Authors: Palvi Sharma
“I died in a car accident, killing
two teenagers too.” Rafe said. “It was in hell that I started to repent for my
mistakes. I was a really bad person, but it was too late to redeem myself. But
my remorse gave me the position of taking care of other souls; those that
showed hope of redemption.”
Rafe grew silent and clenched his
hands into fists. “This is my chance to save those souls from damnation. But
the curse has to be set right. Two innocents have to die by their hand.”
“So how is Mark innocent?” Melissa
scoffed. “He’s helping them kill innocent people and he sacrificed me. Didn’t
he even have the guts to kill me himself?”
Rafe stood silent, looking away
into the distance.
“Is there anyone else left apart
from me?” Melissa sobbed.
“Well, Carl’s still here.” Rafe
said. “The guy who brought you soup, remember? He has a nice soul according to
my accounts. Harley is another one. But you and your child...”
“How could you possibly know about
Carl?” Melissa asked. “You know what; I don’t even want to know. You were
obviously keeping an eye on me. You always have a back-up plan don’t you? So
there we go now, the riders or you have to kill me and Carl and then the city
is saved!”
Melissa picked up a rock and threw
it at a tree where it bounced off and went into the water. She saw Rafe looking
at her with a cocked eyebrow. “Oh dear, am I not an innocent anymore now that I
flung a rock at that tree?”
“Sarcasm won’t do you any good.” Rafe
said dryly. “Besides, you wouldn’t be alive if I didn’t need you.”
“So you have a plan for me?”
Melissa said.
Rafe nodded. “It’s more of a
theory. But it might just save you.”
“What do I have to do?” she asked.
“Marry me.” Rafe said.
As night arrived, Melissa made her
way quietly towards the restaurant. She walked as softly as possible and was
glad that it wasn’t as dark as it had been a few nights ago.
“Marry me!”
Rafe had told
her blatantly.
“You and your child will live and atoning for my misdeeds
would give me a chance to live as a human again.”
She had heard the wind swirl around
them then, cooling her and sending a shiver up her spine. Her head had started
to feel lighter and she resisted the urge to ask him if he had indeed asked her
to marry him. Her first thought was to call him crazy and run the hell out of
there, but he was a demon; she had seen him in his true form and the last thing
she needed to do was to piss him off.
“I need time to think about
this.”
She had lied and hoped like crazy that he couldn’t read minds. She
tried to control her thoughts and when Rafe had agreed she had let out a breath
she hadn’t been aware she had been holding.
As the sun set, she had asked to
see Mark before she made her decision and when he had agreed, she walked as
slowly and casually towards the land, to avoid being caught by him.
Melissa closed her eyes and took
deep breaths. The real reason she was here was so that she could see for
herself how Mark had betrayed her. The two most important people in her life
turned out to be the complete opposite of whom she thought they had been and it
was breaking her. She wanted to confront Jennifer too, but for some reason her
heart told her to see Mark first. He was the one who had broken her trust and
used her.
The restaurant looked deserted from
the outside, but she knew that they were all inside, probably laughing at how they
had fooled her. His ‘friends’ were probably be applauding Mark’s performance as
he gave his speech on how to pretend to care about people and then sacrifice
them to demons. The very thought was making her sick!
She stood outside the door and
decided she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t bring herself to step inside and see
Mark relaxing in his chair and commending himself for pulling off the perfect
betrayal.
She touched her stomach and gently
ran her hand over it. This was no longer Mark’s child. From today onwards, this
child was only hers and she would protect it at any cost.
Melissa turned to go and uttered a
gasp. “Mark!”
Her first reaction was to grab him
by the lapels of his leather jacket and demand to know why he had played with
her trust and then sacrificed her to a demon. But before she could even open
her mouth, Mark gathered her on his arms. "I am so sorry!"
"For what?" She asked
stoically. Perhaps Mark was finally going to tell her the truth.
He pulled back a little, not
letting go. "I couldn't find you in time. The minute that demon took off
with you, we were attacked by Kevin."
"What?" And that's when
she noticed the bandage on his shoulder. On his neck were small bruises and a
cut just below his jaw. "Oh!"
"He was one of them!"
Mark removed his hands from her shoulders and slapped his head. "How could
we have all been so naive!"
"Is he...?"
Mark gave her a weak smile.
"It was a tough fight, but in the end we subdued him and burnt him."
He pointed towards a large trash bin and Melissa noticed that it was on fire.
She could catch the smell of rotten eggs and something heavy and bitter wafting
in the air. She covered her nose as her nausea returned and then recalled what
Rafe had told her about being pregnant.
"But before that we were able
to get some answers from Kevin. He lied to us!" Mark cried. "That
Bastard betrayed us!"
"Rafe?" She choked back a
sob.
"Yes!" Mark looked down
and hesitated. "There is something you need to know. This all is happening
because of me."
Melissa swallowed and felt her
hands go numb with cold. She wanted to stop him and tell him that she already
knew, but if Marks story coincided with Rafes, then she would know for sure
that she was being told the truth for once.
"The riders were responsible
for my parent's death. I mean I thought they were..."
"I know...Rafe told me."
Mark looked shocked and he took her
hand in his. She had expected his touch would be alien to her considering the
way he had broken her heart several times, but all she felt was a combination
of strength and warmth that for some odd reason made her feel safe.
"Did he tell you that he
played with me?" Mark asked bitterly. "Did he tell you how he made me
believe that the riders were responsible for my parents' death and made me
curse them?"
"What do you mean he made
you?"
"He lied!" Mark said out
loud. Behind him, his friends were watching them warily. "He concocted
this whole thing just so that he could escape from hell every year and look for
a wife for himself!"
Melissa sucked in her breath.
"Are you...sure?"
"Kevin confessed." Mark
said and shook his head. "I've been such an idiot!"
Melissa squeezed his hand. "He
asked me." Mark looked up at her in confusion. "He asked me to marry
him so that he could redeem himself."
"I'll kill him!" Marks
eyes darkened.
Melissa grabbed Mark's arm before
he walked away. "There's something else."
"What other lies did he tell
you?"
Melissa took a deep breath.
"He said I was pregnant."
She could see Mark process this
piece of news and the hesitation that followed. She stepped back when Mark
still hadn’t spoken. Was he going to leave her now? She felt her heart breaking
into tiny pieces.
“Did you find Jennifer?” she sobbed.
“At least tell me you were really trying looking for her.”
Mark looked at her for several
seconds without replying and then held her arm. “We have to go.”
“What?”
“A friend of mine will come to take
you away.” Mark said and walked her over to the fence.
“I’m not leaving until I speak to
Jennifer.” Melissa insisted, but Mark ignored her request.
“Does he know?” he asked.
“Who? Rafe? He’s the one who told
me.” Melissa replied and tried to pull her arm away from his grip.
Mark stopped and squeezed her
shoulder. “Do you know for sure if you are pregnant?”
Melissa bit the inside of her cheek
and realized that Mark was actually implying that Rafe was lying to her. She
thought hard and inhaled deeply. “I think that I am. I don’t know how I know
this but I feel like I maybe am.”
Mark nodded and shone a flashlight
at the fence. Melissa blinked as another flashlight was shone back. The fence
was then pulled back and Melissa gasped as she saw an opening. “You’re letting
me go?”
Mark didn’t answer her and instead
spoke to the other guy. “Take care of her. Get her out of this town.”
“Sure.” he replied back and gently
took Melissa’s arm.
“Thanks, Phil.” Mark said and
started to close up the gap in the fence.
“Wait, I’m not going anywhere
without Jennifer.”
“I’ll do what I can to save her.” Mark
replied.
Melissa broke free of Phil’s grip
and walked over to Mark. “Come with me. You need to tell me what the hell is
going on! I won’t leave you until you tell me!” she screamed.
“Can’t.” Mark said.
“I need answers!” Melissa said. She
shoved him on his shoulder. “Now!”
Mark looked at her and Melissa saw
how terrified he looked in the dim light. “Rafe is using you. He’s playing us.
He never cared about the souls. All he cared about was finding a replacement
for his wife and kid.”
“He said the only way all this can
be stopped is if they killed two innocents.”
“Then it has to be me.” Mark said.
“No. “Melissa started to cry and
then a thought occurred to her.” Rafe said you weren’t an innocent because you
cursed the souls.”
“But I also asked for forgiveness
from God and tried to amend my mistakes.” He said.
“You still need another one. I
could be the other one. You need me.” Melissa pleaded.
“Jennifer is dead.” Mark said
dejectedly. “Her body was found buried in the grocery store. Her soul is
trapped with them. We must free her.”
“Rafe said that Jennifer killed her
sister. Accidentally.”
“If she prayed and asked for
forgiveness then she too has redeemed herself.” Mark said. “The fact that the
demons are holding her soul captive means that she hasn’t realized this yet.”
“Let me talk to her.” Melissa
pleaded.
“Take her away Phil.” Mark ordered.
“What if you’re wrong?” Melissa
yelled as Phil dragged her away. “What if you made a mistake?”
But Mark didn’t answer her and
against her wishes she was made to sit inside a truck.
“Don’t worry.” Phil said as he
started to engine. “They know what they’re doing.
Melissa felt her limbs go numb. “No
they don’t.”
Eleven months later...
Melissa stared at her computer
screen and rubbed her eyes. There was still no news about anything that had
happened. She pushed up her glasses and started to type when her mother called
from the doorway.
“Aren’t you asleep yet?” she asked.
Melissa forced a smile on her face.
“I wasn’t sleepy.”
“It’s two in the morning.” Her
mother said. “You need your rest.”
Melissa turned back to the computer
screen and tapped her fingers on the keyboard before turning off her computer.
“I need to know.”
Her mother walked up to her and
placed a hand on her shoulder. “The police will find them all.”
Melissa turned to her mother and
hugged her waist. “Nobody knows where all those people vanished.”
“The police will find them.
They’ve been working on the case day and night.” Her mother said.
Melissa smiled to herself. The
police weren’t really searching hard enough, were they? She couldn’t imagine
what they had found that night and what they had decided to cover up. They had
all been fooled and there was no way they were going to own up to it.
She looked at the baby in the
cradle and smiled. Her daughter looked up at her with big sleepy eyes and
Melissa picked her up. She had been so nervous when she had told her parents
that she had gotten pregnant. Her parents had initially been disappointed but
then surprised her by taking full responsibility of her daughter whom she had
named Marcia.
“I need to go there.” Melissa said
suddenly. “I have to.”
“Melissa, you have to think about
Marcia.” her mother said.
“Please!” Melissa said. “I need to
go there just once.”
Her mother hugged her and stroked
her back. “Okay, but you’re not going alone.”
*****
Melissa paddled the small boat towards
the islet and found herself wondering if her eyes were deceiving her. Something
felt just out of place to her. As soon as she arrived, she got off the boat and
stepped onto the islet.
She had been so glad when her
mother had accompanied her here, but the last thing she wanted was for her
mother to step into this islet. So she had done what she was supposed to: lie
to her mother. As far as she knew, she was out getting groceries before heading
back home tonight.