Greetings, Fire Enthusiasts.
So close to Halloween - and since the purpose of this Substack is to focus on my writing, I thought I would share one scene with you. It comes from my novel The Color of Sound. In the standalone novel that also ends up becoming a part of my vampire series (It’s a surprise. Don’t tell anyone.), a young woman receives sight. The scales are removed from her eyes in a freak accident and she can suddenly see both angels and demons that surround us.
In this pivotal scene toward the end of the book, Julie “Jewel” Foster finally realizes things have not been as they seemed. You might say that her eyes have been opened once again and she suddenly finds the strength to push back. Her relationship with her mother isn’t great. When she does talk to her, she calls her by her first name. Layla senses that her daughter has been going through dark times. She just has no idea just how dark.
She pictures Aza now, all the way back from the beginning when she first noticed him in front of the house. She relives how he slowly worms his way into her life. She can see it now: the stories he tells her, his patience. She recalls how agreeable he is to everything and how willing he is to do anything for her. She wonders now how much he really helped her locate Markus.
She feels anger again, but then she feels him, between her legs, pushing against her last boundary with renewed realism and she feels sick. Jewel lowers her head in the stream of water. There is nothing she can do about that now.
Then she sees Layla. She sees herself too.
I’ve been a terrible daughter, she thinks.
Eventually, she turns off the water, but just stands there in what’s left of the steam, facing forward. She should feel cold, but she doesn’t. She smells sulfur and isn’t the least surprised.
“No amount of water is gonna do the job,” the female demon says from somewhere in the bathroom. “He’s dirtied you now. No amount of scrubbing is gonna make that go away!” She laughs her maniacal cackle.
Jewel doesn’t jump or even look her direction. She just stands there and clenches her fists.
“I noticed you didn’t let him finish the job,” she continues. “A damn shame. You don’t know what you’re missing”
There is more cackling.
Jewel turns and opens the sliding door. The demon stands with her vile back up against the bathroom door. Jewel reaches for her towel and ignores her as she takes her time drying off. She steps out onto the bath mat when she’s just about finished. Jewel isn’t embarrassed in the least to be naked in front of her. She eventually stands to full height and matter-of-factly wraps the towel around herself. Then she just stands there and glares at her.
The demon grins and shakes her head. “I see. Brave to the end.” She seems to laugh, but makes no sound. Her face twists into an exaggerated look of remorse. “Who am I kidding? Aza has marked you and wouldn’t take too kindly to me killing you. He’s got plans for you.”
Anger still simmering, Jewel takes a giant step and practically climbs into the demon’s revolting grimace. “Doesn’t sound like you’ve got any power then, does it?” she grits her teeth and whispers. She places her hands against the door on each side of the demon’s suddenly surprised face. Her face is only inches away from the leaking bulbous piece of cartilage that passes for a nose. “Bitch.”
The demon blanches. She twists her face up in mock anguish.
“Death wish, huh?” the demon says. “You’d like nothing better than for me to lose my temper and rip that sweet head off its stem.” She shakes her head. “Not today.”
Jewel grits her teeth again, but this time she slaps her hands together on both sides of the demon’s head. She grabs handfuls of whatever mangled hair the creature has left, pulls her forward and then slams her head back loudly against the door.
Fluid spurts out of the demon’s ears, but Jewel doesn’t release her. Some of it, thick and repulsive, drips onto her hands. She just rolls with it. She’s had worse things happen in the last hour.
The demon screams and reaches out for Jewel. She has her by the arms and drives her into the far wall. The house creaks with the blow. Jewel only seems to relish the pain inflicted. It drives her.
The demon feigns confidence, but she’s clearly in discomfort.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” Jewel asks with a grin.
The demon releases her and steps back.
“You don’t have to tell me. I can see it does,” Jewel says.
The demon reaches out with her left hand and seems to hold onto the vanity for support. Then she stops and turns, and seems to glance over her left shoulder briefly, momentarily distracted by something.
Perhaps Aza.
Apparently satisfied, she looks back. “Fair warning, Jewel,” the demon begins. Her eyes never waver and her words are measured. “If I pay you another visit, it means the situation has changed. And then one of us will lose their head.”
Jewel does not respond and the two simply stare at each other.
Slowly, the female demon turns around and then is gone through the closed door. One moment she’s there. The next she isn’t.
Jewel holds her ground there for a while, but eventually she finishes getting dried off and then dressed.
“Nice shower?” Aza asks as Jewel returns.
Jewel doesn’t answer. She has on black jeans and a sweater that is more blue than black. It looks new, but she has had it nearly two years. Today is the first time she has worn it. She walks slowly into her closet and drops her soiled bedclothes in the hamper inside.
“Let us not fight,” Aza begins. “It doesn’t have to be like this.”
“Doesn’t it?” Jewel says and then stares. She places her hands upon her hips and waits.
Aza stands from his spot on the bed, but Jewel doesn’t wait around to see how he might respond. Instead, she quickly leaves the room. She immediately finds a light on. Layla is up.
“You are up early,” Layla greets her. She is sitting at the first barstool at the corner of the breakfast bar. She looks to be reading her Bible by the single light over the sink.
Jewel stops near the entrance of the Living Room there. She glances at the digital LED clock on the microwave. It reads: 5:51 am. She hears Aza a few steps behind her, but ignores him. His footfalls sound like cleats again on the vinyl flooring.
“I’m sorry,” Jewel says. She remembers the short fight in the bathroom. The walls shook. She feels a slight ache in her back from the blow she received. “I woke you, didn’t I?”
Layla looks at her, but her expression isn’t easy to read. It’s very striking. Measured even. “I do not sleep very much.” She waves it off like a bothersome moth in her face. “I was up most of the night praying for you.”
“Julie?” Aza begins speaking behind her.
Jewel ignores him. She remains where she stands, but glances toward the corner of the kitchen. She detects the smell of coffee, but there is another smell as well. A coppery smell. Almost like blood.
I hope it isn’t me, she thinks.
“Coffee is ready,” Layla says. She continues to hold Jewel in her gaze.
Jewel holds her position there. She wants coffee, but she would rather Aza stay away from Layla.
“Are you all right?” Layla asks. She stands and flips the kitchen switch and floods the house with light.
Jewel studies Layla. She sees that she is fully dressed as well, but that isn’t it.
Something isn’t right. If she has had a shower this morning, I didn’t hear it. She looks completely put together.
“Julie?” Aza continues to call her from the hallway.
“Jewel?” Layla asks.
“I’m fine,” she answers all too quickly and then rubs her eyes as she fights to understand what she is doing. Or going to do.
“I hope so,” Layla says. “I heard you crying in your bedroom very early this morning.”
Jewel blanches and finds herself walking into the kitchen. She doesn’t feel her feet touching the floor as if floating. “Really?” she manages to answer, but doesn’t look Layla in the eye. She is afraid that she may cry again if she has to think about what happened, and what nearly happened. She walks over to the cupboard and picks out a coffee mug. She then turns the opposite way, away from prying eyes. She steps over to the coffee station.
“Come on, Julie,” Aza says. He sounds closer. “Come back to the bedroom and let’s discuss this.”
“Jewel,” Layla begins. “Please look at me.”
Jewel clears her throat for courage before she finally looks up at her. “I’m fine.”
“Did he hurt you?” Layla asks.
“What?” Jewel asks. “Who?”
“Azael,” Layla says, but never takes her eyes off of her. “The devil that you inexplicably invited into our home.”
Happy Halloween, friends. Save me some candy.
We’ll talk soon.
