Previous Volumes
Volume 4 No. 3
Demons
by Chelsey R. Knapp
I lifted the man named Carl from the floor so he could perhaps maintain some form of dignity in front of his children. He stomped away from me. He straightened his collar and settled for a moment as if having fixed it, but he looked ridiculous. “Well, isn’t this a surprise,” he said, “I didn’t think I’d ever see you again, sis.”
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The woman named Margaret yelled from the foot of the stairs to drown out the duet of screaming children clinging to her ankles. “Your brother said you were dead! That was years ago! This is how you come back into his life? You’ve traumatized our children before you’ve ever even met them!”
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She locked eyes with the children and they buried their tiny heads. That impressed me. Frightening children with only a look was a rare gift that few mortals coveted.
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She stepped towards Carl and he jolted back, nearly falling down the stairs.
“Based on the way you acted last time...I wasn't supposed to meet them. Was I, brother?”
I moved closer and noticed his drunk, rosy cheeks had gone pale; humans did have their own way of haunting one another.
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He shoved me in a violent way meant to showcase his limited, though prideful human strength. “Why come here?” He asked her. “What do you want, money?”
“Of course that’s what she wants, Carl!” Margaret yelled. “Just give her the money and get her out of here! When are you going to leave your brother alone, you leech!”
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The mortal insults didn’t appear to phase her, and I sensed this was the way things had always been. She smiled, seeming overjoyed specifically by the word ‘leech.’
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“I’m glad you asked me that, Margaret. Please cover the children’s ears for me.”
She gestured towards Margaret to obey, and dumbfounded, the mother showed her children to cover their ears.
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“There’s something I’ve been wanting to tell you.” She motioned towards Carl as if he were part of an exhibit she was presenting. “The last time I saw my brother, he threw me down a flight of stairs. Then he smashed my head against the cement. And dumped my body in a river.” She watched with great satisfaction as her brother’s eyes grew furious. “Call me crazy, but I think he was trying to get rid of me.”
He smiled. “You’re delusional as always. I feel bad for you. You make it all up in your head.”
One of the children had stopped covering their ears. "Daddy, who is that?"
She started wiping her eyes. “I see you’re raising more children to join the business. Dad would be so proud. Are they my replacements, Carl?”
Margaret comforted the children and looked up with disdain. “No, they’re your niece and nephew.”
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Carl threw open the front door. “You’ve already been replaced, sis.”
They were silent for a while as the children settled.
She approached her invitation to exit, turning to relay one last message to the children as she ran out; the children that she had yet to meet but had already managed to scare; the children that would have grown up knowing her as their Aunt if life had allowed it. “Children, this was a routine visit from your Guardian Angel. Please don’t be alarmed." She emptied her pockets and handed them her last pennies and balls of lint. "Remember to be good now! Farewell! Until next time!” She raced out into the darkness and the fog between them grew thicker.
Carl shouted at her back. “You can’t prove anything if that’s what you’re thinking! I can’t believe how many years I spent feeling sorry for your dumb ass! Stay the hell away from my kids!”
“It’s our Guardian Angel, daddy, don’t swear at it!” One of the children shouted back at their father.
The dreadful experience had left me exhilarated and she seemed to match my excitement. She threw her head back and howled at the moon. She ran until she disappeared behind hazy violet shadows.
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She was exceptionally fast as I caught up to float beside her. “I'm a bit of a late bloomer...did they know you? Family? Sibling, perhaps? Something about, he tried to kill you and then he tried to kill you again, and then he still didn't kill you? By the way, were you in the mafia?”
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“Sounds like you have all the answers you need, Satan.”
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I leapt far away from her. “Whoa! Whoa! Flattering, but cannot accept. He has a complex, he’s very sensitive about these things. I probably shouldn’t even be telling you that! But before I say anything else...how was it, haunting your brother? I'm wildly envious. My brother died a day after I did, and that bastard had the audacity to never come back.”
She motioned for me to fly.
She didn’t speak as we soared back into town. Her eyes stayed on the stars. In most cases, I would have been asking her all sorts of questions about her memories and her pain. I would have used that to weaken her. And then slowly, I would have possessed her soul. And it would have given me a promotion of sorts as a demon. Another soul collected. Another trophy. More status, more power. I had never realized how empty it was. Or that empty was what I strove to be.
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We landed on a boardwalk with a carnival running along it. She raced towards the pier, climbed over the guard rails and dove into the river. After a long minute of calm, she emerged. “I could just stay here. And spend my last moments floating. Or I could take on that carnival and spend those moments soaring. None of it is really the worst thing, is it?”
She asked me to fly her into the carnival and she rode everything multiple times.
"Don't feel like you have to stay with me, demon." She raced towards the Ferris wheel.
I didn't like carnivals, but Ferris wheels were different. I could showcase my finest scares. The slow rotations came to a sudden stop. The warm, melodic notes reversed to an elegy. The ride rushed backwards and everyone screamed. Except her.
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The Ferris wheel carried us through the air and she fell asleep. When we approached the landing, she wouldn’t wake. She remained peaceful and still as cotton candy colors flashed over her cold skin. It carried her up into the sky. And she was gone.
Tears erupted into flames around my face.
I returned to the tavern with little intention to continue haunting and more to continue moping. It was an annoying, devastated state I’d never before experienced. If any demon before me had let themselves mourn a human, they’d never admit it. We knew not to grow attached to mortals. Because inevitably, unlike us, they died. We were programmed to see that as weakness. But all we wanted was to admit that we were damned in having to stay. That this was all much scarier and more painful than life had ever been. None of us did, though. We pretended we had gone through a metamorphosis. Like demonic butterflies.
I sulked through the tavern, looking over at the drunk and boring souls perched along the bar, just taking up space.
I roamed the streets without purpose, cutting through the alleys with no intention to scare.
Fog rolled in from the river, and I heard a faint roar echoing through the clouds. A storm was fitting; it matched my mood swings.
A cry behind me. I turned around to spot a group of girls, but I had no desire to frighten them so I ignored them.
What happened next came with such startling rapidity, I screamed. I was surrounded by howling beasts. I roared back at them, baring my teeth. But I was outnumbered! They charged me all at once and my roar became a shriek.
As I braced myself for the ultimate end, for utter and eternal damnation, they suddenly crumbled back into the Earth.
A voice called from the shadows. “Do you have nothing better to do without me?”
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Emerging from the darkness, she braided flames around the horns that poked through her hat.
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“Shall we haunt?”