by Tom Lewis
Sean grabbed the weed at its base this time and tugged out the entire root. He held it up. “Like this?”
Jenkins nodded. “Yes. Quite resilient things, these weeds.”
Sean nodded. It was an interesting allegory for the reason he was there.
“I need to talk to you about Cassie Stevens,” Sean said.
“Yes. Yes, I heard about the incident outside the church. Have there been any updates?”
Sean shook his head. “They have her under sedation at the hospital. She’s scheduled to have some tests run tomorrow. That’s all I know right now.”
“God love her,” Jenkins muttered. He had known Cassie since her family had moved to the small town and had watched her grow up over the years. He had also been friends with her dad before his death. “Let’s pray it’s nothing serious.”
“Justin Mahoney spoke with me about her last week,” Sean began after a brief pause to collect his thoughts. “He’s worried her problems are more of a... spiritual nature.”
Jenkins paused from his gardening to sit up. “How so?” he asked.
Sean hesitated a moment, then finally spoke those words he had dreaded to say out loud. “He thinks she’s the victim of demonic attacks.”
He had Jenkins’ complete attention now. “What makes him think that?”
“It’s a number of things,” Sean said. “Her erratic behavior over the past couple months. I’m sure you’ve heard talk about what her teachers and the students call the ‘Disturbances.’”
Jenkins nodded. “I understood there hadn’t been much talk of that lately. Not since her accident.”
“It’s been better, but it seems to have reoccurred the night she attempted suicide.”
“I wasn’t aware of that,” Jenkins said. “Go on.”
“She also claims to see a... some sort of entity from the corner of her eye and feel its presence at other times. She also believes it inhabits her at times, and those times seem to coincide with the Disturbances.”
Jenkins set his gardening tools down and sat back. “Does her doctor share this belief?”
Sean shook his head. “No. Apparently he feels she’s suffering from dissociative identity disorder and dismissed the possibility of supernatural causes. That’s why Justin wanted to talk to me.”
“And what did you tell him?”
Sean took a breath. “I told him I agreed with the doctor.”
“I see,” muttered Jenkins. “As per the conversation you and I had.”
Sean nodded. “It was several days after that when Justin and I spoke.”
“And is that how you still feel?”
Sean shook his head. “I don’t think so. Not anymore.” He took another deep breath. “I saw something in her eyes outside the church that made me question a lot of my previous doubts. There was a brief moment when something like a veil came down from behind her eyes, and she looked at me for help, and she was filled with this terror I can’t even begin to describe.”
Sean physically shook at the memory. He looked at his arms, and the hairs stood on end. He showed it to Jenkins. “The whole time I was in the Marines, death was something we faced every day. And you’d see fear in the guys’ faces sometimes. But this is the first time I’ve experienced just complete and utter terror.”
He took a moment to shake off his arm then looked again at Jenkins. “I think I’m ready to believe again.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Redemption
Cassie lay asleep in her bed at Hillview, while Justin sat in a nearby chair attempting to read a book. He had been on the same page for over an hour. Every time she had shifted in bed or her breathing changed, he had checked to make sure she was okay.
They had rushed her straight to Hillview from the church. Switzer had met them at the entrance and prescribed a powerful sedative to help calm her. The Shrill had subsided by the time they arrived, but her nerves were shattered.
She had slept for over sixteen hours now. Alison had met them when they arrived and had stayed the entire night. She finally needed to leave an hour earlier, but Justin stayed on.
Justin glanced up from his book and was startled to see Cassie looking at him.
“Hey. You’re awake,” he said, closing his book and setting it on the floor.
She nodded. “How long was I out?”
“Almost a day. How are you feeling?”
“Like hell,” she muttered. “How bad was it?”
“You don’t remember?”
She shook her head. “I remember walking up to the church and looking at the cross on top of it, and that thing got furious. I mean, it really, really hates God and pretty much everything. Then that woman started yelling, and that was it. That’s all I remember.”
“I think Father Sean’s a believer now,” Justin said.
“He saw it?”
“Everyone saw it.”
Cassie cringed and squeezed her pillow. “He must think I’m a freak.”
Justin shook his head. “No. He doesn’t. He helped me get you to the car, and he said he was going to talk to Father Jenkins about you.”
She rubbed her temples. “Now you see what that Shrill does and how bad it is.”
Justin nodded. “That’s why Kyle killed himself, isn’t it?”
“And why I almost killed myself trying to get it out of my head.”
Justin reached over and took her hand. “Just promise me you’ll hang in there till we find a way to fix this.”
“What if there isn’t a way?”
“There is.”
“But what if there isn’t? I don’t know if I could take that happening again.”
“Just promise me you won’t give up.”
She nodded. “Thanks, Justin. For doing all of this.”
“You’d be doing it for me.” He started to say something else but was interrupted by a knock at the door.
Cassie looked over at the door. It was probably a nurse. “Yeah?”
It opened, but it wasn’t a nurse — it was Maggie Dunne. She stared into the room a second, then hesitantly stepped in. Justin rose from his chair to block her, but she held out her hands in a reassuring gesture.
“Please,” she said as she looked at Justin, then past him to Cassie. “I’m just here to apologize.”
In her hand, she held a small cross on a thin chain.
****
Dr. Switzer skimmed through a medical report at the check-in counter in Hillview’s lobby. A young technician, Charlene (”Charlie” for short), pointed to the signature line at the bottom. “They need you to sign it right there,” she indicated.
Switzer scrawled his signature on the form and handed it to her. “You’ll get me a copy.”
She nodded. “I’ll do it right now.”
Across the lobby, the double doors at the entrance opened, and Father Jenkins strolled in carrying a small briefcase. He spotted Switzer across the lobby and walked over.
“Might you be Doctor Switzer?” Jenkins asked.
Switzer turned to the elderly man and immediately noticed the white rectangle on his collar. “Yes,” he replied. “Is there something I can help you with?”
Jenkins nodded, extending his hand. “I’m Father Jenkins. I left message for you earlier about a patient of yours, Cassie Stevens.”
“Oh yes,” Switzer said with a nod. “Her parish priest. What can I do for you, Father?”
Jenkins looked around the lobby. A few people sat there and seemed to be eavesdropping on their exchange. “Might we talk somewhere in private?”
“Of course.”
Switzer led him down a short hallway to a small conference room and showed him in.
“So, what is it I can do for you, Father?” Switzer asked as he took a seat at the conference table. Jenkins slid into a nearby seat and placed his briefcase on the table.
“I’m concerned about Cassie,” Jenkins said. “How do you feel she’s responding to her treatment?”
Switzer leaned back. “
Well, we haven’t isolated the cause of her dementia yet, if that’s what you’re asking. I’m sure you can appreciate that much of this is a process of elimination.”
Jenkins nodded. “Have you eliminated the possibility of supernatural causes?”
“Ghosts?” Switzer almost chuckled at the absurdity of the suggestion. He shook his head. “No, Father. I leave that area to men such as yourself. My focus is on the neurological causes.”
“And what if there are none?”
“Then we look elsewhere.”
“Does this elsewhere include the possibility of a demonic attack?” Jenkins asked.
Switzer was already tiring of the direction this conversation had taken. “Father, if I might be frank, I believe the church’s obsession with demons and spirits is what may have planted the idea in Cassie’s head to begin with.”
Jenkins was unfazed by Switzer’s tone. In a way, he pitied the man. “So, you don’t believe in demons?”
“No, Father, I don’t. And in twenty years of psychiatry, I’ve only had one patient suffering from a dementia similar to Cassie’s who I wasn’t able to successfully treat.”
“And you’re certain those other patients were cured?”
“I have no reason to believe they weren’t.”
“Then I’d ask that you consider the consequences,” Jenkins said. “And that is, if I’m wrong about Cassie, she loses her sanity. But if you’re wrong, she loses her soul.”
Switzer felt it was time to end all this nonsense. “I’m well aware of the consequences, Father. And I assure you, Cassie Stevens will have the very best in medical care. Now, was there anything else?”
“No. That was it,” Jenkins said, still appearing unfazed at Switzer’s dismissal. “I appreciate your time.”
“We’re all concerned about her, Father,” Switzer said.
Jenkins started to rise, then paused, as if remembering. “By the way. What ever happened to that other patient of yours? The one who suffered from a malady similar to Cassie’s.”
The question caught Switzer off guard. He hesitated a moment but was fairly sure the priest already suspected the answer. “She died,” he said. “As a matter of fact, it was right here in this hospital. She was found with her neck slit open.”
Jenkins didn’t appear surprised by this answer. “Self-inflicted, I assume.”
Switzer nodded.
“I’m very sorry to hear that,” Jenkins said in all sincerity.
Switzer acknowledged this with a nod.
Jenkins undid the latches on his briefcase and removed a book from inside it. He slid it across the table to Switzer. “I’d like to leave this with you, doctor. In case you run out of those... neurological causes. And I suspect you might.” There was a slight note of sarcasm in his tone. He hadn’t meant it, but he did see Switzer’s closed-mindedness to even the possibility of supernatural causes as woefully ignorant.
Switzer picked up the book, and it was the same one Jenkins had previously given Sean: A Case for Demonic Possession.
****
Maggie sat in a chair beside Cassie’s bed and ran her fingers across the small cross necklace. “Katie was only one when her dad died.” Maggie thought back through her memories. “He and I had been married five years when it happened. And with him gone, Katie was all I had left.”
“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Dunne,” Cassie said from her bed while Justin watched from across the room.
“Please. Just let me finish,” Maggie said and gently patted Cassie’s hand.
Cassie nodded.
“This necklace belonged to Katie,” Maggie resumed, again running the cross and chain through her fingers. “I got it for her for her first Communion this year. And after that, she just used to wear it everywhere. Even to bed.” Maggie took a deep breath...
“She was wearing it the night she died.”
A deep sob escaped Maggie’s chest, and Cassie choked back her own tears.
“Oh God, Mrs. Dunne...” Cassie said.
Maggie quickly composed herself and looked up at Cassie. “I want you to have it, Cassie,” she said, and, taking Cassie’s hand, she laid it in her palm.
Cassie was speechless. She stared at the necklace a moment, then back at Maggie, before finding her voice.
“Oh, no, Mrs. Dunne. I can’t. This was your daughter’s.”
Cassie reached out to give it back, but Maggie gently closed Cassie’s hand around it.
“Please, Cassie. Just take it.” Maggie took another deep breath. “I don’t know how to explain how I know this, but Katie wants you to have it.”
Cassie was again speechless. By now, her own eyes had filled with tears. She looked down at the small cross then back at Maggie. “Thank you,” she said, and her voice broke. “I’m so sorry.”
“I know you are, dear,” Maggie said and leaned in to wrap Cassie in a warm hug. “And I forgive you.”
She leaned back, and let her eyes meet Cassie’s. “And I know Katie forgives you too.”
****
It was late in the evening by the time Father Jenkins returned home to the rectory. He found Sean at his desk in his bedroom, reading the original copy of the book on demonic possession that Jenkins had given him.
Sean looked up as Jenkins entered the room. “How did it go with Cassie’s doctor?”
“As you might expect,” Jenkins said with a frustrated shake of his head. “What do you think of the book?”
Sean bookmarked the page and closed it. “Scary.”
Jenkins nodded. “And keep in mind those are only words, Sean. Words used to describe something that’s completely inexplicable.”
“You mentioned that the other day,” Sean said. “Something about feeling their threat.”
Jenkins nodded. “And a part of me has never recovered from that encounter. Not even after all these years.”
“Can you tell me about it?”
Jenkins sat down in a chair across the desk from Sean and seemed to stare at a distant memory. It was a place inside him that he didn’t want to go, and yet he knew it was important to Sean that he did. “Are you familiar with the concept of summary evil, Sean?”
Sean shook his head. “No. I never heard the term.”
“It’s an evil that exists in and of itself as its permanent state. There’s no motive or provocation behind it; it simply is, and always will be evil. And to encounter such a being is to encounter a vicious cruelty and intelligence that’s vastly superior to you, and without a trace of mercy.”
Jenkins sat back in his chair and again seemed to stare at those faraway memories. “My encounter happened shortly after I was assigned to my first parish in Los Angeles. There had been a series of particularly grisly killings in the city, and the police were tipped off that a group of high school kids were responsible. They traced these kids to an abandoned building, and what they found in the basement of that building would forever haunt even the most hardened of them.”
Jenkins adjusted in his chair.
“I spoke with many of those officers later, and what they described was feeling a pronounced sense of presence as they descended into that basement. This evil surrounded them in the very air itself and filled each of them with an overwhelming sense of dread. But it was in a back room of the basement that this presence seemed most concentrated. As they entered that room, they felt a precipitous drop in temperature. The walls and floor were painted with satanic symbols, and as they explored farther into this rather large room, they began to find the remains of half-eaten bodies in pools of blood...”
Jenkins breathed back an unsettling discomfort before he resumed. “It was in the back of the room that they found the Girl.
“Her name was Natalie Stark, and she was a junior at a nearby high school. But nobody who knew her would have recognized her that day. They described her as covered in blood and snarling at them with the wild, feral look of an animal. She had been eating the severed arm of one of the bodies, who were later identified as the other membe
rs of her coven. But it was what they saw in her eyes that would forever haunt them. Each of these veteran officers felt what they described as a threat to their very souls.
“It was because of the obvious satanic nature of the crimes that I was asked to come speak to the girl at the jail. But by the time I arrived, it was too late. She had chewed through her wrist during night and had already been dead for several hours. But there was a message for us on the wall that she had written in her own blood. It said ‘Ave Satana,’ which is Latin for ‘Hail Satan.’
“But there was one more message for me, and it came as the jailer and I started to leave. It was something I heard in my mind, and I’ll never forget it. It said, ‘Soon, Father. We’re coming for you soon.’”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Katie
A chill night breeze whispered through the trees and tossed dry leaves across the long unkempt grass of the lonely playground.
Missing were the joyful sounds that typically accompany a playground: the giddy laughter of children, happily frolicking on swings and monkey bars; parents calling their kids to picnic tables for lunch; and fathers playing catch with their young boys.
But not this playground. It stunk of death and decay and was as quiet and desolate as a long-forgotten tomb. Cold moonlight filtered through skeletal branches of trees and bathed the playground in its ghostly tint.
But there remained dark untouched corners of it where even the moonlight feared to tread. It was from there that the eyes watched.
Cassie crossed the grass toward the far side, where the playground’s only other occupant sat on a swing. It was the Little Girl, and she was bathed in a warm radiant light. And those things of the shadows feared that light.
Cassie sat on the swing next to the girl and felt the darkness retreat to its corners. It was like the ocean tide, washing past her ankles as it flowed out to sea.
Cassie felt peace. She just sat there for a moment and basked in its gentle warmth. She never wanted it to leave.
She finally turned to the Little Girl. “You’re Katie, aren’t you.”
Katie Dunne nodded while continuing to stare at a single white daisy she held in her hand.