Demon's Door (27 page)

Jim was stunned. He shouted out, ‘
Yaaaaaahhhhh!
' and threw himself at Kwisin again, but again Kwisin knocked him aside with her bristly forepaw, so violently that he rolled right over the top of his desk and fell heavily against his chair. He lay back, winded, but he was just about to climb on to his feet and attack Kwisin yet again when he thought:
She could easily have killed me. She could easily have bitten off my head like Charlie the Boston terrier
.

He thought of the first time that Kwisin had appeared in his bedroom, too. She had swelled up into this same black bristling beast, with horns and fangs, and she had scared him shitless, but she hadn't touched him. Maybe there was a good reason for that. Maybe she hadn't hurt him because he was Roland's grandson. Roland had deserted Kwisin, just like Lieutenant Pinkerton had deserted Madam Butterfly, but maybe there was still some dark particle in her demonic brain that still loved him – and Jim, of course, carried Roland's genes.

He gripped the edge of his desk and heaved himself on to his feet. Kwisin was still standing with her head thrown back and her forelegs wide apart, and when he looked around the gloomy, blood-glistening classroom, Jim could see that the souls of Special Class Two were beginning to rise from their fallen bodies. Tamara's first, semi-transparent and shimmering in rainbow colors, closely followed by Teddy's and Judii's. As they glided toward Kwisin's bristling embrace, all three of them turned toward Jim and gave him sad, regretful smiles.

‘You're not having them!' Jim shouted. ‘Do you hear me, you bitch? You're not having them!'

This time, he didn't try to launch himself at Kwisin again. This time, he went for Kim, who was still kneeling close beside her. Kim gasped, and tried to struggle, but Jim grabbed him around the neck with both hands and threw him backward on to the floor. He pressed both thumbs into Kim's throat and banged his head again and again, as hard as he could.

‘You started this!' he shouted at him. He was so angry now that the spit flew out of his mouth. ‘You started this, just to save yourself! Sixty-one people killing themselves, just to save you! You miserable, cowardly bastard!'

Kim started to turn purple, and let out a thin, guttural whine, but Jim dug his thumbs into his throat even deeper, and banged his head so many times that his eyes rolled up into his head.

Kwisin twisted her head around and snarled at him, but now the souls of Special Class Two were clustered all around her, their arms held out wide, trying to embrace her, and to her they were just as substantial as real, living people.

Jim squeezed Kim's throat relentlessly. ‘This is finished, you got it? This is over. No more kids are going to die. Not for the sake of your worthless skin.'

At that moment, however, he heard a voice shout, ‘Let him go! Let the kid go!'

He turned around and saw Detective Wong and Detective Madison pushing their way into the classroom, with Nurse Okeke and Dr Ehrlichman close behind them. Detective Wong tugged his gun out of his holster and pointed it directly at Jim's head.

‘Let the kid go, or I'll shoot!'

At the same time, Detective Wong saw the bloody bodies of Special Class Two lying underneath their desks. ‘Jesus Christ, what's happened here? Madison – call for some back-up! Tell the lieutenant! You! Mr Rook-like-the-bird! Let the kid go!'

But Jim kept up his relentless grip on Kim's throat. He couldn't hear him breathing any more and he thought that he was probably dead, but he wanted to make absolutely sure.

‘Let the kid go, Mr Rook! This is your last warning!'

Detective Wong came across the classroom, his automatic held steady in both hands. What he didn't realize was that he was walking through a crowd of invisible souls, and that a hideous demon was only two feet away from him. He stepped forward until the muzzle of his gun was pressed right up against Jim's right ear.

‘Let him go,' he repeated.

‘I can't. He has to die. There's no other way.'

‘Detective!' called out Nurse Okeke. ‘Whatever you do, don't shoot! There are things in this room that you don't understand!'

Detective Wong cocked his gun. ‘I understand that Mr Rook is trying to strangle this kid to death and that I'm going to shoot him if he doesn't desist.'

‘Detective!' shrilled Nurse Okeke. ‘There is a demon in this room! There are human spirits! You cannot shoot!'

Now Kwisin had gathered all the souls of Special Class Two together in a restless mingling of light and color and shadows and sliding images. Jim could see glimpses of their faces and their expressions as she pulled them into the darkness of her embrace. She snarled again, and let out another of her warbling, high-pitched screeches. Then she lowered her head and Jim could hear the crunching of souls as she started to devour the very substance that had made up each of his students' lives – their character, their memories, the love that they had been given as they grew up, sunny days, tears, and then hopelessness. This was what Kwisin fed on.

Nurse Okeke hurled herself across the classroom. She seized Detective Wong's wrist and tried to twist the gun out of his hand. There was a deafening bang and she fell sideways on to the floor, right next to Kim, with a bloodstain spreading across her white nurse's coat. She stared up at Detective Wong, her eyes wide, and then at Jim.

Detective Wong shouted, ‘Paramedics! Get me a bus, now!'

Jim let go of Kim. As he did so, Kim let out one long breath, the last air that had been trapped in his lungs as Jim throttled him. Nurse Okeke turned her head and whispered, ‘Is he dead, Mr Rook? Have you killed him?'

Jim laid a hand on her shoulder. ‘It's OK. Just stay with me, OK? You're going to be fine. It's only a gunshot wound.'

‘Only?'

Just then, Kim opened his eyes. He looked up at Jim and whispered, ‘Forgive me, Mr Rook. What you did, I deserved it. I was a coward, you were right.'

‘Can you put things back the way they were?' Jim asked him.

‘Who the hell are you talking to?' Detective Wong demanded. ‘Come on, stand up, put your hands behind your back.'

‘Doors close, Mr Rook. But doors open, too. There are so many doors, and all we have to do is choose which one.'

Kim's soul rose from his body, fluid and iridescent. He pressed his hands with their palms together and bowed his head. ‘Goodbye, Mr Rook. Remember me.'

He walked across to Kwisin and pushed his way in between all of the souls that were gathered around her. He held his arms out wide, and held her close. Kwisin lifted up her head and gave one last screech. Jim didn't know if it was pain, or joy, or despair. All he knew was that Kwisin would now have the eternal peace for which she had been waiting so many years.

Kwisin began to shudder, and fade. Quite suddenly, she seemed to twist around, like black smoke caught in a gust of wind, and then she vanished. She left behind her the souls of Special Class Two, standing together in bewilderment. Some of them had been scratched and bitten, and some of them were glowing with that dazzling essence that courses inside a soul instead of blood, but most of them appeared to be uninjured.

Jim stood up. Detective Wong pointed his gun at him and said, ‘Hold it. Just hold it right there. You're under arrest for homicide. Madison? Where's that back-up? Jesus!'

Jim went over to the souls of Special Class Two, and said, ‘Listen to me. Listen. I know you're in shock. But what you have to do is go back to your bodies, and lie down, and close your eyes, and pretend that you're asleep.'

‘We're dead,' said Arthur. ‘We cut our own throats.'

‘For once, Arthur, just do what I tell you. Please.'

‘But we're
dead.
'

Jim said, ‘We'll see about that.'

SIXTEEN

H
e was woken up the next morning by Tibbles licking his face. He didn't like Tibbles licking his face at the best of times, but Tibbles had obviously just finished a bowl of Instinctive Choice shrimp dinner.

He sat up in bed and pushed Tibbles away. ‘Jesus,' he said, wiping his face on the sheet. ‘Your
breath
, dude.'

He climbed out of bed and pulled up the blinds. It was a sunny, clear morning, with only a few small puffy clouds in the sky. He went to the bathroom for a pee, and while he stood there he looked at his face in the medicine cabinet mirror, as if he were looking at a portrait of himself.

He flushed the toilet and washed his hands. He was trying hard not to think about anything at all. He didn't want to ask himself how he had gone to sleep in the West Hollywood police headquarters and woken up here, in his own bed. He didn't want to ask himself if any of his students had killed themselves, or if Nurse Okeke had been shot dead. He just wanted to go through today as if it was a normal, boring day.

He put three heaped spoonfuls of Arabica coffee on to brew, and then poured himself a large glass of grapefruit juice. He hesitated for a long time before he switched on the TV, but when he did, the main stories were an unexpected drop in share prices and an air crash in Juneau, Alaska, in which four people had been killed.

It was 7:09 a.m. on September 7, the first day of the fall semester.

He slammed the front door really quickly to make sure that Tibbles couldn't escape. He double-locked it, just to make sure that Tibbles couldn't get out and that nothing else could get in.

On his way along the landing below, he hesitated outside Summer's front door, wondering if he ought to ring the bell and ask her how she was. But then this was another September 7, and he had stepped through another door. Maybe he and Summer would get together, but then again maybe they wouldn't.

Mrs LaFarge's apartment was pristine; no smoke stains and no windows broken. As he passed he could see Mrs LaFarge on her balcony, feeding her pet canaries.

He climbed into his car and fastened his seat-belt. He pulled down the sun vizor and flipped open the vanity mirror. To his genuine surprise, he saw that he was crying.