Will sighed. “Order something for dinner. Tor hasn’t slept since Lucy has been in here.”
“No problem, any preferences?”
“I don’t think either one of us care at the moment.”
“So, what delivers here besides pizza?” I asked.
“Nothing. So, I guess order a pizza.”
Tabby motioned to me. “I’ll cook,” she said.
I nodded. “Tabby said she’d cook if that’s okay with Tor.”
I heard him ask her, but I couldn’t make out Tor’s answer. “She says that sounds great. Tor said to tell Tabby to make anything she wants, just to leave everything out so she can keep up her system.”
“I’m sure that will be no problem. When do you think you’ll be coming?”
“Probably in a couple hours. The doctor just told us they were releasing her.”
“Okay, Tabby will have something ready.”
He clicked off without responding. I didn’t care. Not really. Food was food. There were much more important things afoot. “I guess cook whatever you want, but Tor doesn’t want you to put anything away because it will mess up her ‘arrangement.'”
Tabby laughed. “She’s just a little anal.”
“Yeah, just a tad.”
Tabby hopped up. “Come on, you don’t think I’m going to cook by myself do you?”
I shook my head. “Yes, dear.”
She punched me in the arm. “Ow!”
“Well, that’s what you get.”
###
When Lucy came back into the house, it was like the house itself darkened. It felt like the house rippled for a moment and then righted itself. It was hard to explain, but without her, it seemed almost like a normal house. With her, it felt oppressive.
I had walked to the foyer when I heard the front door opening. Tabby had stayed behind in the kitchen to finish up dinner.
When Will walked in with Lucy, there were no theatrics. Maybe her body was too weak, or maybe it didn’t want dropped. He made it up the steps just fine.
“Something smells good,” Tor said when she walked in.
Tor and I walked back to the kitchen.
Tabby looked up when we walked in. She smiled. “I made chili.”
“I haven’t had chili in awhile,” Tor said. “Will will be ecstatic. Chili is one of his favorites.”
We sat down at the table. None of us really said anything. It was hard when everyone feels awkward. None of us wanted to chit chat. We were waiting for something to happen. Finally, Will wandered in a few minutes later. There was a bleeding scratch on his hand.
“Got you, did she?” I asked.
“She always does when she’s not restrained. I’m surprised she waited as long as she did.”
“Maybe she didn’t want to be restrained,” Tabby said.
I looked at her. “Maybe so.”
###
After dinner, and after Tor righted her kitchen, I figured it was time I brought up my idea. I wasn’t sure if they’d go for it, but it was worth a shot. “Ever thought about installing a security camera?” I asked.
We were all seated around the kitchen table, enjoying some quiet time. Lucy wasn’t making noises, yet.
“You brought up something like that once before, didn’t you?” Will asked.
“Yeah, for the exorcism,” I said.
“Well, we have a security system,” Tor said.
“No.” I shook my head. “I mean in Lucy’s room.”
Will looked at me, puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“Think about it. If you record her, you have proof that the injuries she causes are self-inflicted, then you’ll be able to quell any accusations that might come up. Plus, the church, if they grant an exorcism, will want everything documented. These days, they use video.”
Will tapped his fingers against his coffee mug. “It’s something to think about.”
“But what about Lucy’s privacy?” Tor asked.
“She’s six, what privacy does she need?” Will countered.
“What about when I bathe her?” she asked. “I sure don’t want to record that.”
“Well,” I said. “You could cover the camera with a cloth. That way you’ll have the audio portion proving that nothing bad happened, and you’ll still be able to bathe her without invading Lucy’s privacy.”
Tabby smiled at me.
“That might work,” Will said. “I’ll call around tomorrow and see what I can do.”
“If anything else, you could always try one of those shopping clubs, like Costco. I’ve seen them at those places before,” Tabby said.
“Anymore ideas, Jimmy?” Will asked.
“Nah, plain out. I come up with the ideas. I have no idea how to make them work though.”
“Anyone want dessert?” Tor asked.
“Don’t trouble yourself,” I said. “You’re tired.”
Tor looked at me. “I know I’m tired, Jimmy. But it’s, how do I explain it? Cooking is the only thing that makes sense anymore. Please, let me cook for you.” Her eyes pleaded with me.
“Well, when you put it like that, how can I refuse?”
Tor turned to Tabby. “What sounds good?”
Tabby smiled. “Anything chocolate.”
Chapter Nineteen
Belief
The silence had to end sometime I guess. Round about eight it started, the sounds I mean. At first, it was so quiet I barely noticed it. Then, the sound of sharp rappings came from inside the walls. Patters of little feet ran across the ceiling, interspersed with that same choppy laughter. We were in the library.
The antics kind of amused me in a way. It was fucking with us. Of course it wasn’t funny at all because Lucy’s life was at stake, but there was a kind of perverse humor in it.
“I guess Lucy got out of her funk,” I said.
Tabby followed the sounds with her eyes as they traveled around the room. “It’s amazing that all of this is coming from one little girl.”
“Or a little girl who just so happens to have spirits and other beasties attached to her,” I said.
Will and Tor had gone to bed early. I could tell they were tired. Their movements had been slow and their eyes drooped. Towards the end, Will could hardly keep his head up. So, it fell to Tabby and I to be the witnesses of Lucy’s nightly antics, unless, of course, they woke Tor and Will up.
After Tabby was quiet for a few moments, she turned to me. “Do you think Lucy is in there somewhere, just asleep?”
I shrugged. “Probably. Little as I know about it, from what I understand is that when the demon is forward, the possessed is in a trance-like state. They don’t even know what is going on. That is, people who are really possessed. People who aren’t are just terrific liars.”
“How much research have you done?” she asked.
“Tons. Every night that you haven’t been in here, before I went to sleep, I surfed the net for information.”
“Shame we can’t wake Lucy up,” Tabby said.
I smiled. “That’s exactly what the rite of exorcism is supposed to do. It ‘wakes up’ the possessee’ and drives the demon out. Hopefully, to Hell.”
“And if there is no Hell?” she asked.
I shrugged. “I guess that’s what your mirror is for.”
I slipped off my shoes and socks and got stretched out on the sofa, propping my feet up on the coffee table.
“Are you ever afraid?” she asked.
“Of course,” I said. “Wouldn’t be human otherwise.” The truth is, I’d been scared many times, mostly by losing people I cared about—Tabby included. “Are you scared?” I asked.
She nodded. “You know me. I don’t touch the dark, never did. And this thing… it’s nasty. It was bad enough that I dealt with that demon as a kid. I have never touched a Ouija board again.”
“How did that happen again?”
She sighed. “I was about ten. A couple of friends and I were playing with an old Ouija board in the house. You know, u
sual sleepover type of thing.” She rubbed her hands up and down her arms. “Like idiots, we’d waited until three. Since my mother had always told me that three was the ‘real’ witching hour, I had told my friends. We figured we’d have the best luck contacting a spirit then.”
Tabby scratched her leg and looked down at her feet. “At first, nothing happened.” She looked up at me. “Then, the planchette began to move. Like kids are, we got spooked, so we pulled our hands away. The planchette kept moving. It went faster and faster in a circular pattern around the board. And then, it stopped dead with the pointy part pointed right at me.”
She swallowed. I could tell that even now, this had scared her. “I felt something grab me and a bad odor filled the room. Things began to look almost brown—like I was looking through a brown fog. I took a deep breath. Then, I heard voices. They were telling me all types of weird things. Some of them telling me to do violent things. I stood up and began calling the corners…. I hate to think what would have happened if my mother hadn’t trained me in the arts.”
“What happened to the thing?” I asked.
“I said some incantations for protection, and it disappeared. Luckily for me, it must have been a very weak demon, but I’ve never touched a Ouija board since.”
“I don’t blame you.” I had heard the story before, but it was good to ask her to tell it again. Some of the things seemed similar to what was going on with Lucy. I put my hands behind my head. “Look at it this way. If we get the church involved, we probably won’t even be active participants. They’d view us as unworthy, I imagine, with me being defrocked and you being a witch.”
She scratched her head. “”But that’s what scares me. I have a bad feeling about all of this.”
“What type of bad feeling?” I asked.
“That the church will refuse. Then, who’s left to help Lucy? Me and you, and neither one of us know diddly squat about exorcism.”
“At least you have experience with demons.”
Tabby rolled her eyes. “One demon, and it was a weak one. Nothing like what’s going on here.”
I pulled my copy of the Roman Ritual from my bag. “I don’t know if it matters, to be honest. In the early church, any Christian could do an exorcism. In the ritual, it clearly states that the exorcist must be pure in thought and intention. For both of us, all we want is for Lucy to be okay. To Hell with the extra baggage. How much purer of a mindset can you get?”
“Is that even a word?”
“What?” I asked.
“Purer.”
I chuckled. “I have no idea.”
###
As we laid down to sleep, all I heard for a long time was the normal Lucy sounds of the house. The scratching and pitter patter didn’t bother me so much anymore. Will had said that the sounds kept him and Tor up, but I didn’t understand how that could be when I was getting used to them and I’d only been there a few days. Maybe they heard different sounds upstairs. Maybe the thing spoke to them through the baby monitor. I really didn’t know. I fell asleep, figuring I would have more time to think about it tomorrow. Then, long about three, I heard it.
“Jimmy,” it whispered.
I jerked awake and looked around. There was nothing there. Whoever or whatever it was, was near my ear when they spoke. It wasn’t a creepy voice, just a loud whisper. But the notion that something tried to break through was unsettling to say the least.
I didn’t bother going back to sleep. I sat up and pulled my knees to my chest.
The rest of the night the house was eerily silent. Even the settling noises of the house were gone.
###
The next morning, I flailed when I woke. What I was dreaming, I couldn’t remember. At some point, I must have fallen back to sleep. I uncurled my legs and groaned at the stiffness. Then, I felt something— a piece of paper clutched in my hand. I opened it. In a child’s handwriting it said:
Liberaté m
Liberate me. When does a six-year-old know Latin? And how in the Hell was she able to do this?
I stood up and walked out of the library. I went up to Lucy’s room. It looked almost normal. The early morning sunlight drifted in from the window. Lucy was asleep, at least I think she was. Her restraints were fastened to her wrists. The covers were arranged around her comfortably. Now, I had another mystery to solve.
Who wrote the note? And if it was Lucy, how in the Hell did she do it? She was restrained at all times. Nothing about this made sense anymore, and I was starting to wonder if my mind was slowly cracking.
I left Lucy’s room and walked back downstairs to the library. Tabby was sitting up on her sofa.
“Where were you?” she asked.
“I had a note,” I said. Then I noticed that the note was gone. It was not in my hand. It was not on the floor. It was not on the sofa. I looked around, it was nowhere. I ran out of the room and retraced my steps. Even in Lucy’s room – the note was gone.
I took the stairs easier this time around. There was no sense in rushing. Either I’d just had the most vivid dream of my entire life, or someone was fucking with me. What they would get out of it, I had no idea.
When I got back to the library, Tabby was standing just inside the doorway, looking worried. “Are you okay?” she asked.
I shrugged. “I have no fucking idea.”
‘What’s wrong?”
I sat down on my sofa. “Either Lucy tried to contact me in a dream, by writing a note— in Latin no less. Or someone here is playing a Hell of a joke.”
Tabby furrowed her brow and walked over to me. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Yeah. I know.”
###
Tabby and I waited in the library until we heard Will and Tor get up. I was starting to think it would be better if Will would just assign a bathroom for Tabby and I to use. Granted, we had the half bath for our daily constitutionals, but it would be nice to be able to get up and shower whenever we wanted.
“Jimmy?” I heard Tor call from the hallway. I ran out. Tabby followed right behind me.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
Her face was strained. “Lucy… she…” she pointed upstairs.
I ran up to Lucy’s room. I walked in the open doorway to Lucy’s room. Lucy’s back was arched so far that she was raising herself up off the bed. Her eyes were rolled back in her head so that only the whites were showing.
“Shit.”
I ran over and released the restraints from the bed and laid Lucy’s hands down.
I looked at Tabby. “Hurry, come help me!”
Tabby ran over and blocked her side of the bed to prevent Lucy from falling out. Tor watched from the doorway, her face lined with worry. Lucy’s back was arched so far I hoped she didn’t hurt herself.
I looked at Tor. “Lucy ever have a seizure before?” I asked.
Tor nodded. “Once in the mental hospital. They thought it might have been brought on by the medication.”
I let go of the breath I’d been holding. “She’s had CAT scans, right?”
Tor sighed. “She’s had so many tests, but I know both the CAT scan and the MRI came out clear.”
“Okay,” I said.
Suddenly, Lucy completely relaxed. She focused those horrid eyes on me.
“Good morning, Priest,” she said.
I smiled at her, as best I could. “Good morning, Lucy. You gave us quite a scare.”
She smiled. I realized that Lucy had spoken to me without her mouth. Her lips had not moved. The sound had come from somewhere else.
I reattached the restraints to the bed. “Try to get some rest, Lucy. You might have to go back to the doctor.”
She laughed.
###
It wasn’t until we were all downstairs that I realized that Will wasn’t there. We went into the kitchen.
“Where’s Will?” I asked.
Tor sighed. “He left early this morning to get some new prescriptions filled for Lucy. She’s out of one of her morning
medications.”
Will had left early. He could have been the one to pull the cruel joke on me, but what would he accomplish by doing it? True, he could be insane enough to think that this joke could help make me believe Lucy was possessed, but it still didn’t make any sense, which meant I still had no explanation for what had happened. “I think Lucy needs checked out again,” I said. “Grand Mal seizures aren’t something to play around with.”
Tor sighed. “When’s it ever going to stop, Jimmy? When’s my little girl going to be okay?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know, Tor. I don’t.”
Tor walked over to the stove. “Well, we can’t do much until Will gets back,” she said. “Who wants breakfast?”
Tabby and I settled ourselves at the table. It was turning out to be a Hell of a day. All Tor wanted to do was cook, and all Tabby and I wanted to do was get to the bottom of this whole mess. It was like opposing forces clawing at each other. Would things ever even out? I sure didn’t know.
###
Will got back about nine. We’d had breakfast and Tor had cleaned up the kitchen long ago. We’d been chatting about Tor’s plans for the gardens in the spring. Will came in through the back door.
“Where in the Hell have you been?” Tor asked and jumped up from her chair. She put her hands on her hips. Her eyes were wild and her body shook. She was more angry than I had ever seen her.
“Calm down, Tor,” Will said. “The pharmacy let me know Lucy’s refills had run out, so I had to go get a new prescription.” He held up the medicine bag.
“I just can’t take it anymore, Will. You know what happened this morning? Your daughter had a Grand Maul seizure. Thank God Jimmy was here and knew what to do.”
I wanted to crawl into a hole. I didn’t like being put in the middle of their domestic spat. This was the last place I wanted to be. I wanted to be on an island somewhere, drinking margaritas and watching the ocean.
Tor and Will continued arguing. I motioned to Tabby. She nodded. We snuck out the back door.
When we were well away from the house, Tabby looked at me.
“Jesus Christ,” she said. “What is with them this morning?”