The Devils You Know

by M. C. Atwood

  His voice is silky. He sounds different than when I accidentally go out of my way to eavesdrop on him at school. He sounds like he’s comfortable right now or something. Hope flashes through me. I look at his nice, brown eyes. He seems like a really good, beautiful, incredibly hot person. Maybe he wouldn’t be grossed out by me and what I’ve done. But then I feel my face get red.

  Of course he would. I’m grossed out by what I’ve done. Am doing.

  Ashley sidles up behind him and leans into him. “Paul, thank god you’re on this trip. You’re the only person here who’s worthwhile.” She flips her hair.

  I’m standing here, right?

  Paul looks at me and she follows his gaze and looks me up and down. She says, “Who is this?”

  I open my mouth, then close it. She goes on. “Anyway, I brought this flask and I am totally ready to get the fuck out of here, so do you want to follow me? Let’s start this tour early. I am NOT going with the rest of these peasants, I’ll tell you that. Especially not with that freak Gretchen.” She blinks her gorgeous blue eyes and licks her lips.

  Paul looks at me again and then half-closes his eyes at her—maybe he’s sleepy? “I don’t know, it might be cool if we expand this party.”

  She says, “She can come, too. Whatever. Bring who you want.”

  And then she turns on her really high heel and walks toward the entrance of the House.

  Paul made sure I would come. Who cares that Ashley Garrett doesn’t know who I am? Or if she does, thinks I’m literal poop? Paul asked me, literal poop, to come.

  I look around and see Ms. Harper talking to some other students. She’s gesturing in huge movements—she’s one of those poor excited teachers who likes her job. I feel sorry for her. But it looks like we could actually make it out of the entrance without her knowing.

  Paul edges toward the entrance and Ashley, then turns and smiles at me. He flicks his head in a “come on, this way” gesture. It’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. Warmth spreads all the way through me. Normally I would never disobey a teacher or do anything naughty. Except for that one really big thing—nothing like this. But this is Paul. And he is reaching out his hand to me.

  I reach out and take his hand and we smile at each other.

  The warmth shoots through me now. I can’t stop smiling.

  “Wanna go through this crazy chaotic House with me?”

  I nod and he looks at my mouth for a second and leans in, and my body turns liquid. Lightning flashes in my down there parts. Is he . . . is he going to kiss me?

  Do, Paul, do. I know we barely know each other, but I have crushed on you forever. Go ahead. I want to.

  I WANT TO.

  But then he snaps his head back when he hears Gretchen and Dylan move up behind us. He leans back and in the voice he uses in school, says, “Cool. Let’s do it, then.”

  GRETCHEN

  Dylan won’t stop giving me his “I’m sorry” puppy eyes. Which really means he’s just sorry we didn’t do it on the bus, which is just logistically stupid anyway. But I know he thinks he can talk me into doing it some place in the House. Truth be told, it’s been a while since I’ve wanted to do it with him anywhere. Maybe a change of venue is the thing. He’s just not . . . what I want right now. But that’s something I don’t think about because I have no time for the drama that will definitely come up if we have to talk about it.

  But still, the little weasel can’t just sign me up for shit. It’s the principle of the matter.

  Unlike everyone else on this damn trip, though, I’ve never been to Boulder House. We never took Leave It to Beaver vacations like this when I was growing up. My dad left way too early for vacations. Everyone else is only here to get out of school, but I have to admit: I am actually, totally, 100 percent digging this place. This is completely my type of place. It’s so funky, I can hardly stand it. And we’re just in the information center. I want to live here.

  Not that I’d let Dylan know.

  He stares at me again with his cloudy baby blues, cloudy like a storm coming in, and looks up through his eyeliner. The boy is good-looking in a faux tweaked-out heroin sort of way. I bet a ton of people must think he’s actually on heroin because he’s so nuts, but the only thing he’s ever done is weed. We’ve been together since 8th grade and there’s nothing we don’t know about each other. Which, in some ways, sucks.

  Dylan tugs on my pinkie and motions toward the entrance to the House. Ashley, Paul, and that quiet girl (Vicky?) are looking around all stupid like no one can see them. Actually Ms. Harper can’t, and everyone else seems to be texting.

  Dylan whispers, “Let’s blow this bitch, baby. Go through the House in our own time. I’ll make it up to you for dragging you along, I promise. And I think this is your kinda place, for realsies.”

  I stare daggers at him. “So now you want to add detention to the list of shit you’re putting me through.” I don’t even try to keep my voice down and Ms. Harper half looks up then keeps talking, waving her arms around so she looks like she’s batting away flies.

  He looks away and swallows, then looks back. “Baby . . .”

  I sigh like I’m doing him the biggest favor in the world. But I’m already designing a new clothing line based on this place. I’m getting that itchy feeling I get when I want to start sketching. I pat the pocket of my monster bag to make sure I’ve got my sketchbook. There’s the outline of a magazine in there, too—something I brought along just for eye candy. There’s a girl in the mag I think is stupid hot. My girl-on-girl fantasies have been on point lately. I shoot a look at Dylan. I wish I could fantasize about him and still get off. I wish I wanted to have sex with him again. I just . . . don’t. For, like, a year now.

  I say to him, “Fine. Let’s go. But you owe me big time.”

  Dylan smiles like a maniac and crosses his eyes then gives this weird half-assed gang sign he made up and always does and will probably get shot for someday. His black fingernails flash and I can’t help but give a half-smile. The boy is seriously weird. I adore him, even if I don’t want to do him.

  I look toward the entrance again and watch Ashley, Paul, and the girl disappear, then I wait a few beats. No way am I running into Ashley Garrett in there, the bitch-hole. I never use that word lightly, either—sister strength and all that. But Ashley Garrett is pure-D bitchitude and a traitor to our sex, so she gets zero respect from me.

  I look at Dylan sideways and he smiles and inches away from the group of students. I inch away, too, and for once, for whatever reason, no one notices us go. Which is weird because everyone is always noticing me.

  We show our tickets to the bored attendant in front of the entrance to the House. I peek around the corner, excitement shooting through me like a first kiss. This is going to kick ass.

  PAUL

  I would not wish any companion in the world but you.

  God help me, but Shakespeare quotes—this one from The Tempest, stormy like how my hormones are right now—are running through my head. It’s hard to think when her pretty face is taking up all the space. I’m half-swaggering, half-skipping. I forget how I’m supposed to walk.

  Violet is pretty, for sure, but there’s something else. Something sweet and smart and . . . something that makes me want to put capes on mud puddles and be all chivalrous and stuff. She, like, listens when I talk. And isn’t fronting AT ALL. For real. I know this because she always does something kind of awkward around me. It’s adorable. Like she always accidentally snorts when she laughs and then goes bright red. Which I’m pretty sure means she likes me back. I mean, she’s like the least secretive person I’ve ever met. My mom would say, “She has no guile.” Plus, she’s soft.

  I put my hand on the small of her back as we move toward the entrance to the actual House in the boulder. Ashley’s high heels flash before us.

  The entrance is actually up this long, bridge-like
ramp that zigzags up to the House. The layout of this place is mad bizarre. All of it. You drive through the parking lot and there are these HUGE sculptures with gigantic metal bugs and worms and stuff on them. So . . . great mood killer there. Then you go into the lodge-like building that looks like it’s the only building but it’s actually just sitting on one hill. Then, in the back of the lodge you go up the ramp we’re going up now to get to the House that sits on an adjacent hill to the right. Then you have to go back down the ramp to the lodge where the entrance to the warehouses is. It’s like a fever dream or something. I’m already disoriented and I’ve just started the tour. I caught a glimpse of the warehouses when I was walking into the lodge. I could see buildings climbing down the hill to the left, going down, down, down, like they were part of the landscape. So far downhill that the shadow of the House covers them.

  Ashley turns around like she’s reading my mind. “The House is fine, but it’s the warehouses we should go to. The House is too small to get lost in.” She winks at me and half-scowls at Violet, like she can’t even muster the energy to dislike her.

  My kingdom for a horse to run Ashley over. If I had a sword . . . I probably wouldn’t do anything, if I’m honest. But I’d want to. For Violet.

  We reach the top of the ramp where an old-fashioned looking sign says, this way for the tour. The three of us stop and look at it. I feel Violet stiffen next to me and I wonder if she’s actually scared. I have to admit, the sign is . . . well, strangely terrifying. The letters are written in a font that I’d imagine the devil might use on the contract to buy your soul.

  Ashley turns and says to me, “Well, here we go. Into the mouth of the beast.” Something flashes across her face, but then she winks and turns on her super high heel and goes through the door.

  Now, I am not a person who believes in ghosts or the supernatural or anything. Like, I tried for years to feel or hear or see something from my dad that said he forgave me and nothing—I mean NOTHING—happened. But if I did believe in that stuff, I would swear there is a shimmer when Ashley walks through the entrance. It freaks me out, so without even thinking, I grab Violet’s hand.

  She stares at our hands and stays still. I am barely breathing. I think about how ballsy this move was, accident or not, and suddenly I lose my nerve, so I let go.

  Why’d I let go?

  Violet smiles at me, and I feel a loosening up of everything in her. Which makes me stand up taller.

  We lock eyes, and she gives me a little head movement that says, “Let’s go.” The same one I gave her to get her to sneak away with me. Goddamn it’s adorable. I take a look at the sign again and another Shakespeare quote pops into my head, this time from Macbeth: “Tis the eye of childhood that fears a painted devil.”

  Just a painted devil, that sign. The eerie feeling clamped on my nervous system? Just a superstitious fantasy. And anyway, about right now, I’d travel to hell and back for Violet.

  This time I mean to grab her hand. And I don’t think twice when together we walk through the door, side-by-side.

  DYLAN

  Gretchen peek-a-boos me from the corner of her eye. I know this look—she is trying to be mad still but isn’t feeling it. Hopefully her look also means she’s horny. Adrenaline spikes through me and I feel that fire of turn-on. Yeehaw. I love me some Gretch when she’s horny. Which lately hasn’t been, like, ever. I shift my legs and try to let my down-theres breathe. We go through the entrance to the ramp thingy that leads all the way up to the door.

  “You haven’t been here, right?”

  I snort. “As if.”

  Gretchen nods, her eyebrows furrowed. “Yeah, some of us don’t get vacations. We’re too busy trying to, you know, pay for heat.”

  “Yeah,” I say, and swallow a big ol’ glob o’ guilt down. Gretch thinks my family is, um, different than what it is? I may have told her that my parents were never around. And poor. And might have hinted that they were neglectful. Truth is, I have been here before. My parents took me here like five years ago. They thought Satan built this place. They might be right. A lesson and a warning and a weekend outing all wrapped up in one creepy visit. I guess families are supposed to do that shit. The outing part anyway.

  She moves on. “Look at these statues.” She points to some skeletons, at their blank eyeholes. “And remember those ones we saw coming in with the things crawling on them?” Her own eyes are bright. She is digging this place.

  I mush my lips into her neck, pushing her until she hits the side of the ramp.

  She pushes me off. “Jesus, Dylan.”

  But I felt her curves in the shuffle and my body is starting to heat up.

  Too bad we’re at the entrance now. But . . . it’s, like, there’s something covering the doorway, kind of like a film. Hard to see, but if you look just right . . . Jell-O-y. Like if I stuck my hand in the doorway, goo would slather my arm and turn me into a goo-monster. I don’t remember that from last time. I look at Gretch and then turn back to the entrance. The Jell-O has vanished. Did I imagine it?

  Gretch doesn’t hesitate—something I love about my girl—and we walk straight in. It takes a minute for my eyes to adjust and I swear when I hear the door shut, it sounds final. Like an Amen. If I was a Catholic, I’d give the sign of the cross.

  “Whoa,” she whispers.

  I breathe in her ear, “Wait till you get to the warehouses.”

  She flips her head to me. “I thought you hadn’t been here before.”

  I feel the oops-blood rush to my head. Nice one, Dylan. I stutter. I stammer. I swallow. And then I come up with this: “I heard Ms. Harper say it.”

  Her eyes narrow and I know she doesn’t believe me. So I do what I would do with my mom and dad when I want the heat off. I point randomly.

  The best thing about pointing anywhere in the Boulder House is you are guaranteed to land on something rad.

  I end up pointing at a stained glass coffee table in another room. And it is mega-cool. It’s some samurai dragon shit or something. It’s long and big and takes up the entire room. We walk to the room and lean in, looking at the table. It’s got people-shaped shapes in some of the panes in the table. Looks like they’re screaming—it’s creepy with a capital DAMN.

  “What is this place?” she wonders out loud.

  We move past the table, down the stairs. Tan carpet worn from thousands of feet trampling grosses up the House, but otherwise it is a motherfucking house in a motherfucking boulder. It’s dark and gloomy—swirly dust dances around us every time we move. You have to duck to get around things. There are swank ’70s corners with velvet couches that you just KNOW Max-Whatever used for some love shacking. There’s also a kitchen and a ginormous fireplace that is actually fire-placing with actual fire. Like, crackling. Little windows here and there shoot out shafts of light. But it’s a losing battle. The place is shadow and dust.

  I feel like something’s missing, but I don’t know what it is.

  Gretchen has stopped to look at a cubbyhole with a baby grand piano.

  It bursts out playing and Gretchen screeches and jumps.

  Hell, I jump, too. Then I remember, this place is full of instruments that play by themselves. Fucked. Up. And awesome.

  I put my man-child arms around Gretchen and she half leans into me, half feels ready to pounce. That about sums up our relationship.

  She flips around and her hair is gleaming from some light up and behind her. She looks like an angel. My heart falls in love with her just a little more.

  “This place is so freaky.” She smiles big. “I love it!” I can’t help but smile big, back.

  “Yeah, it’s pretty rocking. Like you.” I lean in to kiss her, but she’s already gone. We’ve walked through the whole part of the House that is in the boulder and we’ve already hit the eternity room.

  My dad wouldn’t go out there the last time we came—the h
uge, all-glass room perched on the boulder. There are tons of mirrors in there, so you see yourself and the landscape all around over and over and over, stretching off to infinity. But the bottom is clear. The room sticks out, like 200 feet up, over the forest, so you’re constantly aware of the distance to the ground. Thinking about what it would be like to fall. Or what it would be like to walk on air.

  My dad said, “If God wanted us to walk on air, he’d have given us winged feet.”

  My mom laughed hard at that one. You know. God humor.

  Now, as Gretch and I stand at the big entrance to the room, with another self-playing band starting up—this time with the theme from Jaws, nice touch—I realize what’s been poking at my brain.

  People.

  Or, like, their absence.

  There’s no one in here.

  Uneasiness starbursts on my skin, prickle prickle. Maybe it’s because it’s in the middle of the day. Maybe they cleared it out for the school trip?

  The starbursts turn to sweat. Something ain’t right.

  Gretch has walked into the eternity room and is staring down to the trees below. “Holy shit, Dylan. This place is INSANE!”

  Her words seem to echo off the glass. And right at that moment, the Jaws theme stops. I hear the ticking of the clock somewhere. And then it stops.

  Just, silence. A bead of sweat trickles down my temple. “Gretch, babe, let’s go see those freaky warehouses Ms. Harper was talking about.”

  She takes one last long look at the forest floor way below, then up at herself and the forest around us, and walks to me. I am looking around me, eyes darting everywhere. When she gets to me, she and all the other Gretchens in the mirror say, “What’s up, squirrely?”

  “Where are Paul and Ashley? And that other girl, Violet?”

  Gretchen shrugs and furrows her eyebrows. She always looks mean when she does that, but she’s actually not pissed. It still scares people off. I think she likes it. “Who gives a shit?”