I had to squint to dig the guy’s face from out of my memory. I had seen his fake tan and whitened teeth before. But where?
“His name is Mason Scarborough. Runs a kids show or something? Dresses like an effeminate sailor?”
“Holy crap! Captain Cross is possessed by a Shade? I wondered why his show was getting weird. And don’t look at me like that. I was only watching it because my roommate keeps watching it.”
Barnem sat forward. “What else has it done? Anything weird?”
Remembering my sister and Donaldson’s reactions, I showed Barnem the pictures on my phone. He swiped and handed it back unimpressed. “Shades aren’t stupid, Grey. Even without a host, they can hide in plain sight. The only reason you can see its true form is because of the pact you made with it. And I can always see them. To everyone else, it doesn’t register.”
I felt so lost. How could I screw up so badly? I mean, I know how I could, I never expected that I would manage the size and scope of such a thing. Slumping in my chair, I mushed my hands into my face until my cheeks hurt. “This has all gone to hell, and no the phrasing isn’t lost on me, thank you very much. I have a psycho after me. And you’re telling me Captain Cross is possessed with more demons on the way. I’m never going to get my life back, am I?” I looked up at Barnem as he stared out of the window. “What should I do?”
The Seraph sighed. “You can jump on a plane headed in any direction. Stay in someone’s house. Change your hair color, your name, the way you sign your checks. Don’t answer the phone. Don’t have human contact. Never go out at night. Pray often.”
I took out my mom’s bank card. Petty wanted to meet in about an hour for this thing that could do nothing to save my ass. I was out of options “You really think all of that would help, Barnem?”
“Not one bit,” he replied, and tipped his can at me before taking his last sip.
CHAPTER 14
Petty dabbed the edges of her mouth with a napkin and ordered dessert. I entertained myself by pouring more salt into my water and using a fork to swirl it up into a big cloud. The restaurant was a new eatery within walking distance from my apartment; a swanky French/American fusion spot, which meant that they cut up croquettes and called them “Frencher Fries” for $11.95. The damn napkin I had folded on my lap was made of better material than my bedsheets at home. I really wasn’t in the mood for her, or public scrutiny, or fucking bread baskets that came with oil and vinegar instead of copious amounts of butter. But there I was, trying my best to be civil when all my soul was needing at the time was one good self-implosion. I was teetering on it the more Petty didn’t reply to my question. Even after I handed her my mom’s card. Whatever money was on it, I had no care for. I needed my sister to answer.
“You want to come back with me? Back to the UK?”
“I need …” and this grated the shit out of me for saying so, but I still managed, “I can’t stay here. I need your help.” When she blinked at me, I added, “Ingrid.”
Petty nearly soiled herself hearing the name come out of my mouth. She was wearing this plum blouse and black skirt. It made her look regal (like a regal bitch, but still …). Most importantly, her hair was in a tight, unforgiving bun; one that pulled on her scalp. The Petty I knew had wild hair, hair that would swallow a comb, curls that made her brown hair explode outward like a fiery mane. Also, I hadn’t realized how much weight Petty had lost staying over there. She was nothing like the sister I grew up with.
“Oh, Mandy.” Reaching out, she patted my hand, but the way a stranger would do to a dog she had found with no intention to keep. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“What?”
She seemed honestly blown back by my reaction. “Come on now. You? Moving in with me? I live in Winchester, darling, not some gross motel.”
I tried to hold it together. “If it’s your husband, what’s his face―”
“It’s not. Look, I know it’s been hard on you. I don’t have to imagine, my dear. I already know how hard it is living with our parents, living in this city, without going completely crazy.”
“I’m not crazy. I didn’t say that.”
“Now, Mandy. No one called you crazy,” she said, raising the “patronizing” to one hundred. “I’m agreeing with you. This is me, agreeing with you. I’m on your side. I’ve supported my big sister throughout everything, don’t you forget. I’ve seen how bad you can get. The ticks, the episodes.”
My left hand started shaking. “Don’t call them episodes, Petty. You don’t know shit.”
A waiter came by to ask if I could lower my voice. I glared at him until he slid the fuck away.
Petty only shook her head. “Honestly, Mandy, always making a scene. It’s no wonder you hardly go to places like this and frequent that … burger place instead.”
“Burly’s? Last time I checked, Petty, we both ate there as kids!” I slammed the fork down, making the appropriate amount of mess on the table between us. Reaching into my back pocket, I pulled out the card and my mom’s info and tossed it into Petty’s salad.
“I don’t want a dime of it,” I shouted, standing up. “If it’ll make you go away, far the fuck away, take the whole thing. And I think you should take some of that money to a good surgeon while you’re here, Petty. See about getting that silver spoon pulled out as soon as possible.”
Petty only tittered. “Clever. But I was not born with a silver spoon in my mouth, deary.”
“Never said it was shoved in your mouth,” I tittered back.
I was going to let this be my parting shot, finally leaving this whole thing behind me, but Petty snagged my forearm as I tried to walk by. She clasped it so hard that her nails nearly broke through my skin.
I could see it in her eyes. Something went off in Petunia “Ingrid” Grey. Suddenly, with her accent hanging on for dear life, the Queens girl came out of her. “You’ve always been funny. Funny, funny. Amanda is always cracking jokes. But you know what’s not hilarious? You know what’s kind of sad? Borderline pathetic? How about the amount of years I had to put up with Mom and Dad coddling your ass after your episodes, your breakdowns, your meltdowns? Or the fact that you can’t keep a job to save your life? Oh, oh. I know. How about how Mom and Dad decided to homeschool you, which meant I had to be homeschooled? They never wanted to put their foot down and own up to the fact that their oldest was ill and needed help. They never asked me. Me! I was the normal one, and they trampled over me running to pick your ass up every time you fell flat on your face. It was always about ‘Mental Mandy’.”
The last barb cut so deep that it made me lightheaded. Prying her stupid fingers off of me, I stormed out of there. Part of me wished I had not given her Mom’s card. Part of me wished that I had ordered the snow crab, or pelican soup, or at least the fucking braised swordfish to slap onto Petty’s tab. I wanted to punch something, anything.
It took me forever to purge Petty’s stupid face from my mind, the way her eyes were turned up at me from the table I had ruined. Part of me wanted to go back and flip out, but I didn’t want to give her ammunition. A normal life? Episodes? She’s never even seen what I can do in an episode. She doesn’t even want to know. Uh oh, here comes the crazy again! Punch, punch, punch, die, bleeding die.
A few blocks down, after finally wrestling her out of my thoughts, I took a breath. Petty was taking her expensive bags, her fufi ratdog, and getting the hell out of my life. I considered myself the royal idiot for thinking that she had somehow changed. Petunia Grey—the godsend of kin; the patron saint of the perfect life. This was the woman who had an online profile with more pictures of her bags and shoes than her actual face.
Passing a small fruit stand, I spotted one of the community papers and stopped. Hilary Clamp was on the front page. The picture they posted of her was one of her smiling in a nice blue flower top. She was my age, I’m guessing. Seemed social, happy with he
r life. I don’t know where I was pulling this from. Maybe most of it was pooling inside of me, making me sick. But what else could I do? Instead of letting the entropy set in right then and there, I pulled my hood over my head and hurried home.
And that’s when I noticed footsteps picking up the pace behind me.
It was still pretty early. The sun had gone down but not totally. Tons of people were around, but every time I glanced back, there was nobody there, or there were too many somebodys to pick one nobody out. I dipped into a few stores to see if I could shake the feeling only to come out and feel it again. Those same steps closing in.
Finally I ran, full speed, like a maniac down Brook Avenue. My plan was simple: make the next hard right―which would leave me a straight shot right to my apartment―but then spin around and wait at that corner, catching the would-be tail by surprise.
The first part worked. I swerved around the corner, then hit a 180. But when I came around in my “gotcha moment” my pursuer turned out to be two people who half-assedly dove behind a nearby mound of trash. Not before I spotted their faces.
Realizing who these jerks were, I got ready for a fight. As I got closer to their hiding spot, I heard:
“RUN BITCH, OMMAGAHD! RUN BITCH, OMMAGAHD!”
“Are you kidding me?” one voice whispered to the other. “Are-you-kidding-me?”
The second voice replied, “I’m sorry. Thought it was on silent.”
“Your damn mind is on silent. Go check and see if she’s still there.”
“I am!” I shouted.
“Goddammit, Phil.”
“Get a fucking life, Gary.”
“Come out, you two,” I snapped, shoving my hand in my coat pocket. I carried my can of mace on me, but I wasn’t sure that in this case, it was enough. “I have a gun on me and I’d rather not shoot you until you tell me why you’re following me.”
“Wait. Would she have a gun?”
“I don’t know, Gary. Dammit.” The bald guy from the Bryant Park cult stood up with his hands in the air.
“Where’s Tweedle-Dee?”
The second guy was much taller but chunkier. He was the red-haired guy from the park as well. “I’m Gary.”
“Phil,” the other guy said.
“Phil. Gary. I’m the girl who’s about reached her asshole quota for today so you’ll have to speak up. Firing from my pocket tends to increase my chances of hitting testicles for some reason.”
Phil and Gary glanced at each other, trying to figure out what to say. I had to admit, sure they were following me, and yes they had gone all creepy back at the park, but they both were pretty pathetic looking. And I know pathetic looking. They looked closer to being one of those guys who becomes famous for the ridiculous way he died. A tipped over port-o-potty or trampolining during a lightning storm. That kind of stuff. Part of me was about to relax when I spotted the carving on Phil’s head.
Whipping out the can of mace and pointing it at them, I started blurting, “Fuckfuckfuck! It was you!”
Gary lowered his hands. “Oh, she only has mace, Phil. She can’t really hurt us if—”
I lobbed the can and it struck him right in between the eyes. Gary doubled over. “For Christ’s sake!”
Pissed at myself for tossing it, I threw up my fists. “Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh fuck.”
“Wait, wait,” Phil shouted. “Okay. What are you talking about?”
“You did it. One of you. Or both of you. You killed Hilary Clamp. And that other guy.”
Greg stood up groggily, a red welt growing between the top of his glasses and right below his eye carving, and turned to his friend disapprovingly. “Aw, Phil. You didn’t?”
“No, you idiot.”
“Oh.”
“I don’t know Hilary Clamp or … that other guy. We haven’t killed anyone. Promise.”
“Bullshit. You were staring at me in the park. And you carve into your own forehead. Sounds like a creep psycho murderer to me.”
“But I’m not,” he insisted. “I’m not any of those.”
That’s when I noticed that Gary had walked up beside me, whipped around, and started rubbing his chin. “Hmm. You know, and call it a hunch, but I think I believe him.”
I threw a shot to the big idiot’s kidneys and pushed him away. “Get back there, you moron!”
“Right, right. My bad.” Gary took his place beside his friend who only looked at him mortified.
“Look. Yes, we saw you in the park, okay? We did. And yeah, we stared because,” he looked at Gary, “because of reasons. But that doesn’t make us murderers. No one killed anyone. And we aren’t here to kill you. We promise. Not here to hurt you in any way.”
I watched them for a few seconds, my heart still beating in my ears. “So? If you’re not here to hurt me, what are you here for?”
Phil and Gary looked at each other and nodded.
That’s when Gary smiled and said, “Your autograph.”
CHAPTER 15
So there the three of us were. I wanted them nowhere near my apartment, so I pulled them into an organic tea bistro thingy that used to be a shoe shop. Regardless of its past or present, it still smelled like feet to me.
Phil seemed as reluctant to talk as I was. He sat hunched over, rocking a bit. He face was drawn, eyes bloodshot. Couple that with his ripped white T-shirt, the fairly worn leather jacket, and the carving of the eye on his forehead and you have your typical New York nutjob checklist.
Gary was larger than anyone at the table. Round and flabby in places with a large nose and pock marks on his skin, he didn’t seem to have an evil bone in his body. With his swooping ginger hair and girth, he looked like a big, red panda. Out of the three of us, he was the most carefree, doting over how good his spinach/asparagus (goop) tea was tasting. Even with the bruising on his forehead from the mace can, he seemed like this was the best day of his life.
“I didn’t come to break bread,” I told them. “I want to know how you followed me. And why. Start there.”
“We already said,” Phil replied. “We wanted to meet you. As for the how …” He peeked over to his partner whose eyes were locked on the TV hanging over the overworked coffee barista. Mason was making news again, this time with a commercial featuring the slogan “Make New York Nice Again” and an Eagle with a monocle. A quick scan of the room revealed other eyes on the television and, more disturbingly, a few people wearing shirts with the same words printed on the back.
“Well …” Phil started.
I glared. “Well?”
“Your aura,” Gary said sheepishly and then smiled.
I shot them both my half eyed glare and stood to walk away.
“Wai-wait! He’s telling the truth,” Phil insisted, though he winced as if he wasn’t too happy about letting me know more. “Um. What’s your name?”
“Not relevant,” I replied.
Phil clicked his teeth. “Have it your way. If you really need to know, we can see the darkness in people, in everyone. I mean, hypothetically, you know? It’s what we’ve devoted our lives to. To prepare for the arrival of the Beast.” He gestured to the eye carved into his forehead. “Our group has been around for years.”
“Your cult?” I asked.
“We are a group of likeminded individuals commonly seeking the arrival of a higher, more perfect being in hopes of garnering its praise when it eventually enthralls the masses and enslaves humanity,” Gary recited from memory, and then added, “Oh, and every third Thursday of the month, we also host a book club.”
“A satanic book club,” Phil insisted, as if that made it any better. “Any way, a couple of weeks ago, we saw the video everyone was talking about. The demon hoax video. Except we knew it wasn’t a hoax at all. It was our lord showing us a sign that he was here. And then I saw a bird.”
I sat up straight. “A bird?
”
“Big. Black feathers …” Phil seemed to trail off and then he shook his head as if static had erupted in his ears. “I blacked out. When I came to, the bird was gone but it wasn’t like I could see evil. I could really see it. On everyone. Sometimes it’s like smoke, or like a gloom on people’s shoulders. I could look into their sin. And then I saw you in the park …”
Phil stared up at me as if hypnotized. His eyes began to widen as his cheeks seemed to be drawn in, leaving his face as discolored as a skull. “I’ve never seen a darkness like the one you have bursting out of your skin. It’s like looking directly into the sun, but one totally eclipsed. You’re like a pulsating heart of darkness. ”
“Cool story,” I said, but secretly squirmed in my seat. “The bird. You said it was gone when you woke up?”
“The bird was gone,” Gary interjected, and Phil jumped slightly hearing his voice. “Phil and I are roomies,” he said, as if this made things better.
“So you can see the darkness inside of me,” I stated, trying my best to wrap this convo up. One of the Shades was involved here, which I knew could mean that either Phil or Gary was possessed by it. Which meant that I could have been sitting across a potential murderer. I believed them about not being the carver for some reason. They seemed too stupid to get anything done on that scale, so I ruled them out. But I was sure that Phil could have been possessed, waiting for the perfect chance to pounce on me. “What happens now?”
“Whatever you want to happen.”
Both men waited for me to respond.
“I’m not following.”
“But we are,” Phil insisted. “We’re a cult who prays to the darkest souls. And it looks like … well, you’re it.”
“What’s your first command?” Gary asked.
Both men waited for me to respond again. And the only smart thing I could come up with was, “Party in my house?”
CHAPTER 16
I’ll admit that it must have been a lot to take in. I don’t blame Barnem for freaking out. Not one bit. The scene was double-take worthy, triple if you wanted to wrap your mind around it, to let it all sink in at once. Let me explain.
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