Lana Gibbons was not in class on Tuesday.

For a brief moment, I considered the possibility that I had hallucinated her entire existence. But then Ms. Morgan called her name during roll call and my fantasy shattered.

Still, I couldn't complain too much. Even though I still couldn't remember her, I preferred that she wasn't around. Something about her made my skin crawl.

"Here," I said, passing Taylor a Tupperware container as we left home room. "It's not a muffin, but I thought you might like some of these."

"What are they?" she said, peering through the blue-tinted plastic.

"Christmas cookies." My mother seemed to realize sometime last evening that we did not need ten dozen Christmas cookies. She had packaged most of them into small Tupperware containers and pawned them off on Mallory, my dad, and me. She said she was going to send the rest to Evan in a care package, but I doubted that even my brother could eat that much.

"In October?" Taylor asked, pulling out a snowflake before passing the box back to me. She took a bite and her eyes widened. "Wow, these are sweet. Where'd you get them from?"

"My mom," I said. "She went into this weird baking mode yesterday." I rubbed my face. "But that's not the only weird thing that happened. Lana showed up at my house."

"Didn't she say she was going to do that?" Taylor said, finishing the cookie and pulling out her phone.

"Yes, but she was being so weird. She kept asking me questions, like where I wanted to go to college and if I ever got jealous of Mal and Evan and wanted them to go away, and..."

I trailed off because I realized that Taylor was no longer paying attention. She was looking down at her phone with a grin on her face.

"Taylor? Are you listening?"

She jolted upright, then blushed. "Sorry. I'm the worst." She slipped her phone away. "What were you saying?"

I ignored her question and pointed at her pocket. "What were you looking at?"

"It's nothing," she said, her eyes flitting to a poster tacked on someone's locker. "Just this art forum I post on sometimes."

"Oh. Is it like Deviantart?"

"Sort of. It's a new social media site for artists. You can post your artwork and get feedback, but it can also pair you up with people who live locally if you want to meet up and work on projects together. I posted some of my portfolio pieces to get feedback before I submit them to art schools. And I've been getting some nice comments."

I almost snorted. "You're amazing. You don't need people on the internet to tell you that."

She laughed. "Thanks Jessa. But it's still nice to hear it from someone besides you."

I pressed my hand to my chest in mock disappointment. "But I'm your biggest fan!"

"You're right. You're my biggest fan and I'm being a terrible friend by not listening to you," Taylor said, waving off the topic and getting back to business. "So what was Lana asking you yesterday?"

But now the memory of the day before was fading, and Lana's questions didn't seem as intrusive as they had while I was lying in my bed. "It's nothing," I said. "Just some weird stuff about what I wanted out of life."

"Sounds very philosophical," Taylor said with a wink as we walked into AP Bio. "So, what did you say to her?"

"I don't know. Nothing good, apparently. She kind of left in a hurry."

"Well what do you want?"

I shrugged as I sat at our shared lab bench. "I don't know. Am I supposed to want something? I'm planning on applying as undecided to schools because right now I kind of just... want to go with the flow." I ran my fingers through my hair. "Is that bad?"

"No, that's not bad," Taylor said, reassuring me with a squeeze of my hand. "You have plenty of time. No matter what anyone says, life doesn't peak in high school."

"Thanks," I said, but inside, I didn't feel so reassured. Taylor had always seemed to know what she wanted. She was destined for a life of art galleries and cocktail parties. Probably a stint in New York in her twenties as she gained a cult following before showing her work at the Met.

She had everything figured out—or at least a path to start on. She had goals, wishes, and dreams.

So why didn't I?

Taylor decided to skip lunch that afternoon.

"I need to finish that abstract piece for my portfolio," she said, stealing one more cookie before she veered off towards the art classroom. "I'll see you in English!" And with that she was gone.

I bought some lunch—it was pizza today, layered with thick cheese the consistency of chewing gum—and then surveyed the room for a place to sit. I was about to join Kelly Zhu's table—she and her friends always played Rummy during lunch—when I noticed that the glass door leading to the outside seating area was propped open. And yet none of my classmates were sitting outside.

I balanced my lunch tray in one hand and checked the weather on my phone: 62 degrees, partly sunny. It was too good to be true.

Suddenly, playing a few rounds of cards with my classmates seemed less appealing than spending a period outside in the sun, eating lunch, and reading a book. So I walked towards the doorway. And when no one stopped me, I crossed the threshold.

The weather was absolutely phenomenal for October. The grass was still green, if not a little stiff from lack of water. The trees that dotted the yard were full of red, brown, and orange leaves. And the air was warm, with just the slightest breeze.

The metal tables looked cold and bare, so I wandered around the corner of the building. I planned to sit by myself under the large oak tree, but I saw that someone had already beaten me to it.

Lana Gibbons.

She sat cross-legged on a gnarled root, her short skirt covering just the essentials as she looked up at me with dark eyes. She patted the patch of dirt next to her. "Sit," she said.

It didn't sound like a suggestion.

"Hey Lana," I said slowly, setting my lunch on the ground. "Where have you been all day?"

"Around," she said, her eyes flitting up the tree to the hodgepodge of leaves and the crisscrossing of branches. "I spent most of my day thinking."

"About what?"

"About what to do. With you. With this." She gestured abstractly. "And I decided it was best to start with the truth."

My stomach flipped. "What are you talking about?"

She reached for her backpack and unzipped the top. "There's a reason why you can't remember who I am." She pulled out a black book and held it out to me. "Here."

I recognized it instantly. "The Bible?"

She opened it for me and pointed at a particular sentence. "Read that."

I frowned and leaned forward. "And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the Earth, and his angels were cast out with him."

She tapped the name "Satan" with her purple-painted nail. "So that's me."

I blinked. "What?"

"That's me," she repeated. "I'm the Devil."

I stared at her for a few seconds in disbelief. Her face was completely serious. Her eyes didn't flicker in a lie; her lips didn't twitch into a joking smirk. "What do you mean?" I finally asked, thinking I must have heard her wrong.

"I mean exactly what I said. I am the Devil. The actual Devil."

I couldn't think of a response. She either had the best poker face I had ever seen or she truly believed she was the Devil. What the hell is going on in Arlington? I thought to myself. Was there a new chemical polluting our air? Or perhaps some toxic sludge had leaked into the water supply? Maybe the entire town was slowly slipping into madness and no one had realized it yet.

As these thoughts formed in my mind, she rolled her eyes. "You think I'm crazy."

"I—" I started, but she cut me off.

"I had hoped I wouldn't have to resort to parlor tricks to convince you, but..."

She snapped a finger and suddenly I was surrounded by darkness.

I was no longer sitting under a tree. Instead, I was in a dark void, without another soul in sight. But before I could truly process what had happened, my mind was flooded with terrors. There were loud, tortured screams of the damned. Demonic creatures appeared before me with curling horns and deep scars.  The smell of sulfur and burnt sugar filled my lungs. And—most terrifyingly—my soul ached with a deep, longing sadness. It was as if a coldness had settled into my bones and I would never feel warm again...

And then, as quickly as it had come, the images vanished and I was back in the school yard sitting with Lana Gibbons.

The Devil.

I started to scramble away from her, but Lana stopped that with a raise of her finger. "I wouldn't leave if I were you," she said, her voice echoing through my skull. "You can't hide from me. I'm everywhere."

It took all of my will power to stay where I was. I knew I was trapped. There was nowhere to go. So I dug my fingers into the dirt and raised my head, daring myself to look her in those dark, cold eyes. "What do you want?" I ask, my voice coming out hoarse.

She laughed as if she genuinely found my question funny. "Oh the irony. That is exactly what I've been trying to ask you." She crossed her legs. "I want to make a deal with you."

"Why?"

She rolled her eyes. "Because that's what I do. It's called 'making a deal with the Devil.' Ever heard of it?"

My mouth was too dry to answer, so I nodded dumbly.

She dragged her finger over a gnarled root tree; I was surprised the branch didn't shrivel under her touch. "When I was cast out of Heaven, I was cursed. My powers were bound such that I could only use them to help others. The problem is that it's nearly impossible to survive in the Underworld living an entirely altruistic existence. A girl's got to eat." She smiled. "So, I found a way to get what I wanted while still helping others. The 'deal with a Devil' loophole. I help others with their deepest desires and then they help me in return."

"You take their souls," I said in a low whisper. "How does that help anyone?"

"Souls are handy things," Lana said as if I had unfairly appraised her grandmother's prized tea set.

I shook my head. "I'm not giving you my soul. I already told you yesterday: I don't want anything. So you should just... leave me alone."

She leaned forward, so close that I could see all the tiny pores on her nearly flawless face. "Listen Jessa, that's not how it works. Becoming human takes a lot out of me; I can only do it every once in a while. So now that I'm here, I'm not going back until we strike a deal. And I know that we are going to make a deal because I wouldn't have appeared here in Arlington had you not needed me."

My brain was spinning. "Explain that," I said. "What do you mean you appeared here because I needed you?"

Lana reached over for my Tupperware, cracked it open, and started nibbling on a frosted Star of David. "A long time ago, I set up a spell that would summon me to Earth whenever there was a good deal to be made. The spell temporarily alters the memories of those around me, making everyone believe that I've always been a member of the community—except for the person I need to make a deal with. It would be unethical for me to mess with their mind, of course."

"The Devil cares about ethics?" I muttered, the sarcasm coming out thick.

She ignored my jab. "That's why you don't remember me... because yesterday was my first day at this school. Technically, you're the only sane person in town." She smiled.

"But it doesn't make sense," I insisted. "I don't want anything."

"But you must. I was summoned specifically to this high school and you are the only one who can't remember me. Believe me, I know. I talked with almost every single person in this school yesterday, faculty included."

That explained her jumping between every stratum of the social pyramid, but it didn't make me feel any better. "Well, there must be something wrong with your spell."

The Devil snorted. "The only way it'd be wrong is if God Almighty interfered with it himself." Her voice was dripping with disdain. "No, there's definitely a deal to be made here. I just need to figure it out." She leaned back against the tree. "Lucky for you, I enjoy a good challenge. Haven't had one in a few millennia."

"You're not going to find anything—" I started, but she cut me off with a flick of her pretty little wrist.

"I can stay human for a few weeks, so here's the plan: I'm going to stick around, and when you're ready to make this deal, we'll do it. If there's actually something wrong with my spell and you truly don't want anything, I'll go home empty handed. But I am sure that there's a deal to be made here."

I gathered my things—including the cookies—and stood up. I had lost my appetite and the weather was no longer compelling enough to convince me to stay outside with the most famous fallen angel in history. "Well," I said, "have fun waiting around for something that's never going to happen."

She winked. "We'll see about that."

- - -

Hello everyone! Thanks for reading these first three chapters :) What did you think about Lana's revelation?? And what do you think is going on with Taylor and this art forum?

<3

~Bdicocco