4
"This thing, the way it killed your father, there's a good chance it's the kind of creature that tags your genetic line. It remembers your scent, your blood, your…makeup. It has the ability, if it so chooses, to seek out other members of your family."
"I've never seen it before," I say. "Doesn't that destroy your little theory?"
She wipes down one of the little cups, and crosses the room to hand it to me. "Just because you haven't seen the demon before doesn't mean it won't come for you."
"Seems like a coincidence to me. I've only just seen it and it's already after me." My sarcastic tone is finally waning. I'm getting tired of hearing it, even if it is coming out of my own mouth.
"No. That's stupid," she says, returning to the machine. "If it is what I think it is, it has always been after you. You've always been in danger."
"Then it's not urgent now, is it?"
"How so?"
"I've been living fine with it for this long."
"You are taking this too casually."
"You haven't even told me what it is, yet. You might as well get on with it. It'll have a funny name, but a little creepy, too. And it will be from the old world, and there'll be a horrible tale of its creation. Just get it over with."
Mistress Karen sits down, placing the other little cup on the table before her. She looks like she'd developing a new breed of tired where the eyes turn red-rimmed and the lids flutter to stay open; a hyper-fatigue, a combative exhaustion.
"It has no name. Names take away power."
"I've wasted my time here," I say, standing. "Just another cryptic answer."
"I haven't been cryptic," she protests.
"You're just keeping me here, waiting for the perfect moment to ask for more money."
"Mr. Heller? You are a jackass. Why would you have stayed so long if you didn't believe? Obviously you thought something was odd about your father's passing, or you wouldn't have focused in on that night!"
The marionette passed through his head, arms rigid.
"No. Fuck this," I say. "I've had enough. You let me know when you've come up with some better details for your story. Maybe then I'll be convinced enough to open my wallet again."
I storm through the beads.
"Your daughter paid!" she says.
"Fuck yourself!"
I push through the front door, bell ringing overhead. I know I'm being an idiot, though I'm not sure exactly how. The woman pushed too hard, bruised my pride, and I had to leave.
Suddenly I'm in the night, alone.
My mind takes over, replaying the entire ancestral memory from start to finish. Each terrifying detail zoomed in, full of cinematic life.
I see movement near my car.
"No," I say aloud, hoping my own voice will give me strength. It sounds weak and sad in the dark.
This is how it works, I think. That bitch plants the idea in your mind and you start seeing things.
"Are you really this weak?" I ask myself, digging my keys from my pocket.
I manage to get into the car without incident, continuing to veer my mind away from the terrible vision, actively thinking of other things, mundane things.
After five minutes of driving, I start to feel a little better.
Flight has beaten fright, and I'm calmer.
My logical brain returns, and it has a voracious and devastating question waiting for me.
Where did that scene come from?
I'm not all that creative a person. I can't draw a straight line or sing on key. I'm not a good storyteller. I always focus on some inane detail and forget an important point, then have to explain that I've forgotten something after already telling the end to no applause.
It's not like me to make something up. Not with that sort of detail and emotion.
The whole thing really had felt like a memory.
I sense motion behind me. I look in the mirror and see nothing. My imagination, now more lively than ever before, creates a scenario where the woman is in the back, lying down, waiting for me to be distracted before coming over the seat, that wound-mouth latching onto my neck…
I smack myself in the face. Something I've never, ever done before in my entire life. I'm not going to turn and look. I will not stop the car and check the backseat. I am not a child.
I only end up stopping the car twice before I get home. I check the backseat once more after I'm out of the car and in front of my house.
I feel like a fool.
"How was it?" Gina says as I open the front door. She's sitting on the steps in her Harley Quinn pajamas.
"Aren't you too old for those?" I ask.
She doesn't understand what I'm asking at first. Eventually, she clues in, looking down at herself. "They are tight across my boobs."
"Jesus, Gina! How many times have I asked you not to talk about your boobs! You're not supposed to have boobs, you're my little girl."
"Graduating in like a month, dad," she says, rolling her eyes.
She can't be this old. A legal adult? She still seems like a little girl to me. Is that the way it is with all fathers and daughters? When she comes home with a law degree, talking about some case and drinking scotch, will she still seem like my little girl?
If she makes it that far.
I shake the horrible thought from my head. Gina's asking me how it went again.
"Fine, it was fine," I say.
"Did you have fun?"
I decide to be honest. "It wasn't really my thing."
Her face sinks.
