On Demon Wings Part 9

How could I have been careless, to let my emotions get the best of me like that? I was acting out of character and succ.u.mbing to my own paranoia that there wasn't something right with me. I just couldn't seem to get my head screwed on properly, couldn't seem to focus and bring myself into the present, into the here and now. Even the ride home, with the nasty, cold rain and the wind that picked up as I rode and battered me from the side, even that felt like it happened to someone else.

I called for my mom but she was out, so I went upstairs to my room, each step rising above me like a mountain, and crawled right into bed.

I lay on my back for a while, just staring up at the speckled ceiling. I was numb and grateful for it. I knew there was a whirlpool of feelings just churning beneath the surface, waiting to come out. All I had to do was think about how scared I was and how alone I felt. All I had to do was wish I had someone at my side who would know what was wrong with me and do whatever they could to fix me. I had that once and I didn't have it anymore. If I thought about that, the tears would never stop coming, so I pushed the thoughts away.

Rolling over on my side, I spied a pamphlet that my mother had brought back from the hospital, sitting on my bedside table. I picked it up and flipped through it. It was all about miscarriages and the recovery process and was littered with poorly drawn cartoons. I was surprised it wasn't called So, You've Had a Miscarriage!

I wondered if losing time and accosting customers were part of the side effects. There was mention of heavy bleeding and cramps, but that all stopped a few days ago. I suppose since my pregnancy (it was still weird to refer to it as that) wasn't even one term, I got lucky. Though nothing about my life seemed the slightest bit lucky anymore.

The other thing the pamphlet mentioned was how every woman reacted differently. Some women were distraught beyond repair and needed to mourn the loss. Others didn't feel much of anything. I still didn't know how I felt but I knew my body was healing at a much faster rate than my mind. Sometimes I felt like I didn't even know who I was anymore.

Even though it was the afternoon and a weak sun was pushing apart the rain clouds and streaming in through my windows, I fell asleep with tears teasing the corner of my eyes and the pamphlet folded open in front of me. When I came to, it was almost dark. The clouds had rolled back in and a wind rattled the window pane every couple of seconds. A layer of frigid air seemed to descend from the ceiling and I shivered intensely, bringing my blanket in closer around me.

There was a knock at my door but before I had a chance to panic, it opened, revealing Ada.

"I didn't think you were home," she said, hovering in the doorway, backlit from the hall.

"I was napping. It's freaking freezing in here, isn't it?"

She shrugged. She was only wearing leggings and a lacy tunic. "So what do you want?"

"Huh?" I asked.

She crossed her arms. "I've got to get ready. I'm going out with Layton. What is it?"

I frowned at her. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Well, you just called me," she said impatiently.

"No I didn't. What do you mean?"

"Yes you did," she said as she gave me a strange look. "You were just yelling Ada, Ada, Ada."

I sat up. "Nooooo, I wasn't. I was sleeping."

She raised her eyebrow. "Sleeping and texting?"

"What?"

She sighed and came over to the bed, flicking on the bedside lamp. I watched as Ada accessed her text messages. She pointed at the screen with her slender finger.

"See."

I looked. There was a text from me saying Ada, come here, I need you and her response B rite ther. I obviously hadn't sent it. The time said it was sent three minutes earlier. I had been asleep and I was pretty sure my phone was in my purse by my bed.

I told Ada so and she brought it out. My phone was in there, as I thought, but when we went to the texting app, I saw the same outgoing message.

"So you don't remember sending this like two seconds ago? You don't remember calling my name?" Ada asked. She sounded casual enough about it but I could tell from the slant of her brow that she was starting to worry.

I debated about lying to her to save some face but I couldn't.

"No, I don't remember. And to tell you the truth, I don't remember painting my nails the other day either."

"Maybe you're sleepwalking. And sleeptexting. And sleepprimping."

"What's next?" I grumbled to myself. Things were getting more out of control by the minute.

"I don't know," she said, straightening up and tucking her phone into the waistband of her leggings. "Just don't start sleepf.u.c.king."

"Ada!" I admonished her.

She smiled and shrugged, delighted for having offended me. "So there was really nothing?"

"Well now there's something. I'm doing things and not remembering them! Do you have to go to the movies tonight?"

She sucked in her lip. "I don't have to but I want to. I haven't been with Layton outside of school all this week."

"I thought you were going to break up with him," I said.

"Maybe that's what I'm doing," she told me.

I nodded to myself. I wasn't going to keep her from doing something she needed to do just because I was scared. I mean, what could Ada do anyway except take my mind off of things. And maybe prevent me from sleepf.u.c.king, G.o.d forbid.

She put her warm hand on my shoulder and squeezed it. Then she paused as she stared at my face. "What's wrong with your eyes?"

I felt a strange, sickening fear tighten the muscles in my back.

"My eyes?" I shook my head slowly. My voice trembled, "You tell me."

She leaned over and tilted my head so that it was facing the light more and looked directly into my eyes. A frightened expression spread across her face.

"What is it?" I asked frantically.

"Your pupils...are...are huge. Like, so f.u.c.king huge. You look like you have, like, shark eyes. Are you on something?

The fear spread up my spine. I leaped out of bed, nearly getting tripped up by the covers, and ran over to my mirror.

I gasped and the room started to spin. I reached out for the corner of my vanity and held myself up, stealing glances at my face. I couldn't bear to look head on.

Shark eyes were a good way of describing it. My pupils were so unbelievably wide that only a thin ring of color encircled it. And the weirdest, scariest, creepiest thing was that the color wasn't blue, as it should have been. But brown. A golden brown.

"They're brown!" I cried out.

"What?" Ada came over to me and gave me another examination. "No they aren't, they're blue. And horrifying."

I looked back at the mirror. My pupils were still huge but the ring of color was the cornflower blue of my own eyes. The brown was gone. Maybe it was never there.

"What did you take?" she asked me. "You promised you weren't going to do drugs anymore, Perry."

I was shocked and actually offended at her accusation. I wanted to protest angrily but I could see how hurt she was just by thinking it.

Looking at her honestly, with my funny eyes, I said "I didn't take anything, Ada. I haven't done drugs for who knows how long. Haven't even touched the stuff. I'm not on anything. Not even those painkillers."

She was hesitant to believe me. I couldn't blame her. I must have done a number on her back when I was her age. I was one stupid teenager.

"But what if you're sleepdrugging," she said quietly.

I took one last look at my scary-a.s.sed face and brushed past her to my closet.

"Now you're just being ridiculous. Where would I even get drugs from?"

"Where did you get the nail polish from?"

"Well, I guess I picked it up at Walgreens," I said, glaring at her, "right next to the crack cocaine aisle."

I put a Baroness tee on and a hoodie and hopped back in bed. Ada was still watching me.

"Aren't you going out?" I asked her, not wanting her company anymore.

"Are you going to be OK?" she asked.

"I'm not on drugs," I insisted, my tone laced with annoyance.

"If you say so," she replied. "Call me, though, if you need anything. Just try and make sure you're awake when you do it."

She gave me a compa.s.sionate smile and left the room, closing the door behind her.

"Patronizing b.i.t.c.h," I mumbled in a strange voice. I quickly clapped my hand over my mouth, horrified at what came out of it. I didn't mean to say that. I wasn't even feeling it. Or was I?

I had to distract myself. The more I focused on what was happening, and the peculiar way I was feeling, the more scared I got. I almost felt there were two parts inside me arguing with each other. One was very mean and wanted to do mean things to Ada, Ash, my parents. The other side was fearful and cowering. At this rate, the mean side would win. I would be Mr. Hyde.

I picked up the remote and flicked on the TV. Though it was plugged in again, I hadn't watched it since the incident the other night. A note of terror tugged at my heart in antic.i.p.ation of something supernatural happening but everything looked normal and bright. The episode of Friends where Ross and Chandler have to pivot the couch was on and the laugh track was coming from the speakers. I giggled despite myself and settled back in my bed, deciding to spend the evening watching sitcom reruns. I couldn't remember the last time I had done something like that and mindless entertainment was long overdue.

After two episodes of Friends and two episodes of Frasier, I heard my dad pull his car into the driveway and a wave of relief rushed through me. Subconsciously, I must have been on edge, despite the antics of Niles Crane.

I heard the front door open and my mom saying something to him. Then I heard their footsteps cross the driveway and the car doors close.

"Nooo!" I cried out and ran to the window. My dad's SUV was backing up down the drive, my mom in the pa.s.senger seat. They pulled onto the street and disappeared into the darkness and waving trees.

"f.u.c.k," I swore. They probably just went to a friend's house or out to get food, but that meant I was all alone in the big house for who knows how long. The wind whipping around outside, the cold blasts, and shuddering windows weren't making the situation any calmer. Of all days, I did not want to be by myself.

I tried to watch a rerun before prime time kicked in but couldn't get into it. I left it on so that the voices would keep me company but my mind was all over the place. I kept relaying the events from the day over and over again and wondered what was next.

Twenty minutes later, an old episode of The Outer Limits came on the tube. Now that was something I didn't need to see. I made the move to switch the channel and as I picked up the remote I knocked the miscarriage pamphlet off the bed. It made a solid sound as it landed on the floor. Odd. It was essentially just a few pages and light as a feather.

I looked over the edge of my bed and saw the pamphlet sticking up at a funny angle, as if there was something under it. Curiously, I reached down and picked it up.

The blue baby slippers were beneath it on the floor.

I dropped the pamphlet in alarm and leaped back in my bed, my heart doing a jackhammer impression. I grasped nervously at my hoodie and wished to G.o.d that my parents were home.

Seriously, what the f.u.c.k was going on? Had Ada brought them to me? I peered my head over. The slippers looked clean and new, waiting for newborn baby feet. There was no sign of them ever being in the trash but I know they had been there. I had seen my father put them in there and I even tossed an empty carton of orange juice on top of them in the morning. I could have gone downstairs and checked but leaving the false security of my room seemed out of the question. It didn't matter anyway. Somehow they had found me again and I didn't think I could ever fully escape. Like clock wheels that were just beginning to fit in place, I realized someone, or something, was on a mission to frighten me. It wasn't all in my head. It couldn't have been.

With my parents out and Ada on her date, there wasn't much I could do. But I could call Maximus and I did just that.

I grabbed my phone from the table, keeping a safe distance from the slippers in case they started moving on their own, and quickly dialed his number.

"Perry," he said warmly as he answered.

His voice filled me with a spark of hope. "Hi, listen, what are you doing right now?"

"Right now?" he repeated carefully. I held my breath, afraid he might already have plans. I was so scared though, I would do what I must to convince him.

"Yeah, I could really use some company. I need to get out of my house," I tried to say as calmly as possible, but it still came out fl.u.s.tered.

"Are you in trouble?" he asked, getting straight to the point.

"I'm not sure," I said honestly.

"I'll be right over. Where do you live?"

I told him and we hung up. The thing I knew about Maximus was when you called, he came running to you.

I pa.s.sed the next thirty minutes by dolling myself up. I don't know what possessed me to start thinking I was going on a date he was saving my a.s.s from going crazy was what he was actually doing but looking at it this way eased the terror from my stomach and replaced it with b.u.t.terflies. The good news was when I finally found the courage to look at myself in the mirror, my reflection was no longer demonic. My eyes were back to normal, and though I was pasty, I covered that up with a swipe of bronzer.

I ransacked my closet looking for something to wear but couldn't decide on anything until I spied a purple sundress at the back. For some reason I was drawn to it and I slipped it on.

I glanced in the mirror. It was startling to see myself in that color but it went well with my black hair and paleness. I looked girly and for once I liked it. It felt oddly natural. I put on my own leggings and black combat boots to even things out and as I grabbed a cardigan from the closet, I heard a car vroom up to the house.

Below was an old-fashioned red truck with white trim, steam rising up from the exhaust and blowing away in cold gusts. Maximus kept the truck running and got out. I knocked on the window quickly to indicate I'd be right down, then I grabbed my purse and went for my door.

I hesitated before I touched the door k.n.o.b. There was a tingly feeling in my hands, kind of like when you think you're going to get a static shock. I wasn't afraid of no shock; however. I was suddenly, inexplicably afraid that I'd try to open the door and there would be something on the other side refusing to let me out.

"I'll just jump out the window then," I said out loud to intimidate things that were probably in my imagination.

It was true, too. The roof below my window sloped gently and with an oak tree at the corner of the house, it was easy to stealthily move across and then climb down the tree. It was an escape route used many times in high school.

But this wasn't a time to sneak around. I breathed in deeply and grabbed the door handle. It swung open with ease I wasted no time running down the hall and stairs and to the front door. The lights were on, which made things less creepy, but I didn't want to spend an extra second in that house anymore.

I leaped out the door and quickly locked it behind me before speed walking toward Maximus, who was holding open the pa.s.senger door.

"Nice truck," I said with a smile.

He returned the smile with extra wattage. "Nice dress."

I was too cold and uneasy to blush. I jumped in the seat and he shut the door just as the wind picked up again.

He got in his side and gave me the once over. "Where to, little lady?"