We were supposed to spend the day shopping. We needed to replace our clothes before work and school the next day. I needed makeup to cover the road map of bruises still coloring my eye and Benjamin needed some boy toys. He said his reputation was at stake; he couldn’t be seen playing with Muriel’s old dolls.
We went shopping that afternoon and stopped at Grams’ afterward. Ben carted every single one of his toys into her apartment and laid them out on the floor. Like any good grandma would, she made the appropriate oohs and ahs when he held up each one.
My grandmother toed me with her house slippers. “Hey!”
I jumped and looked up. “Hmm?
“I asked what toys you got,” my grams said.
“Oh, I got a MP3 player.” I held up the music player and headphones I’d been listening to. “Mine was on my dresser along with my computer. Mom and Dad replaced the laptop, but for some reason, it didn’t come preloaded with all my school assignments, so I’ll have to redo those, which means I got a bunch of crap to replace my other school crap, but that’s about as close to toys as it comes.” I smiled when she laughed.
“Well, at least it wasn’t your phone,” Grams exclaimed in mock horror. “Imagine losing all your texting contacts.”
“I know, right?” I agreed with a shudder. My pocket beeped and vibrated. Grams laughed.
“Sounds like someone is texting right now. Go on, child, you can answer it.”
I smiled at her and fished the phone out of the front pocket of my jeans. After I pushed the button to look at the text, my heart twirled. I couldn’t help the smile that curved my lips.
Chay: Whatcha doing?
Me: Visiting Grams.
Chay: How ya doing?
Me: Okay. The fire was one way to get a bunch of new stuff.
Chay: Tough way.
Me: Yeah.
Chay: Okay, I gotta go. Just wanted to check on ya.
Me: Bye.
“Judging by that grin, I’d say that was your boy?” Grams winked at me.
Ben rammed his trucks together in the middle of the room. “Which one?” he asked. “She has two.”
“Do not!” I threw a purple throw pillow at him.
“I hope it was Chay,” Ben said, knocking the pillow out of the way. “I like him better.”
“Benjamin,” my mom scolded.
That’s the second time he’s told me that. I wonder if kids can sense good character like some people claim dogs can.
“So what’s the official word on what caused the fire?” I heard Grams ask my dad. I didn’t listen to them talk. I texted Muriel instead. Besides, I already knew what caused the fire… and it wasn’t any electrical malfunction.
After dinner, we gathered our things to leave when Grams wheeled her chair to me. I smiled down at her. She looked at me with worried eyes, dulled by a long life.
“Don’t you be going and doing anything rash, child,” she whispered.
I opened my mouth to ask her what she thought I’d do when she called to Ben and asked him if he wanted some cookies to take home.
That night, Muriel’s family and mine sat around their dining table in my aunt’s cheery, yellow kitchen. We talked about school and what the firefighters thought caused the fire, our dads talked about work, and Benjamin told us all about the newest video game my mom said she’d buy him when we got settled in an apartment while our house was being rebuilt.
“He’s gonna kill us all,” I said out of the blue. It just popped out of my mouth. It surprised me as much as it did everyone else.
Everyone looked at me. My dad’s mouth was open, a fork full of pie halfway to it. My mom shook her head and her gaze landed on Benjamin.
“Him, too, Mom. All of us.”
“Why do you say that?” my uncle asked me. He set his fork down and wiped his hands on a napkin before he tossed it on top of his plate.
“Jake told me. He said he wants us all…” I stopped and looked at Benjamin happily playing with an action figure my parents bought him when we shopped for clothes earlier that day. “Dead.”
“Why?” Muriel asked.
“He wants to hurt me, and he knows it’s one way he can do it. Probably the best way. Jake said he might not even kill me because knowing I could have prevented your deaths would be worse than dying.”
I was strangely detached from the conversation, like it was happening to someone else. Maybe I was used to it. I mean, I’d just dealt with Azazel a little more than three months earlier. Or maybe I was in shock. After all, my house had just burned down. I was visited nightly by Jake standing in the shadows, and the little red hobgoblins showed up every once in a while. There was plenty to be shocked over.
But I think I was just accepting it. It was my life. It wasn’t a life I would have chosen. I wished I’d never heard about demi-angels, let alone been one. But we didn’t always get to choose the paths our lives took. What we could do was decide how to deal. And I was going to deal with it the only way I knew how.
I was going to kill Abaddon. Or die trying.
23
Muriel’s House