“Hey,” I moaned.
“You all right?” he asked as he popped a frozen sausage biscuit into the microwave.
“Sick,” I said.
He frowned. “Doctor?” he asked.
“Maybe not,” I replied. “Just out in the rain too long yesterday. Probably just need some rest.”
He nodded.
“Andy up yet?” he asked.
“Haven’t seen him.” I reached into the fridge and poured a glass of orange juice, never making eye contact, when I added, “He might need to rest some too.”
There was a long pause, but I refused to look back. Instead, I took a long sip from my juice, making sure that everything looked just as it should. Another day. Just a sick daughter and an exhausted son. Nothing to be worried about.
“Did he tell you that?” he said, an edge of suspicion in his voice.
I finally turned around, my brows creased. “No. He’s just usually up by now. I know yesterday was a rough day for him.”
I was on the attack, but subtly so, and I kept my tone in check. Dad wouldn’t be suspicious if I got snippy, but he might if I didn’t get snippy at all. This was me we were talking about.
“School’s pretty much done anyway. Everybody’s just floating this week. I’m sure it’s the same for Andy too. Even the teachers got one foot out the door.”
Dad chewed on it and finally said, “Fine. Keep an eye on him. We need to sit down and talk when I get home from work.” He pulled his breakfast from the microwave and pecked me on the cheek. “Be good.”
I sat at the counter, sipping my juice, never looking up at him until the door shut behind me. I heard his truck start up, and I dashed to the window just in time to see him pull away into the rising sun of a clear day. I took a deep breath and readied myself before I pushed open the door of the bathroom.
The door creaked open, and I expected the smell to knock me down. I had left the frosted window cracked the night before, just in case, but now I wondered if it had been necessary. For a long while, I stood there, watching the shower curtain and listening to the sounds of robins chirping outside the window.
“Okay,” I whispered with my eyes closed. “You can do this.”
I reached for the curtain and pulled it back, hoping that maybe last night had just been some awful dream. I knew at once that it hadn’t been. He was still there, still leaned back into the corner of the tub, his pink eyes dry and cracked, his lips pulled back strangely over his teeth. His mouth looked as if he had died in the desert while searching for water, so dry and desiccated. That awful burned hand still rested on the edge of the tub, gripping it as if it might get away from him otherwise. In the other hand, close to his sunken chest, he held the bear. I stood there, staring, wondering if I could smell anything rotten or if I just thought I did. No. Nothing yet. Just the familiar scent of burned flesh, not unlike a barbecue. The realization made me kneel down to the toilet and retch up the few sips of orange juice in my gut.
I slumped back against the wall, and once the world stopped spinning, my mind went back to more pragmatic things. I… we… had to get him out of here. We had all day to do it, but I didn’t have the slightest inkling as to how we could ever hope to accomplish this task. He was bigger than either me or Andy, and even though he was as thin as a rail, I figured he probably weighed more than he looked. I spent a moment or two trying to make a plan. Then I realized I was getting ahead of myself. The first thing to do was to show Andy.
Andy.
The Thief’s words from the night before rang in my mind once again. This entity, this demon as he called it, wanted Andy’s body, and it had already begun to push Andy’s personality aside to make that transition happen. I remembered the way he’d acted, his normally calm, hard-to-ruffle personality suddenly swinging from one extreme to the other. Glancing down at the dead body, I wasn’t sure if it was all over now or not, though I certainly hoped it was. All I could do was take it one moment at a time and hope for the best.
Whatever the final goal had been, Andy’s transformation wasn’t complete. He was still my brother, still good – of that I had little doubt. Even so, I didn’t fully trust him. If you beat a good dog long enough, he’ll learn to bite. That was my brother now, and I wasn’t sure how he would react when he saw the Thief dead in our own home.
Andy was still sleeping, still curled into the corner like a puppy in the back of a kennel. I kept waiting for his eyes to open and lock onto mine, but they didn’t. He was truly out, but there was an edge to him, a sense that he wasn’t really resting, not the way he had before he was taken. He shifted uneasily, and more than once he spoke to himself – tiny, sharp whispers that I couldn’t make out. I quietly sneaked over and sat gently on the edge of the bed.
“Andy,” I whispered, afraid to actually touch him just yet. His eyes were darting from one side to the other behind his closed lids, and I knew he was dreaming. I couldn’t imagine that it was pleasant.
“Andy,” I said a bit louder as I tapped his shoulder. “Wake up.”
I had to shake him several more times, but he finally awoke with a start and immediately sat up, drawing the covers up to his chin. His eyes, as mad as blue hornets, were dancing from side to side, scanning the room.
“Andy,” I said once more as I placed a hand on his shoulder. “You’re home. It’s okay. You’re back home.”
He looked at me, and his grip on the blanket began to loosen. “Home,” he said, nodding.
“Sorry,” I said, and he looked at me, confused. “For waking you, I mean. We need to talk, though.”
He never stopped nodding, and I wasn’t sure if he was agreeing with me or if he had just temporarily lost control of the muscles in his neck.
“We need to talk about everything that happened.” I waited for him to reply, and when he didn’t, I added, “Talk about what’s still happening.”
He cut his eyes at me, and I knew he had heard the message. “What?” he said frantically. “What’s happening?”
I wasn’t sure where to start. For one thing, I still had questions, and even though I was fairly certain that Andy didn’t have the answers, at least not all of them, I figured he could get me closer.
“When you were back there… in that cave… what happened?” I said, wanting to get some things straight first. “I mean, what did he do to you?”
He cast his eyes down to the bed, his face flushing red with either shame or embarrassment.
“It’s okay,” I said. “I mean, you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“You know,” he answered, finally glancing up. “He did the same to you when he grabbed you.”
I remembered it well, but I still wasn’t sure what it all meant. “I saw him grab you too,” I said. “Before I got you out. I heard you… in pain.”
He nodded and scratched at his leg before holding it out for me to see. “It’s already healed,” he said. “In just a day. It heals so quick. The kind of thing you wouldn’t even notice if you weren’t paying attention.”
I nodded. “Yeah. It’s supposed to be like that. Something you don’t ever see. Don’t question.” I waited for him to add more, but when he didn’t, I went further. “When it grabbed me, it felt like I was sinking. Like I was drowning in ink. Everything was just pure blackness.”
He didn’t answer, but I could see him back there in his mind. “There was a voice,” he said finally. “Something that whispered to me. Told me things. Made me promises. It told me it would make me better. Make me happy. That I’d live forever.”
I listened, breathless as he talked. Then I asked, “Did you believe it?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe. Part of me. It wasn’t just what he said. It was… this pain. All I could think of was… her.”