It was the end of October, and the weather couldn’t decide between blistering heat and icy sleet; frozen early morning rime melted into puddles by midday. The rain rat-a-tatted the bus windows like pebbles in a can. Daniel was wedged into a seat in the back, heading to Sage’s, overcoat hiding his costume.
When he’d originally agreed to a paired costume, he’d had no idea that she’d make him a tailored get-up. He’d thought she meant Calvin and Hobbes, or maybe Pooh and Piglet. This outfit made him look like a clown, a French clown. An 18th century French clown. Not what he’d had in mind.
The bell chimed to stop the bus, and Daniel uncrossed his legs to stand, the ring box shifting in his pocket.
And the monocle. He sighed. Jeezus.
On top of all of this trying-to-impress-Sage shit, he’d bought an $80 monocle that he’d probably lose at some point tonight. He hadn’t meant to plunk down his hard-earned cash for a piece of old metal and glass, but it had happened all the same. And all because of the Weird Guy running that shop—Monsieur Curious’s Curiosities. It should’ve been called Monsieur Curious’s Crap instead.
Daniel climbed off the 53L at the corner of Carson and Stewart, stepping down hard in his unfamiliar shoes. Sage’s neighborhood, peppered with rowhouses lining cobbled and graffitied streets, was so old-school and gritty it had become an unexpected hip hood. Sage swore she’d be out when Pink Berry and 5 Guys moved in. She was like a red-winged blackbird, but instead of forecasting the onset of spring, she was a harbinger for up-and-coming neighborhoods.
It was the day before Halloween, Devil’s Night where he’d grown up: eternal night of mischief. Daniel always felt like burning something down on Devil’s Night. The rowhomes’ steps were overflowing with Jack-o-lanterns, and multi-hued Indian corn tied with twine rustled in the wind. He knocked hard on number 77, hoping Sage would hear him over the funky beat reverberating through the wood.
In a few moments, the door swung open. As always, Daniel’s breath caught when he saw Sage, like there was a bubble surrounding her with far less oxygen in it and he was on the edge of passing out, a sensation both pleasant and jarring.
“Hi!” she said, grey-blue eyes peering up at him through a fringe of curls.
“Hi,” he responded, and bent down to kiss her proffered lips. He only noticed when she turned to let him inside. “Nice haircut.”
Last weekend her dark hair had fallen halfway down her back; now she sported a scruffy pixie cut. With a pang, Daniel thought of running his hands through her lost locks.
In the kitchen, Sage opened the fridge door to snag a beer, handing it to him and retrieving one for herself. He cracked the tab, slurping foam from the top and admiring her. She looked gamine, like a sexy wood elf.
“It matches my costume. As you know, I’m a Merveilleuse,” she explained. “Condemned prisoners of the Revolution had their hair cut. To bare their necks for the guillotine.” She twisted her head, lifting the fringe of hair and baring the stalk of her neck, where a slim red thread was tied coquettishly in a bow. “And the fashionistas followed suit.”
“And how about me?” he asked, putting down his PBR and shouldering out of his coat. “How am I looking?”
She took him in: tight breeches, floppy shirt, insanely big cravat tied to his chin. “Diggin’ it. Seriously, you’re a perfect Incroyable.”
She stepped closer, a candy-colored cloud of chiffon and décolletage. “Thanks for putting up with my Halloween obsession. And my French Revolution obsession.” She rested the point of her chin on his chest as his arms went around her.
“Anything for you.” He smiled down at her. Then he remembered. “Check this out,” he said, gently breaking their embrace and groping for the box. “Found it at that place around the corner from my office.”
When he pulled the ring box out he had the strange urge to go down on one knee. Sage saw and horror spasmed her face. He fumbled the box into her waiting hand.
“It’s a—” he was about to call it a half-spectacle again. “It’s a monocle. It was a Count’s, the Weird Guy said.”
“Weird Guy?“
“The guy who ran the shop.”
She pulled the monocle out of the box, the long chain dangling down like a tail, and her grey-blue eye magnified as she stared at him through the warbly glass. “It’s perfect. Try it on?”
#
There had been so much crap in Weird Guy’s shop—shelves and shelves, a cacophony of clutter. The proprietor had stood behind a long glass counter, conspicuous in his striped waistcoat, twisting the end of a curled goatee. Daniel had at first thought the guy was putting him on—the antiquated outfit, the villainous facial hair—but as he’d approached he’d changed his mind. This gent, who’d introduced himself as shop owner Claude Louis, was the real deal.
When Daniel had called what he was looking for a half-spectacle instead of a monocle, the proprietor, sputtering like a chicken bone was caught in his throat, corrected him as if personally taken aback. Mr. Louis had really come alive when Daniel had asked about the wares in the case beneath them.
“This one, ah yes, I remember its origins,” Louis had said, his thick fingers fondling (the only word for it) the monocle’s curved watery lens. A sturdy chain sprouted from one edge, puddling on a blue velvet cloth as Louis positioned it for inspection.
All Daniel had wanted to do was buy the damn thing, but Louis wouldn’t stop talking. Like he hadn’t wanted to sell it; he’d only wanted to talk about it.
Let me give you my money, Weird Guy, so I can get out of here. Daniel’s lunch hour was almost eaten up and he’d just wanted to buy the stupid monocle.
“The Comte de Saint-Germain’s, eighteenth century, found it at an estate show in Palm Beach years ago. Who knows how it made its way from the city of lights to the isle of the wizened.”
Daniel had asked about the prescription, if the monocle would hurt his eyes or give him a headache if he wore it.
“Dear boy, no, no. There’s no prescription,” Louis had chuckled.
Daniel couldn’t remember the last time he’d been called ‘boy,’ certainly not in five years. His chest tightened as he’d glared down from his 6’3” standpoint.
“The Comte, the original owner, used the monocle for, well, I suppose you’d call it effect.” Monsieur Curious threw back his head so Daniel was treated to an exceptional view of his nostrils. “It truly embodies all the Comte’s eccentricities. Embodies them, you know.”
At that moment Daniel’s phone had chirped, saving him. He’d pretended to answer the weather app that was updating him about a nearby thunderstorm.
“Mhhmmm…yup…you bet,” he’d said into the phone. “How much?” he’d mouthed. Louis had looked down at the monocle with its “$40” tag, and held up eight fingers.
“$80?” Daniel had breathed hotly across the glass display case, and then resumed his fake conversation. “Yes Ma’am, I’ll be there in ten minutes…Okay then…See you soon.” He’d slipped his phone back into his pocket before the salesman could see the black mirror of the phone’s screen. “$80? But...the tag!”
The proprietor had looked down and deftly yanked the tag off its string. “My apologies. The tag was misleading. My assistant must’ve priced it. It’s really an exceptional piece. The Comte de Sain–“
“I know, I know, the Count de Saint-German’s thingamajig fully embodies his spirit, I was listening.” Daniel had fumbled two more twenties from his wallet and slapped them down, making the monocle jump on its blue velvet bed.
I hope Sage appreciates this.
The man in the striped waistcoat put Daniel’s new monocle in a ring box.
#
Daniel headed to the bathroom off the hallway to try the monocle on, cringing as he remembered how terrified Sage had looked when she’d thought he was about to propose. He crammed into the tiny bathroom and checked himself out in the mirror in all his Incroyable glory.
There was the billowy blouse, and the bright red cravat swaddling the lower half of his face. He looked like he’d robbed a bank and was about to make his get-away. He fitted the monocle in his eye socket, wiggling it until he was sure it wouldn’t pop out. The metal was intensely icy and ground into the bone through his thin skin. A strange sensation swept over him as soon as it was secure, like chills from a fever, a prickly flush of tingling.
Mirror-him looked pulled together with the monocle on, less like he was in costume and more like someone who dressed like this all the time. He nodded to his reflection, an incredulous smile lifting his mouth. You got this, he thought to himself, and held up his pointer fingers like guns, bang bang.
Something caught his eye. Someone, actually. His heart stopped, then lurched.
A figure was plainly silhouetted in the alley outside the bathroom window. Daniel’s heart pounded against his ribs as he squinted at the shape behind the glass. Sage’s teardrop vintage light didn’t illuminate much, but he could clearly see a human form outlined by the light filtering through her neighbor’s hallway window.
What was the stranger wearing? A top hat? And how had he squeezed himself between the two buildings? Daniel’s heart was still stuttering in fear, but anger lurked close behind it. Sage’s was a stand-alone house; there couldn’t have been more than half a foot between her and her neighbor, and the space was filled with electrical and cable wires along with many years’ trash and detritus. A very determined Peeping Tom.
Daniel smoothed the ridiculous ruffles of his shirt and leaned towards the window, towards the figure poised just beyond. However he got in, he wasn’t getting out that easily.
Just as he was about to yank the window up to give the peeper something to write home about, the image clicked into clarity—the flat shape was actually a cardboard cut-out silhouette of a person. Their Peeping Tom did indeed wear a top hat, as well as a cummerbund and jacket, and a little cut-out name tag that read: HI MY NAME IS SPRING-HEELED JACK.
Of course. Jack the Ripper, Terror of White Chapel, haunted Sage’s downstairs bathroom. He chuckled at his pounding heart. Got me. But he left the bathroom in a hurry.
Halfway down the hall he glanced back at the window, just a slice of Jack visible through the half-closed bathroom door. Jack now looked like he’d sprouted horns. Daniel’s mind digested and discarded this as he kept on into the kitchen. “I met your Peeping Tom. Well-played.”
“You like our visitor?” Sage replied in an orange-stained apron, next to the kitchen table where a butcher knife glinted amidst the slaughter of a whole family of pumpkins. A large bowl was filled with veggie innards. “We have two hours until guests arrive, can you help with the Jack-O-Lanterns?”
He slid a knife out of the block on the counter.
“The monocle is the perfect touch.” She regarded the carnage. “You know the thing about pumpkin-carving? It’s a fucking bloody mess. Like, you never thought about that as a kid, but as an adult, it’s like, ‘Ugh, pumpkin guts.’”
#
Sage’s History of Horrors Party started in earnest around nine. Daniel was on door duty, so he got a monocle-full of all the costumes. A swell of confidence buoyed him through party take-off, like smoke billowing from a well-stoked fire.
Through Sage’s narrow red front door waltzed H. H. Holmes with a glorious mustache and a handkerchief supposedly doused with chloroform to incapacitate his unsuspecting victims (it was actually lavender water, H. H. told him over his well-coiffed upper lip). Calamity Jane and Typhoid Mary arrived arm-in-arm, the former with spectacles that made her eyes wildly magnified, the latter with skin blotchy with makeup. A Plague Doctor, long nose-beak filled with bergamot oil (so he said), paraded through in excellent steampunk goggles and a stained cloak. Iron Maiden materialized in a “Piece of Mind” T-shirt, and the spikes deftly glued to his shoulders and down his spine matched his epic mohawk.
It didn’t stop there.
The surge of people in historically horrific get-ups pushed in, and Daniel had a clever bon mot for each and every one of them. His breeches didn’t feel quite as tight, but were comfortably snug against his corn-fed thighs; the ruffles that frothed at his neck no longer frothed quite as much; his oversized cravat felt less Yosemite Sam and more like a trite political statement. He felt authentic, like he knew what he was doing. Like he knew who he was.
Sage joined him in the foyer a little before eleven, handing him a tiny hollowed-out pumpkin filled with dark liquid.
“It’s going well, isn’t it?” she asked as he took a sip. She watched with delight as he choked down a swallow. “Strong, eh? I call it murderjuice: the punch with punch. You can even light it before you drink it.”
“No, no,” he said, squinting against the fumes wafting from the mini-pumpkin. “It’s good just like this.”
“Suit yourself.”
They stood in the small foyer, relishing the relative silence. Beyond them, in the living room and down the hall to the kitchen, a kaleidoscope of people revolved. The party was a success: the rooms were satisfyingly crowded but not claustrophobic, James Brown was telling them that Papa’s got a brand new bag, and laughter punctuated the hum of conversation at frequent intervals.
Through the doorway to the living room, they could see a guest dressed as a Heaven’s Gate cult member right down to his Nike sneakers telling a particularly hilarious story to a toga-ed woman whose placard read: The End is Nigh but I Know You Won’t Believe Me.
Cassandra, of course.
“The costumes have been great this year. Folks really thought about it,” Sage commented.
“Agreed. My favorite is Iron Maiden, with H. H. Holmes’s mustache a close second. Not him, his mustache.” Daniel tried another baby sip of punch. It felt like a hot razor slicing through his esophagus.
“Right? He tried to make me his next victim but I danced out of reach.” She did an adorable two-step, the flesh overflowing her bodice jiggling ever so.
The fire in Daniel’s belly was no longer just punch.
“My favorite,” Sage continued, “is Demonica. I don’t know her name, but that’s what I’m calling her.”
“De-what?”
“Demonica. The demon? Her costume is spectacular, you have to check it out. Up close if you can. Hooves, tail, horns, the whole deal. Amazing.”
From the living room came the tinkle of breaking glass. Sage’s head jerked toward it. “Uh-oh, party foul.” Her lips thinned as she started towards the scene of the crime. “Go check out Demonica,” she said over her shoulder. “You won’t be sorry.”
Huh, he thought in the now-empty foyer with his tiny pumpkin in hand, I thought I opened the door for everyone, I never saw a demon. Shrugging, he threw back some more murderjuice and left his post to mingle.
#
From Sage’s foyer, Daniel walked through the double doorway into the living room, scanning the crowd until he spotted a demon-costumed guest among a group in the kitchen. She hadn’t come through the front door; he certainly would’ve remembered her.
First off she was tall. Like tall-man-tall, looming a full head and a half over most of the folks gathered around her. Sage was right, her costume was well-detailed, the mini-skirted haunches and sapphire-hued hooves especially. He made his way around couches and armchairs towards the kitchen for a better look. Cassandra’s high-pitched giggle followed him as Heaven’s Gate got to the punchline.
She was also blue. Horns peeked through Demonica’s midnight blue hair, her skin a slightly lighter shade warming to periwinkle across her cheeks. Even her eyes were indigo, all of them, even the whites. Contact lenses as well as the rest, then.
Daniel sidled up to the large pumpkin that was serving as the murderjuice’s punchbowl, and Demonica glanced at him and grinned, revealing pointed teeth. Behind her, a long tail twitched. He blinked, taking it in.
In the cramped kitchen, he refilled his pumpkin-cup and studied Demonica the best he could from his monocled side. Yes, that was a tail sprouting from her furry haunches, peeking out from under a leather miniskirt. As he ladled punch, he tuned into the conversation around Demon-lady.
“Is it some kind of prosthetic? Like, how did you attach it?” A curious Tank Girl reached out to touch the tail, but the thing twitched out of reach.
“Ah, ah, ah,” Demonica reprimanded the woman, shaking a blue-nailed finger in her face. “No touching unless I say so.”
“Sorry, it’s just so real-looking!” Tank Girl said, watching the tail like a cat at a fishtank.
“I’m rather attached to it,” Demonica conceded. Laughter rippled.
She leaned forward and her tank top, which read Property of the Wonderman, dipped down, affording all those looking (and it was all of them now) an enchanting view of her breasts, which were furry too.
This woman had spared no expense at the body art store.
“I do have a trick up my sleeve though. Would you like to see it?” she asked.
Tank Girl was almost drooling. She didn’t know where to look. “Oh, yes please. What…what did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t.” Demonica turned to the kitchen table filled to bursting with party accoutrements. “Too hard to pronounce.” She looked at Daniel and his cravat. “Nice tie, Monsieur.”
At the end of the table stood a miniature guillotine. Sage had used it to slice the tops off the pumpkin-cups as well as halve lemons and limes during party prep. God knows where she’d found it.
Demonica’s eyes lit upon it and she dragged it towards the edge of the table, making a path through bottles and plates and napkins as she did. By Daniel’s account she got it over there pretty quickly. It wasn’t light, he knew because he’d been the one to perch in its original position.
Demon-lady grabbed her tail and jammed the spade-shaped end through the hole under a small, sinister blade hanging eight and a half inches above it. She now had Daniel’s full attention. That blade was razor-sharp; it went through the tough rinds of limes like wire through brie.
There was a collective intake of breath. Daniel’s brows crinkled. It’s one thing to glue hair all over your boobs and put a working tail on your nether end, he thought, it’s quite another to chop the damn thing off. Shame to ruin it.
“Wha-ha ha,” Tank Girl chortled, half nerves, half murderjuice-inspired glee. “What are you doing?”
Demonica pinned her gaze on Daniel. “Exactly what it looks like.” With a flick of her finger, the wooden stopper popped out and the blade dropped.
The overhead kitchen light glanced off the blade as it sliced down in a half-second. There was a muted thunk and the crowd gasped. The end of the tail dropped to the table, wriggling like a landed fish. More gasps.
The tail that was still connected to Demonica whipped free of the miniature execution device, unperturbed. Daniel goggled as the chopped-off tip spasmed obscenely on the table like spit in a heated saucepan.
“But how, how can you—how does it—?” Tank Girl’s mouth was open. “How come it’s still moving?”
“Magic, cher.” Even Demonica’s tongue was blue. Maybe a blue raspberry lollipop? Talk about commitment to the bit. “Doesn’t bother me.” Demonica brushed the still-moving, shriveling end into the trash can at the end of the table. Then she grabbed her tail and brandished it at the a-gog spectators. They should’ve been looking at a stump with wires or felt sticking out of it, but they weren’t. Unbelievably, a new spade-shaped tip waggled in their faces. “Not a bit.”
Tank Girl looked like she might pass out.
Merde, Daniel thought in admiration. That’s pretty fucking cool.
#
Daniel found Sage an hour later on the upstairs landing, waiting for the bathroom. He couldn’t wait to tell her about Demonica. Unfortunately, she wasn’t in the mood.
“That bitch is ruining my goddamned party.” Sage’s eyes glowed in anger. She was swiping nonexistent lint from her costume.
“Who?” But Daniel already knew.
“The demon!” Sage pinned him with electric eyes. “De-mon-ic-a.” She drew out the name like a nine-year-old in a playground spat.
Daniel, in a bristle of anger, wanted to remind Sage that she was the one who’d coined that name. “I don’t know, she was pretty cool in the kitchen. She did this thing—”
“You too? I can’t believe it.” Sage clamped her hands on her hips, staring at him in defiance. “Look, if you want to be Boyfriend with a Big B and save my party from complete ruin, get rid of her!”
“But...but what’d she do?” Daniel asked.
A flush gurgled from inside the bathroom, the door opened, and Plague Doctor stumbled out. Sage didn’t even glance in his direction as he control-fell down the stairs. She stomped into the bathroom and swung the door shut, leaving Daniel in the hall.
He grumbled his way down the stairs and back into the melee. It was past one and the room still had decent energy, but it was right on the edge of lampshades-on-the-head shit. Daniel wondered if Sage was just being murderjuice-mean. Then he saw Demonica.
She was in the living room crouched next to Iron Maiden, a feat considering the unique construction of her costume’s hindquarters. Maiden was fixing up a beer bong as he sat on the sofa. He looked shaken, a little pale beneath his spikes, and for good reason. Instead of the cheap canned beer they’d been using, Iron Maiden was unhappily pouring Fireball into the funnel. He kept trying to lower the whiskey bottle before the tube was filled. But, somehow, Demonica’s tail kept pushing the bottle up.
“Holy shit,” said Maiden, “listen, Blue Lady, I don’t think this is a good idea. You could get alcohol poisoning or die from this.”
Demonica’s hand was wrapped around the end of the tube, blue-nailed thumb firmly pressed over its mouth. “Do you have a lighter?” she asked, ignoring his concern.
“A…lighter?” Maiden fumbled in his pocket before drawing out a pink lighter and holding it out. “Someone please call 9-1-1.”
Demonica put the tube to her mouth and pulled her thumb away. The Fireball disappeared in three long swallows. Daniel couldn’t believe it, the brown liquid just slid out of the tube and was gone, down into Demonica’s gullet. She snatched the lighter from Maiden, flicked it, and blew, emitting a flame-thrower jet of fire. Iron Maiden yelped and dodged just as the flame jet seared the couch, eating up the black paper bats hanging in the window behind it before leaping to the drapes.
I suppose I can understand why she’s not an ideal guest, thought Daniel as he watched the flames devour the drapes and lick the ceiling.
#
The fire was put out with little fanfare, although Sage was not stoked that her party almost literally went up in flames, and the crowd was too busy wowing at Demonica or asking one another who she was to be of much help.
“You have to do it now,” Sage hissed as they put the charred remnants of bats and drapes into a garbage bag. “I don’t care how cool or mysterious she is. Do. It. Now. It’s not just the party anymore, it’s my goddamned house.”
As Daniel scooped smoldering bits up with a dustpan, he was inclined to agree.
“Look, I got this.” She grabbed the dustpan out of his hands. “You go find her. And tell her to get lost!”
Daniel stared at the top of his girlfriend’s head as she leaned over to inspect her drapes. She noticed he hadn’t moved and hissed. “Now, Daniel, I mean it!”
It was a little before two am and the party had turned full haunted house. Most of the guests were dribbling out the open front door with the last smoke from Demonica’s stunt. There was a burnt hair stench in the living room, and Daniel wondered if Iron Maiden’s mohawk had gotten singed.
He stopped just beyond the empty kitchen in front of a back bedroom, or what Sage called her Creativity Cave. In it, she sewed and pasted and painted to her heart’s content. Daniel heard a noise from the Cave, a very distinctive giggle. Two guesses as to who it was. He just hoped she was alone. And that she hadn’t destroyed anything else. But mostly that she was alone.
Daniel stepped up to the door adorned with a prominent “No Trespassing” sign with a skull and crossbones (someone had obviously decided that this rule didn’t apply to them). He pushed it open to reveal the dark and cluttered space of Sage’s Cave, his eyes taking a moment to adjust. Then he saw her. Them.
She wasn’t alone.
Dammit.
Demonica was with the Plague Doctor of the awesome steampunk goggles, who was sprawled on an overstuffed armchair beneath her. Jeremy, Daniel suddenly recalled, a college pal of Sage’s. At the moment, he was in a very compromising position as Demonica leaned over him. Daniel couldn’t get a grip on what they were doing: Demonica looming, Plague Doctor’s legs sticking out like toothpicks, her twitching tail.
He thought maybe the two were making out until he heard a long sniff and Demonica straightened, holding two blue fingers to her nose. She noticed him and grinned maniacally, sharpened teeth glowing like they were under a black light.
“Hello, Beau, I thought you’d never get here,” she said, voice grating his spine like sandpaper.
“What are you doing?” Daniel stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. He felt guilty for some reason. “What are you doing to Jeremy?”
Demonica looked down at their comrade. “Is that his name?” She moved away from Plague Doctor, skirting a mannequin and stopping in front of Daniel. “I’m using him for my pleasure. That’s what I do.” They were eye-to-eye, exactly the same height.
Damn she’s tall, he thought.
“You want to know a secret?” she asked, running a talon under his cravat and sending chills down the back of his neck.
“You’re actually a demon?” he blurted. He hadn’t thought about that one, it had just popped out.
Demonica threw her head back and cackled. “Well, I was going to say that the Plague Doctor doesn’t have bergamot oil in that nose-beak-thing, only cocaine. But sure! We’ll go with yours. I’m a demon. And?’
“That’s…that’s it,” Daniel sputtered, confused. He felt pressure around his left knee and tried to look down but Demonica pushed his chin up with her pointer finger, nail digging in.
“No, cher, that’s not it.” She stared at him with her talon in his tender chin flesh, then sighed. “I’m your demon.” Her breath was hot cinnamon fury in his face.
“You’re what?” Wait. Hold on a sec. “My demon? What are you talking about? You’re high.”
The pressure around Daniel’s leg increased. She reached up and with a quick mean motion flicked the monocle, still firmly embedded in his eye socket. He flinched. Her tail tightened around his leg, pulling him in. “Didn’t you listen? The Comte de Saint-Germain? He didn’t wear the monocle to see better, connard, he wore it for effect!”
Daniel sucked in his breath. How could she know that?
“You’re my demon?” He whispered, incredulous.
“Oui, lucky me.”
“What are you good for?” He took a deep breath. “And how do I get rid of you?”
She snorted. “What am I good for? First off, I look fucking epic. Second, I’m great at a party.” She picked off the points on her fingertips. “No matter what Up-Tight says, I’m a lot of fun. And thirdly—and most importantly to you I would imagine—is the effect I have on the one who is in possession of the monocle.”
“The effect...” he began.
“Yes, slow-poke, the effect.” One midnight brow crooked up. “Remember how you felt after you put on the monocle the first time?”
Daniel recalled the rush of chills in the bathroom. “Good. Really good.”
“Yes. Quite. What I do is bestow my master —or mistress, equal opportunity demon here —with glamour. In the oldest sense of the word. A feeling of confidence and allure. To others you look ten feet tall and strapping, self-assured above all else. That’s what I do for you. Makes up for, y’know, the rest of it. The casualties.” She gestured at the Doctor, who was still flopped across the armchair, a smear of white on his long beak, his goggles askew.
Daniel was suddenly sickened by a terrible thought. “Is he…is he dead?” he whispered.
“No. Passed out.” She kicked one of Plague Doctor’s boots with a hoof. The Doc groaned and rolled his head the other direction. Daniel’s heart loosened its iron knot.
He thought back to his time in the foyer. He’d been invincible, unstoppable, a sally for every gal and a joke for every fella. Self-assured was right.
Demonica closed in on him again. “Why would you ever want to get rid of that feeling?”
At that moment, Sage hollered from the kitchen, “Dan-IEL!”
In the dark of the Cave, Daniel winced. “How do I get rid of you?”
“You’re sure?’ Demonica asked. The tail’s pressure on his upper thigh intensified and when he chanced a glance down, he saw the spade-shaped tip questing for his fly.
“No,” he said. “I’m not.”
“Of course not. You may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but you know what you want.” Demonica smiled, her incisors peeking over her blue bottom lip. “How about we give this a try.” She slipped a furry arm around his waist, whispering into his ear. In a few seconds it was like he was talking to himself. In a few more, he was.
#
Daniel found Sage furiously scrubbing a burnt pan at the kitchen sink. Her curls were plastered across her forehead and her dress was stained. She hadn’t noticed him yet and so he just stood there, watching her hectic jerking back-and-forth. Finally, she turned.
“Well?” she asked, wiping a wet wrist across her forehead and leaving a streak.
Daniel slipped an arm around her exactly as Demonica had moments ago and pushed her against the lip of the counter. “Well, what?”
Sage’s eyes went wide. “Did you get rid of her? Like I asked?”
You ordered me to, you didn’t ask. Daniel thought, but kept smiling. He leaned down to nip her earlobe and she gasped.
“Yes, cher, I did. She won’t be bugging you. She had to split.”
A smile finally graced her face. “Really? Oh thank goodness, no more property damage!”
“Hey, I got an idea,” Daniel went to the fridge for two last beers. “Let’s go to your roof and do some star-gazing.”
Sage gestured at her sink and the trashed living room. “I shouldn’t, there’s too much to clean up.”
“It’s not going anywhere. Fresh air will do us good.” Daniel grabbed her by the elbow, not waiting for an answer, and propelled her towards the stairs. “And we’ll be seeing Demonica next week,” he added as they climbed.
Sage startled, and turned to stare at him as they ascended. “What are you talking about, Daniel?”
“Don’t you remember?” Daniel asked, a sly grin sliding into place.
“I…I,” Sage snapped her mouth shut and considered the question. “Last time I saw her was after the drape massacre. Pray tell, why are we seeing her next week?” They paused on the landing.
Daniel gave angry Sage the once-over. He stepped closer so she could feel the full force of his power. Let’s have some fun. Damn if his eyeballs didn’t feel like they were friggin’ glowing. “You asked her to hang out, remember? When we were in your Creativity Cave?” He headed down the hall towards the French doors that gave them rooftop access via balcony.
Sage trotted after him, brow creased in confusion and head cocked like she was listening to distant thunder. “I did? When were we in there with her?”
Daniel opened the doors at the end of the second floor hallway. “Don’t pretend not to remember.” He let her step through into the chilled night air and followed. “You were very into the idea.” They stood together on the balcony and Daniel ran his fingertip over Sage’s lower lip and along her jawline. “You were enthusiastic about the three of us, how did you put it? Getting to know one another.”
Sage froze as the implications became clearer, and then shook it off, clambering onto the rickety ladder leading up to the roof, chiffon skirt and curls going every which-way in the breeze. “No. No way. Blue Lady? Demonica? I don’t go that way,” she muttered, eyes on her hands and feet as she climbed. “She is not my type. Impolite party guest? Please.”
“You don’t think so?” Daniel swung onto the ladder, glancing up at her swaying form.
Soon she disappeared over the lip of the roof, and Daniel joined her in a moment on the 16’ by 24’ slab of concrete that made up the elevated outdoor area. It was decorated with curb furniture, twinkle lights, and an indoor-outdoor rug that anyone could see was a bunch of yoga mats sewn together. Sage was lighting candles on the trunk in the middle, where previously burned wax pooled into a multi-colored frozen wave down one side of the trunk. Sage looked confused in the candlelight, and a little forlorn. Unsure of herself.
Daniel could feel the power pulsing through him as he sprawled onto a sunbleached rattan armchair that screeched in protest and almost gave up its ghost. Once the candles were lit, Sage perched on a stool near him, and played with the tassels on her shawl as she looked over the jewel-like lights of the neighborhood. They could see the bridge from here, and the city had lit it for Halloween in orange and black. He grabbed her hand and pulled her into his lap. He felt like he was the sun and Sage a light-starved plant. He could almost see tendrils pulling from his skin and wrapping around her body.
“Yes, cher. You seemed very excited about the idea.” Daniel grabbed her small pointed chin, looking deep into her eyes, where the last light of defiance was dwindling. “You made her promise. Next Thursday, at 9, she will be here,” Daniel lied. “Remember now?” On the last word, he pushed, all his energy tentacles wrapping around Sage as he pulled her into a hard kiss. No way was she getting out of this one.
Sage looked a little dazed when he broke away. “I guess so. Yeah. I guess I do remember,” she stuttered. “You and me and Demonica.” This time when she said it, the name sounded lyrical, poetical. “Thursday. My idea.”
That’s my girl. Daniel had convinced her. It had been that easy. Demonica was right: why would he ever want to give this up?
Sage snuggled closer, her small frame fitting neatly against his. “What’s gotten into you? You’re different.”
“Really.” It wasn’t a question. “And what do you think? Do you like the new Daniel?”
This time she smiled genuinely, the stress-crease between her brows smoothing out. “Love him.”
“Good,” Daniel said. He shifted as she leaned in, the icy ring of the monocle pressing into his thigh. “Because he’s here to stay.”
THE END
