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Chapter Sixteen

I got out of bed slowly, carefully, peeling the blankets away from me with extreme precision. The room was like a meat locker, and a shiver edged through my body as soon as my skin touched air. I felt those eyes following me as I tiptoed as quickly as I could across the glassy floor. It was a guessing game, with me trying to catch sight of the shards in the glint of moonlight and skirt my way around them.

Everything felt lighter the second I was out of my room. It was as if someone had given me glasses, and now I could see everything. I suddenly realized that I was shaking violently. When I held my hands up to my face, they were trembling. Despite my sweater and thick fleece pajama pants, I felt a kind of chill that seeped all the way into my blood.

Downstairs, I thought blindly, feeling my way through the dim hallway. I'll go get a drink of water, and everything will be fine.

Funny, how easy it is to lie to yourself when you're scared.

As my foot hit the bottom step of the stairs, I heard something that filled me with both dread and joy, simultaneously. It was the sound of my mom's car, scuffing concrete as it rolled into the driveway. I saw her headlights through the living room window.

I froze in place, feeling my stomach plummet to my knees. She was back; what did that mean? Should I go back to bed and pretend not to see her or confront her right now, in the middle of the night? I didn't have long to decide. Already, I heard her getting out of the car, arming it. The sound of her footsteps kicking up snow and gravel wandered toward me as I stood there, indecisive.

Logan's form made a lump on one of the couches; the longer one, closer to the fireplace. He was fast asleep, and I knew he would stay that way. The boy was practically Sleeping Beauty when he was tired. If I could be quiet, maybe I'd be able to talk to my mother without waking up either of the siblings. It was worth a try, I figured.

It took a moment, but eventually I heard the sound of a key in the lock of my front door. It inched open slowly, and my mom's head appeared around the corner. There were rings beneath her eyes, and her hair was askew. She didn't seem to see me, poised there in the shadows.

She ducked all the way into the foyer, closing the door gently behind her, and I couldn't stifle a gasp. She was still wearing her suit, the one from the night she'd left, but now there were tears in the fabric, and it was stained with something dark and grimy.

Her head whipped around at the sound of my voice, her expression vulnerable, and her eyes found me in the darkness. We stared at each other for a moment, both of us open-mouthed, before I moved from the stair step and onto level ground. My mother's face was completely open, obvious enough for me to read the surprise and fatigue and worry in her eyes.

She spoke first. “Hello, Parker,” she said. Already, she was piecing her features back together, smoothing them into that typical soulless line. This time, I didn't react to it at all. My entire body was still shaking, and there was still glass on my floor, but I needed to address this now.

“I think we need to talk,” I replied.

We took seats in the sun room, on the two chairs in front of the little wood stove. Aubrey had started it up earlier, because it kept the kitchen warm, but it was just smoldering embers now. Still, it had left a bit of heat in the room.

There we were, mother and daughter, facing each other across a rickety iron table. I wondered if she and Rosemary had sat like this, once upon a time, just holding an innocent conversation because my mother was so lovely back then. I could practically see it: Rose, with her long hair swept into braids, her eyes glowing and a sketchbook in her lap, my mother, smiling, sipping tea and asking her favorite daughter about her day at school. And maybe I was in the picture too, playing with dolls off to the side, forgotten in the moment.

Now, in the present, my mother wasn't smiling or drinking tea, she was just staring at me blankly. Maybe she knew what I was about to ask, but she was so impassive that I couldn't tell. I was just trying to put the words together in my head and not be distracted by what I now saw was blood on her clothing.

“Where is Zipper?” my mom asked abruptly, her eyes darting to the empty dog bed behind me.

“Upstairs,” I said quietly, “sleeping in Aubrey's room.”

“What? Parker, you know I don't like the dog in the house at night.”

I gritted my teeth, sudden anger filling me. She was glaring at me now, so I ignored her words completely, instead leaning back against my seat and crossing my arms.

“Mom,” I began slowly, “would you like to tell me about me sister?”

My mother's eyes widened immediately. She licked her lips, then swallowed. “Sister?” An attempt at a laugh. “Parker, don't be silly. You don't have a sister.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really?” From inside the pocket of my pants, I withdrew the many-times folded drawing of the girl and unfolded it, holding it up so that my mother could see. I smiled grimly when she gasped. “Don't even bother, Mom. I know all about her. I believe her name was Rosemary?”

When my mother spoke again, her voice was thinner than I'd ever heard it. “Rosemary,” she whispered. “Yes, she was Rosemary. But she passed away long ago, Parker, and I don't want to—”

“Passed away?” I interjected coolly. “Mom, we both know that she didn't 'pass away'. My sister was murdered, wasn't she?”

“No, I—”

“Wasn't she?” I was breathing hard, my grip tightening on that paper. “I read the article in the paper; I'm no idiot. Someone murdered my sister.”

My mom leaned forward in her chair, hands clutching the armrests. “How do you know this?” she hissed, evidently frightened.

“Because Rosemary Elway had been visiting my dreams,” I stated. “Because she knew I didn't know about her, and she wanted me to. She came to warn me, Mom. Whatever killed her wasn't human, no matter what anyone says. I don't care how crazy I sound, because the same thing that killed Rosemary is after me. I've been seeing men in the streets, following me. I've had dreams about shadows that shake my bed. And last night, a boy appeared in my room, and something dragged Zipper outside and attacked her.” I narrowed my eyes. “Something is going on here, and I know that you know all about it. And even if you don't like me nearly as much as you liked her, you owe me a goddamned answer.”

To her credit, my mother tried to maintain her composure. I saw her expression at war with itself, slipping between apathetic and twisted. But I had thrown too much at her at one—within seconds, her shoulder slumped, her head dropped, and she looked up at me with very tired eyes.

It was a moment before she spoke.

“Have I ever told you about your father?” she asked.

I shook my head. I'd never thought it strange, but I knew very little about my father. I'd seen a few pictures of him, but my mother never kept them out, and she never talked about him, either. I always assumed that it was just too painful for her, though I'd doubted for a long time that she was even capable of feeling such pain.

“Your dad was a soldier,” she said, toying with her hands. “An army lieutenant. We met in high school, way, way back, and fell in love. We got married straight after graduation, because he was planning to enlist and I had college starting in the fall. He rarely came home for longer than a few weeks, but when we were twenty, he was put on leave for a full two years. And that was just perfect, because we were expecting a baby. A daughter. And her name was Rosemary.

“Everything was perfect for those two years, and even after. He stayed safe and visited when he could. Ten years later, he received word that his service time was over. He came home. We were a family again. And then we had another daughter on the way—you—and we were so happy. Rosemary was excited to have a sister, and your father was ready to raise a child...but just after you were born, he received news that he was needed in the army again.

“In mid-ninety-seven, I got a letter,” she continued, her breath hitching. “Your father had been among a group of men whose bunker had been bombed. He was in a coma, being sent home, but they didn't know if he would ever wake up. I was devastated, of course. I was desperate, praying constantly that he would wake up and everything would be all right. But for the first time, God didn't help, and I didn't know what to do.

“That's when they found me.”

She took a shaky pause, her lips quivering in the silence. I was paralyzed by her sudden change, and could only stare as she tried to compose herself. She had never told me about my dad like this, except to say that he was a good man. But he was never here, so I didn't believe her.

“I don't know how they found me,” she went on eventually, “but I guess that doesn't matter. They know who needs them, and they'll find you no matter what. I was driving home from work one night, and one of them was standing there on the side of the rode. It was dark, and all I saw was a polite young man in a suit. He asked for a ride into town, and I didn't think about the fact that I had never seen him in Callery before. So I agreed.”

She shook her head, laughing a little. “God, I remember all this like it was yesterday. He didn't speak at all for about five minutes, until suddenly, he said, 'We can help you'. I asked him what he meant, and he started talking about my husband and the coma and how he knew people who could save him. He knew everything, somehow, even though he wasn't from here. He asked me, 'Do you believe in angels?'. And I did, of course. I thought he was one.

“He told me about his 'people', who weren't from here, and how they could help me for a small price. I was so blinded by the idea that you father could be okay that I didn't even think about what it would cost. When he asked me if I wanted their help, I accepted it. I just...I told him that I just needed to see my husband one more time.”

A beat of silence followed, and I noticed that my mother's eyes were red around the rims. She murmured, “To this day, I don't know who these people are. But they take their deals very seriously. I said one more time; I got one more time. He came home, woke up for five minutes—and died in my arms. Heart failure, they said, but I knew. And it was too late to take it back; they were already preparing to collect their payment.”

It hit me, quite suddenly, what she was talking about, and I felt sick. “Rosemary was the payment,” I breathed, my eyes accusatory. My hands clenched into fists. “How could you agree to something like that?”

“I don't know!” A sob escaped my mother's lips. “Parker, these people are evil, but they are very thorough, very official. They have physical contracts and everything. After that first meeting, they never mentioned anything about the payment again. It was only after I'd received my part of the bargain that one of them came to my door, asking when my daughter would be ready to 'depart with them'. They wanted her because she was pure of soul. They take girls like your sister and sacrifice them, then keep their souls trapped in their underworld, whatever it is. I tried everything. Praying, bargaining. But I couldn't fight them; I was one person. And eventually, through her dreams, they reached Rosemary and took her away.”

I swallowed. Souls. Underworld. “Incubi,” I said, though I knew now that this was not exactly correct. “Dream creatures. I went to see...someone, and she said that's what they are.”

My mother shrugged. “Incubus, demon, devil. They're all the same, but I don't know if that's truly what I was dealing with. These creatures were some kind of darker breed, and they don't stop for anyone.”

I took an anxious breath. “And now they're coming after me.”

My mother did not respond. Her eyes flicked downward, so filled with guilt that I actually felt pain for her. It was warm in the sun room, but there was a chill inside of me. How long would I have, really, before they came for me? I knew they would, and suddenly, the fear was immeasurable.

“Mom,” I said after a while, twisting a lock of hair around one finger, “I have another question.”

She looked up. “Sure, sweetheart, anything.”

She never called me sweetheart before.

I stared at the table, forming my question. “When you went away on Sunday,” I said haltingly, “it wasn't a business trip, was it?”

Silence. I heard the wind whistling outside, breathing through the trees. Logan's snores drifted in quietly from the living room. But for a long moment, in the little sun room, it was deadly quiet.

Then my mother heaved a broken sigh, slowly shaking her head.

“No, Parker, I was with them,” she whispered. “Bargaining for your life.”

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A/N: hi i'm daven and i've never written anything paranormal before please bear with me.