Page 45 of Succubus

“No. Just me. I’m sorry I’m leaving you with Ella. Maybe Mom can— ”

“We’ll all go,” she says, firmer this time. “We’re a family. Mom can watch Ella for once in her life. We’ll stay in a hotel for a few days. Will that make you feel better?”

I don’t know. I don’t know anything at the moment.

I’ve trailed after her into the kitchen, where she’s pulling things out of the freezer. Ice cream, frozen cookie dough, a burrito. “Does it have to be tonight?”

“Yes. I’m worried he’s going to . . . come over.”

“I won’t let him in!”

You won’t be able to stop him, I think, picturing Joel’s formerly appealing frame, the breadth of his chest, the heavy muscles. I wish for a second that we had a gun.

“Dee. Just let me go by myself.”

“We’re all going.” Her tone is final. “How about that stupid water park hotel—what’s it called? SplashVille? SplashTown?—remember we talked about taking Ella there?”

When is next time? I text Joel. This is a perk of being in close contact with the man who wants to kill you.

But he doesn’t answer.

I’m gathering Ella’s stuff, putting bags by the door. Mom is out and so far unreachable. Dee is eating the burrito really quickly. “Ow, fuck, that’s hot,” she says. “I didn’t eat dinner. Who are you texting?”

“Alice.” The lies are flowing freely.

I write: You know I’m the only one in my family who is like this right? You seem like a totally shitty demon hunter since you didn’t even figure out it was me. So maybe you don’t know. Stay away from my family. They are completely innocent and have never hurt anyone and you really need to believe me about that.

And then: They’re all related to me through my father. The Dows. It feels faintly odd, referring to Dick Face as my father, even through the storm of my more relevant feelings. I didn’t know until FL. Do you understand that my family isn’t involved? They’re related to me through my mom. They’re just regular people.

He doesn’t respond.

My father will hunt you down if I die, I write, feeling utterly alone. He’s some kind of demigod.

Okay, that could have been more threatening. But at least “demigod” sounds better than “super old hypnotist.”

Fifteen minutes later, Mom gets home really high. The yoga club doubles as a weed club, and Mom doesn’t count pot as a drug. Dee is yelling at her as she wafts through the door, beaded necklaces swinging in long loops.

“What? Why are we going?” Mom is bewildered. “It’s a beautiful night!”

It’s a bumpy transition to the car, Ella crying in confusion, but then the caramel-flavored NPR voice of the storyteller on her folktale podcast is intoning: “The banker had taken all of their money! Michael, the youngest—and cleverest—son of the humble tailor, had to come up with a plan,” and Ella curls against me in the back seat. I am brilliant for somehow remembering the purple iPad and charger. Ten mom points! Not that saving them up ever gets me anything good. Not that I’m an actual mom.

My own mother is up front, trying to tell us about tonight’s tarot reading and how this period of unease was predicted by her friend Tammy. No one has explained to her what the unease is about, exactly, but she’s sure it has something to do with Dee’s refusal to go on that low-acid/high-alkaline diet she suggested.

* * *

It’s 11:17 PM.

I’m standing between one of the beds and the single chair crammed against a small desk in the hotel room I’m sharing with Mom. Dee has talked her way into a two-room reservation at SplashPalace, only thirty minutes from home, just over the Pennsylvania border. I’m pretty sure Molly’s whole family contracted a weeklong norovirus here not too long ago. I’m also pretty sure Joel won’t think to track me here for the purpose of killing me among the vacationing children on their bobbing rainbow inner tubes.

There are photos on the walls of waterslides and ice cream and someone in an inexplicable giraffe costume with a lopsided giraffey grin. Mom is on the phone in the bathroom, loudly explaining to Barry that she feels like he isn’t handling his stress well. “You aren’t fully present in the moment with me,” she tells him. “I need you to be fully present. In the moment. Which is all we have, Barry. Do you agree with that?”

I have already posted on the Discord server Grub set up, looking away from the messages about his death. I gave Joel’s name, a description of his appearance that says nothing about how beautiful he is, and Dick Face’s advice: Strike first. Use your power, even if you’ve been running away from it your whole life. (Which they haven’t, let’s be real. That was just Grub. And me, once.) I also gave a quick overview of Dick Face’s version of reality and asked everyone if they have a missing bio dad. Then I sent a flurry of private messages, shared the screen name Joel used, warned everyone not to post publicly, warned them he’s watching.

I don’t know how much good any of this will do. No one is in the area. The people who Grub IDed as victims weren’t on here, as far as I know. Which means Joel found them somewhere else.

I realize I should’ve been on other chats, in other groups, like Grub. I should’ve been in all of them.

I text Dick Face: Any tips on killing an angel?