Possessed

lots of mistakes. He didn’t know about the voices. He thought I could read minds.”

Cass shuffled back against the white wall as the monster moved closer to her. One step, then another. The urge to panic was escalating. She didn’t know what to do. Which one to focus on. The dead. Or the living.

“So I just started walking up and down, up and down on the street where you were supposed to be. That’s when I found the New Age shop. The lady who worked inside was a witch. I thought you could be a witch. Witches have powers, right?”

“Only in books.” Cass closed her eyes as she listened to Chris recount Lauren’s last minutes on earth.

“I followed her home and when I saw she lived on Addison, I thought it could be you. She was so nice. I said I was like her, and she thought that meant that I was a witch, too. She invited me in for tea, but when I asked her if she could hear Daddy, she…she said she couldn’t.”

“You didn’t have to kill her.”

“You don’t know what it’s like!” Chris shouted back. “You can’t understand what it is to hear him every day. Sha-a uh-h-h, Sha-a uh-h-h. You know what he’s saying, don’t you? Shut up. Over and over again. Shut up. I have to take their tongues. It makes him quiet when I do it.”

“No,” Cass countered. In her mind, she focused on the monster that hovered over her, waiting to serve up his next blow. To inflict pain. That’s what it wanted to do. That’s what his daughter had learned from him. “I don’t think that’s true. I think you do it because you liked hurting those women. I think you do it because you want others to suffer like you did. You took that other woman’s tongue while she was still alive.”

Chris shrugged. “She was nasty. I heard her mother in my head. So I did a reading for her. Me reading for the psychic.” She giggled. “But she didn’t like what I had to say. She didn’t like that I had the power and she didn’t. That’s how I knew she was a fake. I had to kill her. Just for that.”

Cass gasped as the beast’s hoof slammed into her stomach. Her body screamed out at the brutal punishment, and for a time she couldn’t see anything at all except his arm swinging at her over and over again. She couldn’t hear anything except for the muted roars of a tongueless beast.

Sha-a uh-h-h. Sha-a uh-h-h.

It was enough to drive a person insane.

You can fight him, Cassie. You can fight him off. You know how. You just need to be strong. I believe in you. I’m so sorry I didn’t before. But I’m here now. I won’t leave you again.

The voice in her head echoed over the muted roars of Chris’s father. It was coming from outside of her white room, just beyond the open door. She had never let her grandfather get through. She’d never listened to him, never let herself hear his pleas for forgiveness. Partly because she didn’t want to forgive him. And partly because she couldn’t forgive herself.

He had been dying and still she wouldn’t go see him. They had buried him, and she was not there. For what? A grudge. In the end it seemed like such a trivial reason.

Gramp? Cass tried to concentrate. In the room, she shuffled away from the beast toward the open door. It howled, but she closed her mind to it and instead tried to focus on letting her grandfather come through.

You can fight him.

He’s too strong.

He’s not. Only in your head. Only because you let him be.

He’s a monster.

No, he’s just a man. See the man. Remember what you were taught.

Cass looked up at the beast, its foul face moving closer to her with each step it took. There was nothing there that resembled a human. Nothing that she could see. A faint whisper of smoke drifted in front of her, forcing her back into reality.

“We need them to think you’re dead. Burned up.”

Cass watched as Chris dumped a packet of matches into the smoke smoldering on the futon, and suddenly the smoke turned to flames. Flames that were eating up the cushions at an alarming rate.

“This will work,” Chris said. “This will work perfectly. There will be a fire. Nobody will find your body, but they’ll have to think that you’re dead.”

“What does that get you?”

“That gets me you. Forever. We’ll go someplace. Somewhere where we can hide. And you’ll keep Daddy occupied and I’ll be free. That’s all I wanted. It’s all I wanted when I killed him. All I wanted when I went to the institute. And now I have a chance. You’ve given me that chance.”

“People will look for me,” Cass breathed even as she mentally pulled herself into a ball inside the room. It was coming for her again. It wanted to hurt her again. She didn’t know how much more she could take.

“No, everything will be gone. This building will be gone. Everyone will think you’re dead.”

The flames continued to feed off the wood frame, and Cass could see Chris watch the fire growing, her attention for the moment occupied. Cass needed to act now. She tried to make a break for the apartment door, but when she rolled onto her knees to get to her feet, the beast struck again. Mentally and physically, she was once again down.

“I have friends. I have friends that are coming.” Dougie was coming, wasn’t he? Cass thought numbly. And Malcolm would call again soon. She was sure of it. All she needed to do was hold on.

“We’ll be gone before they get here,” Chris assured her. “I just want to watch the fire. It’s so pretty. I didn’t used to like it. Daddy one time burned my hand with a match. He wanted to teach me that playing with fire was bad.”

“I’m sorry,” Cass said. “I’m so sorry he hurt you. That doesn’t mean you have to do this. Help me. Help me stop him.”

Chris turned away from the fire that had now consumed the futon and was moving onto the old rug. The apartment was quickly full of smoke, and Cass felt the heat in her throat. Chris started to cough, too, but she didn’t seem to be in any hurry to escape.

“I told you I can’t. He’s too strong. You’ll just have to learn how to deal with the pain. Me and Mommy did. We were one big, happy family. One big, happy, hurting family.” Chris coughed again as the smoke became that much thicker. She reached into her jeans pocket and pulled out a worn and tattered piece of paper. She held it out for Cass, who was still on the floor.

It was a picture. A picture of three people.

“See, just one big, happy family. Of course you can’t tell from this, but Daddy had beaten me up pretty good the night before. I have all sorts of bruises under my dress.”

Cass squinted against the smoke and looked hard at the photo. Not at the girl in the dress with the sad expression on her face. Not at the fragile woman standing just behind her. She looked at the man. He was short and pudgy. Balding with a weak chin and beefy hands that he had clenched into fists.

He was just a man.

Instantly, the beast inside her white room transformed. The tusks receded. Hooves turned into hands. The snout was gone, to be replaced by a broad nose and a weak chin, and suddenly Cass found herself confronted with nothing more than a man.

A man she could fight.

She pushed herself back onto her feet and slid out from the corner of her white room.

You’re not so tough now.

Sha-a uh-h-h! Sha-a uh-h-h!

Internally, Cass moved closer to him. She felt strong. She felt…invincible.

It’s your room, isn’t it? You can do anything you want inside it. Malcolm’s words returned to her, as did his instructions. Stay on the balls of your feet, keep your target in sight and swing from your gut.

Cass swung her fist in an arc and felt contact with the man’s face. He was taller than she was but not by that much. She landed a right and left to his head and then an uppercut into his soft, fat belly.

Dancing around him, infused with a power that she was only starting to comprehend, she raised her foot and sent it into his backside. He toppled over onto his belly, and she moved on him with a swift kick right to his groin. He squealed and then he was the one curling himself into a ball.

What’s the matter? You can dish it out, but you can’t take it?