“Demi-angels.” She flicked the back of my head and smiled. “Goofball.”
“Ah, I should have figured that one out.” I threw my messenger bag in the backseat of Muriel’s car and tilted my head. “When did you show signs?”
Muriel looked at me over the roof of the car. “About a month and a half before my eighteenth birthday, just like you.”
“Ah, right about the time you had Mono and couldn’t come to school for three weeks.” I arched an eyebrow, and she grinned.
We climbed into the car, and I reached for the seatbelt. “Is everyone else eighteen?”
“Everyone but you.” Muriel started the car and looked at me. “When your birthday gets here, we’ll all be stronger. And it can’t happen soon enough.”
Five weeks, five days until my birthday.
I worked a two-hour shift after swim practice, and then a friend from the bakery drove me home. When I unlocked the door and walked into the house, it was unusually quiet—I was alone. Dad had to work late, and Mom was out with friends. And my brother, Ben, was at Grams’.
Generally, I didn’t mind being alone. I kinda liked it. I could read, watch something other than cartoons on television, and get takeout for dinner. It was pure bliss. But that night was different. I was edgy, full of restless energy.
I swayed on the old, wooden swing on the back deck, watching the clouds float across the dying sun. The sky was filled with streaks of reds and oranges—it almost made it look on fire.
The breeze shifted toward me, carrying a smell that made me wrinkle my nose. It smelled like something was burning—tinged with something else.
What is that smell? It’s putrid.
Not long after the smell, I noticed a change in temperature. The cool night turned warm, and I started sweating under my sweatshirt. I could feel my hair sticking to the back of my neck.
I was looking at the floor of the deck, fanning the back of my neck with my hand, when I heard a puff of air. Looking up, I saw a puff of smoke in the yard a few feet from the deck. When the smoke cleared, I saw a small figure about the size of a toddler standing in the grass. It was short and fat with stumpy legs under a big, round belly. Its skin was red, and it had a shock of black hair standing atop its oval head. I jumped backward against the swing, a little scream coming out of my mouth.
What in the hell…?
I rubbed my eyes with my fists and looked again. It was still there, staring at me.
I’m dreaming. This is too out there. Wake up. Wake up now!
As if my life wasn’t weird enough already, the short, fat thing spoke, its ruby, bulbous lips bouncing. “Hi, Milayna,” it said, its voice high pitched like a little girl’s.
I stood up so fast that the swing flung out behind me, hitting the house. The pipsqueak kept still, smoke curling around its body. The strong smell of something burning nearly suffocated me, and the temperature had risen another few degrees. I was sweating heavily, my sweatshirt damp.
What? What—oh, damn. Oh, no. That’s not real. No. That can’t be real.
I inched toward the door, keeping my eye on the thing in my yard. I had to call my dad. Then I had to call the police and tell them… what? A little red man popped into my backyard? No, I needed my dad.
Another pop sounded and I jumped with a scream. I slapped my hand over my mouth and watched the smoke billow and float away, revealing another creature much like the first. Their red skin against the green lawn made them look like peculiar Christmas decorations, and the smell reminded me of scorched meat.
The creatures were alike in almost every way, except the second had a scar running down the left side of his face, from his ear to the corner of his mouth. He also seemed grumpier.
“She doesn’t speak,” the first weird gnome-like creature said to Scarface.
“We don’t need her to speak. We just need to bring her back,” Scarface answered. He waved me away with both hands and then put his fists on his hips. “Then we can go home and get away from this horrid place. It’s too cold up here.”
I stared at them as they talked, my eyes moving between them like I was following the ball in a tennis match. My mouth was open, and my mind whirred as it tried to process the scene.
What. The. Freakin’. Hell. Is. Going. On?
“Milayna.”
I thought it was the one of the creatures talking, but realized the voice was lower, smoother—not an ear-piercing squeal.
“What?” I didn’t want to take my eyes off my uninvited visitors, but I glanced toward the gate where the voice came from.
“Go inside.”
I wasn’t sure why I listened to the person—I didn’t even know who it was for sure—but I did as he asked.