Monstrous- The Complete Collection

by Sawyer Black

  Chapter Twenty

  Henry sat on the edge of his bed, staring at the sky between buildings. The sun was rising, and he’d been awake all night. The city’s victims called to him, begging for help, begging for him to feed on the evildoers. Every angry shout. Babies crying. Like a migraine’s point pounding into every splintered crack in his resolve.

  A whole pizza and some smothered nachos hadn’t touched the gnawing in his belly, because that was a hole that couldn’t be filled. A twelve-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon, and then dessert couldn’t either.

  Every time he closed his gritty eyes, he saw Samantha curled up next to Stone, a smile on her face and blood in her hair; Amélie smiling up at her tormentors; and then the hollowed-out terror on the faces of the children at the Viazo Grand auction.

  He let himself fall back into the mess of blankets and fixed his eyes on the ceiling. He didn’t have the energy to kick off his shoes. His eyes drooped, and he was sinking. His eyes closed, and he was under water. Fire roared across the surface, but he was safe in a current that let him drift like the breeze.

  A ringing phone splashed him with ice and shattered his dream.

  Henry bolted upright, shielding his eyes from the blazing morning that beat against them. He leaned over to dig the phone out of his pocket. He slid his thumb across the screen, but it continued to ring.

  He shook it. Slapped it against his palm, and still it filled the room with its scream.

  What the Hell?

  The sleep sat on his brain like the chunky fat in the top of a can of beef stew. He growled and slung Meyor’s phone across the room. It spun like a disc, hit the floor, and skipped under the dresser.

  A ringing phone, and Henry realized it was coming from his other pocket.

  “God DAMN IT!”

  He leaned the other way and fished in his other pocket, jerking the phone out with a snarl. It stuck in the lining, and he screamed in frustration, snatching it up and tearing his pocket to shreds.

  He flipped it open and jammed it to the side of his head. A flap of fabric poked into his eye. He batted it away and took a deep breath. “What?”

  “Hold for your party, please.”

  Henry dropped the phone in his lap and pressed his fists into his eyes. Another calming breath, and he lifted the gently against his ear.

  A baptist choir singing Victory in Jesus.

  Click. “Good morning, pal.”

  Henry rolled his eyes and fell back with a whump of the mattress. “Good morning, Mr. El. To what do I owe this pleasure?”

  Mandyel took a deep breath and exhaled in a huff, making the speaker crackle. Henry knitted his brow with suspicious thought. “Are you smoking?”

  “Yeah, I am. What of it?”

  “Whoa, calm down. I was just asking a question. So, the toothpicks didn’t work, huh?” Henry smiled and settled in.

  “No, it wasn’t the toothpicks, Henry. It was my choice to give in.”

  “Free will and all, right?”

  “That’s right, pal.”

  Henry giggled. “Keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better. It’s what all the junkies do.”

  “You know, I was actually calling to apologize, but I don’t think I will now.”

  He pictured Mandyel hanging in the air in front of him. The terrible, beautiful rage on his face. Henry’s own panty-pissing fear.

  Maybe I’ve pushed him far enough.

  “Nah,” Henry said with a joviality he didn’t feel. “That was weeks ago. All is forgiven.”

  “Thank you, Henry.” The angel’s sober tone wiped the smile from Henry’s lips. “That means a lot to me.”

  “Come on, nobody got hurt. Don’t mention it, buddy.”

  Mandyel snorted laughter. “He said you were funny, but he never said you were smart. You surprise me sometimes, pal.”

  “Hey, thanks. So who we talking about?”

  “Boothe.”

  The phone fell onto Henry’s face. He jumbled it back into his numb fingers and sat up. “Come again.”

  “He feels bad, Henry. He really does.”

  “How do you know how he feels?”

  “Who do you think gave me this idea?”

  “The fuck what?” Henry rocked his head to the side like he was shaking water from his ear.

  “That’s right. Boothe came up with this deal to get your daughter out of Hell.”

  “Fucking Boothe sent you? I thought you were an angel?”

  “I am, and Boothe didn’t send me.”

  “Oh, you came here on a whim? Using my daughter’s suffering against me … like … by choice?”

  “Henry!”

  Mandyel’s sharp voice brought Henry to a freezing stop. “What?”

  “You are a terrible person. That’s why you are in this mess. Stop blaming everyone around you for your own bullshit. I cut you break after break, and you won’t stop bitching.”

  “No. This isn’t my fault. It’s Boothe’s fault. And Randall. They tricked me, and now my daughter is in Hell, and my wife is fucking another man.” Henry swiped his tears with the back of his free hand. “How is any of this on me?”

  “Your wife is in bed with another man. So what?”

  “The fuck you mean, so what?”

  “Her husband was murdered in front of her.”

  “I know. I was kinda there.”

  “Her daughter killed at the same time.”

  “I know.”

  “She was raped in her own home.”

  “I fucking know what happened to her, goddammit, I don’t need a ‘Last Time on Henry’s Shitty Life’ recap! I was there.”

  “No Henry, you weren’t. You were dead.”

  Henry leaped from the bed and charged to the dresser. He lifted the phone over his head and smashed it down on the gleaming wood.

  I know I was fucking dead!

  Over and over, chunking away like a lumberjack. Spit and wood flying.

  They took them away from me!

  He screamed wordless fury. Ragged breaths, gasping through his torn throat.

  The only thing!

  He kicked the face of the bottom drawer, his foot sinking into an explosion of lacquered wood.

  That ever meant ANYTHING!

  The next drawer up disintegrated under a wild punch. The ring dug into his finger, and he pulled it off, holding it in a tight fist.

  His mind filled with a red haze, molten and dripping with rage. Henry flared, and the dresser crumpled into splinters. The bed crashed to the floor on broken legs, sliding back to smash against the wall. The bedroom door blew off the jam, flying into the apartment to knife through the coffee table glass.

  He stood in the calm of the center. Scorched tendrils extended away from his feet like sun rays on the Lucius vault.

  His chest heaved. Snot dripped from his nose. His eyes blurred with tears.

  And she had to go on without me.

  He turned in a daze to survey the damage.

  She had to go on without our baby girl.

  The small modern entertainment center dropped from the wall. The fifty-inch Mitsubishi sat at angle, its screen a crazy web of cracks. Henry heard Mandyel blowing another mouthful of smoke into the receiver. He lifted the phone back to his ear.

  “I broke the TV.”

  “Do you feel better?”

  “No, Mandy. I don’t.”

  “What happened to you was heinous and wrong. But what happened to her was much worse, Henry.”

  “I know,” Henry whispered.

  “Have you cried yourself to sleep most nights these many months?”

  “No.”

  “Spilled your guts to a dozen shrinks?”

  “No.”

  “Relived the moment over and over in testimony to the cops.”

  “You know I haven’t.”

  “Every time some mundane task rears its head. The normal things that nobody ever thinks about. Calls from the insurance company. Lawyers. Production partners. Magazines asking
for an interview. And a man comes along who also lost something. Same as her.”

  Mike Stone.

  “A good man, Henry. Maybe even a better man, and you never once thought about her. Not really.”

  “That’s all I’ve done is think about her. Her and Amélie.”

  “Your wife and daughter weren’t taken from you. Samantha’s husband and daughter were taken from her.”

  “Ah, fuck.”

  “You, Henry, are a selfish bastard.” The angel’s voice was so tired. Sick of trying to pound a point home into the thick skull of a dumbass who refused to listen.

  Henry’s knees unhinged, and he fell to the floor, his ass planting in the middle of the scattered dresser. The ring slid from his hand and fell to the floor. It rolled away, flashing sunlight off the scales of the snake carving. It tipped like a spinning coin, ringing into the silence. Swirling and slowing like water flowing down the drain.

  Henry sniffed and wiped his eyes. “She was the only reason I woke up in the morning.” He looked up at the ceiling. Cracks spread out from where he had been standing, radiating from a point above his head toward the walls.

  “She saw something in me … that I still can’t figure out. Never could. And you know what? I lived every day like I was waiting for the joke to climax. That fatal punchline where she would scream laughter in my face. Just kidding! Ha!

  “But it never came, and the harder I listened, the louder the fear. God, that terror that she would see me for the fucked-up piece of shit that I really was? It was all I could hear.”

  Henry trailed a finger through the dust in front of his knees. He saw her face. Amélie’s, just like hers. The sound of their laughter together. A weird genetic harmony.

  “It was enough just to be in the room with her. Or just in the house with her. I knew I could look over and there she’d be. Catch me looking at her and smile. Or sometimes, she’d chatter non-stop. Knowing I was only pretending to listen, but still. Just talking away. Amélie did the same thing. I was pushing for TV. Writing instead of performing because the road had been getting … like I resented it. Every minute away from them was like a knife in my stomach. I fucking hated everything that took me away from them. They were the best of me. Why would I leave that?”

  His throat closed. He cleared it with a loud cough, but it tightened again. He sniffed and swallowed, shaking his head, and the sobs burst out of him like vomit. Doubling him over and taking control of his muscles in waves of shaking cramps.

  “Ah, fuck. That’s what I did. I left them.” Henry lowered his head into his hand, and an angel listened to him cry.

  Henry shook his head and sat up. He took a calming breath, sighing it out in a yawn.

  “Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for you to have to sit and listen to my bullshit like that.” His nervous chuckle trailed away. “What were we talking about, anyway?”

  “Boothe.”

  “That’s right. Where is old Boothe, anyway?”

  “In Nowhere. With his love. Thanks to you.”

  Henry smiled with false cheer. “Good for him. You get what you pay for, huh?”

  “He followed the rules, Henry.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I get it. I still hope he gets lost in The Forgotten and rots there, but I get it. What’s next?”

  “You tell me.”

  “I gotta wait for the Purveyor to call me. Should be today some time.”

  “That’s great, Henry,” Mandyel said, not sounding like he meant it.

  “Yeah, I know a guy now. A couple in fact. Amazing who you meet at church. Or the cemetery.”

  “And this guy has the horn?”

  “Probably, but he’ll only take something in trade. Maybe you can make yourself useful and get me something shiny for him.” Exhaustion yawned through his body. A swelling tide crashing against him.

  “I think I can come up with something.”

  “That’s just great, Mandy.” His eyes sagged, and his head nodded forward.

  “Henry?”

  “Yeah. What’s up?”

  “We are the choices we make, pal. You understand that now?”

  “Sure. And I’m choosing to tell you to go fuck yourself.”

  “Come on, pal.”

  “Nope. I’ve already chosen, buddy. Go fuck yourself.”

  Henry snapped the phone shut and tossed it away. His head dragged his shoulders down, and he spread out in the mess he had made with his hissy fit.

  He fell into a dream where he stood on a dark stage, shouting the same dumb joke on repeat.

  The crowd was there, but nobody laughed.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The ringing phone jolted Henry awake.

  He lifted his head and focused on the dented brass brick. His tongue felt like burlap. A paste of dust and spit clung to his cheek.

  The emotional weight of the city pressed on his shoulders as he rose to all fours on quivering muscles. Fear and pain drizzled a glaze on his brain. The phone was a spike in his ears. He had reverted to his demon form while sleeping.

  At least there’s no crazy rebound bitch screaming at me.

  He scraped through the rubble and slapped his hand over Mandyel’s ring. It lowered the city’s incessant roar. He slid it on, becoming Mike Serafino, and the psychic noise dropped like he had slammed the door on a screaming argument. He could hear the tone but not the words, and he sighed as the weight floated away.

  I’ll take it.

  He flipped the Holy Hotline open and mashed the button. “Yo.”

  “Hold for your caller, please.”

  No music, just a click, and a raspy voice filled his ear. “I understand you are looking for something, Mr. Serafino.”

  “A couple of things, actually. Are you the Purveyor?”

  “I am.”

  “Then I found one of ’em, already.”

  Breathless laughter. “I admit, I am difficult to reach at times. I am… medically fragile, shall we say. It has slowed me down, but I do so love to trade. What about you?”

  “Oh, yeah. Super fun. Look, did Hennessy tell you what I was looking for?”

  “He did.”

  “And?”

  “Your offer?”

  “Let’s just say I have an angel on my shoulder for guidance.”

  Silence filled with the Purveyor’s rough breath. Henry couldn’t tell if he was waiting for more or thinking or scratching his balls. He cleared his throat with a soft cough. “Very good. 829 Watershed. Shall we say ten this evening?”

  “That’ll work.”

  “Then, good day, Mr. Serafino.”

  “Sure.”

  Henry snapped the phone shut and tossed it over his shoulder and onto the bed. A few hours of sleep made his eyelids gummy. He was still surrounded by a wall of mist. Henry sighed.

  Might as well get going.

  The pitchers of cold water and a hot shower didn’t touch his exhaustion. His sour stomach and black mood escalated in equal measure.

  He stood in Boothe’s walk-in closet, staring at another gray hoodie and another pair of jeans. Magical clothes that would make the Hulk jealous.

  Fuck this.

  He snapped on the light and stepped deeper into another man’s wardrobe.

  “Jesus Christ, Boothe.”

  He had never looked into the depths of the closet. At all the suits. Shirts and ties in every color. A wall of watches. Shoes that could put an eye out with their shine. Henry dropped his towel and opened one drawer after another. Silk underwear. Patterned socks. Garters and cuff links.

  Henry’s deepest shame had been his body. He never understood people who hated things about them that they couldn’t change. Or being proud of their blue eyes. The genetic lottery was exactly that. A roll of the evolutionary dice. Being a fat slop? That was all him.

  His struggles lasted years. Every pound lost was another victory celebrated with Little Debbie. Staring at himself in the mirror and pointing at all of his flaws, sinking into despair with each bullet on the
list. Demon Henry was powerful and hideous. Mike Serafino was slim and confident and not fat. Might as well dress the part.

  A slick black three-button suit. Gray shirt with a tie the same color. Standard black shoes with a high polish and a stainless-steel diver’s watch. Some smellum in his hair combed through with a stiff bristled brush that looked like animal hair. He stepped back and admired what Mandyel’s ring had given him.

  Instead of hating himself and feeling even fatter in nice clothes, he nodded.

  So, this is what pride feels like.

  Watershed was above Northpointe in the hills. Posh and fake. Just like him. The Halcyon Tavern was a pretentious and expensive restaurant a few blocks down. When courting the networks, he and Samantha had eaten there several times, always gawking at the bill with an incredulous laugh.

  Not this time. Filling his pockets with Boothe’s money, a monster in a demon’s clothes left the magic of his borrowed apartment to catch a ride to a luxurious lunch. Then, off to find the weapon that can save God. Or kill Him. Whatever.

  Now, that’s a full day.

  The Halcyon was an exclusive place that tried to look fresh but couldn’t quite keep the wear from showing. He slid a fifty into the hand of the brute watching the front door, then stepped into a movie set. Perfect faces and bodies glossing over the dirt with a manufactured sheen. The coy slant of a bare shoulder. Capped teeth in a predator’s smile.

  Deals being made. Hearts being broken.

  He headed to the bar to wait for a table to open. It looked out over the dining room with a glimpse of the expensive tables up in the balcony. Even as high as he’d made it, Henry had never sat at the top. Always at the bottom with the other writers. Mid-level agents and people with talent but no looks, moving up the ladder.

  The regular type of drinkers were leaning against the bar. Suits and dresses. Everyone pretty. For once, Henry felt like he belonged. A woman in a tight black number caught his eye. Hair as black as Samantha’s. Glossy and shimmering when she tipped her head for a glass of red. There was space to either side of her.

  Maybe she’s alone?

  Nah, her old man is probably in the shitter.

  Henry headed away from her to belly up at the end of the bar, and she turned to look at the door.