4
I requested that my body be buried next to my brother's, next to William. It was where I felt that I belonged, that my short life here was so congruent with how my brother had gone. We were similar, even with our quick deaths. People even mistook us for twins while we 'were' still alive.
I was referring to myself in the past tense, in the 'expired' tense.
My brother and I, had had the same nose, the same highlights in our hair, those ones that come out only in the summer months while you're swimming outside.
Both of us... us kids. Gone at such a young age. I opted for the same gravestone, a black one with my portrait on the front.
The worst was planning my own funeral.
Never would my family follow through with my list of agendas; I had wanted to stay in positive spirits. So jokingly, I wrote on a piece of paper my desires when my mom asked.
I'm sure she was probably thinking simple stuff like 'play this song' or 'may I please have white roses on the tables'. But instead it was more like:
1.) I want a mile long salad bar with 4 flavors of ranch dressing lined up. Each person with a ticket gets a free lunch.
2.) I want 10 firefighters all in speedos carrying my coffin into the funeral home.
3.) I want my coffin spray-painted in glow in the dark paint, so I can think of my body like it's a piece of radioactive material.
4.) I want to be buried with vampire fangs in my mouth, so during open casket people will think I'm turning.
5.) I want to be transported in a bright yellow Lamborghini to the gravesite, and I want my arrival announced with the theme song to Game of Thrones.
6.) I want have my coffin filled with as many bags of White Cheddar Cheezits as you can manage, I want everyone to look in and think 'man she really loved Cheezits'.
There is no way that someone could stay in good humor with someone dying.
But my mom.
She cried when she read it... when it had been over-dramatized to make her laugh.
She had a meltdown. It was getting close to the end of the week, and my time was getting closer. I should of known that something silly like that would make her burst into tears. I should of known that it would be a reminder to her of my attitude, my personality. That paper with all those dumb requests, it was something that reminded her of me and only me.
I should of known... It'd hit her hard.
She'd been gone for nearly an hour by the time he showed up.
Elliot.
And thank God he had, I'd been feeling rather down after what I felt had done to my mom. I knew it was a natural response, but I still felt responsible.
He had flown in that morning, bearing gifts of donuts.
At this point, I could whisper but that was all I could do. My chest felt so heavy and full.
He's managed to figure out a way to get the railing off the right side of the bed so he could sit in it with me and he was holding my right hand. His grip felt so warm and comforting. Perhaps in a different life, I would of dated him. But, we were just too different.
"I looked into that information for you. I did it on the plane."
"Good. Consider it one last request since I'm giving you my stereo system." Currently the wall in front of me was morphing it's shape; strange, because it looked like it was dancing. My eyes were seeing things that were off every hour or two.
"Seriously. Shut up." He mocked, smiling at me. He knew the inevitable was coming, but he still would always smile that rubbish smile, and be strong. He was a stronger person more so than my own family, always had been. "Where's your mom?"
"She's downstairs somewhere. She's upset." My voice was small.
"Okay good. I know you said you didn't want her to know what you emailed. Wait." He corrected himself. "Not good that she's upset, that's not what I..." He looked me in the eye just to clarify. "Yeh."
I nodded. I know. I know. I waved it off.
He opened his macbook on his lap, and the screen pulled up immediately to what he had been on: JSTOR; a college based, essay and published documents website used by college students to find sources for paper writing.
"I know your throat hurts. If you want to interject just squeeze my hand."
"Okay. I would of looked this up myself on my iphone, but I shut my service off... obviously I don't need it anymore."
"How'd you email me?"
"I did it before I shut my phone service off. I just was feeling too tired, you know? I wanted to just send the email and get my service shut off and taken care of. Leave the rest to you. Plus my mom had to go do it anyway, I can't leave the hospital to go down to Verizon."
"Oh okay." He cleared his throat, and lowered his voice to a whisper to match mine. "Listen. I don't want to believe it." He breathed in and out. "But somehow, I don't know... I've always been into this stuff." He spoke with his right free hand. "You know... the paranormal. I took a class on Mythics."
"Why were we always the weird kids?" I pinched his side.
He squirmed. "Stop!" A giggle.
I pulled away with a smirk. Oh yeh. In another life. For sure.
"I don't know. But you came to the right person." He chuckled through the sentence. He used his free hand to navigate the web pages, pushing his thick glasses up on the bridge of his nose. His lips barely parted, beginning to read out of a highly esteemed article written only a few years ago by a published PhD in Boston. "Okay. I'm going to read what I highlighted."
He began.
"Mephisto, a demon of literature published in the 18th Century, is highly categorized to be one of the most popular fictional writings of the time. It recounts the demon taking part in the life of Faustus, and his fall into sin. Mephisto is shortened version of the longer name Mephistopheles. A demon of German folklore originally."
I squeezed his hand and he seemed surprised that I had so suddenly, so quickly. He stopped. There were plenty more purple highlights to read. He always highlighted on his MacBook in purple.
My face went red and my heart beat on the monitor quickened a little.
"What's the matter? I haven't even started."
"Deja vu."
"Hm?" He pushed up on his glasses again, his blonde hair shaggy, swept behind an ear to get the bangs out of his face. He wanted to look on my expression better.
"German folklore?" I whispered, throat scratchy. "I've only studied actual demons mentioned in the Bible or religious texts."
He listened.
"I've heard this name before." But what flushed my face the most was remembering... The encounter I had.
I recalled. I fummed back to him pouring me a glass of water, and then drinking out of it himself. Him swishing a stupid cape with a sparkling pattern underneath. Taking off white gloves to reveal long, lanky fingers.
What was it about those things? About him? His description?
Then it struck me hard.
I had remembered thinking that he sounded... foreign.
"Elliot. I know this is odd." I began coughing and in response his grabbed the Kleenex box and put it in my lap. Through the tissues I spoke, and he moved his ear in to listen. "I didn't tell you this in the email. But... I remember thinking that he sounded strange."
"Like what?" He could tell I was bothered and was growing clammy.
"He had an accent. I couldn't quite place it. Do you remember those exchange students in high school?" I was forcing myself to speak a little louder than I should be.
"Of course, I had such a huge crush of Svetlana. She was a babe."
"Oh God." I rolled my eyes, and he chuckled in response. I whispered: "Well they were all from Germany. All three; they were actually pretty good at speaking English. Do you remember their accents?"
"How could I forget?"
I knew where his mind was... probably floating downwards between Svetlana's 'rack', but I didn't care. "Well... that accent. That was his accent. It was German. Keep reading."
Trying to keep my cool while being wired to a heart machine was hard. It picked up the slightest change. I was nerve wrecked now, and Elliot was right. He'd just began reading. I was mildly alarmed.
"Mephistopheles works not in the claim to corrupt the men and women of the world, but more so, comes to serve and ultimately collect the souls of those who are already damned." He turned to me. "And you said he wanted your soul? Are you sure you've NEVER studied this before? In Demonology 1 or 2?"
"No." My breathing intensified.
"I'm telling you, everything I highlighted in here, I cross-referenced with the things you told me he said to you in the email."
"I'm getting a bit scared. I've been trying to hard to rationalize this. But, yes. The hallucination was vivid and he said he wanted my soul." My mind raced.
Damned? He collected souls of those who are already damned? Damned by what terms? I mean this is just documents, I shouldn't be so uptight. My rational brain was telling me to calm it down, but my curious side was prevailing at the moment... and if I was damned? Did that mean? Did that mean I was meant for hell? But he had said...
Metaphorically.
His voice was so soft. Smooth.
I asked if hell was real.
He said a word that meant 'sort of'.
A metaphor is a word that means 'like' something. By religious terms we refer to hell as this ghastly place, covered in fire and brimstone.
Was my rational brain having a lucid hallucination and in it, in me not actually 'wanting' my life to come to an end, did my subconscious make a figure speak those words to me to make myself 'feel' better? To make hell just a metaphor for death?
Or was the existence of hell really, actually... metaphorical?
And if so, metaphorical how?
And if 'hell' is a metaphor... then what is the place we call 'hell'? And what is truly a 'damned' soul then? Did he mean damned by being trapped inside bodies that are garbage? Like mine?
"Keep reading."
"Okay." He could tell I was thinking. "Mepistopheles wagers for the souls of mankind. He is trapped in his own hell by serving the Devil." He skipped down a page. "Wagering for the souls of man, is commonly grouped with the process known as 'avocation and delight'. This temptation process is known as a way to collect souls that are already damned."
"What's that?"
"Essentially it's a process, from my understanding, where a demon will advocate for a treaty with a host and then will continue to delight them until they come to a terms of agreement."
"So? It's a deal?"
I was pissed! In that case. If it was true, if all of this nightmarish ride was true, I'd been played... like a drum! My eyes went hazy with fury for a few seconds. He seen it.
"Cynthia."
I looked him cold in his stare.
Stunned, a certain look that someone gets when they are frightened because of the unknown. Elliot's lids pulsed with seriousness, his words deep, his own heartbeat quick, I could feel it on my wrist. "I don't want to believe this. But please. For my sake. For my peace of mind. In this supernatural stuff. I know it's no Ouija Board, it's no candles in a circle summoning a creature, but when you emailed me... The way you wrote about this... it seemed real." His voice got low. "Is this..."
I whispered back. "Is it real?"
He nodded.
"It felt real."
"Felt?" He instantly froze.
I had slipped. I pinched my lip together with bottom teeth.
"Did you do something?" His voice raised a bit.
I looked at him blank.
"You did. I know that look." He sighed. "What did you do?"
"I didn't even know." I squeaked out.
How was I supposed to know? What was I supposed to believe? The information was laid out. But even the man in my hallucination, not a man, a demon, said studies were vague.
Wait a minute. No.
If he said studies were vague... he wasn't real right? So aren't the things he said not real too, all fake? But if they were real, then what? Demon studies are plain, watered-down, utter crap he meant! Should I discredit this? Should I think about it? Consider?
Those lips.
The taste.
That light hint of smoke. That mint/cinnamon mix filtering in, so long the linger that the taste became the same.
My mouth tasted like his mouth. His lips warm against mine, tender.
Seductive.
"Hello?"
"What?!" I shrieked so loud it caused him to blurt:
"SHIT!"
The light came in from the window suddenly, a cloud had parted outside.
"He was just in here."
"What do you mean? Now?!"
"No idiot. I meant then. Suddenly. He was in here Elliot!" My voice raised as high as it could on the end, it wasn't that high, but high enough to get my point across: That I really was unsure how the man even got in. Wrong. Demon. "He talked me into something." My mind was hoping back and forth from this to that, from question and answer, from questioning the answers and whether I possessed the wrong or right ones.
I had left out some important parts of the story in my email.
But the touch.
The touch.
It never lies. Right?
"Tell me what you mean by 'feel'." He pestered.
"I." I sighed. I got much more quiet than I had been. "Elliot." The mood changed. "He was breathing. I could feel the air. I felt it on my face, I could smell his breath."
"He was that close?" He seemed again, appalled.
I nodded.
"What'd he do?" He was getting a tad worked up, Elliot was somewhat protective over me, he squeezed my hand ushering a response... NOW.
I wasn't sure if Elliot was believing me or if he was just trying to get something out of me. If he was trying to get something out of me... I decided I was best off just saying it.
"I kissed him."
"What?!" Elliot's jaw dropped and his face formed into an expression that was halfway aghast and halfway smirk-ish. He was somewhere in the middle thinking-wise.
"Yeh I felt his lips and everything."
"You're telling me. Wait wait wait. You're telling me..." He let go of my hand to make an expression I've never seen before, but whatever angry-ish eyebrow furrow he had had before was smoothed and he looked kind of nutty. "that this dude... dressed in a clown suit. Who was wearing eyeliner and had green eyeballs, you kissed him? For real?!"
"Yeh."
"High-Five moron." He held up his hand and I high-fived it with a grunt. I was confused.
"Congrats on kissing a circus freak, I hope it was sexy as hell! It's one of my ultimates."
I crossed my arms, "You're gross. You know that?" I scoffed.
"So? So are you. Apparently." He poked me in the side this time.
My mind raced with questions while he was laughing and checking his personal email. I looked away awhile he did it, I didn't want to see his password. It wasn't my business.
What has become of this? He's laughing it off as a joke now.
A circus freak. Okay. I had thought he was a clown when I first seen him. I had asked questioned about a balloon. He was so confused. A confused hallucination. A hallucination, a dream with emotions? Thoughts? Ones that crossed a face with good-looking traits? A long face, a well manicured beard and chin strap, I had watched his eyes look around at the room, like 'it' was having thoughts of it's own.
Was I going a little nuts over this?
Maybe. My answer is maybe.
How is it that I could not be going crazy though?
Nobody experienced this. Nobody except me. I had thought he looked like an idiot, that tall figure in that white and magenta. A top hat? Seriously? It was such bad taste. I had thought he looked kooky and odd, but then, when I kissed him, which was a spur of the moment, 'why the hell not?' action, his response. His response.
I pecked him first. Just a peck, and detested peck. I hadn't really wanted it.
But then... He surprised me, my eyes had shot open... wide.
He kissed back then as if he hadn't kissed. Like his lips could speak desire themselves.
A true 'avocation and delight'.
No truer were words for this, for me, to me... about this.
The thoughts of him in those moments.
My view of him looking like a freak, it melted away.
As his palm held my jaw, and under that cape that draped over, I had slowly moved my hand up his side, and I felt a heat.
A male, masculine warmth coming from under his shirt, his dress shirt. His waist taught and fit.
I felt muscles, lean ones, and I felt them move in a manner that suggested... that 'he' was having a 'feeling'.
He was?
Was he?
Aroused?