Running With The Demon

CHAPTER 6

Nest and her Mends spent the long, slow, lazy hours of the hot July afternoon fishing, they laughed and joked, swapped gossip and told lies, drank six–packs of pop kept cool at the end of a cord in the waters of the Rock River, and gnawed contentedly on twists of red licorice.

Beyond the shelter of the park, away from the breezes that wafted off the river, the temperature rose above one hundred and stayed there. The blue dome of the cloudless sky turned hazy with reflected light, and the heat seemed to press down upon the homes and businesses of Hopewell with the intention of flattening them. Downtown, the digital signboard on the exterior brick wall of the First National Bank read 103°, and the concrete of the streets and sidewalks baked and steamed in the white glare. Within their airconditioned offices, men and women began planning their Friday–afternoon escapes, trying to think of ways they could cool down the blast–furnace interiors of their automobiles long enough to survive the drive home.

On the picket lines at the entrances to MidCon Steel's five shuttered plants, the union workers hunkered down in lawn chairs under makeshift canopies and drank iced tea and beer from large Styrofoam coolers, hot and weary and discouraged, angry at the intransigence of their collective fate, thinking dark thoughts and feeling the threads of their lives slip slowly away.

In the cool, dark confines of Scrubby's Bar, at the west edge of town j ust off Lincoln Highway, Deny Howe sat alone at one end of the serving counter, nursing a beer and mumbling unintelligibly of his plans for MidCon to a creature that no one else could see.

It was nearing five o'clock, the sun sinking west and the dinner hour approaching, when Nest and her friends gathered up their fishing gear and the last few cans of pop and made their way back through the park. They climbed from the old boat launch (abandoned now since Riverside had bought the land and closed the road leading in), gained the heights of the cemetery, and followed the fence line back along the bluff face to where the cliffs dropped away and the park began. They wormed their way through a gap in the chain–link, Jared and Robert spreading the jagged edges wide for the girls, followed the turnaround past the Indian mounds, and angled through the trees and the playgrounds toward the ball diamonds. The heat lingered even with the sun's slow westward descent, a sullen, brooding presence at the edges of the shade. In the darker stretches of the spruce and pine, where the boughs grew thick and the shadows never faded, amber eyes as flat and hard as stone peered out in cold appraisal. Nest, who alone could see them, was reminded of the increasing boldness of the feeders and was troubled anew by what it meant.

Robert Heppler took a deep drink from his can of Coke, then belched loudly at Brianna Brown and said with supreme insincerity, "Sorry."

Brianna pulled a face. She was small and pretty with delicate features and thick, wavy dark hair. "You're disgusting, Robert!"

"Hey, it's a natural function of the body." Robert tried his best to look put–upon. Short and wiry, with a mischievous face, a shock of unruly white–blond hair, Robert eventually aggravated everyone he came in contact with–particularly Brianna Brown.

"There is nothing natural about anything you do!" Brianna snapped irritably, although there wasn't quite enough force behind the retort to cause any of the others to be concerned. The feud between Robert and Brianna was long–standing. It had become a condition of their lives. No one thought much about it anymore, except where the occasional flare–up exacerbated feelings so thoroughly that no one could get any peace. That had happened only once of late, early in the summer, when Robert had managed to hide a red fizzie in the lining of Brianna's swimsuit just before she went into the pool at Lawrence Park. Mortified beyond any expression of outrage at the resulting red stain, Brianna would have killed Robert if she could have gotten her hands on him. As it was, she hadn't said a word to him for almost two weeks afterward, not until he apologized in front of everyone and admitted he had behaved in a stupid and childish manner–and even that seemed to please Robert in some bizarre way that probably not even he could fathom.

"No, listen, I read this in a report." Robert looked around to be sure they were all listening. "Belching and farting are necessary bodily functions. They release gases that would otherwise poison the body. You know about the exploding cows?"

"Oh, Robert!" Cass Minter rolled her eyes.

"No, cows can explode if enough gas builds up inside them. It's a medical condition. They produce all this methane gas when they digest grass. If they don't get rid of it, it can make them explode. There was this whole article on it. I guess it's like what happens to milk cows if you don't milk them." He took another drink of Coke and belched again. With Robert, you never knew if he was making it up. "Think about what could happen to us if we stopped belching."

"Maybe you should give up drinking Coke," Cass suggested dryly. She was a big, heavyset girl with a round, cheerful face and intelligent green eyes. She always wore jeans and loose–fitting shirts, an unspoken concession to her weight, and her lank brown hair looked as if no comb had passed through it any time in recent memory. Cass was Nest's oldest friend, from all the way back to when they were in second grade together. She winked at Nest now. "Maybe you should stick to tomato juice, Robert."

Robert Heppler hated tomato juice. He'd been forced to drink it once at camp, compelled to do so by a counselor in front of a dozen other campers, after which he had promptly vomited it up again. It was a point of honor with him that he would die before he ever did that again.

"Where did you read all this, anyway?" Jared Scott asked with benign interest.

Robert shrugged. "On the Internet."

"You know, you can't believe everything you read," Brianna declared, repeating something her mother frequently told her.

"Well, duh!" Robert sneered. "Anyway, this was a Dave Barry article."

"Dave Barry?" Cass was in stitches. "Now there's a reliable source. I suppose you get your world news from Liz Smith."

Robert stopped and slowly turned to face her. "Oh, I am cut to the quick!" He looked pointedly at Nest. "Like I can't tell the difference between what's rebable and what isn't, right?"

"Leave me out of this," Nest begged.

"Don't be so difficult, Robert!" Brianna chided, smoothing down her spotless white shorts. Only Brianna would wear white shorts to go fishing and somehow manage to keep them white.

"Difficult? I'm not difficult! Am I?" He threw up his hands. "Jared, am I?"

But Jared Scott was staring blankly at nothing, his face calm, his expression detached, as if he had removed himself entirely from everything that was happening around him and gone somewhere else. He was having another episode, Nest realized–his third that afternoon. The medicine he was taking didn't seem to be helping a whole lot. At least his epilepsy never did much more than it was doing now. It just took him away for a while and then brought him back again, snipping out small spaces in his life, like panels cut from a comic book.

"Well, anyway, I don't think I'm difficult." Robert turned back to Brianna. "I can't help it if I'm interested in learning about stuff. What am I supposed to do–stop reading?"

Brianna sighed impatiently. "You could at least stop being so dramatic!"

"Oh, now I'm too dramatic, am I? Gee, first I'm too difficult and then I'm too dramatic! How ever will I get on with my life?"

"We all ponder that dilemma on a daily basis," Cass observed archly.

"You spend too much time in front of your computer!" Bri–anna snapped.

"Well, you spend too much time in front of your mirror!" Robert snapped right back.

It was no secret that Brianna devoted an inordinate amount of time to looking good, in large part as the result of having a mother who was a hairdresser and who firmly believed that makeup and clothes made the difference in a young girl's lot in life. From the tune her daughter was old enough to pay attention, Brianna's mother had instilled in her the need to "look the part," as she was fond of putting it, training her to style her hair and do her makeup and providing her with an extensive wardrobe of matching outfits that Brianna was required to wear whatever the occasion–even on an outing that centered around fishing. Lately Brianna had begun to chafe a bit under the constraints of her mother's rigid expectations, but Mom still held the parental reins with a firm grip and full–blown rebellion was a year or so away.

The mirror crack brought an angry flush to Brianna Brown's face, and she glared hotly at Robert.

Cass Minter was quick to intervene. "You both spend too much tune in front of lighted screens, Robert" — she gave Nest another wink — "but in Brianna's case the results are more obviously successful."

Nest laughed softly in spite of herself. She envied Brianna's smooth curves, her flawless skin, and her soft, feminine look. She was beautiful in a way that Nest never would be. Her tiny, grade–school girl's body was developing curves on schedule while Nest's simply refused to budge. Boys looked at Brianna and were made hungry and awestruck. When they looked at Nest, they were left indifferent.

Robert started to say something and belched, and everyone laughed. Jared Scott cleared his throat, and his eyes refocused

on his friends. "Are we going swimming tomorrow?" he asked, as if nothing had happened.

They walked through the center of the park, keeping to the shade of the big oaks that ran along the bluff up from the ball fields bordering Nest's backyard, then cut down toward Cass Minter's rambling two–story. A game was in progress on the fourth field, the one farthest into the park and closest to the toboggan run. They sauntered toward it, caught up in their conversation, which had turned now to the merits of learning a foreign language, and they were almost to the backstop when Nest realized belatedly that one of the players lounging on the benches, waiting his turn at bat, was Danny Abbott. She tried to veer away from him, pushing at Cass to get her to move back toward the roadway, but it was too late. He had already seen her and was on his feet.

"Hey, Nest!" he called out boldly. "Wait up!"

She slowed reluctantly as he started over, already angry with herself for letting this happen. "Oh, great!" Robert muttered under his breath. A scowl twisted his narrow lips.

"Go on," she told Cass, glancing at her shoes. "I'll be along in a minute."

Cass kept moving as if that had been her plan all along, and the other three dutifully followed. All of them drifted on for about twenty feet and stopped. Nest held her ground as Danny Abbott approached. He was big, strong, and good–looking, and for some reason he had a thing for her. A high–school junior in the fall, he was two years older than she was and convinced he was the coolest thing in jeans. A few months ago, at a Y dance, flattered by his interest, she had made the mistake of letting him kiss her. The kiss was all she wanted, and after she experienced it, she decided she wasn't that interested in Danny Abbott after all. But Danny couldn't let it go. He began to talk about her to his friends, and some of the stories got back to her. Danny was saying he had gotten a lot further with her than he had. Worse, he was saying she was anxious for more. She stopped having anything to do with him, but this just seemed to fuel his interest.

He strolled up to her with a confident smile, the big jock coming on to the impressionable little groupie. She felt her anger build. "So what's happening?" he asked, his voice slow and languid. "Catch anything?"

She shook her head. "Not much. What do you want?"

"Hey, don't be so prickly." He brushed at his dark hair and looked off into the distance, like he was seeing into the future and taking its measure. "I was just wondering why I hadn't seen you around."

She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, forcing herself to look at him, refusing to be intimidated. "You know why, Danny."

He pursed his lips and nodded, as if thinking it through. "Okay, I made a mistake. I said some stuff I shouldn't have. I'm sorry. Can we drop it now? I like you, Nest. I don't want you pissed off at me. Hey, why don't you stick around while I finish this game, and then we'll go out for a burger."

"I'm with my friends," she said.

"So? I'm with mine, too. They can go their way and we can go ours, right?"

He gave her his most dazzling smile, and it made her want to say yes in spite of herself. Stupid, stupid. She shook her head. "No, I've got to get home."

He nodded solemnly. "Okay. Maybe tomorrow night. You know what? There's a dance here at the park Sunday. The Jaycees are putting it on. Want to go with me?"

She shook her head a second time. "I don't think so."

"Why not?" A hint of irritation crept into his voice.

She bit her lip. "I'll probably come with my friends."

He gave a disgusted sigh. "You spend a lot of time with your friends, don't you?"

She didn't say anything.

He glanced past her and shook his head. "Why do you hang out with them, anyway? I don't get it." He was looking right at her now, facing her down. "It seems to me you're wasting your time."

Her lips tightened, but she still didn't say anything.

"I don't mean to be picking on them or anything, but just think about it. They're weird, Nest, in case you hadn't noticed.

Barbie Doll, Big Bertha, Joe Space Cadet, and Bobby the Mouth. Weird, Nest. What are you doing with them?"

"Danny," she said quietly.

"Hey, I'm just trying to make a point. You've got a lot more going for you than they do, that's all I'm saying. You're one of the best runners in the state, and you're not even in high school! You're practically famous! Besides, you're a cool chick. You're nothing like them. I really don't get it."

She nodded slowly. "I know you don't. Maybe that's the point."

He sighed. "Okay, whatever. Anyway, why don't you stick around."

"Hey, Danny, you're up!" someone called.

"Yeah, in a minute!" he shouted back. He put his hands on her shoulders, resting them there casually. "C'mon, Nest. Tell me you'll stay until I finish my at bat."

She stepped back, trying to disengage herself. "I have to go."

"One at bat," he pressed. "Five minutes." He stepped forward, staying with her, keeping his hands in place. "What do you say?"

"Abbott, you're up!"

"Hey, Nest, take your shoulders out from under his hands!" shouted Robert Heppler suddenly. "You're making him nervous!"

Danny Abbott blinked, but kept his dark eyes fixed on Nest. His gaze was so intense, so filled with purpose, that it was all Nest Freemark could do to keep from wilting under its heat. But she was just angry enough by now that she refused to give him the satisfaction.

"I have to go," she repeated, keeping her eyes locked on his.

His hands tightened on her shoulders. "I won't let you," he said. He smiled, but the warmth was missing from his eyes.

"Take your hands away," she told him.

A couple of the boys who had been standing around the backstop started to drift over, curious to see what was happening.

"You're not so hot," he said quietly, so that only she could hear. "Not half as hot as you think."

She tried to twist away, but his grip was too strong.

"Hey, Danny, pick on someone your own size!" shouted Robert, coming forward a few steps.

One thing about Robert, he wasn't afraid of anyone. He'd been in so many fights in grade school that his parents had taken him to a psychiatrist. He'd been suspended more times than Nest could remember. His problem was that he wasn't very careful about choosing his opponents, and today was no exception. Danny Abbott looked over at him with undisguised contempt. Danny was bigger, stronger, quicker, and meaner than Robert, and he was looking for an excuse to slug someone.

"What did you say, Heppler?" Robert held his ground and shrugged. "Nothing." "That's what I thought, you little creep." Robert threw up his hands in exaggerated dismay. "Oh, great! I'm being called a creep by a guy who wrestles with girls!"

Half–a–dozen ballplayers had congregated, and a few snickered at the remark. Danny Abbott dropped his hands from Nest's shoulders. His hands knotted into fists, and he turned toward Robert. Robert gave him a very deliberate smirk, but there was a shadow of doubt in his eyes now. "Robert," Cass called in a low, warning voice. "I'm going to wipe up the park with you," Danny Abbott said, and started forward.

Nest Freemark darted in front of him, bringing him to a stop. She stood there shaking, her arms at her sides. "Leave him alone, Danny. I'm the one you're angry at." Danny shook his head. "Not anymore." "You're twice his size!"

"Guess he should have thought of that before he opened his big mouth."

"Punch him out, Danny," one of his friends muttered, and a few others quickly echoed the sentiment.

Nest felt the late–afternoon heat scorch her throat as she breathed it in. "Look, forget about this, Danny," she insisted, still blocking his path to Robert. "I'll stay to watch you bat, okay?" She hated herself for saying the words, but she was frightened now. "Leave Robert alone."

He looked at her, and there was undisguised contempt hi his eyes. He was enjoying this. "You should have thought about that before. You should have paid a little better attention to your mouth."

He started forward again, and she moved back quickly, still blocking his way. She could feel her control slipping, and her breath came more rapidly. She had promised herself! She had promised Gran! "Danny, don't do this!" she snapped at him.

"Danny, don't do this!" he sneered, mimicking her, and the boys with him laughed.

"Danny, please!"

"Get out of my way," he growled.

He reached for her, their eyes locked, and her magic slammed into him. In an instant he lay sprawled on the ground, his legs and arms tangled, a look of utter shock on his handsome face. The eager shouts of his friends turned to gasps, and Nest stepped quickly away, her face white, her eyes bright and intense with concentration. Danny struggled to his feet, glared at her in rage, not certain what had happened to him, but knowing that somehow she was to blame, and then lunged for her. Her eyes found his. Down he went again, crumpling like a rag doll, as if he could no longer manage to stand upright. He rolled over and over, shrieking unintelligibly, his voice unnaturally high and piercing, his words a jumble of unrecognizable sounds.

Everyone had gone completely still. They stood knotted into two groups, Nest's friends on one side, Danny's on the other, frozen in the swelter of heat and excitement, stunned by what they were witnessing, mesmerized by the spectacle of Danny Abbott's collapse. The park had become a vast arena, carpeted with grass, walled by trees, empty of sound. Magic raced through the air with savage grace and reckless need, but no one except Nest could sense its presence.

Danny came to his hands and knees and stayed there, his head hanging down between his shoulders, his chest heaving. He coughed violently and spit, then drew in several huge gulps

of air. He tried to stand, then gave it up, mouthing a low obscenity at Nest that faded quickly into a whispered groan.

Nest turned away, feeling cold and empty and sick at heart. She did not look at Danny Abbott or his friends. She did not look at Cass or Robert or Brianna or Jared either. "Let's go," she whispered, barely able to speak the words, and without waiting to see if anyone would follow, she walked off into the park.

Nest had been eleven before she discovered she could work magic. She was never sure afterward if she had been able to do so all along and simply hadn't realized it or if her ability had matured with growth. Even Gran, when told about it, hadn't been able to say for sure. By then Nest had lived with the feeders and Wraith for close to six years and with Pick for almost that long and knew there was magic out there, so it wasn't all that weird to discover that a small piece of it was hers. Besides, Gran had been saying she had magic for so many years that, even without ever having been presented with, any evidence of it, she had always half believed that it was so.

Her discovery that she really could do magic was due mainly to Lori Adami. As grade–school classmates, they had developed a deep and abiding dislike for each other. Each worked hard at snubbing the other and each made certain she told her friends what a creep the other was, and that was about the extent of it. But in the sixth grade the war between them suddenly escalated. Lori began to go out of her way to make cutting remarks about Nest, always in front of other kids and always just within earshot. Nest retaliated by acting as if she hadn't heard, all the while patiently waiting for Lori to tire of this latest game.

But Lori Adami was nothing if not persistent, and one day she said that Nest's mother was crazy and that was why she killed herself and that Nest was probably crazy, too. It was winter, and they were standing in the hall by their lockers before classes, stripping off their coats and boots. Nest heard the remark, and without even thinking about it, she dropped her coat and gloves on the floor, turned around, walked right up to Lori, and hit her in the face. Since Nest had never lifted a

hand against her in all these years, Lori was caught completely by surprise. But Lori had been raised with three older brothers, and she knew how to defend herself. Hissing something awful at Nest, she went after her.

Then a funny thing happened. Nest, who didn't know much about fighting, was unsure what she should do. Anger and fear warred for control. Should she stand her ground or run for it? She stood her ground. Lori grabbed for her, their eyes locked, and Nest, raising her hands to defend herself, thought, You better not touch me, you better quit right now, you better stop! And down went Lori in a heap, legs tangled, arms askew, and mouth open in surprise. Lori scrambled up again, furious, but the moment their eyes met she began to stumble about helplessly. She tried to say something, but she couldn't seem to talk, the words all jumbled up and nonsensical. Some of the students thought she was having a fit, and they ran screaming for help. Nest was as shocked as they were, but for a different reason. She knew what had happened. She couldn't explain it, but she understood what it was. She had felt the magic's rush, like a gasp of breath as it left her body. She had felt it entangle Lori, its cords wrapping tightly and implacably about the other girl's ankles. She would never forget the horrified look on Lori Adami's face. She would never forget how it made her feel.

They were suspended from school for fighting. Nest had debated how much she should tell Gran, who was the one she had to answer to for any sort of misbehavior, but in the end, as she almost always did, she told her everything. She found she needed to talk to someone about what had happened, and Gran was the logical choice. After all, wasn't she the one who kept saying Nest had magic? Fine, then–let her explain this!

But Gran hadn't said anything at first on hearing Nest's tale. She merely asked if Nest was certain about what had happened and then let the matter drop. Only later had she taken Nest aside to speak with her, waiting until Old Bob was safely out of the house.

"It isn't as strange as you might think that you should be able to do magic, Nest," she told her. They were sitting at the kitchen table, Nest with a cup of hot chocolate in front of her, Gran with her bourbon and water. "Do you know why that is?"

Nest shook her head, anxious to hear her grandmother's explanation.

"Because you are your mother's daughter and my granddaughter, and the women of this family have always known something about magic. We aren't witches or anything, Nest. But we have always lived around magic, here by the park, by the feeders, and we've known about that magic, and if you live next to something long enough, and you know it's there, some of it will rub off on you."

Nest looked at her doubtfully. Rub off on you?

Her grandmother leaned forward. "Now, you listen to me carefully, young lady. Once upon a time, I warned you never to tell anyone about the feeders. You didn't pay attention to me then, did you? You told. And do you remember the sort of trouble it got you into?" Nest nodded. "All right. So you pay attention to me now. Using magic will get you into a whole lot worse trouble than talking about feeders. It will get you into so much trouble I might not be able to get you out. So I am telling you here and now that you are not to use your magic again. Do you hear me?"

Nest chewed her lip. "Yes."

"Good. This is important." Gran's face was scrunched up like a wadded paper sack. "When you are grown, you can decide for yourself when you want to use your magic. You can weigh the risks and the rewards. But you are not to use it while you are a child living in this house. Except," she paused, reminded of something, "if you are threatened, and your life is in danger, and you have no choice." She looked away suddenly, as if fleeing things she would rather not consider. "Then, you can use the magic. But only then."

Nest thought it over for a moment. "How am I supposed to be sure I've really got magic if I don't try it out?"

Her grandmother's gaze fixed on her anew. "You seemed sure enough about it when you were fighting with Lori Adami. Are you telling me that maybe you made it up?"

"No." Nest was immediately defensive. "I just don't know for sure. It all happened so/ast."

Her grandmother took a long drink from her glass and lit a cigarette. "You know. Now you do as I say."

So Nest had, although it was very hard. Eventually, she broke her promise, but not for several months, when she used her magic on a boy who was trying to pull down her swimsuit at the pool. Then she used it again on a kid who was throwing rocks at a stray cat. She knew for sure then that the magic was real, and that she could use it on anyone she wished. But the odd thing was, using it didn't make her feel very good. It should have provided her with some measure of satisfaction, but all it did was make her feel sick inside, as if she had done something for which she should feel ashamed.

It was Pick who had straightened her out, telling her that what her grandmother meant was that she wasn't to use her magic against other people. Using it against other people would always make her feel bad, because it was like taking advantage of someone who couldn't fight back. Besides, it would attract a lot of unwanted attention. But the feeders were fair game. Why not use it against them?

Pick's idea had worked. Using her magic against the feeders satisfied her curiosity and gave her an opportunity to experiment. Eventually she told Gran. Gran, saying little in response, had approved. Then Pick had enlisted her aid in dealing with the nighttime activities of the feeders, and summoning the magic had suddenly become serious business. After that, she had been very careful not to use it again on people.

Until now, she thought wearily as she walked home through the park. She had split up with the others as soon as they were in the trees and out of sight of the ball field. See you tomorrow, she had told them, as if nothing had happened, as if everything were all right. See you tomorrow, they'd replied. Hardly a word had been spoken about the incident, but she knew they were all thinking about it, remembering anew some of the stories about her.

Only Robert had ventured a parting comment. "Jeez, it didn't even look like you touched him!" he'd said in his typically direct, unthinking, Robert way. She was so distressed she didn't even try to respond.

As she reached the edge of the service road, she thought suddenly she might vomit. Her stomach churned and her head ached. The inside of her mouth tasted coppery, and her breathing was quick and uneven. Using the magic on Danny Abbott had been a mistake, even though it had probably saved Robert a beating. She had promised Gran she wouldn't use it again. More important, she had promised herself. But something had happened to her this afternoon. She had been so angry she had forgotten her resolve. She had simply lost control of herself.

She angled through the trees and houses that paralleled the park, closing in now on her home, buoyed by the sight of its familiar white siding and its big stone chimney, her refuge from the world. She knew what troubled her most about what had happened. It was what Danny had said. Your friends are weird. What are you doing with them? But, really, she was the one who was weird, and using the magic as she had just pointed it up. Having magic made her different from everyone–but that was just part of it. How much stranger could you be than to know that you were the only one who could see feeders, the only one, with some sort of monster dog for a protector, and the only one with a sylvan for a friend?

She was the one who didn't belong, she knew, tears running down her cheeks, and she wanted desperately not to feel that way.