Pet
Page 15
“I didn’t want to believe it,” Glass said. “I thought…I thought he was better.” A shocked murmur ran through the crowd as she looked up, straight at Malachite, who was bloodless with building rage. “I’m so sorry, Mal. He was so good with Redemption, it had been decades, you have to understand, it had been decades…he had been so good. I didn’t want to believe he would again…not with Moss…not with our little Moss…” She had been twisting a handkerchief in her hands, and she brought it to her face as she broke down into tears.
Malachite let out a guttural scream and launched herself out of her seat, aiming with violent hands for her sister. The room broke into tumult as Whisper threw a forearm around Malachite’s stomach, pulling her back. “I’m going to kill you!” Malachite screamed at Glass. “You knew! You knew and you let him near my babies, you monster!” Whisper put their other arm around her and locked her against their body while Beloved held Moss to his chest, shielding the boy’s ears and head with his large hands. Redemption stared at his mother and his aunt, tears dripping down his motionless face, his hand a vise crushing Jam’s. She didn’t mind. Bitter stretched an arm around both Jam and Redemption, holding them as close and as tight as she could.
Aloe was standing, furious, gesticulating toward Glass as he shouted: “Get her out of here! Can’t you see what she’s doing to the boy’s family? Are your heads not correct?!”
They ended the hearing early that day. It took another week for Lucille’s angels to come to a resolution: how to rehabilitate Hibiscus and Glass, what amends they would have to make, what the city would have to change so this didn’t happen again. Most of the angels had walked around like ghosts the whole time, shocked to their core at what Hibiscus had done. His confession left no room for doubt or questioning; he had been open with all the details of what he had done, desperate even to share them. It had been hard for the other angels to hear it, to see one of their own confess to being something else, something other, something ugly. It shook the whole of Lucille, what had happened with Hibiscus. The angels launched new investigations, new policies and programs meant to fix the blind spots they’d created by claiming that the monsters were gone. In some ways the hunt had returned to their city, but no one argued with them. “We do not know if there are more monsters in Lucille,” the angels said, “but we intend to find out, with your help. We intend to help those who need helping, whether they are harming or harmed. We are each other’s harvest, we are each other’s business.”
Lucille had responded as one. “WE ARE EACH OTHER’S MAGNITUDE AND BOND.”
* * *
—
Jam and Redemption had given their testimony in private, just to the angels, who had exchanged meaningful looks that no one would explain before letting them go. No one had mentioned Pet since.
When Jam asked Bitter why, one night when her mother was tucking her in, Bitter paused and looked around before answering in a low whisper: “I not suppose to tell you this, but the angels of Lucille, they know about creatures like Pet. From time of the revolution.”
Like the first one you brought through? Jam asked. Was that during the revolution?
Something drifted behind Bitter’s eyes. “That was a long time ago, sweetness. Is another story altogether.” She smiled and the thing behind her eyes fled with her smile.
I think Pet was an angel, Jam said.
Her mother looked at her studiously. “Is possible,” she said.
I mean a real angel.
“I know what you mean, child. Angels could look like many things.”
So can monsters.
Bitter’s face grew sad. “Yes, doux-doux. I know.”
She sat with Jam for a little bit afterward, then kissed her goodnight and turned off the lights as she left. Jam felt the air change as soon as she was alone, become heavier and stifled with presence.
She sat up in her bed excitedly, casting out in her head. Pet?
I am here, little girl.
Jam could see it now, huge in the dimness of her room, glinting gold and glowing splattered white. Where have you been? she asked.
Away. Must still be away, but came to see you, my seeing one.
Jam felt tears start up, and she dashed her hands against her eyes. She was so tired of crying. You’re here to say goodbye, aren’t you?
Yes, little girl.
She could see now that its wings were enclosing its body once more. I’m going to miss you, she said.
Pet rested a hand on her knee, the gold claws digging slightly through her sheets. And I, you. It was an honor to hunt in this world beside you.
Are you an angel? Jam asked. Or just a hunter?
Pet crouched by her bed, its horns outlined in the window behind it. Is an angel not always a hunter, is a hunter not always an angel? it replied. As long as the target is a monster.
Will there be more monsters? Jam asked. Pet stayed silent, its face blank, and she tried to explain more. I’m scared. You’re leaving, and I’m scared.
Do you remember the last thing I said to you before tonight? it asked, and Jam nodded. Put faith in that, little girl.
Jam nodded again, and Pet leaned its face in toward hers, touching their foreheads together. She could feel the heat of its true face pushing through the gold feathers, warming the skin of her forehead. I must depart, Pet said. Tell me the words so I know you will remember them, you will hold on to them and it will be as though you are holding on to me, and you will not forget, yes?
I won’t forget.
Pet nodded. Tell me, it said again.
Jam stared at the locked layers of Pet’s face and remembered how it looked that night, with its mighty wings outspread, terrible justice come to Lucille. What would have happened to Moss if she had not believed Pet, if she had refused to look at the unseen things? She took a deep breath and smiled shakily at Pet, knowing this was the last time she’d ever see it.
Do not be afraid, she said.
A gold mouth smiled, and smoke dripped out.
Good, Pet whispered, and then it was gone and Jam was alone with the house, with the whispers in the floorboards and her parents asleep in their room, one last tendril of smoke fading before her eyes.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book would not exist without Chris Myers. Back in 2016, he asked me to write a young adult novel and I refused, saying I had another list of books I needed to finish writing first. A year later, I gave him thirty pages of what would become Pet, and a few months after that, the first draft was done. Thank you, Chris, for believing in this work as fervently as you do, for advocating it into existence, for caring so much about young readers and what worlds they need. It’s an honor to work alongside you.
Thanks to my sister, Yagazie, for being my favorite beta reader and live-texting me her responses as she went through the manuscript. I’m always excited to share these stories with you.
Massive thanks to the team at Make Me a World, to the force that is Barbara Marcus, and to my phenomenal agents at Wylie, particularly Jacqueline Ko and Alba Ziegler-Bailey.
To my lovebears and squad, you are brilliant, and I’m so grateful you’re in my life.
To my readers, thank you for receiving this work, engaging with it, and sharing it! I want Pet to reach as many readers as nonhumanly possible, so it can do the work it’s meant to do in the world. We are each other.
With all my love, thank you.
BEOWULF SHEEHAN
akwaeke emezi makes their young adult debut with Pet on the inaugural Make Me a World list. A 2018 National Book Foundation “5 Under 35” honoree, their adult debut, Freshwater, continues to receive critical acclaim, following rave reviews from the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the New Yorker, and the Los Angeles Times, among others. Their sophomore adult novel, The Death of Vivek Oji, is forthcoming in 2020 from Riverhead B
ooks. Born in Umuahia and raised in Aba, Nigeria, Akwaeke currently resides in liminal spaces.
akwaeke.com
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