I just needed to prepare, and that meant getting my parents as far gone as possible, like Area 51 or Guam.
This was all running through my mind as two loud voices approached from down the hall. That’s why when I glanced up at them and saw what they were. I froze, the last thought stuck in a constant buffering loop as I tried to process what the hell I was looking at. I stood there, watching the two approach, two eight-foot-tall roaches glistening in the hallway light. One laughed to itself as it fumbled with the keys to the apartment three doors down. The other threw itself up against the wall. I didn’t realize until it was too late that it was glaring at me.
“Hey,” it shouted, throwing one of its legs beside its mandible in order to call to me. “Hey, you. Something wrong with your eyes, honey?”
The roach at the door hissed at it. “What are you doing?”
“Don’t ask me what I’m doing. Ask her what she’s doing. I’m just asking missy-foo over there if she has something wrong with her eyes because she’s staring hella hard.”
The roach leaned back just to notice I was there. “Hi. Oh hi, neighbor. Don’t mind him. Happy hour was a very happy hour.” It said this by miming taking a drink with its skinny brown appendage.
“Don’t ‘hi neighbor’ her,” the drunk one said. “And yes, mind me. Mind me. You know, that Mason guy was right. People are just rude nowadays. Rude. I would have voted him for mayor. For freaking president!”
Luckily, the door finally opened and the hostile roach was pulled in by its wing, followed by the door slamming shut behind it. The large thud left me to my thoughts in that dark hallway. Thoughts that went something like, Okay. Well. That just happened.
With a little more motivation to get the fuck out of there, as soon as I swung the door open, I called my parents, “Mom and Dad. Super, super surprise for you. Get dressed so we can lea—”
“Lea—” was all I could get out and “Lea—” was as far as I was going to get.
A familiar young man, who was sitting on the couch, snapped his sunglasses-shielded eyes toward me.
Mom waltzed right of the kitchen and set the last plate on the table. She was wearing a pretty amazing flowery dress. “Oh, honey. We are not going out tonight. We have,” she gestured around, “very special guests over for dinner.”
I turned to the young man who stood slowly, but I quickly realized that it wasn’t for me. Instead, he was paying close attention to the older man stepping out of the bathroom, wiping his hands on his shirt.
“If we are ready to eat, I believe it is only right that I say grace,” the Pope said.
CHAPTER 35
He was a short man, slightly hunched over the way men with age curve into the world. He was wearing cargo short that showed off his wrinkled—and yes, pale—knees, and a striped polo shirt. He looked very ordinary. I mean for a Pope. I don’t know what I mean. The guy beside him was the same one from the vision Cain let me see. Oswalt, he said his name was. A long way from the black and white suit he was wearing in the vision, as he passed my mom’s mashed potatoes, he wore salmon-colored shorts, a plain white V-neck T-shirt, and moccasins. Unfortunately, everything from the neck up was still all secret service-y. Hair slicked back, sunglasses, mean mug.
“You know, I have never been to New York,” the Pope said.
“Oh my. That’s hard to believe, your Highness,” my mom replied. She clearly forgot what a Pope was to be called. I think this whole thing had her mind whirling.
But the man laughed. “James. You can call me James. I’m … on liberty. You know I fought in World War II? Was part of the squads who helped set up triage centers after the U.S. hit the sand in Normandy. There was one guy, a young kid from Manhattan. Big mouth. You say it like that, right? He talked a lot. Never stopped talking. He used to talk up New York like it was a paradise.” James nodded to himself, lost in that memory for a bit. Then he planted his fork into the meatloaf and said, “So tell me about yourself, Amanda.”
I nearly bit my tongue. “Me? Bleh. Nothing. What?”
He glanced upward. I can’t describe the amount of pressure I felt from just his eyes. It really was nothing, not even close to a glare. But there was something behind his half-opened eyes. I somehow got the feeling that my answers were really going to effect the way this dinner turned out. He obviously knew who I was, and Cain told me that he was looking to kill me. I just didn’t know his game.
“I’m a nobody.” I dropped my gaze down at my plate.
“Everybody is a nobody,” he replied, wiping his mouth. But he didn’t follow up or explain. He calmly went back to his food. The man was definitely the Pope. He even spoke like the Bible. He was Bible-babbling me.
I could tell that his private security was staring holes into me from behind his shades. His head was always angled toward me and he ate … really … slow.
“Mandy is our oldest,” Mom said, and grabbed my arm. “She’s come a long way, fighting demons.”
The Pope, er James, and Oswalt both stopped chewing.
“Mom!”
“Oh, it’s true. I mean we all have those things that stick to us, right? Those things we have to overcome? Mandy has been amazing at seeing through her personal troubles.”
Our guests quietly went back to their plates.
Just before I could figure out where to steer the conversation, D walked out of the room, completely oblivious to the absolute paleness of my face upon seeing him. Both James and Oswalt stared as this young man sleepily dragged his feet from his room to the living room. There he checked on this large potted plant he had bought the other day. A demon with a green thumb—I can’t even wrap my mind around it all.
After checking the soil and watering it, he then plopped right down on the floor with the TV remote. Old habits die young.
“And who is …” The Pope’s voice trailed off in mid-inquiry.
Oswalt’s chair screeched as he pushed it away from the table for a better look.
“Ah,” my father said. “Just the young man who’s renting out the back room. A friend of Amanda’s.”
“Not!” I found myself yelling, and then trying to cover it up. “Not … really. Guy, man, person. He is, um, crashing … staying, renting the room in the back. He is. Is he? Yup. He is.”
James didn’t turn to look at me. He just made a muffled “ah huh” sound in his throat. Ah huh, yes I understand? Or ah huh, there’s the little demon fucker? There was no way for me to decipher which it was.
A commercial came on. It was hard to tell what it was at first. The black and white image of a cow tied to a post. A little girl walked up to it. She picked up a shotgun, pointed it at the creature’s head, and the screen went to black to the sound of the blast. The golden arches slowly came on screen.
“Hey, D. Would you like to eat? We can scoot over.”
My mom. Oh my god. My mom.
“I’m good.” D rolled partially over to look at the table. From his upside down position, it seemed like he finally recognized that we had guests. “Who’s the dinner party for?”
“I guess that would be me,” James said, and stood to his feet.
I went from having a slight headache to feeling like I was trying to power through a concussion. I made a motion to stand, but Oswalt spun around to face me. I was suddenly aware of the position of his hands. There was the one grasping the fork. The other was below the table.
“You must be pretty important,” D said very matter of factly.
“Nowadays, not so much,” the Pope replied with some softness in his voice. He didn’t approach. He kept his distance. “Do you recognize me?”
Blindly pointing, D replied, “No, but those are the good plates. Mrs. Grey only breaks those out for special occasions.”
There was so much “wrong” in that sentence that I immediately had to drop it or else my head would explode.
&nbs
p; “I see.” James set his hands behind his back but still did not move. “TV. I heard the American stuff rots a person’s soul.”
“Depends.”
“Depends on?”
“Primetime or cable. Now, reality shows? Those are the work of the devil.”
James laughed as D fiddled with the remote, flipping it this way and that. He had no idea what the hell was going on and I wanted so bad to shout at him, or strike him with a car. Maybe something between those two.
“May I?” James said, pointing to my father’s seat. Dad nodded and I nearly fainted. This was escalating past what I could take. Oswalt never took his eyes off of me. Now I all I could do was watch. Now I was just along for the ride. The eternal struggle of Light and Dark, watching reality TV together.
“What is this woman’s problem?” James asked after watching for some time.
“She didn’t kiss Chud, that’s the platypus looking guy, after their first date,” D explained. “He kissed the first four women in the first episode, so he expected more. It’s all been downhill from there.”
“Hmm. And now? Why is he handing her a phone?”
“Because he voted her out. So now she has to call her own cab home.”
“Hmm-hmm. And the other woman, smiling back there. She is … the blonde?”
“Oh, that’s Kindy. Spelled like Cindy but said like Kindy. She wants to learn to be a foot plastic surgeon to help kids in Third World countries. She’s also kind of a bitch.”
“Oh, I see.”
I was mortified. My parents also sat there totally confused, but that’s the thing with Mom and Dad. Something will confuse the ever living crap out of them, but they would just accept it as law. They constantly rewrite the rules of the world, which is where I guess I got most of my reasoning from.
They watched the entirety of the episode. The whole thing. Mom cleaned the Pope’s plate while Oswalt ate very slow just to have a reason to sit at the table with me.
“Fascinating,” James said, rapping his fingers against the arms of the chair as a form of applause. “I can see it. I can see the draw. Though it certainly lacks the enriching entertainment value. Me. I was born in Poland, in the capital, Warsaw. You can imagine the difference. Cameras were different. Society, extremely different.”
“Humor,” my father added.
“Of course. Humor was radically different.” James paused and turned just his eyes toward D. “Ai auzit gluma despre preotul care a intrat într-un bar?”
The entire table fell quiet. Everyone lingered on how D would respond, but the demon took a sip of water, looking bored.
“Ou diriez-vous si je demande en français?” James re-tried. I caught pieces of this one. My father spoke French to us when we were kids.
This time, D turned to look at him.
James was only smiling.
The tension in the room was steadily climbing. By their tense bodies, I could tell that it was even affecting my parents, and they had no freaking idea the gravity of the issue.
“Quomodo autem nunc vado punchline iterum?” James tried.
“Waqal: ‘Rbama la yjb ‘an ‘akun qad dakhalat fi hadha alqifs fi almaqam al’uwala’,” D replied dryly.
The shock on James’ face was enough to make me stand. Oswalt jumped out of his seat to head me off. I was just lining up a proper fist when we were both stopped by laughter.
The Pope was laughing. Tears were flowing. Sweat lined his white hair. After a long minute, he was able to bring it down to a chortle. I didn’t understand the exchange between them, but it totally sounded like the structure of a dick joke.
“That’s it,” James began, “that settles it. Family Grey, this evening you all will be my guests.” Before my mom could lose it, he shook my father’s hand. “And you will stay with me tonight. No need to decline because I will not hear it. They have rented out an entire hotel for me. Just endless halls and empty rooms. I’ll give you one. You’ll be home tomorrow afternoon. Oswalt, call a car to pick us up.”
The young man did as he was told. Mom and Dad were beside themselves, and of course would never say no to a Pope. My mom sneaked in a hug and pinched my cheeks.
“You handle the apartment. You help your sister. You meet new people. You see what happens when you put yourself out there, honey? Things happen.”
“They sure do,” I mumbled.
I knew that I needed to stay with my parents at all costs, so I went to grab a sweater. But that’s when I heard, “On second thought, Oswalt.” James set his hand on his escort’s shoulder. “Call a car for the Greys to go on ahead. I would really like some time with young Grey herself.”
James smiled.
I didn’t.
It was odd watching my parents go without me. I knew that it was accomplishing what I was going there for, to get them out of harm’s way. But watching them leave, scoot into the black unmarked truck that came to pick the Pope up, and seeing it drive away made me feel lonely. Absurdly. The most I’ve ever felt. I mean, here I was about to get murdered by the leader of the Christian following, and my parents had just driven off thinking that they would see me in a few hours.
Oddly, he didn’t even want to talk to D. An incarnate of darkness, and the Pope really wanted some “time” with me?
I sat in my living room, waiting for James to come back after insisting on escorting my parents down. That left Oswalt standing by the door. I tried asking him a few questions about the Pope’s business with me, but the guy barely acknowledged me. I then sat there wondering if the Vatican had blessed the stick before shoving it up his ass.
A knock at the door broke the silence and I immediately remembered that Petty was supposed to come; she was the last person that needed to be there. Luckily, my super Lou’s voice followed.
“Came to say hi and start fixing hole in kitchen, Grey. Your mom asked me to stop by.”
Even through those thick sunglasses, I could tell that Oswalt was agitated. I needed Lou to go away so I shouted through the door, “Not today, Lou. I’m in here having lots of sex so come back tomorrow. Now, thank you!”
I could hear Lou audibly gasp. “You are … I mean, are you sure?”
“Yes, yes. I’m sure, Lou. A lot of the sex is happening.”
“I’m in here, too,” Oswalt said to my disbelief. His accent was thick and oddly pornstar-ish.
Lou sulked around a little bit, uncomfortable and not sure what to do with himself. But then he apologized and promised to come back at another time, awkwardly saying, “Have fun. I mean, no. I mean, I’m leaving now.” And then his footsteps died away.
As Oswalt checked through the peephole to confirm, I shot a text to Petty in a flash with the easiest message I could get out.
Bad dont come
Oswalt caught me but I feigned checking the time. When he stuck out his hand to take my phone, I put it back into my pocket. He was silently staring at me, wondering about taking the phone by force, when James returned. The old man closed the door behind him and Oswalt the good guard dog stood in front of it. D’s door was closed so I wasn’t sure what my options of rescue were.
James set his hands behind his back and walked calmly to my father’s chair. Grabbing the back of it, he said, “The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men.”
I chuckled. “How did I know this talk might start with scripture?”
James scrunched up his nose. “Scripture? No, no. Pulp Fiction. They were giving it on the plane ride over and I saw it twice. Love Tarantino. Ay! ‘Zed is dead’.”
Pushing the chairs only a foot apart, James took a seat and leaned back. Then, as if remembering something, he drew two guns from his waist—the same silver pistols Cain showed me in the vision—and placed them on the coffee table that Oswalt fetched for him on silent command.
“He doesn’t sit,” James says of him like a doting father. “I tell him to sit, he does so for five minutes, and then … pops back up again. Frustrating. By far, his worst trait.”
Pointing to the revolvers, James crossed his legs and let me take them in. They were much larger in person, and by the sound they made against the wood when he set them down, they seemed to weigh a ton.
“I was going to use them. I still may use them.”
“So this is a threat?”
“What this is, Amanda,” he countered only with a tinge of anger, “is a discussion in which I recognize the short span of time we have been given. And I choose to spend that time escaping pleasantries. Would you rather pleasantries?”
“Never heard of the word. Please continue.”
“I simply wanted you to see these as proofs of my faith, and nothing more.” When I gave him a silent nod, he continued. “I have seen you. In visions. In dreams. This is what is connected to the title I hold. It’s what all of my predecessors have wielded as well. It is what gives us the preparation to protect the Church. It’s also robbed me of sleep every single day since taking on the role. Tell me, Amanda Grey. How do you sleep? Do you dream?”
“Like any other person.”
“Visions?”
I didn’t want to mention what Cain had showed me. Of D tearing his heart out. It might sour this. So I replied with another question. “How did you explain needing to meet me? My parents were weirder than usual.”
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