As Jared walked away, Mr. Smith shouted, "Hey! Are you upset about something?"
"No, Dad. I'm not upset. I'm going to bed."
"Jared!" He called out, but his son continued toward the house without looking back or uttering a single syllable.
*
Leah yelled from the sofa, "Dad!"
Mr. Smith strolled into the living room with a partially eaten apple turnover in his hand. "What? I'm busy eating my snack," he teased.
"Shh. Listen."
"Listen to what?" Mr. Smith stepped farther into the room and stationed himself next to the coffee table. He trained his ear to the silence. Nothing. Then he heard it. The scurrying of little rodent feet.
"Is that a mouse?" He scanned the dark-mahogany hardwood flooring. The sound traveled from a corner to his left, along the far wall, then stopped near the fireplace. "Dammit. Don't tell me we have mice in the house."
"Ew. Dad. Find it and get it out of here!" Leah screamed as she ran out of the room.
Yet he found no mouse that night. Nor the next evening when the sound returned. Eventually the sound of scampering feet relocated to the foyer, then the stairs, and then the hallway on the second floor, increasing in volume and intensity as if the invisible mouse had grown to the size of medium-sized dog. A few nights later the sound returned one last time, and then they never heard it in the house again.
* * *
"Do you mention the mice," Lou asked, "because it was the first incident that seemed supernatural?"
"Yes. The strange things that occurred afterward led me to believe that the rodent noise was the first supernatural occurrence in the house. There's no other way to explain it."
"The noise never came back?"
"No."
"Did you hear other noises in the house?"
"Yes. Thumps and banging. And then later on there was"—he paused and cleared his throat—um, there were other noises."
* * *
Mr. Smith arrived home in the afternoon, intending to walk out onto the patio and check out the fence work by Jared and Adam. In the kitchen, he found Jared seated at the breakfast nook with his hand laid out in a pool of blood on the table.
"What the hell happened?"
Jared seemed dazed, his face and hair damp. "Um . . . huh?"
"Your hand. Why didn't you call me or your mother? You should have gone to the hospital." Mr. Smith peered out the window to the backyard. "Where's Adam?"
"Oh. His mom wanted him at home."
"You're going to need stitches." He pulled Jared to standing. "What did you cut yourself on?"
"A nail in the fence."
Mr. Smith shook his head. "Seriously, Jared? Use your brain. You need stitches and probably a tetanus shot."
Oblivious to the severity of his wound, Jared stared at the open laceration as if registering it for the first time.
Wrapping a kitchen towel around Jared's hand, Mr. Smith led his son out to his car and drove straight to the hospital.
*
Following dinner one evening, Jared suddenly appeared pale and sickly. When his mother asked if he was all right, he replied that he was. But when his father touched his son's arm, it was cold as ice even though he seemed to be sweating. Fearful that Jared was sick with a raging cold, he escorted Jared upstairs to his bedroom.
"You should take a hot shower," Mr. Smith said. "It'll warm your body, and you can sweat out some of the virus."
"I'm too tired."
"Just a quick shower. It will do you some good."
Yet Jared remained seated on the edge of the bed, making no effort to walk to the adjoining bathroom.
Mr. Smith worried that Jared's apparent inability to concentrate might be the result of a high fever. He tugged his son to his feet. "C'mon. I'll help you."
In the bathroom, he turned on the shower and then instructed Jared to get undressed, but his son stood stationary as though he had no clue what to do.
"Honestly, Jared. Did you forget how to take your clothes off?"
Still unmoving, Jared lifted his arms as if signaling his father to pull the T-shirt over his head.
Mr. Smith helped his son undress and then guided him to the shower like he used to do when Jared was a little boy. "All right, son. Get in. You don't even have to wash. Just stand under the water for a little bit. You'll feel better if you do."
"I need to piss."
"Okay, well, pee first or just go in the shower."
Gripping his penis, Jared released a heavy stream of urine onto the tile floor.
"Dammit, Jared! What the—I'm sorry. You're sick, buddy. You're not yourself. I'm sorry. Don't worry about it. I'll clean it up. Just get in the shower, okay?"
While Jared sat under the jet of water, Mr. Smith pulled a towel out of the hamper to clean the floor. He heard Jared giggle.
"Are you all right in there?" he called out.
The giggling suddenly stopped.
A few minutes later, Mr. Smith dried his son's body and then ushered him to the bed. After placing Jared under the comforter, he sat on the edge of the bed, brushing the hair from Jared's forehead to check for a fever. He promised to check on him every couple of hours through the night. If Jared worsened, he'd rush his son to the hospital.
Once he was certain that Jared had fallen asleep, he quietly crossed the room. Before he closed the door, he could have sworn he heard Jared mumble something to the effect of: "I can see him in the fire."
The next morning Jared was his usual, happy, healthy self again.
* * *
With a crinkled brow, Lou said, "I can see him in the fire?"
"I'm pretty certain that's what he said."
"At that time, did you have any guesses about what he was referring to?"
Mr. Smith stared at his hands as he rubbed his thumbs together. "Of course not. I chalked it up to delusions because of the sickness."
"And now, what do you think?"
"I think it was the beginning of the takeover."
"The takeover by a demon?"
For a few seconds, Mr. Smith remained
