briefly, which means only as long as it takes Aidan to
leave the parking lot. If I keep watching Cain then I’ll be too tempted to wake
him up, too tempted to ask if he’s okay. It strikes me as especially cruel that
all Cain wanted was a hot shower and a bed, but we’re making him sleep in the
backseat of the car with just a cheap throw blanket for comfort.
Aidan’s hand jostles my shoulder. “Hey.”
“Yeah, okay.” I’m already turning around to face out the front of the car
again, so I just flash Aidan a meek, apologetic smile. Much as I’ve ruined his
life already, the least I can do is spare him the torment of playing chaperone
on top of everything else. 
He smiles and twists open the bottled coffee. I help clear space for him to use
the cup holder, and Aidan settles in with stubborn determination to keep
ruining his life. I wait until we’re on the highway, when Aidan’s got the
cruise control set. I wait until he’s relaxed and not expecting trouble.
I ask it quietly, put my eyes down at my knotted hands. “Will you go to school
tomorrow?”
“What?” He sounds as startled as I anticipated, but I don’t glance up to see
his expression.
“Tomorrow, school. Will you go? Promise me you’ll go. I want you to go to
school tomorrow.” I tighten the nervous, tangled ball of my fingers. “Will
you?”
A long silence between us stretches, even though the minutes themselves are
noisy. There’s the rumbling purr of the old sedan’s engine, the spin and rush
of the tires over the pavement, the droning beat and wail of the stereo system.
I look at my hands. I bet Aidan’s watching the road. Both of us are probably
thinking the same kind of things.
Aidan’s only got this last semester and then he’s done, graduated, with the
state college already accepting him under early decision. He has a scholarship
waiting. He’s going to live in the dorms. I didn’t apply anywhere in-state. We
figured it out early that we wouldn’t be going to the same college, resigned
ourselves to the inevitability of getting separated this summer. He’d move into
the dorms at his school, I’d move into the dorms in mine, there would always be
chatting online, texting, we just wouldn’t get to hang out in person anymore.
I’d come home for long weekends and holidays, so would he, and we’d see each
other then, it didn’t seem like a big deal.
Now Aidan’s right -- I’m not getting into any of the schools I applied to, not
with the way my grades have been, with the test scores I submitted. Not with
the way my life derailed between fourteen and fifteen. I’m not going to
college. I’m not going to finish high school. I don’t know what I’m going to
do, but I know my life is over. 
Aidan shifts in his seat. “I’ll go if you go,” he says. “I’m not leaving you
alone.”
I don’t think if I said my immediate plan was to stay with Cain that Aidan
would be reassured. “I can’t go. If I go to school then I’ll have to go home,
too. And you said it yourself, I can’t go home. You can, though. You can go
home.”
From Aidan I get a sigh and then more silence. I peek up from my lap to watch
him instead. Aidan checks the rearview and left side mirror before drifting a
lane over. We roll past a slow-moving semi.
“If I show up at school without you, I’m going to get a lot of questions about
where you are,” Aidan says. He’s thought it out enough to start arguing with
me. “And then who knows if I’ll be able to meet back up with you later. I might
get grounded for life. Or at least until graduation.”
I’m hoping exactly that happens, but I don’t say it to Aidan. I just shrug.
“I’ll have my phone,” I say.
Aidan shakes his head. “No,” he says softly. He reaches over and touches my
leg, pats my knee, leaves his hand there. “We should stick together.”
I promised Aidan I wouldn’t run off again, but if he’s going to be this
stubborn than I don’t see how I have a choice. I’m ruining his life. I can’t
ruin Aidan’s life. I know entirely too much how painful, humiliating, and
terrifying it is to lose control of your life. I don’t want him to be tormented
by dead things, I don’t want him to feel isolated from everyone and everything
that once brought him comfort, happiness, and a sense of belonging somewhere.
The only place I feel like I belong anymore is here in the passenger seat of
Aidan’s car. It’s the only place I feel sane. Since all this started, he wanted
so desperately to believe me -- to believe in me, that I wasn’t crazy or if I
was crazy that I could beat it, I could get over my mental breakdown like it
was strep throat or bronchitis. He wanted to help. Seances, ouija boards,
anything out of books or off the internet that I thought might work, he was
willing to help.  
I don’t want to lose Aidan. He’s my best friend. I stare at the steering wheel
and wonder if I yanked hard if the resulting crash would kill us. It’d
certainly attract a lot of attention and trouble, all those impossibly
complicated things about my safe, regulated world that make things difficult
for Cain.
Aidan shakes my knee again. “Hey. Ethan.”
“Yeah. Yeah,” I say quickly. I snap my gaze from the steering wheel to the hood
ornament and then turn to face the window. I don’t want Aidan able to see me
get zoned out like that so easily. I think I must look too obviously
devastated, too obviously floundering around in dangerous waters about to make
a bad decision.
“What are you going to do?” he asks. Quietly, like he’s dreading the answer.
I shrug and then decide to be honest. “Whatever Cain wants.”
From the corner of my eye I watch Aidan frown, fret, look devastated and
floundering in his own way. His desire to somehow help, to somehow fix this,
it’s overwhelming. His expression knots my stomach, hurts my chest, I have to
look out the window. He’s forever going to be on the safety of the pier
watching me swim toward my own reckless self-destruction.
“Maybe kill myself,” I say.
I don’t mean to say it. The words slip over my red-marked lips in the heavy
sigh of my breath. I want to snatch them back just as soon as I’ve said them.
Quickly I say, “I won’t. I won’t. Sorry. That’s not what Cain wants me to do, I
won’t do that.”
Aidan’s silent. I don’t look to see what he’s doing. Driving, assumably, since
he decides to take one of the exits, he’s done with the highway. I don’t care
what’s happened to put us on this particular stretch of pavement, he probably
doesn’t either. He plans to keep moving forward.
At least until I start screaming at him to stop. I dive sideways to grab at
Aidan's shoulder, his arm, the steering wheel, I’m all over him shouting,
“Stop! Stop, Aidan, stop!”
“Ethan!” He shrieks my name with cutting layers of panic and tries to shove me
off him. His foot finds the brake pedal, the car skids and then cuts to the
side as it drifts.
I hear deep snarling from Cain that announces he’s awake and unhappy with the
circumstances. We narrowly avoid catastrophe. The car crunches into a sideways
halt on the shoulder, front corner nudged flush into the retaining wall at low
enough speed that it’s harmless. A dent in the front bumper maybe.
I burst the door open soon as I can and one of the shopping bags tumbles out
with me. I hear Aidan and Cain’s voices overlapping except I’m already running,
already gone, flying down the shoulder to get a better look at what I’m pretty
sure I just saw.
I’m not exactly certain why my first impulse is to run toward a headless corpse
standing in the middle of the highway. I don’t need a dead body -- I don’t need
this dead body in particular, but clearly my horror movie survival skills are
as bad as Aidan’s because here I am running toward something dead. As I realize
just exactly what I’m doing, I start to slow from a run into a jog. When the
headless motorcyclist turns toward me holding a flashy red helmet, I stagger to
a halt and start screaming.
Under the pallor-cast destruction of the harsh streetlights, the dripping
length of blonde braid shines bright. A black curve of face shield works with
the red shell to obscure the rest of what that braid’s attached to, but I’m not
stupid. I can see the gore-topped stump of a neck sticking out of the
motorcyclist’s sleek black jacket.
There’s a good thirty feet or so between me and this dead body. I whirl to put
more distance between us and collide into Aidan’s chest. He grabs me, but I am
a hysterically-shrieking flail of panic and terror for him to try holding.
The dead thing turned toward me like it saw me, like it knew I was there. I see
it shift the helmet under one arm and come closer. I let out a blood-curdling
scream that’s so loud and desperate it hurts. I kick Aidan in the shins to get
him to let me go and then start running back toward the car.
I run toward Cain, specifically. He’s put on the jeans I bought him and gotten
out of the car. He has an angry scowl ready for whatever’s woken him. He’s
barefoot, shirtless, it’s too cold for only pants but at least he bothered with
pants first. I got the inseam length wrong, I obviously got the size wrong,
those jeans don’t really fit him. Somehow, that’s what I think about. Better
than thinking about a dead thing trying to find me that isn’t Cain. It's better
than thinking about Cain’s arms around me as he catches me, as I literally
throw myself at him.  
My fingers shake and curl, I try not to claw scarlet ribbons into Cain’s back
as I clutch at him. I huddle my face into his shoulder, his neck, I’m trying to
explain around fearful sobs about the dead thing except he cuts me off with a
brusque -- “Yeah, yeah. I got you. Quit shrieking.”
I hide against Cain, press and tremble at him, sniffle some, and feel absurdly
calmed by the amused annoyance in Cain’s tone. I hear Aidan’s sneakers hit into
the pavement as he comes jogging back, and I ease away from Cain. He keeps an
arm around me, half-protective and half-possessive. I see he’s mostly half-
asleep, actually, now that I’ve calmed down enough to actually take in the
moment.
Aidan slows as he approaches and flicks a wide-eyed, wary look from me to Cain
to the car. He left the keys in the ignition. The passenger’s side door is
hanging open. The way the car’s wedged against the wall must not have left
Aidan enough room to open his door. Everything’s positioned now so that Cain’s
directly between Aidan and the car, the keys, he’s between Aidan and me. In the
river crossing puzzle analogy, I guess that makes me the chicken who just
flapped itself off the safety of the boat and straight into the fox’s jaws.
Cain rolls his shoulder, pops his neck, I guess sleeping in the backseat wasn’t
that comfortable. His lazy lack of concern is maddening, it’s utterly
intoxicating. It’s reassuring that Cain’s sleepy scowl lacks any measure of
fear. He’s looking down the stretch of road to where I guess at least he and I
can see the headless body standing there holding its head.
No, not standing -- walking. I swallow my own tongue with a moan, get weak-
kneed and frantic, I don’t want a headless corpse to walk toward me. Nothing
about a headless corpse wanting closer to me is a good thing. Why did I run
toward it in the first place? I really am crazy.
Cain rubs his hand over my arm to brisk warmth into me even though I’m in my
sweatshirt, I’m not the one between us wearing too little clothing. I'm not
shaking because I'm cold; I'm terrified. Cain's mouth stretches with a yawn
before he says, “Get in the car, sweetheart. I’ll handle this.”
He says it bold, cocky, sneering at me like he’s half-amused I need his help,
half-disgusted he needs to help me. As I stare up at him and smear the back of
my hand under the sniffly-wet drip of my nose, I know I have to look pathetic.
I know all kinds of desperate, hopeful heartbreak just burst into my expression
because I’m chest-crushingly relieved that Cain’s going to help me. He’s that
trifecta of believing me, knowing what to do, and then best of all actually
being able to do it. If anyone can help with a dead thing, it's Cain.
“Thanks,” I hush. A tremulous smile pulls the corner of my mouth. “Um, sorry I
woke you. Um, I bought you other clothes, too, there’s a jacket if you want --”
Cain interrupts by pushing me at the open car door. “It’s fine, sweetheart.
I’ll survive. Get in the car.” He snaps his fingers at Aidan. He points at me
and orders, “Keep him in the car.”
As Cain hunches his shoulders against the chill and starts marching down the
shoulder toward the corpse, Aidan stares after him with an expression of pure
disbelief. He obviously can’t believe his good turn of luck that the fox just
paddled into the river to drop the chicken back into the boat for him. I have
got to stop thinking about that riddle and just look up the solution on my
phone.
Suddenly Aidan jolts like someone shook him and then rushes at the car. He
pushes at me saying, “Get in the car, get inside--”
I start to protest, “Wait, shouldn’t you --?” but Aidan shoves so insistently
that I end up in the car first. I scoot into the driver’s seat. Aidan climbs
into the passenger seat and then shuts the door. I scramble around to look out
the back windshield at Cain.
The dome lights turn off. Aidan remembers to turn on his hazards, he turns down
the music. He joins me in staring out the back. “What’s Cain doing?” he
whispers. "What happened?"
“I saw a dead thing,” I whisper back. “He’s going to handle it for me.”
Aidan’s hand rubs between my shoulders. Belatedly, apologetically -- “Are you
okay?”
“Yeah. Fine. Sorry.” My attention stays glued to where Cain’s just about gotten
up close to the motorcyclist. “Sorry. Sorry, Aidan, about --”
As I watch, the motorcyclist comes to a stand-still while Cain keeps moving
forward. One hand lifts from holding the helmet. The dead body hails Cain like
they’re friends. Cain lifts his hand right back like they are. I guess they
might be. Cain was in that body for a while.
Cain gets closer. The hand Cain has lifted abruptly strikes forward like a
cobra, he grabs the hand of the dead body. Cain sweeps with his ankles, pulls
on that arm he’s grabbed, and the motorcyclist hits the pavement. The flashy
red helmet goes rolling, that gold rope of hair flops around, Cain grabs the
helmet in both hands and chucks it toward the wall. When the motorcyclist’s
body crawls upright, Cain kicks it back down. 
I’m watching Cain fight a dead thing. Cain is fighting a dead thing for me. I
can’t fucking believe that Cain’s solution is to fight the dead thing. That's
his plan to make it leave me alone.
I turn and grab for the door, but it opens about three inches before hitting
the wall. I jerk it closed and instead throw the car into reverse. A half-
second too late Aidan reaches to stop me, except I spin the wheel and slam the
gas. Metal screeches over cement as the car separates from the wall.
“Sorry!” I gasp. I adjust the wheel, ease off the gas, I’m going much too fast
considering this is reverse and what I’m reversing toward is the highway.
“Ethan, stop. Stop, please --” Aidan’s scared to forcibly interfere with my
driving, and I’m too focused on the mirrors and Cain to explain what I’m doing.
Last thing I want to do is hit Cain with the car.
Cain notices me coming at him and stops what he’s doing, starts coming at me. I
stop what I’m doing, too -- I hit the brakes, put the car into park. Aidan
snatches the keys out of the ignition, Cain yanks open the car door.
His expression is pure fury, tight brows and scowled snarling mouth. “I told
you --”
“I’m in the car!” I flinch deeper into my seat, hold up my hands some to show
Cain and Aidan both that I’ll cooperate. “You said to stay in the car! And,
well, I’m … I’m in the car.” They’re both just staring at me, almost matched
sentiments even if their expressions are different. Neither of them can believe
I’m being real right now, that I’m really this dumb.
Cain recovers first. He glances over his shoulder at where that poor dead
motorcyclist is trying to find his head. “Fine,” he says. Cain looks back at
me. “Scoot over.”
“Wait.” I speak before Aidan can point out he has the keys. I think Aidan might
eat the keys to keep them away from Cain. I say quickly, “Wait, wait. Cain -
- what did he want? The motorcyclist, what did he want?”
Cain stares at me. “Fuck if I know,” he says. “But I handled it. He’s not gonna
bother you.” Since I’m not moving out of the driver’s seat, Cain opens the back
door. “Where’s that fucking jacket?”
“I’m driving,” Aidan says. He shakes my shoulder to get my attention, because
I’m watching the motorcyclist using the side mirror and ignoring him. “Switch
me seats, I’m driving.”
“I’m going to go talk to it. The dead thing -- the motorcyclist, I’ll go talk
to him.” My announcement gets me yet another look of frustrated bewilderment
from Aidan, and it’s matched by Cain appearing over the back of my seat with a
wary growl.
“Fuck that,” he says. “Fuck that loser.”
“It’s probably my fault he’s out here. Um, you know, that he didn’t go into the
light or whatever?” I look to Cain. “Can I help him move on? Is that something
I can do?”
Cain knows the answer. I can see it in the way he’s frowning at me, the way I’m
fully annoying him now and there’s nothing amusing about it. “I thought you
didn’t know shit about being a necromancer,” he says.
“I don’t. That’s why I’m asking you.”
Cain rumbles and snarls with more anger than I really think this warrants
considering I’m only asking him a question. He doesn't have to answer. There’s
real animosity in the way he grits through clenched teeth, “Guess you could.”
“Okay. Then, I want to. I want to do that.” I look to Aidan, because finally
I’ve founded something I want to do that Cain didn’t tell me to do first. It’s
something that involves dead things but not killing anything. I’m thrilled to
have anything I want to do that I actually can do, that I’ll actually get to do
something with my new life besides fear it. I think Aidan understands because
he smiles, looks immensely relieved. I realize I’m smiling at him, we’re
smiling at each other.
Everything’s great until Cain says, “Guess I’ll get Princess Abel’s new best
friend,” as he exits the car.
I have no idea what he means by that until I see him chase down the helmet and
pick it up by the braid. Numb drips over my face like icy tendrils of water.
Some noise chokes in my throat and draws concerned background buzz from
Aidan. Cain tucks the helmet under his arm as he strides to the headless
motorcyclist’s body. Cain gestures angrily, issues orders I can’t hear. Another
terribly frightened and sick-sounding moan escapes me as motorcyclist’s body
gets to its feet.
Cain keeps a firm hold on the body’s arm as he stalks back toward the car. He’s
bringing the helmet with him. I’m choking on either a scream or vomit as Cain
jerks open the back door and shoves this body into the car immediately behind
where I’m sitting in the driver’s seat. He casually tosses the helmet into the
floorboard.  
I can’t look at the clotted ruin that caps off the corpse’s neck stump, I can’t
look at the matching bloodied stump inside the helmet. I don’t want to be
intrigued by the jigsaw-piece shatter of white edged vertebrae. I can’t be
inside the same car as a headless body, not even one that’s found its head.
Everything fades, I slump into the steering column, dimly register that I’m in
the middle of fainting. That’s fair enough compromise, I guess, if I have to
stay in the car.
 
***** Chapter 15 *****
The dark of unconsciousness gets broken by sweeping overlays of lights. They
pass in bands of iridescent red behind my closed eyelids that grow brighter as
I wake further. I hear the steady rolling rumble of the sedan’s engine, but
it’s a blurred together moment where I can’t tell if I’ve woken as the car’s
stopped or because the car’s stopped. The back-and-forth click punctuated by
the tap of fingers against the steering wheel announces Aidan’s waiting for a
left turn. It’s a reassuring, normal way to wake up.
I’m stretched almost flat, oddly positioned, my head rolled limp to the side.
It’s the passenger seat reclined far as it’ll go, which I confirm as I open my
eyes. My face is turned into my hood, I’m facing the door, but as I roll my
head to the left I’m stopped. A hand runs across the sweatshirt fabric, my
bangs, it settles into place over my eyes like a blindfold.
I allow only the miniscule amount of motion I need to keep breathing, otherwise
I stop moving entirely. I want to say the hand belongs to Cain, I want to say I
recognize and know even that little of him. That desire takes strange shape
alongside the other accumulated wants that fill me at thoughts of Cain.
Fingertips brush a gentle command that my eyes to stay closed before the hand
withdraws. I feel pressure lean into the seat on my left, and then I hear
Cain’s voice so I know for a fact it’s been him the whole time. “Pull over,” he
says. “Stop the car.”
“What? Now?” asks Aidan. He sounds startled, more than anything.
“Yeah,” says Cain. “Find somewhere to park.” He sounds almost bored, kind of
tired. He must be exhausted still, and I recall the line of hurt between his
brows as he slept. Oh, but I woke him up --
Suddenly I realize what Cain’s strange blindfolding gesture was all about,
because I remember about the headless corpse that found its head. I have a
sudden new mental image of the car’s interior; Aidan in the driver’s seat, me
reclined beside him, Cain seems close enough to be in the awkward middle seat
which leaves room for the motorcyclist’s body in the seat behind Aidan. I bet
that’s it. I bet I’m in the car with that dead thing.
Cain’s weight drapes into my shoulder, his elbow nudges behind my neck. With my
eyes closed he’s hard to place, but he’s near. Close and pressing closer, so I
steal glimpses of his arm, the red shirt I bought him. I wonder if he likes the
clothes I grabbed. I wonder so much about Cain that it’s distracting, it’s
better than thinking about headless corpses.  
“I’m awake,” I decide to say. “I’m okay.” Loud enough for Aidan, too. I’ve
pulled up my hood and can press my face into Cain’s arm, the seat. I’m not
going to look at the dead thing. I can be calm about this if I don’t have to
look at the dead thing.
Cain tenses, soon as I speak.
A voice I don’t recognize says, “Oh, hello!”
I flinch, Cain snarls. I hear him snap, “Shut up.”
“Oh,” sniffs the voice. “You’re still here.” It’s a man’s voice, pleasant and
airy. He sounds breezy and casual like a sidewalk cafe, sunshine and macchiatos
and not dead.
I press my hands to my ears. It’s the motorcyclist. That’s a dead thing
talking. I know without needing to see or anything needing to tell me.
“I’ll put you in the trunk with the rest if you don’t keep your fucking mouth
shut, got it?” Cain growls.
Cautiously I let myself take a quick flashing glimpse around at the dim
interior of the car. Aidan’s focused on the road, face turned away as he checks
traffic. Cain’s leaned forward, but his head’s turned as he talks to the dead
thing. Nothing else sitting in the backseat I can see, at least at neck and
shoulder level.
I peek my head up further, and Cain notices. We look at each other. A thousand
questions burst through me, my lips twitch into a sudden smile, and then I
notice a lurid red mark cresting his cheek.
“Are you okay? What happened to your face?” I push to sit up, I get my elbow
into the seat and pull away Cain. I want a better look at him, the car, this
entire situation. Nothing is as I assumed it was when I had my eyes closed.
Aidan’s still looking left as he waits to turn. Once the approaching car’s
headlights crest and fade, he turns his head along with the wheel. Smudged
swelling and bruises explain the crimson teardrop of dried blood under his
nose. I keep staring as he parks in the empty lot of a grocery store several
hours already closed. A few empty cars scatter through the lot like garden
weeds. He leaves the engine running. The dome lights come on expectantly even
though none of us move to get out of the car.
Aidan avoids looking at me, even as I ask, “What happened?” I decide to look to
Cain for answers instead, because I know this is his fault somehow. “What did
you do?”
Fury twists over Cain’s expression as he leans back and mutters a rude, too-
quiet response. He’s slow, but his dark eyes are bright and alert even though
he moves like he’s bleeding somewhere, he’s broken something. I’ve run my gaze
over him enough times that I’m certain his physical body is unharmed.
I pull on the seat belt, unbuckle, end up turned around kneeling with my back
against the glovebox. There’s a flashy red motorcycle helmet on the floorboard
behind Aidan’s seat, but no headless corpse anywhere in sight. Judging by
Cain’s earlier threat, it’s in the trunk.
I narrow my eyes at Cain, flatten my mouth, force myself to feel anger rather
than concern. “You hit Aidan,” I accuse.
Cain rolls a lazy shrug at me. 
From Aidan I hear a murmured, “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” Aidan keeps
his gaze on the dash, the wheel. His soft-spoken words are impossible for me to
understand because this isn’t fine at all.
“What happened?” I demand of Cain. "Tell me."
“We had a disagreement over where your fainted little ass was gonna sit,” Cain
snaps. He’s obviously furious that he’s answering me at all, so I don’t know
why he bothers. He points down at the helmet. A bit of that blonde braid is
visible, a pale-gold ribbon curled against the speckled black floorboard. “Now
you still want this guy or am I kicking him out?”
I wonder why Cain didn’t just get rid of the motorcyclist while I was
unconscious. Obviously I wouldn’t have objected, just like I couldn’t stop him
from hitting Aidan. I can’t believe he hit Aidan. I glare at Cain and fold my
arms so I won't be tempted to touch him. “No. I said I’d do this. I’ll do it,”
I say. “Let’s do this. I’ll help him.”
Cain mutters something rude under his breath and picks the helmet up from the
floorboard. I can’t help but recoil, suddenly scared he’s going to toss it at
me. Cain simply sets the helmet into his lap, adjusts it toward me. He leaves
the face shield down, which makes me wonder a bit too much about what body-less
head looks like.
From the corner of my eye I see Aidan staring. I point at the helmet and ask
him, “Do you see this?”
I’m not surprised when he shakes his head, although maybe a little
disappointed. At least he can see Cain, and Cain can also see this motorcycle
helmet containing the dead thing I’m about to start talking to. I’m not too
many degrees of crazy. I swallow and settle my nerves. I can do this.
“Hello,” I say. “You can talk now, um --” I lean forward some to peer at the
black sheen of the face shield. I think maybe I can see a face looking back at
me and abruptly decide I really don’t want to know. I retreat and feel the hard
plastic of the glovebox cut into my back.
“Who are you?” the voice asks. “Do you know where we are?” The voice is
pleasant, kind, seemingly unconcerned. It’s as if we’ve met in a coffee line,
and he’s asked if I’m next so he’ll know where to stand.
I’m not sure how to respond, so I look at Cain. I’m not sure why I think Cain’s
going to be of any use to me, because he keeps a hand on top the red shell of
the helmet but otherwise is painfully not in the mood to put up with my
questions. He looks ready for another nap. I'm not sure if his eyes are closed
or if he's lazing like a tiger, dark lashes low over his gleaming sneer. 
“I have somewhere I need to be,” the voice says. Thin pinpricks of concern dot
through the words. “I don’t think it’s here, though.”
Relief sweeps through me. “That’s right,” I say. “You do have somewhere to be
that’s not here. You need to move on. Um, go into the light.”
And the voice asks me, “What light?”
I see Cain’s mouth twitch. A chuckle reverberates and builds in his chest
before slipping out with a single mocking, “Heh.”
I’m furious with Cain for hitting Aidan still, so it’s easy to glare and scowl
at him like he’s always scowling and glaring at me. “If you’re not going to
help then don’t say anything,” I hiss.
Sardonic fuck youcomes across loud and clear in the way Cain lifts a shoulder
at me. This is my dumb idea, he won’t help me. I bet he knows what I should do.
He’s been trying to boss me around since the beginning, but for once we’re
going to do what I want to do.
I smile at the dark wrap of face shield, hope that I look comforting. I gentle
my voice further, make an effort to speak softly. “I’m sorry to tell you this,
but you died. You were in a - an accident, riding your motorcycle. I’m very
sorry, but you’re dead.”
I reach my hand out to caress the side of the helmet, because I guess I’m crazy
enough to feel sorry for this dead thing. My fingertips brush through the hard
plastic shell, they go right through that flashy red. I snatch my hand back
even before Cain starts to smirk. He’s infuriatingly smug. 
I pull my hand back. I wonder if this means the motorcyclist’s fingers would
brush through me as well. I hope that’s the case. I shift to sit more on my
side as the voice stays silent, as I hear nothing more from this helmet I see
Cain holding.
Finally a floating hum precedes the voice’s polite counter-argument. “That
doesn’t seem right.”
He says nothing more. I look to Cain’s cocky grin and wish there wasn’t a dead
thing between us, or maybe I should be glad there’s a dead thing between us. I
draw in a long breath and then say, “Okay. Well. Let’s pretend that you are
dead. Would you have any unfinished business?”
“No, I don’t think so. Maybe that no one would think to water my plant.” He
speaks as if I’ve asked after his favorite television show. And then even less
concerned -- simply confused, “Do I have a plant?
Cain rolls his head, he seems to bite on his lip. I can’t tell if he’s
containing laughter or threatening me. I should be looking at this helmet, I
guess, but then from the corner of my eye Aidan’s watching, too. I can’t get it
out of my head that when I’m talking to the helmet I’m actually I guess staring
at Cain’s crotch, from Aidan’s perspective on things.
The motorcyclist and I are both red, then, we have that in common. I am certain
that I’m blushing. I must be embarrassed and blushing to be this much burning.
I force myself to look away from Cain, the dead thing, that bruise on Aidan’s
face. I look down at my own hands and flex my fingers. 
I can do this, there’s no reason I can’t do this. I take a deep breath, smile,
and say, “I don’t know if you have a plant or not. Surely you have more than
just a plant to water though, right?”
The voice hums softly, considers the question with all the weight of choosing a
latte from the menu. “No,” he says. “I don’t think so. If I were to die, I
wouldn’t have any regrets.”
“But… you did die. You’re dead.”
“I am not dead.” This headless motorcyclist sounds like I’ve offended him by
pointing out the obvious, painful truth even though I’m trying to be nice about
it.
I frown at the helmet. “Yes, you are. You’re dead, I’m sorry, you’re dead and a
- a ghost, I guess. So you can’t be here. You need to move on, go into the
light or whatever.”
The voice sounds angry now as he says, “I am not dead!”
“You are!” I cannot believe I’m having to convince this spectral head-inside-a-
helmet of its own ended mortality. “Just look at yourself, look at you. You’re
a decapitated head. You are dead. You died. You -- Cain, hold him up. Can he
see me? Make him look around, hold him up to see --” I’m gesturing with my
hand, getting frustrated, I’m still furious with Cain for hitting Aidan but I
should be nicer to this poor dead thing. I know I should be nicer.
Surprisingly Cain obliges me, he puts his palms to either side of the helmet
and lifts it up, waves it around. The braid dangles, I try not to look too
closely. I hear the motorcyclist insist again, “I’m not dead.”
I know I should be nicer, but I’m impatient and sound it. I sound like a jerk.
“Where’s your body, then? Where’s the rest of you? If you’re not dead, how come
you’re just a head?”
“Well, I don’t know, but I’m not dead,” the voice says defensively. “I think I
would know if I was dead.”
I wonder if I punched Cain’s smug smirking smile if he’d hit me like he did
Aidan. Whichever of them threw the first blow, I’m at least glad that Cain’s
got a bruise to show for it. Good on Aidan, hitting back. I wish I’d been
conscious for it.
Bemused laughter rumbles softly from Cain as he leans for the door. “Guess
that’s that. What can you do, sweetheart? He’s not dead.” He shifts the helmet
as if to chuck it from the car.
“Wait,” I say. “Wait. You said I could do this. You said I could help him.”
Some of the amusement slips from his expression, he regards me with a wary,
tensed caution. I feel like I’ve pulled a gun on him when Cain grits out,
“Yeah.”
He doesn’t elaborate. I have to ask, “How? What do I do?”
Cain cocks his head, his brow, he gives me this exasperated look like I’ve
still got that gun on him but he’s noticed it isn’t loaded. “Sweetheart, ever
think, if you have to ask then it’s probably a dumbshit thing to be doing?
Let’s ditch this guy.”
He tries too hard to sound casual, tries too hard to sound like he’s not
exhausted and hurt. I lean back some, sigh, see Aidan’s curious, sympathetic
expression and then glance instead at the dashboard. It’s late, past one in the
morning, we’re all probably tired and not just Cain. I don’t want to give up on
this, though. I want to help this motorcyclist somehow. I want to do something
helpful and good with this new life of mine. If I have to be a necromancer, if
that’s going to define me, then I want to know what it means.
“I want to do this,” I say to Cain. “Tell me what to do.”
A low, ominous growl accompanies the dangerous gleam of Cain’s eyes as we sit
there glaring at each other. He knows the answer, he knows more about this than
I do, he knows but doesn’t want to tell me. It’s infuriating, after I did so
much to get him here. I have no idea why I worked so hard to get Cain into my
living, breathing world if he’s just going to be a jerk about everything.
“Give me your hand,” Cain snaps. His juts between us palm up like I challenge.
I slap my hand into his, and he grabs hold. I hear him mutter under his breath,
“Fucking idiot.”
It’s like being underwater, it’s like diving deep into the lake, this sudden
sweep of cold and numb that flows over me. I suck in a gasp, feel Cain’s hand
tighten around mine so I can’t pull away. I try again, pull harder, I know I do
even if I can’t see, can’t feel, can’t hear --
Am I still in the car, have I gone somewhere? Am I whimpering with panic or
just feel like I want to because I think all I am is these panicked thoughts
about what I can’t feel, what I’m not. I don’t think I’m enough for whimpering,
I think I’m losing even my thoughts. I’m unraveling, fading, sinking to the
bottom of vast empty depths. Pieces of myself break apart, float away, drift
into this vacuum of sensation. I’m only the terror of this observation and not
enough to stop it or do anything about it.
Pain reaches through first, a pins-and-needles outline that describes to me the
unrecognizable shape of my own body. Ache throbs in one particular spot, a part
of me that cycles from numb to cold to hot to searing. It’s like a burn in
reverse to sketch the shape of my hand, the arm attached to that hand, the rest
of me follows until I’m more than just my emotions and thoughts again.
Bursts of here and there nothing take form around me, flashes like a on-and-off
light switch. Through the blinking stutter are dark eyes, dark and deeply drawn
eyebrows, Cain’s teeth bared in a silent grimace. His glazed expression is
distant, focused elsewhere even though it’s aimed at me.
My earlier anger with him is gone entirely in that insignificantly small moment
where I’m overwhelmed with relief at seeing Cain, at knowing Cain’s still
holding on to me. His hand is clenched around mine, it’s both a sensation I can
feel and something I can see. At least until the strobe light flashes settle
into the constant shadowed nothing I recognize as the Otherside, and there’s a
roughly Cain-shaped shadow holding my hand instead.
 
***** Chapter 16 *****
I turn my head, flick my gaze, confirm there’s an Aidan-shaped shadow sitting
in the equally shadowed driver’s seat and know that if I was breathing I would
be screaming. It’s like before, this is the Otherside. From beside me comes a
cadence of noise that I know is speech, I know Aidan’s saying something even if
all I hear is warbled nonsense.
And then Cain cuts in with a hoarse, “Shut up.” There’s no anger to it, just
cranky weariness, but the words are distinct and sharp.
The fact I can hear him, feel him, that should come as a reassurance except
he’s a shadow. Before he was the only thing I could see clearly on the
Otherside, but now I’m surrounded by a black-and-white world I can’t understand
with all this terror filling me. I’m not sure how it’s possible to keep feeling
more and more frightened.
“Cain!”
The name flies forward with the same panicked strength as the rest of me, but
fire shoots up my arm as Cain bears down on my hand. Only my other arm moves,
my folded legs and chest don’t seem mine anymore. I lose where I am to the
seat.
Grabbing the smoky, insubstantial shadow of Cain’s arm is impossible, but I
snatch frantically anyway. I’ve gone hysteric and know it, I even try to pull
my right hand free. The more he strains to keep hold the harder I struggle
until I’m clawing and shrieking, gone as impossible for him as he is for me.
“Ethan, stop!”
He snatches at empty air before his free hand connects with my left arm. That
same reverse-burn sensation flares where the pressure and resistance of his
shadowed flesh finds me, wrangles instead my wrist into his hand.
“Calm down,” he says. He actually sounds reassuring. He’s not snarling or
snapping. He’s pleading it at me, soft-toned and desperate, “Abel, calm down.”
I stop fighting him, stop struggling to either free my right hand or grab new
places on him with my left. I let him hold on to me instead, reassure myself he
won’t let go because of the way he begs me again, “Sweetheart, calm the fuck
down.”
I shake with deep, wracking shudders that get smaller and smaller as the panic
drains out of me. My voice is horrifically shattered sounding as I say, “Okay.”
I hear Cain sigh. It’s frustrated, weary, lifting into a rueful chuckle.
“Okay,” he agrees. He eases his hold on me in slow increments until I don’t
flinch each time. He keeps hold of my right hand, pats his other hand over the
tight knot he’s made.
His tone changes, the black-on-black outline of his head turns some. I know
he’s addressing Aidan when he says blandly, “He’s fine. I got him.”
From Aidan’s intangible shadow is a stream of garbled noise, indistinct and
unknowable.
“Yeah,” says Cain. “Sure. Why not?” He snorts, amused and bitter, full-throttle
sarcasm that betrays him. I don’t think his answer was the one Aidan wanted,
and it sounds like Cain knows that. I’m getting pretty good at recognizing when
Cain has the answer but doesn’t want to give it for whatever selfish reason.
“Are you okay?” I’m relieved I don’t sound quite so scared and broken anymore.
I certainly feel a lot calmer.
Cain rumbles a low laugh and says, “Yeah. Sure,” in much the same way. I bet
Aidan just asked him that. Cain’s voice softens as he says, “You are the worst
fucking necromancer.”
I should feel insulted, except I’m not. The weight of Cain’s affectionate tone
crushes my chest with incandescent ache. Apology rushes up and lodges in my
throat.
Cain speaks first, beats me to it. “Sorry,” he says. Flippant, brisk, too-sharp
and not especially sincere, and he follows it up with, “You’re not going to
like this next part any better.” It has to be my imagination that Cain seems to
squeeze my hand. “Ready?”
“Wait,” I say. “Wait, please.”
He does, to judge by the sudden awkward pause. Awkward for me, because the
silence of the Otherside is absolute without Cain’s voice to fill it. I flinch
my right hand tighter into Cain’s and hear a soft grunt from him, as if I’ve
kicked him. I stop, immediately, almost jerk my hand back except he won’t let
go. He’s gripping me tight.
“Is this hurting you?” I ask. “What’s happened? Why am I on the Otherside? What
are you doing?”
“Sweetheart.” He speaks through gritted teeth. “Now is not the time for your
dumbass fucking questions. Are you ready or not?”
Exasperation shoots through me. I make a small, quiet snarl of my own as I
snap, “No! No, I’m not. I’m not ready at all! Cain, please -- I don’t know what
I’m doing. I don’t even know what I am anymore, much less whatever it is I can
do. I can’t be ready if I don’t know what to be ready for. You have to explain
this to me.”
Silence follows. Abject silence, painful in how complete it is. A hollow panic
blooms somewhere low and rises through me. I’d be breathless, if I was
breathing.
At last Cain grumbles something harsh and foreign. “Fine,” he says, louder.
“Fine, princess. Think of it like I’ve got one door open, you’ve got the other,
and we’re about to toss this hapless shithead through. The door hurts like a
motherfucker to keep open, so I need you to shut up and be ready. Does that
make enough fucking sense, or do I need to draw you a goddamn picture?”
I bring my lips between my teeth, feel at the scar with my tongue. “Yes, it
does. I understand. Tell me what to do. Please,” I add. “I can be ready, but I
have to know what to do.”
“Just be you, sweetheart.” He tries to sound snarky but comes across as
sincere. I feel a pause in the air like he wants to say something more, hear
him sigh in defeat as if he was struggling not to say anything else. It’s
gritted teeth snarling as he adds, “Don’t let go of me. I’m not chasing your
ass down if you do. This one’s too fresh and stupid to struggle, but if he
tries to keep hold of you then, well.”
I wait, but Cain doesn’t elaborate. Tentatively I prompt him with a soft,
“Yeah?”
“Then I’ll have to find me another necromancer. One that’s not so fucking
stupid, maybe.” All these snarled things aren’t what he really wanted to say, I
bet. He was going to say something else. He sticks out his left hand
expectantly.
“I’m ready,” I say quietly. If this is hurting Cain then I don’t want to delay
any longer. I want back in my bright complicated world rather than the shadowed
sterile nothing of the Otherside. I set my left hand into his.
Our right hands clench together, Cain’s blunt-edged nails biting in with a
sting. He guides my left hand toward his lap -- that helmet, I can almost feel
the hard plastic shell. Yes, I can, my fingertips brush into something solid,
Cain presses my palm into the rounded curve.
A brisk, chipper voice speaks up with a soft-startled, “Oh! Hello, again.” I
get a brief glimpse of big, soft eyes and a smile, a droopily sweet expression,
a strange insight into everything this motorcyclist once was as a person. I see
a bedroom with sunshine streaming in from gauzy curtains, feel satin sheets
with a stretch, know these aren’t my memories but get lost in them anyway.
I roll my head on the pillow, look to the window, think about a mother and
father, a best friend, a lover, errands I’m going to run that day, pleasant
dreams and expectations. I get out of bed, find myself dressed and in a kitchen
filled with light and color. Plants crowd the window ledge, beautiful bursting
blooms and tumbling green leaves.
Details pop everywhere, like a familiar goofy souvenir magnet holding a pizza
menu to the fridge, or the wafting smell of the incense from my nextdoor
neighbors. Comforting, domestic familiarity overwhelms and excited me for the
day. I snag keys off a hook near the door, pick up a flashy red helmet, lock up
my apartment and hum to myself because it’s my last day alive and I don’t even
know it.
I don’t even know I’m dead. I couldn’t be dead. I don’t remember dying, after
all, I remember all these things about being alive. I know all these wonderful
lovely things, like the invigorating first sip of hot coffee on a chill Sunday
morning, or the damp cool touch of fresh-sweated dark skin on a lover. How can
I be dead? I’m meeting someone for lunch, I’m running late as usual. My lover
is waiting, and we’ll laugh about it when I get there. I’m all these living
memories, I’m something still thinking about being alive.
Something painful knows a terrible dark truth, though. It knows obliterating
nanoseconds that contain miniscule molecular destruction -- the breaking
silence of synapses firing their last chemical glory. Bursts of adrenaline,
dopamine, and serotonin form that last conscious moment. Muscle fibers flex and
bones shatter, it’s a cellular infinity of ruin that knows this singular
absolute truth of nonexistence.
I won’t deny this harsh awful truth, but it’s not mine. My truth is the searing
numb hold of Cain’s hand in mine to know what is me, what I am. I’m not the one
who has to let go and be dead. I am not on a motorcycle, nor am I meeting my
lover for lunch. I am not a soft-spoken young man fond of orchids and moonlight
who loved life so much and doesn’t want to be dead.
That’s someone else, that’s not me. I don’t even know his name, but I know
everything else, his first and last kiss, secret moments alone wondering and
wanting. I knew his final shocked denial absent of fear, the memory full of
endorphins and dopamine to make everything pleasant, even to the gruesome end.
It’s an overwhelming amount of information, an utter confusion where the line
between his life and mine threatens to blur again. I didn’t die, I’m not the
one dead even though I have memories of torn-apart moments full of agony and
suffering. I have violent memories of slipping on a boat deck, swerving on my
bike into a car. My life, painful and real, I won’t let it go and can’t, it’s
all here inside me amid this invasion of foreign memory.
A pulling sensation redefines my arm, my entire body, my existence -- who I am,
not just my name but whole collective consciousness of memory that forms the
tapestry of my life. The distinct perspective of what’s impossible to share
completely, the continuous stream of thought that’s mine and mine alone, this
entirety of what makes me separate and distinct, a thing that is and does. This
me that I am, I keep hold of Cain’s hand for the blistering return to my
beautiful living world.
An impossibility of everything consumes me at how abrupt the transition is. My
lungs snatch and spasm for breath, and I try not to panic that it needs to be
forced. I have to find and set a rhythm that should be natural.
I hear Aidan’s matched gasp, feel the tightened squeeze from Cain -- I see him,
we’re still faced off across the interior of the parked car. It looks like a
monster’s clawed our joined hands, put long red ribbons into Cain’s arm.
Horror fills me, a fresh-certain dark truth I have to confirm. I lift my left
hand up, see blood smeared on my fingers and ripped skin collected into thick
crescents under my nails. I can feel the fullness, bitterness rushes into my
mouth. I’m the monster. I’ve done this to Cain.
I think Aidan’s saying something, it’s not precisely the distorted nonsense I
heard on the Otherside, but I can’t understand him all the same. I can barely
hear him over my own choked sobs, the shuddering hard slam of my frantic
heartbeat. He’s probably asking if I’m okay, or exclaiming over how I’m clearly
not and neither is Cain.
Cain still has my hand, or I still have his. I don’t want to let go of the only
thing that feels truly mine. The hard-squeezing pressure and bruising grind of
small bones, I’d let Cain crush my hand entirely just for the reminder of what
I am, who I am, where I am. I need something solid and real. I want the burning
sear of his flesh
I throw myself forward. Our mouths fit together with hungry desperation. He
bites at me, I bite at him, we’re attacking each other even as he cradles my
hands in both his as if this is going to be gentle. I push my knees to either
side of Cain in the seat and spread my thighs over his lap, fit against him
close.
The collar on my sweatshirt cuts into my neck as I get yanked back from Cain.
Aidan’s frantic, “Get off him!” is sharply distinct. He gets a second fistful
of fabric and tugs, grabs at my arm.   
I squirm and twist to knock Aidan off me. “S’fine!” Tears blur my vision, sobs
still choke my voice. “Go - go away! Go away!” I slap at Aidan’s hand.
Aidan gives up on trying to haul me off Cain and pleads with his big puppy-dog
brown eyes instead. “He’s bleeding. You disappeared --”
“Go away!” I scream at him. “Get out of the car! Go!”
I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I am. This terrifying depth of want within
me that I possess for Cain, it’s filled and overflowing. I’m going to drown in
the flood, all this cold numb impossible that fills me with desperation and
need is going to win. I know I’m being beyond crazy, but I also know I’m going
to fuck Cain right now in this parking lot and if Aidan doesn’t leave then this
is happening right in front of him.
I’m half-turned toward Aidan but still straddled across Cain’s lap. I have my
left arm around Cain’s shoulders to keep him pulled against me, half-protective
and half-possessive. I’m so totally crazy right now and know it, even without
seeing Aidan’s expression mirroring the truth back at me.
This isn’t the face he makes when he’s pitying his crazy best friend. No, right
now Aidan’s realizing I’m a monster like Cain. He’s a demon, I’m a necromancer,
together we’ve manage to kill the boy thirteen-year-old me could have grown up
to be. He’s only memory, dead as that orchid-adoring motorcyclist. I’ve killed
Aidan’s best friend.
Aidan fumbles a hand into the console for his phone. The engine’s running, the
keys are in the ignition. He pulls on the handle but doesn’t open the door. He
stays turned around staring at me. It’s officially the most scared I’ve ever
seen him. He knows he won’t see me again if he gets out of the car.
“Wait,” I say. “I’m sorry. Wait --”
Cain’s draped heavy on my shoulder, his lazy lean more woozy than seductive.
His arm is slung limp around my waist, one rests heavy on my thigh. His hot,
ragged breaths fall over the smallest hairs on my neck.
“Sweetheart,” Cain slurs. “Don’t stop.”
I might be a necromancer, totally crazy and full of lust for this demon, I
might be all that but I can also be calm. I should stop crying at least. I
don’t want to have sex while crying. I need to be calm about this at least.
“Wait,” I say softly. Now I truly do sound calm. “Wait, stay. I’m sorry.”
Aidan opens and then shuts the door to reset the latch. The dome lights pop on
to be helpful, but all they do is expose the horror of the moment. I shudder in
a fresh sob to help clear the rest and remember only with brief, peripheral
crimson flash not to wipe my face with my hand. Collared bruising denotes
Cain’s strong grip, but the blood is his. It’s his skin under my nails.
“Cain, you’re hurt.”
A sandpaper snarl forms his reply. “Yeah. No shit.”
He stirs with a stuttering jolt that’s punctuated by a laugh. Mocking me
invigorates him enough to push out of that slow-melting lean. He’s on the verge
of collapse -- I reach without thinking to steady him, my hands snatching like
to catch a teetering porcelain vase.
Cain’s gaze slips out of focus but then sharpens as he rallies with a sneering
look of disgust. “You are the worst fucking necromancer,” he declares. He bites
each word distinctly. He keeps a glare locked on me until his dark-gleaming
eyes roll back, he slides forward. I have all of Cain’s dead weight to hold.
I have this hurt, unconscious demon now and a wide-eyed best friend. I don’t
know what to do except start laughing. I keep at it until Aidan joins in,
nervous at first and then giggling. We start howling, it’s the best fucking
joke either of us has heard. Too bad it’s going to be painfully awkward when
the joke’s run its course, and we have to figure out what to do next.
 
***** Chapter 17 *****
Briefly in the second grade I wanted to be a firefighter. I forget what sparked
the obsession, but it proved all-consuming to my small seven-year-old self. My
mother, in all her viciously affectionate ways, orchestrated a field trip to
the fire station for my entire second grade class. We toured their kitchen, the
dorms, they let us sit in the truck. I had my picture taken with one of the
firefighters, I stuck it on my bathroom mirror along with favorite drawings and
other childish things.  
The unknown man in the picture was this tousle-haired hunk that thirteen-year-
old-me finally took down, threw the picture away in shame after rubbing one out
thinking of him. No idea who he was then, who he might be now, he was just a
body to hold my unknown desires. I actually don’t even remember the trip to the
fire station. It’s just the photo and the story, everyone else telling me I was
there. When I think of that day, I can imagine all the things that must have
happened even if I don’t remember them. It’s like the day on the boat, how
everyone says I wasn’t breathing but I don’t remember that, I wasn’t there to
see it. I didn’t live that moment, just my body was there.
I’m not sure why I’m thinking all this as I sit shivering in Aidan’s car. I
guess I’m thinking about that firefighter, the strangeness of memory and my own
existence, what makes something alive and what it means to be dead -- I’m
thinking all this to keep from thinking about Cain, because if I think about
Cain I’m going crawl into the backseat and flatten myself over him, throw
myself on him, rub all over him because I’m completely and totally insane.
I want to fuck a demon, this demon, I want Cain so desperately that I’m sitting
here in the front seat of Aidan’s car clutching my knees and shaking. Maybe I’m
doing that and thinking all this about memory and desire and want -- I’m doing
it to cope with the fact I just obliterated a dead thing into something more
gone than dead. I rendered that motorcyclist into total nonexistence.
He’s nothing but memory now, he’s in other people’s thoughts -- mine -- he’s
become a body for someone to remember -- me, his friends, family, lover,
bystanders, the truck driver, the people on internet gore forums and the
eventual news reports. He’s a body, a collection of moments, a thing for others
to remember being alive or maybe dead, too, just his body being dead. He’ll
slowly fade and be forgotten, turn into memories that become only stories,
pictured thoughts that seem so real even though they’re not.
I don’t know what I looked like that summer day, lying there unbreathing on the
boat. I don’t remember seeing the crystalline sky dotted with fluffy white like
I picture in my head. I remember earlier in that day, I remember lots of things
about that day, but how much is what I just think I remember, and how much is
really me? Who I am, what makes me -- me? Am I only this body, these frantic-
running thoughts in my head?
Aidan’s been saying my name for so long in so many different tones and ways
that I’m not even sure it’s mine anymore. I have no idea who I am, what is
means to be alive or dead, what anything is besides this exact shivering moment
where I’m a panting, shaking, numb-staring mess scaring the hell out of my best
friend.  
He’s lucky I’m not screaming. He should shut up and be happy I’m not all over
Cain. I could bolt out of this car. I could climb in the backseat and stroke
that hurt line on Cain’s forehead until he wakes up. I could kiss him until he
wakes up, call his name, beg and plead or just let him sleep.
I should do something, if not those things, I should do somethingbesides
terrify Aidan. I should say something, at least.
“I don’t know.” The words hush as dry ache over my scarred lips.
Aidan goes silent, gets to staring.
“I don’t know.” Like saying it a second time will make it sound less desolate.
I’m not trying to deflect, not trying to dodge the question, I’d just lie if
that was the case. “I don’t know if I’m okay. I don’t think I am, but I don’t
know.”
“Oh.” Aidan’s startled I’ve spoken, taken aback by what I’ve said and how I’ve
said it. I don’t blame him.
“I don’t think anything’s okay anymore. I think I’d rather have died. I wish I
was the boy who went into the water and wasn’t pulled out in time, wasn’t
pulled out at all. I wish I’d never started breathing again. I should have
stayed a dead body that day.” Honestly it’s astounding this hollow rasp belongs
to me at all, that it’s my voice even capable of saying something so calmly
bleak and terrible. “I wish I was dead.”
“Fuck that.”
The leather upholstery squeaks, blankets shift -- Cain’s hand grips into the
back of my seat, he half-collapses over the console. He’s smearing blood
everywhere, all over Aidan’s car, it’s going to look like a murder scene in
here.
“Being dead sucks.” He sounds exhausted. He should sound exhausted, he was just
unconscious a moment ago. I can’t believe he’s awake.
I’ve plastered myself up against the glove box, the window, I’m terrified to
touch Cain or let him touch me because I know I won’t stop. A single brush of
our skin, I don't know what I might do. My fingers dig into the hard plastic of
the dash as I stare at him, elated and horrified in turns.
Aidan chokes on something. A word, his tongue, total panic, I don’t know. Then
he asks, “Are you okay?” and actually sounds like he wants to know.
I remember the warbled nothing of his voice asking from the Otherside, and I
know exactly how Cain’s going to answer. I’m not sure why Aidan bothered to
ask. Cain’s obviously not okay.
“Yeah, sure," he says. "Why not?" Cain's blood-streaked forearm slips off the
leather as he tries to stay leaned forward into the seats. The ragged cuts over
his skin don’t seem real, can’t really still be there to remind me what a
monster I am. It’s impossible my nails did such a thing, raked those raw jagged
lines into Cain. It looks like I took a knife to him, like my pale curving
nails became wicked sharp claws.
That line between his brow is obliterated into a woozy deep frown. He’s trying
to hold an angry scowl together like that’ll help him with the rest. His dark
gleaming gaze can’t hold mine for long, but he tries anyway. “Where are we?”
“I don’t know. Parking lot. Same place we were.”
Each breath seems to hurt him, speaking seems to hurt worse to judge by the way
he clenches his fist and jaw both. “Why?”
“I don’t know.” I’m sorry to answer like this, but I’m soft-spoken and quick
with my responses at least.
Cain struggles to respond, but I can’t tell anymore if it’s teeth-gritted
impatience or agony-driven torment that keeps him silent. His gaze is glassy,
mirrored, slurred same as his voice. Everything about him seems out of focus,
fragile, I’m scared if I try to touch him my hand might go right through, that
he won’t even be real anymore.
“Where -- nng.” He sways and fumbles, grips for the seat and then slumps
heavily into the console instead. “Where’re you --” This barely-conscious demon
snarls and groans, tries to push to even his elbows and can’t. He can’t even
finish his question. He sprawls there and pants like he’s catching his breath,
like he’s a dog basking in the hot sun or a weary runner at the end of a
marathon.  
Aidan’s barely blinking, hardly breathing, gripping a white-knuckled terror
into the steering wheel. His gaze cuts from Cain to me. I see all the hollow-
voiced desolate things I was saying stamped over his face. I’m not sure if I
explained the depth of my existential crisis or what I did to the motorcyclist
if it would help Aidan understand what’s wrong with me.
I ease into my seat, let myself get closer to Cain. I glance up at Aidan. I
don’t want to forget he’s in the car when I touch Cain, when I let myself glide
my fingers through his hair. Tentative, scared I’ll wisp through him, but he’s
shiver-inducing solid. He feels so warm, even just his hair like this feels
heated to touch.
“You’re hurt,” I say softly.
Hoarse, ragged coughs shake out of Cain. I think he’s trying to laugh in my
face, although all he’s managing is a sick, weary moan into the cup holder. His
eyes are closed, but I know he’s still conscious because of his struggled
breathing and stubborn scowl..
I brush my fingers over that pain-driven tight line between his brows, and it
has to be my imagination that he seems to breathe easier, suffer less. It can’t
be as simple as soothing away Cain’s pain with my touch, but that’s what I try
to do. I don’t know what else to do except try to comfort this wounded, weary
demon. I’m sure my expression is all kinds of hurt-puppy sympathy, and when I
glance up at Aidan again he confirms it. His round-eyed stare tells me just how
desperately pathetic I look, sitting here petting at Cain.  
I’m not sure if I explained about the firefighter if that would help him
understand what’s wrong with me. I could try to explain about what happened on
the Otherside, how Cain’s already fucked me once so Aidan shouldn’t look so
terrified about how I want it to happen again. I could maybe explain about that
awkward not-crush I tried so hard not to have on Aidan. I could remind him of
when we kissed, when Cain made me kiss him, and how I told him I was like this.
I warned him.
It’s not worth trying to remind Aidan he should have cut me loose hours ago,
days ago. I look down at Cain, brush aside his bangs and keep at it, keep
touching him like I never want to stop because I don’t. He doesn’t make any
effort to move, even though it must be uncomfortable. He’s slung himself into
this doubled-over drape between the front seats, when I had him situated as
comfortably as I could manage in the back.
“You should lie down again,” I tell him. Whisper it, even though I know he’s
still conscious.
The snarled groan I get in reply is a pretty clear refusal. It might have been
an effort at telling me to fuck off, or maybe trying to tell me yet again how
bad I am at being whatever it is I am. I’m as much a disappointment to Cain as
anyone.
I sigh and scratch gently at his scalp. I try not to think about the russet-
smeared stains on my hands or the collected skin under my nails, I try
desperately not to think about how Cain’s hurt like this because of me.
“Is there anything I can do to help?”
"Heh." Cain’s head shifts, his eyes stir beneath his closed lids. He can’t even
manage to get his head off the console, much less keep his eyes open for more
than one long, bleary blink. He’s just barely able to mock me with that single
dry chuckle that took him too long, took too much effort. There’s an answer
here somewhere, I know Cain has the answer.
A sigh slips from me, passes into the smooth motion of my fingers through
Cain’s hair. I shouldn’t bother him with a bunch of questions. I glance at the
clock, look to Aidan. “It’s late.”
His hands tense, the hard plastic of the steering wheel creaks. “I can drive.”
He doesn’t even let me get the suggestion out. Either I’m that obvious in what
I’m thinking, or it’s that obvious of a need that Aidan knows I have to be
thinking it.
“Not forever. Let’s find somewhere. A hotel,” I say.
Aidan goes three shades whiter, his eyes flick to where I’m caressing Cain.
“No, that’s okay. I can drive. I’ll just -- drive, somewhere.” He shifts the
car into gear, glances at me and then keeps his gaze there with an impatient
air.
I don’t reach for my seatbelt. I keep caressing Cain as if he were a stiff-
still lump of soft black fur in my lap. “I want to wash my hands. I want a
shower,” I tell Aidan. “And Cain’s hurt, he needs rest. Come on, let’s just
stop for the night.”
Aidan sets his jaw, his shoulders. Stubborn determination drives harshness into
the way he says, “No, buckle up. I’m driving.”
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him look this serious about something, except maybe
when telling me not to kill myself. I shift my gaze out the passenger window as
if the empty parking spot next to us holds anything of interest. “You’ve been
driving all day.”
“It’s fine. I’m not tired,” he says. “I haven’t even been up a full twenty-four
hours yet.”
“Well, I’m tired. I want to stop.”
“No, we’re going. Put on your seatbelt.”
I’m not sure Aidan’s ever spoken to me this way. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard
him speak to anyone this way. I remember the first day we met, that Saturday
our mothers dumped us on each other so they could go play bridge. His mom had
to tell me his name, he was too shy to even get through introductions. He
looked half-terrified of me, I thought he was going to cry when our moms left,
I can’t believe I’m getting bossed around like this by timid, awkward Aidan.
I don’t know what’s going to happen if we keep fighting about this. We never
fight. This is weirder than our argument over killing a cat, although maybe
it’s just the same argument after all. Aidan doesn’t want me near Cain,
certainly doesn’t want to put Cain and I in the same room as a bed. He’s having
a hard enough time keeping me off Cain with the seat division to help his
efforts.
Cain’s come crawling over this console just to be near me because there’s no
way I’m wrong about this. The more I put my hands over Cain, the more I sit
here caressing smooth that pained little wrinkle and he lets me, the more I
know it’s working. I don’t have to ask Cain what he needs -- he already told
me. A hot shower, a bed -- me in that bed with him. He was on the verge of
collapse, saying sweetheart don’t stop when I was all over him. I can’t be
wrong about this. I know how to help Cain.
“Please, Aidan.” I’m shameless enough to beg, desperate enough to plead.
“No,” he says. Snapping and stern, but he's not angry I guess. He sounds like a
stranger. I don't even recognize the bossy-firm insistence as his. “Put on your
seatbelt.”
I ignore him. In the slanted reflection of the window I see him lean toward me.
He stops, glances down at the ragged-breath interruption between us that is
Cain. After a moment we roll forward even though I’m not buckled. Apparently me
smashing through the front windshield in the event of a wreck is less
concerning to Aidan than getting the car into motion.
I’m not sure why he thinks that’s going to help him. If anything he’s made his
situation worse, because now he needs to stop the car if he wants to stop me.
I’m not sure what I’m going to do that he’ll need to stop. More of the same
expecting different results, I guess, which I think might be a textbook
definition of insanity.
“Please,” I say. I try to sound firm, not angry either, because I don’t want to
fight with Aidan. “Just for a few hours. I want to shower, and Cain needs to
sleep somewhere that isn’t the inside of a car.”
“S’fine, sweetheart.” Mostly slur and snarl, but he’s distinct and sharp enough
I know what he’s trying to say. Cain shudders closer, nudges under my hand, he
might have been trying to do something else but that’s what he does. He gets
closer to me, that's his answer for how I can help. 
“Aidan, please. I won’t…”
He slides a sideways glance at me for the way the assurance fades into nothing.
I can’t promise him that I won’t do anything with Cain. I don’t know what I
might do anymore. I slashed Cain’s arms into ribbons without meaning to, I’ve
started to cry without meaning to, I keep telling Aidan how much I hate
everything about my life when he’s trying so hard to keep whatever part of me
he still gets to have in his life. I really am the worst.
I should stop crying. I don’t want to win this not-fight I’m having with Aidan
by crying. That’s a pathetic way to win a fight, it’s a monstrous way to do it,
I’m a monster for sitting here sobbing just because my best friend won’t let me
fuck a demon. My life is so pathetic. I hate it so much. I’m all these mean,
vicious thoughts about how much I hate being alive when I realize I'm about to
die.
I’m faced toward the window, head turned aside like maybe it won’t be obvious
I’ve started to cry. It’s this strange breathless moment, all my hair standing
on end, when I see the fast-growing headlights. Either my half-shrieked gasp is
enough to warn Aidan or he’s paying close attention, but the sedan’s rumble
veers into a roar as we race forward.
That’s just like Aidan, he wouldn’t think to hit the brakes, he’s got the green
light and it’s the other car blatantly running the red. We were already in the
intersection, he’s reacting under the pressure of being caught in the
crosshairs. Maybe he did think about it, maybe he was quick-thinking enough to
put the physics of all this together, to realize his odds are better if he goes
faster. He’s such a smart kid, a loyal and true friend, he stayed up thirty-six
hours straight once to defeat back-to-back finals, he hit that home run, he’s
fucking amazing. If we live through this I’ll tell him I’m sorry, I’ll try to
explain about the firefighter and that not-crush at thirteen and --
Here’s my life flashing in front of my eyes, all these memories of Aidan
because I’m so fucking sorry the last thing we did together is have the worst,
weirdest, most terrible fight we’ve ever had as friends. We’re going to get t-
boned by this red light-running car, it’s coming right at us, I definitely
don’t want to die, I don’t want this to be over, I don’t want to become
something that only remembers what it’s like to be alive.
This is it, this is the moment, it’s lasting forever so it has to be my last
one. My fingers clench into the heated dark warmth of Cain’s hair. I’m not
ready for the shrieking clash of metal and glass, not ready at all for an
explosion of sideways-streaking motion. I’m not ready for this to be the end,
but it is.
***** Chapter 18 *****
Red. Blood red, these streaks and smears of blood bright in bleary black
nothing. Shadows over shadows with all this bright red, motion and movement in
ways that are strange. Wavering awareness brings unpleasant sensations,
stabbing reminders of something tangible, something important.
A rolling motion glides a here and there glimmer, a sudden change in
perspective. Unfocused, bright by comparison even though it’s still dark, still
mostly shadow, disorienting and implacably familiar. Sounds now, trickling
through a fogged-over, muffled awareness. More motion, blinking, everything
gaining better focus as the lurid red glow fades, harsh yellow-tinged
streetlights provide contrast to the darkness.
More sounds, louder, everything rushing together because I remember fast-
growing headlights, impending doom, this is the aftermath of the wreck. I’m
something enough to be thinking, slowly becoming more as I keep at it. I’m
starting to feel terror. I feel so many things in the moment I realize that I
don’t feel my body, that I don’t think I can move. I’m in this moment, I’m
thinking about it, I’m here watching it happen and listening --
Cain?
A blur of fast motion, too fast for me to follow just what exactly is in the
confusion of space. The soft darkness of closed eyes follows. Vibration forms a
groaned protest. It’s not quite an answer. It’s all the answer I need.
Cain? Cain, open your eyes.
Lidded oblivion parts to reveal the sideways shadows of the backseat. I can
hear Cain’s panted breath, the steady-ticking protest of the sedan’s turn
signal or maybe the hazards, it’s hard to understand just what I’m looking at,
where I am, or rather -- what Cain is looking at, where Cain is. I can’t be
wrong about this.
I have to stay calm, even though I want to panic. I am so frightened, so beyond
terrified, I try not to think about it but I’m nothing except thoughts and
feelings, I can’t do anything besides think and feel.
Cain, are you okay? Can you get up?
His eyes close amid a low tight growl, this terrible sound of agony and
frustration.
Okay. Sorry. No questions. I’m just -- scared. I’m really scared. Cain, I’m not
in my body. I’m in yours.
He snarls some, his head shifts so the perspective changes. He looks around
slower, blinks, things waver in and out of focus. I get a brief glimpse of his
feet, his legs, I think Cain’s okay. The interior of the car is this blown-
apart mess of wrong angles and broken glass. Cain’s behind the driver’s seat
mostly, he’s this strange upside-down sprawled mess of limbs but I think he’s
okay-ish. Not significantly worse off than he was before the wreck, at least. I
don’t think he’s broken anything, I don’t see fresh blood anywhere just those
same deep cuts I gave him.
Something’s happening outside the car, there’s a cadence of voices and urgency.
The inside of the car is just that ominous back-and-forth click, the harsh
ragged sound of Cain breathing hard, the engine idling. Maybe it’s because I’m
only thoughts and feelings, but I have the sudden understanding that everything
is terribly wrong.
Cain, get up. You have to get up.
Blunt-edged nails claw at the leather upholstery as Cain struggles to sort out
the tangle. His legs flop off the seat as he gets upright, it’s incredibly
confusing to watch Cain’s body move like this. I’m suddenly grateful to have
experienced Cain controlling my body, just so I can feel this calm about being
stuck inside Cain’s body.
I’m not in the front seat. That’s immediately obvious, soon as Cain gets to
where he see the front half of the car. I feel this dizzy sense of relief, I
become nothing but how relieved I am that my dead broken body isn’t taking up
space in the front seat. The windshield is cracked but not shattered, unlike
the back, and I hope I don’t need to make Cain crawl out of the car to see if
my dead body was thrown clear of the wreck. I’m just not there, but Aidan is,
he’s slumped unconscious and bleeding in the driver’s seat, half-draped over
the wheel.
Oh, the engine -- Cain, turn off the car!
Cain lurches forward and grabs the steering wheel to keep his balance. He
scrambles his fingers for the keys. He yanks them from the ignition and then
flicks his gaze to the window. I want him to look at Aidan, I’m about to tell
him to make sure Aidan’s okay, but then I realize just why Cain’s suddenly
staring at the dark glass. Someone’s staring back at him.
Face stark white in the gleaming night and nearly hidden behind a sweep of
black silk, it’s Deimos staring back at Cain. His gaze is sharp like a knife.
Fear cuts me with cold certainty.   
Get out. Cain, now -- out the back windshield, go!
Cain shoves off from the wheel, the console, he throws his hand against Aidan’s
back as he struggles to push his body into motion. I think Aidan’s okay, I’m
pretty sure he’s alive, there’s going to be ambulances and police soon.
Someone’s going to call in this wreck. My safe complicated world will save
Aidan, but Cain needs to save himself.
Light floods the car as Deimos yanks open the driver’s side door. It’s kind of
pathetic the dome lights still work. I nearly warn Cain not to cut himself on
the broken glass as he wedges through the busted back windshield, but I don’t
want to distract him. It’s hard just to stay calm like this, but I have to stay
calm.
Aidan nearly made it, to judge by where the car’s crumpled and smashed. I bet
he would have made it, too, if the other car hadn't been gunning for us. We’ve
been slung through the intersection, spun into facing the way we came. The
collision happened on the corner, square over the rear tires, I’m trying to
take in this whole scene at once for Cain just as fast as I can. It’s strange
to use his eyes like this, stranger than being a passenger inside my own body,
but I try not to think about it. I need to focus on what I’m doing, so I can
get Cain out of this mess.  
The headlights I saw belong to a hulking SUV, this sleek black monstrosity with
a grille guard and dark-tinted windows. It’s cockeyed up on the sidewalk,
taillights flashing as starts to reverse. The two front windows are down
despite the cold weather, and from the pitch and timbre I know it’s Phobos
shouting at Deimos. It’s mostly Cain’s tormented breathing that I hear, I think
maybe I can even hear his hard-pounding heart.
Where’s Deimos? Look for him, quickly.
I get an answering whirl of perspective until Cain finds him, close and coming
closer now that Cain’s out of the car. That’s okay, I have more options now, I
couldn’t let Cain stay trapped in the car. I don’t think Cain is armed, I
certainly didn’t give him any weapons, I can’t think of anything within arm’s
reach he can use either.
Deimos has a knife, of course he has a knife, it’s this silvery blade that
catches the glaring streetlights and softens their harsh brightness into a
moonlit glow. I’m sure it’s not a normal knife, I’m positive I can’t let him
get anywhere near Cain with it.  
Cain, you need to do something. You can’t let Deimos catch you. Can you run?
Cain rises from his crouched stance. He shouts something -- a short collection
of sounds, perhaps in a language I don’t even recognize, it’s bewildering not
to understand the single-word shout. Deimos’ eyes widen, he takes a step back
even though he’s got a knife and Cain’s wavering, bloodied, exhausted -- he
must look more intimidating on the outside. From in here, I’m desperately
terrified that Cain might collapse and not get back up again. I can feel the
way he’s trembling.
This time when Cain shouts I understand him perfectly, even though it’s all
slurred snarl and growling, gritted teeth. “Miss me?”
Deimos hasn’t moved, I’m not sure he can, his blown-open stare is one of
complete shock, total fear. He recognizes Cain, that’s immediately obvious, but
it’s more than that. It’s whatever Cain said first that I couldn’t understand,
that strange foreign-sounding something, and I can’t even remember how it
sounded. Couldn’t take a guess at a single syllable it contains, a solitary
letter that shapes it.
Cain’s boots beat into the twisted metal as he gets on top of the car, balances
himself on the roof like a colossus. I have no idea what he’s doing, but I’m
not about to stop him. Deimos scurries back with a quick-startled reaction, I
think he’s genuinely frightened of Cain now. He doesn’t seem nearly so
intimidating, looking like this, even with the knife held at his side. Deimos
seems rather small, a little trembling thing staring up at big snarling
monster.
I can feel Cain’s mouth spread in a fearsome, mocking smile. “My necromancer’s
not here right now, but good try with the hit-and-run.”
Cain glances briefly from Deimos to the SUV, this black mechanical beast
curving into position behind the demon hunter’s slight frame. It’s Phobos at
the wheel, his petite and pretty runway model look ridiculous compared to the
size and style of the vehicle. He’s wide-eyed as well, though not nearly as
frightened as Deimos. He doesn’t seem frightened at all, actually, he looks
excited and eager, almost grinning with glee.
“Deimos!” he calls. “Time’s up! Gotta go!”
Deimos jerks back another step, feet shuffling like there’s something sticky
keeping him in place. Headlights sweep onto the street in the near distance,
the first bystanders about to arrive on scene. My complicated world is coming
to rescue Aidan.
Cain cocks his head to the side. His fist clenches, his jaw tightens. It’s
hurting him, but he forces the words to sound distinct rather than slurred.
“How’d you end up with a fairy like that, kiddo? Bet it’s an interesting story.
Too bad this reunion’s getting cut short.”
“Killed you.” It’s a whispered rasp, a pleaded denial. Deimos flails a hand
behind him for the car door without taking his eyes off Cain.
All Cain’s inner torment comes out in his laugh. It’s this terribly raw and
hoarse clatter of morbid amusement. “You sure about that?”
Deimos doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t need to, his terrified expression says
it all. He gets a foot up on the running board, swings open the door. His
getaway driver’s already hit the gas, even though Deimos is half-hanging from
the vehicle. He’s got hold of the grab handle, either can’t or won’t take his
eyes off Cain. I know that feeling too well.  
Only once the SUV’s clear of the intersection and making a fast escape do I see
Deimos shift into the seat. The door closes, and Cain watches the taillights
from atop Aidan’s ruined car. His head turns to check out the approaching
headlights. These poor bystanders can probably see Cain, he must be pretty
obvious standing on top of the car like he is.
You need to leave.
A shudder runs through Cain. I’m reminded of a dog shaking wet from its fur. He
shudders again and then slumps to his knees. He slides across the warped metal,
tumbles off the car and to the pavement in a barely-controlled fall. Breathing
becomes choking as he coughs.
I’m sorry. I’m sorry, but you have to go. Cain, get up. You need to run. You
can't stay here.
He struggles and pushes. That approaching car is getting louder, brighter. Cain
doesn’t have any form of identification, he doesn’t have a real name to give,
I’m sure he doesn’t have a home address or medical insurance or anything that’s
going to be required of him once the police arrive, once an ambulance comes on
the scene. I’m not even sure a hospital could fix what’s wrong with Cain.
I’m not sure he can manage back to his feet again, though he’s trying. He’s
hurt, but I’m not. I feel fine. Terrified, yes, but I’m staying calm about it
at least.
Cain, I’m sorry. I’m going to --
It’s all the warning I can give him, because soon as I think about what I want
to do, I’m doing it. There’s resistance, this tissue paper-thin block I brush
aside. It’s like sweeping back a curtain or sliding into a soft, freshly-washed
shirt. It’s like pouring water into an ice tray, this wavering effort of
infinitesimal struggle to level everything out. It’s like nothing I’ve ever
experienced before, taking over Cain’s body.
I clench my fingers, Cain’s blunt-edged nails claw jaggedly at the pavement. I
shudder in a breath, Cain’s ribcage heaves. I take control of this battered,
bloodied demon and suddenly become something more than mere thoughts and
feelings. I become a chaotic ruin of blistering white-hot pain, this constant
shredding sensation like ravaging jaws closed tight and shaking.  
A scream rips through my throat -- Cain’s throat -- I can’t tell anymore, I
don’t know anymore, I don’t know anything except agony, this is too much to
feel -- too much to think, I’m not sure I can be all these things, it’s too
much, it’s impossibly too much. Simply impossible.
Switch me! Abel, let go! Let go!
Pressure surges forward, there’s no resistance at all. Not even a tissue paper
effort, not even a whisper. Soft lidded darkness parts with a bisected waver.
Perspective whirls and straightens, it’s rolling over and then pushing upright,
staggering forward. Boots pound off the pavement, even as concerned strangers
shout, because it’s those bystanders arriving to make everything so
complicated.
It’s not impossible now to think about things and understand them. I’m not in
control of Cain’s body anymore, I’m definitely not going to try that again. I’m
not sure if it hurt because Cain’s hurt, or if that’s just what it’s like
trying to control a body that’s not mine. I don’t want to know anyway, I’ve got
enough to think about as Cain runs from this car accident that wasn't an
accident at all.
***** Chapter 19 *****
“Fuck.”
It’s the first he’s spoken since mocking Deimos. There’s nothing to see but the
red-black luster of his closed eyelids. I thought all these deep, measured
breaths meant he’d passed out finally.
“You fucking --” Cain rolls onto his back with a weary groan. He must have been
out after all, he sounds groggy and slurred, thickly unfocused. “You’re
unbelievable.”
Me?
“Yeah.” He’s hushed, not whispering so much as intentionally quiet. His hands
lift into his eyes, he rubs mottled, exhausted circles. The gesture’s heavy and
slow. Cain drops his hands into the grass and looks at the sunrise-warm expanse
of softening sky.
I’m positive the dew-soaked cold grass isn’t comfortable, but it’s better than
where he’d originally tried to collapse. I urged him to find somewhere no one
would see him from the street. He’s tucked into a smoking area outside an
office complex for now, but he’ll need to leave soon. I just hadn’t wanted to
wake him.
Are you feeling any better?
He answers like I expect with, “Sure. Why not?”
It’s lacking in sarcasm. He doesn’t put enough vibrating growl into the words
for them to carry anger. I can’t tell if his voice is soft like this because of
the moment or because he’s just talking to a voice in his head. He keeps
looking at the sky, doesn’t say anything else. I hope he’s okay.
Worrying over Cain is easier than worrying over myself, like where my body
might be, or if I’m really only something that thinks and feels inside Cain. If
I think too much about what’s happened to me, I’ll stop feeling calm.
Cain?
“Hmn.”
You need to be somewhere no one will find you. It’s a workday. People will be
here soon.
“Fuck off,” he groans. It’s a wretched effort. He rolls to his side and
struggles onto his elbows, his knees. Cain sits upright to look around at the
glass half-enclosure that isn’t more than a wind shield and ashtray. He braces
a hand to the ground as he leans to see more of the lit parking lot around the
side of the building.
He gets the rest of the way to his feet, sways only a little before deciding to
brace himself against the glass. His arms cross over his chest, his shoulders
hunch. I think he might be cold. He must be cold. He hasn’t a jacket, a coat,
his forearms are bare except for dried blood. He’s just in a shirt and jeans,
the things I bought him, the wounds I gave him. 
Everything’s inside Aidan’s car or with me, my body, wherever it is. Everything
I can think of to help Cain isn’t with him. He doesn’t have any money, no
credit cards, no cash. He can’t buy himself a coat, he doesn’t know anyone to
give him one. It’s too risky to send him to my house, I don’t dare send him to
Aidan’s either.
I have no idea if Aidan is okay. He must be okay. Those bystanders would have
called for help, they’ll help Aidan because this is my safe, living world.
Cain’s a dead thing running around in it, no one’s going to help him except me,
a necromancer -- I guess I’m his necromancer, and Deimos wants to kill him.
I’m so full of questions, but Cain gets one out first. “Where am I going?” he
asks. Brusque and bossy, even though he’s looking to me for all the answers.
I don’t know. Cain, what are we going to do about Deimos?
“I’ll handle Deimos,” Cain says. “Don’t you worry your pretty head over him.
Now, princess, you got a castle for me to hide in, or am I on my own?”
Oh. Well, I - I can probably think of somewhere for you to rest for a bit, but,
um, you can’t walk around with cuts on your arms though, so I’m not sure what
to do about that...
Cain’s eyes close. His head hits up against the glass. “You’re fucking
worthless.”
I think he’s smiling. He sounds so quiet, but it must be because I’m a voice in
his head. Surely I’m imagining fond affection in the insult. He’s amused by me
at best, annoyed with me often, I don’t know anymore if I knew ever. I’m inside
Cain’s head and still don’t understand him.
It’s not my heart beating loud and fast like this, I don’t know if I have a
heart anymore, I’ll have to convince Cain to keep sharing his with me. I want
to cry and can’t. I want to feel Cain’s arms around me, not this strange half-
awareness where I know he’s arms-crossed hugging his chest for warmth in the
bitter winter chill.
“Abel,” he says suddenly. Snapping at me, actually sounding angry. His eyes
open, through his eyes I see his arms, those cuts I gave him, everything whirls
too quick for me to follow as he lifts his head and looks nearly anywhere else.
He settles on the sky again where stretching pink glow is overtaking grey dawn.
“Stop panicking.”
I’m not. Or, I am, I don’t know. I’m trying to stay calm. Cain, am I dead now?
Be honest. Please.
He laughs. Quick, startled, I’m not sure he meant to because he sounds neither
angry nor mocking. “Sweetheart, you’re as alive as ever,” he says. I’m pretty
sure he’s smiling, but I can’t see his face. He might also be trying not to
chatter his teeth at the cold.
I give up trying to keep track of what Cain’s doing, not when he’s willing to
answer questions -- able to answer questions, which prompts further worry from
me.
Are you going to be okay? Are you okay now? How could I hurt you that much? It
doesn’t seem possible.
Cain’s started snarling halfway through my torrential outburst of fretting, but
I’m a voice in his head now. He can’t easily get me to shut up.
What are we going to do? What am I going to do? Cain, where am I?
He tries anyway, growling a harsh, “Shut up! Abel, cut it out! Just, stop
talking. Calm the fuck down.” I’ve quieted, but he keeps going without pause to
block my blathering terror. “Let me handle this.”
How? Fight it? Fight me?
“Sure. Why not?” Arching sarcasm accompanies the flick of his gaze over the
parking lot. Cain starts walking, arms folded against his chest. “Fought to
keep hold of you, didn’t I? Some fucking gratitude won’t hurt you. Think I’m
any happier about us sharing a body than you are?”
No…I guess not.
“Damn right, but you don’t see me panicking about it, do you? No? No. Because
that would be stupid, and I know that you’re a complete fucking dumbass, but
try to appreciate the fact that you freaking out makes it really fucking hard
for me to stay calm about the fact I have a goddamn necromancer up in my head
controlling me around like a fucking puppet.”
Cain’s snarled monologue is mostly hissed and whispered, so I have a moment of
clarity to appreciate the full ridiculousness of the situation. He’s walking
around talking to a voice inside his head. I’m the voice he’s talking to, and
even I think he sounds crazy right now. Sudden empathy strikes me, a new
understanding of Aidan’s perspective, but thinking too much about what happened
to Aidan will only make me panic.
Okay. I’m sorry, Cain. Um, am I really controlling you? I don’t mean to. Don’t
listen to me. Or, no, don’t do that, you need to listen to me -- no one else
can hear me, please don’t stop listening to me.
The dark, ominous rumble of Cain’s laugh seems more annoyed than usual, less
amused -- not amused at all, really, and Cain stops walking. He comes to a halt
there on the sidewalk and glares up at the sky, mouth flat and brows tight to
such an extreme that I can feel them through the echoed sensations that form
all my awareness of Cain’s body. This terrifying, confusing impossibility where
I’m inside Cain’s body makes so little sense to begin with, but I’m positive
that Cain is glaring.
So I expect his voice to sound harsh. It’s soft instead, barely a whisper.
“Forget I said anything. You’re fine, sweetheart. You’re fine. I’ll handle
this.” He glances to the street, turns to look back at the building, and then
eyes the sky again before sighing. “Yeah. I’ll handle this,” he says.
The lack of confidence hits like a physical blow, even though I’m nothing
physical anymore. I’ve lost my body, and now I’m terrified to ask Cain if he
knows where I am because the answer might be no. I might have done something
Cain doesn’t understand, not just that he won’t tell me or doesn’t want to tell
me, but that he can’t explain this. Cain’s been able to explain everything so
far, or seemed like it at least.
Cain stops watching the sky, starts walking like he’s got a destination in
mind. I’m too scared to ask. Too scared to do anything, other than feel scared
and think about feeling scared, even though that runs counter to exactly what
Cain and I just talked about. He doesn’t snap at me for it, so maybe I’m doing
okay. Maybe my fear is such that he can’t notice, or it’s been a constant
enough emotion that he expects this.
I don’t realize what Cain’s doing at first. I’m not exactly keeping that close
of tabs on him, despite the temptation and lack of distraction otherwise. He’s
the full focus of my unfocused attention, but it’s only when the car door opens
that I realize he’s been walking along trying each door handle for just this
moment.
I ask even though it’s obvious. Not many other reasons for Cain to pry his
blunt-edged nails under the steering column and rip off the front panel.
What are you doing?
“Handling shit.” Cain’s smug, cocky response is a balm of soothing comfort. I’m
actually pleased to watch him yank apart the multi-colored wiring, at least
until he mutters, “What’s all this shit?” and hesitates over two identical-
looking green wires. Cain lifts his head to check the street before tipping his
head under the steering column again and yanking both green wires close to a
red one.
A whooping protest comes from the bowels of the car, the alarm shrieking and
wailing now that Cain’s sparked it into a fury. His head slams into the wheel
as Cain jerks upright. “Son of a bitch!” He slaps the center of the console in
retaliation and then abandons the car.
Only once he’s gotten several streets away and slowed to a normal walking pace
do I dare comment.
I’m not sure it’s possible to hot-wire a car anymore. Um, you’d need to
override the alarm lockout on the computer…? And I’m not sure how you’d do
that, honestly, but maybe --
“The what?” Cain’s head shifts as if I’m walking beside him. He hisses,
“There’s a fucking computer in the car?”
Um… yes.
Cain stops and turns. He looks back the way he came and frowns. “When?” he
demands. “When did hot-wiring a car get so fucking complicated?”
It seems like a rhetorical question, and Cain seems angry asking it, so I
decide not to answer. He keeps standing there on the sidewalk with an
impatient, attentive air until I realize the question was literal, not
rhetorical. Cain really expects me to answer him.
When did…? Oh. Um, gosh, I - I don’t know. 90s maybe?
A slow-crawling, deliberate stare moves along the quiet side street with dense-
packed lines of parked cars on either side. Cain turns his head, this is such a
deliberate thing he is doing and I have no idea why. Not until he demands, “Any
of these made before then?”
He answers his own question with, “Doesn’t look like it,” and starts walking.
Cain sets a brisk pace, I can’t tell if that’s to keep himself warm or just the
way he walks, or maybe he’s turned into a bloodhound on a trail now. We go up
and down the streets looking at cars trying to find one older than me, but
they’re all barely older than my jeans. Cain circles a sedan and even peers
inside to let me check out the interior, but the CD players nixes it as a
possibility.
“Here we go,” says Cain. I think he means the hybrid parked in the street, but
then his gaze stays steady on a beige-colored tarp draped over the low body of
a car parked in the narrow driveway. Cain sweeps his attention over the brick
townhouse and then keeps going, past the car, right up to the front door. On
the way he kicks one of two plastic-wrapped newspapers toward the steps and
succeeds in sending it sideways into the flowerbed.  
Cain. Cain, what are you--?
Behind him, briefly, a painfully casual yet tense check, and then his elbow
goes into the glass pane of the entry.
You’ll cut yourself!
Cain’s already bloodied forearm knocks the broken glass out of the way so he
can reach inside and unlock the door. I’m braced for an alarm system, voices, a
barking dog, anything other than Cain humming nonsensical, self-satisfied
melody as he lets himself into the house. He even closes the door.
Did you hurt yourself? What are you doing? You can’t be here.
“Wrong on that one, sweetheart. I’m here,” Cain whispers. “Now shut up. I’m
getting me a fucking coat. Maybe breakfast.” His gaze flicks away from the
empty kitchen to check the equally empty living room, and then Cain retreats
toward the entry and front staircase.
For several minutes Cain stands at the bottom of the stairs and simply looks up
at the second floor landing, the brief corner of hallway visible. At last he
decides to go for it, even though Cain’s figured out there’s a blind spot. I’ve
realized it as well, just from tracking Cain’s vision over the scene. He goes
up the stairs with his head turned, body tense. The half-open door leading into
mysterious darkness gives him a long pause before he continues.
Cain’s searching each room like leading a SWAT raid when I realize as worried
as I am about Cain getting caught, I should be more worried for whoever tries
to catch Cain.
Don’t kill whoever you find. I don’t care even if I need a new body, don’t do
it.
Cain scoffs. The timing and degree of amusement is somewhat reassuring. I think
it means he wouldn’t have use for a dead body. I don’t think it means he wasn’t
planning to kill someone. I have all kinds of new reasons to be grateful Cain
finds the upstairs as empty as the downstairs.
I’ve put together a weird understanding of the man whose house Cain is
ransacking. No family photos anywhere, an immaculate home office, the third
bedroom looks like an honest guest room with an untouched, impersonal bed and
empty closet. Cain finds the master bedroom and finds the crisp business suits
I expect in the closet. His digging turns up two different black coats, both of
which he tries on and then discards. I pay more attention to his arms than
anything, because each time I get a glimpse of the fresh cuts from the broken
glass, the harder it is, until finally I can’t any longer.
Cain’s holding a third black dress coat at arm’s length when I decide to start
bothering him. Rather than ask, though, I decide to give him the answer first
and just see what he says.
The cuts I gave you didn’t heal, but the ones from the glass did.
Cain’s response is to stop what he’s doing and demand, “So?” He then tosses the
coat to the floor in disgust. A hard shove sends hangers and clothes squeaking
along the bar in the closet. “What about it?”
I don’t actually have anything for him. I’m still thinking when Cain hauls one
of the coats up from the carpet and slings it on. He holds his hands out to
check the too-short length. “Fuck this guy. Ought to burn this fucker down,
make him get better shit.” He kicks aside the other two coats and then leaves. 
Downstairs, Cain goes right out the front door and even closes it behind
himself even though the narrow entry window is smashed to pieces. From the
street that might not be obvious, maybe, I don’t know. It isn’t like Cain’s
fingerprints will match any in the system, or --
Have you ever been arrested? Was this body ever arrested?
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he hisses. “Are you scheming again? Don’t.
Your ideas are shit, remember the exorcism?”
No, I -- I was just curious. Um, your fingerprints? Police trace people that
way, so, your fingerprints are probably all over that house now. And --
Cain’s gotten up close to the tarp-covered lump on the driveway. The whisking
reveal is of a sleek black sports car definitely older than me, definitely
older than computers being small enough to fit inside anything. It’s locked,
Cain tugs twice to make sure, and then he’s back inside the house searching.
A car like that is so flashy, it must be really expensive. The owner will
report it missing. The cops will find you right away, Cain, they’ll arrest you
--
“Relax, sweetheart.” He snags a set of keys from the junk drawer. As Cain
turns, I catch sight of grocery list on the fridge pinned in place with a retro
sports car-shaped magnet. It’s the only bit of personalization I’ve spotted so
far in this catalog-perfect townhouse that seems like somewhere my dad should
live.
“Cops show up, I’ll handle it,” Cain says. “You worry too much.” He hums a bit
as the key slides into the door, the lock lifts, he plunges the squared-off
mechanism of the handle flush with the panel -- I’m actually not sure I’ve been
inside a car this old. There’s an obscene amount of sloping, pointlessly
aerodynamic hood in front of the dash, a ridiculous 200 at the bottom of the
speedometer, a terrifyingly loud roar of engine as Cain cranks the car to life.
I'm pretty sure he laughs. It sounds like a cackle, a gleeful burst of fiendish
excitement. 
Cain. Cain, maybe you shouldn’t -- no, check your mirrors!
He’s already out of the driveway, in the street, he didn’t look at all before
reversing so there's not much point now in his brief glance at the rearview
mirror. He’s not buckled either. Did cars have seat belts this long ago? Didn’t
we all just learn a valuable lesson about seat belts? Then again, Cain walked
away from that wreck. Ran, actually, he ran from the wreck, even if he had to
crawl his way out of it at first.
Cops will arrest you for driving reckless, Cain, please, that is a stop sign.
That is a -- STOP! Cain, stop the car!
His foot smashes the brake so fast that the car lurches, the transmission
groans, I think there are more parts to this car than I can name because I only
ever learned to drive an automatic, and Cain’s fury gets tangled in the gear
shift, the clutch -- I’m pretty sure that’s called a clutch -- but, I really
don’t --
“Abel!” Cain’s done with keeping the car alive, now he hits it, pounds his fist
into the center of the wheel. The horn beeps slightly in protest. Cain shakes
his fist like he wants to punch it again for talking back, and it’d be comical
if the car wasn’t taking this abuse in my place. “Abel, goddammit, you are
going to get us both killed if you don’t shut the fuck up!”
I’m not sure it’s helpful that I immediately become grateful Cain can’t do
anything like hit himself to hit me, because I have no doubt he would try. At
least I’m calm. I don’t think Cain would like it if I pointed that out to him,
especially since it’s actually I’m calm now. Emphasis on the present state of
the car being stopped.
Let me drive. Can I drive? Will it hurt again if I try to control you?
“Shut up,” Cain snarls. “Shut up, or I am kicking you out.”
Of the car?
“Of my head,” he snaps. 
I have no idea if that’s possible. Regardless of whether or not he means the
threat, I genuinely have no idea if he can get rid of me. I couldn’t get rid of
him. Then again Cain’s had so many of the answers, even if he won’t share them
with me, so maybe he could get rid of me. If I stop being a separate set of
thoughts and feelings inside of Cain, than what am I? Am I still anything?
I don’t dare ask Cain. He already said I wasn’t dead, he obviously doesn’t want
me talking any longer, it’s probably distracting him. I don’t want to distract
Cain while he’s driving. I am terrified to do anything now that Cain’s driving.
I resist the urge to scream when the stop light changes to yellow and the car
accelerates. I can’t imagine this car has any side-impact safety rating. I’m
still not even sure it has seat belts. It probably does, that seems reasonable,
I’m not sure I’m staying calm but at least I’m thinking about things other than
screaming at Cain. He doesn’t beat the yellow, cruises right through on a lazy
red, gets caught at the next light despite trying to run it again. He stops,
though. Cain at least understands stop lights.
Surely stop signs were invented first. That seems reasonable, he must know what
stop signs mean if he knows how to drive a car, and clearly Cain wasn’t lying
about being able to drive. He even obeys a stop sign, waits more patiently than
Aidan to make a left turn at it. I shouldn’t have angered him so much, because
now I can’t ask how Cain knows to drive but had to ask me about car alarms and
the internet. I can’t even ask him where he’s going, but I guess it doesn’t
matter. I’m just along for the ride.
***** Chapter 20 *****
It’s surprising when Cain breaks first, when he decides to start talking to the
voice inside his head. He even turns down the radio. I’m not sure why. I guess
so he doesn’t have to shout over the music.
No whispering this time, no strange softness. He’s brisk and growling,
definitely annoyed with me, that’s obvious even discounting the rude way he
asks, “You done having a hissy fit?”
I wasn’t the one yelling and hitting things, but I don’t point that out to
Cain.
Yes. I’m fine.
“Good.”
It sounds a bit sarcastic, mostly distracted. Cain checks the rearview mirror
and then reaches up to adjust it some. Rather than watch for the light to
change, he keeps an eye on the flow of traffic, tracks for too long a white
sedan. I wonder if he’s worried about the police.
“Answer without panicking. Do you know where you are?”
Besides here? No.
“Fine,” Cain snaps. He’s so quick and ready that I suspect it didn’t matter at
all how I answered. The light changes to let Cain turn left onto the highway
ramp. I try not to worry about the barreling roar of acceleration that he uses
to gain speed. It’s easier to accomplish that modest goal once I hear Cain say,
“That’s fine. I’ll find you. I know where you are.”
You do?
I told myself I wouldn’t ask Cain any questions, once he decided to start
talking to me again, because I don’t want to shut up. Or get us killed, if me
talking is really that distracting or -- worse -- if I really am controlling
Cain. I told myself no more questions, and yet my incredulous reaction just
compounds itself further.
Where am I? My body, you mean my body, right? Where am I? Take me there. I want
my body back, I want --
“Stop. Shut up. No panicking.” Cain’s hand lifts, like I’m somewhere in the car
to see the gesture. “You’re already there, you fucking idiot, and don’t say
anything else stupid. Just listen. Can you do that?”
He’s teeth-gritted snarling, furious and snapping, and the question is so
demeaning and rude that I realize he means it. He’s legitimately concerned.
This is a genuine question, if I can listen and not panic as we talk about what
happened to me and what we’ll do about it.  
Yes. Yes, I’m sorry. I’ll listen.
“Good. This car’s too nice to crash.” Cain pats the matte beige plastic of the
dashboard like greeting a loyal hound. And then without further preamble, “So
you’re on the Otherside. Have to be. Get pissy about it if you want, but you’re
the necromancer, not me. Obviously I didn’t put you there. You did this to
yourself, sweetheart.”
Cain sighs, looks out the window for such a long moment that I wonder if it’d
be panicking to remind him to watch the road. “I felt you reach, so I grabbed,
and here we are. I’m stuck with you. Don’t suppose you know where I can find
another necromancer?”
Am I actually supposed to answer that?
“Heh.” When Cain flicks a grin up at the rear view mirror, I realize he’s been
adjusting it to look at himself rather than the back windshield of the car. “Go
for it. Answer away, princess. You know where I can find another necromancer?”
No. Of course not. Cain, I didn’t even know I was a necromancer until you told
me. I still don’t really understand what that even means. Please tell me you
mean stuck with me like you meant stuck in a dead body. Cain, please tell me --
“Abel.” His eyes go to the mirror, so he can glare at himself to glare at me,
and it’s more effective than lifting his hand or even yelling at me. It’s
easier to judge where I am along the scale of amused to annoyed when I can see
his face, easier to see that I’m scaring him because I can’t stay calm. I’m
this panicking voice inside his head that keeps telling him what to do with
increasing desperation. Cain is operating a motor vehicle at highway speeds,
and I’m freaking out inside his head.
Sorry. Sorry, Cain, I’m okay. Just, scared.
His long glance at the side mirror is either to check traffic or ignore me.
Cain switches lanes before saying, “Yeah. I know. Pretty fucking obvious, but
try harder at keeping your shit together. Okay?”
Okay.
“Okay, then.” He breaths like bracing himself and rolls his fingers over the
wheel. “So I can’t find you from here. Doesn’t work that way. I could find you
easily if I was on the Otherside, but I’m not crossing by myself so don’t even
think about it.”
It’s a warning. A dire one, too, because he’s quiet about it and not just
because I’m a voice in his head. We’re completely alone inside the car, there’s
no risk of anyone overhearing him or getting suspicious, no risk of getting
caught besides the flashy stolen sports car currently exceeding the speed
limit.
Could you?
“Don’t,” Cain snaps. “Don’t even fucking think about it. I’m staying on this
side.”
I just want to know if it’s possible.
Silence forms his response. Cain glances to the side mirrors, the bit of back
windshield he’s left himself in the rearview. He looks at the passing signs
overhead announcing exits and lane splitting, and then a mile later watches the
signs until they’re out of sight.
“I don’t know,” he says at last. “I’ve never tried. Why the fuck would I? I
can’t go from the Otherside to here by myself, I’ve tried that loads, plenty of
motive, everyone’s doing it. That’s the popular direction, sweetheart, you’re
one in a million for thinking to do it the other way on a whim like this.”
It wasn’t a whim! We got hit by a car.
“No, I get it. Can’t get hurt in a car crash if you’re not part of it, can’t
get fucked over by Deimos if you’re not around in the aftermath. Honestly it’s
a neat party trick once you figure out how to get yourself back here.” He
glances into the mirror so I can see his smirk, but then he looks away. There’s
enough echoed sensation that I can tell the smile fades.
Cain’s worried over something. Me, it must be me, he must be worried about me
and that’s terrifying. I don’t want a demon to worry about something I’ve done.
I don’t want to have done something that worries a demon because he doesn’t
know how to undo it, that’s even worse.  
Knowing that I’ve started to panic isn’t exactly helping me stop before Cain
notices, and then it’s too late. He’s scowling reassurances into the mirror.
“Abel, it’s fine. I’ll find you.”
How? You just said you can’t and won’t and don’t know.
“I’ll figure it out somehow, you stupid piece of shit, without the help of my
worthless fucking necromancer. You got yourself into this mess. You reached
like you knew what the fuck you were doing, so of course I grabbed you and
fought like hell to keep you.” Cain hits the steering wheel. “I should have let
you go. Dammit!” Another hit, hard enough to knock the horn, and brake lights
flash in front of us from whomever Cain’s confused by honking.
But I didn’t do anything! I remember we were going to get hit, and I - I think
I even remember the impact, maybe, but I don’t --
Suddenly I recall that exact last moment, that small eternity of regret and
despair and fear -- and the clench of my fist into Cain’s hair, my last
physical sensation. I think very rapidly over everything Cain’s said and done
since the crash, everything I’ve experienced since the crash.
What if you let me go now? Would I go back to my body?
“Who the fuck knows,” Cain growls. It’s a rhetorical question, there is no
answer, I know that, but it gets me thinking anyway. I’m still thinking when
Cain decides to give a more serious answer. “Probably not. You don’t know where
you are. Just say put with me, sweetheart, I’ll get you out of this mess.”
Phobos asked me to send him from this side to the Otherside. Maybe he knows
how? And if I’m with you, then you don’t have to cross by yourself, right?
Cain shoots a brief glare to the mirror. “No,” is all he says. A firm, resolute
nowithout any further sarcasm or follow up, so I know he means it. That won’t
stop me from trying again, although I leave him alone for a bit. He’s back to
focusing on highway signs, which makes me wonder if Cain has any idea where
he’s going.
He speaks before I’ve figured out how to reapproach the subject. He sounds
confident and self-assured as he says, “Alright. So there are my options. Wait
for another necromancer, or play hide and go fucking seek with the one I’ve
got.”
How long would you wait?
“Forty years,” says Cain. He flashes a smartass smirk at the mirror. “Maybe
less, searching from this side. Maybe never if your world gets anymore fucking
complicated. This used to be a lot fucking easier.”
I can’t believe I’m getting more or less straight answers out of Cain for once,
and I don’t want to jinx it even though I have hundreds of questions
stockpiled. I think carefully and make sure I’m perfectly calm before prying a
little further.  
How so?
“It’s called demon summoning, sweetheart. People used to kill each other just
for the honor of killing for me. Necromancers knew what the fuck they were
doing, did shit on purpose. Things used to be simpler, no fucking fingerprint
tracing or computers inside cars. No one needing little fucking plastic with
your face on it, keeping track of you in databases, serial numbers and -
- fucking electricity everywhere, fancy hospitals, all this bullshit.” His hand
gestures to the passing strip malls and gas stations, stretching billboards,
desolate intermittent spots of activity lining the stretch of highway. 
“Used to be the necromancer did the calling, I did the answering. Now I gotta
run around as a fucking cat just to get noticed. Used to be forty years felt
like nothing, a hundred years felt like nothing. Now you blink and everything’s
tits up." Cain sighs, pulls his gaze from an illuminated billboard advertising
the local news. “If we hadn’t done this the hard way, the risk wouldn’t be so
high. I wouldn’t be stuck on this side without you, I’d be ditching a dead
body. Hope you’re happy, princess.” He's quiet, even though he doesn't need to
be. 
I’m not.
“Yeah. I figured,” Cain hushes. He winds the car around a series of exit loops
to reverse directions, starts heading toward the city again rather than away
from it. “Hide and go seek it is, then. Let’s go do what Princess Abel wants,
because that always ends well.”
I keep quiet for the drive back into the city. I can’t tell if Cain’s furious,
annoyed, worried -- I have no idea what Cain is thinking, now that he’s turned
the radio up and stopped talking to me. I don’t think he’s happy with me, but
I’m not really sure when Cain’s ever been happy with me. I keep messing
everything up. I apparently jumped into Cain rather than stick around, so now
here I am with no idea how to un-jump or even find my poor, abandoned body.
I’ve gained a new appreciation for having a body at all, for having a physical
presence. Now I’m barely more than memory, nothing more than thoughts and
feelings, but I do have a body somewhere. A living body, waiting for me. I hope
it’s waiting. I desperately hope my body isn’t wandering around somewhere
without me in it.
“Can’t fucking believe this,” Cain mutters. I’m pretty sure that’s what he
says. Most of it gets lost into the radio. I guess it does matter if he turns
the volume down. It must be like I told Aidan, I’ll only hear whatever Cain
hears.
When Cain nudges down the radio, I know it’s so he can say something. He asks
me, “How do I get to where you crossed before? That exorcism room, the one I
couldn’t get into from the Otherside.”
Keep on the freeway until exit twelve, but, Cain -- Deimos was there last time.
He did the exorcism.
It takes me several seconds to realize Cain’s shrugged. He seems to realize
this as well, belatedly tosses out a sneering, “So?”
Deimos wants to kill you. He said he had killed you.
“And I said I’d handle Deimos. He’s not the first to try. Fuck, he’s not even
the first to succeed. Trust me, sweetheart, if there’s anything I can handle,
it’s someone trying to kill me.” Cain laughs, a rolling roil of mockery and
scorn. “I don’t even have to worry about keeping you clear of the chaos. You’re
right here with me, safe and secure.” He thumps a hand to his chest, grins into
the mirror.  
He sounds gleeful. I think he’s looking forward to fighting Deimos.
I don’t know how to get into the building. It’s Praxis’ place, I guess, um, I’m
not sure actually but he’s been there both times I’ve been there. He’s the one
who tried to help me forget about you.
“Some fucking sorcerer or whatever won’t be a problem.”
Should we try contacting Phobos? I don’t know if he can be trusted, but --
“Fuck no,” says Cain. “Not getting a fucking fairy involved in this, shit’s
complicated enough already. His damn fault for getting himself stuck here, not
mine, not yours. I don’t want you talking to him.”
You’re not the boss of me.
It’s the most childish, immature response imaginable. I don’t even know why I
say it, besides the overwhelming amount of terror and anxiety that is fueling
the moment.
I get a laugh from Cain. Fully amused, too, he doesn’t seem annoyed in the
least. “No, princess. I’m certainly not,” he says. Sounding smug, despite the
admittance, and I have no idea if this is him mocking me or acknowledging an
actual truth. I have no idea now if I should apologize for being rude. Cain’s
unapologetically rude to me. I decide to keep quiet.
I sulk long enough that Cain notices, glances into the mirror like he expects
to see something besides his own dark eyes, dark brows, a gentle scowl of an
expression more like he’s puzzled than anything. “What?” he prompts me.
Nothing. I’m fine. Sorry.
Cain scoffs. “For what, shutting up finally? Don’t be.”
Oh. Um, okay.
It’s silence between us. Actual awkward silence, even though one of us is
mostly silence anyway -- one of us isn’t in the car. Would Cain be looking at
me, instead of his own reflection, if I was actually in the car? I can’t even
tell what his level expression means besides a lack of eyes on the road. The
strangest part of being inside Cain like this is being able to focus on the
corners of his vision. Surely he’s aware of the brake lights ahead.
I’m almost ready to scream when Cain slows the car. He looks to the road and
slows further, glances, and then shifts lanes. “So then,” he says. His gaze
goes into the mirror. “What’s the plan?”
***** Chapter 21 *****
“That’s a dumb plan.” The long slurping sound of the last dregs whisking into
the straw punctuates Phobos’ announcement.
A scowl tightens over Cain’s brow. “You got a better one?” he demands.
I don’t think Phobos knows Cain near as well as I do, because he turns his head
aside with a snooty sniff and doesn’t answer. Cain meant that question, it
wasn’t rhetorical. We both know the plan sucks, that’s the whole reason Cain’s
sitting in the passenger seat of the massive black SUV that tried to kill us
talking to the driver who purposefully accelerated through a red light to do
so. This is borderline suicide, but it’s part of the shitty plan we came up
with so I guess it’s happening.
Phobos chews on the end of the straw for a moment before leaning forward to
check out the front entrance of the mall. “Throw this away,” he says. He
thrusts the empty cup out at Cain.
“Fuck off,” snaps Cain.
“I don’t want trash in my car.” Phobos rakes a sneer over Cain. “For any longer
than necessary, at least.”
Cain clenches his fist, jerks forward --
Don’t hit him! Just do it, take the cup, it’s okay.
Plastic crumples as Cain chokes his hand around the remains of Phobos’ enormous
sugar-stuffed frappe. The tight line of his jaw seems uncomfortable, but it
still isn’t tight enough to stop a slow, ominous growl.
Phobos makes a shooing motion with his hand. “Go. Trash cans are by the doors
there.”
Please, Cain, please just do it.
The passenger door shoves open, Cain’s boots thump into the pavement. He slams
the door and then stomps across the parking lot. A mini-van brakes hard to
avoid hitting him and honks, Cain flips off the driver without even looking -
- I just see his lifted finger swing out to the side, I use the corner of his
vision to keep track of the situation. Fortunately he stops before I have to
remind him about behaving in public.
I think Cain understands the risks, even given his eagerness to steal cars and
break into homes. I convinced him to wait until the mall opened before going
inside, I even convinced him to say more or less nice things to the sales
associates to make them go away while Cain used one of the display computers.
Somehow I managed to talk Cain through using the internet to find Phobos’
Instagram feed to message him about meeting.
Actually that part was easy. The hard part was convincing Cain to leave the
store after we were done. I told him the display computers had a time limit,
that his was almost up and that the employees would make him leave. I have no
idea if he could tell I was lying. I suspect I didn’t sound believable. Too
many umsin my explanation for why Cain should leave.
“I’m not doing this,” Cain hisses. Soft, quiet, because even for a weekday the
mall entrance is crowded enough that he doesn’t want to be overheard talking to
himself. “I’m not, okay? Think of something else.”
I know. I know, I hate him too, but he can get us inside. That room without
shadows, if you think that’s where we can cross --
“I’m staying,” Cain declares. He spikes the drink cup into the trashcan. “Fuck
the whole plan.”
Rather than turn for the parking lot, Cain goes for the mall entrance. He’s got
the door handle, he’s yanking it open.  
What are you doing? Phobos can see you, he’s going to leave -- Cain, stop!
Don’t move!
He rocks to a halt inside the vestibule, stuck between the sets of doors and
two women trying to leave. They awkwardly apologize, smile and shuffle, while
Cain stands there, fists clenched, trembling with fury. Helpless, because the
voice inside his head got panicky, started screaming orders that I’m pretty
sure he can’t ignore.
I’m sorry. You can move, I’m sorry. Please go back outside though, please.
A wordless snarl accompanies Cain out the door. Brisk strides take him down to
the curb, but he doesn’t cross into the parking lot. He stares at the black
SUV, visible in its parking spot thanks to its hulking size.
You won’t be crossing by yourself, Cain, I’ll be with you.
“Abel,” he says. There’s not a follow up, not at first, he runs a hand through
his hair. He sighs. Cain looks up at the mid-morning sky and sighs again,
heavier than the last. Something’s weighing him down, something he wants to
say.
A final sigh contains his, “Sure.” The follow up of, “Why not?” contains so
much sharp sarcasm it hurts. He marches out to the SUV, to where Phobos is
waiting.
Cain’s hand hesitates over the car handle. “I fucking hate you,” he whispers.
He jerks the door open with a grunt, like the effort’s uncomfortable.
Despite Phobos comment about trash in his car, the interior of the vehicle is
cluttered. Baubles and bright charms dangle from the rear view mirror beneath a
set of pink fuzzy dice. Canvas totes and reusable shopping bags litter the
floorboard in the back.
I’m pretty sure the cargo hold has crap in it, I can see a wire cage or kennel
at least, but Cain hasn’t gone looking so I really have no way of knowing. I’m
pretty sure this vehicle’s amenities include protection spells and wards and
all kinds of things I don’t understand but know can’t be good for Cain. I know
this could be a trap, could easily turn into a trap. Deimos could be in the
cargo hold with that knife, ready to stab Cain.
This is such a bad idea, and it’s mine. I’m giving Cain such horrible ideas, as
horrible for him as being told to kill people was for me. Understanding why
Cain’s furious with me isn’t very helpful, but at least it’s something to think
about.
Phobos watches Cain get settled. The navy pea coat forms part of the clutter in
the back seats, and Phobos’ stylish turtleneck and skinny dark jeans matches
everything else about his pretty runway model look. I didn’t realize Cain was
being serious both times he referred to Phobos as a fairy, but now looking at
him I guess that makes as much sense as Cain being a demon.
“New plan,” Phobos says. He turns to face Cain, tosses his hair. His snobby
expression doesn’t waver, nor does Cain’s scowl.
The cliche of fighting like cats and dogs seems accurate, given that neither of
them seems able to stand the other based solely off what they are. Their
greeting, in fact, consisted mostly of outing the other right away with finger
pointing accusation. Phobos’ wide-eyed declaration of, demon! , getting matched
by Cain’s sneering, fairy. I think without me present, Phobos might have tried
running Cain over with the SUV after that.
“We go right in the front door,” says Phobos. “Hide in plain sight.”
“How is that plan any less dumb than the one my necromancer came up with?” Cain
demands.
Phobos’ pretty smile isn’t especially friendly. “No, it’s still a stupid plan,
but at least it stands a chance. Sneaking in will never happen, trust me,
Praxis has that place on lockdown. But so long as Deimos isn’t there, I should
be able to convince him I know what I’m doing.”
What if Deimos is there? Cain, ask --
“So we kill Deimos first,” is what Cain says. He goes straight to the answer
without my asking.
Phobos shakes his head. “If it were that easy, don’t you think I’d of done that
already? I’ll tell Deimos I found you, send him off hunting. That’ll buy us
time. We go in, get upstairs, and then your necromancer pulls us both across.
By the time Deimos figures out I lied, it won’t matter.”
Cains looks out the front windshield, doesn’t say anything. By the patience
radiating from Phobos, I suspect he thinks that Cain’s listening to me. Except,
I’m being quiet, because it’s daunting telling Cain what to do. Both these
plans are bad. All these plans are bad, everything about this situation is
terrifying and awful. I just want my body back, and no one even knows how to
find it, let alone get me back inside it.
“Don’t suppose you know where I can find another necromancer, do you?” Cain
asks. He glances to Phobos with a sharp, toothy grin that I can feel pull at
his cheeks. There’s nothing friendly about it, same as Phobos’ smiling
response.
“There’s the body of one six feet under at Sunset Memorial, courtesy of
Deimos,” he says. “By now I’m sure it’s mostly worms and formaldehyde. Not sure
that’d be useful to you. To anyone, really, that was kind of the point. He’s
nothing if not determined.”
Phobos sounds almost fond of this demon hunter he so casually dismissed
killing. I’m a bit more focused on the fact Deimos likes to kill necromancers,
though.
As is Cain, apparently. “When’d that go down?” he asks.
Phobos shrugs. “Fifty-two? Fifty-three? The year Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was
released, whenever the fuck that was.”
Cain’s response is just a slow, bewildered, “Huh.”
“Oh, and, sixty-something, late sixty-something, I crossed paths with one. Tall
guy, good-looking, dangerous as hell. He was a Black Panther -- not literally,
he wasn’t a shapeshifter, it was just the sixties and things were weird.
Anyway, if you weren’t there I can’t explain it, and he’s probably long gone.
Not that I’d know where or how to find him. I barely remember meeting him.”
Now Cain’s staring at Phobos, focused right on him. His hollow-voiced, “Yeah?”
seems especially strange.
It’s strange enough Phobos notices, starts staring right back. “Also yours?” he
asks, incredulous.
It’s Cain’s turn to shrug, it doesn’t seem like a comfortable response.
“Oakland?”
“Near enough. Haight-Ashbury,” replies Phobos.
“Late sixties,” says Cain. He’s stopped snarling entirely. “Young looking?”
Phobos nods. “Under thirty.”
Their staring breaks, each of them looking elsewhere. My curiosity is bursting
to the point of rudeness, and if I were actually in the car I would’ve already
started in on my questions. I’m not in the car, not really, I’m just inside
Cain, and Cain’s sick of my endless questions and telling him what to do.
“So… is he dead?” Phobos asks at last. His head turns, I see the motion from
the corner of Cain’s flicked-away gaze.
“Yup.” Perfectly flat, no inflection at all.  
“Oh. Sorry?”
The scoffed dismissal isn’t much of an answer, even for Cain.
Phobos turns over the engine on the SUV, a surprisingly soft sound that results
in a gentle purr. “Well,” he says. “You can crash at my place until tonight,
Deimos definitely won’t find you there.”
While still not especially friendly, Phobos sounds less hostile. He looks over
at Cain, but Cain’s looking out the windshield. It’s just me watching Phobos,
but I’m not sure he can tell that. He knows I’m here, knew before Cain even got
around to explaining it. After that initial hiss-and-spit greeting between
them, demon and fairy, the necromancer got acknowledged and then dismissed. I’m
not about to ask Cain to start relaying messages for me.
“Sure,” says Cain. Under his breath he adds, “Why the fuck not?”
Phobos swings the SUV out its spot and takes off across the parking lot obeying
all the crosswalks and stop signs to accommodate pedestrians. Along the way,
Cain spots and then keeps his eye on the black sports car he’s abandoning. I
almost start to tell him it might still be there later, that we can come back
for it, but I remember the magnet, the empty townhouse - the owner’s going to
want his car back. Parked here at the mall, it’ll be easy for the police to
find.
Cain’s jaw clenches when Phobos turns on the radio. He sinks low into his seat
as Phobos turns up the volume. The low rumble in his throat is only vibration,
I can’t actually hear him over the bouncing pop music. For someone who just
talked about murder and mayhem almost half a century ago, Phobos certainly
seems to embrace modern living. He’s humming along to the top 40, even sings a
few lines of the catchy chorus. I contacted him through Instagram. Everything
about this is crazy. I think I might not be the craziest person I know anymore,
although maybe I am, since I’m watching this fairy from inside a demon.
I think again about what Cain said things moving slower, about waiting forty
years, and this long-gone necromancer from the sixties who apparently Phobos
met once. I fully appreciate for maybe the first time the sheer impossibility
of the time involved in all this, the fact that neither Cain nor Phobos nor
even Deimos looks really all that much older than me, probably not twice my
age. Definitely not enough times older than me to account for all this.
With the bubblegum music blaring, I don’t bother with trying to ask Cain
anything. Whatever he says back to me is going to get heard by Phobos anyway. I
find it a bit ridiculous that we can’t talk privately despite sharing a body. I
think about it while Phobos drives and Cain sulks, or whatever it is he’s
doing.
Cain? Cain, I’m sorry about earlier. I’m really trying not to give you any
commands. And, I know this plan seems reckless -- well, it is reckless, but …
I’m glad you’re helping. So, thanks for that, it means a lot. Um, that you’re
here. That’s all.
The roll of Cain’s shoulders seems like my answer, until Cain rolls his fingers
over his thigh, looks at himself do it, so maybe that’s my answer instead. Or
he’s ignoring me. It’s impossible to know, without Cain saying anything.
Somehow the gate that Phobos has to fob open just to get into the parking lot
seems suiting. The entire complex seems suiting, from the fountain out front to
the quaint balconies dotted along the length of the buildings. Phobos drives
around the manicured grounds to one of the buildings in the back of the complex
and then taps the garage opener clipped between the dome lights. The SUV barely
fits, Cain’s door nearly hits the wall. There’s nothing else in the garage, not
even paint on the walls.
Phobos unlocks the door and then leads the way inside, the pea coat over his
arm. “Don’t touch anything,” he says to Cain. “I’m not sure what might bite.”
A tight nook of closed doors in the short hall doesn’t provide any clue as to
what Phobos means by that, although Cain’s answering grunt seems blandly
affirmative. I guess Cain understands the warning. He keeps his hands in the
pockets of the stolen coat as Phobos rounds the washer-dryer combo to reach the
front entry and staircase leading up into the rest of the house.
It’s catalog-perfect decorating in the entry, with tasteful framed photos of
generic black-and-white cityscapes, white marble flooring containing an oval
rug, but Cain doesn’t look at any of it for long. He traces his gaze over the
lintel where home sweet home is written out with woodblock lettering, and maybe
it’s my imagination or a trick of the light, but I doubt it. The black-painted
wood gleams and glows with the same intractable quality as Cain’s eyes. I don’t
think Phobos’ home is all that sweet to anyone he doesn’t want inside it.
“Are you hungry?” Phobos glances over his shoulder at Cain as they go upstairs.
“I have food,” he offers, as if this is an accomplishment worthy of note.
The living room is less catalog perfect, clean and somewhat tidy despite ample
clutter. More woodblock letters catch Cain’s attention, he finds love and wish
on the living room walls and eatin the dining room. His reply to Phobos is to
shake his head and say, “Nah.”
“Well, if you get hungry,” Phobos says. He gestures at the kitchen part of the
open floor plan. “Bedrooms are upstairs, don’t go there, use the couch if you
want to lie down. I have cable -- do you know how to operate a television? Yes,
of course you do. You have to. Right?”
Phobos’ wavering certainty ends when Cain looks at him. Glares at him, really,
eyes narrowed and brow tight.
“Right,” says Phobos quickly. He goes to the coffee table and picks up the
remote briefly, sets it back down. “Well, it’s here. Oh --” He gathers a laptop
from the sofa cushions. Cain’s attention goes to it immediately, but Phobos
starts for the stairs holding it. He disappears upstairs under Cain’s watchful
eye and then reappears without Cain having looked away.
“Got a shower?” Cain asks.
“Yes, but you can’t use it,” Phobos replies. “It’s upstairs. Use the sink if
you must.”
Cain side-eyes the dark-gleaming lettering on the wall. It’s a tense moment
with suppressed mutual violence, I realize, even though it seems awkwardly
silent instead. I don’t think Phobos wants Cain in his house anymore than Cain
wants to be here, but Cain and I both know he doesn’t have anywhere else to go.
Everything’s so complicated, he can’t just be a body walking around, he needs a
name, a photo ID, so many things that suddenly I have to wonder how Phobos even
has a car, a house, cable television, internet access, all these complicated
things in my complicated world that he’s pretending to be part of.
“Sure.” Cain shrugs, looks around at Phobos’ pretend normal life. He checks out
the teetering stack of fashion magazines shoved into the corner, turns his head
to take in the bookcase loaded up just the same. Most surfaces seem to contain
at least one or two of the glossy, colorful things now that I notice. They form
the primary source of tidy yet crowded clutter.
Phobos lets out a held breath. “Okay, then,” he agrees. “I’m going. If you need
to leave, don’t go downstairs. Use the balcony.” He points at the sliding glass
doors in the dining room, just alongside the eatset of woodblock letters. “I
assume the height won’t be an issue for you?”
“Yeah, fine,” Cain says brusquely.
A few steps get Phobos closer to actually leaving. “Help yourself to whatever’s
in the kitchen that’s edible. Maybe don’t open some of the cabinets.” He pauses
with a hand on the bannister. “Use your best judgment,” he advises Cain. It’s a
vague warning or an apathetic threat, I’m not even sure Phobos knows which. He
hesitates further about leaving a demon unsupervised in his home before
descending out of sight.
Cain goes to the living room window that overlooks the back of the building.
There’s a modest run of trimmed grass and hedges to separate it from the
street. Cain leans his head without touching the glass to see further, to look
at more, I think maybe he’s anxious about something more than curious. He backs
away from the window cautiously, like it might explode if he moves too quick.
Next Cain heads into the kitchen, doesn’t stray long over anything in
particular on his way into the dining room. He watches through the glass
sliding doors as Phobos’ SUV emerges from beneath the lip of the balcony,
drives through the parking lot. Cain stays there for long enough I almost
wonder if he’s okay, if maybe being inside Phobos’ house is more terrible than
it seems.
At last Cain turns, goes into the kitchen. A vast array of colorful, whimsical
magnets secure almost every available inch of the fridge in paper. Takeout
menus, magazine cutouts, notes and lists in round, looped handwriting, a few
faded newspaper clippings, recipes -- nothing particularly personal, no photos,
just collected items of interest that say so much without meaning anything. It
gives as much of an understanding of Phobos as that one single sports car
magnet.
Inside the fridge is an absent horror of actual contents. There aren’t even
condiments, besides a handful of ketchup packets hanging out in the drawer. A
Chinese takeout carton and pizza box occupy the shelves along with a half-
consumed sports drink. Cain closes the door, checks in the freezer and finds
shriveled cubes in a plastic ice tray. He slams it shut and then sweeps his
gaze over the rest of the granite countertop kitchen.
Fashion magazines occupy spaces meant for appliances and food prep, dishes.
They’re stacked or scattered, one flopped open beside the sink and littered
with tell-tale crumbs. A nearby set of bagels wrapped in their plastic bag get
picked up, studied, and then tossed down in disgust by Cain. After a cautious
study of the cabinet and drawers, Cain decides to open none of them. He checks
the pantry, first tapping cautiously at the knob like checking for a live wire.
A bag of potatoes wiggling with sprouts greets him, it’s slung into the bottom
corner. A few cans of condensed soup, one-pound bags of rice and beans,
lentils, Cain picks up and sets down each thing with subsequently louder
swearing. He ends up with one of the soup cans that has a pull tab, yanks it
off with enough force that chicken noodle slops over his hand.
Um, those are actually meant to be --
Cain lifts his finger, flips off the pantry and makes sure I can see it as he
keeps chugging straight from the room-temperature, still-condensed can. I’m
disgusted on his behalf, horrified on his behalf. The profane gesture lowers as
his head tips back for the last gloopy noodle and slimy chunk of too-cold to be
pleasant chicken. He sets the empty can on the counter, or rather on one of the
magazine stacks occupying the counter space.
The stolen coat ends up across of the silver-stemmed, white-cushioned
barstools. Cain turns on the sink and adjusts the temperature until he’s
satisfied. The flow of water passes over the ragged red lines on his arms.
He scrubs the dried blood with soap, seems unconcerned with the raw, open
flesh. I’m concerned about how they’re not bleeding, not healing, maybe they
look a bit better than before the crash, actually, now that he’s cleaned up the
blood. Maybe all the blood made them look worse.
Cain?
“Hmn.”
More absent then anything, I think, he doesn’t seem to be scowling at anything.
He’s not attacking the faucet to turn it off, he’s shaking his hands slow to
dry them. As I hesitate over what to say now that I know he’s okay listening,
Cain puts back on the black wool dress coat. By the time I figure out what I
might want to say, he’s collapsing onto the sofa.
Cain’s left on his boots in blatant disregard or sheer exhaustion, I can’t
tell. He tosses and turns to get comfortable and can’t on Phobos’ elegant
white-leather sofa. 
Cain, I’m so sorry. I wish I knew more about what I was doing. Is there
anything I can do to help you right now? Besides shut up and let you sleep.
The intense study of the ceiling doesn’t waver. Cain’s decided to lie on his
back, arms and ankles crossed. The dumbest question blurts out of me in the
silence of Cain not answering the stupid one I already asked.
Are vampires real?
A genuine laugh escapes Cain and continues, builds, he has to sit upright with
it. I’ve pushed him so far off the scale of amusement that Cain starts to cough
these horrible, ragged coughs that remind me just what hell I’ve dragged this
poor demon through since pulling him half-frozen from a lake in the middle of
the night.
Sorry. Sorry, Cain, you don’t have to answer that.
“Fuck yeah,” is what Cain manages. There’s a grin pulling his face when he gets
the coughs and laughter both under control. “You really are the dumbest fucking
necromancer. What the fuck makes you think vampires wouldn’t be real if demons,
fairies, fucking wizards -- Sweetheart, didn’t your mother ever read you any
bedtime stories?”
No… I mean, I read books to myself... I - I’m not stupid, Cain, except in my
world none of that is real, okay? My mom would have let a doctor cut my head
open and rearrange it manually if she thought it would make me stop being
crazy. That’s what I thought I was, Cain, I thought I was crazy, and - and -
you know what? Fuck you. Seriously, Cain, fuck you for laughing at me when you
don’t explain anything or answer a single question without me forcing you into
it. Maybe I hate you. How’s that, Cain? I hate you. There. Now you’ve pissed
off the voice inside your head that can tell you to do whatever it wants. And
you think I’m the dumb one? Ha!
Cain’s not saying a word back. He’s not even moving besides breathing,
actually, and then blinking too I guess. Now that I’ve pause my tirade enough I
can actually take in the silent, passive way Cain does nothing about the fact
I’m freaking out on him like this.
I was just thinking of all the horrible things I’ve done to Cain, and here I am
finding even more ways to hurt him. I have no idea what I’m doing, why I’m
doing this. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to hurt Cain or boss him
around or threaten to hurt him further.
Such devastation fills me that I think Cain feels it, he starts to stir
uncomfortably. He turns onto his back and snarls softly like he wants to tell
me to shut up, stop panicking. I’m freaking out on him silently instead, and
I’m sorry for that along with the rest.
I’m not sure if I’m calm or not, but I’m only thoughts and feelings and talking
to Cain, so if I need to feel and think less then --
Cain, is this what it means to be a necromancer? Is this what I can do, hurt
you? Command you? Make you fight things and do anything even if it means
getting you killed and - and what else? What other horrible things can I do?
He’s hushed, even though we’re alone. No rumble, no snarl, mostly sigh. “You
really want me answering that, sweetheart?”
...No.
“Okay, then.” Cain watches the ceiling, like that’s the end of it. His eyes
close finally, it’s sunshine-bright late morning sun flowing into the
apartment. It's bright behind his closed lids. Cain turns toward the back of
the sofa and hunches the wool coat over his head some until things darken.
Cain?
“Hmn.” It’s a soft acknowledgment, same as at the sink, as if my outburst never
happened.
Cain, I’m sorry.
His breathing’s gone slow and heavy like he might be asleep, except Cain slurs
back, “S’fine.”
I don’t really hate you.
The echoed sensation of Cain’s smile is pulled cheeks, same as any sharp-
toothed sneer or jeering grin. His eyes open, he lifts his head like I’m
somewhere in the room for him to see. That I’m somewhere in the room to see
him. When I’m not -- when he remembers I’m not -- Cain stops smiling. He lowers
into the sofa, curls the coat over his head to block the light.
I want to tell him goodnight. I want to tell him again that I’m sorry, that
maybe I did mean some of that outburst but it was rude. Even if Cain’s rude to
me, I don’t want to be rude back. That’s not who I am, that’s not the type of
person I am. Even if I’m a necromancer, a monster, I still want to be me.
Someone smart, nice, funny, caring -- surely I’m those things, surely that’s
who I am, how I’ve lived my life. I had such a nice life. I was such a nice
kid.
“Sweetheart,” groans Cain. “You want the TV on? I can’t stay awake to entertain
you now and do this dumb plan later, princess, it’s one or the other.”
Sarcastic and snapping, pushing himself upright to glare at the nothing I’ve
become. Cain snatches up the remote and stares for too long at the plethora of
buttons.
It’s the red one, top left.
He jabs it. The screen flickers to life. I suggest a few channels, but Cain
gets so distracted by putting in different number combinations that I stop, let
him take over entirely. He starts scrolling through channels with rapt
attention to even commercials, although he doesn't stay long with anything in
particular. He interrupts celebrity spokespeople mid-sentence,  watches the
opening credits to a sitcom and then flips to something else once the show
actually starts. Cain's fascination with the television sets him into scowling,
I'm not sure if that means he's upset or just focused, concentrating, trying to
figure out my complicated world via toothpaste commercials and daytime soap
operas.
When Cain gives up on the television in favor of trying to sleep, he leaves it
running. So I'll have something to listen to, I suppose, although I'm full of a
sudden curiosity how this is going to work once Cain is unconscious. He's
closed eyes and steady breaths, a settled heaviness that's getting heavier. The
shadowed darkness behind his shut eyelids seems to undulate into deeper
oblivion. Am I imagining the television's gotten quieter? Is it just a quiet
part of the show? 
I'm still braced for something to be different when I hear the end credits run
on the show, a fast-paced announcer hyping the next vapid dose of weekday mush.
I listen to the entire hour-long talk show with Cain still unchanged, quiet and
heavy with closed eyes. All he asked for was a shower and a bed. That’s all he
wanted, all he needed, I’m here with him still but it’s not the same. I can’t
stroke my fingers through his hair, rub his weary shoulders. All I can do is
let him rest, wait for him to wake up, move forward with this terrible plan to
play hide-and-seek with my body. 
***** Chapter 22 *****
I don’t realize Phobos is there until the television volume lowers, his breathy
voice makes up the difference between the silent dark nothing of Cain asleep
and the rest of the room. “Necromancer, get him up. It’s time.”
If Cain’s still asleep then maybe I don’t want to wake him up. Maybe he needs
his sleep. I can’t exactly explain that to Phobos, obviously. Without the
television there’s very little for me to listen to, it’s already a strange
muffled experience. I can’t tell where Phobos is standing, what he’s doing.
“Abel. Hey.” His fingers snap. “Necromancer. Wake your demon, let’s go.”
How many hours of bland, uninteresting programming did I not really listen to
while Cain slept? How long has he been asleep? Why hasn’t he woken up, with
Phobos hissing and snapping like this where I can hear, which means Cain can
hear, and why doesn’t Phobos just wake up Cain himself? I have so many
questions, none of the exact answers, but I can put together guesses. I guess I
don’t really want to wake Cain either. Best case he’ll be grumpy. Worse case
he’ll try to kill something, one of us maybe, actually now it makes sense
because I’m the one thing in the room Cain can’t hit.
Cain? Cain, can you hear me? Phobos is back.
It’s a strange way to whisper, a strange way to try being soft and kind about
this. I’ve thought a lot about things, about what Cain’s said, about what all I
can do or maybe what I might be able to do. I’ve wondered a lot about the other
necromancers Cain’s known. Necromancers who were smarter than me, who knew what
they were doing and did it on purpose. Other necromancers, bossing him around,
making him kill for them, killing for him, getting him hurt and then hurting
him.
Cain?
He stirs this time, I put a bit more force into it. His eyes open to the
shadowed cushion, his head turns some to knock the coat back. No sunlight, the
brightness is from the overhead light fixture, so that tells me a little about
how much time has passed.
Phobos is back, he asked me to wake you up. He’s somewhere in the --
Cain’s already on it, already sitting upright and searching. He finds Phobos
standing several feet away, navy pea coat and dark skinny jeans, creamy white
scarf bundled under his chin and white knit gloves on his clasped hands. He’s
standing very still, very stiff, chin lifted and gaze firm on where Cain’s
groggily half-aware and rubbing at his face.
“Get up,” says Phobos. His eyes shift to Cain’s boots on the leather
upholstery. A frown pulls down the pretty line of his smile, but he doesn’t
comment on it.
On the floor beside him is a canvas shopping tote, the side decorated in a
burst of bright vegetables. One more mystery, why Phobos has all these grocery
totes and a kitchen devoid of food. He picks up the handle on the tote and then
steps toward the stairs. “Ready?”
Cain gets to his feet. “Sure.”
I wait for the why not? part of that answer, but he doesn’t say it. He flicks
his attention to the television briefly and then looks up at the menacing
woodblock letters so cheerfully inviting him to love and wish . Sincerely meant
as the home sweet homeover the front door, I’m certain.
Phobos descends the staircase. “Come on, let’s go.” Cain follows him, but stops
at the halfway point when Phobos says, “I’ve thought of a better plan.”
In the entry, Phobos turns to see Cain glaring down at him. I agree entirely
with Cain’s decision to wait for an explanation before going further, but he
should say something. I’m not sure Phobos is going to understand otherwise, he
doesn’t know Cain like I do. But Cain says nothing, he continues down the
stairs. He keeps an eye on that home sweet home threat, doesn’t seem keen to
put his back to it to follow Phobos through the laundry and utility nook, that
tight blind-turn of closed doors that leads into the garage.
Cain, if it was a trap he wouldn’t have said anything. I think, I’m not sure,
but I don’t like this. What’s in that bag he’s got? Can you see inside it?
Cain reluctantly pulls his gaze off the black-painted letters and catches up
with Phobos. He tries for a glance inside the tote, but it’s a confusing half-
second of colors and shapes I can’t make sense of -- fabric, pink, black,
something plastic maybe.
I couldn’t see anything. Didn’t look especially harmful though? I’m not sure.
Cain’s shoulder lifts some. I’m not exactly certain what that means, but it’s
an acknowledgment at least. We’re on somewhat speaking terms, I guess, despite
how awful I’ve been to him.
Phobos pops the locks on the SUV and starts up the engine from the fob. The
rumbling strength of the hulking vehicular beast quiets into a gentle purr once
we’re inside it, once the doors close to the cozy, dark interior. The canvas
tote stays in Phobos’ lap.
“Okay,” Phobos says. Bracing himself for something that can’t be good. Despite
the engine being started, the automatic garage door stays closed behind us. The
doors are locked, and I bet Cain’s door won’t unlock if he tries the handle.
This feels entirely like a trap. The stiff set of Cain’s shoulders tells me he
feels it, too, he feels as trapped as he is. I have no idea what Phobos is
planning or what might happen. That’s terrifying, but I have to stay calm. I
have to stay calm about things, no matter what happens. That’s somehow even
more terrifying.
Phobos crushes the fabric handle of the tote between his gloved hands. “I want
to talk to your necromancer,” he says. He looks directly at Cain, looks beyond
Cain, his gaze seems a little unfocused somehow. He knows I’m in here, same as
he knew Cain was inside me when we first met.
Cain, can he see me? Can he hear me?
“No,” says Cain. It suits for the answer to Phobos as well, but just from the
way he’s said it I know that’s not the case. He would have answered Phobos
differently otherwise. He wouldn’t have tapped his finger against his thigh
enough times for me to notice otherwise.
“I talk to your necromancer or this doesn’t happen,” Phobos says.
“So talk. He can hear you.”
Phobos’ eyes narrow. “I’m aware of that. You know what I want, don’t play coy.
Let him come talk to me. I only have your word he’s going along with this.”
“You think I’d be here if he didn’t want me here?” Cain’s more incredulous than
sarcastic.
“I think you’re an especially clever demon or an extremely cruel one. This
could be a trap,” says Phobos.
Tell him it’s not. Remind him about how we found him, that business card he
gave me. You wouldn’t have known about that if not for me.
“Won’t matter,” says Cain. He turns his head some without taking his eyes off
Phobos. “If he doesn’t believe me, then he doesn’t believe me.”
Well, then, I’ll talk to him.
Tightness drags Cain’s brow together with enough force I can actually see it at
the top of his vision. I see the inward invasion of his scowl. His gaze flicks
away from Phobos to the dashboard, the windshield, the dark-tinted windows that
make this a terrible dark, tense moment.
Cain? I’ll talk to him. How do I do that?
The tapping of Cain’s finger against his thigh starts up again, turns into a
clawing motion. “Fuck me,” he whispers. To himself, I’m pretty sure, he’s soft
enough I’m pretty sure it’s not meant for anyone else besides himself. I’m
certain that’s not my actual answer.
I won’t say anything about it, then, won’t ask what’s wrong. I won’t get pushy
or panicky. I just wait.
“Be quick,” Cain says. “For fuck’s sake, be quick ” He takes in a few quick
breaths, lets them out as strong puffs like getting ready to move a heavy piece
of furniture. His tone turns brisk, less desperate and trapped, he’s snapping
at me so that I know what’s wrong even before he says it. “You’re taking over,
Abel. Got it?”
I think so. I think I can do that. Like at the crash? Is there a better way
though? That hurt. Cain, wait, wait, that really hurt when I did that --
“S’fine! Just do it, Abel, stop making me wait. Do it.” Cain closes his eyes,
winces them shut actually, so I really don’t want to do this. I think this is
going to hurt one of us, and I don’t think Cain’s going to let that be me this
time.
Maybe it’ll be better, since he’s not so hurt already, he’s rested, that was
just right after the crash, and I hadn’t been in Cain’s body long. Maybe that’s
the trick, maybe I don’t need to be scared. I can’t do this if I’m scared and
panicking, I know that, I have to stay calm.
I don’t give Cain any warning, since he’s braced and ready. It’s pushing
forward into a lack of resistance, wispy bare sensation of pushing a door open
at the same time someone’s pulling it. Physical awareness turns from an echo
into a roaring cacophony of too many things all at once. Rather than try to
fight for understanding, I tumble helplessly into the torrential flow. I won’t
struggle, won’t panic, I know I can’t do that. I stay calm. I can do this.
It’s easy, comparatively, and also impossibly hard. I hear the ragged pant of
Cain’s breath first, register the lidded darkness is under my control.
Awareness of the seat beneath me is pressure to match context. I know where I
have to be, besides inside Cain, I’m in the front seat of a car.
Hey? Abel?
Tentative, like he’s not even sure where I am. I hope it’s not because he isn’t
sure suddenly where he is. I’m not sure I can do this without Cain.
“Yeah.”
Cain’s voice, with my inflections, sounding relieved and sighing, tension going
slack from my shoulders. Cain’s shoulders, but they feel like mine. So long as
my eyes are closed like this, it’s hard to tell much of a difference. There are
a million differences, an infinity of complications and nuances, but I’m not
going to focus on them. I’m going to focus on staying perfectly calm.
Okay. Good. You’re doing great, sweetheart.
I’m not even going to be insulted that he sounds surprised. I draw in a breath
and then open my eyes. Looking at my lap is too strange, because it’s Cain’s
hands I see, Cain’s denim-clad thigh, that stolen wool coat. I quickly pull my
head up, turn toward Phobos.
“Okay. Let’s talk,” I say. “Now I’m Abel.”
He’s wide-eyed, tense, I think it’s rather strange that Phobos would look
intimidated considering this was his idea. That should be enough warning, but
it isn’t. Neither is the canvas tote being opened, Phobos’ hands hiding in his
lap beneath it, none of this is enough warning. It’s only when he lunges
forward that I realize this is the trap.
Shit!
Cain’s commentary, not helpful, because I think we both panic at the same time.
I jerk in the seat trying to do two things at once, one of us wanting to run
and one of us wanting to fight. I don’t even know which is which, who is who,
what we’ll do. Phobos grabs hold of my arm -- Cain’s arm -- he slaps the
handcuff into place. The fact that the handcuffs are pink and fuzzy makes them
seem all the more menacing.
I shriek, Phobos yelps, Cain’s silent. Cain’s completely silent.  
“What did you do? What is this?” I wave the handcuff around, feel terrified to
touch it even though it’s touching me. Phobos has retreated into the door,
gotten out of immediate reach, and I know without Cain needing to tell me that
I shouldn’t try leaving the car. The handcuff isn’t attached to anything, he’s
left one cuff secured closed but empty.
“Where’s Cain? Cain?” He’s not saying anything, he’s not fighting me for
control. I don’t know what to do in this situation so I won’t even fight him
actually. I’ll let him take back over, this is his body, we wanted this to be
quick.
I round on Phobos with a furious accusation. “You said you wanted to talk!”
Cain’s voice is so effective for shouting. I sound so angry. I’m this snarling,
furious demon.
“I did. I do,” says Phobos. He’s still wide-eyed, looking like I might explode
on him. I feel ready to, maybe I can, I’d rip his pretty face to shreds if it’d
make him give me back Cain. Phobos winces a smile at me. “Now we can talk
privately.”
“What did you do to Cain?” I demand. “Did you hurt him?”
“No, I didn’t. He’s fine. It’s just a binding,” Phobos says. He stares at me,
stares at Cain’s body with me at the controls.
I wonder how different I look -- he looks -- all those hundreds and thousands
of uncountable small details. My glare’s a firm line of mouth, narrowed eyes,
tightness higher in my forehead and no invading fierce brows. “Undo it. Let him
go. Unbind him,” I say. I grab for the handcuff and then yank my hand away with
a flinching gasp. It’s a static-shock bite of warning
“Well, that’s part of the plan,” Phobos says. “The new plan. The better plan.
I’m going to show up with as much of the truth as possible, because I’m a
terrible liar. We’re going to tell Praxis that you’re stuck inside Cain. It’s
more or less the same plan, only now it’s more believable. If I showed up with
an unbound demon, no one would believe a word I said.”
“You’re taking him prisoner?”
Phobos shrugs. “Yeah, basically. He’s under arrest.”
I flex my left hand, the one handcuffed, and try my best not to think about it
being Cain’s hands instead. I have to think of this as my body for now, I have
to stay calm. If this starts to hurt Cain, he has no way to tell me. I can’t
think about how much I don’t want to do this without Cain telling me how.
“You mean I’m under arrest,” I say. I look at Phobos, narrow my eyes at this
snobby, stuck-up monster bossing me around. “I don’t like this plan.”
The slow-churning grind of the garage door announces Phobos’ intent. His head
turns to check the clearance before he starts backing out of the narrow space.
“It’s a horrible plan,” he agrees. “Did you have a better one?”
I almost tell him to fuck off, just because of how satisfying it will sound
with Cain’s rough, snarky scorn. Instead I actually think about it for a moment
and then reply, “Yeah. Yeah. I do. Release Cain. I’ll stay in control and we’ll
do the Wookie prisoner plan if that’s your genius idea, but if I’m going to
occupy Cain’s body then I need him here with me. That’s how it has to be. I
cross with Cain, or none of us go.”
Phobos stops halfway out of the garage. He stares at me. “Praxis will know if I
start lying too much. I can’t walk in there with an unbound demon.”
“Okay, well, I don’t know what that means.” I cross my arms over my chest.
“Release Cain.”
Phobos keeps his hands on the wheel and his foot on the brake. The radio
whispers exuberant in the stretching stubborn silence. “How old are you?” he
asks me suddenly. “Fifteen? Sixteen?”
I want to lie or ignore him. Instead I warily tell him the truth. “Seventeen.
Why? How old are you?”
He smirks, titter softly on a laugh. “Oh, honey. Honey, no. You are so young,”
he says. Phobos shakes his head. “How old am I? What kind of --”
“How long have you been on this side? On my side. How long have you been
pretending to be human?” I demand. This dumb fairy shouldn’t have told me he
was a bad liar. He shouldn’t have gotten himself trapped in a car with a
necromancer. I’ve got all these questions stockpiled, and if he wants me to
cooperate then he better cooperate back.
“Ah.” Phobos says it such a distinct way that I know I’ve caught him somehow.
Until he says, “I’m not pretending to be a human. I’ve just bound your demon, I
hang out with a demon hunter and the wizard he’s fucking. I’m not a human. Do
you mean this?” He gestures to his clothes, the car, leans forward to gesture
beyond the front windshield at the luxurious townhouse. “This? This is hiding
in plain sight.”
I resist the urge to look at anything other than Phobos, because now I suspect
everything he does and says to be a trap. A lie, somehow, despite what he says
about being a terrible liar. “You’re not mortal then, right? Am I? Do I get to
live for hundreds of years now, is that part of being a necromancer?”
“Oh, honey,” is what Phobos says. “Your demon’s smart and cruel both if you’re
this fucking stupid. You’re a human. If I slashed your throat right now, you’d
die. Heart attack in your sleep, hit by a bus, stabbed in a duel, pneumonia,
cancer, whatever terrible way, you’ll die one day. Having dominion over the
dead certainly makes a lot of those terrible ways less likely, but one of them
is happening eventually. Assuming you make it ten, twenty, thirty years -
- whatever, you’ll age and wither and fade and die. You’re mortal. You’re
human. You’re just, different. Powerful."
“Okay.” I have no idea what else to say to such a direct answer about what I
am. I’m almost terrified to see what else Phobos will tell me, so long as we
have each other trapped in this car. He’s still straddled half-out of the
garage and unmoving, I’m sitting here with my hands in my lap.
The plan can’t move forward unless we agree on what it is. Right now the only
thing Phobos and I have agreed on is not to kill each other -- that’s the
originally truce I offered. I promised my demon wouldn’t kill him. It’s the
only way he’d agree to meet. 
“What does it mean when you say Cain’s bound?”
“I took away his power, silenced him -- he’s deaf, dumb, blind, bound. That’s a
binding, he’s bound,” says Phobos. “It’s safer for everyone this way. I’ve
bound him inside you, -- or, rather, I’ve restrained him to … himself, so that
you are here and not him. For the love of all that is beautiful in this world,
must we play twenty questions about this? I am not an encyclopedia. Do you know
how to use Google? Just take it with a grain of salt and assume everything is
bullshit and you mostly have all the right answers.”
“I looked it up already,” I snap. Harsh, growling baritone sounds so unlike my
own, and I try not to think about what Phobos said he’s done to Cain. I can’t
think about what Cain might be thinking right now. It’s several deep breaths
later before I’m calm enough to try speaking again, before I can be reminded of
Cain’s voice shaping my words. I smooth my right hand along my thigh. “How will
they know if he’s bound or not?”
“Unbound, his power will be enough to set off the wards Praxis has in place.
Abel, do you know what you’ve done?” Phobos’ eyes go over me, head to toe, he
looks at every inch of Cain’s body. “You gave him corporeal form. This isn’t a
corpse he’s possessing. I can tell that. Praxis will know that. For this plan
to have any chance of working, he has to be bound. That’s the way it has to
be.”
“You should have told me that in the beginning.”
“Your demon would have never agreed.”
I shake my head. “No. No, you don’t know Cain, he's more reasonable than he
seems. You should have told me, you shouldn’t have trapped him like that. If
it’s just that his power needs contained, fine. Make it so he can hear me then,
so I can hear him. Let him see what I see. Do that first, then if he’s okay
with this, we’ll do it. We’ll do this stupid plan.”
It’s the flat way Phobos frowns that tells me I’ve won. I’ve asked for
something he can give me, I haven’t made an impossible request.
“You’re taking me with you to the Otherside.”
“I said I would. I meant it. I have no reason not to, right? That’s where
you’re from originally, so if you want to go back there, fine. Get out of my
world. If necromancers are humans, then that makes you and Deimos monsters. You
said you killed --”
“I said Deimos killed,” Phobos corrects me. He holds up a slim finger. “Deimos
killed. I merely did the navigating and driving, some mild assistance with the
disposal. And, I’m happy to leave. Good riddance to your beautiful world.”
When he reaches for the handcuffs, I hold my hand out a little. Phobos picks up
the locked empty cuff and then glances at me. “He’s going to be angry.”
“I know.”
He hesitates. “Deimos is right in trying to kill you. If you think he’s a
monster, how many humans do you think your demon has killed?”
“So far none,” I reply. “Now release Cain.”
Phobos’ smile is the least friendly one I’ve seen so far. “Let me know if you
change your mind,” he says. He snaps open the lock on the cuff. He leaves the
other wrap of pink fluff around my wrist, but the empty end dangles free.
I settle my hands into my lap and wait. I can’t tell if anything’s different. I
lift my gaze from my lap to look out the front windshield, the side window, but
it’s dark. I turn instead to look at Phobos. “Did it work?” I ask him. “Does
Cain hear me now? Can he see?”
“Yes." Phobos' response gets drowned into Cain's, swiftly following.   
Yeah. Yeah, Abel, fuck -- sweetheart --
“I’m fine. It’s fine.” My reassurances growling in his voice. “I’m okay, I’m
okay, Cain. I asked Phobos to do this for you, but, he says you can’t --”
No, fuck that, no --
“Cain, please, let me finish. Everything’s okay just calm down. Phobos told me
the new plan. I haven’t agreed to anything yet, we’re still talking about
what’s going to happen. No one’s going anywhere until I say so, okay?” I nod my
head at Phobos until he starts to nod as well. “Put the car in park.”
Phobos does so, one perfectly-plucked eyebrow raised.
“Okay, then,” I say. “Okay. I want to talk to Cain privately.”
“No.” Phobos laughs at the same time, stammers further, “N-no way, you’re
staying. Nuh-uh, honey, no way.” He shakes his head at me, grabs for the gear
shift. Before I make up my mind about stopping him, he sets the car into
reverse and keeps going, clears the garage entirely.
“I’m sorry, Cain. He says it has to be this way. I don’t think he’s lying. Or,
at least, that --”
Abel, stop. It's fine.  
It’s abrupt and clipped, but there’s no inflection or much of a tone to it. He
sounded frantic earlier only because of the swiftness, the rushed quality. He’s
as hollow and empty as the dangling cuff now nestled in my lap. Cain’s lap. I
swallow and have to look anywhere else, out the dark window and then my
reflection. Cain, looking back at me, so that I flinch my eyes closed.
“How much more can you release Cain?” I open my eyes and look to Phobos. “What
else can you give him?”
Sweetheart, it’s fine.
I don’t think it’s fine at all, because I don’t like the way Cain sounds. I
don’t like this empty voice, because I can’t tell what he means. If he’s hurt,
if I’m annoying him or amusing him, if he likes me or hates me or just even if
he’s okay. I don’t think he is. I’m sure this must be terrifying. I certainly
think it’s terrifying.
Phobos wavers a frown at me. “We are wasting valuable time. None of us want
Deimos trying to stop this, so we need to leave. I’ll remove the binding once
we’re in the center. Until then it stays in place. Praxis will know otherwise,
there’s no other way. You don’t need his permission, Abel. You’re a
necromancer, aren’t you? Pull the leash tight on your demon already."
“Hold on,” I tell Phobos. “That’s not fair.”
Phobos blows out an exasperated breath as he jabs the automated door for the
garage closed. “Yeah, honey, life’s not fair.”
***** Chapter 23 *****
Given the size of the SUV, it’s no surprise Phobos circles the block several
times looking for a spot to park. I find it suspicious anyway, I find
everything that he does suspicious. He trapped Cain, didn’t exactly lie about
anything that I can tell, but I don’t know. I don’t know what might happen, if
Phobos can be trusted, if anything about this situation can be trusted.
“What happens if Deimos shows up?” I ask. “I can’t fight him. Cain needs to do
that.”
Phobos’ shoulders lift without his gaze breaking from an intense scan of the
cars lining the street. He slows for a gap and frowns at the sight of a fire
hydrant. “If Deimos shows up the whole plan’s off anyway. Praxis won’t go along
with anything after that.”
“Will you release Cain? If Deimos shows up.”
Phobos turns his head to check his mirrors. He’s wedging the massive vehicle
into the open spot regardless of the fire hydrant. “I suppose so. I’ll try,” he
says. “Assuming our original deal’s still good.”
Tell him I’ll rip his pretty blond head from --
“Original deal’s still good when you release Cain. He won’t kill you. I’ll make
sure of it.” It’s hard to talk over the echo of words in my head, somewhat
easier because they don’t sound as much like Cain. I have his voice now, it’s
mine to use, his rumbling snarl shapes everything I say. Cain has only a flat,
hollow nothing to use inside his own head.
“How reassuring,” mutters Phobos. The hard spin of the wheel seems a practiced
gesture, a well-honed understanding of the angles and trajectories involved in
squeezing the oversized SUV into parallel impossibility. He cuts the engine and
then reaches around to grab the tote out of the backseat. I wait for the locks
to pop open before trying to exit the vehicle.  
“I’m sorry about this,” I whisper. Maybe it’s soft enough Phobos won’t hear,
since the car is between us. I step onto the sidewalk and fold my arms against
the cold. I’m so quiet that I’m just mouthing the words almost. “Cain? Are you
okay?”
Yeah.
Which tells me he’s not. I want to ask what’s wrong, but I already know what’s
wrong. I guess I’m not okay either, so I’m not even sure why I asked. I know
this isn’t okay. Nothing about this is okay.
Phobos joins me on the sidewalk and pulls a fat piece of yellow sidewalk chalk
from the tote. He kneels beside the fire hydrant.
“What are you doing?”
“Avoiding a parking ticket,” he replies. Self-assured strokes produce
impeccably straight lines, gently sweeping curves, I have no idea what he’s
drawing but I can guess. When he straightens, a complicated circle of symbols
surrounds the hydrant. A trio of straight lines burst from the bottom of the
ring to point toward the curb.
I don’t see anything different. I still see an illegally parked SUV with only
inches of clearance in front and behind. I suppose I don’t see anything
different because I am different. Human, but different. Powerful, somehow, even
though I don’t feel like it. I just feel scared as I follow Phobos along the
dark, empty streets.
At the mouth of the alley, Phobos pauses. He turns to face me and has to tilt
his head up slightly -- Cain is taller than him. I’m trying not to think about
everything being several inches elevated, about the strangeness Cain’s boots
marching to the tempo of my stride.
“Okay,” he says. “I’m going to say a bunch of stuff you might not like, but
that’s part of the plan. I have to convince Praxis, or this will never work.
Let me do all the talking.”
Silence fills the space between us only because I’m waiting for Cain. I’m sure
he’s silent because he’s waiting for me. Neither of us is okay, neither of us
likes this plan, but neither of us could think of anything better. This is a
miserable situation.
“Sure,” I say. The urge to add why not? to the end is overwhelming.
Phobos turns his head, looks back at the dark street and the line of parked
cars. His expression is pensive, worried, I’d feel a lot better about this if
one of us felt confident. I guess that needs to be me, then. I wonder if being
a necromancer -- a human -- makes me somehow more powerful than all these
monsters from the Otherside. This is my world, after all.
Somehow I don’t think that’s the case, as I follow Phobos to the rust-hinged
steel door. I don’t think fairies and wizards and demon hunters count as dead
things. My powers are over dead things. I’d need to kill one of them first, and
I’m not even sure that’s possible. I’m pretty sure Phobos just tried to explain
to me he’s immortal, ageless, he laughed when I tried to ask how old he is.
“Stand here,” Phobos says. He snaps and points to the ground beside him. I’ll
give him a pass on being rude, considering how scared he looks.
Abel.
“Okay.” It’s an answer that works for both of them, as I stand beside and just
slightly behind Phobos.
Abel, he’s going to --
“I need to put the other handcuff on you.” Phobos speaks calmly into the
frantic overlap of Cain’s warning. “It’ll be temporary.”
I lift my hands and look at them. I let Cain get a good look at the dangerous
pink fluff, the linked metal chain letting that empty cuff dangle. “Okay?”
No.
Phobos reaches, but I yank my hands down before he has a chance. I shove my
hands into the coat pockets and take a quick step in retreat. “Cain says no.”
Phobos whispers, “We’re wasting time again. Praxis already knows we’re here,
he’s not going to open the door unless --”
The well-timed interruption to prove him wrong is either a relief or a sign of
disaster. A sliver of darkness appears. Phobos whirls to greet it with a big
smile. “Hello!”
A heavy chain crosses the slim span of the opened door. “What is this?” demands
a deep, husky voice. The warm tones are sharp, alert, but not overly hostile.
“A long story,” says Phobos. “May we come in?” The friendly tone comes across
as suspicious. I’m in on the plan, and I think Phobos sounds suspicious.
“You may not,” Praxis replies.
“I can bind the necromancer as well. The demon’s already been taken care of,
see?” A white knit glove flaps in my direction. His tone turns pleading, his
smile sweetens. “I need your help.”
The cracked-open darkness doesn’t waver. “Where is Deimos?”
“Elsewhere. Not here. He doesn’t know I’m doing this. You know how he is.”
Phobos shrugs, keeps smiling in that same offensively friendly way that is so
suspicious to me. “A simple banishment, that’s all I want. I’ll be in and out.
You don’t have to tell Deimos.”
“Yet I will.” The door eases shut enough for the chain to slide free. When it
opens again, Phobos steps back to wave me through first. I don’t like that, but
I do it anyway.
An oppressive waft of melting wax and incense greets me. Candles dance light
and shadows into the curtained entry, and it feels like walking into a horror
movie set. If Phobos referred to his place as hiding in plain sight, then
Praxis’ place is stark contrast to that. 
Once I’m inside, the steel door closes. Ominously with Phobos on the other side
of it, so I hear the burst of his frantic, “Wait!” and then nothing else. I’m
not sure if that means he’s in the alley shouting or not. The quiet calm of the
dim, smoky room drowns out all other sounds except my own quick breaths and
thudding heartbeat. Staying calm isn’t happening anymore for me, there’s just
no way to manage it.
I could run for the curtain, try to run up the stairs, try to get myself into
the center of that pentagram before Praxis tries to stop me. I could do that,
but I don’t. Cain’s body stands there with me panicking away inside it,
Cain himself silent so it panics me further, makes it so I start looking around
at everything.
Praxis watches, arms folded and back straight, shoulders stiff. His weight’s
cocked in such a way that I’m glad I didn’t try running. “Abel?” Uncertain,
perhaps wary, with a steady frown pulling at the line the patch cuts across his
forehead.
My head bobs up and down. Phobos wanted to do the talking. Explaining what
happened, what we need to do, that was his part of the plan.
“Ach, what a mess.” His sigh holds a note of amusement, perhaps fondness for
something. Maybe he likes messes. Maybe he’s going to help me. I peek sideways
at the door, unsure what it means that Phobos isn’t part of this anymore.
Tell him to do the banishment.
My reaction to Cain’s sudden announcement is an obvious splash of surprise, an
incredulous, “Without Phobos?”
Yeah.
“Can he be trusted?” I nod my head at Praxis, who doesn’t seem to mind the
conversation I’m having right in front of him. He’s got a patient air of
waiting to see what happens, a nonchalance that worries me as much as it
reassures me. I’ve got the answer to my own question, I think, based solely off
how unconcerned Praxis seems. I’ll take my chances with anyone who wants to
approach this situation calmly.
Who the fuck knows.
Cain’s agreeing with me, I think, it’s hard without hearing how he feels about
what he says. I nod anyway to acknowledge him. “I need a banishment,” I say to
Praxis. “Will you help me?”
A dark brow raises, a dark gaze judges me with lopsided strength. Even the
patch seems surprised, that black swath of mystery seeming to stare right at
me. “You do not know what you ask.”
“You’re right. I don’t. I know that, but my body is somewhere on the Otherside.
Whatever it takes for me to get it back, that’s what I want to do. So, if
that’s a banishment, that’s what I want. If it’s another exorcism, that’s what
I want. I want my body back.” I say. In Cain’s voice, but I’m sure it’s a
sentiment he agrees with. Unlike what I say next, which is, “Please. Please,
you have to help me.”
“Have to? No. I do not.” A slight smile softens the denial. “Yet I will.”
“You will? Thank you!” Without thinking, I react exactly like I want to react.
As if this were my body -- as if what I’m doing would be wanted, like there’s
not a binding spell around my wrist. I move forward and throw my arms around
someone willing to help me, someone who knows how to help me.
The height’s all wrong. Those several extra inches make this extremely awkward.
The fact that I’ve just used a demon’s body to deliver this hug makes it
extremely awkward. That I’ve still got my arms squeezed around this shock-stiff
wizard makes everything so horrible. 
The fuck.
I release Praxis, jump back. I lift my hands to my face, cover my mouth in
horror for the strangled expression on Praxis’ face. “Sorry!”
His head shakes. “Ach, you are young.” Praxis turns and pulls aside the
curtain. He gestures to the stairs. “Go, then. If you are certain.”
I look to the door again. I wonder if Phobos is outside in the alley or if he
already left. I promised Phobos I’d take him with me to the Otherside -- if I
could. If I don’t explain that to Praxis, then am I technically following
through on my word? If I go up these stairs without Phobos, if I get into the
center of that pentagram without him, then I can’t bring him with me. I only
said I’d do it if I could. I never said I’d make sure it happened. I only said
I’d make sure Cain wouldn’t kill him, because I was reasonably certain I could
do that.
I count the landings as I think about if I’m certain about this. I’m not
especially certain about anything other than … Cain, I guess. That makes as
much sense as anything. When I turn from the third floor for the fourth, I’m
reminded of the first time I did this.
Then I felt desperate to make everything stop. I wanted my normal life back,
but I’m not normal. I’m different. I didn’t understand that at the time, and
Praxis tried to warn me. He gave me a lot of warnings. I’m not sure I followed
any of them. I listened to the voice calling for me. I gave that voice a name,
gave it a body, no wonder everyone’s referring to Cain as my demon.
When it’s time to brush aside the curtain, I’m ready. I’m certain this is what
I want to do -- right now in this moment, perhaps for the rest of my life. I’m
not going to run anymore from being whatever it is that I am. I’m going to be
the best at it. Dartmouth, MIT, CalTech, if all my other options at excelling
are gone, then I’ll excel at this. Whatever this is.
Praxis joins me in the room without shadows. Ruddy, dark stains outline the
star and circle of the pentagram, everything in the room looks the same as when
I first saw it.
“The center?” I ask.
An insolent smile spreads beneath the eye patch. “The center,” he agrees.
The slip of the smile from my face matches the slow sink of my heart. This
feels as much of a trap suddenly as the locked car doors, white gloved hands
clutching the strap to a canvas tote. My gaze flicks to the curtain.
Do what he says. He’s not going to hurt you.
Cain’s voice is mine now, but these words are supposed to be his even if they
don’t sound like it. I hold up my hands to stare at the pink handcuffs. “I need
this removed. Phobos said he’d remove it before we crossed.” I look up to find
Praxis watching. He’s standing next to the table. He’s holding the knife.
I take a step back and have to glance down quickly to make sure I’m not
crossing one of the lines on the floor. I retreat along the outside curve of
the massive circle. “Are you going to remove the binding?”
“Go to the center,” Praxis commands quietly.
It’s his serious expression, how he maybe looks reluctant now that I look
scared. This is such a trap. Everyone knows it, I’m sure we’re all aware of how
much this is a trap. Cain knows it, he’s telling me just to go along with it. I
let him walk into this powerless. He can’t fight anything for me.
Abel, it’s fine. You’re close, go for it.
Soon as I step into the circle, a pull directs me to the exact center. I walk
along one slanted line to reach it as if on a tightrope, deliberate heel-into-
toe steps. My heart -- Cain’s heart -- pumps a loud and strong terror into the
moment. My feet come together, I turn on a precise point to face Praxis. I lock
into place, immobile as Cain trapped between the glass doors of the mall. The
empty handcuff dangles against my thigh as I stand there, hands to my side,
shoulders square.
I should have delayed longer. I should have told Cain yet again how sorry I am
for having gotten us into this mess. I should have insisted Phobos remove the
binding entirely. Praxis approaches holding the knife, and my fear vanishes. My
panicked thoughts fade. My attention focuses as I’m caught up in the spell
unfolding.
“Are you certain this desire is one you want granted?” he asks. He does not
cross the circle. Prowling steps take him around the outside curve
Vibration pulls Cain’s voice from me. “Yes.”
Praxis continues along the circle and my awareness follows. My eyes do not, my
head does not. I stay perfectly still, don’t move at all. He turns on the point
of the star and comes forward.
Had a good run, kid.
Praxis comes to a halt in front of me. His hand lifts.
Fun while it lasted.
The knife descends in a gleaming streak of silver. No pain, no fear, only
awareness and then nothing. Darkness, and fading, a glimmering sense of being
enveloped in oblivion like rolling into a cozy bed. A separation, hollow and
empty, anticipated resistance but nothing, all this nothing, not even a
goodbye.
***** Chapter 24 *****
I’m something enough for thoughts and feelings, only I don’t know what to think
or how to feel. Sluggish confusion slowly trickles details and memories into
the void. I recall the back and forth click of a turn signal, the dull tapping
rhythm of fingers on a steering wheel. I remember a deep growling voice, the
slap of water over my face and a buoyant feeling.
More things, all these things, a bridge of wasted space and the lilting cadence
of arguments, NASA posters, a firefighter’s picture-perfect smile, my memories.
My life. Who I am, the things I think about, how I feel about things, my
thoughts about my feelings, everything of substance that forms who I am becomes
mine.
This lidded darkness is mine. My eyes are closed. I’m lying somewhere in a
face-up sprawl. I’m in my body, but don’t I remember why I shouldn’t be, why
this is strange. I think I know where I am, yet I have no idea where I am. I
think I know what’s happening. I have no idea what’s happened. There’s still so
much that I’m missing, but I found my body.
I open my eyes. An eye stares back. One eye, dangling on a red cord, a rounded
white orb with a glazed dark center. A bright spot of color in a black and
white world lacking substance, the shadow-on-shadow impossibility of the
Otherside. It stretches above and around what part of my vision isn’t being
taken up by this dangling eyeball, the fearsome red socket, a mottled ruin of
broken skin that comprises a dead woman’s half-crushed face leaning over me. A
scream tears from my throat. I kick and claw at nothing, wispy insubstantial
nothing that resists enough I scoot backward.
Remembering how to use my body complicates matters, trying to think about what
I’m doing complicates matters. Thinking I need to stay calm reminds me of Cain.
Of a knife descending.
The kneeling dead woman turns her head to track my backward motion. She moves
slow, glacial, eerily unconcerned and half-aware. Long auburn curls spiral
around the bashed-in destruction that used to be her face. By the twisted,
bloodied knob of her arm and jutting bone from her leg, I’m guessing she died
in a car accident.
“Cain! Cain, I’m awake!”
A lack of heart-thudding, breathless reality leaves me standing there watching
her in ways that seem calm, even though I’m screaming for Cain. He crossed with
me, that was the plan, so I need him here to handle this dead thing.
“Cain?” I retreat from the dead woman’s lackluster effort at chasing me. She’s
managing a crawl. Bright crimson paints blooms into the floral pattern of her
dress. She might have been pretty, before.
Besides my own terrified shouting I think I hear something else. Whispering, or
the wind, except the air is perfectly still. This burned to ash ruin of a world
calls and moans. The dead woman seems to moan. Her mouth is a slacked-open
horror. It wobbles nonsense in dead-sounding tones.
I cup my hands like a megaphone. “CAIN!”
If I had breath I’d be sobbing. I back away further from the dead thing that’s
found me. I hold out my hands to check the length of heather-grey sweatshirt
and slim, pale fingers peeking out from the end of the sleeves. I poke my
tongue into my numbed knot of scar tissue on my lip. I feel at my face and
hair, I look down at my jeans, my sneakers, this is definitely my body and not
Cain’s.
A few shuffling steps get me further away from the dead woman. I’m not sure if
she’s trying to talk to me or if that’s just the noise dead things make on the
Otherside. I’ve never been here without Cain, he found me after the exorcism
and had hold of me when I obliterated that motorcyclist. I thought he’d be here
for this. I thought we’d cross together. I can’t do this without Cain. Racing
panic loops my thoughts in tight circle of how Cain’s not here, I was with Cain
and now I’m not, I don’t know what’s happening without Cain to explain it. Not
that he’s ever explained much.
Thinking of how little Cain’s explained reminds me of my outburst, how I told
Cain I hated him. Wildly I consider the possibility he’s ignoring me, but I
don’t think that’s the case. I don’t think that’s what’s happened here, but I’m
thinking so carefully about those last moments we had together and how it
seemed like a goodbye. Cain knew this would happen. I have no doubt that Cain
knew this would happen, whatever this terrible unfolding disaster is that’s
left me stranded without him.
Or, him without me, I realize. I left him. I left his body to find mine, and
now Cain can’t find me. The stupid binding, those handcuffs, whatever power let
Cain find me before he can’t use now. He can’t do anything. Phobos described it
as deaf, dumb, blind, bound -- Cain’s trapped, that must be the explanation.
He’s trapped somewhere. I desperately don’t want to think of Cain trapped and
helpless, even though he must be. Stomach-sinking certainty tells me that’s the
meaning behind Cain’s silent answer to my desperate calls.
Knowing what’s happened fills me with calm, even though I’m still lost on what
to do about it. At least I have some understanding of the situation. Wandering
around the immediate vicinity provides a little more understanding, but not
much.
I decide to assume this desolate crossroads of shadow is where the wreck took
place. That fits with my understanding of things, it fits with what I’ve seen
so far. The Otherside is the dark, twisted mirror of my world, a ruined-ash
shadow devoid of color and substance besides myself and the dead woman. As I
cautiously explore the intersection, it becomes easier to denote the separation
between the grey, hazy shadow-shapes.
I arrive back where I started, in front of the dead woman. “I don’t suppose you
can actually talk, and not just moan?”
An insensible zombie-quality slur forms my response. She drags her ruined body
closer to me as if magnetized, no matter where I stand. She seems ready to
chase me in circles, if I let her. I recall Cain referring to me as a beacon
for anything feeling ambitious during my first visit to the Otherside. I guess
this dead woman’s ambition lead her to me. I wonder if she died in this same
intersection, or if she crawled here from somewhere else.
I don’t want to think about how long my body lay limp and vacant, why this dead
woman may have been lured to it or why she’s still eager to get hold of me. I’m
trying my best to ignore the lifted whispers calling to me, because none of
them sound like Cain.
“Sorry. I’d help you if I could,” I tell the dead woman. “But I need to find my
demon. I don’t suppose you know where he is?”
Her shattered jaw quivers, same as the dangling eye, as she drags herself
forward.
I tuck my hands into the front pouch on my sweatshirt. “You remind me a lot of
a zombie. I hope you’re not trying to eat my brain. Although, if you were
trying to crawl into my body, I guess that kind of is like eating my brain. I
hope you weren’t trying to do that, though. You seem like a nice enough dead
thing.”
Talking to this dead woman isn’t helpful. I know that, but I do it anyway. I’m
not sure what else to do, besides leave, but that’s terrifying. I know where
this place is, in some small degree. I’m not sure which direction to walk
without knowing the names of the streets or being able to see any of the
landmarks. I can’t navigate blind like this.
Except I’m not blind, I can see all this hazy dark nothing of the Otherside. I
might not see much, but I see something. If I get close and focus I can tell
the difference between curb and street. I can tell the difference between the
terrifying upward abyss of the sky and the jutting overhead shape of the street
lights against it. As I stand there staring up at a void without any stars or
glimmer of moonlight, I think of Cain watching the sunrise.
“Where am I?” I whisper. To myself, of course, because the dead woman’s not
going to have an answer and there’s no voice inside my head listening anymore.
I’m all alone.
Or so I think. Until a voice replies nicely, “I have no idea, sorry.”
I whip my head around at the dead woman in silent accusation. That’s a familiar
voice, though, sometimes maybe boyish tenor memory but definitely not a
feminine one. And these are such distinctly shaped sounds instead of the
zombie-dead babble she’s been giving me so far.
Slowly I scan each surrounding shadow. “Where are you?” I use the same to-
myself-hush, hoping for another response.
“Definitely no idea,” the voice replies. “I hope I’m not dead.”
If this weren’t the Otherside, my reaction would be a lot of sweaty-palmed,
heart-pounding breathless terror. I still get to feel all that, but my body is
a perfectly calm vessel to carry me forward. I step cautiously, eyes on the
ground.
“Can you hear me?” I ask.
“Um, yeah. Why wouldn’t I?”
I know who I’m talking to, but it’s the strangest thing where I’m not sure I
actually do know who I’m talking to. I can’t think of the name. I can’t think
of the face this voice belongs to, what the body looks like that shapes it. I
recognize the voice, but I don’t understand this. I can’t think of his name,
what to call him.
“Where are you?” Desperate now, even though I think I’m getting closer.
“I really have no idea, I’m sorry. Let me know if you figure it out though,
okay?”
This is so not okay. The dead woman’s been crawling around the spot where I
woke up, and I can’t get back to that same spot without getting within reach of
her.
“Get out of my way,” I tell the dead woman. I point across the intersection
like commanding a dog. “Go. Get. Crawl faster that way.”
She comes toward me instead with that same stubborn, relentless, snail-paced
determination. A terrible fury born of frustration and fear grips me. “Get out
of my way!”
I burst toward her and snatch a fistful of curly auburn something. The
slippery-soft feel of hair tangling into my fingers is a visceral shock.
Without thinking I tug -- yank, really, like whisking a sheet off a surprise.
The dead woman vanishes. She wisps into shreds of nothing with a soft murmured
regret that barely stirs any memories. I don’t know anything about her other
than her ugly dead body in my way. My impression of her fades almost
immediately, so that I doubt I even had one to begin with. I’m just glad she’s
gone.
I take her place crawling on my hands and knees like searching for a dropped
contact. I carefully sweep my fingers until I feel resistence. “Is this you?
This is you, I found you --” Excitedly I feel further at the firm bit of shadow
I’ve found, and my exploring hands shape the darkness like molding clay. “I’m
so glad you’re here! You missed so much, it’s crazy, you won’t believe what’s
happened --”
Little reminders, like bubbles popping, my enthusiasm deflating as I think
about the back-and-forth click of a turn signal, fingers tapping on the
steering wheel, blood streaming a stark crimson mask over a slacked round face.
I think of seances and ouija boards and waiting scared in an alley after
delivering a letter. I think of why this voice won’t think I’m crazy, but yet I
still can’t name this person I know. I found my best friend, and I have no idea
who he is.
That’s impossible. This is so many degrees of impossible that I sit back on my
heels to stare at this shadow that’s getting upright to stare at me. The burnt-
ash ruin that’s meant to be the street separates into the outlined body I felt
at and shaped. Roughly my size, thicker in the limbs and chest, this person
I’ve known since the third grade and can’t even name. I saw him nearly every
day of my life after meeting him, I have no idea what to call him.
I grip my hands into my hair. That seems the safest place to put them. I’m
suddenly horrified about what I might have done, if maybe I wasn’t supposed to
do that. I shouldn’t have started talking back to voices calling to me. I
learned my lesson already with Cain.
This shadowed friend of mine turns his head. I can only tell by the arrangement
of hazy charcoal limbs that he’s facing me and looking around, or I suddenly
hope that’s what he’s able to do. I can’t see any eyes, not a lick of color or
light, no pale freckles, not a single white-blond curl.
“Oh, wow. Ethan?” he asks.
It blurts right out of me. “You know my name? You know who I am?”
“Well… yeah,” he says, sounding confused. “Why wouldn’t I?”
Which is the right way to be thinking, that’s the way to approach this, what’s
wrong with me instead of what’s wrong with him. A lot’s wrong with him, if I
dug the smoky insubstantial shadow of him out of the place where the old sedan
rumbled its last. Why isn’t he like the dead woman, flesh-toned and bloodied?
“Maybe you’re not dead,” I say.
“Oh, that’d be nice,” he says. As if I’ve offered to buy him lunch.
The dreamy unconcern of even the way he remarked on recognizing me, it all
reminds me of that motorcyclist. It’s better than the zombiesque moans from the
dead woman or warbling nonsense I’ve gotten from speaking shadows before. Maybe
it’s worse, because he should be scared we’re talking like this.
“Can you stand?” Sitting, it’s hard to confirm that I shaped the legs of him
correctly. I stand so this shadowed friend of mine does as well, and it’s
easier to tell what’s him and what’s the Otherside.
“Did something happen?” he asks. His head turns again with a disorienting lack
of context besides motion to shape the gesture. “Where’s my car?”
“There was a wreck. Do you remember that? Do you remember me?”
“Yeah, I remember you,” he says. “You’re Ethan. I have a lot of memories of
you.”
It’s a tickling lack of breath to catch, a lack of tears to shed, a lack of
heart to break. “Yeah. I have a lot of memories of you, too.” And despite all
these memories he might as well be a stranger, if I can’t think of his name.
Then suddenly I have my answer, my explanation, because I’m thinking of the
first time we met. I went to the very beginning of our friendship, that moment
I met him, and there’s my answer why I’m coming up blank on his identity. I
smiled and threw out a friendly, Hi, I’m Ethan!only to get timid, fearful
silence in return. His mother had to tell me his name. She told me what to call
him. He was too shy for introductions.
But that’s crazy, that’s completely crazy, that makes just as much sense as
everything else. Cain listened to people talking about me by name, calling me
by name, and still had to ask. I’m pretty sure I heard Cain say Deimos’ name,
back at the crash, actually, because now I’m thinking of Cain shouting that
word I couldn’t understand while inside his head.
I’m trying to make sense of all these impossibilities without making progress
on my goal. I need to get that binding off Cain. I need to find him, or Phobos,
I’m not sure which first. I don’t even know where I am.
“What else do you remember?” I ask. “Do you know where we are?”
“Um,” my friend says. He’s not used to answering questions, since I usually
decide things. His midnight on moonlight head turns against the shadowy world
around him. “Forty-second and Union.”
I turn as well to look up at the street sign, which is where he found the
answer for me. “Okay. Well, I need to find Cain, so… Which direction is north?”
“Um.” He starts to walk closer to the sign for a better look, and I follow
closely. I’m concerned if I let him out of my sight, I’ll have to find him
again by feel. It’s almost impossible for me to tell where anything is, which
shadows are something and which are simply dark nothing.
“Let me hold your hand,” I say.
“Okay.” His hand takes mine in a warm, familiar clasp. With his other hand he
points. “This way is north. Did you want to go that way?”
“Yeah. I think so. The place where I took the letter, that’s where I want to
go. Do you remember how to get there from here?” If I had breath to hold, I
would. Instead I hold his hand and wait for the answer I know he can give me.
“Oh, yeah. Sure, I can take you.” I bet anything he’s smiling, even though I
can’t see his face. “Do you know where I parked the car though? Also where are
my keys? Did you say I was dead?”
“Nope.” I’m quick with it, because the last thing I want to do is start an
argument with my best friend about if he’s dead or not. “Nope, I didn’t say
that. I don’t think you’re dead.”
“Oh, good,” he says.
Scary as it is for him not to sound worried, I'm glad he's so unconcerned about
things. “Your car’s not here. It, um, it’s somewhere else. We can walk though.
Okay?” 
This friendly shadow nods agreeably. “Okay.”
He leads me into the endless darkness with the confident air of knowing
precisely where he’s going, and I keep a tight hold of his hand. The last thing
I want to do is lose my best friend, now that I’ve found him.
***** Chapter 25 *****
“Do you think it’s locked?”
My hand clenches around the warmth of his. “Yes, and don’t touch it. Stay here
with me, okay?”
His shadowed head turns to me, so I know it’s an invisible smile shaping the
way he easily agrees. “Okay.”
The bewildering stretch of darkness in either direction provides little
context, but I’m confident he’s lead me in the right direction. Proof exists in
the hulking SUV that gleams like an onyx in the eternal nighttime of the
Otherside. A bright circle of symbols glows and flickers beside it, a small
bonfire to illuminate the scene and give it substance.
“Is this your car? I didn’t think you had a car. Did you buy a car?”
“No, it’s not my car. Let’s whisper though, okay?” I keep my voice low, keep a
firm hold of his hand.
“Okay.” Pressure and gentle heat forms the sensation of him squeezing my hand.
“Are you scared?” Gentle concern fills the words, he’s worried about me. My
potentially dead best friend whose name I don’t know, he’s worried about me.
“A little,” I admit.
“Don’t be,” he says. I get another reassuring squeeze. “I’ll keep you safe.”
I have no idea how he plans to do that, being made of shadow that I shaped from
memory, but it’s such a nice sentiment. He sounds so matter-of-fact, so honest
and earnest. Bodyguard, chauffeur, attack dog, lifeguard and ladder, my guide
through this nightmarish netherworld -- “Was I a good friend to you?”
“The best,” he replies. He seems surprised that I’d ask, even after everything.
 
“I bossed you around all the time. I made you drive me everywhere, I dragged
you everywhere. I oogled you at the pool. I went totally crazy on you. I became
a monster. I got you --” I won’t say killedbecause I can’t think like that, not
while I’m holding his hand. “I ruined your life.”
The outline of his head shakes back and forth against the darkness. “No way,”
he says. “I know you get sad sometimes, Ethan, but please don’t think that. You
didn’t ruin my life.”
This isn’t an argument I want to have with him, not now, perhaps not ever. I
look along the dark oblivion that’s supposedly a street of parked cars. We’re
wasting time, and I know it. I’ve made us stand here staring at Phobos’ clever
means to avoid a parking ticket because I’m scared this means he’s here, that
this is part of the trap somehow. That perhaps the whole scheme was a lie,
beginning to end, because how could Phobos park his car on the Otherside and
need my help crossing? I’m too scared to touch the car to find out if it’s
solid or if I’ll wisp through it.
“Ethan? You okay?”
“Yeah.” I look to him. “Yeah, I’m okay. Let’s, um --”
“There’s someone coming,” he says.
Not so unconcerned anymore, not so dreamy-sounding or unfocused, and he tugs me
close. The hand with me attached goes behind his back, the other extends to the
side like he intends to summon a weapon into it. For a half-second I wonder if
he will, if I haven’t inadvertently created a monster to help me negotiate the
unknown terrors of the Otherside. Instead I realize he’s just making sure I
stay behind him, that he’s ready to push me back if I step forward.
Ahead of us is a swift overlay of motion, a shadow-on-shadow movement I have a
hard time understanding or seeing. I try to track the roughly Phobos-shaped
darkness approaching. “Does he notice you? Can he see you?”
“I don’t think so,” my friend replies. “He’s not looking this way at all.”
Trusting Phobos got me into this mess, either inadvertently or intentionally.
He trapped Cain, but he was also terrified of Cain -- it was obvious, trying to
convince him to meet, that he genuinely was frightened of getting near Cain.
Cain’s dangerous, obviously as a demon he’s something dangerous. I know all too
well how strong he is, how tough he is, how eager and capable he is of fighting
anything he needs to fight.
The SUV’s headlights flash without extending cutting beams into the darkness.
In the sterile qualm of the Otherside, the vehicular beast is utterly silent,
but I can tell anyway that Phobos has activated the remote start. The driver’s
side door opens.
I raise my voice to call, “Phobos!”
The car door closes. A rush of motion cuts in front of the gleaming SUV. With
substance behind him and the flickering light of the spell circle to give
contrast, Phobos is a distinctly anxious shadow. His steps are light, frantic,
his head turns with chest-heaving quickness.
“Phobos,” I call again. “Phobos, can you hear me?”
Warbled nonsense bursts in a tenor-pitched, breathless frenzy. His hand
cautiously extends and sweeps the empty air. The gesture pulls close as he
takes a step in retreat, tone turning questioning. I think I’m frightening him,
or something already has, because he turns to flee. He scurries around the
front of the vehicle. The driver’s side door opens, closes. A moment later the
passenger side door pops open a few inches.
“Are we getting in?” my friend asks. “He says to hurry.”
“You understand him?”
“Um, yeah?” I’ve confused him with the question. “A little. Maybe, no, I’m
sorry -- I’m not sure what he means but --”
By the severe volume and short intensity, I can hazard some guesses at what
Phobos shouts. The urgency is obvious and somewhere firmly on the spectrum of
reassuring to suspicious.
“Don’t touch anything yet,” I warn my friend. I slip around from behind him and
tentatively approach the cracked open door. The cold metal resists the brush of
my fingertips less than it should but still more than I expect. I pull the door
open enough to look into the colorful interior of the vehicle. The vegetable-
splashed design of the canvas tote sitting in the passenger seat, the pink
fuzzy dice and baubles dangling from the rearview mirror, and even Phobos -
- wide-eyed, pale, pretty and blond, stylish navy pea coat, white scarf.
I jerk my head back to check that the shadow-on-shadow reality of the Otherside
still exists outside the car. My friend stands beside me with a patient air of
waiting to see what I decide, if we’re taking the offered ride or not.
I peek through the cracked door again, so that Phobos’ fearful, wide-eyed gaze
focuses. He lets out a held breath. “Get in the car,” he says. Each sound
distinct, each word comprehensible.
“What about my friend? Will he be okay? Why can I see your car? How can I see
you? How come I can understand you?”
“Magic, Abel, it’s all fucking magic -- please get in the car,” Phobos says.
The pleasant twist of his smile seems stilted and forced, but there’s genuine
fear in the way he stares past me. Almost like he can see me, mostly like he
can’t.
“Unlock the back. I’ll sit there with my friend.”
After a delay he says, “You’re being serious. You made a friend. How quaint.”
Phobos lurches forward to awkwardly crawl over the console. I close the
passenger door and then wait for the back door on the SUV to pop open instead.
 
I carefully guide my shadowed friend to the vehicle. “Go slow,” I warn him.
“Keep hold of me, okay? Don’t let go.”
Phobos withdraws into the driver’s seat. Much as I want to keep an eye on him,
I focus instead on making sure my friend’s capable of getting inside the
vehicle. I’m terrified he might vanish in the light like a true shadow, but as
he steps onto the silvery streak of the running board it’s nothing but
obliterating darkness to shape him.
An uncomfortable half-crouched shuffle gets us both into the SUV. He scoots
into the middle of the second row bench seats, and I use the opportunity to
check out the folded-flat third row of seating in the large cargo hold. It’s
empty, just a wire kennel taking up space. No sign of Deimos anywhere, which I
suspected but wanted to confirm anyway.
Phobos flicks a curious, unfocused look over the shadow-occupied space next to
me. Our tightly clasped hands rest on top of our pressed together thighs,
because if I were sitting any closer I’d just be in his lap. The thought’s
tempting.
“The plan didn’t work at all,” I say.
“It was a dumb plan,” he agrees. “Most of mine usually are.” A soft, pretty
sigh escapes him, something light and airy like spring breeze. Phobos turns and
sets the car into gear. He backs up a little and then aggressively swings the
wheel. “It worked enough that I’m completely fucked. Deimos is going to kill me
for this.”
His panicked tone seems half dramatic, half deadly serious. Out the front
windshield I see only darkness, but there must be a street and buildings, there
must be substance for Phobos to be driving like this.
“How come you need my help to cross if your car’s part of the Otherside?” I
ask.
“That’s a stupid question,” Phobos says. Distracted, mostly, not even all that
rude but merely pointing out the blunt truth. He nervously checks the mirrors
like he’s expecting a high speed pursuit. “If the separation between the
Otherside and here is normally a brick wall, think of this as being a chain
link fence. Just because we can talk doesn’t mean there’s not still a barrier
between us. And that brick wall has holes in it, or you can dig under it, or -
this is a bad analogy.”
“I think I understand,” I say.
“I doubt you do,” replies Phobos. “If you truly understood it, we wouldn’t be
having this conversation.”
Anger flashes through me, so that I wish I still had Cain’s snarl to use. My
own biting scorn seems flimsy by comparison. “For someone who wants me to help
them, you’re being a jerk about it.”
Phobos shrugs. “What do you expect? It’s not in my nature to be helpful. At
least, not without getting something in return, and so far the only thing
you’ve given me is a stress headache. I fed your demon, I gave him somewhere to
rest -- I even got you back to your body, didn’t I?”
“You made Cain eat cold soup and sleep on the couch. And Praxis was the one who
helped get me across, not you.”
“If you want a better deal next time, specify some terms and conditions,”
Phobos snaps. “Deal was I help you, you help me. Well, here I am helping you,
and you’ve yet to help me. Do you really want to start breaking contracts this
early in your career?”
I wasn’t aware I was starting a career in necromancy. I think abruptly of those
stupid business cards with worthless contact information on them -- or, rather,
contact information without a physical address, a phone number, a connection to
the real world. I think of an Instagram account with endless pictures of
clothes on display racks and mannequins, the over-filtered bright photos of
decadent cakes and sweets, not a single selfie or identifying detail. I wonder
how my dad would react if I told him I planned to start a business talking to
dead things.
“Are you helping me?“ I ask Phobos. I look to the window even though the
passing darkness tells me nothing. “Where are we going?”
“To hide. I assume that’s helpful. If it’s not, I can slow down enough for you
to tuck-and-roll,” says Phobos.
“I’m not doing that. You’re going to free Cain. He’s stuck where he crossed,
right? With the binding still in place, and you said you’d remove it before we
crossed.”
“I said --”
“You said you’d remove it once we were in the center.” I struggle to remember
the exact words, the exact language of the contract so Phobos can’t wiggle out
of it. “I said I’d bring you with us when we crossed if I could. Well, Cain and
I crossed, and I couldn’t bring you with me. Technically I already fulfilled my
part of the arrangement. I never said I’d help you. I only said I’d bring you
with me if I could.”
The angry teakettle hissing Phobos makes seems harmless and cute in comparison
to a demon’s shattered-rock snarls. I expect him to argue or snip something at
me in return, but he doesn’t. He sits fuming in silent fury, eyes intent on the
road.
Finally he bursts out with, “I’m not helping you free a banished demon. That’s
crazy. That’s completely crazy. I’m not helping you with that.”
“Ethan’s not crazy.” My friend’s decided to interject finally, and he sounds
offended on my behalf despite the accuracy of Phobos’ accusation. He leans
forward some, tone turning anxious and soft. “You shouldn’t say that. Ethan’s
not crazy. He just gets confused sometimes.”
Abruptly I wonder how many times my friend made this argument to someone behind
my back. My mom, maybe, or his mom and sisters, because I remember all the
desperate ways in which he wanted to believe me. He wanted to believe in me, at
least, that even if none of what I saw was real, that I at least wasn’t
clawing-at-padded-walls crazy.
I squeeze his hand. “Shh, it’s okay. Phobos knows that. And call me Abel around
him, okay?” My whispering attracts Phobos’ attention. His head turns some, I
see a frown pluck the edges of his mouth.
“But your name’s not Abel.”
“I know that, but --”
“Who are you whispering to? What are you muttering about?” Phobos demands.
“Don’t try anything stupid. I’ve got this thing humming with so many wards and
charms, you’d be an idiot to even think of it.”
“I’m talking to my friend,” I say. “He’s here with me.”
“Right. That makes sense.” Phobos’ crisp reply is followed by the driver’s
window rolling down, the sheet of dark-tinted glass disappearing to reveal a
terrifying lack of anything I can see besides darkness. Context for identifying
what’s happening comes in the form of Phobos’ brief wave of his keychain into
the empty space.
“I’m not doing anything to help you,” I say. “I already did my part of our
agreement. I made sure Cain didn’t hurt you, even though you treated him worse
than a dog.”
“He’s a demon,” Phobos protests. “How else would you have me treat him?”
I ignore the question, because I have no idea how demons are meant to be
treated. Probably not nicely, because Cain’s not very nice, and I doubt
anyone’s bothered trying to make anything nice for him either.
“If you want me to help you, then I need the binding removed from Cain,” I say.
“That’s the only way this works.”
I’ll let this dumb fairy huff and hiss and flit about in flimsy, panicked
circles, but we’re doing what I want to do. Phobos starts to huff something
dramatic about how that won’t work at all, I’m sure, because I’m stupid and
crazy and whatever else for being this stubborn about freeing my demon. I don’t
know if that’s just how necromancers are or if I’m a defunct one, the worst,
because I want to do things the hard way. It’d be easier to find another demon,
I’m sure, than go after the one that found me.
“Fuck!” Abruptly Phobos slams on the brakes. An odd lack of momentum leaves me
stationary while he rocks forward. His hand scrambles for the gearshift, his
eyes flick to the mirrors. Phobos braces a hand into the passenger seat as he
turns around to stare out the back windshield -- driving in reverse, faster
than he was driving forward.
“It’s Deimos.” The flat, swift urgency in his tone is sobering. Our petty
bickering suddenly seems astronomically nearsighted. “He must have already
talked to Praxis.”
Phobos turns to face the front again, the wheel already spinning. I bet it’s a
tire-squealing and engine revving reversal, outside the car, but the chain link
separation muffles my awareness of all that. I can’t see anything out the
windows, either. It’s a terrifying, helpless feeling where I’d wildly suspect
Phobos of making it all up if I could.
Another jerking slam of the brakes stops Phobos’ attempt at fleeing. He sits
with his hands on the wheel, eyes wide and staring forward. “Fuck,” he
whispers. “I’m trapped.”
Some vicious, unhelpful part of myself is fiendishly pleased seeing Phobos get
as trapped as he made Cain feel. If I wasn’t caught in the same trap, that part
of myself might be bigger.
Phobos doesn’t turn his head. He barely seems to move his lips as he whispers,
“Don’t panic. There’s a chance I can talk our way out of this.”
I have no idea how Phobos plans to do that, since he couldn’t even talk his way
into Praxis’ place. We’ve been running around in circles trying to avoid Deimos
this whole time for a reason. I’m not sure I want to be trapped in a car with
him. I made Cain crawl through broken glass specifically to avoid being trapped
in a car with Deimos. If Deimos has that knife, I don’t want him anywhere near
me or my friend.
Phobos shifts the SUV into park. His head turns to the passenger door as it
opens. “Hi! How’d the hunting go?” he asks, with a big smile.
Deimos stands on the running board with the door open, one hand gripping the
roof handle. I sit very still, not even breathing since my body’s on the wrong
side of the fence for signs of life. I don’t want to think too much about that,
but it’s a useful way to be silent. A hard grey-eyed glare goes over the
interior of the SUV before focusing on Phobos.
“You lied.” Deimos’ accusation is a soft, rasped hush. He’s wearing head-to-toe
black, a turtleneck peeping above a fitted winter jacket, black leather gloves
-- ready for the cold or ready for a murder, either way he’s ready. He seems
ready for anything. He’s tense, expression full of distrust.
Phobos’ pleasant smile, in contrast, seems warm and open. “Did I? I don’t think
I did.”
A narrowed suspicion forms Deimos’ response. It’s enough pressure to make
Phobos crack, his smile starts to take on a nervous edge. “What did I lie
about? You found the car, I assume. It reeked of demon.”
Deimos shakes his head. “Wasn’t there.”
“I didn’t get close enough to see if the demon was actually present,” Phobos
says quickly. “Did I mention that? I must have. Anyway, the police must have
already picked up the vehicle if you couldn’t find it. That or he left, maybe,
there’s just no telling.” I think he should quit while he’s ahead, but maybe
his nervous rambling is less suspicious.
Deimos climbs the rest of the way into the vehicle and shuts the door. From the
way Phobos’ hands clench around the wheel, this is either failing spectacularly
or succeeding far more than he expected. Palpable tension fills the front half
of the car. Somehow even the drowsy way Deimos half-covers a yawn seems
dangerous.
“Drive,” Deimos says, sounding bored. “Already wasted enough time.”
“Right. Sorry about that.” Phobos shifts the car into gear. “Seemed like such a
solid lead, you know? Win some, lose some. C’est la vie. That necromancer, the
kid, I was thinking it’s probably going to be easier for you to find him than
to find the demon. I could start searching hospitals, or --”
Deimos’ interruption is soft but abrupt, a raw whisper that’s loud enough to
cut through Phobos’ rambling. “Shut up.”
A swallow bobs along Phobos’ throat. The delicate, pink bow of his mouth works
anxiously before fitting into a smile. “It has been a long night,” he says
agreeably. “But you still have two hours before dawn, so maybe there’s still
time to...” The slow shake of Deimos’ head stops him. Phobos licks his lips.
“So. Just, take you to Praxis.”
Deimos’ sly, sideways glance is accompanied by the small uptick of his lips.
“Problem?”
Phobos shakes his head.
The cornered curve of his smile deepens. “Problem?”
Another head shake from Phobos, faster and more frantic. “No, no problem. I can
take you there, no problem. I assumed you’d already been, but, no problem. No
problem at all.”
He really is a terrible liar. I have no idea why I trusted him to do any of the
talking, despite his eagerness to  answer all my dumb questions. I look to the
door and wonder how easy it’d be to bail. The shadowed hand I’m clutching is
both a comfort and a concern, because I’m not bailing unless I know he can come
with me.
I’m pretty sure Deimos either suspects something or knows something. He’s
smirking sideways at Phobos in such a way it’s obvious. He’s like a cat toying
with a mouse, this demon hunter watching an airheaded fairy squirm and grimace
under the weight of attempted subterfuge. I really shouldn’t have trusted
Phobos. I think he’s trustworthy enough he’s looped right back around into
being useless.
“Are you tired?” Phobos asks suddenly. “Feel free to recline the seat, take a
nap. I’ll tell Praxis --”
“Not tired.”
Phobos bites at his lip. “Hungry? I could stop somewhere --”
“Not hungry,” Deimos rasps quietly.
I think maybe next time Phobos stops the car, my friend and I should try
bolting. If Deimos can’t see me, then he probably can’t stop me. It’s worth a
shot, but I have no idea where I would run, what I would do. Maybe my best
chance at finding Cain is to let this demon hunter find him for me.
When Deimos leans forward, Phobos flinches. I brace for unknown disaster, but
all that happens is the radio flicking to life. Deimos turns up the volume and
then settles comfortably into the passenger seat. Bright, bouncing pop music
assaults the tense silence.
I try to think of a plan. A good plan, if possible, even if I suspect a smart
plan would involve being somewhere far away from all this. My only advantage is
that Deimos doesn’t know I’m here. My disadvantages start with I don’t know
what I’m doing and run all the way through to how much I don’t know about
Deimos. No one’s explained what makes him a demon hunter, besides his
propensity for killing necromancers and demons.
By the time Phobos starts to park, I still haven’t figured out what to do. When
Deimos and Phobos open their respective doors to leave the car, I realize I’m
about to be stuck inside the SUV. Before I can do more than panic about it, the
cargo hatch opens.
“Oops,” Phobos says. He turns his head toward the back of the vehicle. “Wrong
button.”
I doubt it, I doubt this is anything other than intentional. “Go,” I whisper to
my friend. I help him scramble over the seat and make sure to keep hold of his
hand, same as he makes sure to keep hold of mine. Phobos comes around to close
the hatch as I’m letting my friend lead me to the sidewalk.
“The alley’s this way,” he whispers. “Did you want to go there?”
I shake my head. “Follow Deimos,” I whisper back. The dark outline of my
friend’s head nods, and we stand there for a moment further before starting
forward. We go the opposite direction of the alley. I can barely discern Phobos
and Deimos moving through the smoke and shadow of the Otherside in front of us,
but that’s okay. My friend can see them, he can hear them, and I’m thinking of
Phobos’ wall analogy without trying not to get my hopes up about what that
means.
Context tells me we’ve walked around the block to the front of the building. I
remember from coming here before that the street entrance is completely
inaccessible, it’s a solid denial of boarded up windows and bricked-over
doorway. I remember driving past with my friend and seeing graffiti tagging the
property.
None of that exists on the Otherside, though. I shouldn’t be surprised that
instead a soft glow breaks the impenetrable gloom. The bricked-over, graffiti-
covered doorway I remember appears as a perfectly normal-looking door. Normal
as something can look on the Otherside, I suppose, given the gentle spill of
light that comes from no readily apparent source. An ethereal porch light,
then, lit up in friendly welcome.
Phobos and Deimos stand as stark shadowed contrast to the glowing red door. The
knob gleams as polished and softened white that I suspect is bone. Beneath
curls an ornate old-fashioned lock with a foreboding keyhole. Bright streaks of
crimson drip like accumulated wax, thick with light in the black eternal night.
The door opens without anyone needing to knock. A man stands in the doorway,
his face a dance of shadows in the flickering light. A strong jaw anchors the
firm line of his fearsome lopsided glare. The patch stretches across the wrong
side, leaving a scarred socket exposed. An overlay of glimmering suggestion
shapes a red outline, a glowing orb, some ghosted presence of an eye focused
directly on me.
Praxis shifts the patch’s concealing shadow back to the left side of his face.
The red glow is slow to fade. His scowling disapproval remains. He steps back
as Phobos and Deimos step forward, not a word or glance exchanged, so that I
wonder what this looks like in the bricked-over reality of a rundown building.
 
These two shadows I’ve been following disappear into the flickering candlelight
that’s probably not coming from any candles. Praxis remains, visible in mottled
overlays of light and dark. He keeps the door open expectantly. I see nothing
of the room beyond. I have every reason to think this won’t end well, every
reason to want to run. I should be afraid, as I cross over the threshold and
into the unknown, but I'm not. 
***** Chapter 26 *****
Plenty of shadows fill the room, and plenty of light as well, in ways that seem
normal until I realize there are no candles, no overhead fixtures. I feel as if
I’ve stepped back in time, given the heavy wood furnishings, the stuffy velvet
upholstery, the arrangement and feel of the room. A curtain sweeps across a
doorway to the left. The coziness of the space better reflects that someone
lives here, unlike the alley-side entrance I’ve used before.
I’ve brought one shadow along with me, my friend, who stands dark as soot in
the gentle glow. Deimos forms another spot of dark in his head-to-toe black. He
stands with his arms crossed, lips firm and brows peaked beneath the long fall
of his bangs. For a moment I’m terrified he sees me, but then I realize he’s
glaring at Praxis.
Phobos hovers nervously around the paired armchairs occupying the corner
furthest from Deimos. An open book lies face-down on the small, round table
between the two chairs. It gives a blatant suggestion that Praxis may have been
here waiting, and given the tension in the room that seems entirely true.
An expectant pause hangs in the air. Each of them is anticipating the other
will speak, I realize, and perhaps the smart thing to do would be to let that
happen. If I was doing the smart thing, though, I wouldn’t have come here.
“Hello,” I say.
Deimos takes a wary half-step back. His gaze flashes over the small room.
“Necromancer,” he hushes.
“It’s Abel,” I correct him.
The downward flick of Deimos’ hand brings a slim blade into his palm. Praxis
takes a step toward him, and the sideways snap of the demon hunter’s gaze is
just as sharp as the knife he’s holding. Praxis disregards the knife and glare
alike as he gets closer to Deimos.
“Enough,  suflețel . Put it away.” Praxis takes hold of Deimos’ upper arm.
Fury twists the delicate, dangerous lines of Deimos’ expression as he glares up
at Praxis, but the knife whisks out of sight with another flick of his hand.
“Explain,” he demands. Despite the anger coloring his expression, his voice
stays the same short, clipped rasp. It’s a dry sound, hoarse and raw, the
texture rough like sandpaper.
Phobos grips slender, pale fingers into the velvet upholstery of the chair he’s
hiding behind. “So, funny story, you’ll never believe who I ran into at the
mall today. Right? More tragic than funny, I suppose --”
“I banished the demon,” Praxis says. He lets go of Deimos’ arm, though their
expressions stay clashed and crossed. I think this is a lovers’ quarrel. How
awkward, and incredibly dangerous, because Deimos flashes with a sudden fury.
“Mine!” His snarl is more of a raw squeak. I’m the only one who flinches when
Deimos strikes. A rather harmless fist smacks into the larger man’s shoulder.
“Told you! Mine!”
“You already killed him once.” Phobos’ placating tone carries a ring of
desperation. “Do you really want to spend limited eternity holding a grudge?”
Deimos’ sharp, steady glare indicates that’s likely true, as does the
accusation he throws in a low, venomous growl. “ Killed me .”
Brittle silence follows. Phobos and Praxis exchange a knowing look, so clearly
this information only comes as a surprise to me. I’m not sure why it’s a
surprise. I shouldn’t be surprised, given what I know of Cain. It seems
entirely reasonable for Cain to have killed Deimos.
“Enough,” says Praxis. Firm and resolute, with his hand on Deimos’ arm again
despite the hard, murderous stare this earns him. “I told you once before,
enough of this with him. It is over.”
“Not over,” Deimos insists. “Never over.”
The stiff lash of Praxis’ tone conveys terrible finality, despite the softened
hush. “End this, or we are ended.”
Shock ripples over Deimos’ expression, breaking up his anger for a moment, but
then he’s plunging brows and howling fury. “Wouldn’t!”
I’m with Deimos, that it seems a bluff, despite the way Praxis shakes his head
like it isn’t. Across the room, Phobos stands frozen with an awkward half-smile
slapped in place. He’s clearly decided to try hiding in plain sight from the
bickering lovers, and that seems likely to work. The way Praxis and Deimos
stare at each other leaves little room for anything else.
A slow rumble builds in Deimos and gains pitch and intensity along the way.
Frustration bursts from him as a short, wordless cry. He shoves both hands into
Praxis with ineffective rage before he turns to storms from the room. The whisk
of the curtain gets followed up by a steady thumping up the stairs. I expect a
door to slam, when the pounding footsteps silence, but of course there isn’t
one. I’m not sure how a curtain could get slammed closed.
“Well,” says Phobos. “That went splendidly. Entirely less bloodshed than I
expected, although --”
A single glance from Praxis shuts him up. The same commanding lopsided gaze
sweeps the corner where I’ve been standing. “This trouble has been long
coming,” he says.
The absurd urge to apologize strikes me, even though I’m pretty sure I’m a
victim in all this. “I just want to know where Cain is. I want Phobos to remove
the binding,” I say. “You leave me alone, I’ll leave you alone… I don’t have a
reason to want Deimos dead. Or, more dead --” I can’t believe Cain didn’t
mention the incredibly important detail that the demon hunter out to kill me
was already dead.
Realization flows over me like an icy wave. I hurry for the curtain with my
friend’s hand held tight. I sweep my other hand to catch the fabric and instead
wisp right through, the curtain or me or perhaps us both being made of smoke
and not substance. When I try to simply walk through it, however, I can’t. The
wispy curtain resists my efforts with startling effectiveness.
If Deimos is a dead thing, and I’m a necromancer, then really I shouldn’t be
afraid of him. He should be afraid of me. Except this curtain’s between us, and
I can’t even figure out how to get around that simple of an obstacle.
Everything I don’t know outweighs what little I do know, so I’m not sure why I
thought even for a second that I’d be able to take control of the situation.
I turn to find Praxis watching me -- actually watching me, because he shifted
the eye patch over. In the flickering light of the room it’s just a scarred-
over socket that I see, but I remember the red outlined glow that greeted me at
the door. I’ve pretty handily been caught trying to leave the room unnoticed,
so I point at the curtain rather than deny anything.
“Why can’t I go through here?” I demand. “I want to follow Deimos. I want to
talk to him.”
“Good luck with that,” says Phobos. “I’ll save you the --”
“If he’s dead, then maybe I do want to make him more dead,” I say. “Maybe I’ll
do that, if you don’t help me get back Cain. I’ll make Deimos more than dead. I
know how. I’ve done it before.”
Rationally I’m very aware that making threats is a stupid thing to be doing,
when I have no way to carry them through, no understanding of why Cain and
Deimos keep murdering each other, no real plan to get myself out of this mess.
I wish being a necromancer came with an instruction manual, because I’ve been
told a lot about how powerful I am without actually feeling very powerful.
Praxis seems unimpressed with my efforts at being threatening. After a moment
of watching me, he moves the eye patch to the left again. “Is it your desire to
make an enemy?” he asks quietly.
Immediately I know the answer to that is a resounding no. Even if I knew what I
was doing and had Cain with me, I still don’t think I’d want this wizard for an
enemy. “I don’t want any enemies,” I say, quite truthfully.
A slow smile spreads over Praxis’ face. “Nor do I.”
“Me neither,” says Phobos.
As if anyone in the room cares, and he shouldn’t have said anything. It gets me
to thinking, even though I know I can’t think too much about Phobos crashing
his massive SUV into my friend. Much as it’s my fault for ruining my friend’s
life, it’s arguably more Phobos’ fault for accelerating through the red light
to kill him. But I can’t say that, I can’t even think that.  
“How then is this to be done, without an enemy made?” Praxis poses the question
like a riddle to match the sphinx-like quality of his smile. I don’t think he’s
truly amused. His gaze keeps going to the curtain, to where Deimos went. I
don’t think I’m the enemy he’s most worried about making.
Phobos slides closer to the door. “Don’t think you need me for this, do you?
Deimos is down for the day, so --”
“Stay.” Praxis gestures to one of the armchairs. Abrupt, stiff motions drag
Phobos into the offered seat. It’s a pleasant-seeming moment laced with danger,
since it’s an offer that can’t be refused. It gets paired with an equally
soothing and irrefusable, “Tell me of this new trouble.”
“I let Deimos talk me into doing the hit-and-run maneuver. I know, you said to
leave Abel alone, clearly he has difficulty listening, clearly I have problems
saying no. Surprise we all already know, this demon is that demon, reverse
possession, I told Abel I’d help him if he took me across with him, I sent
Deimos on a wild goose chase and took the goose home with me, I had a dumb
plan, you ruined it, I honestly thought it might work, obviously not.” The
speed at which Phobos spills his guts is almost impressive. He barely pauses
for breath.
Praxis stands beside the table with his fingers lightly rested across the
splayed cover of the book lying there. The yellowed pages and plain brown
exterior indicate the book’s age matches the furniture, and definitely
everything in the room is multiple times older than me.
“Ach, what a mess.” Praxis shakes his head. “Have I not explained to you enough
the restraints of the spell? Abel cannot help you.”
“You don’t know that,” Phobos shoots back. “He’s a necromancer, you’re not.
That has to count for something. He crossed when Deimos did the exorcism, you
were able to send him across --”
Praxis lifts a finger from the book cover, and Phobos quiets immediately.
Genuine sympathy carries in the way Praxis says gently, “The spell cannot be
altered. It would not have worked, this plan. You may try, if you so desire,
but this I assure you. Only time will release you.”
“But --” Desperation claws over Phobos’ expression. He slumps in defeat,
shoulders drooping. His protest is soft and deeply pensive, “But I’m sick of
waiting.”
I step closer to the two of them but stay well out of arm’s length. I’m scared
to remind them I’m listening, scared of what it means that apparently I can’t
help Phobos. I’m not sure I have any bargaining chips, besides destroying
Deimos, and I’m not even all that certain I could do that. Somehow I don’t
think so, now that I’m actually thinking things through. I doubt Praxis would
have let me close to Deimos at all if that were the case.
Praxis turns consoling as he asks, “It is only -- how many years?”
“Twenty-four,” Phobos says gloomily. “I have twenty-four years left.”
“Not so many,” offers Praxis.
Phobos shrugs without lifting his gaze from his lap.
A sigh escapes Praxis. It’s a practiced sound of knowing when an argument’s
been lost, even if he’s got the right answer. His head turns toward the
curtain, where he saw me standing last, even though I’m across the room. “Now
to untangle this,” he says.
“I’m here,” I say. It seems the polite thing to do.
Praxis adjusts accordingly. He stands straight and tall, shoulders squared like
he’s braced for something. Immediately I know he’s got the answers for me as
well, and I’m not going to like my set anymore than Phobos and Deimos liked
theirs. It’s bad news, whatever he has for me, I know it’s bad news.
“I cannot summon you the mortal plane. How it is that you returned before, that
is how you must return again. I do not know what name to call,” Praxis says.
He lifts a hand to plead for silence, even though I’m still trying to make
sense of what he’s said. “You cannot tell me now, so do not try. The one to
call you back must know your name. As I understand this,” he adds, as a further
warning. “Yet I could be mistaken. I am not a necromancer.” Praxis smirks
ruefully, inviting me into an inside joke that I’m clueless about.
Only after I’ve nodded for a bit do I remember to say, “Okay.” It’s not okay,
at all, but I at least understand it. Perhaps not the inside joke, where this
wizard sounds apologetic for not being me, but I understand that I’m stuck on
the Otherside. For now, at least. Hopefully not forever.
“What about Cain?” I ask, when nothing further gets volunteered.
“I will help you,” Praxis says reluctantly. “To release the demon, you need
only find him and remove that which binds him. Walking the spiritual plane as
you are, this is what you must do, if you wish to release this demon.”
“Okay. Okay. So, first I free Cain, then I go home. Great. Where’s Cain?”
Praxis and Phobos suddenly exchange a knowing look, a highly suspicious look. I
wait with growing impatience and terror, because no one’s mentioned anything
yet about where Cain might be. I thought he’d be here, where we crossed, but I
don’t think that’s the case.
The silent negotiation between them ends with Phobos’ grimaced effort at a
smile. “So, funny story,” he says. He looks somewhere to the left of where I’m
standing. “The thing about that is we don’t know. We don’t know where your
demon went, just that he got banished, so…”
Phobos edges lower into the armchair and grips the upholstery. Praxis stands
very tall and straight. Both of them look incredibly frightened, in this
incredibly frightening moment, as the lights in the room flicker all the
stronger. If this were candlelight, it’d be a gust of ominous air doing all
this frenzy. Instead I realize it’s me, I’m doing this, I’m freaking out enough
to do this.
Realizing my shattered emotional wavelength is about to shatter Praxis’ house
makes me stop. The calming breath I draw in happens because of habit only and
doesn’t need released. Gradually the glow of the room stabilizes. Phobos flicks
his gaze around with the same frozen, terrified smile.
“Abel,” says Praxis. He sounds remarkably calm, considering I might set his
house on non-literal fire. Or maybe literal fire, I certainly don’t know what
all I’m capable of doing so anything seems reasonable. “Abel, this is not to
say he cannot be found.”
“How am I going to find him, then? How do I do that?”
I’m tempted to try for whatever fire-setting powers I can when Praxis and
Phobos exchange another reluctant look. Phobos takes up the explanation, which
starts with a shrug. “Demon summoning is so not something we have a lot of
experience doing, you know. I mean it’s entirely possible there’s a way for you
to find him. Praxis, was that your first time banishing a demon?”
Praxis’ answer requires a lengthy pause first. “It was.”
I focus on his uneasy expression, rather than Phobos’ guileless smile. “What
aren’t you telling me? What does it mean that he’s been banished? If I can find
him, then he’s somewhere, so where is that? Where do demons go when they get
banished?”
“To wherever it is they were before.” Phobos answers, despite my questions
being directed at Praxis. “You summoned him, Praxis banished him, he’s back
where he started. I don’t know where that is, Praxis doesn’t know where that
is, getting dramatic about things won’t change that. He’s wherever he was,
wherever he died, wherever that is. It’s certainly not here. You’re wasting
time bothering us.”
Phobos’ dismissive, bossy tone is rude to the point of insulting, but I don’t
think that’s why Praxis stiffens expectantly. I think it’s because Phobos just
blurted out more than he should.
“Where he died,” I say. “You mean, where Deimos killed him.”
I know I’m right by the swift exchange of glances -- Phobos guilty, Praxis
annoyed -- neither of them wanted to admit that my situation wasn’t so hopeless
as presented.
“Assuming no one killed him after Deimos,” Phobos says. “Then… yeah.”
Silence follows. Terrible and awkward, because I know without anyone needing to
tell me that Deimos intends to keep the location secret.
“When?” I ask. “When did Deimos kill him?”
Phobos shrugs and looks up at Praxis, who worries together a frown. I realize
he’s having to think about it. I see him look down at his hands and realize
he’s having to count. Phobos realizes the same and shrugs again, less
dismissive. “Around the same time Cher divorced Sonny and recorded trash for a
bit. When was that? Seventy-six? Seventy-seven? Somewhere then, maybe, is when
Deimos came back.”
I find it a bit ridiculous they can’t give me a straight answer to such a
simple question, but fortunately it aligns with one of the rare times Cain gave
me one instead. Stretching before me are my endless stupid questions, each one
a little piece of the puzzle I’ve been putting together for years. I’m grateful
for the fact I’m a non-breathing, seemingly-invisible presence in the room. My
silent epiphany requires no dramatic gasp, and they can’t see my sudden
bursting grin.
“Okay.” It slips from me a bit too brightly. I don’t think either of them finds
my tone unusual though, despite the swapped glance between them.
“The best thing to do is just go home,” Phobos says. “Skip finding that demon.
If you really want another one, they’re not that hard to summon. Well, no, they
are, but that didn’t stop you the first time.”
“I thought you wanted to stop me from summoning demons,” I say. I’m suddenly
suspicious this might be some kind of trap. “You said Deimos was right to want
to kill me.”
“Yeah. That’s Deimos,” says Phobos. “He hates necromancers. He hates demons.
Your demon, in particular, but it’s like we just agreed. No one wants to make
any enemies here. I’m not looking to fight any moral battles, that is so not my
thing. Kill hundreds of people if you want. Kill thousands of them, if you can.
Raise an army of the undead, see how well that works out for you, or try taming
a demon if that’s more your speed. I don’t care what you do, Abel, so long as
you don’t bother me with it.”
Despite a disapproving frown for how Phobos worded it, Praxis nods his
agreement. “This life, what it is you can do, it is yours,” he says. “I am not
to judge how it is used.”
That seems an entirely reasonable position to hold for a wizard whose house
contains a door to the Otherside and a pentagram made of blood. Confusing as I
find all this, there’s a certain soothing simplicity to it as well. I suppose
in a room full of monsters, no one wants to be the first to start pointing
fingers.
“So we’re done here,” I say. “Unless you think Deimos will tell me anything.”
A nervous, tittering laugh escapes Phobos. He glances up at Praxis’ unhappy
scowl and quiets. From Praxis I just get a solemn, “He is not to be involved in
this.”
So much warning carries in the husky, soft-spoken sternness. Immediately I
respond with, “Okay. Okay. I understand.” I think if I try asking again to
speak to Deimos about Cain, I really will make an enemy of Praxis despite my
best efforts.
I only asked to seem less suspicious, because I don’t need Deimos to tell me
anything. I know where to find Cain. I know exactly where to find Cain, if he’s
back where all this started. The trick now is getting there, but I’ve got a
plan for that. I’ve got my own chauffeur and bodyguard, an all-too-willing
guide, the best friend a necromancer could have while stuck on the Otherside.
He followed me into this nightmare, refused to leave me, and as we leave
Praxis' place I make a silent promise that no matter what happens next, I'll
find a way to help him go home once it's over. Somehow I'll find a way to help
him. I'll find a way for us both to go home, after I find Cain. 
***** Chapter 27 *****
“You need to wait here until I come back.”
“Okay.”
Beyond the shadow of his head stretches vast, murky depths of undulating
darkness. Both his hands are clasped tight in mine.
“Just stay here and wait, okay?”
His head bobs in an agreeable nod. He should be trying to talk me out of this,
but instead he says, “Sure.”
Still I won’t let go of his hand, won’t stop saying all these stupid things. I
tried taking him with me into the surrounding pool of smoky-black nothing, I
thought maybe we could look for Cain together. I won’t do that again. I can’t.
“You have to be here when I get back,” I say. “Okay?”
He’s starting to sound a bit confused, maybe a little concerned. “Yeah, Ethan.
I’ll wait here.”
I can’t think about how scared I am that if I let go of his hand, I’ll never
find him again. That I won’t know where to find him, without him to guide me. I
don’t know his name to call for him, and I’m too scared if I ask he won’t know
the answer to tell me. Considering what a nightmare my life has become, this is
the most scared I’ve been.
“Okay,” I hush. I’m in my body, but there’s no heartbeat for this. No tears, no
ragged breathing. Just the whisper of all my pleas for him to be here when I’m
done finding Cain.
The shadows beneath us firm enough to stand on, this spot that I guess is solid
ground, it’s the wooden boat dock of my parent’s lake house. My father’s boat
isn’t here on the Otherside. Actually I think he sold it, after my accident,
after all those arguments with my mother about what to do about me. Certainly
not take me and my friend out on the lake, no more Memorial Day weekend
barbeques with business partners and country club friends. All that ended the
day I fell. All this started instead. I haven’t been back since. Unless this
counts, I guess.
I’m wasting time. I don’t know how long it took to get here. I’ve lost track of
time entirely and have no idea where I am beyond this particular spot. I could
guess by feel to find the end of the dock in either direction, but beyond that
is nothing. Black eternal everything, my whole world gone silent, dark and
sterile.
I release one of my best friend’s hands. He stands there, probably smiling,
unaware of why I’m terrified to let him go. Slowly I release his other hand.
The constant held warmth fades from my palm to leave a cold, empty longing.
“You’ll be here when I get back, right?” I wish I could cry. Now that I’m not
holding his hand, I can let myself think all these terrible things. I can
remember the blood-streaked slump of him against the steering wheel. I can be
scared now that I’ve lost him forever, despite him being right here in front of
me.
“Yeah,” he says. “I’ll wait here for you.”
“Okay.” I take a step closer and put my arms around the strange, solid feel of
him. I close my eyes, and it’s less like hugging a shadow, more like what I
remember. I have so many memories of him, all these memories of him, most of my
life spent with him.
He wasn’t there that day I hit my head and fell into the water, he wasn’t there
to see me flopped unbreathing on the deck of my father’s boat. He only heard
about it later, rode his bike all the way to the hospital to visit me. He took
notes for me, brought me my homework, did everything he could to help because
that’s just who he is, just the type of loyal best friend I don’t deserve. I
said we’d stick together, but I have to leave him here if I want to find Cain.
I wish I could cry for this, even though I’m sure that would scare him. He
squeezes warmth and happiness into me with the force of the hug, a nice long
hug like we’re two dumb little kids. “I’m sorry,” I tell him. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he says. “I’ll wait for you. Okay?” Concerned, because I’m upset, I
won’t let go of him again or stop making these strange whines that are all I
have to shape my sorrow. He should be trying to stop me from doing this, should
be trying to talk me into just going home, but I’m not sure if he remembers
where home is, that he has a home.
I brush my lips into the soft shadow of his cheek. I pull from him, he lets me,
our hands slid into a twinned hold between us before dropping. It’s a long,
lingering goodbye that I won’t think of as such.
“Okay. Yeah, okay,” I whisper.
It’s not okay. I wonder if he knows that, I wonder if he’s scared. I hope he
isn’t scared. I don’t want him scared to be left here alone.
I turn to face the edge of the dock, although I try not to think of it like
that. I look forward into the darkness and then walk forward. I make the easy
transition from what’s the dock to what’s the murky-soft density of the
supposed lake. My friend sunk into the darkness, when I tried to take him with
me, but I find it difficult but not impossible to walk over it. The grasping
depths reminds me of walking through heavy snow. I try not to listen to what I
know isn’t the murmuring of choppy water. I’m hearing voices, whispers, the
breezy call of ambitious unknowns in the stretching distance.
None of them are Cain. None are my friend, or even friendly, so I won't listen.
I struggle to keep moving even as I sink deeper. I know from memory it’s
possible to run and cannonball off the edge of the dock, the water's deep
enough for that. The fact I’m wading through smoke-thick strangeness of the
Otherside a bit past my knees is concerning for many reasons. I try not to
think about it, same as I try not to think about all the summers my friend and
I spent doing those running balled-up jumps.
I’m equally trying not to think about how impossible it’s going to be to find
Cain. This is a big lake. I don’t know where the boat was, where I fell, how
close I fell to wherever Cain is, and if I need to find him by feel -- if I
need to shape Cain from darkness like I did my friend, then I have no idea how
I’m going to do that. Am I to feel blind into the shadows forever, until I’m so
lost I don’t know where I am?
No. Not that. That's not what I'll do. I’ll find Cain. I run my tongue over my
lips to feel at the scar he gave me. With my fingers I feel at my back of my
head, I feel through my hair to find the scar there as well. Unlike Cain’s
jagged bite, the cut of the boat rail into my scalp needed stitches and time to
heal. 
Chill brushes along my ankles. It’s the spine-tingling panic of clingy algae or
moss, a buried twig or maybe some small fish. It’s not that, but I’m not going
to think what else it might be. Probably not Cain. Probably whatever’s
whispering and moaning on the carried sound of windless, open dead air.
Another touch tugs at my feet as I move. I keep moving, try to move faster in
fact, even though I have no idea what I’m moving toward. Finding Cain, that’s
what I need to think about, I need to ignore everything that isn’t finding
Cain. I don’t know how else to find him, except by trying to find him. That
makes as much sense as anything, and it’s the best plan I’ve got.
Eventually the effort really is a bit like swimming. It takes a whole-body
effort to move through the dense darkness and clutching, grabbing ambitions of
things that aren’t Cain. I bite my lip and think only of trying to find Cain,
and then I see him. I see something, at least, something bright and getting
nearer.
The brightness shapes into winding coils of shimmering creamy-rose rope. The
binding, wrapping him head-to-toe. I want to shout, scream, run closer but it’s
struggling instead. Desperation like I remember before from half-drowning in a
different lake, a real lake, surrounded by a sleeping city but so much more
real than this nightmare.
Cords of that pinkish-gold light constrict Cain’s ankles, thighs, his wrists
held together behind his back, arms bound to his chest. The glow forms a gag
and blindfold as well, it’s a visceral too-real binding just like Phobos
described. He’s blind, deaf, mute, unable to move, totally helpless and trapped
here in this dark, foreboding hell.
But I found him, I’ve found Cain. I strain through the last few inches of
separation. I don’t know what I’ll do if I wisp through him, but my fingers
fall into the heated warmth of his hair. I fumble to grab for the binding over
his eyes, the first of those glowing horrors I need to remove. Electric-shock
agony bursts with sudden reprimand.    
With a sharp cry I yank my fingers back. Throbbing pain radiates from the
reddish round bite. Frustration builds in me like a slow drip from a faucet.
All this cold terror within me, how much I don’t know what I’m doing, it’s too
much. I can feel the pressure all around me, the murky darkness squeezing
close. Those whispered ambitions surge closer, become louder, but I won’t
listen. I won’t give up, not when I’ve found Cain.
All I need to do is remove the binding. I’ve found him, that was the hard part,
this must be the easy part, even if it hurts. I sweep my fingers into Cain’s
hair, the dark heated warmth I remember. My touch brushes away the constricting
light . Harsh sting numbs my fingers into leaden torment.
I grit my teeth and cup Cain’s cheek with my other hand. I caress aside the
wisps of light to clear his closed eyes, slacked lips. “Cain,” I whisper.
“Cain, wake up.”
Faster I attack the binding, all this flurry of sweeping touches and trying not
to whimper and flinch when bitten. Yanking the cords free of Cain’s wrists is
when my hands start to bleed. I bite back sobs and keep going, work even faster
to free him. 
The drops of blood suspend oddly in the darkness around us. Glistening crimson
shines and shimmers with a dulled, shadowed light all of its own. That too-
bright hot glow of my own blood, it lifts a baying howl from the surrounding
darkness. Blood in the water, a scent being caught by what I wish were just
sharks. Terror crawls down my back as the cry is lifted into a hundred voices
surrounding me. I see nothing except Cain, eerily illuminated in the fast-
fading light that I’m trying to extinguish faster.
“Cain!” His legs and feet are still wrapped tight, but I wrap myself tight
around him instead. I crush my arms around his chest, bury my face into his
neck and shoulder. “Cain, please, wake up, wake up --”
Something grabs at my ankle, and I scream. I’m pulled from Cain a measure of
inches before it happens, he jolts into motion. The most beautiful rumbling
snarl accompanies the fast, bruising snatch of Cain grabbing me back from the
unknown.
His hands tighten into my arms, my shoulders -- the surrounding chaos silences.
The grip on my ankle is gone, as is the struggle to move, the creamy-rose
light. None of that. Just Cain, grabbing hold of me, the snarl fading.
His dark gleaming eyes are wide, his brows lifted high for once, he’s as
shocked to see me as I am thrilled to have him see me. The widest bright smile
consumes my face. I can’t even stop smiling to kiss him, though I try as I
smash excitedly into him. I’m all over Cain shrieking once more, this time with
laughter.
He’s just standing there too stunned to hardly move. Solid ground beneath us
now, the moment Cain snapped awake everything stabilized. I’m not sure what
that means about the lake, where I am, what’s happening but who cares. I woke
up Cain, I found him. He’s here with me.
Cain’s fingers dig bruises as he shoves me off him. He’s scowling now, looking
furious even though I think the harsh, feral gleam of his teeth is a smile.
He’s got something sarcastic and snaky ready for me, but then he looks down at
my bitten and bleeding hands. His eyes widen at the sight of the smeared
scarlet shine.
He hisses, growls, pulls me in close and looks around into the black nothing.
My laughter stops, the smile fades. My stomach tightens, a strange heaviness
builds through me. I press close to Cain and get under the tight protection of
his arm.
I’m frightened by how quiet he is, how serious this just got. Cain’s scanning
the darkness around us like whatever grabbed my ankle might come back. I only
see and hear Cain. I intend to keep it that way. I’ve started shaking,
trembling up against Cain. Around us is a suffocating heaviness that’s making
me feel breathless and tight despite the way I can’t breathe.
“Cain,” I whisper to him. His eyes flick down to me immediately. “Cain.”
Pleading, aching -- terrified, and he ducks his head down to kiss me.
The devouring gasp of his lips flares through the scar. My mouth opens
willingly to the invasion of his tongue, same as I spread my legs for the press
of his thigh between them. I only want Cain’s touch, his husky growl. No other
voices or hands in the dark. Only him.
Shivering moans bring me closer against Cain, the solid, real feel of his body
beneath the wool, cotton, and denim of his clothes. Cain lifts my arm in an
odd, cradling gesture. The hot rasp of his tongue runs along the soft underside
of my forearm and flicks over my wrist.
I’m transfixed by his expression, the strange close-eyed rapture of it, the
tender way Cain does such a demonic thing as drink my blood. I’m tight against
Cain, tight everywhere, hard arousal throbbing through me in tempo to the
heartbeat I’m missing. So many alarming, dangerous things I could be thinking
about, when all I’m focused on is watching Cain lick the blood from my wounds.
Heat suffuses the sharp cuts and stinging bites, a hot whip of sensation that
turns cold, becomes trickles of icy numb. As Cain collects the spilled blood,
the peaches-and-cream skin clears into scarless normalcy. Sweet ache lingers as
memory over the wounds. Questions lodge in my throat, thick as tears.
Cain’s eyes open in a slow daze. Luminescent and radiant, his dark-gleaming
eyes shine bright as my blood did. Bright like the shining corded light of the
binding. Bright enough that it’s breathtaking, even in the breathless
impossibility of the Otherside. The onyx brilliance forms a vast eternity, a
bottomless depth to get lost within searching.
I stared once before to find the shaded difference between iris and pupil. I
remember the vibrant gloom of a car’s backseat and sloping bands of
streetlights passing over Cain’s face. I remember as well a cloudy sky, bright
sunshine, the rippling waters and wind in my hair on that beautiful summer day
I fell into the watery depths of the lake. Deep oblivion, eternal night,
gleaming dark eyes -- a moment between heartbeats in the absence of breath,
such an insignificant small gap of time to serve as a beacon for Cain’s
ambitions. I should have died that day, I should be stuck on the Otherside, but
the gleaming forever of a demon’s eyes assures me of unknown possibilities.
I realize what’s happening much too late to stop it, much too late to work the
lump of uncertainty in my throat into a desperate plea. I’m not sure who I’d
beg to stop this, considering I’m the necromancer doing it. I don’t need anyone
to call me back, I don’t need my name to remind me who I am, where I belong.
Not when I can see the way home in the endless darkness. 
***** Chapter 28 *****
When I hear Marcia in room thirty-seven killed herself, my first thought is
good for her -- she set a goal and followed through. She accomplished it
despite the obstacles, despite everyone telling her what a stupid thing it’d be
to throw her life away at seventeen. I’ve been trying to kill something for six
weeks without any success other than cementing my status as pants-on-head
crazy. I’m jealous of a dead girl, that’s my gut reaction. I’m jealous she’s
succeeded where I failed.
“How’d she do it?”
Cynthia and Jamil stop talking, start staring at me. Belatedly I realize that
I’m not actually part of this conversation. It’s just happening right in front
of me. Also it’s been a few days since I actually said anything to anyone
voluntarily. I haven’t exactly been cooperative. It’s no secret I don’t want to
be here.  
Cynthia twirls a finger into her fly-away dark curls. “Um, hey, Ethan. Didn’t …
realize you were listening.”
I’m sure I’m not making this any less awkward for her with my emotionless
staring, but I just want my question answered, I don’t want niceties. I’m not
here to make friends. I’m here against my will, because I’m not crazy. I’m not
bipolar or schizophrenic or suffering from an identity disorder. I know exactly
who I am, what I am. I’m a necromancer. It’s not my fault that diagnosis isn’t
in the manual.
“I think she OD’d,” Jamil says. “Hoarded pills under her mattress or
something.”
Cynthia tugs on the fresh-twisted curl with a frown. “Oh, that’s kind of lame.”
Her disappointment matches mine. I already thought of an overdose, except I’m
not sure it’d work. I’m not sure it’d be clean enough. It seems like it’d make
a mess of things on the inside, at a molecular level, a chemical reaction to
destroy vital organs that I probably need to keep functioning. I’m not sure
what happens to a body in an overdose, and I can’t research it to find out the
risk. I’m not allowed to use the internet anymore. I’m not allowed to use a lot
of things, like shoelaces or a belt, even things like sharpened pencils or nail
clippers.
The two of them keep talking with a modest effort to include me, even though
I’m back to ignoring them. The book I’m reading is awful and boring. I’m not
even reading it, I’m mostly just staring at the rows of printed letters.
Though I quit being cooperative pretty early on in this adventure, there’s
still the rules I have to follow. My complicated world enforces order and
security with omnipotent power I can’t contradict. Not when I’m supervised
twenty-four seven. Sometimes my world requires me to abide by the limited
possibilities presented. Medicine check is one of those times, or so I thought.
I haven’t figured out a way yet to get out of it, but it’s possible. Clearly
it’s possible somehow to pass the nurse’s mouth check without swallowing the
pill. I have no idea how. Being a necromancer doesn’t help me with that. Even
if I don’t plan on overdosing, hoarding my medication rather than taking it
would make this easier. I wouldn’t spend so much time staring at sentences
without understanding them. More reasons to be jealous of a dead girl. She
figured out a way around the rules.
Eventually I realize what’s just happened besides Marcia earning a gold star on
her chart for self-actualization. I’m sure the psychiatrists wanted her to set
a goal like go to college, but they can’t deny that she realized her potential
as a teen suicide statistic.
“Marcia died.”
Quite the sudden announcement I make, considering the conversation’s moved on
to pop music. We’re no longer discussing the dead girl. The novelty of it’s
worn off on Cynthia and Jamil, who I’m pretty sure spend all this time talking
in front of me because word got around I bat for the other team. I think Jamil
has a crush on me, and Cynthia’s agreed to play matchmaker. Clearly Jamil
deserves to be here, if he thinks a psychiatric hospital is a good place to
pick up a boyfriend. I’m glad I make a cute crazy kid though. It’s kind of
flattering, in a weird creepy way.
“Um, yeah.” Cynthia offers me a smile. “Yeah, Ethan. We told you that. Marcia
died last night.”
It’s my favorite tone of voice, theI’m talking to a crazy person voice where
all the answers are obvious, and it’s sad I can’t understand that.
“We don’t know if she’s dead. They took her to the hospital,” Jamil says.
“She looked dead,” Cynthia insists.
“You don’t know that.”
“Katie does, she swears to it. Girl was dead.”
The spiral of hair drops from Cynthia’s hand. Her mouth keeps shaping words,
but I’m not listening. Something died near me. Finally, something died near me.
“Where’s her room?”
Both of them stare at me like they’re not sure how to answer, or maybe like
they’re not going to answer. I’m fine with that, I’ll wait. Someone else will
tell me, maybe one of the nurses. From where I’m sitting in the common area,
there’s three staff in line of sight. I could also ask Katie, soon as I
remember who she is. I can wait for that, too, it’ll come to me eventually. She
might be the young nurse who says heytoo much.
“Um.” Cynthia exchanges a side-eyed uncertainty with Jamil. “Ethan, did you
know Marcia? I never saw you guys, like, talk… or anything.”
Again, not here to make friends. I’m not sure I should repeat the question.
It’d be rude. I look down at the book in my hands instead, which is less rude
and more my usual flavor of crazy.
I’m fine with crazy, minus being completely trapped, helpless, drugged into a
stupor and separated from my demon. I am oddly fine with all that, and knowing
it’s the drugs making me feel that way is less alarming than it should be.
Probably because of the drugs.
“Her room is near mine,” Jamil says. “I could show you.”
Cynthia’s lit up, poorly-suppressed smile makes him nervous enough without me
staring. I close the book and set it aside. Getting to my feet serves as my
answer, even though I suspect this is a very strange first date. I wonder if
explaining he’s not my type will be necessary. It wouldn’t be a lie either,
even if it’s not the whole truth. I study his wide shoulders and thick waist as
I follow him through the ward. He’s not bad-looking. He even has dark eyes.
Actually Cynthia’s a troublemaker and drags Jamil along with her most of the
time. I bet between them I could get Jamil alone enough to try choking him. I’m
not sure I could. He’s built like a linebacker, I might not survive the
attempt. I’ve thought of saying it’s my kink. It might buy me enough time, if
he thinks I’m that cute. Not that I especially want to murder Jamil. He seems
like a nice kid.
My stomach sinks as I realize he’s taking me to the same dormitory wing as
mine. Marcia died near me, but my head’s silent. No Cain, not one drop of
snarky commentary. I left him behind. I went home. I woke to the sound of my
mother saying my name. A scar on my lip, Aidan’s coma, the weeks I spent
missing between the crash and being found unconscious in my room -- all these
unexplainable, impossible things. My complicated world can’t explain it, and I
haven’t bothered to try. It’s gotten me stuck here, in the wrong kind of
hospital for people dying.
Or so I thought, until today.
“This is her room,” Jamil says. A smile works a nervous line over his broad
face.
I stare at the closed door. “Neat.”
It probably would have been less awkward for him if I’d said nothing. If a
ghost or Cain or whatever else is listening though, I have to say something.
“Um, sure. Well, my room’s over here. If you wanted to see it.”
I don’t, especially. I’m sure it’s similar to mine. I let him take me there
anyway. Two staff and three other patients are in line of sight of the hallway.
If I go into the room with him the door stays open, and someone’s poking in to
check on me with clockwork precision. I’m not allowed to do anything
unsupervised for long, not even sleep.
“So, um. This is my room.” Jamil flaps a hand at the bed, nightstand, and
dresser combination like they’re anything to remark over. It looks identical to
my room, only with a messier bed.
“Neat.”
This probably counts as the most words we’ve ever exchanged, even if I’m
repeating myself. Jamil’s uncertainty about where to take this next elicits
genuine sympathy from me. I wonder if now would the appropriate time to explain
he’s not my type, or if that would seem presumptuous. I don’t actually know if
he likes me or not, despite the fact I’m pretty sure Cynthia’s teased him about
it within earshot. It isn’t like I really pay attention to most of what they
say in front of me, or most of what anyone says to me. I don’t want to be here.
That’s no secret.
Cooperating might get me out of here. I’ve thought about it. I’ve thought about
playing along. Trying to insist I’m not crazy doesn’t work when I can’t and
won’t explain anything about what happened to me, where I went, how I got this
scar. Dissociative fugue, I think that’s what explanation they came up with for
my absence. I certainly wasn’t stupid enough to volunteer that I’d taken a
sojourn through the dark, hellish depths of the Otherside in order to free a
banished demon.
When Jamil offers, I sit on the bed next to him. I’ll give him credit, he makes
a noble effort to remove the awkwardness from the situation. I stare between my
knees while he attempts to flirt. I bet he’s wishing Cynthia was here to play
wingman for him. I wonder if he’ll realize what a poor life choice he’s making
by hitting on a crazy kid, no matter how cute.
One of the staff walks by to check on me, stands around in the doorway for a
bit to observe. I’ll probably be asked about this later in therapy. I probably
shouldn’t have popped off about being gay, even if it was amusing at the time.
That was early in this, before the drugs ended my efforts at being actively
uncooperative. Now I’ve switched to passive, apathetic disobedience. It’s
somewhat intentional but mostly a consequence of circumstances.
Jamil keeps talking to me until it’s time for group therapy. We walk there
together, and Cynthia meets us outside the room with waggling eyebrows and an
eager giggle. I bet Jamil would be blushing, if his skin wasn’t so dark.
Group therapy gets followed by another hour in the common room, and then I’m
off to my individual therapy. Lunch happens, dinner happens, lights out
happens. More sitting and staring fills the time, occasional monosyllable
responses or whatever other bare minimum I need to get through the day. I think
a lot about how I might manage to kill someone and try not to be tempted by
thoughts of killing myself instead.
It’s tempting. It’s so tempting, because suicide would be so much easier than
murder. I couldn’t even kill a cat. I realize now that perhaps it would have
been smarter to wait before trying to summon Cain. At first my parents were
just happy to have me home -- or, my mother, at least, expressed her relief and
gratitude that I came home safe. I wonder if my father wouldn’t have preferred
I stay a runaway, rather than return a certified lunatic who got caught trying
to kill the neighbor’s cat.
A morbid fascination with death is part of my diagnosis, which sems grossly
unfair. I’m a necromancer. Interacting with dead things is kinda my thing. I’m
not a future serial killer, despite the mounting evidence to the contrary. In
theory if I kill Jamil, no one’s even going to notice. Except maybe his
parents. And Jamil, I guess.
Lying in bed that night, I stare at the ceiling and think about the dead girl.
Sometimes I whisper to myself at night. I’ll whisper to Cain, in case he’s
listening. I don’t do it as much anymore. I did it a lot at first, enough I got
caught a few times by the overnight staff responsible for ensuring I’m not in
here murdering myself or anyone’s pet. Talking to myself gets me extra
questions in therapy, so I try not to get caught.
I wonder if Cain’s ignoring me, if he’s decided to wait for a different
necromancer. I didn’t exact meet expectations. I’m clearly not very good at
this, despite putting in my best effort there at the end. I’m sure I removed
the binding for him at least. I freed Cain, he’s free to come find me. Someone
died near me. But I guess if he wants to ignore me that’s okay.
It’s not, none of this is okay, but the drugs make it okay. I don’t feel sad or
scared anymore, I don’t worry very much about anything. I think about all these
painful things, but it doesn’t hurt. I’m not sure I’m capable of feeling things
deep enough for it to hurt. I don’t cry anymore, even when my mom comes to
visit and starts weeping. I try to do nice things for her, like smile and talk,
but it’s hard. I don’t want her thinking I’m mad at her for doing this to me. I
understand she wants to help. She’s my mom, and she loves me, I get that. I’m
sorry to do this to her, I really am.
I don’t like to think that maybe I really did make everything up, that maybe I
really am so insane that I can’t discern reality from imagination. No one’s
around to corroborate my story, after all. It’s only sometimes I start to doubt
myself, but those are usually the days I spend the most time thinking about
killing myself. I’d rather be dead than crazy. I don’t want everything that
happened to be a lie. I don’t want Cain to only be a collection of thoughts and
feelings I had.
I’m sorry I wasn’t a better necromancer for him. I’m sorry for a lot of things.
It’s a sad, sorry life that I’m living. I guess this is what happens to
necromancers in my world these days. I guess this is it for me. I guess this is
how it is ends.
The next morning at breakfast I decide to go ahead and kill myself. Marcia’s
plan seemed to work, so I’ll copy her. I’ll figure out how to hide the pill
instead of swallowing. I’ll wait until I have a big pile hoarded. I bet even if
someone comes to check on me, I might look like I’m sleeping instead of dying.
I’ll roll to my side. I’ll sleep face-down, actually, that’s a good idea. I’ll
start sleeping that way now, so it won’t look suspicious to do it later. Maybe
I’ll vomit and aphixiate during the night. Looking on the bright side of
things, that’s me, always an idealist.
A tray hits the empty table in front of me. I don’t bother to look up. Jamil
and Cynthia sit across from me at breakfast. They do the same at lunch and
dinner. They usually sit across from wherever I’m sitting.
A girl’s snippy, treble tone grates over the words. “Hey, sweetheart. Miss me?”
It’s not Cynthia. That’s unusual. I lift my gaze to stare at the girl. Mousy
brown hair, thin lips, some freckles splattered across the scrunched-up
annoyance of a sharp glare. I wonder if I stole this girl’s seat without
meaning to. I don’t keep track of who sits where, I just sit at whatever
table’s the emptiest.
“You look like shit,” the girl says. She kicks out the chair and slumps into
it. The lazy sprawl seems strange to me, it’s a very strange way for a teenage
girl to sit in a chair.
I have no idea who this person is. One of the other patients, that’s obvious,
but I don’t recognize her from my group therapy or any other session. I’m not
sure why she’s sitting with me. It isn’t like we know each other. I’m not here
to make friends.
The girl’s frown slips. She leans forward onto her elbows and studies me
closely, almost with a sloped look of concern. Her brows are as thin as her
lips, they look like the kind that get drawn fuller with makeup, except makeup
is on the list of restricted items. No point in looking pretty in a place like
this, despite Jamil’s efforts to cruise. Although her eyes are pretty. The rest
of her’s not, but her eyes are. They’re brown like her hair, a puppy-dog brown
like Aidan’s. That must be why she’s reminding me of someone.
“They really did a number on you, princess.” Her fork waggles into the space
between us. “How much of you is left in there?”
I have no idea what she wants with me, asking this kind of thing. What does
that even mean? I’m not the only kid drugged like this, why is she picking on
me? I turn my head to look at the rest of the cafeteria. I spot Cynthia and
Jamil shuffling along the line with their trays. If I stare long enough, maybe
one of them will come over here and chase this girl away.
“Hey. Hey, kid.” Her fingers snap. “Ethan.”
I whisk my head around. Tension slacks from her expression and leaves her
looking worried again, like this whole exchange is supposed to be happening
differently. I’m really not sure what she expected. It’s no secret I don’t want
to be here, that I’m not putting any effort into my recovery. I’m the example
of what not to do, how not to behave.
Cynthia and Jamil approach with their trays. The girl watches with a wary
expression and grips her fork like this might turn into a sudden fight. I hope
it does. I hope she stabs me with that fork. I could point out to her where my
jugular is, see if she wants to go for it.
“Marcia?” Surprise shimmers over Cynthia’s bland expression. “You’re, uh. Not
dead. That’s weir--”
Jamil catches her with an elbow. “That’s great,” he says. His tray goes beside
mine. Apparently we’ve upgraded to sitting next to each other after our date.
“I’m really glad you’re okay.”
“Sure,” says the girl. Marcia, her name’s Marcia. She’s the dead girl. Who
didn’t die, despite rumors to the contrary, so really she’s a failure. I’m
taking away her gold star.
Cynthia slides into the seat next across from Jamil. The not-dead girl glances
over and then adjusts the way she’s sitting. Thighs together, ankles crossed,
less of a sprawl to hog the entirety of available space and more of an demur
agreement to take only as much space as needed. It’s such a strange, subtle
shift.
Not subtle is the way Cynthia stares at the girl. “Are you friends with Ethan?”
she asks. “He was asking about you yesterday.”
Marcia’s shoulders bob in a quick shrug. She chews a big shoved-in bite of
toast and then takes another bite, rather than pause to respond. It’s clear
she’s not going to. The shrug was her answer. It’s not the answer Cynthia
wanted, but it’s the one she’s getting.
I know someone who never answers basic questions in a straightforward way. I
know someone who likes to take up a lot of space. I remember a leaned-back smug
sprawl in the dark backseat of a car.
“Ethan? You okay?” Jamil leans into my peripheral vision and keeps leaning,
like that might change what I’m doing or redirect my attention.
Marcia doesn’t seem to mind that I’m staring at her with a big, dumb grin.
She’s frowning across the table at me looking kind of annoyed, maybe amused.
The expression’s all wrong in a thin, freckled face, but I know that look. I
guess the dead girl gets her gold star back after all. Good for her.
***** Chapter 29 *****
“Alright, so. There’s the easy way or the hard way.” Cain tosses a balled-up
sock up into the air. The rolled together knot of cotton arcs toward the
ceiling and descends. It tumbles as a blue dot to follow, but instead Cain eyes
the hall.
“I talk us out of here.” Cain snatches the falling sock without pulling his
gaze from the door. “Or you talk your own way out, I’ll follow. I can try for
the assist, but I’m not sure what good this bitch’s word is going to be about
shit inside your head.”
We’re sitting in room thirty-seven, the dead girl’s room, and Cain’s using her
body to talk to me. I’m almost tempted to stand in the hallway pointing. Look,
the dead girl’s talking to me. A demon’s inside her. I’m a necromancer, this is
my demon, I’m not making this up. Do you want to come meet the wizard I know?
You’ll probably get stabbed by his demon hunter boyfriend, but that’s only if
my demon doesn’t kill you first.
I think Cain asked me a question. “What?”
Cain’s laugh sounds oddly high-pitched and giggly. I’m having a hard time
hearing him, understanding him, focusing on what he’s trying to tell me. I’ll
do whatever necessary to get out of this place, to make this stop, but I have
no idea how.
A soft ball of cotton hits the side of my face. I look down at the wadded sock
in my lap. I wonder if I was supposed to catch it.
“Easy way it is,” Cain says.
I lift my head. Cain’s scowl is all wrong, too, in the dead girl’s face. He’s
sitting on the floor against the dresser, Marcia’s body arranged in a modest
stretch. She looks good, for a dead girl. It must’ve been a clean enough death.
I’m glad, that’s nice, I hope she didn’t suffer. Her life hurt enough that she
wanted out, I understand that. Maybe I’ll ask Cain about helping her.
Cain watches me with a level frown, a persistent worried line creasing Marcia’s
thin brows. In the lull of the afternoon, between lunch and dinner, with
Cynthia and Jamil both in session, it’s the stolen hour he’s found to get me as
alone as I can be in a place like this. The door stays open, someone checks on
me like clockwork, my complicated world wants to keep me here, but Cain’s
getting me out. He’s not ignoring me, he’s not waiting for a different
necromancer, he’s here to help.
I feel like skipping, shrieking, I want to run along the halls and jump up and
down screaming to anyone who can hear that I’m not crazy, I didn’t make this
all up, Cain’s real. He’s not a collection of thoughts and feelings inside my
head, he’s not a delusion. He’s right here, he found me, my demon found me, and
he’s going to help me escape.
Cain looks at the open door and then lifts an appraising, calculated look
across the ceiling. “Think there’s cameras?”
I tilt my head back to look up at the ceiling as well. Shaking my head is
awkward thanks to the angle.
“Yeah? Good,” says Cain. The bouncing soprano of his voice is disorienting,
same as the shape of his smirk within Marcia’s bland features. Cain hoists to
his feet and motions me up as well. I stand, and Cain only comes to my shoulder
in the dead girl’s body.
“Can’t close the door, body check every fifteen minutes -- Alright. Fuck. Guess
the easy way’s a bit harder than I thought.” Cain grins with cocky self-
assurance, although the squiggly line between his brows stays in place. I hope
he’s not hurt.
“This might get messy. Might not even work, actually, so don’t say I didn’t
warn you.” Cain glances at the open door. “Not too late to tell me to fuck off.
You sure about this, Abel?”
I’m nodding, but Cain frowns as he watches the agreeable up and down bob. I
should say something, ask him to explain or tell him the truth, which is I
don’t care anymore. Whatever he has to do, that’s fine. I’m sorry for it, I
really am, I don’t want to hurt anyone, but if Cain needs to kill people to get
me out of this place -- I’m okay with that. I’m okay with doing whatever it
takes to get my life back. All those times I thought I’d rather be crazy than a
necromancer, I was wrong. Deeply, irrefutably wrong.
Trying to convey all that to Cain seems impossible. I don’t know what words to
use, how they sound or what shapes my mouth needs to make them. Everything I
want to tell Cain stretches in all directions like a vast, endless sea, yet no
matter how much I scoop it simply leaks and dribbles, refusing to be caught.
“Please,” is what I say. “Cain, please.”
The dead girl’s eyes widen to show white all around the warm, brown irises.
It’s hard to tell she’s dead, looking at her up close like this. It’s nearly
impossible to tell she’s Cain, given the soft, tender arrangement of her
expression. “Alright, kid. Alright. Let’s get you out of here.”
Cain looks sideways to the hall. One of the staff meanders past at a
distressingly slow pace. I’m sure I’ll be asked about this later in therapy. I
probably shouldn’t be seen talking to the dead girl.
“Don’t let go,” Cain says. “You got that? Don’t let go. Claw my arm off if you
fucking have to, just don’t let go. I want this easy.”
The dead girl’s left hand slips into mine -- delicate, thin, with dainty white
crescent nails and a soft, smooth palm, but Cain’s strength accompanies the
tight, squeezed grip. Less reassuring is the sudden cold sweep, the plunging
chaos of sound and sensation unraveling. Bright and dark overlap with jarring
urgency. I think I know what’s happening though, as my thoughts and feelings
become everything and physical reality melts into nothing.
Clarity strikes with faster and faster frequency in reverse echo of the strobe
light flashes. Icy tendrils give shape to the strange, uncomfortable outline of
my own body. A disturbing lack of concern collapses into sharpened
understanding. I should be panicked, to realize I’m hand-in-hand with a
shadowed outline in a shadowed world. I should be alarmed to recognize the
Otherside surrounding me, but I’m not. I’m relieved.
The lightswitch-flip of my bright, living world to the dark, sterile nothing of
the Otherside matches another flip, a better one, a desperately desired one.
Drugged, foggy stupor vanishes. The abruptness hits like a physical slap, a
non-literal smack between the eyes to clear weeks of murky, muddled thinking.  
Outlined shadow stands in front of me. I turn my head and recognize very little
else, even given the obscuring darkness. The gently-undulating wisps of smoky
seem wispier than usual. I’m not sure what that means.
“Cain?” I whisper.
From the shadow in front of me comes a gravel-voiced, “Hey, sweetheart.”
Alarm jolts through me for how exhausted he sounds. Flat, worn, threadbare in
ways that hurt to hear. Following close is the realization I can actually hear
him now, I can hear Cain’s rough-tongued bite instead of the dead girl’s perky
sweetness.
“Cain, what do you need me to do? Besides not letting go, I mean, can I help?”
A pause follows, silence and then the slow rumble of Cain chuckling. He murmurs
softly, “Good to know you’re here after all, princess.”
The light, flippant effort does little to mask Cain’s relief, his worry. It’s
hard not to throw myself over the petite shadow he’s occupying at the end of
our joined hands. It’s hard to stay calm, now that I’m not drugged into
stupidity, but I’m trying. I know I can’t panic, I remember when Cain and I did
this before, when I obliterated that motorcyclist. Clawing his arm off might
literally happen if I’m not careful.
“Fifteen minutes until someone notices you’re missing.” Cain’s quiet tone
underscores the chilling urgency. “Let’s make them count.”
The small, girlish outline of shadow steps toward the door. I follow
cautiously, unsure of my body. The insubstantial darkness around me lacks
definition. It’s as murky and muddled as my thoughts were, leaving me uncertain
where I am despite knowing where I must be. I must be walking with Cain along
the hall, but it barely feels as if I’m moving at all. It barely feels as if
I’m anything besides thoughts and feelings.
Cain tugs on my hand. “Keep moving,” he whispers.
I nearly blurt out how? before thinking better of it. Something tells me it’d
be dangerous to start questioning what I’m doing. I should focus on doing it,
instead, and not worry about the how of something impossible.
Droning cadence forms a dull awareness of other voices speaking. I keep focused
on Cain’s hand, his firm grip, the bone-crushing intensity that reassures me of
physical reality. Warbling nonsense gains a sharp increase in volume and
proximity.  
Cain stops walking. The shadowed outline trembles and shudders like a videotape
turned fuzzy, a shock of jarring lines distorting the basic shape. A stinging
discomfort that verges on agony radiates from the tight clasp of our hands for
a moment before fading.
“I’m being released today,” Cain declares.
The nonsensical reply carries a bewildered note of doubt.  
“Yup. Today. Right now, I’m being released. You can look it up.” Cain’s
pleasant, agreeable tone drips with sarcasm, and I wonder how it sounds coming
from the dead girl. He continues in the same mockingly unhelpful way, “First
name is shut up and let me go, spelled f-u-c-k y-o-u. Last name is hurry the
fuck up, spelled g-o t-o h-e-l-l. Got it? Need me to repeat it?”
Despite the rude horror of what Cain’s said and how, he gets a polite, friendly
response from the speaking stranger.
“Yup. Got my suitcase,” Cain says. “I’m ready to go. Car’s waiting on me.
Through these doors? So kind of you.”
Cain’s efforts at talking his way out would be amusing, if not for the gritted-
teeth snarl bleeding into the words. The longer this goes, the worse he sounds.
I hold my tongue and focus only on keeping near Cain as he shuffles around. I
can tell he’s trying not to move too much, trying as well to keep his left hand
near walls and corners. I’m not sure what might happen if I overlap with one of
the shadows that isn’t Cain. Certainly nothing good, nothing I want to have
happen.
When Cain starts walking quicker, I try to keep pace. It’s hard, on us both I
think, because Cain’s breath picks up a ragged edge. I’m pulling context from
nothing and maybe the vague memory of arriving here, a long hallway, closed
doors to either side. From the opposite perspective, it seemed a worse walk
than descending into the hellish depths of the lake to find Cain.
Excitement shoots through me as I realize how close we are to the outside. It’s
not much further, I think. Past the hallway there’s a reception area, maybe a
vestibule, I’m not sure I actually remember what it looks like. I was drugged
for that part of things.
Cain’s hold provides a continuous, painful reminder of my body. It throbs
outward from my palm, the blistering agony almost reassuring. Less reassuring
is Cain’s harsh, tormented panting.
“Fuck,” he gasps. The shadow of the dead girl’s head turns frantically. Cain
starts walking at what’s barely under a run. “Fucking -- people, everywhere!”
He staggers to an abrupt halt and then darts sideways. The jerking motion pulls
at the joined grip of our hands. His fingers tighten around mine. I hear Cain
grunt, but the interlaced knot stays strong. I try desperately to remember
what’s around the hospital, where Cain must be, but I’m coming up blank. I have
no idea where we are. I’m sure it won’t help Cain if I point that out.
Cain stumbles to a stop. He hunches over, staticky and wavering in a way that’s
terrifying. I don’t want to know what happens if Cain lets go or disappears on
me.
He growls something that might be a name,  an endearment, or profanity. It’s a
warning and question in one either way.
“Ready,” I tell him.
Here to there transition abrupt like blinking brings me back to reality.
Sunshine, warm pavement, the unpleasant aroma of grime and trash. The nook
behind a dumpster provides temporary shelter for us, a small sliver of shadow
that Cain’s found tucked aside from the bustle of city streets.
More disorienting than the abrupt return to my living, breathing world is the
necessity of becoming a living, breathing thing once more. I struggle to find
and set a smooth rhythm for my lungs.
Cain's hand slips from mine. He drops to the ground and braces an elbow into
the pavement. Hoarse, hacking coughs shake the dead girl’s slight frame, and
it’s her pitched groaning I hear instead of Cain’s deep rumbling. The tormented
from Cain shatters into something wretched and wet. I look down. He’s coughing
blood. That can’t be good, nothing can be good about the splatter of crimson
ruin. The dead girl’s thin nails dig into the filthy alley pavement as Cain
gasps and chokes. I hope he’s okay, even though I’m sure he’s not. I’m sure
he’s hurt, it’s pretty obvious he’s hurt.
The sluggish, numb trickle of my thoughts should be more alarming. I’m with it
enough to register a lot of deep concern without actually feeling worried or
scared. I feel fine. It’s awful for Cain that he’s suffering like this, but my
spaced out, drugged stupor forms an inescapable cage of apathy.
I look along the alley. One side dumps into the street while the other end
stretches toward a parking lot. A spin of sirens nearby stirs nebulous concepts
of further concern. I wonder if I’ve been noticed missing yet. Probably,
they’re probably searching the hospital for me right now with low-key urgency.
They’ll look in the library, the day rooms, creative therapy, they’ll check my
room and maybe Jamil’s room, maybe Cynthia’s room. It won’t take long to figure
out I’m not in any of them.
Cain sucks in a ragged breath and shudders it out, more or less smooth. He
pushes upright and wavers into a heavy lean against the wall. He’s shivering
head-to-toe despite the strong, sunny warmth.
I spent long enough thinking about it that the question comes easy. “Are you
okay?”
“Peachy keen, sweetheart.” Cain’s sharp grin lacks edge in the dead girl’s
freckled face. He spits a frothy mouthful of scarlet saliva. Flecks of blood
over his chin disappear into the hard scrub of his hand. He is clearly not
okay.
I should have realized what a dumb question it was. I’m not sure why I asked. I
try for something else, something more helpful. I can’t think of anything
though. I don’t have a car to direct Cain to, no wallet on me, not even my cell
phone. Just me, my body, the trashy lounge clothes I’m wearing.  Cain’s in yoga
pants and a long-sleeved shirt, he’s in the dead girl’s body. I wonder if there
was anything else we should have brought with us. I wish I’d thought to change
clothes. I don’t like these sweatpants.
“Sorry,” is what I say. Which is less helpful than if I said nothing. I’m aware
of that. I’m aware of how exceedingly useless I am to Cain right now. I’m oddly
fine with it, even though I know it’s probably not okay.
Cain’s reply is a shrug, quick and uncomfortable. The gesture’s accompanied by
a snapping sound. His shoulder rolling back into socket, I think. I didn’t mean
to pull his arm hard enough to dislocate his shoulder, but I must have.
Cain looks along the alley with a plucked-together, worried frown. I think it’s
meant to be his scowl. The dead girl looks more dead now, her face thin and
pinched, the skin beneath her freckles a waxy-white pallor.
His shoulders roll, his neck pops, Cain shakes himself together and sighs.
“Alright. Let’s go.” He staggers sideways like a drunk before managing a
straight line.
I follow him with the assumption he knows where he’s going, even though I
suspect he doesn’t. He pauses at the alley entrance to take in the stretch of
street in either direction. Obviously he’s lost.
My mom has to drive three hours to visit, we’re nowhere near my home or
anything I recognize. I went to the art museum here once on a school field
trip. I want to say the museum’s somewhere downtown. I’m not sure that’ll be
useful to Cain. He probably isn’t interested in looking at post-Impressionist
masterpieces, even if the collection here is supposedly one of the best.
Cain checks over his shoulder several times, either to keep an eye on me or to
look for anyone pursuing us. Someone’s going to notice me missing, but I guess
it’ll take them a while to acknowledge I’m not anywhere inside the hospital.
It’s a very secure building, a lot of locked doors and key cards needed, a lot
of people supervising the exits. It’s not possible to walk out in the middle of
the day. Sneak out at night, maybe, but simply walking out the front door in
broad daylight? Not possible. It’ll take them a while to realize I’ve done the
impossible. I wonder if anyone will be surprised. They shouldn’t be. I’ve made
a life for myself out of doing the impossible.
“Jackpot,” Cain says. He grins over his shoulder at me, but I have no idea what
he’s spotted that will help us. I don’t see any tarp-covered retro sports cars,
no massive black SUVs, not even a rumbling old sedan. It’s just hospital
complex stuff, pharmacies, business towers, residences, just a crammed
accumulation of a strange city street.
Cain leads me to a set of revolving doors and makes sure we’re not separated
for even the short sweep into the lobby. I’m not sure what he thinks might
happen. Maybe I’m just so out of it that he’s worried I might wander off in the
wrong direction.
The awkward shuffling spits us out into a hotel, that’s what Cain’s found.
There’s a tasteful armchair arrangement and complimentary coffee bar. I can see
the glass-encased business center. Pleasant music plays. It’s a nice hotel that
Cain’s found.
He walks to the front desk. I start to drift after him, but Cain glances back
 As the front desk clerk approaches, Cain’s eyes flick to the coffee bar. His
head nods that way as well, rather insistent. I have no idea what he wants with
coffee, but I guess I can get him some.
Cain watches me leave before turning his attention to the front desk clerk. A
brittle, cheerless smile spreads across his face. I can’t quite hear what he
says, but I’m sure it’s rude and demanding despite the pleasant, drifting
tones. The dead girl’s voice shaping Cain’s words is too strange, so I’m glad
to be over here messing around with a paper coffee cup.
I have no idea how Cain likes his coffee. Sugar and cream? Just sugar? Just
cream? Straight black? As I pick up an artificial sweetener packet and flip it
around in my fingers, I realize Cain probably doesn’t want coffee. He just
wants me out of the way. He’s walking around in a dead girl’s body, but I’m the
weird-looking one. I probably look exactly like what I am, an escapee from a
juvenile psychiatric ward, whereas Cain barely looks dead. No one’s going to
look at Cain and assume he’s a demon possessing a corpse. That would be crazy.
When Cain comes over to collect me, I’ve got the useless coffee no one wants
and he’s got a hotel key. He waggles it at me with a grin. “Guess what,
sweetheart? Indoor pool. Won’t that be nice?”
I can’t believe Cain’s suggesting we go for a swim. I don’t have a swimsuit,
I’m sure he doesn’t, I don’t even want to go swimming. I barely want to be
holding this coffee cup, but I carry it into the elevator with Cain all the
same. Maybe I should drink the coffee, maybe it’ll help me feel more alert. I
doubt it. I doubt antipsychotic tranquilizers can be negated with a few sips of
French roast.
“Figure we’ll go tonight,” Cain says. He pokes the elevator button for the
fifth floor.
For a lack of better response, I hold out the coffee cup. Just in case.
Cain glances over with a strange expression, like he’s unsure of what I’m
offering him. Surely paper coffee cups were invented before Deimos killed Cain
in the seventies. I push the sliding cover on the lid, like maybe that’s the
part that confuses him, but Cain doesn’t make an effort to take the cup from
me. I guess he doesn’t want coffee. I suspected as much.
The elevator opens. We step out into the landing. Cain checks the room number
written on the keycard sleeve and then leads the way to our room. I’m curious
how he managed to talk his way into this. Probably the same way he talked his
way out of the hospital. At least no one’s died yet, except Marcia, but her
death wasn’t my fault.
Cain frowns as he examines the door handle. He stares at the keycard and then
checks around to make sure I’m the only one watching him get outwitted by
technology.
I realize I should help him at the same time Cain figures it out. He taps the
card around at the handle enough trying to find a slot that he inadvertently
sets off the sensor. The indicator the light switches from red to green with an
accompanying metallic click.
He shoves the door open and motions me through. He closes the door once I’m
inside, which is a little concerning, it’s a lot concerning, except I hear him
unlock the door almost immediately. He pushes the door open, closes it, waits
for the lock to reset, and then unlocks it once more. Cain’s playing with the
lock now that he’s figured it out.
“Well, that’s bullshit,” Cain says. He comes into the room finally, closes the
door with both of us in the room.
There’s two beds, a desk, an armchair, the television above the cabinet likely
containing the mini fridge, and a window above the air unit. It’s all very
nice, almost luxurious, clean and cozy, colorful, warm, it’s a vast improvement
in every way from the hospital. The beds are covered in fluffy white comforters
with a narrow strip of decorative bedspread across the foot. I sit on the
closest one.  
Cain goes to the window first and draws the curtains closed. He tosses the room
key on the desk. Something about the situation tickles the back of my mind, the
clear-thinking parts buried under all the drugs. Something about me and Cain
and a hotel bed.
I stare at Cain. Am I going to have to explain that the dead girl’s not my
type? I’m not sure which bothers me more, that Cain’s body is female or that
it’s a corpse.
Cain regards me with a steady frown and crossed arms. “If I fuck off for a bit,
are you going to do something stupid?”
I shake my head. I can’t think of what possibly stupid thing I could do in the
hotel room by myself. I don’t plan on leaving. I’m fine waiting here. I don’t
want to get caught, I understand the risks.
“Good,” he says. Cain looks to the other bed and then turns his head to look at
the entry.
I watch as Cain explores the room. He finds the mini-fridge and microwave in
the television cabinet. He checks the door and slides the chain into place.
Next he pokes into the bathroom and toggles the light switches. I hear him run
the sink and turn on the hair dryer. He walks back out and pulls open the
closet door.
“Fantastic,” he announces. I’m not sure what about an empty dry-cleaning bag
and some wooden hangers he thinks is so great. Maybe demons like small,
enclosed dark spaces. I’m not sure why else Cain would go inside the closet.
That seems a strange place for him. Even stranger is hearing him call, “Holler
if you need me.”
I sit there for a minute or two, but nothing happens. Cain’s inside the closet,
or maybe it’s like Narnia in there now. I’m not sure which is more disturbing,
the idea that Cain’s walked through the closet to somewhere else or that Cain’s
just standing inside the closet for unknown reasons. I’m both confused that
Cain hasn’t explained this and completely understanding of the fact he hasn’t.
I might not understand the explanation if he tries. I might forget it in a few
hours.
Eventually I get to my feet. I walk over to the closet and listen at the door
for a bit. Cain’s quiet, if he’s in there. The idea that he might not be is
terrifying. Maybe if I open the door that’ll be enough to convey to him I’d
prefer we stick together right now.
I open the closet door. There’s a body wedged into the corner like a hastily-
hid murder victim. Pasty-pale skin, a glassy stare in a stiff expression,
withered cheeks and hollow sockets, slacked-open jaw. The dead girl looks
incredibly dead without Cain inside her. He left the body wadded on the closet
floor like a cheap suit.
A scream chokes in my throat. I stagger back from the grim discovery and slap
at the closet door enough times it swings closed.
Not looking at the dead girl is immensely calming. The fact that I’m drugged is
calming. That I’m sharing the room with a corpse, a dead thing’s body that Cain
stole -- not so calming. I decide to sit in the armchair. It puts me in the
corner furthest from the closet.
I turn on the television. Everytime I look away from the closet, I think I see
movement from the corner of my eye. I start staring at the door, rather than
the television. I’m pretty sure the dead girl’s body isn’t going to crawl off
without Cain, but I’ll keep an eye on it until he returns. Just in case.
***** Chapter 30 *****
When a thumping noise comes from inside the closet, I’m ready. I’m not entirely
sure what I’ll do to stop the dead girl, but I’m ready to try. Screaming
probably won’t work, probably a good idea not to scream when the closet door
cracks open and the dead girl’s body flops to the floor.
“Motherfucker,” the body groans.
Definitely Cain, even in such a trembling, whiny high-pitched voice. He pushes
from the floor with thin, shaking arms. Even from the corner I can hear his
ragged breaths. Cain claws at the door knob to gain his feet. I’m already on my
feet, upright and staring rather than staring while sitting.
Cain glances over and yelps sharply, a bitten-off shriek of surprise. I guess
he wasn’t expecting to find me watching him so attentively.
“Goddamn, Abel. You, uh…” Cain gestures, but I’m not sure what he means. He
follows it up with a forced-casual, “Hey.”
He rolls his neck, twists at the waist, Cain shifts and stirs like adjusting an
ill-fitted suit. I suppose given how he ditched the corpse and then returned to
it, that’s accurate. Even with Cain back inside her, the dead girl looks dead.
Maybe it’s because I saw her empty and exceptionally corpse-like, but I can’t
look at Cain and see anything other than a dead thing. A waxy-skinned, hollow-
eyed, sunken-cheeked dead thing walking toward me.
Cain hesitates halfway to me, in the passage of space between the foot of the
bed and the television cabinet. I’m cowering behind the armchair, wide-eyed and
tensed to run away except there’s nowhere to go. I don’t really want to run
from Cain. I know Cain’s inside the dead girl. I should probably convey that to
Cain, rather than shove myself into the corner like I might disappear through
the wall if I try hard enough.
“Okay,” Cain drawls warily. He doesn’t try to get closer. Nothing’s different
since he was here last except for the television playing, but he checks anyway.
Cain drags his gaze over the screen briefly before glancing at the locked and
chained door. He’s looking for what else in the room could terrify me besides
him.
I should explain I know it’s him. Cain looks so unsure of this situation that I
hate it, I hate everything about Cain standing there looking lost. I’m sure he
hates just as much the way I look, how I’m head-to-toe shaking at the idea of
the dead girl getting any closer to me.
“H-hi.” I sound ridiculous, squeaky with fear and trembling. What I’m
stammering is equally ridiculous. “Hi, Cain.”
A relieved grin cracks the dead girl’s glazed expression. “Hey, sweetheart.
Ready to go swimming?”
I can’t believe Cain was serious about that. I shake my head. I don’t have a
swimsuit. I don’t want to go swimming. An indoor pool does sound nice, but I
don’t want to leave the room. I want Cain to go away again and come back in his
own body, that punk rock idol body of his that I pulled from a lake. Surely he
can find it for me, bring it here. I don’t want Cain inside a corpse anymore.
“Yeah?” Cain tips his head to the side. “Sure you do. Indoor pool, heated and
everything.”
I shake my head. I don’t care if it’s a heated pool, I don’t want to go
swimming. I don’t even have a swimsuit. I’m not skinny dipping with a corpse
either, no thank you, that does not sound fun.
A hint of annoyance pulls the corner of Cain’s mouth. “Sweetheart,” he growls.
He stops himself, grits a terse smile at me instead. He forces brittle-soprano
niceness past a clenched jaw. “I wrecked this body getting you out, it’s not
lasting me much longer. I need another one. Got it?”
Slowly I nod. I understand Cain needs a body to use. What I don’t understand is
what swimming has to do with getting Cain a new body. Are we going to drown
someone at the pool? I’m not sure I’m really prepared to assist Cain in a
homicide. It seems excessive.
Cain matches my slow nod. “Okay,” he says. “We agree I’m getting a new body.
Great. And, I’m guessing, Princess Abel doesn’t want me hitting up the bar to
hunt fresh meat. Not that you’d stop me. Much fun as that idea is, I’m not
listening to you bitch about it later.”
I’m not sure I like the patronizing tone, but I understand why he’s upset with
me. I actually don’t think he sounds that angry. Desperate maybe. I wonder if
he’s hurt, if he’s going to start coughing blood. I look at the carpet. The
dead girl’s wearing plush house slippers, not even real shoes.
“For fuck’s sake,” Cain gripes. “Easy way or hard way, Abel, and I guarantee
you’re not going to like the easy way this time. No matter what we’re getting
me a new body right the fuck now. Got it?”
Okay, now he’s just being rude. It’s not my fault I’m useless right now. I did
my best, I tried, but I’m only seventeen years old. I’m a minor for another two
months. In my world, that means my parents have every right to lock me up
somewhere against my will. I know I’m a necromancer, but I can’t kill people. I
don’t even like horror movies. I couldn’t kill a cat, despite having the
neighbor’s cat and my mom’s kitchen knife and no one around for hours. I’m
squeamish trying to kill spiders, I usually just let them go outside. There are
no such things as necromancers or demons, from any perspective besides mine. In
my world, I’m crazy, no matter how many dead things try telling me otherwise.
“Ethan.”
Cain snaps his fingers, even as the dead girl’s stringy sweetness pleads. My
gaze skips from house slippered feet to a narrow freckled face that’s all
wrong. Busted capillaries form a gruesome crimson pool in one of the corpse’s
milky brown eyes. Cain points at the door without taking his gaze off me.
“Summoning time, sweetheart. Please tell me you know what the fuck that means.”
I’m not sure I do, but I nod anyway. When Cain takes a step toward the door, I
take a matched step from the corner. He retreats as far as the door itself
without turning to watch where he’s going. That’s fairly impressive to me,
because I have to look at the armchair and bed both to avoid tripping over
them.
“Okay,” Cain says. He slides the chain from the lock. “Get towels.”
Even without his head nodding at the bathroom I know where to go. He doesn’t
need to be that patronizing, I’m aware of how a hotel room functions. I
understand the concept of swimming, I know what we’re doing, I’m just murky on
the specifics of why. Cain should understand that, he thought the plastic card
went into a slot to open the door, like a key, only he didn’t realize it worked
on a sensor. I bet he still doesn’t fully understand how it works. It must seem
a bit like magic to him.
I’m holding an armful of towels when Cain calls, “Sweetheart, you look fine.
Let’s go.”
I’m not looking in the mirror, no way, I know I look completely crazy in these
stupid elastic-waist sweatpants and zoned out blank nothing on my face.
Soon as I’m back in the entry, Cain pulls the door open. I shuffle sideways to
avoid touching any part of the dead girl, Cain possessing her or not. I can
barely look at this walking, talking, animated corpse. The cat at least did
look kind of cute, for a dead thing. The dark fur hid all the wrong, broken
ruin much better than the dead girl’s devastated wreck of bloodshot eyes and
chalky complexion. Marcia would serve as a great anti-drug poster child right
now. We both would, I guess.
In the elevator, Cain stands by the panel. I stand in the corner. I’m not sure
if the silence is awkward for me, but it might be for Cain. The sideways cut of
his gaze stays sharply focused on me. Obviously the air’s not really as thick
as the bundle of towels I’m holding, it just seems that way. I look anywhere
that’s not at the dead thing.
Cain checks the quiet hotel lobby from the elevator landing. I stay in one
place for him, so he doesn’t have to take his eyes off me long. I should
probably let him know that I won’t run, that I’m okay going for a swim. I’ll
cooperate with Cain. I’ll help him.
I have no idea what time it is, how long I spent waiting for Cain in the room.
The time might have been on the television at some point, but I wasn’t looking.
I’m looking now for a clock and don’t see one, but it’s dark outside and a
late, lonely kind of quiet throughout the hotel. Brass placards on the wall
tell Cain where to go, he just has to read and follow the arrows to navigate
without me.
Through the glass door, I can see the kidney-bean shaped pool. There’s a hot
tub, too, which seems nice until I remember I don’t have a swimsuit and Cain’s
wearing a corpse like a suit. We’re alone at least. A posted sign warns us
about the lack of a lifeguard on duty.
As I stand hugging the towels, Cain circles the pool area. The rippling
turquoise waters seem bright and welcoming, but there’s something dark and
foreboding about what we’re doing. Cain looks so serious, he’s concentrating
intently on checking every hatch, panel, and door for whatever reason. I’m not
sure what he’s looking for, but I might have an idea. I think he’s making sure
we’re alone. He doesn’t want any witnesses for what we’re about to do.
That thought’s confirmed by the sudden plunge of darkness. Cain’s found the
breaker. The red glow of the exit sign and scant pour of hall light from the
glass door cast the water into nightmarish gleaming. Cain returns to where I’m
standing but stays well out of arm’s reach. Considering how I turn shivery and
terrified when the walking corpse gets near me, that’s nice of him.
“Drop to your skivvies, Abel.”
I am not taking off my clothes, that is ridiculous. I glance at the swimming
pool.
“Abel, sweetheart, clothes off,” Cain says. A note of warning carries in the
saccharin tone. When I still don’t listen, when I just stare at the pool, Cain
snaps his fingers and voice alike. “Clothes, now.”
I guess I don’t want my clothes wet, if I have to get in the water, and I’m
pretty sure I don’t have a choice about that. I guess going for a swim in my
underwear will be okay, boxer shorts are kinda similar to swim trunks. I put
the towels down on one of plastic lounge chairs. I slip the t-shirt over my
head, nudge out of my shoes, create a neat and tidy pile of shapeless, bland
grey clothing.
Cain leads me to the ladder. Under his supervision I descend into the warm,
pleasant water. The heavy smell of chlorine hangs in the air. “Okay,” he says,
once I’m in the pool. He walks along the edge to the deep end and motions me to
follow. I feel a bit like a trained dolphin swimming to where he points me.
Once I’m in place and treading water, he nods. “Okay,” he says again. “Start
summoning. I’m ready.”
The corpse stands there staring at me. I lazily stroke my arms through the
water and stare somewhere just to the left of the dead girl’s face. “What?”
“Oh, goddammit.” Cain’s mouth flattens, he crosses his arms. “Abel, you stupid
motherfucker. Do you know what the fuck’s happening?”
It’s probably frustrating for him that my head shakes. I’m with it enough to
know how out of it I am, but that’s not helping me with anything. I’m in the
swimming pool like he wanted, but I’m not sure why. I wish I did. Maybe Cain
should try explaining it to me. I’ll do my best to listen and understand him.
Instead Cain takes off his shirt. He slips out of the yoga pants. The dead girl
strips to her bra and underwear, her clothes and slippers go beside mine and
the towels. Cain’s coming into the pool after me, why is he doing that? I drift
backward through the water, slow at first, and then with urgency.
“Abel,” he groans. “Get over here. I’m not chasing you all over the fucking
pool, you dumbass piece of shit. D’you know how much easier it’d be for me just
to kill some loser, rather than jump through fucking hoops like this? Immensely
fucking easier. I should have let your ass rot in kiddie mind prison, to hell
with your whispery little bullshit.”
The rant leaves him breathless and shaking, chest heaving like he might
collapse. The tight clench of his jaw makes every forced word sound pained.
He’s probably hurt, I bet it hurts him to make the corpse move around and talk.
Cain’s tone turns wheeling, desperate. He’s braced on the bottom rung of the
ladder, halfway into the pool. “This will take five goddamn minutes if you
cooperate, princess. I’ll take you back to the room and leave you alone the
whole rest of the night, if you just fucking cooperate for the next few
minutes. Okay?”
Yeah, I guess that’s okay. I guess I can close my eyes and pretend Cain’s not a
corpse long enough for whatever he needs. I paddle through the water to get
closer but stay just out of reach.
Cain keeps a tight-knuckle grip on the ladder with one hand. He gestures with
the other. “Come here, sweetheart. Little closer.”
I kick closer and close my eyes, rather than watch the half-submerged corpse. A
cold, thin hand encloses my arm, once I’m in range. Cain slips the rest of the
way into the water. I let him pull me away from the ladder. It’s much easier
with my eyes closed. I should have thought to do that earlier. The feel of
Cain’s hand is all wrong, his voice is all wrong, but it’s so much nicer not
having to look at the dead girl for this.
“Okay,” says Cain. “I’m going to hold you under the water, and you’re going to
stay there until I pull you out. Sound good?”
No. No, it does not. That is a horrible plan, and I’m already shaking my head
and trying to pull away when Cain shoves me under. I flail, kick and thrash, it
shouldn’t be possible for this suicidal anorexic dead girl to hold me under the
water, but Cain’s strong. He’s impossibly strong.
Cain yanks me out almost immediately. The iron band of his grip is firm yet
thin, skeletal, and I won’t open my eyes to see the reality of a dead thing
trying to kill me.
“Abel. Abel, goddammit.”
He’s snapping at me even as I’m still choking on pool water. Sharp and
repulsive chlorine taste clings to my tongue. My eyes are stinging from the
brief flicker of dark, wet terror.
“This won’t work if you fight me,” Cain says. He’s breathing hard like it’s a
struggle, we both might drown in this pool. “Calm the fuck down, sweetheart.
Didn’t I just say I’d pull you out? You’re fine.”
Nothing about this is fine. Cain’s trying to kill me.
“Five minutes, max. Close your eyes, relax, think nice thoughts of putting that
fluffy bed upstairs to use. I’m not going to let you drown, Abel. Trust me.”
I cautiously open my eyes, but there’s nothing nice about a corpse swimming, no
matter how gently the dead girl’s voice pleads with me. I flinch my eyes shut
with a quick nod.
This time I don’t resist when Cain guides me under the water. I’m not sure I
can hold my breath for five minutes, but I’ll try. Five minutes seems
excessive, I’m not sure I can even hold my breath for more than a minute. Maybe
forty seconds at best. I should keep count, how long has it been?
I squirm against Cain’s hold as the first bubbles escape. Five minutes is much
too long to wait, I’m not even sure how many seconds that is off the top of my
head. If I wasn’t drugged, maybe I’d know it, same as I’d know how me drowning
is going summon Cain a new body.
My lungs burn and strain for air. I twist and whine a stream of bubbles. I try
to ignore the uncomfortable drive of panic. Cain said he wouldn’t let me drown.
He sounded like he meant it. I suppose Cain doesn’t want me dead -- I’d be dead
already several times over if that was all he wanted from me. He never would
have saved my life in the first place, after Aidan hit me with his car.
Desperation claws at my throat with the need for air. My eyes flash open, but
the dark sting of water forces them shut again. Three hundred seconds, that’s
how long five minutes is. I definitely can’t hold my breath for three hundred
seconds, I can’t even hold it for however long it’s been already. I'm gulping
and choking on pool water like that's the solution to the bursting crush of
suffocation. I really hope Cain wasn’t lying to me. Cain said he’d pull me out
of the pool, that he wouldn’t let me drown. I trust Cain meant that. I trust
Cain knows what he's doing. I just wish I did. 
***** Chapter 31 *****
I’ve never been drunk, but this is what I imagine a hangover would feel like.
I’m only the awareness of my battered body and a bed, how much I don’t want to
wake up feeling this horribly sick. My stomach’s churning like I might vomit,
and I really hope I don’t, because I can’t remember why I’m waking up feeling
sick. I’m not even sure I know whose bed this is. I hope it’s mine, if I’m
going to puke all over it.
Any number of terrible reasons to feel sick, and I’m thinking of them all as I
try to think of what the last thing is I remember. I come up with mostly murky
memories of the hospital, so maybe this is food poisoning, except for the sharp
sting in my eyes, throbbing ache in my head. A repulsive bleach taste on the
back of my tongue is what reminds me of the swimming pool -- of the summoning.
Of Cain.
I push upright, realize quickly Cain is nowhere in sight. The muffled rush of
the shower tells me where he must be, if I vaguely remember him carrying me
down a long hallway last night. I desperately want to say I can trust a memory
of being carried by Cain.
Speaking is a dry torture. “Cain?” It's mouthing it only, no sound at all.
I try to swallow together moisture. I’ll take a hangover for the drugs wearing
off enough that I’m keeping actual thoughts together. I’m desperate to remember
anything else that I can about last night, everything that’s happened since
Cain found me. My memories are a scrambled, foggy mess, but Cain found me. He’s
here.
In my memory of being carried, I was dressed. I’m still dressed, in the very
same clothes. Shapeless grey sweatpants and an equally boxy, bland t-shirt to
match. No underwear, and I’m on top of the bed. I’m not even under the
blankets. It’s the other bed that’s rumpled, sheets tossed back and pillows
scattered.
The alarm clock on the nightstand tells me what the drawn curtains don’t, which
is that it’s a little past eight in the morning. I wonder if the hotel has free
breakfast, which is an absurd thought to have when I need to find Cain -- I
need to confirm it’s really him, and not Marcia’s dead body.
I force myself out of the bed, though it’s a slow effort with lots of long
pauses. The vertigo and nausea are probably from the shock of quitting my meds
cold turkey, or maybe it’s from all that swallowed chlorine. I vaguely remember
coughing up pool water, Cain’s rumbling laughter accompanying the slap of his
hand on my back. In comparison, my hypothermic dive at the lake seems pleasant.
This disastrous summoning has left me feeling wrecked, even without the drug
hangover.
I’m somewhat loopy, but I feel light-headed and silly like with a cold, rather
than wrung out like a dishrag, dead-brained worse than Marcia’s rotting corpse.
Horrible memories of interacting with Cain while he was possessing her rise to
the surface of my thoughts. I try to dismiss them, before the room-spinning
nausea worsens.
“Cain?” It’s a sandpaper-rough whisper, I’m sure he can’t hear me over the
shower. Assuming he’s in there. Assuming the summoning worked, but I can’t
imagine why a corpse would need to take a shower. I don’t want to imagine a
corpse taking a shower.
I keep a hand on the wall for balance as I stand in the entry, stare at the
partially-closed bathroom door. What if it’s not Cain, what if it’s the corpse?
What if all my memories are wrong, or what if this is an exceptionally vivid
dream? I’m disoriented enough for this to feel like one, or perhaps everything
that happened since leaving Cain on the Otherside was a dream, a nightmare of
heartbreak and fear.
Louder, voice cracking with the effort. “Cain!”
The water cuts off. A man’s voice calls sharply, “Abel?” It sounds like him,
snarling and harsh, demanding, definitely Cain’s voice. I hear the fast
metallic slide of the curtain hooks over the bar. The door jerks open.
Cain appears dripping wet and soapy, streaks of white foam dribbling over his
shoulders and arms. His dark hair hangs in heavy clumps, it plasters over his
forehead to nearly obscure the furious plunge of his scowl. He’s ready to hit
something, murder someone, I think I scared him with shouting. The quick dart
of his gaze takes in the closed and chained door, the empty room. The tight
fury of his expression eases when he sees we’re alone.
It’s really him. He’s here. I can’t stop staring at Cain’s body. His living,
breathing, punk rock idol body. He’s not a corpse, not a suicidal girl with
mousy brown hair, a pinched face, dark-circled eyes starting to decay. He’s
flared nostrils and a gleaming glare, lean muscles and dusky-tan skin, black
body hair with clinging water droplets.
I don’t even know what to say, what to do, it’s such a shock to see Cain. The
cuts are healed on his arms, they’re gone entirely, he’s head-to-toe
unblemished skin. He looks just as he did when I pulled him from the lake, only
magnitudes warmer. Behind him thick steam pillows the air and fogs the mirror.
Cain eyes me warily. “What?” It’s rude, patronizing, neither amused nor
annoyed. Cain seems almost concerned as he asks, “You didn’t open the closet,
did you?”
That tells me where Marcia’s body must be. My skin crawls at the idea of a
corpse in the room. I recall too vividly what she looked like, both with and
without Cain possessing her. I flick a quick look to the shut closet door
before glancing up at Cain. He’s watching me with a frown, equal parts
frustrated and worried. He thinks something’s wrong. He thinks something’s
wrong with me, specifically, something he can’t help me with since the
problem’s in my head.
Cain doesn’t realize I’m tongue-tied with nerves and not drugs. He thinks I’m
zoned out like I was yesterday, and remembering all that mushy grey not-actual
memory of being sedated is horrendously uncomfortable. It’s as uncomfortable as
the feel of these shapeless grey sweats, as not knowing what to say. I have to
say something. I can’t keep staring at Cain, I have to say something to him.
“You’re real. You’re here.”
Blurts right out of me, I can’t stop myself from saying something stupid. Cain
shouldn’t look surprised I’m saying something stupid. It was weeks and weeks of
doubting myself, being made to question my sanity by virtue of being labeled
insane, and then medicated into submission when I refused to break.
I’ve surprised Cain enough that he blurts out something obvious in return.
“You’re awake.” A hasty, jagged sneer wipes the relief from his expression.
“Yeah. Yeah, I am. I woke up feeling awful.” Each word burns my throat raw.
There’s nothing to swallow, but I try.
Cain smirks and takes a step of retreat into the bathroom. He turns on the
sink. “I bet. You swallowed half the pool, dumbass.”
Cautiously I follow Cain into the bathroom as he gets back into the shower. He
pulls the thick plastic curtain closed. I look to the running faucet and
realize it’s Cain’s way of offering me a drink. There are two plastic-wrapped
cups beside the sink to use. That both cups are still plastic-wrapped makes me
curious if Cain’s been drinking straight from the faucet. It seems like
something he might do.
I spot my underwear draped over the towel bar above the toilet. It must’ve been
soaked after swimming. I’m glad Cain didn’t make me sleep in wet underwear. I
suspect he needed to wrangle me into my clothes after dragging me unconscious
from the pool. I don’t have a memory of dressing myself, that’s for sure.
I drink the cool tap water slowly, taking small sips to let my stomach adjust.
I’m not sure how much of the summoning last night I actually remember, before
or after my near-drowning. I’m not sure how much of anything I remember of the
last six weeks. I study my own reflection in the condensation-fogged mirror. I
look like trash and know it, with red-rimmed, puffy eyes and pasty-pallor
complexion. Suppose for being half-drowned and half-drugged, I look okay.
Inside my head is a jigsaw puzzle of memory disassembled and shaken, maybe a
couple pieces lost forever, but I guess I’m okay.   
“Cain?”
Through the translucent curtain I see Cain turn some. The rough sound of his
snarl lifts like a question.
I don’t even know where to begin, which question of the stored multitude to
unleash first. I have so many clear-thinking thoughts that it’s overwhelming,
exhausting. Now that I’ve satisfied my curiosity about Cain, I just want to
crawl back into bed and sleep off the drugs. I’ll take feeling sick like this
over being tranquilized into oblivion, but it’s a miserable trade all the same.
“Is Marcia’s body in the closet?”
Not a question I really need answered, nor one I couldn’t answer myself just by
checking. I have no idea why I wasted a golden opportunity on a dumb question
like that. I expect Cain to laugh mockingly and answer with thick, scornful
sarcasm. Instead Cain hums agreeably and ducks his head under the shower spray.
I set the empty plastic cup on the counter. I find the sink much easier to
stare at than the outline of Cain’s body in the shower. “I’ll shower when
you’re done,” I announce. “Um, I’m going to lie down. I feel sick.”
“Mmhm,” Cain affirms. Half-distracted, maybe, or simply unconcerned. I’m not
sure, it’s a strange response from Cain.
This entire exchange strikes me as odd. I don’t want to admit how disappointed
I am that Cain didn’t offer to have me join him in the shower, even though the
prospect is daunting for many reasons. Perhaps I’m more relieved than
disappointed. It’s hard to say.
I’m equally unsure what to make of the two beds, that I woke fully clothed on
top the bedding, whereas Cain clearly got cozy in the other bed without me. He
just dumped me on the bed unconscious. A hard, difficult search of my memory
pulls up the faint echo of a desperate promise, Cain wanting five minutes from
me for the summoning in exchange for the rest of the night.
I suppose Cain kept his word. He took me back to the room and left me alone.
And I might’ve lost consciousness, but I didn’t drown. I’m definitely alive for
everything to hurt this much.
I find the television remote and put on a morning news program, anything to
help distract me from how awful I feel. Lying down helps with my headache a
fractional amount, closing my eyes helps stop things from spinning sideways.
The water I drank forms an uncomfortable lump in my sore stomach.
I try to focus on the positive, which is I’m not drugged anymore, and that
Cain’s with me. Either one of those facts thrills me, and having both of them
is almost too good to be true. There’s even a hot shower and bed for Cain.
That’s nice. I bet this was a nice summoning for him.
“Abel.”
Rough-callused heat cups my cheek. A soft growl demands again, “Abel. Hey.”
Did I fall asleep? I must have. I open my eyes to find Cain leaned over me,
expression tense. For a split second I’m confused about everything, including
why I’m in a hotel room. I push to my elbow and flash my gaze to the
television. It’s the same morning show, I couldn’t have been out long.
Cain pushes my bangs out of the way with the flat of his hand. His palm presses
to my forehead. He feels at my neck, presses the back of his hand into my
cheek, and then feels again at my forehead.
“You’re sick.”
The snarled words are somewhat questioning. I realize it’s an actual question,
the more intently Cain stares at me with his hand plastered to my forehead.
“Am I?” His hand withdraws, and I replace it with my own. I feel okay, my
skin’s cool and dry. “Do I have a fever?”
I take in the frustrated twist of Cain’s scowl and realize he doesn’t know, he
has no idea, he’s asking me.
“I don’t think I have a fever,” I tell him. “I think it’s just, um, a - a
hangover? From the drugs I was taking at the hospital. They’re wearing off.”
I mean this to be reassuring, but Cain’s frown deepens. I make an effort to
smile. Maybe that will reassure Cain I’m okay. The line of my smile wavers when
I realize Cain’s naked, fresh-clean from the shower, and sitting exceptionally
close to where I’m curled on the center of the bed.
I’m already feeling nervous even before Cain orders, “Give me your clothes.”
Carefully I sit all the way upright. I glance from Cain to the door, from Cain
to the tightly drawn curtains, from Cain to the other bed. My fingers play
along the hem of my t-shirt without lifting it. I’m scared to ask Cain why he
wants my clothes. Specifically why he wants them off my body, but I can guess.
I can guess why Cain wants me naked.
Well, that’s okay. I guess that’s okay, even if I feel sick and gross inside
and out. I didn’t get a shower after nearly drowning, my skin feels dry and
tight from the chlorine, same as my eyes and hair, my sinuses are rubbed raw
from puking up all the pool water I swallowed. I’m not sure when was the last
time I brushed my teeth, probably yesterday at the hospital. But if Cain wants
me naked in the bed now that he’s had a hot shower, I guess that’s okay.
The summoning might have hurt him, maybe he’s hurt like before. Maybe it wasn’t
nice for him like I thought. I glance at Cain. No squiggly line of pain between
his brows. He’s not hurt. He seems impatient. I’m not sure this is okay, but
I’m scared to tell Cain that. I’m scared if I say no he won’t care, so maybe
it’s easier just to say yes. Slowly I slip the t-shirt over my head.
Cain takes the shirt from me. He disappears into the grey fabric and appears as
a damp, dark head and stretching limbs. Cain settles the t-shirt into place
over his chest. It fits him better than it fit me.
“Alright, what do you want?” he asks.
“Huh?”
“For breakfast,” Cain says. Like it’s obvious.
“Oh.” Shaky, relieved laughter titters out of me. “O-oh, right. Breakfast.
Okay.”
I slip out of the sweatpants and hand them to Cain as well. The fold of my legs
and arms provides nothing for modesty. Cain seems unconcerned. He barely seems
interested. There’s no leering suggestion in the way he looks me over, only
that same impatient scowl.
“You’re staying here.” Cain puts on the sweatpants, which don’t especially fit
him, but the elastic waist and shapeless tube legs easily accommodate his
taller, wider frame.
“Okay.” I’m not about to insist I walk naked through the hotel lobby to check
out the breakfast buffet. “Um, my stomach hurts, so maybe just … some toast?”
Cain nods, firm and intense like my breakfast order is serious business. “I’ll
scope the place, while I’m out.” He sounds questioning, despite the bossy tone.
My response is the same compromise between declaring and asking. “Okay?”
Cain rises from the bed and gives me a quick once-over. “I’ll get you clothes.”
His head turns to take in the open bathroom door, the spill of light into the
entry. “And more towels.”
“Could you get me a toothbrush? And toothpaste?”
“Sure.” Cain shrugs. Surely it’s my imagination that he seems eager to ask,
“Anything else?”
“Um.” I try to think quickly. My thoughts aren’t a slow, syrupy drip like they
were before, but I’m not firing on all cylinders and know it. There must be
something else I want Cain to bring me. I look around the room like that might
provide me with an idea. My gaze settles on the closet door. “Are we staying
here a second night?”
Cain follows my gaze. His shoulders lift and lower. “Unless you got someplace
better in mind.”
I shake my head slightly. I don’t, not right now at least, and it’s exhausting
to think I might have to come up with a place later. I’m not ready to think
about what comes next. I’m barely managing the present moment. That I haven’t
thrown up yet is my top accomplishment this morning. I don’t want to think
about needing to accomplish more than that.
Cain snags the room key from the desk. “Don’t open the door. Got it?”
“Okay.” I offer Cain a smile to assure him I’m listening, I’ll do what he says,
he doesn’t need to worry. I’m not about to run away from him or let myself get
caught by the police.
Cain nods. He slides the chain from the door. The do not disturb card dangles
from the outside handle already, Cain checks it anyway, makes certain it’s
secure. He sweeps his gaze over the room one last time, like there might be
some danger lurking despite his vigilance, and then he steps into the hall. He
pulls the door closed. I bet he listens for the tell-tale mechanical whirl
before leaving. I remember him figuring out how the lock worked.
I’m not about to declare myself an expert or anything, but I think I’ve gotten
a little better at understanding Cain. At understanding everything, really,
about him being a demon and me being a necromancer. It’s hard to adjust and
remember that, after all that time in the hospital. It’s hard to remind myself
that it’s okay, I don’t have to be sacred it’s not real. I’m getting my life
back like I wanted.
Since I’m already naked and it’s available, I decide to take a shower. Cain’s
left a path of destruction through the tiny toiletry selection. The bottles
only have miniscule amounts left. I should have thought to ask him about more
shampoo. He used nearly the entire bar of soap, too. I wonder how many hot
showers he took.
As I stand there working lather into my hair, I wonder what Cain else wants. In
the beginning he wanted to know my name, I gave him my name. He wanted a body,
I gave him a body. He wanted a hot shower and a bed, but he managed to acquire
that for himself more or less without my help. It’s a bit bleak to realize Cain
may not have a use for me anymore. I’m not sure what else I could give him,
what he might need from me. Besides the obvious, which suddenly doesn’t seem so
obvious.
I needed his help getting out of the hospital. I need his help to get breakfast
and find clothes to wear. If Cain never returns to this hotel room, I’m stuck
fashioning a toga out of damp towels. I’m stuck waiting to be found by
housekeeping or management. I’ll probably get arrested because of the rotting
corpse shoved in the closet.
When Cain gets back, maybe I’ll ask him if we can switch rooms. Marcia can have
her own room. Maybe we can find a way to give her body to her parents for
burial, they’d probably appreciate that. I need to stop thinking about dead
things, especially the dead thing Cain used to find me. I’ll lose my
accomplishment of not throwing up if I keep thinking about corpses.
I feel so much better after showering that it’s a bit silly. Being clean just
feels so good. Every fresh-scrubbed inch feels more like me, inside and out,
from soft tousled hair to wiggling toes. I drink another cup of water while I
stand at the sink to blow-dry my hair. Afterward the ache in my stomach seems
prepared to accept food, which I take a good sign.
I’m burrowed under the blankets with the television off, the room dark and
quiet, not exactly asleep when Cain returns. The mechanical whir of the lock
and noise of the door latch brings my eyes open, lifts my head from the pillow.
The room’s small enough I spot him right away, I don’t have to call out to make
sure it’s him.
Cain grins something feral and wild when he notices me watching. “Hey,
sweetheart.” He’s cradling an armful of pastries and toting a suitcase. Shoved
under his arm is a stack of towels. Cain dumps the suitcase and towels by the
door, in the already narrow and crowded entry.
I sit up as Cain gets nearer. He’s brought the toast I asked for, wheat and
white both, along with three different muffins and a croissant. He stacks the
assorted baked goods onto the nightstand and eyes me suspiciously while he does
it. 
“You feeling better?” he asks.
Demands, really, in such a sharp and hostile way, like he’s accusing me of
something even though all I’m doing is smiling. A giddy, stupid smile. I’m
admiring him, actually, overcome with gratitude that he returned so quickly. I
was pretty sure he would, but it’s nice all the same. Part of me was scared he
might not.
“Yeah.” I clear a thick clog from my throat and try again. “Yeah. I took a
shower.”
The snarl Cain makes in response seems pleased, I think. He pulls from his
pocket a plastic-wrapped toothbrush and a tiny tube of toothpaste. Cain dumps
both into my blanket-covered lap. From the other sweatpant pocket Cain pulls
out a handful of crumpled white paper rectangles.
When they’re summarily dumped into my lap, I realize Cain’s brought me an
assortment of individually packaged pills. There’s ibuprofen, antacid tablets,
cold and flu tablets, something labeled non-aspirin pain reliever and then
aspirin itself. A grab bag variety of medicine, probably acquired from the
front desk at the same time as the toothbrush and towels.  
I look up from the tumble of supplies and smile. “Thanks, Cain. This is
perfect, thanks.”
The rough tussle of his hand messes up my hair. “Eat something,” he says. Cain
points at the crowded nightstand. Unspoken is the assurance I’ll feel better if
I do. My stomach agrees with Cain, it rumbles gentle encouragement at the idea
of eating. I pick up the blueberry muffin and start nibbling.
Cain returns to the dropped stack of towels. He disappears into the bathroom
with them and then comes back to get the suitcase. He slings it onto the foot
of the other bed.
“Did you steal that?”
Cain glances over as he unzips the suitcase. I’ve asked a very stupid question,
according to Cain’s incredulous expression. Heat suffuses my cheeks. I flinch
my gaze down to the blue-speckled muffin in my hands.
I’m aware that we’ve already broken several laws and will likely continue to do
so, no matter how much I might want to insist otherwise. Cain doesn’t have any
money, doesn’t have a car or even know where he is. Stealing a suitcase to
acquire clothes was a fairly creative solution to the problem. I’m not sure I
would have thought of it.
I watch quietly as Cain goes through the suitcase. I’m curious how he stole it,
where he found it, but I don’t want to annoy him. I’m sure I won’t be able to
think of anything clever if I do try speaking. It’ll just be more stupid
questions. My sluggish thoughts can only focus on simple, basic things, like
wondering if this muffin will stay down, or what kind of clothes Cain would buy
for himself if given the opportunity. Probably not an argyle sweater, since he
holds it up and then tosses it aside in disgust.
“Boring,” Cain grumbles. He holds up a pair of khakis and looks over at me. His
eyes narrow. The khakis get tossed into a different pile than the sweater.
As Cain sorts through the clothes, I finish the muffin. I’m fairly confident
it’s going to stay down, too, despite the pained struggle of my sore stomach. I
stay hidden in the blankets for a few minutes before realizing I’m being silly,
it doesn’t matter.
Cain glances over when I get out of bed. His gaze stays focused on mine,
intense and unwavering, questioning. I hold up the toothbrush as a silent
explanation. His attention goes back to the suitcase.
When I come out of the bathroom with minty clean teeth, Cain’s trying on some
of the clothes. He’s tangled into a plain white undershirt, popping free of it
as I watch. He frowns at the tight fit and turns at the waist, twists and
flexes. There’s something horrifically familiar about watching Cain try on
clothes. I watched him adjust the same way inside a corpse.
That muffin might not stay down after all, if I let myself think too much about
the dead girl. I planned to ask Cain about the clothes, if there were any he
thought might fit me, but I don’t want to linger on that side of the hotel
room. Cain’s bed is nearest the closet, it’s right next to the closet.
The other bed, my bed, it’s next to the armchair and window. I scurry back to
it, crawl eagerly under the covers. I burrow down tight into the pocket of
warmth and huddle the blankets over my head. It’s a dumb, childish comfort like
hiding from the monster in my closet. Precisely like that, I realize, only the
monster is entirely too real.
I peek out from the covers. “Cain?”
His head turns. “Hmn?”
“What are we going to do about Marcia?”
Cain lowers the shirt in his hands. He looks from me to the closet. “Dunno,” he
says. “Hadn’t thought about it yet. Got any fun ideas?”
He’s mocking me, I think. I’m not in the mood to be mocked, because I meant
that question, and it wasn’t a stupid one. It’s a serious question, it’s one I
would like him to take seriously. Maybe some of that shows on my face, maybe
that’s why Cain’s grin slips. He starts to frown instead, a deep sideways scowl
that doesn’t strike me as particularly angry or annoyed.
“You want her out of here?” Cain demands.
I hesitate briefly and then nod, quick and urgent. If that’s an option, then
yes, I desperately would like the dead body removed from the room.
Displeased rumbling builds in Cain’s chest. “Fine,” he snaps. “Whatever
princess wants. Close your eyes.”
So I won’t see him open the closet. He’s going to do it now, in the middle of
the day? Just walk downstairs holding a dead body, carry it to the dumpster, or
ditch it on a luggage cart? That doesn’t seem like a wise idea. That seems like
a terrible idea.
“Wait,” I say. “Wait, what are you going to do with her?”
“Put her back where I found her,” Cain says. “Unless you got a better idea.”
I don’t, at all, I have absolutely no idea what to do with Marcia’s dead body.
Returning her to the hospital seems like a great idea to me, on the surface at
least. “Won’t they notice she’s, um.”
“Dead?” Cain gleams together a sly smile. “Sweetheart, that’s not my problem.
She was dead before I arrived.”
“No, I mean, if you show up with her body, won’t you get in trouble?”
Cain laughs. Sharp, distinct amusement that leaves him chuckling. “Sweetheart,
I’m not going anywhere. She is. Getting her that far won’t be an issue, don’t
you worry your pretty little head about that. I got this,” he boasts. His grin
takes shape again.
Cain looks like he expects me to be impressed even though I have no idea what
he’s talking about. That’s obvious, clearly I have no idea, Cain must realize
that by now, except I don’t think he does. Cain assumes I know what I’m doing,
what’s happening. No matter how many times I remind him, Cain thinks I have all
the answers. His other necromancers did. They bossed him around, asked for a
lot more than some toast and toothpaste.
Maybe that’s why he starts to deflate some, starts to scowl. I must not look
suitably impressed. Perhaps I look like I’m doubting him because Cain insists,
“You want her gone? I’ll get her out.”
I thought he didn’t even want to do this. He seemed unhappy about the fact I
wanted Marcia’s body moved, until it became this weird jab at his ego. I’m not
sure telling Cain I have full confidence in him would be helpful. I’d probably
end up insulting him somehow.
“Okay,” is what I settle on saying. “Okay. Yeah. I want her gone.”
“Great.” He snaps it, peevish and short. “Close your eyes.”
I hesitate. The muffin seems solidly accepted at this point. I’m a little
curious how Cain plans to do this, I suppose. “Do I have to?”
“Fuck no,” Cain scoffs and closes his eyes. “Do whatever you want, dumbass.”
His hand lifts. He turns in place and sits on the edge of the bed. I clutch the
blankets under my chin, flinch my face into my knees, brace for whatever
terrible thing to happen except nothing does. After a quiet, ominous wait
Cain’s hand lowers. I’d accuse him of being overly dramatic if I didn’t already
know better.
From inside the closet comes a thump. Cain’s lips twitch into a scowl. A second
thump, a scraping noise -- limbs against the wall, I realize, the dead girl’s
body struggling to move.
Tremors shake through me as I bury my face tighter into my blanket-clad knees.
I’m on the verge of sobbing. I lied. I don’t want the dead girl gone. She can
stay in the closet, that’s fine, I’ll move.
I hear clawing, a soft snarl from Cain. The latch rattles, the door pushes
along the carpet.
Panic lifts my face up. I’m looking for Cain, for escape maybe, for whatever
stupid reason I look up and see her, the dead girl. I see Marcia and Cain, both
of them. He’s sitting on the bed, eyes closed, she’s crawling her way out of
the closet, eyes open.  
I tangle my fingers into the blankets and swallow rapidly. Either vomit or a
scream starts to choke from me, slips past my clenched teeth as a low, sick
moan. “Nnn-no, no --!” Terror wins over revulsion, my whined protest lifts into
a shriek. “Stop!”
Cain’s eyes snap open. The corpse flops.
I cover my eyes. Breath rushes from me in shudders. “Please, stop. Don’t do
that. Don’t - don’t do that, please.” I bite hard on my lip to keep it from
trembling as part of a wet, futile effort against tears. My voice wavers. “She
can stay. In the closet, that’s fine. Please.”
Silence from Cain. The whole room’s silent compared to the fast thrum of my
pulse, the quick slice of my breath as I wait.
“Sure.” Sarcastic, snarky just like the way he says, “Whatever Princess Abel
wants.”
I realize Cain’s serious as I hear him shove the corpse back into the closet.
Cain is entirely serious. He dumped cheap pre-packaged toothbrush and generic
toothpaste into my lap, but I could have asked for diamonds. Cain would rob a
store for me, get himself arrested or shot doing it. He’d be thrilled for the
chance to kill for me. This demon expects me to command him. I'm a necromancer.
He’s my demon, and he’ll do whatever I want.
***** Chapter 32 *****
I spend the morning napping and most of the afternoon as well. It’s on and off
consciousness, a strange blur of exhaustion as my body fights free of sedation.
Cain’s in the room each time I’m awake, but I’m not sure what to say to him.
He’s unsure what to say to me in return or simply letting me sleep, either way
he’s quiet. Silent, actually. He could be sulking, after I freaked out on him
for trying to move Marcia’s body.
For lunch I split the remaining pastries with Cain. He seems doubtful of taking
them from me, so I lie and tell him I don’t like banana nut muffins, I’m not
that fond of wheat toast. I don’t want the food to go to waste, I insist that
he’s doing me a favor by eating the rest.
Cain shoves cheek-bulging amounts of food in his mouth, barely chews before
swallowing. He eats quickly like he expects someone to steal his food, or maybe
that I’ll change my mind about him having it. I wonder if he’d growl at me if I
tried taking the muffin from his hand.
I bet if I didn’t offer him lunch, Cain wouldn’t have done anything about it.
Knowing Cain, he’d eventually complain so it wouldn’t seem like asking, but I
could make him starve if I wanted. Cain’s relying on me to call the shots. He’s
looking to me for what to do, both in the immediate moment and the long term.
It’s incredibly daunting to realize I’m in charge of Cain. I don’t even know
what to do with that level of responsibility. I’ve never even had a pet before,
much less a demon at my beck and call like this. I could be wrong, but I don’t
think I am. I’m certain I’m right about this. Everything Cain’s said and done
confirms it. The moment I gave Cain a body, I gained control over what he does
with it.
Currently the body I gave Cain is sprawl over the other hotel bed. On his
stomach, pillows bunched under him, feet kicked into the headboard. He’s
reading something. I’ve just woken up from a nap, restless and alert in a way
that says I’ll stay awake, and he hasn’t noticed yet. Even though it’s late
afternoon the room’s dim and quiet, curtains drawn. The bathroom light spills
slim shadows to serve as an unobtrusive reading light for Cain.
Cain flips the page. He’s reading the in-room guide, a leather-clad three-ring
binder of information I wouldn’t assume he’d be interested in, but Cain seems
fascinated by whatever he’s looking at. His rapt expression curls into a smile
as he leans closer. I’m desperately curious, but Cain thinks I’m asleep. He
probably won’t like it if I pop up with a sudden question about what he’s
doing, not when he thinks I can’t see him doing it.  
To let Cain know I’m awake, I roll and stretch with a yawn. It starts as
feigned and becomes actual hummed satisfaction. The luxurious hotel bed is
delightfully cozy and warm. I’m worried about a lot of things and have a lot of
things to worry about, but nothing seems too terribly urgent. Everything seems
rather pleasant, and I don’t think it’s the drugs making me feel that way
anymore.
I decide to start with that, something stupid, so Cain will know what to
expect. “This is nice.”
Cain looks over with a sloped, smug smile. Out of the stolen suitcase he’s
found a pair of boxer shorts and a shirt to wear, both a little too small for
him. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I sit upright. I’m dressed the same as Cain, only the pilfered clothes
fit me better than him. “Yeah. It’s really nice not being in the hospital
anymore.”
Amusement snorts out of Cain. His reply is a snarky-sincere, “I bet. That place
sucked.”
Without being too obvious about it, I try to see what Cain’s looking at. It
might be the room service menu, the vertical arrangement of text looks like a
menu from where I’m sitting.
I wonder if he’s hungry. I glance to the clock. It’s pushing five o'clock, and
Cain had a bite-sized muffin and two slices of toast for lunch. Who knows if he
ate breakfast. I hope he did, but he wasn’t gone long and still had time to get
towels, toiletries, and a suitcase. He’s probably hungry. I’m hungry, and the
thought of food sets my stomach into greedy churning.
I nearly blurt out, do you want to order room service? before thinking better
of it. I decide instead to say, “I’m hungry.”
“Yeah? Alright.” Cain pulls upright. His tone is brisk, bossy -- undeniably
eager. “What do you want?”
The enormity of the offer sinks deep. Not just what I want off the breakfast
buffet or out of the room service menu, I’m being offered the world on a
platter. He’d grumble and complain, maybe argue and tell me I’m stupid, but I
could ask Cain for anything. If I asked for my grandmother’s Sunday roast, Cain
would probably dig up her corpse to get the recipe.
“Room service sounds nice,” I say.  “Do they have room service?”
A haughty, self-satisfied smirk crosses Cain’s face. “They sure do, princess.”
He gets up from his bed and crosses the narrow divide to reach mine. He
presents me with the open binder, obviously pleased with himself for having it
ready so quickly.
I take the menu from Cain and spread it across my lap. Cain sits on the edge of
the bed. I glance up with a brief smile before looking back down at the menu. I
have no idea which italicized, snootily described item caught his fancy.
Cain expects stupid questions from me. I decide to go for it. I flash him a
soft, uncertain smile. “How much can I order?”
Sharp, cruel laughter mocks me as Cain tosses back his head. He favors me with
a wide-edged grin, a tiger sizing up prey. In the dim light of the room his
dark eyes gleam. “Sky’s the limit, sweetheart,” he boasts. “You want one of
everything brought up?”
The idea’s so ridiculous that I laugh. “What? No! That’d be too expensive.”
“So?”
“Won’t - won’t we get caught? How are we going to pay for this? You don’t have
any money. I don’t have any money.”
Cain suddenly looks furious. Brows tight, arms crossed over his chest. I’ve
fully annoyed him, nothing amusing about this now.
“Cain, I don’t have any money,” I repeat slowly.
He snarls in response. Did Cain think I could pay for this? I try to remember
what happened at check-in, but I only remember making coffee. My memory is of
stirring coffee even though I’m pretty sure I didn’t put any cream or sugar in
it. No idea why, but I remember doing it at least.
My fingers curl over the edge of the binder. I drop my gaze down, rather than
keep looking at the building stormcloud of anger darkening Cain’s glare.
“Fuck paying.” His response whips over me, crackling hot fury and scorn. “I’m
not buying you shit. I’m not here to play nice. I’m taking what I want, fuck
the rules. Got it? Fuck following the rules.”
This demon I command snaps and snarls like a caged animal. I understand the
warning and ignore it entirely. I understand so much about Cain in that moment,
yet stupidity blurts right out of me. I’m too excited to stop myself. “Is that
really something I could make you do, follow the rules of my world?”
Cain’s eyes widen, the angry line of his brow slips into a waver of sudden
fear. He leans back from me. A wordless growl tells me everything I already
know.
“I could.” It spills from me with a bursting smile. “I could make you get a job
to buy me things. I could make you go to college with me. I could --”
When Cain jerks toward me, I shriek. I clutch the leather-bound binder in front
of my face like a shield. My heart bursts staccato terror that Cain’s going to
hit me. Instead his fist closes over my elbow. Cain yanks me from the warm
fluff of bedding.  
“You’re not doing any of that shit.” His voice is a low, vicious insistence
backed with the heavy threat of violence. “I’m not doing that shit. Got it?” He
punctuates this with a bruising squeeze.
I’m wide-eyed, stiff with fear, tensed to push from him except I know it’d be
futile to try. Cain’s stronger than me. He’s so strong, and quick, he could
hurt me easily. He could kill me without breaking a sweat, snap my neck or
choke me, beat me bloody with his fists. I’m a complete fucking idiot for
thinking I tamed this demon just because he’s been nice to me.
I squirm and whimper. Cain snatches my other arm with a snarl, and I quit my
meager resistance.  He holds me tight and close, looming down at me with a
fierce, determined glare and steady, furious rumbling. I stare up at him, my
whole body shivering, somewhere between wanting to scream or sob.
I run my tongue over the bumpy scar on my lip and swallow. The words slip from
me as a dry, thin whisper. “Okay, Cain. Okay.”
His grip eases by small fraction. I watch the bracketed lines at his mouth, the
slow collapse of his brow. He’s scared. Through my own fear I realize just how
terribly I’ve frightened Cain. I scared him.
Somehow I manage to shape a shaky smile. “We don’t have to follow the rules,” I
tell Cain.
Tension slacks from him further. He starts to look doubtful, wary. I continue
in the same soothing tone, “I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do.”
“Tch!” Cain releases me with a harsh shove. He sneers, “Dumbass fucking
necromancer like you can’t make me do shit.”
It’s a lie. I can make him do whatever I want. I might have to hurt him, to
make him obey, but I could make him obey me. I bet it doesn’t matter that
Cain’s stronger than me physically. I could hurt him if I wanted to, I bet
there’s a way for me to hurt Cain without hitting him. I could make him tell
me. I could order he explain to me exactly what terrible things I’m capable of
doing to demons. I bet I could do a lot of horrible things to Cain against his
will.
Being a necromancer means I’m in charge of him. He’s a dead thing. No matter
how many living, breathing bodies I summon from dark depths, it doesn’t change
what he is. Cain’s a demon. He’s been trying to boss me around and scare me so
I won’t realize how much power I have over him. He won’t give me any of the
answers because he doesn’t want me using them to hurt him, humiliate him,
dominate and control him.
The awkward, painful truth is Cain has to serve me, if he wants a body. If he
doesn’t want to be a dead thing stuck on the Otherside, he needs a necromancer.
He needs me. I’m the only necromancer he knows how to find, the only one stupid
enough to listen.  
That I’ve figured out the truth must be all over my expression. Understanding
floods the tender look of sympathy I give Cain. It heats my cheeks and neck,
sets my heart into slow-thumping ache.
He leans from me. His subtle retreat toward the headboard accompanies the wide
flare of his nostrils, the lift of his brows. Now I have truly frightened Cain,
because I’m not afraid him. There’s nothing scary about this demon, other than
the fact he doesn’t trust me.
“Cain,” I say quietly. “Cain, it’s okay. Really. We can talk about this. We can
figure it out together. Whatever we do, we should both agree on it. Okay?”
“Fuck off,” Cain snaps. “Fuck you.” He jerks to his feet, fists clenched and
ready.
I flinch my hands into the comforter to keep from bolting off the bed entirely.
I’m pretty certain Cain won’t hit me, but I think he could. I might be able to
hit him back somehow, might be able to prevent him from hitting me, but I don’t
actually know how. Regardless I’m not going to fight Cain. It’s a fight I’m
pretty sure I won’t win, a fight that’ll only hurt us both. It might kill one
of us, and I don’t think Cain will let that be me.
“Cain,” I say gently. “Please sit down. Please. Let’s talk about this.”
I don’t think it’ll work, but it does. Cain eases back onto the bed. He moves
slow and cautious like this might be a trap. When I reach my hand out to touch
his arm, I get a wordless snarl from him, a wild and uncertain warning.
I keep my gaze steadily locked on Cain’s and shift closer to him. I draw the
slow line of my touch up his arm and then reach for his face. He flinches, head
twitching to the side with a sharper growl. I slow even further, move in a
measure of whispers. My fingers bury into the dark, heated warmth of his hair.
Tension ripples over Cain, works his lips into a silent, bared-teeth snarl.
“Cain,” I murmur. Almost a warning, not quite a reprimand, a gentle reminder to
this wary demon that I won’t hurt him. Not on purpose, at least, not because I
want to. I don’t want to hurt Cain. Last thing I want to do is hurt Cain.
I stroke my fingers through his hair. I try to convey everything to him with a
tender caress, the pliable willingness of my body folded close against him.
“I’m glad you’re here,” I say to Cain. “I’m glad you found me.”
The angry lines smooth from Cain’s forehead. His dark gleaming gaze searches
over my face. He takes in the close and eager press of my body, clearly trusts
nothing about what I’m doing. Cain’s right to be cautious, because this is a
trap. A well-intended one, but a trap all the same.
I get my arms looped around Cain’s neck, cage him into sweetly-offered
affections. Heat flares through the scar as I press my lips to Cain’s. His
lashes lower. I hum softly, curl my fingers into his hair.
My kiss sparks an inferno into Cain, sets him into an entirely different kind
of snarling. A rough-callused hot hand slides up my arm and cradles between my
shoulders. He parts my mouth with the blunt insistence of his tongue.
I press close with an encouraging, near-desperate whine. Cain groans quietly in
response, the sound reverberating into the tangled shared pant of breath. His
teeth rake over the fast thrum of pulse at my throat. Demanding hands knead
along my shoulders and back, they reach low and cup the rounded curve of my ass
through the thin cotton underwear. I arch into Cain’s touch, moan and keen in
the most embarrassing ways.
“Please,” I whisper to him between kisses. “Cain, please.”
He obliges me, shows no signs of doing anything else. Cain nibbles at my lip
and runs his hands over my body. Arousal follows the exploration of his hands.
The touch draws soft, mewling cries into my gasped breaths. He pushes up the
hem of my t-shirt and then strips it from me once I shift to accommodate. I
reach for the shirt he’s wearing, and Cain lets me slip it over his head.
I stroke my hands over Cain’s bare chest and feel strong muscles beneath the
unblemished perfection of his skin. No scars, no bruises, no scrapes or bumps,
the body I gave him is flawless. I glance up at Cain.
Surely I’m something Cain wants, something he desires. Surely this is something
he wants, and not just something he thinks he has to give me. His dark gaze is
hooded, his mouth curled. Stiffness between his legs demonstrates exactly how
physically willing his body is for this. I can see his cock jutting into the
thin cotton fabric of his underwear as Cain prowls over me. He knocks me into
the bed just as much as I pull Cain on top of me.
I clutch at his hair as we surge into a kiss and tangle together. In the back
of my head is a screaming voice of panic about the fact I’m a necromancer, he’s
a demon. He has to do whatever I want, and it’s obvious I want Cain. I’m hot
hard burning for Cain, eager hands and lips all over him.
“Cain.” It barely sounds like me speaking. Between kisses, pitched whines and
moans threatening to obscure the words. “Cain, what do you want?”
It’s perhaps the stupidest question yet that I’ve asked Cain. His dry chuckle
stirs the fine hairs on my neck. Sharp teeth catch my ear. “You,” Cain rumbles.
His hand glides along my thigh as a command and question, a warning. He hooks a
thumb into the waistband of the blue striped boxers I’m wearing. For an answer
I mimic him, pluck my fingers over the white striped match he’s wearing from
the same stolen set, some stranger’s bland collection that we strip from each
other in a hasty race.
More to see if he’ll let me than anything, I push at Cain’s shoulder in
suggestion, rub my thigh to his hip as we reposition. I roll upright over Cain
and straddle my thighs across the lean plane of his stomach. He lazes into the
bed to watch, attentive and eager, eyes roaming the pale expanse of my body.
Cain’s hips thrust forward with a hungry growl, though he stays down. He lets
me keeps him pinned with mere wanton suggestion, the soft squeeze of my thighs.
Cain guides my hip in one hand, grabs a handful of my ass in the other. Under
his suggestive demand I shift lower to rub myself over his cock with shameful,
all-consuming need.
I don’t mean to sound so sultry. I’m some breathless, bewitching creature as I
ask Cain, “Do you like me?”
“Yeah,” he pants. “Yeah. Yeah, you stupid fuck.”
Cain takes us both into the firm pump of his hand. His cock slides alongside
mine, a matchstrike of sensation that sends fire tracing along my thighs. I
moan and rock forward to match the roll of his hips. The sway of my body
follows his commanding tugs. Ardent fervor tightens my breath into shudders as
an inevitable peak approaches.
“Cain. Oh, Cain!” Pleasure pours from my lips in bubbled moans and cries. I
jerk and thrash, cling and claw a useless scrabble of harmless thin nails over
the sculpted strength of Cain’s chest.
“Please,” I beg him. Whispering, sweet desperation sharpening into a cry. “Oh,
please!”
Cain bucks beneath me with a rumbling purr, a long drawn-out groan. Come slicks
through his hand. The wet, steady pumps and tight, hot spurt of his cock
pressed to mine overwhelms me into matched orgasm. Release claws my throat,
shakes and shivers free the most humiliating small noises.  
I fold into Cain’s chest with a flutter, nudge at his neck with my nose and
kiss his throat, nip a light snip into the buried beat of pulse. I’m wild for
him, a soft-snarling beast in that moment of unleashed lust. Everything about
this is reckless and foolish, but I don’t care. I’ve wanted Cain since the
beginning. He’s exactly my type -- tall, dark and handsome, a punk rock idol of
forbidden, foreboding desire.  
The blazing intensity crescendos and fades to leave me stunned, sated, draped
heavy and limp over Cain. My cheek rests into his shoulder, my fingers brave
small, brushing strokes into his hair. The quiet stretches long after we’ve
caught our breath. I wonder if he’s okay. If this is okay, if anything gets to
be okay now that Cain knows I know the truth.
I listen to the steady, pounding tempo of Cain’s heart beating in his chest. I
wonder how much of the truth he knows, if he heard any of the stupid things I
whispered to him while hospitalized. There were nights I fully accepted that
Cain was only thoughts and feelings, someone I’d made up to cope with the
stress of my dull, normal life. I thought Cain wasn’t real and whispered to him
anyway, whispered horrible things I only partway remember. I don’t know if he
heard me. He didn’t say anything back if he did. I only remember Marcia sitting
with me at breakfast, Cain suddenly there in the dead girl’s body. I don’t
remember his voice in my head acknowledging the repeated, desolate pleas for
him to be real, for him to come find me.
I think maybe I should get up, I should get off Cain and clean the mess. I stay
rested into him instead because he lets me, he doesn’t stir at all to get free
of my smothering collapse. Eventually the gloopy smeared wetness over my skin
becomes uncomfortable enough that I lift my head.
A smug, satisfied gleam shapes the curve of Cain’s mouth. The thick, dark sweep
of his lashes glides open as he feels me shifting upright. Our eyes meet.
I have no idea what to say. The lack of words scalds my cheeks. I pull my lower
lip into my teeth, worry gently at the scar. After a moment of staring at Cain,
I decide to try for a smile. The longer he watches me with that same smirking
contentment, the less concerned I feel, the more my smile becomes genuine.
“Alright.” Cain stretches some with a low, reverberating hum. His voice picks
into brisk, bossy demand -- “You still want room service?”
***** Chapter 33 *****
“That real?”
Cain mushes the words out around chewing. He swallows to make enough room for
another massive, shoved-in wad of food. I’m almost concerned he’ll choke,
eating so much so quickly, but I don’t want to make Cain uncomfortable by
suggesting he slow down. I don’t want to do anything to disrupt our fragile
truce.
I glance at the television. The volume’s a low background murmur, distinct
enough to hear but not so sharp as to be distracting. I don’t necessarily want
to watch TV. It’s a shameless bribe, same as the fancy room service hamburger
swiftly being demolished.
I have no idea what Cain wants to know, asking me if the evening news is real.
He can’t possibly mean the television itself. I take a bite of my club sandwich
to buy time. It doesn’t help me make it less of a question, instead of an
answer. “Yes?”
“Huh.” Cain lets the last handful of hamburger rest in his loosely curled
clutches. He stares at the television.
I look as well. “That’s the White House,” I offer. “It’s where the President --
”
Soft snarling from Cain lets me know to stop talking. Clearly Cain understands
what he’s looking at. He’s familiar with my world, he’s been here before. He
just wanted to make sure this was real news footage, not a scene from a movie
or a commercial.
Cain crams the rest of the burger into his mouth. It’s enough that he struggles
to break it down with his teeth. I try not to stare, but it’s impossible not to
watch Cain. Everything he does fascinates me. Even the way he gestures at the
television and garbles together something scornful and snide interests me. I
have no idea what he’s trying to say, but I hang on to every slurred syllable.
Before I can think of a way to ask he repeat it, Cain swallows. One of the
thick-cut steak fries gets snatched up to be used as a pointer as he gestures
again at the television. “I knew a guy who’d shit himself to see a black dude
in charge. Almost wish the son of a bitch was here so I’d see the dumbass
fucking look on his face.”
I have a million questions about that. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” says Cain. The fry he’s holding disappears into the fast, eager
destruction of his mouth. Several others follow. Maybe I should have ordered
him more food. He’s eaten nearly all his dinner in the time it’s taken me to
get halfway through a single neatly-cut triangle of mine.
Since Cain doesn’t elaborate, I decide to go for it. He asked me something,
that means I get to try asking him something back. I think about it carefully,
put all my freshly undrugged clear-thinking effort into it. I strike a balance
between asking and declaring, stick my best guess out there for Cain to deny or
confirm.
“Your previous necromancer?” I remember his conversation with Phobos, the
mention of a near miss at crossing paths in previous lives.  
“Mmhm.” Cain presses his finger into the white porcelain get the last remaining
fry and burger crumbs. I almost expect him to start licking the plate clean. I
think if there was more left, he would.
I soften into suggestion, a voiced-aloud wonder ready for dismissal. “What was
he like?”
Cain shrugs. He sucks the crumbs from his finger and keeps his gaze locked on
the television screen. We’re sitting cross-legged together on the same bed,
plates balanced across our laps, though Cain’s finished with his. He transfers
the plate from his lap to the room service tray that’s just within reach.
I thought the shrug was my answer, because that question was both too direct
and too vague, but Cain follows it up with something that’s all rumbling purr,
no hint of snarl. “Jealous, sweetheart?”
Shivers run down my spine. What I intend to sound teasing comes out as
defensive. “Maybe.”
His smirk spreads. “Maybe you should be. He wasn’t a dumbass like you.”
I turn molten hot for the warm affection coloring the insult. A wide grin
reveals the sharp flash of Cain’s teeth. Wicked amusement fills a rumbling
laugh as he leans back. Cain braces his weight on his hands and uncrosses his
legs into a comfortable stretch. Heat fills me as I watch his lazy sprawl made
not quite modest by the terry cloth robe he put on to receive the room service
delivery. It's all he's wearing.
If I don’t stop leering at Cain and finish my sandwich, I’ll end up going to
bed hungry. Reluctantly I focus on the food in front of me, rather than my
ravenous desire for the demon in my bed.
"Yeah. He was smart. I’ll give him that." Cain stretches back further to reach
the headboard and settles in comfortably. "The son of a bitch knew his shit
inside and out. He said jump and it was yes sir, how high. Motherfucking pain
in my ass,” Cain gripes. I glance up in time to catch the sardonic twist of a
fresh, feral threat. “Jokes on him though. Being a smartass got him killed.”
I have questions about that as well, but it’s Cain’s turn. He slips his scowl
into something more teasing, less dangerous. “So. You planning to live it up in
this hotel forever?”
He doesn’t sound opposed to the idea. I smile at Cain as I shake my head. “No,
I guess not, but I don’t know where else to go. I can’t go home.”
Cain scoffs. “Why not?”
I hope it doesn’t show on my face how incredulous I am he’s asked me that. “Um.
Because, my parents think I’m crazy?”
“So?” he demands. “Tell them to fuck off.”
“It’s not that easy,” I say. “I can’t do that. They’ll put me back in the
hospital.”
Cain’s low growl starts more doubtful than angry, builds as he goes. “They can
try. You gonna make me stand around while they do, or are you gonna want me
stepping in? Because, fuck that place. You’re not going back. Got it?”
I give Cain an uncertain smile. There’s a certain concerned sweetness in the
brusque, bossy tone, though what Cain’s suggesting is equally concerning. I
don’t want to think about my mother and father being told to fuck off by Cain.
I can’t imagine trying to get Cain one foot inside the big empty house my
parents bought to put me inside, my home that’s not really mine. Putting me and
Cain inside that nice, square life seems impossible, even given all the
impossible things we’ve done already.
“What would you do? How would you stop them?” I ask. “You can’t kill my
parents.”
It’s not reassuring that Cain grins like I’ve told him a fantastic joke.
“Wrong,” he says. “I could easily kill them, sweetheart. Not even a challenge.
Your dad’s what, one-ninety? Some fucking banker or lawyer? Doesn’t even own a
gun? Yeah. Cakewalk.”
The huffed dismissal holds entirely too much mirth. I’m not sure which pleases
him more, proving me wrong or the general idea of committing a multiple
homicide.
“Don’t,” I say sharply. “Don’t kill my parents.”
“Alright, alright. Fine. Don’t get your panties in a twist. I’ll talk ‘em into
standing down.”
“You can do that?”
I’m more mystified than anything, but Cain’s twitched together scowl indicates
I’ve offended him. He snaps, “Talked my way into your fancy fucking house once,
didn’t I?”
“When you were a cat?” Not quite a question, despite how unsure I sound.
Cain’s growl wedges a compromise between confirming my guess and expressing his
ego-ruffled displeasure. It makes sense that Cain used some sort of power on my
mom to make her want a dead cat in her immaculate ivory and eggshell
perfection. I can’t imagine why else she would get cozy and cuddly with
roadkill, other than Cain’s demonic influence. He’s terrifyingly persuasive.
It’s almost impossible to refuse him or deny him anything, even for me, and I’m
in charge of him.  
“You could really convince my parents I’m not crazy?”
Cain regards me with a smug expression, a preening display of arrogant self-
assurance. He doesn’t bother answering. That single smirk is the only answer I
need.
Cain talked his way out of a secured psychiatric ward while under suicide watch
and took me along with him. We’re sitting in a posh business hotel eating room
service despite my current status as a homeless runaway. Cain’s a demon, a
monster from the Otherside. He blatantly ignores the rules of my orderly,
secure world. He exists outside of normal, dull things like chemistry midterms
and college applications. The square confines of that nice lie my parents want
for me, I could make Cain bend the edges so I’d fit.
I finish the remaining wedge of club sandwich while thinking it over. Cain
flips through channels, his interest catching on the strangest of things. He
lingers longest over the commercials, actually seems to prefer them. I suppose
that makes sense. Each thirty second advertisement block contains a density of
information about my complicated world, everything from how people dress and
talk to the types of products and services being sold. He's catching up on
forty years worth of changes.
Once finished with my plate, I stack it on the tray with Cain’s. I hop from the
bed and pick up the room service tray. I start toward the door with the intent
to stick our dirty dishes in the hall for someone to collect, but Cain’s off
the bed and coming after me with a thick, angry snarl.
I stop and turn to Cain with a reassuring smile that doesn’t do anything to
slow his advance. He snatches the tray from me, grabs my elbow in a hard fist
at the same time.
“I was going to put our dishes in the hall.” I try not to sound defensive. I
try to sound nice, like nothing’s wrong, like there’s not a furious demon
cutting off the circulation to my arm.
“I told you not to open the door.” Nothing sweet in his harsh growl, nothing
nice in his sharp scowl. He’s pure deadly fury that I would disobey him, even
though he’s supposed to obey me.
Inadvertently I’ve blundered my way into open hostility. I’ve made a
declaration of war despite so much careful effort at maintaining our truce.
“Okay.” I offer shaky surrender in the form of a smile. “Okay. I’m sorry.”
Cain looks from me to the chain-secured door. Shattered-rock rumble from him
seems less furious, more acknowledging, maybe shifting toward apology the
longer I stand there with a desperate edge shaping my smile. He lets go of my
arm. I retreat toward the bed.
I watch as Cain checks through the peephole first before unchaining the door.
He grips the handle but hesitates, gaze cutting over his shoulder to where I’m
standing. His paranoia about letting me out of his sight falls somewhere
between alarming and comforting, same as his insistence that I not be seen by
anyone. When room service arrived, I hid in the bathroom.
Cain flicks the bathrobe sash into a quick knot before opening the door. He
looks up and down the hall carefully. Quickly Cain crouches and sets the tray
down. He scoots it to the side before straightening upright and flicking the
wary demand of his gaze in either direction. The do not disturb card gets a
double-check before he closes the door. He immediately resets the chain. All
that fuss, for less than ten seconds of exposure.  
“Is everything okay? Is something wrong?” I had other questions in mind, other
curiosities similar enough in theme that my fingers and toes grow numb. “Cain,
are we in danger?”
The scowl I get from Cain isn’t much of an answer, but I think I understand
anyway. Everything’s more or less okay, nothing’s especially wrong, and the
most dangerous thing in this hotel right now is the demon keeping me hostage.
Cain stalks to the spot he abandoned on my bed and snatches up the television
remote. Distinct huffy sulking defines the way he takes the remote with him to
the other bed. Cain resettles into the same stretched sprawl, only on the
opposite side of the room. Apparently we’re done hanging out together. I broke
the ceasefire.
Slowly I scoot into the center of the bed. The queen-sized island of comfort
seems lonely without Cain hogging the excess space. I pull my knees under my
chin and stare forward at the television without actually watching it.
After a bit of silent moping, I glance sideways at Cain. Maybe it’ll comfort
him to see me cooperative and passive. Maybe he’s embarrassed for overreacting,
maybe my worried pestering of questions made him realize just what kind of non-
existent threat lurks in a hotel hallway. Maybe I’m wrong for obsessing over
the fact that every necromancer Cain’s ever known is dead.
I wait long enough for the tension to pass, for Cain’s brow to relax out of
deep, angry furrows. I wait until he’s puzzling over an infomercial and not
expecting trouble. I keep my voice soft, in case he wants to ignore me. I even
ask the question in the wrong way, just to make sure. I give him the easy out
as a peace offering.
“Will you tell me how your previous necromancer died?"
Cain’s dark gaze slides from the television to me. Cruelty plucks the sharp
spread of his smile, sets him into predatory gleaming. “Sure thing, princess.”
His voice is thick dripped-honey sweetness, this is undeniably a snarky, sticky
trap. “Never knew you liked ghost stories. I got some good ones. Hearing how a
stupid stubborn fuck bled to death though, that’s no fun, that shit’s boring.”
I am okay with boring. I do not like ghost stories. I am very sorry to have
asked Cain this question,  especially since he seems so keen to answer.
He thumbs the volume down a couple notches and shifts the full of his attention
to me. “Alright, sweetheart, here’s a good one. You’ll like this. I knew a
girl, this dumb kid even younger than you. She’s going around, doing her little
chores, minding her own goddamn business, when a bunch of assholes show up
looking for a good time. Dad’s out chopping wood and decides to be a hero, gets
his own axe put into his chest for the trouble. Girl’s shrieking, sobbing for
help, getting slapped around nice and tender -- but it’s her lucky day because
guess who’s listening?”
After a lengthy pause I take my guess. “You?”
“Yup.” Cain grins. I think he genuinely likes this story. “I show up as the
dude with an axe, which was real fucking convenient. Hurt like a son of a bitch
to get the damn thing free, but it made things nice and easy having it handy.
Anyway she thought it was a goddamn miracle, lost her freaking mind. Would not
listen to a word I said about not being her damn Papa. That idiot thought
gaping chest wounds just needed some spit and shine to work out fine. Would you
believe the lunatic spent three days playing house with corpses before folks
came around to check on her? That’s when the real fun started, them trying to
break up her little undead tea party. Heads rolling, rocks flying, great time
for everyone until the fucking priest shows up. He turned the party into a
barbecue, fuck-off huge bonfire, the whole place going up in flames. A
necromancer flambe, nothing but blackened bones and ash left of her after
that.”
“Oh,” I manage.
I’m not sure which part of Cain’s story I find most disturbing. Possibly the
dead necromancer at the end of it. Perhaps it’s the missing details that
frighten me most, the lurking reality of horror that fills the gaps of Cain’s
gleeful retelling. I don’t even know when and where the story takes place, if
this was a hundred years ago or a thousand.
I must not look suitably impressed, or at least not adequately frightened,
because the dark plunge of Cain’s brows forms a tight disapproval.
“Got a story about a guy who liked to eat people,” he says. “Sick fuck would do
a dinner date in reverse. You know what killed him? Dog bite. Fucking ironic as
shit, the dog bit his hand trying to get at leftovers faster and the damn wound
infected. Nothing to be done for him after that except point and laugh.”
Did he really do that, or was Cain upset to have another necromancer die on
him? Just how many necromancers has Cain had, and what’s the average amount of
time he spends with them before an ultimately gruesome demise?
Something tells me old age isn’t a likely cause of death for a profession that
involves killing things and summoning demons. There’s a reason I’m the only
necromancer Cain knows how to find, the same reason that Deimos goes around
killing them. I’m not from the Otherside, but I’m still a monster.    
I hug my knees to my chest, like that might help me crush the throbbing ache
that’s part heartbreak, mostly fear. Is something going to change about me, the
more I keep doing this? A lot of stomach-churning certainty assures me how
close I came to murdering someone in that hospital. I was ready to do anything
to get out of that place by the time Cain found me.   
My voice is soft, but it’s not a suggestion. It’s a question I want answered
and would like taken seriously, it’s something I want a very specific answer
to. “How long were you with your previous necromancer?”
“Six years.” Casual and sneering, not exactly serious even though he gives a
direct answer like I want. He even follows it up with the specifics unprompted.
“Sixty-eight to seventy-four.”
“What’s the longest you’ve been with someone?” I ask. “A necromancer, I mean.”
Cain’s head tilts to the side. He regards me with open hostility for a moment
and then shifts his attention to the television. I’m not getting anymore answer
than that, not without repeating the question and insisting he respond. Asking
isn’t the same as commanding.
We’re done talking even though it’s his turn to ask questions, and I’ll answer
as best I can for whatever he wants to know. He knows I’ll answer honestly,
even though I don’t have to tell him anything. I offered that to him as part of
the bribe to sweeten the suggestion he sit and eat dinner with me, maybe answer
a few of my questions.
Even though it’s his turn, and he can ask me anything he wants, Cain’s quiet.
He’s a silent scowl and flipping channels, a full-fledged sulking tantrum that
I’m not as dumb as he wants to think. I’ve figured out quite a bit about
necromancers and demons and Otherside monsters. None of it seems to be helping
me know what to do with Cain. In fact the more I know about being a
necromancer, the less Cain wants to do with me. 
Eventually I decide to brush my teeth and get ready for bed. I tell Cain what
I’m doing before I start moving around the hotel room, but he doesn’t respond.
I don’t even get an acknowledging snarl or something sarcastic. I wonder if
he’d stop me if I tried to leave or if we’re past that now.
I want to suggest maybe he ask the front desk for a toothbrush, so he can brush
his teeth, too. I’m not sure if demons get cavities, but I like the feel of
clean teeth before bed. I bet Cain would as well. As I stand there looking at
my own reflection and scrubbing frenzy of minty white foam, sudden memory
interjects like an unwanted pop up ad. Complete with audio, something I can’t
tune out, the abrupt reminder of Phobos saying -- Abel, do you know what you’ve
done? You gave him corporeal form. This isn’t a corpse he’s possessing.
It’s something I hadn’t realized fully, just how much time Cain’s spent being
dead. Not stuck on the Otherside in between necromancers, but time spent being
a dead thing in my wonderful living world. I suppose corpses don’t need to
brush their teeth. They certainly don’t take hot showers. They probably don’t
need to eat fancy hamburgers or sleep nestled in soft feather-fluff bedding,
either. Dead things are broken and wretched, they’re terrifying and repulsive.
Dead things are empty vessels not meant to last long.
I bet his other necromancers weren’t shy about finding him fresh dead bodies
and didn’t hesitate at putting him to use in violent, dangerous ways. Minus the
little girl whose hacked-open dead father Cain possessed, I guess. No wonder he
thought I’d like the story. She spent three days playing house with corpses,
which I assume from Cain’s scorn is as harmless as it sounds, and to let her
keep doing it Cain killed as many people as he could before going out in a
literal blaze of glory. 
I hope he didn’t tell me that story to highlight what happens when necromancers
refuse to be remorselessly evil monsters. I hope I didn’t just hear the story
of how his favorite necromancer died. I hope that’s not my record to beat. I
desperately hope the bar isn’t so low as surviving longer than three days, if I
want to be the best necromancer possible for Cain.
Nothing’s different when I come out of the bathroom. Same scowl, same lazy
sprawl that conceals just how fast he’d react if something happened. He lounges
with lethal grace of a tiger. From the corner of my eye I see his predatory
gaze track my progress across the room. I try not to look directly at Cain as I
climb into bed.  
After I’m settled, Cain stays on one channel for awhile. He’s chosen a rerun of
Bewitched. I’m curious if he recognizes it, or if the novelty of the show’s
theme caught his interest, or maybe it’s just a coincidence and he’s simply
tired of changing channels. I wonder if asking Cain nice, harmless questions
about things he likes would help make anything about this situation easier for
us or if it would just make everything worse.
I shift my cheek into the pillow and pull the blankets to get cozy. Even though
I spent most of the day sleeping, I’m exhausted. Tomorrow I can figure out a
plan for what to do, where to go next. I’ll think about all the things I’m
avoiding, like my parents and what happened to Aidan. Tomorrow I can decide if
I want to go home or stay a runaway, if I want to bend the rules or break
them. Maybe tomorrow I’ll convince Cain it’s okay to like me, that it’s okay
for things to be nice even though we’re monsters. Maybe I’ll convince myself
it’s okay to be in love with a demon, and that I’m not doomed for thinking I
can play house with one.
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