Chapter 10
I almost feel something gathering in the shadows of a hallway deeper into the apartment. Someone. Waiting there. Waiting for me. The demon hunter.
Is he following me?
The skin on my palms is peppered with tiny needles; I have to pee with sudden ferocity.
It isn’t likely, I tell myself after a stock-still while. I am waiting like a mouse in a field of short grass.
It’s very unlikely.
How the hell do I know how likely or unlikely it is?
But the longer I stand here, the more aware I am that I am probably alone.
That Dick Face is simply gone.
Gone of his own volition.
I shake out my hands.
I go inside like jumping into a pool without touching the water first; I can almost feel the waxy membrane of the air break as I shove through the doorway.
There are a series of cowboy boots scattered across the floor.
It seems like he was trying them on. Maybe picking his favorite pair, the one he walked out of here in.
The boot nearest to me is white with a red heel.
No self-respecting cowboy would ever wear it.
I take a few steps, skirt around a pizza box with its lifeless mouth slightly ajar.
There is a book on ancient architecture left open on a chipped glass coffee table.
It’s a glossy type of photography book, the pages dirty and rumpled from repeated touch.
As though Dick Face sat here, in this greasy depression on the couch, night after night, pressing his fingers to the images, studying the ruins of a world only he remembers.
A deflated bag of kale chips skitters an inch or two in a breeze from some unseen open window.
I know I won’t find him again.
I know it’s time to go home.
On the ride to the airport, I finally write to Grub.
I should have been writing to him this whole time, but I’ve been in shock.
Last night, after I broke my vitamin-rich diet of four years on Burger King takeout, I fell asleep as soon as I lay down on the motel bed.
This morning I rushed over to Dick Face’s apartment the moment I was conscious.
Grub we need to talk about SO MUCH, I write. And it hits me for the first time. I don’t know why it took this long. He is my brother.
One spot of pure goodness floating in a sea of shit.
* * *
But Grub doesn’t respond.
I check again and again while I wait to board at the airport.
He still hasn’t responded by the time the familiar Anheuser-Busch sign comes into view as the plane lands in Newark. This is officially the longest we have gone without talking. And at the least likely time.
Grub should be glued to his screens, checking on me constantly.
I didn’t notice how little he’s been in touch—how he hasn’t been in touch at all, actually, since I first arrived in Florida, that first cab ride.
I read over his most recent messages. He’s advising me to record everything. He’s telling me to be strong, to write my questions on my wrist in Sharpie. He wrote more after I stopped responding to him.
Hows it going? Did you do it?
And then: Tell me when you’re around. You’re in FL a couple more days right?
And then, how did I miss this? I’ve been completely out of it: Ok I know its happening same time as your dad and don’t want to bug you but wish me luck because I’m gonna just do it and meet with this dow I told you about.
If I like her and if it works maybe I can see you but nobody get hopeful yet.
Gotta try right? And then just, Love ya lorelei.
The other Dow! I’d honestly forgotten almost entirely about that.
This seems soon. I wonder if she’s even real, if she even has a DP.
I don’t like him meeting strangers from the internet.
But what if it does work? What if he likes her and they become friends and she’s fine?
And I can finally meet Grub. I can finally give him a hug.
The boy who needs a hug like a starving person needs a loaf of bread. The boy who might be saved by a hug.
What happened?? I write. I missed this!!
It wouldn’t seem long to normal people, maybe, the lapse in our conversation. Maybe it would seem like nothing.
Maybe it’s nothing.
My stomach is hardening to stone. But then, I’m on edge. I’ve been on edge for the past couple days.
I am too many things at once. Upset and relieved and stunned and afraid.
I’m thinking of all the things I failed to do.
I should’ve asked Dick Face about angels and healing powers—does he know anything about that?
I’m realizing again, as I did for a moment in the bar, that on some level I never wanted Dick Face to have any kind of impossible power.
I didn’t want the curse to be real. I wanted it all to be disproven, to have been a misunderstanding.
And at the same time, I am giddy from my contact with the truth.
Finally. Finally some confirmation beyond myself and Grub.
Beyond the horror of my past, watching people die from my touch. It is real. It is awful. It is real.
And there are still no solutions.
Instead there is a hunter, who is apparently going to try to kill me.
Grub was right. He was so right. I have to tell him about everything. He can be proud of himself for being a genius. Even though it’s not a super fun thing to be right about.
He really needs to respond.
Wait. Something else occurs to me—could this be something romantic, the Dow he mentioned? Is he afraid to tell me what happened with her because of that? I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense.
I call him, but he doesn’t pick up.
Love you too, I write. You know you can tell me anything Grub. Right?