18 Thoughts (My So-Called Afterlife Book 3) (41 page)

Because he’s stupid. All demons are.
My anger caused my body to quiver.

Sam laughed. “My father isn’t just any demon. He is Satan himself.”

You’re kidding.

“I kid you not.” He applied some lipstick in the mirror. “Anyway, don’t fret, darling. Once you give birth to our little experiment, I won’t have any use for you. If we’re successful, the priest will take the baby to raise him or her as his own, and I’ll leave you to impregnate our next target. I can’t stay with you forever, sweetheart. I know you’re disappointed, as am I, but we’d raise too many suspicions if I stayed around much longer.”

And if you fail?

He slammed his,
my,
fists down on my desk.

“I will not fail!” Taking a deep breath, he smoothed down my dress.

Wearing a dress should’ve been the first clue to Conner something was off tonight.

“Failure would mean your death, and neither one of us desires that outcome. But even your death won’t mean the end of me. I’ll just possess someone else. So don’t get any funny ideas about trying to swim to the surface to take your own life to save humanity. I’ve covered all the bases. The only hard part will be keeping the pregnancy from your parents and friends. But even that shouldn’t prove too difficult. Gaining thirty pounds from emotional eating will be understandable after the year you’ve had. It will be interesting to see if Conner and Nate still want you when you’re a fat cow.”

A text let Sam know our ride had arrived. He turned out the light and left through the front door, my parents already sound asleep. Once on the open road, the priest stepped on the gas, going way past the speed limit. When we got out of the truck after what felt like the longest ride of my life, the wind howled at our back. Sam pulled the coat around us tighter, but it made no difference. I hadn’t felt warm in weeks. The back alley where we parked smelled like a thousand cats had defecated there. It was a black hole into which every piece of trash, every sinister sound, every dead end had been sucked. Not exactly a prime location for a refutable clinic. After a sweeping look, the priest knocked on a back door, and a man wearing scrubs answered.

“Right on time. Come in. Hurry up.”

As he spoke into my face, I couldn’t help but notice his breath smelled no better than the alley. Walking through the tiny space to the examination room, not bumping into a counter or cardboard boxes or bloody wastebaskets proved difficult. The whole place smelled like vomit, blood, and sweat. A lot of equipment appeared to be held together by duct tape alone. After Sam flicked on the light, he wasted no time in disrobing.

Show a little respect and shut the door!

Sam chuckled. “But I like showing off my new body. You should flaunt it while you got it, love,” he said, shutting the door. Within the span of a minute, he donned a papery thin gown opening in the back. There was no operating table, only a gurney covered by a disposable sheet where we sat waiting. “Ready, doc!”

The man in scrubs entered and shut the door again, thankfully wearing a mask pressed over his mouth and nose. At least I wouldn’t have to smell his foul breath again, which was really the least of my worries. The priest must’ve waited outside, which was another small relief.

“Lay back, please.” He adjusted the overhead light, put on a pair of blue latex gloves, then picked up an instrument from a green cloth-lined tray before starting. “Be still and this will only take a minute.”

Sweat dripped down my forehead and neck as he completed the procedure. Sam may have been in control of my body, but that didn’t mean he controlled how I felt. My breaths were rattled as tears streamed down my face, my stomach contracting with severe cramps.

“Almost done down there, doc?” Sam asked through my heavy breaths.

I felt the cold swipe of an antiseptic being applied, then heard a loud snap of the gurney as it tilted so that I lay with my hips higher than my head.

“This is to facilitate the deposit in the cervix to enter the uterus. Stay like this for ten minutes. I’ll come back in to check on you then.”

His chair scraped the floor as he got up, and I listened to water running in the sink and the squeak of rubber soles leaving before I spoke to Sam.

Mark my words. I will destroy you if it’s the last thing I ever do, even if I have to die trying.

Sam wiped the sweat off my forehead with a flourish and laughed. “You’ll have to catch me first.”

“Either you control your attitude,
or it controls you.”
—Nate’s Thoughts

Nate

oday marked a month since Riel visited Conner and me in the spirit realm. When I woke up this morning, I expected the first day of spring would bring me a renewed hope. Even better, I hoped the last few weeks had been a terrible nightmare. But that was childish thinking. With a sigh, I walked through the front door of Grand Haven High. The Jedi Order stood huddled together near the stairwell and wished me good morning on my way to class. I didn’t return their sentiments. They still tried to include me in their weekend plans, but I always declined, feeling unworthy of their kindness. Their best friend was wasting away inside her own body, but Conner and I couldn’t tell them about any of it. Everything inside me went cold and tight at the thought. There were days I didn’t know whether I hated myself or Conner more.
I can’t get into the Underworld no matter how hard I try… Why is everything so easy for him?

I couldn’t hide my hatred from Conner, either. Every time he tried to help, I lashed out, leaving me with no one to talk to about the situation. Hopelessness overwhelmed me. Trying anything else seemed futile. I knew nothing, had no new ideas, and remained painfully aware Olga would be lost for good if I couldn’t break through to the other side. I spent every evening in pure silence, meditating to the point of being light-headed. Out of despair, I called Lindsey last night, just wanting to hear the voice of someone who actually liked me. Twisting the cord bracelet she gave me when I visited my hometown last month, I thought of the words she said when handing me the gift.

“So you’ll never forget me. I know I’ll never forget you. You never forget your first love.”

The thing is, Lindsey was special, one of the most beautiful and sweetest girls I knew. But she wasn’t my first love. I had thought I knew what love was… until I met Olga. And that’s why I wore the bracelet, as a reminder of what I was fighting for. I had to get my girl back.

When I walked into my first period English class, I wished I could transform into the light feather I dreamed about during meditation because Mrs. Lory, who was also the drama teacher, announced we’d be moving to the auditorium to watch the dress rehearsal for the spring musical this morning, so the drama students could have an actual audience for their last practice.

But somewhere in the middle of watching
Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat
I had an epiphany. Here was Joseph, who went from being a slave to a king overnight. He went through hell, but in the end, being sold into slavery at the hand of his brothers was worth it because the experience led him to the place God had for him. That’s why Joseph wasn’t mad when he saw his brothers years later. Joseph told them what they meant for evil, God meant for good. I finally understood those words. This whole time, I’d been coveting what someone else had, just like Joseph’s brothers did with the coat. They weren’t really jealous of the coat, but of how their father treated Joseph, like he was the favorite son. The relationship Conner had with Olga is what I coveted. I thought back to the phone conversation I had with her a few nights before Sam took over. She told me about Father Jamie’s message during the midweek Mass. He had said you could never drag anger or bitterness to the place God has for you. I needed to release that crap I’d been holding on to about Conner and not just seek the place I was trying to get to but seek God.

“I’m sorry.” I raised my voice to be heard over the loud blasts and gunfire belching out from the zombie game Conner attacked like the undead really were trying to take over the world.

“What for?”

I leaned against the video game. Around us, neon lights flashed, and the sounds of pins being knocked over sounded from the bowling lanes behind us. I’d asked him to come hang out with me in the arcade of Starlite Lanes after school today, hoping I could at least beat him at a video game while I apologized. But Conner was in the zone. Should’ve made me mad again. The truth was, though, as I watched him, the way he tackled each zombie coming through the doorway with his fake shotgun, I not only didn’t feel angry anymore, I felt bad for the guy. The way Conner leaned in too close to the screen, blue light bathing his untamed face, made me think of all those times when he was being possessed by a demon, trapped inside like a zombie. Must’ve sucked.

“For…” I didn’t know how to put my feelings into words. Talking about serious stuff was way easier with girls. Definitely easier to pretend I wasn’t jealous of him. “For hating you. I’ve been feeling so depressed over losing Olga, then jealous that you got into Juvie so easily, envious she only wants to spend time with you, even if she isn’t herself. Every time I see you two together at school, I’m reminded of the history between you. I miss her so much, and I don’t even know if she’d be with me anyway, since you’re back. Everything just makes it so hard not to hate you, to wish you were gone like before. And I know that’s wrong, and I think it may be why I’m blocked from getting into Limbo. So I asked you here today to ask for your forgiveness.”

Conner groaned. “Man, I feel like crap for making you feel like crap, even if I didn’t like you before. Of course I forgive you. I’m the one who should be asking for your forgiveness for everything that’s happened since last summer.”

Laughter escaped from my lips in a snort.

“What?”

I shook my head. “It’s just… you said, even if I didn’t like you before, like you’ve changed your mind. Are we… friends?”

He stepped away from the zombie game. “Yep. And let’s agree to keep our bromance simple. No more crazy complications like love triangles and demon possessions.”

“Sounds good to me, as long as you let me have Olga.” I realized too late how my words might make me sound like a douche instead of the lightness I aimed for. That’s why I almost had a heart attack when Conner pulled me in for a hug instead of flipping me off.