Pet

by Akwaeke Emezi

  Jam bit her lip. Pet was right, but even if it was wrong, she couldn’t take the chance. She wasn’t sure how to hold the picture of Redemption’s house and the family inside along with the things Pet was saying. It felt like one should push out the other entirely, like both couldn’t be real together. Jam wasn’t sure what to do about it, but it was clear she couldn’t afford to throw the possibilities away without even trying.

  It’s not that I believe you, she said, after a long pause. I still don’t see what could be wrong in that house…but I also don’t not believe you.

  Jam took a deep breath.

  If there’s something else happening, which I’m not sure there is, then I want to find out, she said. Okay?

  Pet released her shoulders and stood up, moving back to her side as they began the walk home again. Okay, it said.

  * * *

  —

  After she got home and Pet faded away, Jam pulled out her tablet and laid it flat on her bed, tapping on the screen to wake it up.

  “Call Redemption,” she said, her voice low.

  The tablet beeped once, then the line started ringing. Jam folded her legs on her egg-blue duvet and waited for Redemption to pick up. It took a few rings before the video call connected and Redemption’s face appeared on her screen. His hair and skin were damp, and he was drying himself with a towel.

  “Sorry, I was just getting out of the shower,” he said, his face stretching into an easy smile. “How you feeling?”

  I’m good, she signed, leaning the tablet up on its kickstand. You?

  “Chilling.” He pulled on a T-shirt and sat down, angling his screen to see her better. “Thanks for coming over today. I know it was a lot of people, I was worried you’d be flooded.”

  Jam shrugged. I wanted to show you something, she said.

  His eyes lit up. “Oh, dope.”

  Jam slid her legs off the bed, taking the tablet with her over to her desk. The heavy library books were there, lying open to the pages with the terrible pictures. They’d been there since the night she brought them home. After Pet arrived, Jam had flipped through the pages, wondering if there was anything in there that looked like it. There hadn’t been, which made sense, since Bitter had spun Pet out of nothing, after all.

  Jam flipped the camera to show Redemption the illustrations.

  “Whoa,” he said. “These are wild. Can you zoom in a little?”

  She held the tablet closer, scanning it over the pages, mouth-filled wings occupying the screen.

  “Those are angels??”

  Jam reversed the camera back to her face and nodded, setting the tablet down on her desk.

  “Yo, but they look like straight-up monsters, though.”

  That’s what I said, she answered, plopping into a chair. Bitter said monsters don’t look like anything.

  “Monsters gotta look like something,” he said. “How else would we know what they were?”

  They’re all gone. Jam didn’t quite believe the line, but they’d been taught it all their lives.

  “Okay, fine,” Redemption continued, “but monsters must’ve looked like something at some point. The angels had to identify them, right?”

  Some things must have been obvious.

  “Well, yeah. Like if someone was hurting other people all the time.”

  Maybe it’s not how people look, it’s what they do?

  Redemption nodded. “Makes sense.”

  An easy silence fell, and Jam wondered what to do next. Could she ask him if someone was hurting him, doing things that didn’t feel right? How was she supposed to look for the unseen things Pet kept talking about? It wasn’t her house, it wasn’t as if she could listen to the floorboards talk and trace the secrets. If she could, she’d find the feelings that lay behind the voices when the grown-ups were talking, hunt without moving, just with her hand pressed to the floor.

  “I wonder what their criteria were,” Redemption said.

  Whose? Jam asked.

  “The angels. When they were hunting.”

  Her skin skittered at the use of that word, Pet’s word, but Redemption was right, the work was hunting. Jam tried to imagine Lucille’s angels as hunters, remembering how Bitter had told her they’d had to do dark things, hard things. Now they were kindly adults who appeared on TV and came to the schools to give talks. Everyone revered them a little, but no one thought of them as scary, not really. The revolution had ended; there was nothing for them to scare off anymore. Maybe they had been scary during the revolution, though, if they had been like Pet, ripe with that righteous, boiling fire. Jam knew Pet tried not to let her see that fire, so it wouldn’t scare her, even though she wasn’t its target.

  Did you have to be scary in order to be a hunter?

  Pet had called her a hunter too, but Jam didn’t feel like she had the kind of power to make anyone afraid. She was just a regular kid, not some painted-into-life creature whose entire purpose was literally to catch monsters. She didn’t want to fight or be in a new revolution; she was just trying to help her friend in case he was in danger. Once they could get Redemption out and safe, Jam was perfectly fine with running as far away from the monster as possible. That wasn’t what a hunter did, and it wouldn’t be what the angels would do, but Jam didn’t want to be an angel. She just wanted to be herself, the self she was before Pet showed up and started making her look for unseen and unknown things.

  “So the obvious monsters would’ve been like the police and the billionaires,” Redemption was saying. “But the angels must have figured out how to find the ones that weren’t so obvious.”

  His curiosity was giving her an idea. What about the library?

  Redemption laughed. “You just wanna go see Ube, don’t you?”

  Jam blushed. Shut up!

  “I’m just saying, that’s like your favorite place.”

  I’m going to hang up on you, Jam threatened, laughing. She did love the library, partly because she loved the books there but also because it was nice to talk to Ube. He’d known Jam since she was a kid, and she came to him often with questions. He’d always answer them, tell her stories attached to the answer, pull out books and send her home with some, and it would always be Jam’s favorite part of the day.

  “Okay, fine.” Redemption grinned, backing off. “We’ll go tomorrow and ask your boyfriend.”

  Jam made a face at him, hiding the relief she felt in her stomach, heavy on the lining. If they looked up criteria, it could be like getting a guide on how to find a hidden monster. She might not even have to convince Redemption, because he’d be right there looking with her, so he’d know how to recognize a monster; he might even tell her everything right away. Then she’d be able to tell him about Pet, and they could figure out what to do next. Jam was still scared, but the library would have some answers, it always did. It would help them know what was unknown. Jam smiled at Redemption.

  Thanks, she signed.

  Redemption shrugged. “All knowledge is good knowledge. See you tomorrow!”

  Jam turned off her tablet after she hung up, then burrowed under her covers and took some deep breaths. She expanded her stomach like a balloon on the inhale and imagined stress leaving from the crown of her head on the exhale. Pet interrupted her by appearing slowly, a heaviness displacing the air.

  Well done, little girl, it said in her head.

  Jam growled and reached an arm out of her covers, grabbing a pillow and throwing it as hard as she could in its direction. Go away!

  She thought she heard Pet chuckle softly before it obliged her by fading into emptiness, leaving a tang of pride in the air behind it.

  CHAPTER 7

  Jam went down to breakfast in the morning as if the skin of her life was normal, as if it hadn’t bubbled and warped and fallen off. Pet was a loud secret in her, a wrong note in the usua
l harmony of her house, making it discordant, guilty. She could feel the wrongness warbling through the floorboards, and it made her want to finish the hunt quickly, so the secret would no longer be a secret, so everything could return to how it all used to be. Deep inside her, Jam wasn’t sure if that was even possible, but she held on to the hope anyway.

  “You doing okay, love?” Aloe asked across the breakfast table, and Jam started, her fork clattering against her plate. She’d been so in her head, his voice was a surprise, his concerned face a foreign arrangement of skin and muscle. Her mother was still upstairs.

  I’m fine, she signed. She wished he and Bitter would stop asking how she was, if she was mad at them. Their worry felt like a blanket they kept trying to throw over her shoulders, one she kept having to shrug off. They had tried to talk to Jam about Pet, but she didn’t want to, and her parents weren’t the type of people to force her to open up, so they let her walk away from the conversation each time, and Jam pretended as if she didn’t see the synchronized disappointment flashing over both their faces. It built a stone of guilt in her chest, and Jam added it to the pile that had been forming there since she told Pet to stay. The best thing to do was to focus on the hunt and not on her parents or the lies she was telling them with her silence. She ate breakfast quickly, then retreated up to the bathroom to pee and was washing her hands when Pet appeared. Jam felt it gathering in the air before its body showed up, and she watched it appear bit by bit, fur and feathers and horn like dried blood.

  Hey, she said.

  Pet nodded at her and crouched against the wall next to the shower, its body aggressively eclipsing the rest of the bathroom. It watched her through the mirror, its mouth hanging open, smoke puffing out in short breaths.

  How was your night? Jam asked, wondering where it spent the time away from her but not wanting to ask.

  Busy. A hunt takes preparation, readying for readiness, it replied.

  The bathroom door slid open, and Bitter walked in, tying a scarf around her head. Jam froze with her hands tangled in a towel, her heartbeat spiking to a blur.

  Don’t worry, Pet said. She can’t see me.

  “Morning, sweetness.” Bitter dropped a kiss on Jam’s forehead and slid the mirror aside to show the shelves behind. “I just looking for my face serum. You seen it?”

  Jam shook her head, and Bitter hummed to herself, looking around the bathroom. Jam watched her with wide eyes. There were two bathrooms in that moment, lying on top of each other. One was the room in Bitter’s eyes, with the deep tub against one wall, a stack of books lying next to it. The shower, with its patterned tiles and clear doors; the small bottle of serum sitting on a shelf inside. Bitter saw it and let out a pleased “ah!” as she went toward the shower. Jam stared as her mother moved through the second bathroom, the one with Pet in it. Bitter passed through the creature’s body as if it was nothing but gold and feathered fog. She touched Jam’s cheek and gave her a soft, worried look before leaving with the serum, and Jam sagged with relief as soon as the door slid closed again.

  This is too stressful, she told Pet. I just need it to be over.

  The hunt takes as long as the hunt takes, it replied. I think you should tell the boy about me.

  Jam leaned against the sink and folded her arms. Tell who? Redemption?

  Yes. This keeping of a secret, it is not a good thing to keep, you are keeping too many and they do not fit inside your heart, they will keep spaces between you and your humans.

  I didn’t know you were so concerned about me or my humans.

  Pet tilted its chin up. You need the boy to trust you, it said. Secrets do not help trust, do not help the hunt, which needs his trust.

  Ah. Jam tightened her mouth. It’s the hunt you’re worried about. Of course.

  It is always the hunt, little girl.

  She scuffed the floor with her foot. I don’t think we should tell him. It’s better if we just stick to the original plan.

  Pet shook its head at her. Do you smell your own fears? it asked. They are so strong when they leak from you.

  Jam stared at the floor. She hated being accused of fear, of moving with fear. It didn’t matter that she really was scared, but she just didn’t want to be seen as that, someone who was maybe a coward. Part of why she didn’t want to tell Redemption about Pet was because it was scary to think about how he might react, if he’d freak out, if he’d be mad that she hadn’t told him earlier. It was even harder to think about telling him why Pet was there and that his house was the beginning, a monster’s lair, the starting den. She’d had such a difficult time herself accepting that there could be a monster in his family, how would he take it? But then again, if he was the one being hurt, wouldn’t he already know that? Jam imagined Redemption being furious at having a secret discovered, and even just imagining it was painful, because then it would mean that he had a secret that he hadn’t shared with her. He couldn’t be mad at her for not telling him about Pet, though, in that case. Could one secret cancel out the other?

  But also, there was a small chance that Redemption didn’t even know he was being hurt. Maybe he thought whatever was happening was okay, maybe the monster had lied that well to him, and she would have to be the one to break the news that none of it should be happening. What if he didn’t believe her? What if there was a choice between her and the monster and he called her a liar or said she was being crazy and making the whole Pet thing up, and then he went and chose the monster? What if—

  Pet reached out with both its feathered arms and pulled her against its torso. You’re spiraling, it said. Just breathe, little girl. Slow and deep, breathe in the air, little human, stop thinking.

  Jam closed her eyes, feeling its warm fur through the cotton of her T-shirt, the faint coolness of its goldfeathered arms and the distinct chilliness of her mother’s hands stitched to its wrists, a gradation of temperature falling off at the extremities.

  Why do you have a pulse? she asked, trying to push the anxiety about Redemption away.

  Because I have a body, Pet answered.

  So…does that mean you have a heart?

  Something like that. Not the way you humans talk about the abstract one. But I have an organ that moves fluids around in me.

  Blood?

  No. My body isn’t from this world. I am made of things you have no names for.

  Jam nodded. Her own pulse had settled, and the wildfire beating of wings in her head had calmed down a little. I think I’m okay now, she said.

  Pet released her and drew back a foot or two, watching her as she composed herself. Jam looked at her reflection, backdropped by the creature, then wiped her hands over her face. I want to tell him, she said. But I’m scared he won’t believe me. About any of it.

  I will show myself to him, Pet said. It is hard not to believe me when I am before you.

  Jam thought about her parents. I don’t know about that, she said.

  Your parents are adult humans, Pet replied, pulling on the thought behind the words. Younger ones have fewer blocks about belief.

  It was disconcerting when Pet dipped in and out of her head. Jam wondered if it was reading all her thoughts, if that counted as an invasion of privacy.

  Pet scoffed. I respect your privacy, it said. I am only in part of your head and only because you humans, your heads are always open. If you are uncomfortable, I can try to ignore your head.

  Jam thought about it, then shrugged. I don’t mind it so much.

  It was actually kind of comforting to have Pet there, like she wasn’t alone all the time. You need intimacy to be a unit, and the seamless knowing Pet had of her made up a little for how much she missed the closeness she used to share with her parents.

  Don’t go into Redemption’s head, though, she warned.

  Pet angled its face. The hunter only looks into the head of the other hunter, it sai
d. We are connected, little girl. I would not enter the thoughts of any other human.

  Oh. Okay. Good.

  Tell the boy when you see him today, it continued. I will show myself, and then he will assist us in the hunt.

  Jam made a hesitant face. I’m not sure I want to tell him everything, she said.

  Everything is many things, Pet replied. What would you like him to know?

  Jam twisted her fingers together. It’s fine if we show you to him, she said, and we can tell him you’re here to hunt a monster, but I don’t want him to know it’s in his house.

  Pet nodded and didn’t say anything. Jam wondered what it was thinking, if it thought that leaving out that small piece of information counted as a lie. Maybe her plan was messed up, but Jam hoped that once Redemption got over the shock of seeing Pet, he would be excited about looking for a monster. There was no way that excitement would remain if it became personal, if he knew they were hunting in his house. It was better, for now, if Redemption thought he was saving someone else; everyone’s always braver when they think they’re the hero. And somewhere along the way, things would click for him and he would realize or recognize what was going on, that the monster was in his house, and Jam wouldn’t have to be the one to tell him. It made her chest feel lighter, the thought of avoiding that whole ugly conversation, but doubt whispered through her like smoke seeping under a closed door.

  What then? Pet asked. You’ll keep that secret forever? You’ll never tell him you knew the monster was in his house all along?

  Jam smothered the doubt silent. What was important was finding the monster. It didn’t matter how, or what pieces of information fell through the cracks in the meantime. All that mattered was making sure Redemption was safe.

  Pet cleared its throat. I’m going to go now, it announced. Call for me when the boy is here, when you are ready to tell him your halfway truths.

  Jam glared at it, ready to snap a retort, but Pet left before her thoughts could form a shape. The air went empty, and she was alone in the bathroom.