by Annie Berdel
“You’re just pissed off because you won’t get a cut before they leave. I know what you’ve been doing the next county over. I know what you did that night in the basement”
Emma blinked trying to stay calm. Piece by piece the puzzle was coming together. These two vile creatures before her, their conversation was making her desperately sick. Emma’s mind was spinning in several directions in an unfathomable speed, seeking a way for her to get these children behind her away from these demons and to safety was her top priority.
“Do you think running your mouth like this in front of your wife is going to save you, or her for that matter?” Ben asked Tom
“Fuck her, all she has done is make my life miserable” Tom replied before he could stop himself
Looking at Emma, he figured he might as well continue his barrage. He had nothing to lose now anyhow. He wanted out, away from everything that was being force fed down his throat as normal. He hated his life, Ben was right about that but he just didn’t want to get away, he wanted to see the woman standing there before him pay for his misery. “By the way, if you can’t figure it out, I don’t have your six anymore.” He said with a smirk
The words cut to the core of Emma’s being. She knew it was going to be bad but to stand there and basically wish her dead was something she wasn’t ready for. Blinking, she just looked at him in disbelief. This man before her who she vowed to love til death, just told her she was on her own. The cord of three had been cut.
“Wow, you didn’t know?” Ben asked Emma with a faint sense of sympathy
Emma lowered her eyes first and then lowered her head so neither could see her fighting the tears, the kids behind her starting to pull on each hand that she held tightly. Turning, she yelled to Lauren to come get them.
“Tell her to stay the hell away from here” Tom spat at Emma
“She’s just gonna...” Emma trailed off as Tom screamed over her
“If she comes near here, I will shoot her!”
“What? She’s your daughter!”
“No, not really. Not by blood. She can be just as easily discarded.”
“Tom, what are you saying? This is crazy!” Emma pleaded. While it was true that Tom was not her real father, he had been in Lauren’s life since she was three years old. She had known no other father figure. He had been there for Lauren’s first boyfriend and her first heartbreak. He had watched as she learned how to drive and when she graduated from high school. He was there when she learned how to ride a bike and when she had gone to her first day of pre-school. He was there when the monsters under her bed scared her so bad that she cried.
Emma had no idea what Lauren had seen that night and had no idea the danger she was placing her daughter in. Backing up, Emma scooted the children behind her a little bit closer to safety wondering what was taking her daughter so long to get the kids.
As she was rounding the corner of the building, Lauren was within sight of the scuffle but could not hear exactly what was being said. She saw what she thought was an argument between her parents and the Sherriff but something was off. Her gut was trying to warn her to be cautious but Lauren kept moving towards the group. She saw her mom trying to keep the kids behind her to try and shield them.
“Mom?” Lauren called out
“Lauren, stay where you are.” Emma said without losing eye contact with Tom. Backing towards her daughter, Emma kept pushing the children behind her towards Lauren
“Emma, stop now before I shoot you.” Tom said, his voice now unrecognizable to his wife.
“You wouldn’t dare.” Emma replied with a new found boldness. This nonsense had to stop. She knew her husband had been through a lot but it was no excuse for turning against his own family.
“Mom?” Lauren yelled out as she saw Tom raise the gun up towards her mom. Every muscle in her body now on fire as the adrenaline pumped through her. Lauren was both in as much shock and disbelief at what she was witnessing now as she had been the night she had seen her dad in the field. She couldn’t let him hurt her mom the way he had that other woman. Reflexes taking over, Lauren started to run towards her mom screaming for Tom to stop.
Swinging the pistol in Lauren’s direction, Tom pressed back on the trigger. The bullet found its intended target, right in Lauren’s thigh, toppling her straight to the ground like she had hit an invisible wall.
“I told you to tell her not to come over here!” Tom now sounding like a wounded animal fighting for its life.
Her eyes watching Tom’s pistol as it moved from herself to the direction behind her. Emma observed her husband siting in the muzzle as his finger pad slowly pressed the trigger back. She saw a flash as the projectile erupted out of the firearm. She knew the deafening sound would be coming, expecting it to ring in her ears as her head looked towards her daughter in horror.
“NO! What have you done?” Emma screamed
It all happened so quickly. Tom brought the hilt of the pistol back with as much force as he could and clocked Ben forcefully across his nose. Ben was caught off guard, caught up in the pain Emma was going through with what her husband had just dumped on her. He spun around and fell back against the wall, sliding down into a slump on the ground as blood spurted from his face. Emma pushed the kids backwards are she turned to try and get them away as fast as possible. She figured the commotion between the two men would be the perfect time. If there was anything she had learned over the years it was to notice the signs a person gives off before they do anything physical. She saw it in her husband, the clenched jaw, his shoulders flinching, his hands balling and un-balling. She knew something was coming and glad she was ready for it.
She felt the pull on the back of her skull. It felt like all of her hair was being yanked out of her scalp. Her head jerked backwards as her arms flew up.
“Emma, give me those fucking kids!”
Reaching up, she grasped her hands around the base of her hair being pulled, securing it from being pulled any harder.
“Tom!” she screamed
She heard the gun go off as the hand holding her hair released her grip. Spinning around she saw Ben with his firearm aimed at Tom. Looking quickly at Tom, Emma saw where the bullet had grazed his arm.
Tom lunged towards Emma, pulling her in from of himself as Ben centered his muzzle once again.
Emma raised both of her hands towards Ben, her eyes wide with horror “Ben!” she yelled
Tom pushed her towards the unsuspecting Sherriff. Emma stammered forward, falling onto the sheriff, barely missing the pistol.
“Get off of me!” Ben yelled at Emma, throwing her like a rag doll off to the side
Emma bounced around and finally got turned back towards the two men
“Don’t even think about it” Tom was saying
Emma gasped in horror as she saw Ben’s gun pointed towards Tom. Tom standing in the doorway, in his arms he held the little girl in front of himself like a ragdoll to block the path of any projectile.
“Ben, please don’t shoot her!” Emma begged
“Yes Ben, please don’t shoot the little girl. She’s worth a lot of money to someone!” Tom taunted, his voice unrecognizable to Emma
“You’re a sick fucker Tom” Ben said calmly
“You can talk” Tom sneered back
“You know, I’ve done a lot of stuff I’m not proud of but to hide behind a child is a low I would never go to. You’re a fucking coward.”
Emma stood as her gaze never left the child’s frightened face. “Tom please, just give her to me”
“No way! She’s going with me. Stop me and I’ll make sure no one gets her. I’ll break her fucking neck just to make you sick. And it will all be your fault, once again.” Tom snarled
Emma felt the faint, cool breeze on her face before the terror snuck in. It was enough to keep her from being overwhelmed with the realization of it all. In one fail swoop, all was revealed to her heart and she had minimal time to sort through it all. The evil that she had been feeling in
her own home now was personified before her. The devil walked and talked on her land. He had been sleeping in the very bed in a room below where she spent hours praying to her own God. He called her by name. She called him husband.
“Aren’t you proud Emma, how you’ve made me into the man before you. How you cut my balls off so that you could get your way. All these years, ALL THESE YEARS, all I have done is live in your shadow and I’m tired of it. I’m tired of you and your shit! If I had a gun right now, I would shoot you myself. I’ve never wanted to hurt anyone as bad as I do you. You have made my life miserable and I hate you for it.
“Oh! A little trouble in paradise?” Ben smirked
“Shut up Ben!” Emma shouted
A switch went off in Emma’s head. She had preached it a million times but now it was her turn to live the words. Each of us, in our lifetime, will have to make a decision. The bad guys already lived in the reality of death. They trained for it. This mental fuck would be the downfall of a lot of good people in a life or death situation as it would take them to long to join the dark side. There are no rules in love and in war. It will be a lesson hard learned for many, some would only learn it with their lives.
Time slowed as Emma’s reality became clear. She was here in the present between a corrupt small town sheriff and the man she had been married to for the last seventeen years. Two innocent lives hung in the balance of her decisions going forward.
“I’m taking these children with me and I’m leaving so don’t try and stop me”
“Like hell you are!” Ben returned
Tom moved the child in front of him again to block any shots that Ben could get off. Emma’s heart now beat in her chest so loud she couldn’t hear the exchange of words going on between the two men. Her eyes looked from the young boy and back to the little girl dangling like a rag doll in her husband’s hand.
“Ben” Emma said “put the gun down and let him leave”
“What?” Ben asked surprised
“Do what I told you” she begged
“Ya Ben, listen to the bitch”
“Ben, please!” Emma pleaded this time with such intensity it shut Ben up.
Emma stepped in front of Ben’s gun, blocking it in case he decided to shoot her husband. She could die here but it was a chance she was ready to take. Without a doubt in her mind, Emma knew her Tommy was gone. The shell of the man standing before her was a stranger. Actually no, he wasn’t completely foreign to her. She had picked up on the energy this being had been emitting for some time now and had spent countless hours praying its source be revealed. It had. It stood before her now.
“She’ll pussy whip you next, you fucking asshole” Tom said laughing at Ben. “I’m leaving with these kids and no one better try and stop me again”. Tom now spitting out the words toward Emma as his arm snaked tautly around the little girl’s waist.
Emma could hear Ben shifting his weight from one leg to the other behind her. He was getting restless and with that, stupidity would not be far behind. She would deal with him later but for now, there was no way she was taking her eyes off the circumstances before her. Tom had her full attention and deservedly so. He was the wild card in all of this.
Emma could feel the boldness rising up within her soul. The warmth spread across her chest and across her shoulders, snaking down her arms, empowering her fingers. Like the women who walked before her, she wondered briefly if she was placed here on this earth for this time, for this moment.
“These lives are innocent.” She calmly spoke directly to Tom not losing eye contact
He blinked and his eyes traveled to her mouth
“Let them go” she whispered as he watched the movement of her lips
Like a slow motion movie, Emma’s hand slid around to the back of her hip.
“Let them go” she mouthed, her eyes watching for any sign, any change in his face
Tom felt himself being swallowed by her eyes, by the slow methodical movement of her fleshy lips. His vision slowly receding inward, he was losing all peripheral as his concentration was fully on her face. He blinked.
Emma saw it, the black fog that drifted over his pupils, devouring what was left of his essence.
“Nooo!” his high pitched scream being backed by the personification of evil that had been haunting Emma for weeks now. Emma’s eyes quickly diverted to his throat as his arm flung the little girl away from his body and he reached for Emma.
“Not this time.” Emma said calmly as she turned slightly. Raising her pistol, she centered the sights in on the heart she had known intimately and gently pressed back on the trigger.
65
Demons. We all have them. They play in the dark recesses of our mind. They tap dance across our heart and leave them bruised and damaged. They make us believe untruths and scatter our emotions to the winds like freshly changed leaves in a fall breeze. Demons manipulate us to a point that we become our own worst enemy, sprinkling self-doubt and unworthiness upon our souls like grandpa would layer salt on his mashed potatoes at Christmas dinner. We have given them, might I say willingly at times, unnecessary power over our lives. How do we take that back? How do we break free from these invisible bindings that they have placed around us, or have we bound ourselves, placing blame on them? It’s easier that way, to blame something outside of ourselves. To not take hold of our own destinies and just go with the flow. But a time will come, when we each must make a choice. Circumstances will be life changing, that fork in the road, so to speak. You will either step up, or step aside but either way, your life will not be the same. We each carry this fate at least four or five times during our time here. Is it God? Do you believe in a higher power? Is it not the balance that nature craves, that good versus evil?
Emma has demons who have taunted her all of her life. “You aren’t good enough!” “You are stupid!” “No one could love you.” Over and over the demons sang out to her, and pushed her harder to become someone she might not have become if she had learned how to handle the demons earlier. She lived to make others happy, to take care of their wants and needs because that is what she thought she was only good at. She chased her own dreams away just so she could support those she loved because that was the only time she felt like they loved her. But Emma ended up losing herself in the charade she played. Who was she? Why was she here? To make someone else rich? She missed most of her children’s lives because she worked. She worked because she wanted to give them a better life then she had and funny thing is, all they wanted was her time, something that couldn’t get bought. Something that she gave grudgingly to someone else in exchange for a monetary benefit. How could she be so confused about what love wanted?
Mike’s demons trail him like the wake of dust behind his motorcycle. He ran so far and so fast, he did not allow the demons to settle. He had been hurt. Hurt by a man that was supposed to be there to show him the ropes. To show him, teach him about life. But Mike had to learn the hard way as the old man left. He left to go fulfill his own selfish desires and Mike had to not only figure things out but also fill in the gap where the old man left deep wounds. Mike would listen, night after night to the demons surrounding the old woman as she cried uncontrollably as her heart longed for the old man. But the old man left anyways and Mike vowed to never cause anyone so much harm. Love was a joke.
Megan’s demons surfaced when she faced the challenges of raising a child with a handicap. Life threw a curve ball and she didn’t get the big house with the white picket fence, the doting husband and 2.5 perfect children who excelled at everything and the teachers loved. She didn’t even get the dog. Oh, she got the big house alright, that seemed immense when she was beyond tired from taking care of a newborn alone because her so called “doting husband” was doting on his secretary. How many nights had her head hit the pillow, so tired that she couldn’t even cry herself to sleep? Scared that she would sleep so soundly that she wouldn’t hear the baby cry if he woke. Her demons, poking at her after she turned the light off and s
tretched her hand out across her bed to feel the cold, emptiness of space. Is this what her life had become? Was she not worthy to be loved?
Shelby’s demons chased her minute by minute into her normal of servitude. Her job was to make sure everything was alright. With everyone. All the time. She woke before the sun to make breakfast for everyone and was the last one to lay her head on a pillow at night. She worked hard. She found her worth in other’s notion that “That Shelby, she’s a hard worker.” She wore it like a badge of honor. She never asked for anything from anyone. If she needed, she did without as she didn’t want to be a burden. A liability. An obligation. Wasn’t love supposed to be free? Or did she need to earn it? It’s all very confusing when your demons want it to be.
Ben’s demons kept him awake at night figuring out the next move on the chess board. Power and control fed his soul after the fiends have their way with him. It was the only two things that could quench the hunger deep within him. Day by day, Ben moved his life around until he had everything and everyone under his thumb. Money wasn’t his only motivator. He wanted complete domination over everything that touched his life and if he didn’t get it willingly, he took it. He took it from those around him, his family. He took it from his employees. He took it from the people who lived in his town. And he had plans to take “influence” even further. But he also took it from his own heart, from his own soul. Feelings were a weakness that Ben couldn’t afford. Love was a distant memory.
Chloe’s tried to make excuses for the demons she allowed to play in her life. A horrible childhood, a need to make money or just not wanting the attachment that another human who’s heart you are melded with, are all doors that open to the netherworld. When do you stop, turn around and face the succubus that you yourself were becoming because of the choices you had made?