Page 27 of Succubus

“Simmer the fuck down!” someone calls at him, and he mumbles, “Fuckin’ try me, asshole,” without even glancing their way. And then, “I’m a little stressed. Gotta let it go. Gotta just let it go. Breathe in, breathe out.”

“What are you stressed about?” This man could own the world. In fact, I’m not sure why he doesn’t.

He hesitates for a moment, then says, “Fabian. My son. Impressive man. I got attached.”

Fabian. I know that name. The MMA fighter. His son.

Hold on.

“Motherfucker took him out.” And suddenly he is crying. First he sniffles, then tears cut haphazard paths down his pitted cheeks. He doesn’t try to hide them. He’s gasping, drawing shuddering breaths. “Fuck. Shit. Fuck it all. He killed my boy.”

I experience an alarming, instinctive pang of sympathy.

“The demon hunter,” I hear myself say. Grub’s moniker for the serial killer I’ve assumed was imaginary. Until now.

He looks up sharply, blinks, wipes his eyes hard with both hands, exposing the red insides of the lids. “We aren’t demons. Someone made that shit up.”

“What are we?”

“He’s coming for my kids, trying to kill them all. Trying to wipe us out.” And then, muttering: “So alone. No one around.”

“All your kids?” I am still talking but my mind feels too quiet, like it’s shutting off.

He’s balled into himself. He tries to straighten his shoulders. “Girl, I’m the original. The OG. They’re all my kids! He thinks he’s gonna win and we’re just gonna give up or somethin’.”

My brain slides off the tall, slick sides of this revelation. I can’t grasp any part of it. He goes on in a mumble, eyes on the table: “That’s right, I’m the original. And now everyone else is gone. It can drive you crazy, when you’re alone like this, y’know? Like I am. It can drive you crazy.” He stares suddenly, blearily at me. His eyes fill again with tears, his mouth sags. He coughs. I reach reflexively toward him, startling myself, and my hand lands lightly on his wrist. He doesn’t seem to notice it there.

I ask, “Who is he? Who’s the one who thinks he’s going to win?”

He guzzles his second drink, which seems to revive him a little, and scoops a slick of spinach into his mouth. “One of those, y’know—guardians, the friggin’ cops. We called them . . .” He says a word I can’t understand at all. And now that he has said it, I am noticing a faint accent underlying everything he says. Not one I recognize. He adds unhelpfully, “When they got started.”

“What are they?”

“Didn’t think there were any more around. Been a while. Been a long time. Hardly anyone left anyway.” He finishes the drink, bellows for another. He’s picking up speed now.

“Shut the fuck up!” yells the same guy as before. It’s getting crowded in here, the music louder, but Dick Face is still audible enough to piss people off.

“Make me!” he shrieks, rising a few inches. There’s something pitiably defensive in his voice; I think of Ella for a second, when she gets overstimulated and frantic with fear.

And then a towering muscle-bound guy in a tank top lumbers over, animal eyes expressionless, neck tattoos flexed. “I don’t like to hurt an old man,” he growls.

“No, you don’t, you pathetic prick.” Dick Face smirks.

The man freezes in his massive tracks, eyes narrowing in confusion. Then his face goes even blanker.

“Had something to say?” asks Dick Face with smarmy pleasantness.

“I am very sorry to interrupt you,” the man rumbles.

“Okay, great. And would you also like to say that you are a stinking little cunt?”

I wince, all my pity instantly evaporating.

“Yes. I am a stinking little cunt.”

“Thanks for your service. Bye-bye.” The incongruously lovely voice goes singsong.

The man in the tank top turns obediently away. The server brings two more drinks, anticipating Dick Face now.