1 Straight to Hell Read online

  Seeing my confusion, Alan stepped in. “Apparently, she does this on the playground at lunchtime. She gets some of the boys in her class to try to hit her or pull her into the jungle gym while she defends herself.”

  “She calls it her fight club,” Mrs. Wallace said.

  “That is also the name of a violent movie,” Miss Calloway said. She glared at me. “A very violent movie.”

  It wouldn’t surprise me if Ari had seen the movie since Tanya didn’t care if her daughter ate breakfast let alone watched an R-rated movie. But letting other kids beat her up didn’t seem like Ariel’s style. She was usually the ‘S’ in the ‘S&M’ equation.

  “So what do I do,” I asked Alan.

  He gave me a world-weary sigh. He and I had shared more conversations over my niece in the past few months than we’d had about Grace in the entire four years she’d been at the school.

  “Well, I know what I would recommend,” Miss Calloway said. “That girl needs to be labeled as ‘emotionally impaired’ and put into the special needs class.”

  Both Mrs. Wallace and I started to object, but I was quicker. And louder. “Ari has problems, but she’s also smart and a very good student. I don’t want her labeled as EI.” It had taken me nearly three weeks to convince Alan that Ari could function in a regular classroom, and I wasn’t about to fight that battle all over again.

  Luckily, Mrs. Wallace had my back. “Ariel’s behavior has really improved over the past few months. She’s gotten much calmer and cooperates well with the other students.”

  Miss Calloway wasn’t convinced. “Fight club doesn’t sound like cooperation. It sounds like abuse.” She flipped through the folder. “Plus, she’s been written up for giving a cigarette to a kindergartner, peeing in a bathroom sink, and stealing candy from another student’s backpack. Why this child hasn’t already been labeled as emotionally impaired is a mystery.” She fixed Alan with an icy stare.

  Alan took out a handkerchief and mopped his sweating forehead. “We all want what’s best for Ariel.”

  I’d subbed in the special needs classroom enough to know that Ari didn’t belong with those students. They were sweet kids, but they couldn’t write their own names, didn’t read, and spent much of their time learning how to tie their shoes and zip up their coats. Ari would be so bored that she’d act out more, not less. “Let me talk to her,” I begged. “Give me a few days. Please.”

  “She belongs in the special needs classroom,” Miss Calloway said. “And if you were really concerned about this girl, you’d stop being so selfish.”

  “If I was really concerned for her?” I gripped the arms of my chair. “Do you realize what I’ve already done? I took her in when no one else would. I’ve clothed her, fed her, and made sure she did her homework. I’ve put up with her drawing graffiti on the walls of my house and taking apart my computer to see what makes it run.” I stood up and crossed over to the social worker, ready to slap the condescending look from her face. “I listen to her swear at me, had her hit me, and put up with her stealing from me. I’ve…”

  Alan cleared his throat. “Lilith.” At the sound of my name, I blinked and realized that my nose was only an inch away from Miss Calloway’s pert, little one. Bewildered by my own behavior, I pushed my hair out of my face and backed away.

  “Are you all right,” Alan asked. His face was pale, as if he’d seen a monster.

  I was mortified. I’d handled this situation all wrong. Instead of going into succubus mode and working to charm everyone in the room, I’d gotten angry. In fact, more than a little angry from look of Miss Calloway. She was pressed into her chair, eyes wide. Even the tank-like Mrs. Wallace seemed afraid of me.

  I slunk back to my chair. “Give me two days,” I begged Allen. “Please.”

  He sighed and nodded. “Okay. We’ll meet again next Monday. Mrs. Wallace will keep me up to speed.”

  When we stood, Ari’s teacher patted my shoulder. “You’ve done wonders with your niece, Ms. Straight. I know Ariel’s going to be fine.”

  I wished I had half as much confidence in myself as she did.

  When I was back in the hallway, I was greeted by a small voice. “Hello, Ms. Straight.”

  Sitting on the bench outside the principal’s office was the little boy who had found me hunched in the bushes the day before. He dressed like he was going to church, but his overly large sneakers hung on the ends of his stick-like ankles like clown shoes.

  I sat next to him, drained. “Are you in trouble?”

  He shrugged. “I fell asleep in class again.” He did look tired. Like he could hardly keep his eyes open. He leaned a little closer to me and whispered, “Did you find that demon in your bushes?”

  “No.” I whispered back. “I think he ran away.”

  His eyes opened wider. “How did you make him do that?”

  “I got lucky, I guess.”

  The office door opened and the secretary called out, “DuShawn?”

  My little companion got off the bench. “I wish I’d get lucky like you,” he said. “My demon won’t go away. He keeps me up all night.” As he walked into Alan’s office, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and hung his head like he’d already given up.

  Once again, I was waiting for the girls when they came home from school.

  “What now,” Ariel said when she saw me. That morning, I’d noticed that my glamour’s hold on Ari was fading. But now I saw that it had worn off completely. Ari was back to being my little hell cat.

  “Fight club,” I said.

  “Ah, hell.” She slung her backpack onto the table. “It was a joke, Auntie Lilly. Don’t get your panties in a bunch.”

  “Don’t talk to me like that,” I said.

  Grace raced past us, looking as worried as Drinking Tea did when he heard the vacuum cleaner start up.

  “Ari, I’m worried about you. Mrs. Wallace is worried, too.”

  Ari dug in the cupboard for a box of cereal. “Okay, no more fight club. I promise. Feel better now?”

  “Not really, no. Why were you doing it?”

  “Because.” She’d already shut me out, and I knew from experience that I’d get nothing from her by talking or threatening or even crying. Ari was the champion of stonewalling. Even the psychiatrist I’d sent her to hadn’t been able to get a thing out of her. Yesterday’s stunt with calling the school had worked, but I couldn’t count on it to work again.

  So, with no other recourse, I turned to my demon. “You’re right, Ari. I worry about you too much. You’ve got things under control, don’t you?” I spoke softly, like I was trying to hypnotize her. “Now why don’t you tell me what this fight club thing is all about.”

  Not only did Ariel not succumb to the effects of my demon, she flipped me off and ran upstairs, slamming the bedroom door behind her. Maybe it was because I was exhausted, or maybe it was as William had said – that seducing people who’d been having second thoughts was very difficult – but my succubus was completely ineffective.

  Before I could chase after Ari, the phone rang. I would have ignored it, but at the sound of her dad’s voice on the machine, Grace raced down the stairs to answer. “Hi, Dad!” I hated how cheerful she sounded whenever she talked to him. “Yeah, she’s right here.”

  Without bothering to say ‘hello’, Ted said, “I’m not buying a French horn. Adelaide and I discussed it, and we both think Grace is far too young for such an expensive instrument.”

  I was about to tell him to explain that to Grace himself, but he hung up.

  “So did he say when it’s coming,” Grace asked, her eyes alight. Unfortunately, I’d already told her that her father was buying her the horn. Stupid, stupid mistake! I should have known that even a seductress couldn’t compete with an embittered mother-in-law.

  “Sorry, Love. There won’t be a French horn. Not for a while. But you can have piano lessons.”

  It’s like I’d tripped a wire on an explosive. “I don’t want stupid piano lessons!
I want a French horn. You promised me I could get one!” Grace burst off the couch. “You never do anything you promise! You promised Dad that you’d marry him and love him forever, and you didn’t do that, either. You’re a liar!”

  I let her run upstairs, afraid that if I kept her in the room, I’d slap her.

  And then, right on cue, Jasmine walked in through the front door. “I don’t know why the hell you thought I wanted to work at a friggin’ bagel shop, Lil, but thanks for making me waste my day.” She flung her purse on the couch. “Now, I even smell like bagels.” She wrinkled her nose as she took off her coat.

  “Wait? You got the job?” At last, some good news.

  “Yeah, but I’m not going back. They wanted me at work at six tomorrow. Six in the morning! So I told them I quit.” She glared at me. “From now on, if you want someone to get a job, then you get one! You don’t do anything but lay around all day anyhow.”

  And that’s when I came apart. Literally.

  I don’t remember much about those next few moments except for feeling like my ribs were cracking open and my heart was exploding and the deep, dark thing that had taken up residence inside my body was breaking free. My vision became a hazy red, and a steady roar filled my ears. Once more, I’d become angry without meaning to, but this was much, much worse than what had gone on in Alan’s office. I’m pretty sure that I birthed a monster that afternoon.

  I don’t know what would have happened if Tommy hadn’t walked in the door just then, but thank gods he did. Distantly, I heard him ask, “What the hell is going on in here?”

  His voice drew me back from whatever vicious place I’d been in, and I regained my senses to see that he stood in the doorway, two bags of spilled bagels at his feet. Then I realized that I was looming over Jas who was cringing by the kitchen door. She wasn’t crying, but her face was pale as bone, and her eyes were huge. Her lips trembled. “I’m sorry Lilith,” she said, her voice small and meek.

  I gaped at her, then turned helplessly to Tommy who was staring at me in open-mouthed amazement. “I don’t know what happened,” I said. Which, of course, wasn’t true. I knew exactly what had happened: I’d allowed the demon inside me to take over, and, for a moment, I’d become Miss Spry. Sick with shame, I meekly began picking up the spilled bagels and returning them to their sacks. “I’ve been under a lot of pressure, what with my mom and Ted and all.”

  Jas ran to Tommy and put her head against his chest. Tommy remained perfectly calm, but he eyed me mistrustfully. “I understand. But for my own peace of mind, I need to know: do you have a gun in the house.”

  His question shocked me. “No! Of course not.”

  “Good.” He put his arms around the quivering Jasmine. “Be sure you keep it that way.”

  I was deeply wounded, knowing that he didn’t trust me to not hurt my family. But at the same time, I realized that he was right. I’d become dangerous.

  That night, Tommy moved in.

  He never said he was moving in; he said he was crashing for a few days. He also never said he was there to protect Jas, Grace, and Ari, but it was pretty clear from the way he eyeballed me any time we were together that he thought it was only a matter of time before I went postal again. And while I’m sure he had no idea who or what I was, it was clear that he knew something was up.

  Although Tommy’s constant prattle about spirituality and the Great Universal Power wore on my nerves, even I had to admit that he was in touch with something that most people couldn’t recognize. He had an uncanny knack for seeing into people and knowing what was really going on inside their heads. Even Ariel’s. Especially Ariel’s.

  Tommy was the only person I’d met who was able to reach into Ari and find the places where she was still a normal kid. For example, one day, he got her to make Valentine’s cards. Not cards with bloody hearts or ironic messages like ‘I love you like I love hemorrhoids’ (which is what I’d seen her do before), but real honest-to-goodness cards with pictures of dogs and monkeys and shooting stars. She was flushed with pride when I hung one on the front of the refrigerator.

  But as much as I liked Tommy, adding another person into our already overcrowded townhouse sent my stress level through the roof. Because once he’d made the living room his domain by sleeping on the couch, there were precious few places the rest of us could go. Plus, the brand-new washing machine was always running, and the fridge was always empty and the bathroom… Well, I’d rather not go there, and neither would you had you lived with us.

  So, knowing Tommy wouldn’t leave unless he was convinced I wouldn’t hurt my loved ones, I did my best to show him that I could play nicely with everyone. Although Grace, of course, was no trouble, Jas and Ari pushed me to the limit. But even though I gritted my teeth so hard that I could have compacted coal into diamonds, I didn’t lose my cool.

  That is, not until Ariel walked into the kitchen holding Drinking Tea by his tail.

  The cat was yowling and fighting like a banshee, Ari was crying and, once again, I lost it. I was out of my chair in a second. “Put that cat down right now!” She dropped the cat, Tea streaked away, and I grabbed her shoulder and shook it. “What were you thinking?”

  A thousand bits of advice swarmed my mind like gnats. Count to ten. Take a deep breath. Leave the house if you have to. But instead of doing something rational, I kept a vise-like grip on my niece’s shoulder.

  “Ari, you shouldn’t have done that,” Tommy said. He and I had been having coffee together while he told me for the hundredth time about his trip. The only reason I let him continue to talk about it was because I loved how the idea made his eyes shine.

  “Why would you want to hurt Tea like that?” Tommy asked.

  Like me, Ariel was an ugly crier. Her face, normally pale, had grown blotchy. “I didn’t know it would hurt him.”

  “How could you not know!” I wasn’t quite at Miss Spry level, but I could feel the pressure building. If I’d had a gauge on my forehead, my needle would have been in the red.

  Ari cried harder. “I swear I didn’t know. A kid in my class says he does it all the time.”

  Ever-so-gently, Tommy put his hand on mine. My fingers relaxed. Carefully, he drew me away so that he could come between me and my niece. Then he knelt down so that the two of them were face to face. “You really hurt Tea, you know that? It would be like someone picking you up by your hair.”

  She pressed her face in her hands. “I’m so sorry.”

  Tommy’s quiet expression didn’t change. “How do you think Drinking Tea feels now?”

  Ariel shrugged.

  “How would you feel if someone picked you up that way?”

  “Scared?”

  “Of what?”

  “Of me.” She’d stopped crying, but her lower lip still trembled. “Like I might do it again.”

  Tommy nodded somberly. “Do you think he’ll want to curl up on your bed when you’re sleeping?”

  She looked away and shook her head. “He hates me!”

  “He’s afraid of you,” Tommy corrected. “He thinks you aren’t safe. But you might be able to fix that by convincing him you’ll never hurt him again. It’s going to take a lot of time before he trusts you, but I’m sure you can make it happen. Animals can be incredibly forgiving.”

  “I’ll never do it again! I swear I won’t!” Ari flung her arms around Tommy who hugged her tightly. At times like this, I wondered if Tommy housed his own seducing demon because I’d never seen Ariel take to a human in this way before.

  Ari hesitantly touched my arm. “Sorry, Aunt Lilly. Do you hate me?”

  “Of course not!” I didn’t understand her, of course, but I couldn’t hate her. I hugged her. “Go find Tea, and give him a kitty treat. That might be a good way to start making up.”

  “I can’t imagine what gets into that child’s head,” I said when she’d left. “‘I didn’t know I was hurting the cat’. Really!” I refilled our coffee mugs and sat back at the table. “Where on earth did you get
all your patience from,” I asked him.

  Tommy looked into the depths of his coffee and shrugged.

  “I’m beginning to think you are a holy man,” I said. “Or at least the reincarnation of one.”

  He smiled uncomfortably. “No, but I believe that whatever rules the world is ultimately good, and I try to follow that example.”

  I couldn’t resist gently teasing him. “It’s like those bracelets, ‘What would Jesus do?’”

  “Him, sure. Or Gandhi or Deepak Chopra or Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu or even you.”

  I laughed, startled. “Me? Are you kidding?” If only he knew about the demon lodged in my soul.

  “You took in Ari when she had nowhere else to go. And you let Jasmine stay here, too.”

  I shook my head and blew on my coffee. “I’m no saint, Tommy.”

  “Neither am I.” He gave me a soulful look and toyed with one of the metal spacers in his earlobe. For all his ferocious tattoos and savage piercings, Tommy was a surprisingly anxious young man. I often wondered if his outrageous body art was more of an armor worn to protect himself from the world. “I’ve done some terrible things.”

  “I don’t believe it.”

  He stared at his coffee mug with such concentration that I almost expected it to go up in flames. “I argued with my sister,” he finally said. “The day before she died.”

  When he’d made all of the cookies for Carrie’s wake, he’d told me that his sister had died less than a year before. And even though he talked about her frequently, I still didn’t know what had happened.

  “Stacy had trouble with depression and had been in a downward spiral for a long time. She was also drinking pretty heavy.” Tommy’s eyes were distant, as if he was watching a heartbreaking scene I couldn’t see. “One night, I went over to her house to convince her to get some help. We got to arguing, and things went from bad to worse. She called me names and started screaming that I wasn’t a very good brother.”

  I took Tommy’s hand and squeezed it.