Milayna (32 page)

I took two steps toward her, the wallet in my outstretched hand. “Are you sure? I’m almost positive I saw it fall out of your bag.”

“I’m positive. My wallet isn’t that color,” she said, an amused look on her face.

“Oh, you wouldn’t happen to know whose it is?” I stepped in front of her when she tried to sidestep me.

“Why don’t you look inside and see if there’s any ID?”

Crap. The vision hasn’t changed, and I can’t get her to stop going into the store.

“Muriel!” I called, my voice quivering and an octave higher than normal. I didn’t have a good feeling about this vision. No matter how I played it out in my head, it didn’t change, at least not for the better. Butterflies started to swarm my stomach and my blood felt like goo oozing through my veins.

“Yeah?”

“Call the police. Now!”

“‘Kay.”

The woman stopped and looked at me with wide eyes. “What do the police have to do with the wallet?”

“Nothing. There’s a robbery in progress. I need to report it.”

“Where?” she asked, panicked. She looked around, turning in all directions.

“Here.”

That wasn’t exactly true. The robbery hadn’t taken place yet, but it was the only thing I could think of to keep the woman out of the store and keep her alive. The vision had changed, but my stomach was still tied in knots and the blood rushing through my veins was full of adrenaline. Something wasn’t right.

Blood. Glass. Bloody blue T-shirt. Stop it.

“Muriel, get down!” I screamed at the same time I tackled the woman. She fell on her hands and knees just as the bullet soared through the front window of the store.

Glass covered us. My hands were sliced and bleeding. Shards of razor-sharp glass were everywhere. The woman had a bad gash on her right cheek, but otherwise, we were both fine.

Slowly, the twisting in my stomach eased and fear slithered from my neck as the images faded. I could hear the far-off wail of sirens. They wouldn’t get here in time. The man had already run from the building.

The store clerk hurried to the door. “Are you okay?” He helped us up, picking the large pieces of glass out of our hair and off our clothes.

“We’re fine.” The woman sounded a little dazed. Her eyes were wide and she wobbled when she walked, like a little girl wearing her mother’s high heels.

I sat on Muriel’s car’s bumper and waited for the police. The sensations of the vision slowly dissipated and were replaced with the normal reaction of scared shitlessness a person would have after having a bullet soar over their heads—vision or no vision.

The police wanted a statement of what happened. After they interviewed the store clerk, they interviewed the woman. She said she hadn’t seen anything, but I’d saved her life when I pushed her to the ground.

Great. Thanks, lady.

“Miss, what happened?” a police officer asked. He had kind eyes and reminded me of my dad.

“I happened to look through the window and saw the man with the gun. I panicked and pushed the lady down.” That was mostly the truth.

“How did you see the gun?”

“Through the window,” I repeated.

“The window is covered in posters and signs.”

“Well, some of the window is uncovered or I wouldn’t have been able to see through it.” I tried not to sound annoyed.

“Did you see the man?”

“His back was to me.”

“What about when he ran out of the building?” The officer took notes in his little notepad.

“He was holding a gun. I tried not to look at him.”

“Why?”

Just drop it already!

“Why? Because I didn’t want him to start killing the witnesses!” I said, my voice rising. I tried to sound hysterical. I was sure I came pretty close since I was borderline hysterical by that point. The reality of what happened had started to sink in. One of us could have been shot. Killed, even. Yeah, hysterical seemed to sum up my emotional state. And even though I was only a few weeks away from technically becoming an adult, I wanted my mom and my grams’ purple couch. That always made me feel better.

“I’d like you to come to the station and look at some mug shots anyway, just in case something jogs your memory.”

Muriel and I drove to the station. She was quiet, and the silence made me uneasy.

“I’m sorry,” I said, smoothing out a piece of tape holding gauze on my hand.

“For what?” Muriel glanced at me.

“Making you go with me.”

“Milayna, you probably just saved my life. Here I thought the group was trying to keep you alive, and you just saved that woman’s life and probably mine too. Thank you.”

She reached out, grabbed my hand, and held it a little too tight considering I’d just had half a plate glass window pulled out of it by the EMTs, but I held on to her just as tightly.

We were one bullet away from possibly losing one another. Demons, Azazel, now freakin’ bullets flying around. It’s too much. Too many things threatening the people I love and I don’t know how to protect them from it all.

“It was nothing. All in a day’s work.” I smiled. Muriel squeezed my hand before letting go. She didn’t smile back.

We called our parents and told them what happened. Then we spent the next four hours of our life looking through picture after picture of criminals along with the store clerk.

“I couldn’t believe how many there were,” I said as Muriel and I walked out of the police station. Goose bumps broke out on my skin thinking about it.

“I know, right?” Muriel muttered. “It would have been nice if the surveillance cameras,” Muriel made air quotes around the words surveillance cameras, “were actual working cameras and not just empty boxes put up to deter crime. ‘Cuz, guess what? It didn’t work.”

My lips twitched. “Yes, that would have definitely been helpful.” Muriel had been bitching about the cameras since the store clerk told the police they weren’t real working cameras. She’d bitched to me, the police, and the store clerk, who really got a dose. “I just wish I could have given them something useful to work with. But I didn’t see the guy long enough… Anyway, that’s four hours of our life we won’t get back.” I sighed.

“Yeah. I’m just happy we had four hours of life left.” Muriel unlocked the car, and we climbed in to go home.

***

My dad met us at the car when Muriel pulled into her driveway. “Are you okay?” His face was pinched with worry.

“Yeah.”

We walked across the street to my house. As soon as I opened the door, I smelled him. He waited in the foyer, his hair mussed from running his hand through it. My heart lurched when I saw him, and I reminded it we were supposed to be mad at him for the idiotic thing he said. But somehow, it didn’t seem like such a big deal anymore. And I didn’t want to spend my life choosing to be angry.

He walked to me, cupped my face in his hands, and kissed me hard and deep. My father cleared his throat. Chay kept kissing me, and I kept kissing him back. I wrapped one arm around his waist, the other around his neck, and cradled the side of his head. I held him tight against me, until not even a whisper could fit between us. And still he was too far away. I felt so safe in his arms that my heart hurt. I didn’t realize I was crying until I tasted my salty tears on our lips.

“Okay then. Ignore the father.” My dad walked away.

“I’m sorry about what I said, Milayna. It came out all wrong—” He wiped my tears away, kissing each spot. “Don’t cry. I can’t stand to see you cry.”

I waved off his words and shook my head. “It’s okay.”

“Your hands. What happened to your hands?” He looked at the bandages the EMTs had applied.

“Just some glass. It’s nothing.”

He kissed me again. It was a slow, make-your-toes-curl-and-insides-swirl kiss, and my heart drummed against my chest. I leaned into him, urging him to take the kiss deeper.

“Chay, would you like to stay for dinner?” my mother called.

He lifted his head and grinned. “Yes, ma’am.”

“And that’s how you get their attention.” I heard my mom tell my dad in the kitchen.

I giggled and walked toward the smell of food. I was starving. When I walked into the kitchen, I froze. The large window behind the kitchen table was right in front of me. Through that, I could see my goblin buddies waiting for me in the backyard.

“Oh, yeah, I meant to tell you. You have some little red visitors.” My dad dished up some of the casserole my mom sat on the table in front of him.

I watched them run through the yard. “How long have they been here?” A weight fell onto my shoulders and pushed the air out of my lungs. I closed my eyes briefly and covered my face with my hands.

“About five hours.”

I let my hands fall slowly from my face. “About when the robbery happened,” I whispered.

“Yeah.”

“I’ll go out and see what they want so they’ll go.”

“Eat first, before it gets cold. They’ve waited this long. They can wait until after dinner.” My mom sat down at the table and patted the chair next to her.

Chay pulled out my chair, and I sat down. Throughout dinner, my parents and Chay asked me a million and one questions about the vision I’d had: what had happened at the convenience store, what the police said, how my hands felt, and on and on. By the time dinner was over, I felt like I’d been interrogated again, only my family was more insistent than the police officer had been.

After dinner, Chay and I sat on the deck and waited for the mini-goblins to reveal the purpose for their visit. I lay sidewise, my head in his lap. His arm was like a steel band around my waist, holding me to him. After the day I’d had, I welcomed the sense of protection he offered.

“Milayna’s here!” Friendly said in a singsong voice.

“It’s about damn time. I was getting bored,” Scarface said.

There were seven hobgoblins running amok in my backyard. I knew two of them. One I’d named Scarface and the other Friendly, based on his personality. They usually always came to bug me. It was like they were my personal demon buddies. The others I’d never seen before, although they all looked alike, so it was hard to tell.

“What are you doing here, guys?” I let out an exasperated sigh. I was drained from the vision and the hours I’d spent at the police station. I just wanted a quiet, peaceful evening so I could sleep.

“Did you like our game?”

My heart slowed. I could hear it plodding along in my chest, squeezing the blood through my veins. “What game?”

“The store. That was a close call with the bullet,” one of the hobgoblins said, its eyes wide.

“How do you know about that?” I pulled myself up to a sitting position. My knees were pressed against my chest and my arms wrapped around them. Chay wrapped his arm around me and scooted me close to his side.

“‘Cause we did it. It was easy convincing the guy to rob the place. Just a few subliminal suggestions and he was all set. Of course, he thinks it was all his idea, but that’s okay. Whatever gets the job done, right?” The demon’s lips pulled over his yellow, chipped teeth in what I guess was intended to be a grin. It looked more like a snarl, so maybe that was what he meant it to be. Who knew with them?

“You don’t know anything,” I bluffed, cringing when I heard the slight tremor in my voice.

“You’re wrong, you’re wrong,” Friendly chanted. “It was fun, fun, fun.” The red imp twirled around, tossing colorful fall leaves into the air.

“We know you saved that woman from the bullet Azazel meant for her. We know the window exploded over you and that’s what cut up your hands. We even know you’ve spent the last few hours at the police station,” Scarface said, ticking off each item on his stubby, sausage looking fingers.

“How do you know?”

“I told you, we did it. Wasn’t it fun?” This from Friendly again. I was beginning to think he was a little dense. He twirled a red-and-orange leaf between his fingers before holding it out to me.

I batted his hand away. “No.” My insides shook. I wasn’t sure if it was fear or rage. Another innocent victim. Azazel tried to kill another innocent human. The trembling inside my body spread until my entire body trembled, inside and out. A mix of emotions tumbled in my head like a cement mixer churning them over and over.

“She didn’t like our game.” Friendly’s eyes turned black and his face distorted. “We planned that especially for you. You should be polite.”

“Azazel is irritated. He wants an answer. You either give it up or die. That bullet could have fired a second sooner and we’d be having this conversation in the afterlife, you know.” Scarface made a show of picking something furry and bloody out of his teeth. He’d probably found a squirrel for dinner, or a neighbor’s cat. My stomach turned over, and my dinner splashed around. I was afraid I would hurl it on the little demon’s feet.

“Tell Azazel that this is the last time I’m going to answer him. It’s becoming redundant. No.” My body started to heat from the inside. A tingling heat fingered its way through my veins and muscles. I shifted on the deck, letting my legs fall and dangle off the side. I didn’t recognize this sensation. It was new, and I felt off-balance. My breathing started to quicken and was shallow. The earth started to slow, and I felt sluggish.