Divine Vices (34 page)

I
wasn’t sure what time it was, and quite frankly, I didn’t want to know. After
hours of laying in bed hopelessly watching the digits to my alarm clock count
away the minutes and hours, I had finally had enough. Now, the bulk of a tissue
box blocked the bright blue numbers from announcing how desperately I needed to
get some shuteye, and how more urgent it was that I fall asleep immediately.

Instead,
my copy of
Jane Eyre
sat laxly in my lap as I tried to read its
contents, but it wasn’t much use. In actuality, nothing could tame my thoughts.
Not the television, not my music, not my book. Everything was either too happy,
or too sad, or too tense. I sought relief where relief was not had. Only an
intoxicated state of sorts could grant me a moment’s peace, but I knew better
of its fleeting affects. No, I was left to stir restlessly as I now simply
prayed for the morning to come.

A
light tap registered at the window beside my bed, and I instantly scrambled to
the other side of the room. Slowly peeling the shade back to peek out the other
window, I could see Jack standing in the middle of the lawn. Then my phone
began vibrating on my nightstand.

“You
know, smart people would have made the phone call first. This way it saves them
from possibly making an unnecessary trip,” I said upon answering.

Before
he even had the chance to speak, I flipped my phone shut and fell back into
bed. Unfortunately, that didn’t seem to deter his insistency. My phone
continued to vibrate around the tabletop, and just as it was about to fall off
the edge, I caught it.

"TEN
MISSED PHONE CALLS,"
it read, all made in the last three minutes.

“What?”
I finally said, hitting the answer key.

“Can
you come down?”

I
didn’t bother to reply. I rolled out of bed and threw on a pair of slippers.

“What
do you want?” I said, upon opening the front door.

“A
cleaner earth and world peace,” replied Jack, trying his best to cast a
slightly more lighthearted tone. He could see though by my grimness that I was
hardly in the mood. “I just wanted to talk.”

“It’s
two in the morning,” I clarified.

“As
the clock in my car was kind enough to inform me of.”

“What
the hell could you possibly have to say that couldn’t wait six hours?”

“Were
you actually asleep?”

“And
bear having to face what my subconscious digs up for me in the form of a
nightmare? Yeah, I couldn’t wait to get to bed.”

He
took a closer look at me. “You’ve been crying.”

“Nothing
gets past you, does it?” I stepped back inside and closed the front door.

Knock.
Knock. Knock.

“You’ve
got to be kidding me,” I growled lowly. I immediately torn the door back open
again and flipped on the lights over the front porch before joining him
outside. “You should thank God, or Satan in your case, that my dad’s a heavy
sleeper, because if he wasn’t, you’d be looking down the barrel of a shotgun
right about now!”

He
remained silent, simply looking back at me as if he wanted to say something in
return but was too afraid.

“Does
any of what you want to say to me involve you answering my questions?” I asked
at last.

“No,
probably not.”

“Then
I trust you don’t need my assistance in finding your own way back to your car.”

I
prepared to head inside when he cleared his throat.

“Do
you know what it’s like to drown?” he blurted out.

“I’m
sorry?” I turned to look back at him. “Are you threatening me?”

Surprisingly,
he looked more like a deer caught in headlights. “No, I’m asking you a
question.”

“Yes,
I do,” I replied bewilderedly. “When I was eight, my cousins threw me into the
deep end of their pool despite the fact they knew I couldn’t swim. None of the
adults were around, but thankfully my sister was able to get to me. I was only
under the water for about half a minute or so, but it was probably one of the
worst experiences I’ve ever gone through... even up against tonight's events.”

“That’s
how I died.”

I
suddenly found myself exchanging the same expression. “Why are you telling me
this?”

“How
well do you know the Bible?”

“Not
as well as I should.”

“You
know the story of Noah though?”

I
nodded.

“Do
you why God chose to flood the earth?”

“Because
the whole of mankind had been corrupted, with the exception of Noah and his
family.”

“Corrupted
by what?”

“Sin,
I suppose.”

“Lucifer
led a rebellion of angels against God, and as punishment, He cast them all from
heaven. During that time, these angels fornicated with human women as they
settled on Earth, producing a new hybrid offspring called the Nephilim. The
Nephilim were raised to be brutal, oppressive, and unforgiving. They overthrew
and crushed all those who got in their way as they rose to power, ruling over
mankind. God witnessed the fall of his creation, watching the human race
descend into violence and depravity as all their pure bloodlines soon became
tainted by the Nephilim’s breeding.

“God
looked upon the whole of the earth and only found one family untouched by this
wickedness, telling the patriarch of the household, Noah, to prepare for the
wrath that He was about to unleash upon the rest of mankind so that He could
spare Noah and his loved ones... Do you know what demons really are, Cassie?”
he asked at last.

I
shook my head.

“We
are the spirits of the Nephilim, killed by the Great Flood. God condemned us so
that we will never be able to ever enter Heaven or Hell, leaving us bodiless to
roam this planet for the whole of eternity, forcing us to act as parasites,
attaching ourselves to hosts for a fraction of a time. It’s the only way for us
to ever have physical fulfillment. That’s why this body means so much to me.

“Normally
when we possess someone, it’s either a temporary fix in which we have full
control over our hosts for only a short while, like those who are
incapacitated, or it’s a long-term deal by someone morally corrupted in which
we merely have a sense of influence over them. Never anything permanent, and
never anything without the host fighting for control. Until now. Jack’s state
of mind allows me to live fully in this body, without conflict.”

“I
still don’t understand why you’re telling me this.”

“Because
I want you to understand where I’m coming from.”

“You’re
a malevolent spirit seeking to exact revenge and wreak destruction,” I replied.
“After nearly killing my best friend just a few hours ago, you can’t honestly
expect me to see your side of things.”

“What
would you do if you were me? What would you do if you were trapped in my
position?”

“I
never would have done anything to provoke God into wanting to kill me in the
first place.”

“Do
you honestly know what it’s like having to live like this?” His eyes were
ablaze, yet I could see them about to break under his anguish. “Without this
violation, I can’t feel anything! How can you expect anyone in my position to
be anything but angry? How can you be happy without having anything that’s
yours? Everything ripped from you. No physical sensation or form that’s truly
your own. No one permanent to ever grow any real attachment to. Nothing that’s
yours. Nothing but the festering wrath that’s been brewing inside you since the
dawn of mankind. Tell me, am I really unjustified in my actions?”

I
didn’t have a fair response, and he knew it.

“You
said it yourself; you can’t blame a shark for acting on instinct. It was in my
nature, through upbringing, that made me into what I became. I was raised as a
marauder. I didn’t have outside influence to teach me otherwise. You can’t
blame a shark for being a predator.”

“But
when it’s a threat, we have every right to take it out. Its disposition in
character doesn’t spare it from being persecuted, whether you like it or not,”
I said. “Now, get off my front porch. You still look like shit.”

I
immediately stepped inside and shut the door behind me, every ounce of my being
now feeling ten times heavier.

It
was still dark outside when I headed down into the kitchen to grab a glass of
water. It was about a quarter after five, and I wasn’t even sure if I had slept
or just stared at the inside of my eyelids in silence for the last few hours.
As I circled around the island, I noticed several brown boxes stacked up on the
kitchen table with the labels “The Early Years” stamped on the sides of each.
Curiosity had gotten the better of me, because I suddenly found myself opening
up the closest one. Unfolding the flaps, I gaped at its insides, pulling out
the photograph resting on top.

“The
school’s been closed down,” said my dad.

I
almost shrieked in surprise. I hadn’t heard him come in. “Can’t imagine what
Gwen’s going through right about now. If the school’s closed, then Homecoming’s
off.”

“Wow,
without the use of phones, you’re more out of touch than I am,” he said.
“Gramercy Hotel already agreed to let the function take place there in one of
their banquet halls.”

“Crisis
averted,” I mumbled.

“But
police are still investigating. Benson says they suspect some kind of gas leak
or something at the school,” he said, heading over to the counter.

A
gas leak that destroyed an entire hallway and blew out every light and window in
its vicinity? Yep, that sounded like our tax dollars hard at work. They didn’t
know how to make head or tails with any of it just as much as the next schmo.

“I’m
sorry,” I said, putting the photo back into the box nervously. “I didn’t mean
to snoop.”

“Why?
It’s your past too.” He turned on the coffeemaker and parked a seat at the
table, motioning for me to join him as well as he pulled out some of the other
pictures.

“I
thought you were still sleeping. There wasn’t any coffee yet,” I said.

“Yeah,
well, coffee’s generally for those who need to wake themselves up a bit more,
not for those who still haven’t slept,” he said, searching through more prints.
“Can I ask what was so pressing that you’d have visitors over in the middle of
the night?”

I
froze in my seat, holding even my breath to ensure he wouldn’t see the panic
arise inside me. “What’d you hear?”

“An
awful lot of floorboards creaking, some knocking, and doors repeatedly opening
and closing,” he replied indecipherably. “I also couldn’t help but notice a
certain black Impala parked a couple houses down.”

“Nothing
happened, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“I
know you’re more responsible than that,” my dad said rather mellowly. “And I
did take note to the state you were in when you came home last night. Is it a
safe assumption to say that the conversation wasn’t a particularly pleasant
one?”

“You
could say that.” As much as I tried not to, I couldn’t keep my attention off
the photograph I had just pulled out. “Did Mom have a twin sister that no one
ever told me about?”

He
took the picture from me and smiled, his eyes looking over the image of the
tall, smiley blonde wearing a faded Ramones concert t-shirt underneath an
oversized plaid flannel top and ripped blue jeans to match, whose unkempt mane
was tied back into a messy ponytail as the loose stands hanged in her face.

“How
old was she here?” I asked.

“Twenty-two,”
said my dad. “Now, that’s the woman I fell in love with.”

“It
doesn’t even look like her, you know?” I said, still studying the photograph.
“Can I ask you something?”

“Shoot.”

“What
happened, between you two? Everything seemed normal even up until the end.”

“It
was,” he said, handing the picture back to me. “Did you know that your mother
and I went to school with one another?”

“No.”

“She
was a lot like how you knew her to be. Beautiful, outgoing, driven. Didn’t give
me the time of day. I don’t think we said so much as a single word to one
another the whole time we were in high school. I guess I was too much of a
riffraff for her,” he said grinningly. “When we graduated, she went off to
college, and I got a job at the local hardware store. I hadn’t given her a
second thought since she left. But then, one day over summer vacation after her
freshman year, guess who comes into the store looking for brackets for a
shelving unit? As I’m finishing up with another customer, I notice her standing
by the service counter singing along to Bad Company’s 'Can’t Get Enough.'”

“Mom?”

“Yep.
So needless to say, it sparked my curiosity, along with a surprisingly
insightful conversation about her tastes in music. We got to talking, and I
eventually asked her out to dinner. Three years, one marriage and two children
later, she was one half of the happily struggling newlyweds you see in that
photo there.”

“What
changed?”

“She
did. The first time around, she went from being a well-to-do society girl to
being a modest, down-to-earth, unpretentious woman,” he said. “My mom, your
grandmother, was diagnosed with liver cancer for the first time just after you
turned two. I was working full-time and your mom was staying at home to raise
you and Nicole, but eventually we couldn’t keep up with all the bills. Your
grandmother’s insurance wasn’t picking up the cost of her treatments since the
only thing that seemed to be working at the time was considered experimental,
and I insisted on paying all the expenses. I mean, that was my mom.

“So
your mother decided to take a part-time job at some office building working as
a secretary to help out with the debt we were racking up, and it took her
supervisors about ten seconds to realize that she was overqualified for her
position. In no time at all, she found herself on the fast track to promotions
and better job titles, and we were able to pay back everything we owed.

“Unfortunately,
well after we got our heads above water, she still insisted on staying with her
job. I was happy to oblige her, at first, because she seemed to love doing it.
But then I started noticing changes in her the larger her paychecks got. What
started off as wearing blouses and skirts only to work turned into her dressing
up all the time. She started paying attention to things like designer clothes
and shoes. She went from drinking a beer at the end of the day to swirling
around a glass of 1967 Château Margaux wine instead.”

“That
sounds a bit more like her,” I said weakly.

“Don’t
get me wrong. She was a great mother, and a beautiful, loving person. We just
wound up wanting different things in the end. When your grandmother saw what
was going on, she felt terrible. She was convinced that all of this had been
her fault. If she hadn’t gotten sick, and whatnot. But things just happen
sometimes that we can’t control.”

“You’ve
always told me to never give up on what you love.”

“And
I put up a damn good fight doing so,” he countered.

“For
how long?”

“From
about the time she started insisting on wearing only name brand athletic gear
to do something as simple as going jogging,” he replied drolly.

“She’d
been doing that since I was five."

“Sounds
about right.”

My
heart sank. “You mean you had spent more than a decade trying to make things
work?”

“Yeah,
that’s what you do when you love someone, even when they’ve lost sight of who
they are. But there also comes a time when you have to face facts. No matter
how much she looked like the woman I married, she wasn’t the same person at
heart anymore. I never gave up on her, on the hope that she’d one day return,
but when she told me that she wanted to file for divorce, I knew she had
already made up her mind to move on. And it was about time I did the same.”

“Would
you have done it differently, if you knew how it would have turned out?”

“And
not have you and Nikki? Are you crazy? Even if I left after your mother started
to change, I still don’t think I would have been able to live with the idea
that I may have had a chance to patch up things between her and me and not
taken it. I had never looked at anyone like I did your mother, and that
fragment of a doubt would surely have eaten me up inside.”

“How
do you know what’s really worth the risk? Worth the time, the effort, the
potential and possibly inevitable heartbreak?” I asked.

“Remember
the time when you and Nikki ditched school to go sneak off to Coney Island? You
both had forged my name on the absence log sheet, saying that you’d be staying
home with your mom and me while you pocketed the money we gave the two of you
for your guys’ fieldtrip.”

“It’s
kinda hard to forget that,” I mumbled.

“Yeah,
well, remember what happened?”

“The
trip had gotten off early, and Mom and you showed up at the school to pick us
up, only to find-”

“Neither
of you was there,” he finished. “What I always found funny about all that was
the fact that even when you and Nikki were as mad as could be at one another,
all one of you would have to do was mention that day at Coney Island. Suddenly,
you two were as thick as thieves again, whispering and giggling about how much
fun you two had had. Now tell me, even with the knowledge of how much trouble
you’d be in for going, would you have done anything different that day?”

“...
No.”

“You
know why that is? Because sometimes there are things that are worth the gamble,
even the inevitable punishment. And I know that as a father I shouldn’t be
telling you this, but on occasion you need to venture into unfamiliar waters.
Will it be scary? Absolutely. But you’ll never know what you’re missing out on
if you don’t. Sometimes, it really is better to be sorry than safe.”

The
lump that had formed in the back of my throat prevented me from getting my
words out, so I simply refocused my attention on the photograph still in my
hands.

“Does
that help you out at all?” asked my dad.

I
looked back up at him.

“I
know we weren’t still talking about me,” he said.

I
let out an exhausted laugh.

“I
honestly can’t say that it does,” I confessed. “In fact, I think that just made
things worse.”

“Well,
my job here is done,” he said grinningly as he rose from his seat. “Just humor
me, and say that it did.”

“Thank
you,” I chuckled.

“That’ll
do,” said my dad, kissing the top of my head before going to grab a cup of
coffee.