Page 37 of Succubus

Who loved me. Who called me Lorelei. Who was always trying to help me. Who never had a friend he could touch. Who never had parents he could hug. Who never got to know regular love.

“No, no, no,” I chant, rocking against the steering wheel. I hit my forehead into it, stay there a while.

He did not end his own life.

Despite it all. Despite how sad he always was. Despite how lonely.

He did not succumb to suicide.

He was hopeful, he was working toward answers, he was always working on something, always trying to solve the problem. He was Sherlock. He was not done.

He was murdered.

He was murdered.

And no one will ever even know. He was the only one who would even believe in his own murder.

Except for my disgusting father.

And now me.

The hour has passed and Ella is waiting for me and I am hardly alive myself, floating out of the car, up the path, to the door. Someone is talking to me, one of the parents doing pickup. Harini, from group. I am not sure what my face does, what my voice does. Ella is grabbing my hand; we are going back to the car.

“I really, really have to pee,” she is saying. “I had to the whole time. How long will it take to get home?”

“Ten minutes,” I hear myself say. “Maybe eleven.”

“That’s a long time,” she whines. “That’s really long.”

“There’s a bathroom. You could’ve— ”

“The toilet there is too loud! Remember?” And then, unprompted, of the class: “I didn’t like it as much today. We had to do a numbers and patterns race, and I don’t like racing because I don’t like games where someone always wins and someone loses. But I had to do it, and I’m not sure I want to go back next time. You said you wouldn’t force me.” The last part is chiding, a preemptive parry.

I don’t think I answer.

We are the only ones at home, of course. Dee and Mom are at work. I hate Mom for her stupid job that she doesn’t even really need. I hate her for not helping out. She could be homeschooling Ella, too. It doesn’t have to just be me.

“You can watch a movie,” I tell Ella when she returns from the bathroom.

“I can?” She is shocked. “Are you sure?”

I nod.

“I can pick it?”

I nod.

She looks at me suspiciously but then runs to get the iPad. A minute later, she is curled up on the couch watching something high-pitched, and I am standing in the kitchen staring at the clock on the oven. I watch the next minute replace the last one. Then another.

I knew he was gone.

I knew before I saw the funeral announcement.

I knew in the cab on the way to the airport, when he hadn’t responded. Grub always responds.

I am being crushed to death by my own rib cage.

I take a heaving breath, stumble up the stairs. Ella hardly glances up.