“Yes.”
“And maybe have an election?”
“Likely not. I suspect that idea was quashed rather quickly.”
I had to laugh. “You sounded so smug when you said that. What, was Lawrence right? Nobody wanted to take me on? No one was up to putting on a cross and learning how to teleport to another dimension?”
“Precisely.”
“So smug.”
“I take pride in my wife and queen,” he replied with simple dignity, and for a second I thought of my parents’ ill-starred marriage. Had my dad ever taken pride in anything my mom did? If he had, I couldn’t remember. Sinclair and I were in love, yes. And in lust, oh, you bet! But we also respected the shit out of each other, and that was the part that took years.
“Goody.” I put my hands on the small of my back and stretched. Undead stamina was great, but scrubbing carpets was, apparently, a literal pain in the back whether you were alive or other. “Can’t wait. Bring it on. I’m sure nothing terrible will come of it.”
“Enough.” Sinclair had put his phone away, stepped behind me, and picked me up by the armpits. That shouldn’t have been sexy, but it was—everything he did seemed effortless and sexy. He took my sponge and my bucket. Still so sexy! “I will dispose of these. Shower?”
“Yeah.” And bed, pretty soon. The sun was coming.
“Start without me. We’ll finish together.”
See? Perfectly innocuous comment on mutual hygiene and I was still dizzy at the thought.
“Um. Okay.” Good Lord. We’d been together how long, and I still got tongue-tied. Oooh. Tongue. The things that man could—
“Are you all right, my own? You look somewhat . . . glazed.”
“Shut up, you know why I’m glazed.” I started past him toward our bedroom to strip, then turned. “I’ll tell you what, though—nobody’s having a weirder day than we are. No chance.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE
It took Jennifer Palmer twenty minutes to move. Betsy
(she expects us to call her that!)
had brought her from Hell to downtown Cannon Falls, given her a perfunctory “Good luck!” pat on the back, and promptly vanished. That had been how Jennifer had realized she wasn’t entirely jaded, because she still found everything about any encounter with Betsy to be surreal.
She still couldn’t believe the twentysomething woman with absurdly high heels and virtually no short-term memory had defeated Satan. Twice. Then took over Hell and made all sorts of changes, and now here she was back in Cannon Falls, and fuck, none of this could be real, could it?
Could it?
Jennifer had been born and raised in the small river town about fifty miles south of Minneapolis, attended CF Elementary and graduated from CFHS, worked part-time at the bakery, and mourned the town’s lack of movie theaters. She’d passed the army reserve recruiting station every day, conveniently placed in front of the high school. Her mom had cracked up every time she’d driven by. “They’ve really got all their bases covered, don’t they? All that’s missing is a community college in the back. But that’s not your plan, is it, hon?”
Once, a thousand years ago, she’d wanted to graduate high school—she’d killed herself halfway through her senior year—and get a bachelor of science in nursing at the U of M, and then her RN. Her mother had thought this was an excellent plan (“There’s a zillion baby boomers, and a lot of them are going to need medical care.”), and had been putting money aside—not that there was much on an office manager’s salary—since Jennifer was a first grader.
Mom.
Would she still be here? Jennifer was a third-generation CFer; her mom had been here all her life as well. Dad had vamoosed before Jennifer’s sixth birthday and just as well. Even now, she associated the stink of Budweiser with her father. Yes, there was every chance her mother was still here. But Jennifer couldn’t stand on the corner of Mill and Fourth and ponder. She had to find out.
That was part of it. Her parole—cripes, she could still hardly believe it. Thirty-one years of damnation and then . . . back in Cannon Falls in the literal blink of an eye, and with a mission, no less. She had to find those she’d wronged, however she could, and make amends, however she could. If she did those things, she could live out the rest of her life in the real world.
(Doing what? And with whom? I still look like I’m in high school . . . Should I go to college? I didn’t even finish high school. Maybe I should do whatever women who look seventeen but are really almost fifty do. What would that be, exactly?)
Never mind, focus, stay focused. Way too early to think about the next fifty years. Worry about the next fifty hours.
If she failed, she went back to Hell. To, she presumed, more damnation. And even worse: the new devil’s fury. Jennifer wasn’t so dumb as to miss the fact that she was the test case. How she handled this would have a lot to do with whether or not more souls would be able to leave. Hell would be even more unpleasant if she had to face souls who wouldn’t be able to leave because she’d screwed up.
So: the house she’d grown up in was up the hill on Mill Street, not more than six blocks from here. Time to get hoofing.
Oh God. Tammy used to say that. Jennifer shivered and took a step forward—and jerked back when a car that looked like a big blue electric shaver nearly clipped her as it went through the intersection. The driver—no one she recognized—could be seen visibly rolling his eyes as he blipped his horn at her in rebuke.
Stupid, stupid, stupid. She was mortal again. She could be hurt. She could be killed. Injuries wouldn’t heal overnight so she could be hurt all over again the next day. And if she got killed on parole, she seriously doubted her chances of making it to Heaven.
Also, cars looked strange now. Like they could probably fly, all sleek and rounded curves. Even the horns sounded different.
She took care to check for traffic this time—it was a little heavier than when she’d last been here, and the stop sign was now a stoplight, which was why she’d nearly gotten smeared into the crosswalk. She hurried across the street, feeling exposed and vulnerable and alive.
Alive.
Cannon Falls looked mostly the same, for all it had been thirty-one years. There was another stoplight, yes, she’d finally noticed that, thank you very much. And a McDonald’s. Brewster’s was still there, and the bakery, though the clinic had moved. And there was a winery, of all things. Right downtown. No vineyard, but a winery.
Strange.
Even stranger, Jennifer checked a store window and confirmed that, yes, she looked the same, looked exactly as she had the day she’d chased a bottle of Valium with a fifth of vodka. In those dark pre-Wikipedia days, she’d had to go to the library—the one not even a block away from where she was standing, in fact—to do her research. She’d found articles explaining benzos and booze were painless and even caused euphoria as you nodded off, but that had been a lie.
Not about the pain—the articles had been right about that. But euphoria? No, she’d definitely been in a euphoria-free zone. In fact, she’d been uneasy throughout, struggling not to vomit—she’d had very little experience with booze; the one good thing her father had left her was an aversion to alcohol. Toward the end, she’d started to think that perhaps she was being hasty. The fire was an accident. She hadn’t meant any harm. Maybe it wasnnnnnn’t
tooooooooooo
laaaaaaaaate.
She woke up in Hell.
Up, up, up the hill, and now she was glad for the coat and boots Betsy had given her. She’d looked Jennifer up and down in her office, said, “Well, jeez, you can’t atone if you’ve got frostbite; talk about setting you up to fail!” and just like that, Jennifer had a new coat, gloves, and boots over her outfit of a Madonna T-shirt and acid-washed jeans. It was technically spring, but: Minnesota spring. So she was glad for the layers.
The best part about Betsy making things appear out of nowhere was how surprised she looked each time. There was already a betting pool in Hell over when that would stop. Or if it would stop. Jennifer had declined to participate, but if she’d taken a date it would have been at least ten years in the future. Betsy struck her as the type who took a while to get used to new things. Like, a long while. And would complain the whole time she was adjusting. Constantly.
But who was she to judge? Having been judged, Jennifer was careful to avoid any appearance of siding with any judgments. No better way to piss off fellow Hell residents than by implying (a) they deserved to be there, and/or (b) if anything, they hadn’t been judged harshly enough.
She had, though ironically it could be argued the judgment and punishment she’d handed down to herself
(death penalty)
were worse than anything the devil had cooked up
(food court duty).
Tammy’s lungs had been crisped. She hadn’t died of smoke inhalation, but from trying to breathe the superheated air. Jennifer had discussed her sins
(in Hell, even confession is seriously screwed)
with a man who’d been an arson investigator in life (and who liked to spend his spare time crisping the neighborhood cats in his broiler). He’d happily explained that the air in a house fire can reach eleven hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Just one breath of that air could kill someone. Then he’d pinned her down and masturbated onto her stomach, which wasn’t important to the story except to say that at that point, Jennifer could still be shocked by the things people did in Hell as a matter of course.
Tammy’d had to take more than one breath while she waited for Jennifer to bring help. And she’d had to wait a long time, struggling to breathe air getting progressively hotter with every second.
Thinking about her best friend’s last moments of terror and agony—and she had, almost obsessively, for decades—had been worse than anything Hell could put her through.
The only thing worse would be admitting what she’d done. Parole, Jennifer feared, was just another way to torment the damned. And she didn’t know what was more frightening: if Betsy knew that . . . or if she had no idea.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR
If the speech team had made state, Tammy might have lived to be a grandmother. Unfortunately, they got stomped. For want of a nail, a kingdom was lost.
So they were home that weekend. Tammy’s parents had gone to Vegas but didn’t mind if Jennifer came for a sleepover, since she was a notorious virgin who didn’t drink. “Isn’t it great how usually when a father abandons his family it screws up the kid, but that didn’t happen in your case?” Tammy’s mom had burbled on more than one occasion. “I mean, you really learned something!” Oh yes, definitely, my dad leaving was a wonderful learning experience and worked out great for us in the short and long run. So, ’bye.
A notorious virgin, yes, but not because of abandonment issues. She was saving herself. For Lars.
He’d moved to Cannon seven months ago and his name should have been stupid. A blond, blue-eyed guy named Lars Gundersson who lived in Minnesota and loved lutefisk?* It sounded like what someone from Hollywood thought a typical Minnesotan would be like.
Not only was Lars all those things and more; he was popular! She was sure with a name like Lars he’d be doomed to marching band, but nope. Because he was also beautiful and athletic, played b-ball and football and had the build of a running back: fleet and strong.
Tammy had invited him over to her house on Jennifer’s behalf. So Lars was coming over. Tonight. And he could stay as long as he—and she—wanted. Tonight! Tammy, giggling, offered the use of her parents’ room.
“Whoa,” Jennifer had said, putting her hands out as if to physically rein in Tammy’s enthusiasm as a matchmaker/pimp. “We’re not even going together. We haven’t even been out. He only just broke up with Amy last month.”
“So? You can just snuggle.”
Well. That sounded like a plan and a half.
So she went over early and Lars called and said he was coming over early, so she and Tammy did the teenage girl squealing/yelling thing
(“OhmyGodohmyGodohmyGod!”)
and Jennifer went around and lit candles in every room, then went to the basement and stoked up the woodburning furnace, something she’d done in that house at least a dozen times over the years. She’d been so excited
(he said he was biking that means he’ll be here in ten minutes)
she hadn’t latched the door after tossing in several logs, and some coals had spilled out onto the floor. In her panic
(where’s the shovel WHERE’S THE SHOVEL gotta get these picked up oh shit it’s catching)
she’d made it worse. And Tammy’s folks kept five cords of nice dry wood right there in the basement where it was convenient. Tammy’s dad hated scrounging around outside for wood, even if it was stacked neatly behind the garage.
Even now, she couldn’t believe how fast it had gone up. Masturbating Arson Investigator Guy told her that the time between the fire light point and total engulfment of the structure was two minutes.
She knew. She saw.
She hadn’t even tried to help her friend. Well, she had, but not very hard. It was just—smoke was everywhere and it was so fast and she had to get out so she started up the basement stairs and couldn’t get past the fourth step
(I thought smoke was supposed to rise can’t see I can’t see can’t BREATHE)
and finally she had to turn and stumble through the opposite hallway to get out via the garage door and when she opened the double doors a ton of oxygen-rich air rushed in, which fed the fire, and two minutes? If anything, it hadn’t even taken that long.
Of course Lars saw the smoke and rushed in and tried to help them. As she was leaving by the garage, he was running through the front door, for all the good it did Tammy, or him. They never saw each other.
The police had been right behind the fire trucks.
* * *
They thought it was on purpose. Apparently, teenage boys and fires went hand in hand sometimes, and the investigators decided Lars had a crush on Tammy—his call to her house just before the fire looked bad—and set the fire so he could be a hero and rescue her. This sounded exquisitely stupid to Jennifer, but she was in no position to argue.
Incredibly, she was safe, and not just from immolation. She wasn’t supposed to be at Tammy’s until after supper; no one knew she’d been in the house that afternoon. And Lars didn’t know about her crush; he’d thought he was just going over to hang. Everyone thought he was going over to have sex with Tammy, because parents forgot that kids almost never turned down invites to parent-free houses. It could be someone you didn’t even like and you’d still go. Lack of supervision was like any drug: once you got a taste, you always wanted more.
The sympathy. That was the worst part. Everyone in town knew she’d loved Tammy, that they’d been best friends since sixth grade. She got almost as many thoughtfully sympathetic looks as Tammy’s folks did. Hell, Tammy’s parents tried to comfort her: “Thank God you weren’t there; you could have died, too!”
Then, the indictment, and she said nothing.
The trial. She said nothing.
Guilty of felony arson and involuntary manslaughter. Tried as an adult, of course—why not? It was a heinous crime, one that bought him twenty years. ’Bye, Lars. I loved almost going out with you.
She said nothing. She said nothing. She said nothing. She was too busy researching methods of suicide at the library.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FIVE
“This might be the dumbest thing we’ve ever done,” I announced.
“Ha!” Marc stuck a finger in my face, which was just as annoying as you’d think it would be. “You’ve got nothing to back that up and you know it. This isn’t even close to the d
umbest thing we’ve ever done.”
“The most annoying, then,” I countered. I was tired of holding the bag, so I dropped it on the dock at my feet. “Or idiotic.”
“Well, you might have something there.”
“Children,” Sinclair murmured. Usually he’d be glued to his phone, but we were outdoors and it was a sunny spring day, so not this time.
It was still super cute to see Sinclair luxuriating in sunshine. Most vampires burst into a cloud of fanged, wailing ash if exposed to sunlight, and for decades Sinclair had to work to avoid that sad, ashy fate. But the devil owed me a favor, so I asked her to fix it so he could bear sunlight, handle holy water, et cetera. She knew she owed me for killing her (long story*), and granted my wish, because nothing about my afterlife makes any sense at all.
This, as anyone could have foreseen, led to lots of alfresco sex (Between Sinclair and me. Not the devil and me. Obviously.) and Sinclair joining the church choir. It also led to Sinclair taking Fur and Burr outside for walks about seventeen or eighteen times a day.
Now he had his hands stuffed into the pockets of his black greatcoat, head tilted back so he could close his eyes and turn his face up and just soak in the sunshine like a sexy sponge. He occasionally hummed and rocked back and forth on his feet because now and again he was the cutest thing ever.
“Am I the only one who thinks it’s weird that we haven’t even talked about the dock or the tunnel in years—”
“We means you, Betsy. Just you.”
“—and now we’re in the tunnel twice in twenty-four hours?”
“Yep. You’re the only one.”
“Also, we’ve got an Assembly of vampires about to descend on us in all their fang-gnashing rage.”
“Are you pronouncing assembly like it’s capitalized on purpose?”
“Yes. Murder of crows. Pack of wolves. Flock of geese. Assembly of vampires.”
“Asshat of vampires,” Marc suggested, and I giggled like a kid—couldn’t help it.