A tear rolled down Saul’s cheek. “And that night, it was on me.”
“Do you want to take a break?” Jack asked him gently.
Saul wiped his eyes. “I’m almost done. That night I awoke before dawn, paralyzed on my bed with something heavy on my chest. I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it. It came again and again, night after night, pushing me into the mattress and making a high-pitched buzzing sound in my ear. Over time the buzzing deepened in tone and then broke up into a series of grunting sounds, as if it was trying to form words. In the hours before dawn on my fourteenth birthday, it finally spoke. It said, Feed me. And at last I understood what I needed to do. Right then I stopped resisting, forcing my mind to think of other things, forcing my body to relax, inch by inch, starting with my toes. And then, some barrier, some protective force around me, was finally penetrated. Take it, I said, and let it feed.
“When it was done, hours passed before I could move again. It fed on my energy whenever it wanted for the next couple of years. I was tired all the time, quit sports, quit seeing friends, became a loner. As time went on I could feel when it fed elsewhere or was sleeping. When it slept I felt nothing. Well, I felt free, I guess, in the way a trapped animal is free when it dreams. Then one day it stopped feeding from me altogether, like it was bored of me. I went to college, got my real estate license, was happy.”
Saul picked up the towel again for another round of nose blowing, one that went on for far longer than Anna thought was necessary.
“And now it’s back,” Saul said, “and it’s learned how to use me to feed from others. Using my hands to make portals where people feel the safest, their homes.”
Saul exhaled, his face haggard.
Jack knelt down and patted Saul’s forearm. “So, you’ve been creating these EMF abnormalities, these portals, as a food source for this friend of yours?”
“My friend, Jack?”
“Forgive me.”
Anna’s hackles went up. Jack was asking this fraud for his forgiveness now?
“Tell me more,” Jack said. “Specifics. How do you make them?”
“It did something to my hands when it first came back a few weeks ago. I was half-asleep, but I remember it felt hot—zappy—like when you screw in a lightbulb with the light switch on. Since then, it tells me where to put my hands. I mean, it’s not me doing it. I’m just the conduit.”
“So, it’s not inside you?” Jack said. “It’s not controlling your body?”
“No,” Saul said. “It talks to me, tells me what to do.”
“That’s good,” Jack said. “That’s real good.”
Saul looked at Jack like he was nuts, but Anna understood her father’s reaction. He was glad he didn’t have another demon on his hands.
“You called them portals,” Anna said. “Portals to where?”
Saul shrugged. “How am I supposed to know?”
“You could ask it,” Anna said. “I mean, you said it talked to you, right?”
Saul fingered his collar, about to respond, but Jack butted in. “Saul, do you believe that you sold your soul to the devil?”
Saul nodded. “It will torment me until my dying breath and then take my soul to hell.” He choked back a sob. “I would have killed myself years ago, but how could I knowing what I’d face?”
Anna shuddered, thinking about the unknown fate of her mother’s soul. Was she too hard on Saul? His life, like her mother’s, was shattered by a parasite. But Saul had survived. Maybe that’s what bothered Anna the most.
“That’s why this thing has power over you,” Jack said. “Ouija boards are portals just like the ones you created. Gateways. When you give permission to a negative entity to attach to you, to manipulate you, it will take full advantage. This thing was opportunistic, that's all.”
“What are you saying?” Saul said, hope burgeoning on his face. “You don't think it’s the devil?”
Anna couldn’t contain herself. “Why would the devil be spending its time messing with a real estate agent in Bloomtown? Wouldn’t it try to start a nuclear war or something?”
Jack glared at her, holding a finger up to his lips. He was always careful about stepping on anyone’s belief system. He measured his words carefully.
“Saul, I think that what we’re dealing with is more along the lines of an energy vampire, an entity—rare, mind you, but documented—that draws power from the energy of living beings. The entity is not a demon, Saul. It’s not powerful enough for a full possession. That’s the good news. You’re going to survive this.”
Saul sagged with relief and the two men thumped each other’s backs in an awkward hug.
“So, if this entity is feeding from these portals. The portals aren’t just transmitting EMFs, but sucking in energy, too?” Geneva asked.
“Yes,” Jack said. “And I’m guessing that the energy this thing feeds on is pain energy—guilt, hatred, fear, misery. The portals had astronomically high EMF readings, correct?”
Geneva nodded. “Off the charts.”
“I’m sure you’re aware that high EMF levels can affect the brain, and therefore people’s moods and behaviors?”
“I read some of those testimonials during my research,” Geneva said. “Mostly from people suing power and phone companies, lawsuits that went nowhere in the courts.”
“Never underestimate the power of lawyers and lobbyists to discredit legitimate claims,” Jack said, “especially when there’s billions in profits at stake. I can tell you that EMF-related psychosis is very real. I’ve run into it a few times during paranormal investigations. You see, EMF spikes can indicate the presence of a spirit. However, sustained levels of strong electromagnetic fields from manmade sources, like those found near high-voltage wires, can alter brain waves and make people feel uneasy, like they’re being watched.”
“So, people think there’s a ghost in their house when there’s not,” Anna said.
“Exactly. There are protocols that I follow during investigations to qualify the EMF source,” Jack continued. “And with your invention,” he said to Geneva, “that job will get a whole heck of a lot easier, but that’s not important right now. What I’m getting at is that these portals could be spitting out EMFs that are designed to trigger extremely negative emotions, off the charts, as you said.”
“And then the portals feed on the negative energy they create,” Geneva said quietly, “sucking it back in.”
Jack and Geneva locked eyes, the current between them palpable. Two minds in simpatico. Anna squirmed a little, keeping an eye on Saul. He was following the conversation closely.
“Can EMFs cause headaches?” Anna asked, all too aware of the thumper she’d been lugging around in her head.
Jack looked surprised. “You’ve been having them, too?”
“The last week. Some real doozies.”
“Feedback loops…” Geneva murmured, eyes bright. “I think I got it! The portals are a positive feedback loop, just like the closed timeline curves of semiclassical gravity.”
Even Jack looked confused. Geneva was going all PhD on them.
Geneva tried to translate. “Physicists encounter a paradox when they analyze time and space as if they are part of a closed system. When vacuums such as wormholes create new particles, the curved timeline of the closed system eventually returns the new particles to their original point of creation, meaning there would now be two particles where before there was only one.”
“I think I see what you’re saying,” Jack said slowly, “but what does this have to do with the portals?”
“I believe they’re getting exponentially stronger,” Geneva said. “That would explain why certain people in Bloomtown”—Geneva looked pointedly at Jack—“seem to be acting more and more unstable with each passing day. And if we don’t stop it, it will only get worse.”
Jack beamed at Geneva and Anna felt a bit warm toward her, too. She wasn’t sure what Geneva was talking about, but it sounded plausible. The increasingly biza
rre events of the past few weeks finally had an explanation, and it wasn’t a nasty new breed of Tricksters or the solar flares. She couldn’t wait to tell Freddy. Yet something nagged at her. A piece of Saul’s story didn’t add up. If the entity tormenting him was so unwanted, why had he let it back into his life without a fight?
Jack pulled Saul to his feet. “This entity…where is it now?”
“Wandering,” Saul said. “I can still feel it a little. Almost like a cord is connecting us.” He pointed to the center of his chest. “Feels like a pulling here. I think it must have other hosts in other places—” His voice went flat. “But it will come back, and then it will punish me.”
“We’ll do what we can for you.” Jack turned to Anna. “How much holy water do we have left?”
“A couple jugs, and those were on credit.”
Jack looked back at Saul. “You’ll tell us where these portals are?”
Saul nodded.
“How many are there?”
“About a dozen. I’ll write you a list.”
Jack took the Windex bottle of holy water out of Anna’s backpack.
“I can spray you down. It will make it very unpleasant for that thing to come near you. Holy water is corrosive to a negative entity.”
“No,” Saul said, stepping back. “Save it for the portals. It's more important, please—I deserve whatever happens to me.”
“You have put people in danger, it’s true,” Jack said. “But I can't leave you unprotected.”
Anna blanched. “But he could have asked for help.” She confronted Saul. “Why didn't you?”
“Because,” Saul said, his fingers working the top buttons of his crisp, blue shirt. He spread the fabric apart, revealing a spattering of gruesome wounds on his chest. “It hurts me.”
Jack and Geneva gasped but Anna was unmoved. Because of Saul, Bloomtown was in shambles and her father was on the verge of losing both his business and his marbles. Yet, as bad as things were, there was reason for hope. The portals could be destroyed, and there was one person she knew who’d be dying to hear all about it.
Chapter Fifteen
Freddy
Anna checked Freddy’s backyard first. She expected to find him there as she had many times before, peering through his telescope pointed east toward the ocean and the darkest part of the sky. But his telescope sat several feet from where he lay in the grass, gazing at the ribbons of green that rolled above him in a celestial light show. It wasn’t until she tapped his shoulder with the tip of her sneaker that he noticed her, his eyes dark caverns in the dim light.
“Anna,” he whispered.
“You sleeping out here?”
“Just thinking.”
What about? The words were almost off her tongue, but she decided they could wait. Anna knelt beside him. “The Big News of the Day,” she said, “is that I found out what’s happening and it has nothing to do with the solar flares.”
“What’s happening where?”
His voice was flat and she couldn’t see his face, not the details. It made him look like a stranger, or a ghost.
“In Bloomtown, where else? Let’s go inside, and I’ll tell you all about it.”
For a moment he thought she’d come because the growing distance between them was hurting her, too, but no, that wasn’t why at all. Of course it wasn’t. Freddy turned his head from the vast cosmos, from his own insignificance, pressing his cheek against the cold soil and focusing on the blades of grass. But he found no comfort there either. All around him nature was in harmony. The stars above him, the grass, the insects and the trees, they belonged, but humans were a mutation. The only way he could ever truly belong was to decay.
When he sat up a new and dreadful weight, cementing in his skull all day, began to fall in painful clumps into his chest, turning his insides heavy and stiff. Who cared about the aurora borealis anyway? It didn’t mean anything. A painful buzzing started in his head. Nothing meant anything. Despite Anna’s presence, he’d never felt so alone.
“Dude, get up,” Anna said.
Freddy allowed her to pull him to his feet. The back of his light gray hoodie was dirty and wet. Without a word he climbed the steps of his screened-in back porch, barely holding the door open for Anna before shoving his hands back into his pockets. She followed him inside to the kitchen. Whatever he was sulking about—maybe the door slamming episode at the office?—he was sure to get over it when she told him about the portals.
Freddy’s mom, Gloria, was on the phone, her long curly hair tamed in a bun. Gloria winked at Anna and ruffled the mop on Freddy’s head as they passed. He clicked his tongue in annoyance before ascending the stairs, two at a time, toward his bedroom. Anna followed, the pain in her head sharpening as the sound of Gloria’s chatter faded away.
Anna would have done anything to feel her mother’s touch again, to hear her voice, but Freddy took all that for granted. She swallowed a strong surge of resentment, knowing that her exposure to the portals could have lingering aftereffects. The portals affecting her and Jack had been extinguished, and so, she hoped, would the fits of rage she now attributed to them. Still, she needed to be careful not to overreact.
Anna closed his bedroom door behind them. Freddy studied her impassively, but Anna was sure that the playful light in his eyes would return soon enough.
“That thing above Geneva’s bed,” she whispered, moving closer. “It was a portal.”
Instead of leaning toward her in his usual posture of coconspirator, Freddy straightened up, increasing the space between them. Did she have bad breath?
He raised an eyebrow. “A portal to where?”
“We’re not sure yet. But we know who made it. This real estate agent, you know, the guy with bleached teeth on the for sale signs in people’s yards, Saul Gleason?”
Freddy stared back at her blankly.
“You know him, c’mon. The guy. His face was plastered in the window of Yo! Yogurt for like, two years, on that dumb flyer.”
But Freddy remained nonplussed. “I guess.”
Anna had expected him to be excited, to at least care. She was talking about portals here, actual portals to an unknown world. Freddy had floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lined with books about astronauts and wormholes in space. He still had glow-in-the-dark solar system stickers on his ceiling—stickers that looked greenish and worn under the lamplight.
“Is something up, Freddy? You’re not having headaches, are you?”
Her own headache thudded along with the anxious pulse of a growing paranoia. Maybe she should get Emi and do a sweep of Freddy’s house. But if Freddy’s house was on Saul’s list, her Dad would’ve told her, wouldn’t he?
Freddy brushed some dirt from the back of his jeans. “No, Doctor Fagan. The Sunday night blues are a little worse than usual, that’s all.”
He plunked down in his chair and booted up his dinosaur of a PC. A guitar riff blasted out of his speakers before he turned the volume down.
She spoke without thinking. “Is that the Manarchists?”
Freddy’s glare grew icicles. “Shine’s cruddy band? You gotta be kidding.”
He dismissed her with a swivel of his chair, planting his back to her. Anna sighed and retreated to a corner of Freddy’s mattress. This wasn’t going well. She debated whether or not she should leave or give him a minute to chill the hell out.
Freddy hoped that Anna’s infatuation with Shine would pass like it had with the other idiots she’d crushed on over the years, but this one was sticking. Freddy forgave her a long time ago for not loving him back. But now she pulled farther from him every day, and their friendship, once thought unbreakable, was disintegrating. Except when she wanted something: a ride to school, help at the office, whatever she was doing here now. But it wasn’t him she wanted and maybe it never was. It hurt and Freddy was tired of hurting; he wanted a way out. He hit refresh on his keyboard, and there it was. An email popped up in his inbox from the Cosmology Institute in Florida. As he read it, th
e new heaviness inside him sunk into his legs, pooling at his feet like an anchor meant to drown him.
“Dear Mr. Simms, while we were impressed with your transcripts, you have not been selected to receive this year’s Young Physicists Scholarship. We wish you the best of luck with your future endeavors.”
The door opened and Gloria popped her head in. “Five hundred and fifty bucks a month. How's that for pocket change?”
Freddy turned around in his chair. “You’re supposed to knock first, and it doesn’t matter anyway.”
“Okay. I just thought you’d like to know that the man from the management office—”
Freddy cut his mother off. “I didn’t get in.”
“Oh, honey.” Her features relaxed. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “But, do you mind? We’re studying.”
Sluggish and sullen, Freddy wheeled his chair over to the door like it was a monumental effort and pushed it shut. Gloria’s shadow remained under the door for several seconds before her footsteps faded down the stairs.
Anna was on the verge of walking out herself, but then a high-pitched yapping erupted from the side of the bed. Penelope’s puppies were huddled on a blanket between a laundry basket and the wall, waking, it seemed, from a nap.
“The pups!” Anna dropped to the floor. The puppies charged her, licking her face in a frenzy of tiny tongues, soft paws and warm bellies.
Laughing, she looked at Freddy, but he was glaring at her.
“Did you forget about them?” His upper lip curled in disdain. “You did, didn’t you? You didn’t even know they were here.”
He was right. Anna had forgot about them. How could she? They were Penelope’s babies.
“It’s the portals,” she said, flustered, her face hot. “There was one in our basement, too. I’ve been trying to tell you. We think they’re messing with people’s heads, literally, messing with their brains.”
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