Misfit (2 page)

The demons begged Jesus, ‘Send us among the pigs; al ow us to go into them.’ He gave them permission, and the impure spirits came out and went into the pigs. The herd, about two thousand in number, rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned.”

Jael keeps her face neutral, but internal y she cringes.

She’d rather listen to Ms. Spielman ramble on about the Pythagorean theorem or Miss Randolph drone on about the periodic table than sit through this Bible stuff. Geometry and chemistry are kind of boring, but the religious stuff gets way too personal, especial y passages like the one the Mons just read. She’s begged her dad a bunch of times to let her go to public school. Seattle Public isn’t that bad, and some of the magnet schools are real y great. But he says she needs to be in an environment like this.

Like taking medicine to prevent seizures. He’s never said what he’s afraid would happen if she didn’t go to Catholic school.

She’s never had the guts to ask.

“Miss Thompson.” The Mons’s gentle voice breaks into her thoughts. “Why do you suppose that Jesus cast the demon into a herd of swine?”

“Uh . . . because the Jews don’t eat pork anyway, so it wasn’t real y a waste for them?”

“Is that a question or a statement, my child?”

“It’s a statement,” she says.

“Then believe in what you say,” he says. “Make it sound like a statement.”

“Okay, Monsignor.”

“And, as always, Miss Thompson, your answer is extremely insightful. The Jews do regard pigs as unclean animals. But when we discuss demons, the answers inevitably reach deeper than we first think.

Consider this: We know by the name

‘Legion’ that there are many demons within this man.

So the evil in a single human being fil s two thousand of the most unclean animal. What might this suggest?

Mr. Buchanan?”

“That a man is more evil than a pig?” asks Seamus Buchanan.

Seamus looks like the ultimate red-headed Irish Catholic boy.

He claims that he wants to be a priest someday. Jael can’t understand why someone would tel people that, even if it’s true.

“Indeed,” says the Mons. “You are on the right track.

Perhaps you are al too young to truly grasp this idea.

During my time as a missionary in Peru, I often came face to face with the true darkness that lies within humanity. I had a smal parish in a tiny neighborhood in Iquitos cal ed Belen. An interesting place. Tropical storms caused the area to flood so frequently that the natives built their tiny houses on stilts. Half the year I had to use a rowboat to get to my home. But they were thankful for the flooding when it prevented the the Shining Path, a murderous band of the communist guerril as, from reaching their homes during a raid.”

He looks at them with his gentle gray eyes and it’s the kind of sad wisdom that Jael has only seen before in movies.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the Shining Path did terrible things to the people of Iquitos. Things no human should be capable of.”

Jael tries to hold back. Her father has told her over and over again that she can’t draw attention to herself like this. But . . .

“Monsignor, I don’t get it,” she blurts out. “Are you saying that the communist army was possessed by demons?”

“Very astute, Miss Thompson,” says the Mons with a gentle smile. But then his face grows serious again.

“Yes, I’m afraid it was nothing less than corruption from those most base and vile creatures.” He scans the room gravely for a moment, then his smile breaks through again. “But take heart. The miracle of this passage in the Bible, and what I want to impress most upon you, is that with God’s wil , we can exorcise those horrible demons and send them back to the darkness from which they came.”

It’s hard to hear the sweet old Mons go on about this kind of stuff. But of course, like most people, he doesn’t know the truth.

Jael’s mother was a demon.

The Mons turns his kind old eyes back to Jael. “Does that make sense, Miss Thompson? Do you understand?”

“Yes, Monsignor,” says Jael, putting on the poker face she’s had eight years to perfect. “Demons are bad.

Everybody knows that.”

On her eighth birthday, Jael thompson found out she wasn’t like other girls.

“I have the name of an angel!” she boasted to her father after school at dinner.

“What?” said Paul Thompson. His hard, square-jawed face usual y didn’t show much emotion. But at the word

“angel,” his eyes went wide and he froze, his fork and knife in mid cut through his tamale.

“Mrs. Perez says so,” said Jael. She bit down on a green bean and chewed as she said, “You know the Ark of the Covenant?”

“I am . . . familiar,” he said. He went back to eating his tamale, but his eyes had a strangely intense look. Jael decided it meant he was fascinated by what she had to say.

“It’s a big box that has the broken Ten Commandments of Moses in it,” she said.

“Yes . . .”

“Wel , Daddy,” she said, trying her best to return the intense gaze he was giving her, “the lid of the box has two angels on it. Do you know what their names are?”

He blinked, then stared at her for a moment. “I don’t, actual y.”

She smiled triumphantly. “Their names are Zaral and Jael.

Can you believe that, Daddy? Can you?”

“Amazing,” he said. His voice sounded mild, but a muscle in his jaw twitched.

“I think angels are the coolest, Daddy. Especial y Michael and Gabriel.” She frowned as she ate another green been. “But Uriel is pretty cool too. He guards the Garden of Eden with his flaming sword. I think I’d like to have a flaming sword, Daddy.

Don’t you think that would be cool, Daddy? To have a flaming sword? Daddy?”

“Um.” Her father’s expression was locked in a grimace, but Jael barely noticed. She was too busy showing off everything she’d learned about angels. It wasn’t every day that her father paid this much attention to what she said.

“And there’s Azrael, of course,” she continued. “But he seems a little scary to me. And what about al those other angels? The ones that stay in Heaven al the time and never leave but just sing and sing and sing?”

“Jael”

“You know, Daddy, there’s seven levels of angels that don’t do anything but sing al the time, like infinity and forever. Why is that, Daddy? Why do the angels have to sing al the time?

Don’t they ever get tired?”

“Jael, please stop talking about angels.”

“But they’re just so cool! And there’s al different kinds.

Archangels, of course, Daddy. But also? There’s cherubim, and seraphim, and ophanim, and you know you can pray to them?

Pray to angels, just like God and—”

“Enough!” Her father was on his feet, glaring down at her, angrier than she’d ever seen him. His wide shoulders went up and down with each breath. “Never speak of angels in this house again! Never! Is that understood?!”

She stared up at him for a moment. Then her eyes wel ed up with tears.

“Jael,” he said. “Don’t cry. Don’t . . .”

She ran out of the apartment.

Everything in Tucson was beige. The sidewalks, the streets, the houses—everything except the vast blue sky. Jael ran crying out the beige door, down the beige apartment building steps, and through the beige corridor that was her street.

She didn’t run for long, though. It was late afternoon and the desert heat lay on her heavily, as if she were walking through a brick oven. She slowed down to a walk for the last block to the neighborhood playground. It was her favorite place, probably because it was the only place that wasn’t beige. The massive modern climbing structure was a swirl of primary colors, with a red rock wal , a blue tire swing, and three swirling yel ow slides.

It was sheltered by a massive black mesh canopy that kept off the hard desert sun. Jael spent a lot of time at the playground, alone.

On this day when she came to the playground, it was different. A second structure stood off to the side. It didn’t fit in with the rest. The regular play structure was made of brightly colored plastic and painted metal, but this new contraption was made of a weird mix of wood, stone, and pitted iron. It looked old and not very safe, but Jael couldn’t resist something new to explore. She walked toward it.

Suddenly, a sparrow dropped down from the sky and nearly hit her in the head. She gave a little yelp and swatted at it. It gave her a long, warbling chirp in response. Then it landed at the top of one of the yel ow spiral slides. It cocked its head at her expectantly.

“What?” she said. Like a lot of lonely kids, she had a habit of talking to animals. Sometimes she even talked to inanimate objects. “I’m just going to check out the new one first.”

The sparrow gave her another shril chirp, then flew off.

“Whatever,” she said, trying to make the word sound like it did when the older girls at her school said it.

She walked purposeful y toward the jumble of wood, stone, and iron.

As she started to climb up, sparkling brown eyes snapped open near her foot. Jael gave a little shriek and stumbled backwards The structure slowly began to shift and rise until it had reassembled into the shape of a giant bul . Jael started to back away careful y toward the playground exit.

But then it spoke.

“Happy birthday,” it said in a slow, measured voice.

That made Jael stop.

“Do you know me?” she asked.

It shook its massive stone head. “I knew your mother.”

“My mother?” she asked, her eyes going wide. Her father never spoke about her mother, other than to say that she died when Jael was born. Whenever Jael asked about her, he only said they would talk about it when she was older. So Jael didn’t know anything about her, whether she was nice or mean, pretty or ugly, smart or dumb. Without any real facts, it was left to her imagination to conjure up her mother. She had imagined a thousand different mothers by this point, each more beautiful and perfect than the one before.

A long line of angelic women who would one day swoop down and take her someplace safe where everyone was kind.

“What do you know about my mother?” she asked the giant ox creature.

“She was once a queen.”

“No . . . ,” said Jael. A thril ran through her. Maybe one of her favorite imaginary mothers was the real thing. But she stopped herself. Even if it was magic, this thing was stil a stranger. And sometimes strangers lied. He could be making it al up. “Oh yeah?”

she said careful y. “Queen of what?”

The creature laughed so low and loud Jael could feel it in her chest. “Such a spitfire,” he said. “You are a lot like her.”

“I am?” said Jael, unable to keep the dreamy tone out of her voice. She moved a little closer.

“Certainly,” he said. “There was a time when we al admired her greatly.”

“ ‘We’?” asked Jael. “Are there other things like you?”

He cocked his massive square head to one side.

“Oh,” he said.

“You don’t know.”

“Know what?” she asked. “Who are you?”

“You can cal me Baal. I was a servant of your uncle for a time.”

“A servant?” she asked. Then, “I have an uncle?”

He stared at her for a long time, not saying anything.

“Wel ?” she said.

Stil in his measured monotone, he said, “This is disappointing. I had hoped to toy with you a little, halfbreed.

But I think it would be lost on you. So I might as wel just kil you.”

His brown eyes suddenly flared orange. His mouth stretched open, bits of stone and iron grinding within.

Then he charged.

Jael stood frozen in terror, unable to move.

Something smal and feathered hit her in the head.

The sparrow from before. That jolted her into action, and she dove to one side. Baal slammed into the playground structure, primary colors crunching down on him. He rose to his feet, tossing chunks of plastic and metal in al directions with his iron horns.

Jael scrambled to her feet and sprinted for the gate. It seemed impossibly far away and Baal was rapidly closing the gap.

“You can’t outrun me!” he said. “You’re mine, halfbreed!”

“Not today, hel spawn!”

The hard, clear voice echoed through the playground.

Jael’s father stood at the entrance, his face calm. He hurled a smal glass bottle over Jael’s head. It smashed into Baal’s face. Liquid sprayed out, and smoke rose up around his head. He gave a pained howl, then stumbled and fel .

Jael’s father scooped her up and tossed her over his shoulder like a sack. He sprinted down the street to where the car was double-parked, the engine running.

He tossed her into the passenger seat and climbed in on his side. Then he gunned the engine, and the car tore down the street.

They drove for hours on the highway across the desert plains north toward Phoenix. The sun was setting red across the horizon when Jael final y found her voice.

“Daddy?” she asked. “What . . . was that?”

“A demon,” he said tersely. He kept his eyes on the road.

“We stayed there too long. I knew it, but I just . . .” He shook his head. “We can’t make that mistake again.

We got too comfortable.”

“He said he knew Mom,” she said. “He said she was a queen.”

“Demons wil say anything to get you off your guard,”

her father said.

“Was she?” she asked. “A queen?”

He didn’t say anything.

“I bet Mom would answer my questions.” she said. “I bet she’d be nice to me and she wouldn’t keep making me move to new places al the time, and yel at me for talking about angels. I wish she was here to take me away to her palace!”

“Jael, your mother was a demoness.”

It hung like that in silence for a long time. Her father was stil staring ahead at the road.

“My . . . mom?” she asked final y. “Was a demon?

Like that

. . . thing back there?”

“Not exactly like Baal. She looked like a person, most of the time. But yes. She was a demoness.”

“But you said she died when I was born.”

“Demons can die too,” he said quietly. His eyes softened for a moment as he stared at the lit highway in front of them.

“Was she . . bad?”

“She tried to do good,” he said. Then his face hardened again. “And because of that, she made a lot of other demons very angry. If we stay in one place too long, demons might find us and kil us. That’s one reason we have to keep moving.”

“What’s the other reason?”

“Because if we stay anywhere too long, normal people might figure out what you real y are.”

“What am I?”

“Your mother was a demon. That makes you half demon.”

The desert plains flew by, receding on either side into the encroaching darkness. Jael felt like she was fal ing, even though she could stil feel the car seat beneath her.

“Am I bad?” she asked.

“No, of course not!” he said, final y turning to look at her.

“Can I stil go to church?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. “Jael, nothing has changed. You’re not any different. You just know more about yourself now.”

“But won’t the priests get mad if they find out I’m a demon who goes to church?”

“First, you’re only half demon. Second, they won’t find out.

Because we wil be very careful not to say anything.

To anyone.”

He turned and gave her a hard look. “Won’t we?”

“Yes, Daddy.” She was silent for a moment. Then,

“Daddy?”

“Yes?” His voice was beginning to sound strained.

“Am I . . . going to Hel ?”

“No, Jael,” he said. “I wil do everything in my power to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

“But—”

“Listen, this is al very complicated stuff that you’re not real y old enough to understand. I am doing what’s best for us.

For you. Al you need to do is trust me. Don’t worry about the rest.”

“Do I at least have, you know, special powers?” she asked.

“No,” he snapped. “No powers, no horns, no nothing.

You’re just like any other girl, but your mother was a demon. That’s it.

No more questions. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Daddy.”

They drove on like that for some time. Final y, her father took a deep breath. “Look, Jael. I’m sorry. I wish things weren’t so complicated. That we could just be normal people. But we just . . . can’t.” He drove on for a while longer. “If you want to talk about angels, that’s fine. You can do that. Okay?”

But Jael didn’t respond. She didn’t know if she wanted to talk about angels anymore.

As the desert night settled in and the gleaming headlights cut through the emptiness al around them, it felt like the darkness would never lift. And in a way, it never did. Her father never again spoke about her mother after that night. Occasional y, Jael would ask him questions, thinking she had to be old enough to hear the answers by then. But every time, he would tel her there wasn’t much point in worrying about it, and to just do her best to be a good person.

Once again, Jael’s imagination conjured up a thousand different mothers. But after that night, none of them were kind or angelic. None of them would swoop down and rescue her from this life. She understood that much, at least.