Sheltered

by Debra Chapoton

  “It’ll be okay,” Ben soothed. “It’s all right.” He sloughed off his coat and tossed it toward the side door. He put his arms around Megan and they stood by the sink in an embrace as she sobbed out the details. “See?” he said when she finished. “It all worked out for the best. It is kind of weird, though, that you came to the same conclusion on the same day that the judge ruled.”

  “There’s a lot of weirdness around here.”

  Ben nodded. “Where’s Em?”

  “In her room, I guess. Why?”

  “I thought she might want to go to the funeral home. Cori, too.”

  “Cori doesn’t live here anymore. She’s staying with my social worker. Can you believe it? Mrs. B is turning her life around.”

  “Good,” was all he said before he kissed her again. “I’ve got something to tell you.” He pulled back an inch and got serious again. “I don’t live here anymore, either.”

  “What? Why not?”

  “I told my mom everything and . . . well, she really needs me now. I can actually help her with Ed’s business and stuff. But you and Emily can still live here and I’ll come over and we’ll . . . date . . . and stuff.”

  “So that’s why you rang the doorbell and brought me flowers.”

  “Uh huh, it’ll be like we’re normal teenagers and all.”

  Megan smiled. Normal teenagers. Well, not quite. She lowered her eyes, stared at the floor.

  “What?” Ben said.

  Megan took a moment to raise her eyes.

  ***

  Emily sat in her nest arranging Chuck’s pills in a circle around Cori’s pills. Cori was never coming back. Chuck was a different matter.

  Emily had talked with him through the Ouija board. He was happy, he said. She wanted to believe it, but a little voice in her head told her something else. She had not reached Chuck through the strange board, no, not at all. But she knew he had gotten out. Out of all the hopelessness and pain. She didn’t think she could do the same thing. Another little voice was telling her she could, but there’d be a penalty, a punishment beyond any she had ever given herself.

  Megan had made a little noise when she came home, but hadn’t bothered Emily, hadn’t checked on her even once. Fine. Ben would be around sooner or later. He hadn’t taken her around to the shelters last night. Surely he would make that up to her tonight. She had helped him, told him where Chuck was hiding. He owed her.

  She took one of Cori’s pills, waited, tried to chant, tried to levitate her bed. Took another pill.

  The Ouija board stretched and widened before her eyes. Another message from Chuck spelled itself out without any help from her. D. I. E.

  Then the pretty demons came; they swirled around her room like stars. They pulled her into a dark galaxy. Contentment, pleasure, ease. This was the out she wanted. Such ecstasy – to find a safe haven from every storm of life.

  Then shame welled up in waves, like a foaming black sea of despair and misery. And more than she wanted out of her life she did not want to be damned.

  What? The doorbell? Is it the police again? She pushed herself to stand up. Look out the window. Ben’s car. In the street.

  Why would he ring the bell? She looked down, could only see a grocery store bouquet of winter flowers, clear plastic protecting them from the cold. Flowers?

  She dropped back to the nest, felt the air pressure change as the front door opened and closed, a solid thud. She grabbed a handful of pills and crunched them with her back teeth, swallowed.

  There, that’s done. She stepped on the planchette to the Ouija board, crushed it.

  Ben. One last look at Ben.

  ***

  Megan raised her eyes and said, “I want you to make a decision for me . . . so I can see how I feel about it.”

  “Okay, go ahead.”

  Megan measured her words out, “Should I go back and live with my parents?”

  Ben looked for the right signs in her eyes. He took a breath and slowly, very slowly smiled his dimply grin. “Yes.”

  “Oh,” Megan smiled back, “that’s what I wanted you to say.”

  “I don’t know, maybe I’ve got Cori’s knack for premonitions, but I have a feeling that the only ones who will be living here are Emily, her mother, and her brother. We’ve never gone looking on a weeknight. Maybe we’ll find them tonight.”

  “Can I come?”

  “Of course.” He bent for another kiss and was interrupted by a shriek as Emily fell down the stairs.

  They found her on the bottom step, mouth foaming, eyes glazed, arms twisted at improbable angles.

  “I’ll call 9-1-1.” Ben pulled his phone out as Megan knelt on the floor.

  Suddenly Megan’s body came slamming into his chest. The phone went flying and the two of them fell into the hallway. Emily’s body rose and her limbs flailed in an outrageous show of demonic control.

  “Oh, my god, oh my god, ohmygod!” Megan screamed as Emily loomed above them like a hungry carnivore. Soulless malevolence and a thin-lipped sneer preceded a response.

  “YOU HAVE NO GOD.” The voice reverberated with fiendish conviction. Then came the verbal attack. Filthy vile. Exploding from Emily’s mouth in shards. Chirps of her own voice squeaking through. Scattering syllables of apology. Invectives pounding forth, pinning Megan to Ben’s chest.

  “Say it, just say it,” Megan begged. “Say it, Ben. Make the demon come out.”

  Ben rolled Megan to the left and shielded her body. He punched his fist at Emily’s face, heard her jaw crack. He punched again. “Come out of her, demon,” he bellowed.

  The demon laughed. A raucous bawl. It tore at Emily’s clothes and ripped the sleeves away. It made her arms and legs move in a spider-like tour of the walls and ceiling of the narrow staircase. A roar of humorless screeching echoed back down to unbelieving ears. Emily’s body reached the top and crawled away.

  “Did it work?” Megan said, breathless. She jumped to her feet before Ben, spotted the blood on his sleeve and cried out, “Ben, your wound. You’re bleeding.”

  “It’s all right. Come on, let’s get her.” He leaped up the steps, gathered himself at the landing, and spoke in a whisper, “Stay behind me.” They moved past the other doors and stood in Emily’s doorway.

  Her room smelled of sulphur and urine. The nest of blankets held an arrangement of paper scraps, each balled up into little pill-like rolls. The closet door was closed.

  “In there?” Megan whispered.

  Ben shook his head, listened. “The attic.”

  They reached Cori’s room and entered.

  “Help me,” Emily’s timid little voice persuaded them toward the ladder. Her body was in the attic, but her head was hanging down through the opening and her hands were on the top step.

  “Em, I’m sorry I hit you.” Ben reached for her hands, ignored the icy coldness of her skin. “I think you need to turn around and come down feet first.”

  The icy claws dug into Ben’s hands, yanked him up with the strength of ten. The ladder toppled toward Megan and she screamed.

  “Demon! Come out of Emily! Jesus says come out!”

  Ben dropped to the floor. He stared wide-eyed at Megan. “That was it,” he said. “Those were the magic words.”

  Emily’s head reappeared through the hole, a lop-sided grin drooled saliva and blood. Her booming voice thundered, “ Maaaagggiiiccc! Haaaaaa! Jesus I know, and his followers, too, but who are you to command me to leave? You have no authority!” Her whole body slid through, righted itself, and began to grab objects around the room. She threw the ladder at them and then the boxes and as they escaped out the door the dresser slammed against the frame.

  Tuesday

  “I still don’t understand,” Megan nestled into Ben’s shoulder. They were sitting in the waiting room of the same hospital where Ed Rose lay two floors down. “The doctor said there was no evidence of drugs. They pumped her stomach and all they found were little pieces of paper. But you saw her, Ben, she must have been
on something.”

  He looked at the large electronic clock on the wall, red numbers clicking off another second, another minute, fading the realities into foggy nightmares. It was barely dawn. Emily might not last the night. After she had cast herself through Cori’s bedroom window and hit the white ground, they called the ambulance, rushed behind it in stunned silence the single mile to the hospital.

  “I can’t believe it.” Ben let a tear escape. “She was my little buddy. I . . . I wasn’t nice enough to her. I should have taken her to the shelters on Sunday, like we usually did.”

  Megan sighed, swallowed a sob, tried to bolster Ben, “If she doesn’t make it, she’ll be in a better place.”

  “You think so?” His left arm was around Megan, he crossed his right hand in front of her so he could crack each knuckle with stuttering finality. “I’m not so sure.”

  “Well, I’m sure of one thing,” Megan turned her face into his neck and whispered, “I’m not going back there; I’m going home.”

  “Same here, and . . .” his voice dropped off as he thought about the ‘authority’ he desired, “and I’m gonna do some research. Next time . . . we’ll have the power.”

  Other books by Debra Chapoton:

  Young Adult:

  EDGE OF ESCAPE by Debra Chapoton $2.99 - Emotionally impaired yet clever, Eddie obsesses over the most popular girl. He drugs her, abducts her and locks her away. She escapes, but that is part of his plan as he pretends to be her knight in shining armor. Will she accept his special devotion or reject his fragile love? Stalking gets a sympathetic twist in this story of fixation and fear.

  Adult:

  CROSSING THE SCRIPTURES by Debra Chapoton $7.99 – CROSSING THE SCRIPTURES is a Bible Study supplement for anyone who wants to know more about each of the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments. This is not only a starter course for someone unfamiliar with the individual content of each book, but it is also a collection of divine links between these books based on the Hebrew alphabet. This new way of approaching the Scriptures will edify even those who have spent years studying the Holy Word. The 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet connect three times each with the 66 books of the Christian Bible. CROSSING THE SCRIPTURES matches each letter to each book, in order, three times, so the reader can observe the amazing connections between books that are spaced exactly 22 books apart. Each chapter can be used as a daily devotion, a Bible study lesson, a reference help, a sermon starting point or a discussion guide. Summaries, themes, charts and weblinks are included.

  Middle Grade Chapter Books:

  THE SECRET IN THE HIDDEN CAVE by Debra Chapoton $2.99 – Book 1 in the Big Pine Lodge adventure series for kids ages 8 – 12. Missy and Kevin explore the dark caves beneath the lake and find surprises, danger and secrets. Can they solve the riddles in time to save the lodge?

  MYSTERY’S GRAVE by Debra Chapoton $2.99 – Book 2 in the Big Pine Lodge adventure series for kids ages 8 – 12. Missy and Kevin thought the rest of the summer would be normal, but more surprises await them in the woods, the caves, the stables and the cemetery. Two new families arrive at the lodge, but one family isn’t human.

  BULLIES AND BEARS by Debra Chapoton $2.99 – Book 3 in the Big Pine Lodge adventure series for kids ages 8 – 12. Missy and Kevin unravel more mysteries and secrets in the caves, the attic, the cemetery and the ruins. A new week of adventures and escapades face them as they confront teenage bullies and a troublesome mama bear.

  A TICK IN TIME by Debra Chapoton $2.99 – Tommy slides into an alternate world of weird adventures, creatures and riddles. He finds his way home, but who or what is following him?

  BIGFOOT DAY, NINJA NIGHT by Debra Chapoton $.99 – Anna and her friends find evidence of a Sasquatch then can’t find their way out of the woods. Things get worse when they take shelter in what might be Bigfoot’s nest.

  THE TUNNELS SERIES – 6 chapter books starting with NICK BAZEBAHL AND THE FORBIDDEN TUNNELS

  Find out more at http://www.bigpinelodgebooks.com