When Life Gives You Demons

by Jennifer Honeybourn

  Spencer and I glance at each other. I’m beginning to wish I’d listened to him and waited for Mark and Nora when they come skidding up to us. They’re out of breath from running.

  Nora stands beside me and grabs my hand. The four of us form a line.

  “As wax melts before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of God!”

  “Nam supérbi insurréxerunt contra me, et violénti quæsiérunt vitam meam!”

  The troll begins to slow down, like it’s trying to move through molasses—the combination of our incantations and the strength of our joined voices seem to be working. As we continue to chant, the troll sinks slowly back down into the ground.

  We keep chanting long after it finally stills. Just to be sure.

  Spencer lets out a long breath. I can’t stop shaking.

  Did we do it?

  I think we did it.

  My mom appears from behind the troll. The sun has almost set, and her face is hidden by the shadows. My heart leaps and I want to run to her, but Spencer tightens his grip on my hand.

  “Stop! Let me go,” I say, trying to shake him off.

  “Shelby, it could be a trick,” Mark says. “We need to make sure the demon is really gone.”

  Nora puts her arm around me as Mark climbs cautiously up the hill toward my mom. He’s holding his wooden cross in front of him. He gets a few feet from her when all of a sudden, just like my crucifix, he’s lifted high into the air.

  “Mark!” Spencer yells. This time he tries to run, and I clamp down on his hand.

  Mark’s own hands wrap around his throat. He squirms in the air, his legs kicking madly, as the demon makes him choke himself. His face is already turning purple and his eyes are beginning to bug out.

  “Let God arise, and let His enemies be scattered!” Nora yells.

  “Deus, audi oratiónem meam; áuribus pércipe verba oris mei!” I can feel tears coursing down my face. Please, please let this work.

  My mom roars. Mark falls to the ground. He rolls onto his hands and knees, gasping for air.

  We don’t break the chain and we keep chanting, even as the sand around my mom starts to glow red. The ground beneath her shifts, and I’m terrified that a sinkhole is going to open and suck her under.

  Suddenly, there’s an ear-splitting sound of screaming. Beams of red light shoot toward the shifting sand. It’s so hot, sweat is pouring off of me. It’s like we’re standing in the pit of hell. These red lights have to be all of the souls that came through the portal being sucked back into the underworld.

  And then, as quickly as it started, the screaming stops. The red lights disappear. The sand stops moving, and the air around us cools by about a million degrees.

  My mom crumples to the ground. Spencer lets go of my hand, and I’m vaguely aware of him sprinting to help Mark as I grab the holy water from my bag and run toward my mom.

  Please, God, let her be okay.

  I stand over her, and my breath hitches. She’s lying on her side, her dark hair covering her face. I don’t think she’s breathing.

  I think she’s dead.

  My knees start to buckle. I’m on the edge of passing out when Nora rests a hand on my arm.

  “It’s okay, Shelby,” she says calmly. “She’s still breathing. And that’s what I need you to do as well, okay? Just breathe.” She helps me sit down on the ground, then takes the spray bottle from me and squirts some holy water on my mom’s hand. Her skin doesn’t react. “All clear,” Nora says, and I crawl over to my mom.

  I put her head in my lap, and she starts to stir. By the time her eyes flicker open and I see that they’re back to their beautiful brown, I’m bawling.

  “Shelby?” Her voice is weak. “What’s happening?” She tries to sit up, but I gently push her back down.

  “What’s happening is that you’re back,” I say, my arms tightening around her. My body slumps with relief because the truth is, I really wasn’t sure that this moment was ever going to happen. “I’ve got you back.”

  Chapter

  26

  I’M WAITING for Spencer in a dim corner of the library. Since neither of us had the chance to study for our history test yesterday amid all the chaos of saving my mom, he asked me to meet him here early this morning so we could cram before first period. I’m not sure how much good it will do at this point—besides not having studied, I’m exhausted from staying up most of the night. I didn’t want to come to school today—I wanted to stay home with my mom—but Uncle Roy insisted. He said it would be better to give her some space, let her catch her breath.

  We’ve only had her back for a few hours, but I already know that my mom’s not the same. She might never be the same. We have no idea what she lived through all these months; Uncle Roy says her memory might come back, but maybe it’s best if it doesn’t. Right now, it’s enough that she’s home.

  The library doors whoosh open. Spencer walks in, and I sit up straighter. His dark hair is still damp from the shower and his white dress shirt is buttoned up wrong, like he put it on in the dark when he was still half-asleep. He’s carrying two takeout cups of coffee. I’m suddenly glad that I listened to Uncle Roy and came to school.

  “Hey,” Spencer says, handing me one of the cups.

  “Thanks.”

  He slides into the seat beside me. He’s pale and has dark rings around his eyes, but I swear he’s never looked so good. “How’s your mom?”

  I shrug. “She’s all in one piece,” I say. “Physically, anyway.”

  Spencer frowns, his dark eyes sparking with sympathy. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. If it weren’t for you and the others, we wouldn’t even have her back.” I take a small sip of coffee. “How’s Mark?”

  “His throat is pretty bruised and his voice is a bit raspy, but he’ll be all right,” he says.

  A shiver runs through me as I remember how the demon made Mark choke himself, the way his face turned purple as he gasped for air, and how he dropped to the ground like a stone. If we hadn’t managed to close the portal, it all would have ended very differently. My crucifix wouldn’t have been the only thing that was ruined.

  As if he knows what I’m thinking, Spencer leans over and pulls something from his bag. He clears his throat. “I, um … I made you this.” He hands me a large silver cross adorned with different-size sapphire stones. “You should probably have Father Roy bless it before you use it.”

  Oh my God. He made me a bejeweled crucifix!

  I run my finger over the Celtic protection symbol he’s carved into the shiny silver on the back, along with my initials. It must have taken him all night to make this. But he did it. For me.

  Spencer smiles nervously. “Do you like it?”

  “Are you kidding? I love it,” I say, hugging the crucifix to my chest. “It’s perfect! Thank you.”

  His face relaxes. He stares at me for a moment and then he puts his arm on the back of my chair, his fingers brushing my shoulder. My heart is like thunder in my chest as he leans toward me and finally—finally!—kisses me.

  Maybe it’s the months of lead-up to this moment, all the waiting for something to happen, but this is not your average first kiss. There’s nothing shy or reserved about it, no fumbling or awkwardness. This kiss is full of everything we haven’t said to each other yet. It’s way better than any emoji.

  But as good as this kiss is—and it’s amazing—it’s just the first of many. This is our beginning. And from the way Spencer pulls me toward him like he can’t get close enough, I know he feels the same way.

  Chapter

  27

  PAINTING a ceiling is much harder than you’d think. My arms are already aching, and my mom and I have only covered about a quarter of my room, even though it feels like we’ve been at it for ages already.

  My mom coughs. I glance over, worried that this activity is too much for her. Her hand is shaking as she dips the roller into the paint tray. She’s only been back with us for a week, and she real
ly should rest and get her strength back, but she insisted on helping me.

  “Maybe we should take a break,” I say, but she just shakes her head. Keeping busy seems to be her way of dealing with what happened to her. She doesn’t have any memory of being possessed, and she keeps pressing us for details. Uncle Roy has reassured her that we’ll tell her once she’s recovered, but that’s not a conversation either of us is looking forward to.

  I hear a tap on my window. I have yet to replace the blinds Vanessa ripped down when she was destroying my room, so I can see her standing on the other side, holding up a pair of jeans.

  I get down off the step stool and open the window, and she pulls herself through.

  “You do know we have a perfectly good front door,” I say.

  “Which I can never come through again,” she says, dusting herself off. “I can’t face Father Roy.”

  Vanessa’s eyes land on my mom. From the expression on her face, I can tell that she’s shocked to see her. Not only because my mom’s here—and not in Italy, as she was told—but because she’s changed so much since the last time Vanessa saw her. The past months have been hard on my mom, and it’s reflected in her graying hair and all the weight she’s lost, in the haunted look in her eyes.

  “Hi, Ms. Black,” Vanessa says.

  “Hi, Vanessa. Nice to see you again.” Even my mom’s voice is different. She doesn’t say much, but when she does talk, she sounds much quieter.

  Being possessed doesn’t seem to have affected Vanessa in the same way. She says she’s over it, but maybe that’s because she was only under a demon’s influence for a short time. My mom wants to talk to her about what happened to them both one day soon—she doesn’t think Vanessa is as over it as she claims to be—but she’s not quite ready yet.

  As it turns out, I shouldn’t have worried about Vanessa’s reaction to learning that I’m an exorcist—she doesn’t care. And I am super-relieved that I don’t have to hide that part of myself from her anymore. I’m done with hiding who I am.

  “You’ll have to face Uncle Roy eventually,” I say, hoping that her fear of Uncle Roy is enough to distract her from asking my mom questions about Italy.

  “I fractured his elbow!” she says.

  “He’s not going to tell anyone that you did it.”

  “But I know that I did it.” She hands me a castoff pair of jeans, her favorite pair, to replace the jeans of mine that she tore. “I think these should fit you.”

  There’s no way they’ll fit me—Vanessa is three inches shorter than me—but I appreciate the gesture.

  She takes in the paintbrush in my hand, then looks upward. “Um, why are you guys painting the ceiling?”

  “This color keeps evil spirits out,” I say.

  “Huh,” she says. “I guess we’re going to have to do my room next, then.”

  Like my mom, Vanessa doesn’t have much memory of when she was possessed. And like my mom, I haven’t told her much. I’m not sure she really wants to hear that she levitated up to the ceiling she’s about to help paint.

  I hand her a paint roller. “I’ll help you with your room if you promise me that you aren’t going to fool around with Ouija boards anymore.”

  “Trust me, I am done with Ouija boards.” She slides the roller through the paint tray.

  “What’s this about Ouija boards?” Uncle Roy pokes his head in the door. “Oh, hi, Vanessa,” he says. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

  Vanessa squeaks in response, too embarrassed to even look his way.

  “Haint blue?” he says, glancing up at the ceiling and snorting. “Old wives’ tale.”

  A shadow of a smile crosses my mom’s lips. “Like your flower paintings?” It’s the first time she’s made any attempt at humor since we got her back, and it gives me hope. Maybe it won’t be long before she’s back to her old self.

  Uncle Roy purses his lips. “Yes, well, that’s just proof that it’s all balderdash,” he says. “Those paintings did us no good. Vanessa was able to get in rather easily.”

  Vanessa’s face is burning.

  “But I invited her in,” I say. “The protection doesn’t work if you invite an evil spirit in.”

  “You’re thinking of vampires, not demons,” Uncle Roy responds, sighing. He shakes his head, then turns to my mom. “Robin, would you help me with a report when you have a moment?” he asks. He gestures to his right arm, encased in a sling, to remind us that he can’t write his report himself.

  I know this is Uncle Roy’s way of trying to get her involved. He hasn’t given up hope that my mom will be his partner again, even though she says she’s done with exorcisms. She wasn’t happy when she learned that he’s been training me, but I’m hoping to convince her to let me continue studying with Uncle Roy once he’s recovered. The portal’s been closed, but that doesn’t mean that our work is done—there will always be demons. But hopefully now there will be less of them.

  “Yes, of course,” she says. She sets her paintbrush down and wipes her hands on an old T-shirt we’re using as a paint rag. “You girls okay to finish up?”

  “We’ve got it covered.”

  She gives me a quick hug. She hasn’t stopped hugging me since she got home. And I’m more than happy to let her. We have a lot of time to make up for.

  “You know, this isn’t as nearly as fun as it looks,” Vanessa says a few minutes later. She runs a hand across her forehead, smearing a blob of paint on her skin.

  “I never said it would be fun.” I stretch to reach the corner of my ceiling. Maybe this is just a silly superstition—maybe it’s crazy to believe that a coat of blue paint will keep me from harm—but it makes me feel better.

  Vanessa grimaces, but she doesn’t give up. She keeps painting, even though I know she’s hating every second of it. But we make the best of it, talking and laughing and complaining about how much our arms ache, until eventually we finish. And as I climb down from the step stool, I realize that this moment has already become one of our stories, one that we’ll tell over and over until it’s as worn as an old dollar bill.

  Epilogue

  Case Number: EX104-17-3856

  Incident: The Exorcism of Mrs. Florence Merriweather

  Exorcist: Shelby Black

  June 18, 1600 hours. Zelda Horvath, one of our elderly parishioners, came by the rectory this morning to ask for help exorcising her friend, Mrs. Florence Merriweather. As Father Roy claims his elbow is still not fully healed, he asked me to accompany Mrs. Horvath to her home and attend to Mrs. Merriweather’s exorcism by myself.

  Father Roy’s elbow only seems to bother him when he’s trying to get out of doing something, so naturally I was suspicious. Especially because the only other time he’s sent me out on my own was when he wanted me to exorcise a person who was not even possessed (see the “exorcism” of Shane Harris). Also, he was trying not to smile when he asked me to take care of it.

  And it turns out that I was right to be suspicious of his motives! Because when we arrived at Mrs. Horvath’s apartment and she opened the door, I caught my first glimpse of Mrs. Florence Merriweather dragging her butt across the beige carpet. Right then, I knew for sure that I had been tricked.

  Yes. Mrs. Merriweather is a dog. A toy poodle, to be specific. Tiny and gray and fluffy, with purple bows on her ears. Cute until she tries to sink her teeth into your ankle, which she attempted to do to me as soon as I walked through the door.

  I did not even know it was possible for pets to be possessed, since Father Roy has never once shared this information with me. I wasn’t sure the regular methods of exorcising a demon would work on an animal, but since I had nothing else to go on, I pulled out my crucifix and holy water. I figured that it would be an easy-enough task—I mean, expelling a demon from a dog has to be easier than exorcising a human, right?—and it might have been if Mrs. Horvath hadn’t been yelling at me every two seconds not to harm her precious baby.

  “Almost done?” Spencer asks.

  I glance ov
er at him. He’s sitting behind Uncle Roy’s desk, repeatedly tossing a yellow smiley-face stress ball in the air, waiting for me to finish this stupid report for Uncle Roy. Spencer’s a major distraction with his sexy dark hair and perfectly sculpted arms. He’s rolled the cuffs of his shirt up to his elbows to give me a good glimpse, probably because he’s bored of waiting and knows his arms are my kryptonite.

  “Just about.” I quickly scribble the rest of the details.

  Said the incantation as Mrs. Merriweather alternated between snapping at my ankles and floating through the air like a helium balloon. Gave her a good squirt of holy water, right in the ear. She yelped and ran behind the couch, but I think that’s because she was scared of the water and not because her skin was on fire. I’m 85-percent sure that the exorcism worked.

  I sign my name at the bottom of the paper and get up to toss the report onto Uncle Roy’s desk. Spencer leans back in the leather chair as I approach. I’m about to slide into his lap when Uncle Roy comes into the office.

  “Mr. Callaghan,” he says. He makes a shooing gesture, and Spencer gives him a sheepish smile as he stands up and slides past him. Uncle Roy sits down in his chair, his eyes narrowing as he notices that Spencer’s been messing with his stuff.

  I grab my bag. We’d best be getting out of here before he blows. Spencer and I are halfway out the door—so close, I’m almost home free—when Uncle Roy says, “Oh, Shelby? Don’t forget—”

  “We have training in an hour.” I roll my eyes. “I know.”

  He gives me a small smile and folds his hands together. “Actually, why don’t you take the afternoon off?”

  “Thanks,” I say, smiling back at him. Maybe it’s because he knows I’ve been working really hard lately—both at school and at my exorcism studies. Or maybe this is his way of making up for the fact that he sent me to exorcise a dog. Whatever his reasons, I’m happy to skip training for the day and spend time with my boyfriend.