I stuffed my hands in the pockets of my jacket before the icy air could bite at them as the greasy taxi drove off. It was almost strange for it to be so cold this early in the evening. The street lights hadn't flickered on quite yet, but the dry street still held an almost icy glow. It was a warning of the wonderland that the week of Christmas always brought. I would be alone again, but I didn't really mind. Maybe I would if I was sure it was my last.
I took one last look around the long street of abandoned buildings, dark and towering like tombstones, their skeletal grins and hallowed eyes taunting me.
A sigh escaped me, my breath fogging my vision, but I could still see that there was practically no one else on the street.
My tennis shoes were louder than I expected as they meet the splitting pavement, another sign. I was becoming less agile. My doctor said no running, which was fine. I had no intentions to, I was a good girl. Well, unless I really had to of course, but I wasn't planning on any dangerous encounters today.
The Styx lay before me, a shorter building than the rest that surrounded it, but twice as wide. How anyone had turned this place into a club escaped me. It seemed to be hardly holding its own weight, the roof sagging slightly, like a thumb rubbed in clay. Something I neglected to notice in the dark the night before on my search for a phone with the club's owner, Nick. He'd had me very distracted.
Most would think you'd know evil when you saw it, especially if you were as devote as I was. The Lord is supposed to guide you, warn you of danger. So, running into The Rebel Son himself should send off a million warnings, but even though I knew who I was facing as he offered his help when I was stranded, nothing told me to stay away.
Even so, I knew I should stay clear. Did I want to make the situation worse? No. So why had I come back when his offer the previous night had turned into a payment? He'd taken something of mine.
I could hear my mother begging me to let it go, it wasn't worth it. If she were here to actually tell me that then she would be right. I would be okay, I had prayed for safety tonight.
I strode up to the club, the blacked out windows as inviting as the mostly misspelled profanities carved out among the cracks. Colored lights flashed through the cracks like lightning, becoming more visible as the sky darkened.
Drake, the same doorman that was there the night before, was sitting in a chair up against the wall, it was leaning back, his neck crooked to the side, a steady stream of drool hanging on the side of his face, his dark sweater bunched up around his arms and neck hiding the tattoos I knew were there. The lights from the windows reflected off the top of his bald head, a rainbow of fire.
Drake nearly flew out of his chair when the music started his eyes glassy, but wild. The three beer bottles on his lap crashed to the pavement. I sidestepped the shards, but they continued to rattle toward me as the sound waves moved the earth under my feet.
He righted himself, his round face set into a frown, wrinkles drawn onto his mostly bare forehead.
"Guess the party's officially started for tonight." He mumbled, sighing, his mouth then stretching into a yawn his tongue curling like a feline.
I considered just going past him into the club and begin my search, but I had to ask him one thing first.
It seemed to take him a moment to realize I was there, but when his eyes settled on me he chuckled.
"Well if it isn't angel!" he chirped. Folding his arms and looking me up and down, laugh lines appearing around his eyes.
I was so glad he was amused.
"Told you you'd be back, didn't I doll face?" he chuckled.
I ignored his remark, folding my own arms across myself, gesturing to the club with my head.
"Is he in there?"
His smile went down a little, a loose guitar string. "Well, Miss…Amy was it? I don't know. He could be. I'm not his babysitter."
Did everyone have to play with me here?
"Fine." I muttered, and with a raise of my eyebrows, strode toward the door.
"If you really want something from him that badly, he'll probably find you."
Good, then he won't come looking for me because it wasn't him I wanted.
"On second thought," Drake chuckled, a dark sound, like a broken toy clown forever replaying its last vow. "He'll just find you anyway."
I didn't look at him. I didn't want to see the expression that matched the sound and I prayed Nick wasn't here.
Once I crossed the threshold I meet near instant blackness, an orange glow slightly lit up the small corridor that twisted to the right. Posters, graffiti, and various other dark colored stains covered the walls. I did my best not to look too carefully at them. In and out was the plan.
The hall turned a sharp corner to the left then opened to the dance floor.
I was slammed with an instant headache. The strobe lights paired with the music directly throbbing in my face that swam conflictingly among every kind of smoke and disgusting, gagging smell you can imagine made me nauseous to the point of stumbling over my own feet for a moment. My eyes watered, the fumes burning and stinging them as I tried to find the small stair case that led to Nick's floor through the haze. The crowd pulsating together moved toward me, instantly suffocating me in heat. I backed away into another person behind me, but they were too high to care. I wanted to leave. Being in this mess this long was dangerous for me. I tried to turn around and go the way I came, trying not to bump into anyone sober enough to notice, when I saw them. Small skull lights hung from the low ceiling bouncing along happily to the pounding beat.
I remembered them from the light before, hanging over me like demonic beacons as Nick had dragged me through the cloud to his personal room where he'd said the phone would be.
I followed the hanging lights along the far wall to my right, worming my way through the bodies not making eye contact with any one of them. I managed not to trip over tangled feet or couples thrown against the wall and tables. The tables and chairs that weren't broken were occupied, and most that weren't broken were getting there. I wasn't able to hear the sound effects of their activities. I couldn't help a sudden moment of gratitude for the volume of the music that was surely going to leave a constant buzzing in my ears for the rest of my life.
The stairs were intact, three small cement steps that led to a splitting wooden door. I stole a quick glance around the room. No one was paying any attention to me. The peeling paint on the doorknob tickled my skin as my hand closed around it. It turned needlessly until I cranked it as hard as I could and the door opened. I only opened it enough for me to slip through then closed it slowly behind me. It made a small click as it settled in the frame and to my surprise it muffled the noise a short distance below to a mellow hum.
Sunset was stealing through the gritty window to my right, casting a pinkish glow on the open curtains and around the room. It made the bare walls except for what was left of the peeling black wallpaper along with the tarnished wooden floor seem more pathetic than when I'd first seen it, but I had been more worried about getting a taxi out of here than the décor.
"Looking for something?"
Before I could turn around an arm encircled my waist, trapping me against a body behind me. A hand snaked under my jacket, picking at the hem of my shirt, fingertips icy from the cold outside on my bare skin.
"So happy to see you're back," Nick's lips were at my ear, his hot breath wrapping around my neck, "but something tells me it's not to pay the little debt you've racked up with me from various favors." he hissed. I tried to ignore the chill that settled in as his hand that wasn't in my shirt traced up my leg, coming to a stop and hovering just before the inside of my thigh.
Nothing moved except for the quick rise and fall of my chest as he held me there. I was too afraid to move like I was in the clutches of some animal and any movement would mean my death. I held my breath as his lips settled on my throat, lingering as if tasting it, the stubble on his face scratching my neck.
A slow, thick sigh of disappointed passed through his lips and he released me. My skin tingled.
He strode passed me and I watched him, catching my breath, holding back the retort that was seething on my tongue. Nick flopped lazily into a once gaudy chair. It creaked against his weight and was now in near pieces, showing faded signs of what it once had been. I could almost see it in front of me, the blood red velvet with the stained black walnut arms curving to ends of dark skulls with snakes wrapping out of their open and cracked mouths. Nick lounged in his throne as he glared at me with eyes that contained every kind of blue that I could imagine. The fire they roared in hardly seemed contained by his body. A frown sat on his lips, the rest of his face relaxed, bored. He fingered almost absent-mindedly one of the tears in the chair's fabric. "Why?"
"You stole something from my apartment." I said strictly, trying for hostility, but only managing to whine.
The sun had set further and its fading rays settled on Nick playing with the highlights in his brown hair that settled around his ears as he smiled. The smirk was quick, there in a flash, but there wasn't a gleam in his eyes, especially once his grin was gone. My eyes focused on his face, watching for any other expression when I noticed his skin.
Before he'd sat down into the sunlight it had seemed perfectly normal, fair, but still the same ivory that colored my own body. Now it seemed sickly transparent, revealing the shadow of not flesh, but bone underneath.
If my face had shown my horror, he hadn't noticed and appeared to be deep in thought with his hands folded under his nose.
"Sit." He said suddenly.
I looked around, but there wasn't any other chair in the room. "On the floor?" I tried to clarify.
"NO!" the tone of his voice sounded almost like a possessed child and he grabbed me and yanked me down into his lap. "Here." His voice had changed now, seductive once again, his nose grazing my face, but his grip wasn't kind, his fingers cutting into my arm with enough strength to instantly cut off the circulation to my hand.
I couldn't stop myself from gasping in pain, tears pooling in the corners of my eyes.
"What do you want from me?" I panted.
Nick's hand let go of my arm and began stroking my hair a few of his own brown locks out of place, the other hand caressing my face as examined my eyes, his eyebrows turned down in a look of pity. "Do you know what a child, especially a boy, does when there is a toy that someone else got instead of him?"
I had no idea where he was going with this. How could the picture he had stolen possibly mean anything to him?
When I didn't answer he leaned his head toward mine until our noses nearly touched and whispered, "He breaks it."
I tried to figure out what he was talking about as he reached into the front pocket of his shirt, taking out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He lit one, the flame dancing before my eyes as if it had all of the answers. The breath he dragged in through the cigarette was long, and smooth, which seemed strange to me with all of the smoke that was going into his lungs.
He snatched the cigarette from his mouth, holding it between two fingers lazily. The end burned a smoldered in the side of my vision as he blew smoke in my face.
I held my breath and turned away, waiting for it to pass, but it got to me and I began to cough.
"Come on Amy." He prodded my shoulder with his fingers. "I know you're smarter than that."
He took another drag, but didn't direct the chemicals directly toward me. "What do you have that I don't?"
He couldn't have meant some worldly item. I was sure that anything he wanted he could get easily. I racked my brain with what I knew about the devil, and it didn't take long before it hit me. What was the one thing Lucifer would always be denied?
"You don't have a body."
Nick flashed his teeth at me again. "Good girl." He took my hand and examined it with a strange curiosity, his eyes shining. His hand completely encased my own, his fingers long and spidery, but in no way suggesting they lacked strength and were now warm to the point where they could be soothing if I relaxed for a moment. "I can't feel a thing in this world." My skin pinched in on itself as he squeezed my hand. "Not physically anyway."
"Then why do you bother with this?" I asked, taking the cigarette from his hand and putting it out in the ashtray that I located on the desk.
"I have an image to keep up, now don't I?" He frowned as I put it out and reached into his pocket again for another.
He lit the new cigarette and hung it in the corner of his mouth like he only needed it to sit there.
"If you're so jealous of my body then why haven't you…." I hesitated, not wanting my fear to get the best of me as I chose my words. "…destroyed mine already?"
Nick's eyes snapped to me, aflame, his mouth tense as if I couldn't have suggested anything more offensive. "Don't be ridiculous."
He began to stand and I nearly fell out of his lap before he caught my waist and stood me up. He hurried out of the chair as if he couldn't hold still and paced around the back side of the chair.
I waited for him to answer, trying not to think about the possibility of him changing his mind.
He chuckled slightly almost startling me, "If I killed you now," he was talking to me as if I were a child that had asked why my puppy had died, his eyes dropping as if worried that I wouldn't understand, "you would still be too pure."
A sympathetic smile appeared, thinning his lips to mere toothpicks on his face. "Where's the fun in that? And it would completely defeat the purpose."
"Besides," he whispered with a wink, "the best life is in death."
A weak snicker escaped me. It was sickening because I was still trying to breathe right. "And which death would that be?"
He grinned. I wasn't sure if he was annoyed or impressed. He could have just been amused.
"The death of my spirit?" I glared, accusing. Of course what he really wanted to destroy was my immortal soul.
It was Nick's toothless smirk that I was getting accustomed to meaning I was on the right track. "Precisely."
He took the cigarette out of his mouth and put both of his arms behind his back, circulating the chair with careful steps toward me. "Besides, your clock is already on its last hour. Why would I speed up the process just to get you to the blessed eternity that's waiting?" He raised his eyebrow at me as if waiting for me to see the obviousness of it all.
"It won't work." I heard myself say, but my voice was weak.
"Don't be so sure, Angel."
"I am sure." I wanted to find my picture and leave, but I couldn't seem to move this frightening man pacing before me like a predator his footsteps barely soft patters on the floor.
"No. You haven't had a chance to live. That's your one regret."
How could he talk like he knew me?
"I could give you that, you know." His voice was soft, caressing as if he was sincere, but trying to convince me of it at the same time.
I shook my head. "We don't consider living the same way."
He barreled toward me too fast for me to react, grabbing my upper arms and shaking me, instantly making me dizzy.
"You think these twenty-two pathetic years of yours is a life?!"
Lucifer threw me into the chair, my legs slamming into the edge. He rushed forward, dropping his hands to the arms of the chair, rocking the entire thing. I groped for balance. The chair met the floor again with a thud, creating what I was sure was another of several dents in the wood. I felt his fingers around my chin and he raised my head, his face finally falling into shape inches from my own.
"You think that rotting away 60 years short of what you deserve while leaving only a few pathetic amateur paintings in a storage unit to succeed you is worth it?!"
Worth it?
My mother, before the disease that was now eating me away took her, used to tell me she had no regrets. I was her legacy, the best thing in her life along with my father, and as long as she gave me the best life she could, she was complete.
I didn't have anyone to leave behind, but that's what I had been trying to do. Even though I'd known it was coming, my mother's death was just as hard as my father's had been a year later when a drunk driver mowed him down.
I didn't want to leave anyone with that pain, but I was still selfish enough at times to not want to die alone.
With inhuman speed, Nick grabbed my wrist and inhaled its scent with a hiss.
"I really..." his teeth pricked at the skin between him and my veins "hate you."
His eyes burned at me and I held my breath.
"Why would you hate me?" I whimpered, tears falling hot on my face and he ignored them as easily as he would ignore something invisible.
"Because you fought so damn hard for this body of yours and it is broken, practically useless and you don't even care."
He turned my hand over, his fingertips icicles tracing the green hues of my veins. He had quieted, yet was still able to stare at my wrist in a way that made me wonder if he was contemplating splitting it open and letting the blood flow just to prove how unimportant my life had been.
"I didn't ask for this." I heard myself say, but I had no idea where the words were coming from. I felt my lip quiver. "And I never said I wanted it, but if He had a purpose for me I must have done it already."
Nick stared at me darkly for a long moment, as if trying to find the lie, then pushed away from the chair, rocking it again. I wiped my face dry.
"Not yet."
I was sure I'd heard it, but wasn't sure that it'd come from him. He'd fallen silent again, his back to me, his hands helplessly at his sides and though I couldn't see his face, his true, endless age suddenly shown through his timeless appearance. His back was slumped, his hair grey, and a sting of pity shot through me.
"I have a job offer for you." He began suddenly, the youth back in his body and a whole new tone to his voice, an authoritative, but excited air. "Give you something to really leave behind."
"What?" I asked, even though I was already prepared to say no.
"My club needs an upgrade." He started, striding around the room once again, tall, confident, businesslike, while I still slumped in the chair now noticing springs biting into my back.
"And I want you to design it."
Why? Why did he have to dangle on a string the one thing I was waiting for? How did he even know? The semester was over and I didn't expect to last long enough to get through another, so all I could do was work. I was just waiting for someone to give me the opportunity. Interior design seemed like the most practical thing. It wasn't every day for several hours work and I could take my time when I did have a job. The least stress and hard work the better. Doctor's orders.
"I will…pay you of course." He threw me a glance, a dare, eyebrows raised, expectant, like I was going to suggest he wouldn't.
"I just want my picture back…Nick." I swallowed a rock in my throat.
I was using all of my will power to think about nothing else than the picture. I couldn't even let myself considered the job for one second. As good of an opportunity as it sounded I knew that in the end I would severely regret it.
Nick took my hands and carefully pulled me from the chair. His arms wrapped around my back and he held me almost tenderly, a pleased and almost peaceful look on his face.
"You will get it back when you come back tomorrow and tell me you'll take the job." He said this joyfully, like a promise of a romantic dinner between a loving couple, but I could feel the threat behind it in my core.
I sighed, suddenly very tired. "I'll think about it." I said, hoping he'd just let me go home.
"Now now." He began his grip tightening until I was caged against his body once again. "Kiss me and promise you'll come back tomorrow." He bit down on my ear, just enough to make me tense and a chill ran through me causing me to quiver.
Nick held onto me, waiting. He wasn't going to let me go until I complied. I took a deep breath, and as much as it terrified and disgusted me, I leaned up and put my mouth on his.
Just like I expected, he didn't let me keep it soft and quick. His lips pushed against mine hungrily, forcing them open and breathing his hot breath into my mouth while pulling me against him.
I didn't fight, I knew I couldn't, I just waited for him to finish, letting him do all of the work.
He stopped, but left his mouth near my face, brushing it down the length of my jaw. "I'll see you tomorrow." I mumbled, then pushed my way out of his arms.
I didn't look at him as I hurried away, but I could still hear his soft chuckle as I closed the door behind me.
When I finally made it home, I painted smiling skeletons draped in red, surrounded by mountains of broken toys.
