Boyfriend From Hell (Falling Angels Saga) (25 page)

It was the kind of outing Suze would have loved. It was very much like one of our antiquing outings, the trips to antique shops and garage sales that began right after my father left, and we moved from Phoenix to Glendale. That’s when we became friends.

I blamed my father. The thought had been lurking in the back of my mind for some time. I knew it wasn’t fair to blame him for our current troubles, but if he hadn’t left, had been man enough to stick it out, we wouldn’t have been in this mess. As far as I knew he never wrote, never called. My mother never mentioned him. This was his fault, and if things didn’t go as planned I would never stop blaming him, even though I couldn’t remember what he looked like.

When I finished the tour, I grabbed a few tacos off a truck and headed back to the bus station. I hoped this was enough time to recharge my batteries. When I got back to Glendale, I needed to be ready to battle the devil. I pulled out my phone and called Maudrina.

#

It was seven p.m. when I arrived back at the hospital. I walked through the sliding glass doors. The power of Armando’s presence radiated through the hospital walls.
The Book of Calls
had taught me how to sense when Satan was near. I could tell he wasn’t in the building, but he wasn’t far.

When I got to my mother’s room, she was sitting up in bed.

“Where have you been? I’ve been calling you all day.”

“I had a mathlete challenge in Coolidge,” I lied.

She shot me a questioning glance. “Really? I thought you were kicked off the team?”

“They asked me to come back. They need me.”

This was partly true, and the part that wasn’t, I’m sure she’d forgive me for. There is no way I could tell her I’d spent the day preparing to battle Satan.  That wouldn’t have gone over too well.

“I’m glad you’re back on the team,” she said with an encouraging smile.

“Me, too.”

Tran had told me, “If you take too long, you’ll be too late.” I hoped I hadn’t blown it.

“They wanted to release me today, but I needed a family member to pick me up.”

“I’m not old enough to check you out.”

“I know. I thought you could do it with Armando.”

I stiffened at the thought of doing anything with Armando.

She noticed the change in me. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. I’m just sorry I wasn’t around this afternoon to get you out of here.”

“That’s okay. Tomorrow’s good.”

“Yes,” I said with a forced smile. “Tomorrow.”

We spent the better part of the evening watching TV and chatting. Nothing important, just girl talk. As we passed the time, I realized how precious these moments were. The idle moments that seem like nothing, that feel like you’re just killing time, are actually the important ones.

Cooking together, polishing the silver, watching DVDs, estate sales, garage sales, these tiny threads of seemingly meaningless activity are the bedrock on which relationships are built. Our special friendship thrived on such things. I realized then, it was these trivial moments that gave me the strength to fight for both our lives.

At nine, I kissed her goodnight and stepped out into the corridor. It was empty, yet the atmosphere seemed charged. A cool breeze drifted through. It was as if the corridor had its own weather system. The breeze started blowing  toward me.

He’s coming,
I thought, as I pulled my windbreaker shut.

Tentacles of dread tickled at my belly. I immediately wished them away. Fear would give him power. I couldn’t afford that.

I started down the empty corridor. There was an old wall-style telephone on the wall, midway down. It started to ring.

Brinng, brinng!

The ringing echoed throughout the corridor, shattering the silence. I continued  toward the phone. I knew it was for me.

I picked up.

“Yes,” I said, holding the receiver gingerly in my hand. My voice was flat.

“I believe you want to make a deal with me.” It was Armando. He seemed so confident. Good.

“A deal?” I asked innocently.

“A trade? I think you said you wanted me to take
you
instead of her.”

I knew he had been listening last night when I screamed “take me, instead!” just as he’d been listening to my earlier prayer.

“Of course, if you’ve changed your mind, I’ll give you a few minutes to go back inside and say your final goodbyes.”

“You wouldn’t!” My words seethed with anger.

“It’s your choice, Megan. I am trying to be reasonable here. I have agreed to take you in her stead.”

“Stop flattering yourself. It was me you wanted all along.”

He chuckled. It was a laugh filled with evil. “Very intuitive. So that should make it easier. Right?”

I knew if I was going to send him back to hell, I needed him to be closer. “I’m yours,” I said. “Come and get me.”

“As you wish.”

I hung up the phone. As soon as I did footsteps rang out in the empty corridor, obliterating the silence. They were coming from down the hall and around the bend.

As the footsteps drew nearer, I heard him whistling. I didn’t recognize the tune.

He ended the song and let out a self-satisfied laugh that echoed throughout the empty corridor. A moment later, he came around the corner.

“I love that song. Have you heard ‘The Land Down Under?’” he said. “Men At Work. I do believe they wrote it just for me.”

He stood about twenty feet away, bathed in shadow and eerie light. He wore a light trench coat, the kind you see in old black-and-white movies. It rippled in the breeze.

“I don’t know the song,” I said.

“Pity. You should check it out on YouTube.” He inhaled, expelling the air in a deep, self-satisfied breath. “I am so happy you have agreed to come with me, Megan. I promise you we will be happy together.”

“Cut the sappy stuff. I’m here to save my mother. What do I need to do?”

His expression changed momentarily, a flash of anger spreading across his face. But just as quickly it was gone, replaced by a beatific smile. I was so caught up in his evil, I’d forgotten just how beautiful he actually was.

He started  toward me.

“All you have to do is renounce this life and say that you will be my bride.”

He stopped just in front of me.

“Is that all? Okay. How’s this?” I began chanting the reverse incantation: “Ie n’ay cekt que toi.”

His eyes widened in disbelief. “STOP!” He screamed. Where did you learn that?”

I smiled as I continued the chant. “Semeck tous n’vrais—”

A tremendous force of energy slammed into my chest, sending me air born, and hurtling backwards. I hit the ceramic tile floor, and continued to sliding backwards along the cold tile.

The moment I stopped sliding, I sat up. A searing pain shot through my ribcage and lungs. I was certain I had cracked a rib, yet I resumed the chant.

Armando rose up off the floor, and flew at me like a wraith, rage strewn across his face. He reached me in a second and raised his hand as if to smite me. It was then I threw the holy water I’d been concealing up my sleeve.  

This time he was totally caught off guard. The blessed water splashed into his face.

“YIIIIIII!”
he shrieked.

It was a sound like none I’d heard before, an ancient cry of an animal long extinct. His face began to blister and burn. Like a birthday cake caught in the rain, his features began melting away, dripping to the floor.

What lay beneath the beautiful face was a mask of horror. His twisted mouth, filled with shark-like fangs, took up much of the face. His pupils were dark slits surrounded by irises glowing iridescent yellow.

“Is that it!” I shouted. “Is that all you’ve got?” I continued the chant from where I had left off.

“Insolent child! You shall pay!”

Armando took to the air, retreating back down the hall, his face still falling away. I gave chase, continuing the chant as loud as I could.

A storm began to brew.

An icy twister kicked up, spinning through the corridor, sending chairs and debris flying, anything that wasn’t nailed down. It was as if I were in the heart of a tornado.

A food cart slammed into my head, its hard rubber wheel hitting me in the mouth. Salty, sweet blood flowed freely from a gash in my lower lip, spilling into my mouth. I continued my pursuit, along with the chant.

The force of the storm increased. I was suddenly in a hurricane, being pelted by stinging rain.

It slowed my movement, eventually stopping my progress. I felt like a mime, pretending to walk against the wind. I was going nowhere. Then just as suddenly the wind died. The corridor became unnaturally quiet.

He was gone.

Immediately, I ran back to my mother’s room.  She was hiding under the covers. The bed had been moved away from the wall to the center. A hexagram had been drawn on the floor in dark charcoal. This was very different from how it was when I had left her.

She was quaking under the covers as I joined her inside the hexagram. “It’s okay, Mom,” I comforted. “He can’t hurt you in here. The hexagram will protect us.”  

“What’s going on?” she whispered. She sounded so lost.

Before I could respond, the storm started in the room.

The things atop the bedstand, along with the equipment on the floor, were lifted by the swirling wind and came flying at me. Yet instead of hitting me, everything bounced away, as if there were an invisible force field around the hexagram protecting us.

We were safe as long as we were inside the hexagram.

Armando appeared. He rose out of the floor like fog rising off a swamp. He continued rising until he loomed over me, a hideous genie rising from the depths of hell.

His beautiful face was gone. In its place was the grotesqueness that I knew was the real Satan. All the misery the world had known was etched in the creases of that face. This is how he really looked when he was not trying to convince an innocent human to be his bride.

As the storm raged, I began the chant anew.

“Ie n’ay cekt que toi.”

“I will spare your mother and friends if you give up now,” he thundered, his words reverberating throughout the room.

I ignored him. “Semeck tous n’vrais nom seigneur s’oignt.”

The hexagram around the bed caught fire. Flames leapt up from the floor licking at the bedding. Nothing burned. I wasn’t singed, although I could feel the fire’s intense heat.

“YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!” he bellowed. “Do you think I am a fool? I know your mother is not in this room. She is down the hall—unprotected.” His yellow eyes bore into me.

My chanting slowed.
“O…. venez…”

“Don’t stop,” Maudrina called from under the covers. You’re almost done.” She threw off the covers. “You’re going back to hell, Satan!” she screamed.

Satan smiled. It was a hideous toothy grin that took up half of his face. “Not without my bride.”

He looked at me, speaking softly in that wonderful, melodious voice. “You love your mother, Megan. She is most precious to you. Don’t you see you cannot win? She will die. All of your friends will die. Is that what you want?”

“Ahhhhhh!” Just then an ear piercing scream rang out from down the hall. I recognized the voice—Suze.

“Leave her alone!” I called.

“Not unless you stop this foolishness.”

She screamed again. The anguish in her scream tore at my heart.

“Stop it! Stop it!” I called. “You’re killing her!”

His tone darkened. “Are you ready to become my bride?” he asked, his horrid eyes boring into me.

I nodded, my face filling with defeat.

Slowly the storm in the room subsided. The ring of fire died. Thankfully there were no more screams from my mother.

Satan continued to hover.

“Thank you,” I wheezed.

“My pleasure. Now step from the hexagram and tell me that you will be my bride. I will not ask again.” There was finality to his words. If I didn’t obey, Matt, Erin, Maudrina
and
my mother would all die.

I stepped from the safety of the hexagram.

“Good girl. Now renounce this
life
.” His voice was filled with contempt for my current life.

I opened my mouth, but instead of renouncing anything, I completed the reversal incantation. When I finished the strange language, I said the last part in English.

“With these words, Satan, I command you back to hell!” I cried for all I was worth. Then I stood there, praying it would work.

As soon as I finished the incantation, the Armando thing reeled backwards, as if he’d been punched in the jaw.

“You… you tricked me!” he called. His voice was suddenly much weaker than before. He seemed to be losing strength.

“Be gone with you, Devil,” I called back, gaining confidence.

He stopped hovering, drifting down to the floor before me. He landed, standing like a mortal, and began stumbling around as if he were drunk. “How dare you call from the
Book of Calls
, he slurred. “You are not my equal! You are NO ONE!” he cried as loud as he could. But his voice was getting weaker with each, slurring word.

He collapsed to his knees.

“You will pay,” he rasped. It was a feeble threat, coming off his lips a drunken slur. And then he exploded right before our eyes.

There was a loud bang, a tremendous flash, followed by plumes of billowing smoke. When the smoke cleared, he was gone.

The room fell eerily silent, as wisps of the smoke hung in the air, along with the stench of brimstone.

“You did it!” Maudrina cried, breaking the silence. “You did it!”

I turned to her, a big smile blooming on my lips. “
We
did it. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

I stood smiling at her, relief flooding my body. “I can’t believe it,” I said. “He’s gone. He’s really gone.”

Just then, an earth shattering scream erupted from down the hall—my mother again. We took off on a dead run.

When we entered the room, my mother was in the bed that Maudrina had moved her to. And the bed was on fire. Everything in the room was ablaze or smoldering. It looked like an inferno.