Breathless (19 page)

"I have to get this monitor off," said Jason. "I'm going to pull over."

It made me nervous to be stopped, but Jason was right. Wherever we went with that thing on him, we'd have a homing beacon.

Jason pulled the car over onto the shoulder and switched on the overhead light.

"How are you going to take it off?" I asked.

"I could do it with scissors," he said. "How likely is it that there are scissors in this car?"

I searched the glove compartment. "There's a nail file," I said.

"Give it to me."

Jason struggled with the monitor for a long time, but only succeeded in breaking the nail file.

"I need something stronger," he said, looking around the car. "What's in the glove compartment?"

"Tissues. Owner's manual. Ice scraper."

"How big is the ice scraper?"

I showed it to him. It was one of those plastic hand-held kinds. It said "World's Greatest Dad" on it. It was maybe eight inches long.

"I'll try it," he said. He took the ice scraper and wedged it between the monitor and his leg. "See, I think if I could just apply enough pressure, I could snap it off," he said.

Instead, the ice scraper snapped in two. "Damn it!" said Jason. "There anything else in there?"

"A mini-maglite," I said.

"Yes," he said. "That."

At first Jason couldn't get the maglite flashlight between the monitor and his ankle.

But then he forced it in, and when he did, the monitor's rivets popped away from the bracelet and the monitor fell off his leg. "Success!" said Jason, high-fiving me. I grinned.

Jason got out of the car and placed the monitor under one of the wheels. Then he got back in and ran over the thing. We heard it crunch as we pulled away.

"Now," said Jason. "You need clothes, and we'll eventually run out of gas, and then we won't have a car. So...basically we need money."

Suddenly, I knew where we could go. "I have an idea," I told Jason.

* * *

"I can't believe you know where she lives," said Jason.

"It's downtown Bramford," I said. "Everybody knows where she lives."

"I still think this is weird."

"She said I could come to her," I said. "And she wasn't at the crazy ritual-thing tonight, so we know she's not a Satanist. She can get us help."

"I think we should just hold up a convenience store for cash," Jason said.

"That will get us arrested," I said. "Let's not break the law, okay?"

"I just crushed an ankle bracelet in case you don't remember," he said. "I'm pretty sure that's gonna get us arrested."

"Whatever," I said, getting out of the car.

Jason followed suit. We climbed the steps up to Ms. Campbell's front door and rang the doorbell. For a long time, nothing happened.

Then a man opened the door. He wasn't wearing a shirt, just a pair of jeans with holes in them.

Jason looked at me, as if to say, "Are you sure we have the right house?"

I didn't know either. As far as I knew, Ms. Campbell didn't have a husband. "Um," I said, "we're looking for Ms. Campbell."

"Jenna!" called the man over his shoulder. "I think some of your students are here."

Ms. Campbell appeared at the top of a staircase, which was visible from the door. She was wearing a long t-shirt that came to her knees. It said in upside down letters, "If you can read this, put me back on the bar stool." Ugh. Ms. Campbell drank? I guessed she really wasn't that old. "Azazel? Jason?" she said. "What are you doing here?"

She hurried down the steps, pushing the man out of the way. "Well, come in," she said. "Jesus, Azazel, what are you wearing?"

She ushered us inside and pulled the door closed after us.

"We're sorry we woke you up," I said.

"Oh no," she said. "We were awake. We were—no, we were asleep. We were very asleep." She looked flustered. "This had better not be some sort of Halloween prank. I will flunk you both, don't think I won't."

"Not a prank," I said. "We're really sorry."

"Well, it's okay. I guess. Are you two okay?"

"Not really," said Jason.

"No, huh?" She nodded. "Let's sit down."

She flicked on some lights and led us into her living room, which was a total mess.

There were clothes strewn over the couches, dirty dishes piled on the coffee table, a bag of chips sitting on the floor. Ms. Campbell started picking things up off the couches so that we could sit down.

"I wasn't really expecting company," she said.

"It's okay," I said.

"Sit down," she told us. "I'm gonna go put on some pants."

She disappeared out of the living room for a second.

We were left with the shirtless guy. "I'm gonna go with her," he said.

Alone, I made an apologetic face at Jason. "Maybe this wasn't a good idea," I said.

"Why, because we probably interrupted Ms. Campbell and her boyfriend?" he asked.

"You didn't think she was a nun, did you?"

"Ugh." I shuddered. "I just don't want to think about anybody else having any sex tonight at all."

"Noted," said Jason.

Ms. Campbell reappeared. She was wearing a different shirt and a pair of jeans. The man was wearing the shirt she'd been wearing. They sat down on the opposite couch from us.

"So," said Ms. Campbell. "What's up?"

"Everyone in town is a Satanist," I said.

"You said this wasn't a Halloween prank," she said.

"It's not," I said. "They forced me to wear this robe and made me drink weird stuff out of a chalice and tried to force me to ritualistically kill Jason."

Ms. Campbell sat back on the couch. She turned to her boyfriend. "Kevin?" she said.

"Can you get me another beer?" She looked at us. "You guys want...? No, wait.

You're underage. I shouldn't be drinking in front of you."

"It's okay," I said.

"Really," said Jason. "This whole night has been too weird for anything to shake us."

"Well," she said. "Since I'm already kind of drunk anyway..."

Ms. Campbell was drunk? Was nothing sacred?

Kevin went into the kitchen and came back with two open beer bottles. Ms. Campbell took a long swig. "Okay, then," she said. "So, you were captured by Satanists."

"I didn't know they were Satanists," said Jason. "And they were trying to kill me?

Really?"

I started at the beginning. Told them all the whole story, including the fact that I'd found out Lilith and Toby were screwing around behind my back. When I was finished, Ms. Campbell was on her second beer.

Jason looked appalled, and Kevin was staring at me like I was from another planet.

Ms. Campbell stood up. "Okay," she said. "Okay. Um, first, Azazel, I'm gonna get you some clothes. They'll probably be big on you, but they'll be better than that robe thing."

While I changed in Ms. Campbell's bathroom, I could hear her talking in the living room.

"What am I gonna do?" she was saying. "I don't know what to do. I mean, who do I call? I can't call her parents. They're the ones who are doing this crap."

I emerged from the bathroom in a slightly baggy pair of jeans and t-shirt. Ms.

Campbell had given me a sports bra, which fit me okay. I felt much better now that I was clothed.

"I'm sorry," I said to her. "We never should have come here." In the classroom, Ms.

Campbell had seemed like an authority figure, with power. Now, I realized she was just a person, and that she was only six or seven years older than us. She was just as floored by all of this as we were.

"No," said Ms. Campbell, "you did the right thing. I'm a teacher. You trusted me. You came to me for help. That's good. It means I'm doing my job, I'm just..." She trailed off. "You mean your dad, Daniel Jones, and the principal, and like the entire administration, they're all Satanists?"

I nodded.

"Actually," she said, "that explains a lot." She shook her head in amazement. "Okay,"

she said. "I'm gonna make some calls. You guys sit tight. Um, I think I have some stale chips somewhere if you're hungry." And she disappeared into the kitchen.

Finally, she returned. "It's okay," she said. "Some people are coming. Authority-type people who deal with this kind of thing. We'll get this figured out."

Maybe it hadn't been a horrible idea coming here. Maybe everything was going to work out.

"I should get rid of the beer bottles," said Ms. Campbell, gathering them up.

"So," said Kevin to me, "you've lived in West Virginia you're whole life?"

I nodded.

"People really are whack-jobs, here, huh?" he asked.

Jason shrugged. "Well, they seemed very nice at first."

"Right," said Kevin.

Ms. Campbell came back into the living room. "God," she said. "My apartment's a wreck. This is so embarrassing." She peered out her window. "Oh, I think a police car's pulling up already. That was fast."

"Police?" I said.
"Local
police?"

"I guess so if they responded so quickly," she said.

"Who exactly did you call?" Jason asked.

"Um, I called Cora. Cora Ridgely, the counselor at our school," she said.

"Oh no," I said. "She was there, tonight. She's one of them."

Ms. Campbell shrugged. "Well, we weren't all there tonight, Azazel," she said. "I hadn't seen Kevin in weeks, and it was Halloween."

"We?" I said, a sinking feeling developing in my stomach.

Kevin spread his hands. "Hail Satan, kids," he said, grinning.

No. No, this was not happening.

I looked at Jason. His face was strained. I had to be the stupidest person on earth.

"It's everyone in town, isn't it?" I said.

"Yeah," said Ms. Campbell. "Hey, for what it's worth, you've probably had so much luck so far because you're imbued with the spirit of Azazel. You may not think that ritual worked, but—"

"Shut up," said Jason. "And Robert Herrick was not a dirty old man, okay?" He grabbed my hand. "Back door," he said.

And we were running.

We burst through the back door of Ms. Campbell's apartment and into the alley behind it. Jason gripped my hand as our feet pounded against the pavement. Jason ran fast. I struggled to keep up.

They were pursuing us. Though I didn't look back, I could hear the screen door of Ms.

Campbell's back door slamming and the footsteps behind us.

Jason darted down streets, taking turns at random, still holding onto my hand tightly.

He was trying to lose them. Trying to take so many turns that they couldn't follow.

But they were right behind us, and it wasn't working. I was out of breath. Jason was in much better shape than I was. I felt like an iron fist was closing over my lungs. I didn't know how much longer I could keep this up.

"Stop or I'll shoot!" called a voice behind us.

Shoot? Would they really shoot us? I was the vessel, wasn't I? That had to count for something.

Jason abruptly turned onto a side street, pulling me with him. However, instead of continuing to run, he flattened us against the side of a house. Jason stood at the corner, his face trained on the street.

What was he going to do?

I tried not to breathe too loudly, but I couldn't help it. Jason didn't seem to notice my noisy panting. He was too busy watching the street.

Within a few moments, one of the deputies rounded the corner.

Jason dashed towards him. The deputy was startled to see Jason coming at him. He'd thought we were still running up the street. Jason tackled him. The deputy went down.

There was a frenzied struggle, a tangle of limbs—Jason's and the deputy's.

Then Jason got to his feet, holding the deputy's gun. He leveled the gun at the man.

"Jason!" I said.

Jason pulled the trigger anyway.

The deputy screamed.

I covered my mouth in horror.

Jason came for me again. "I just shot his leg," he said in answer to my expression, tucking the gun into the waist of his pants.

And we were running again.

A police car raced by on the street perpendicular to us, its sirens wailing. Another car screeched to a halt at the end of the street we were running down, blocking our exit.

Jason turned left, down a different street, but there was a car blocking the end of that street too.

We stopped.

They were blocking us in!

We ran back up the street and back the way we came, but there was the police car I'd seen racing by us.

Jason's eyes swept the area. I could tell he was searching for a way out, the way he always did. He didn't see one. Cars blocked off all of the streets around us. "Damn it,"

said Jason.

He pulled out the gun he'd stolen from the deputy.

"Jason, what are you going to—"

"They're trying to kill me," he said. "At this point, it's all self-defense."

"Don't," I said. I didn't like the idea of Jason with a gun, even though he seemed to know what he was doing with one. He looked comfortable with a gun in his hand, as if he'd held guns tons of times before.

Jason kept me close. One hand held mine. The other held the gun. We stood in the intersection of two streets, and watched as people got out of each of the cars that were parked at the end of all of our exits.

They were coming at us from four directions. Jason pivoted, leveling his gun at first one direction and then another.

"Don't shoot anyone," I begged him. I didn't know why. These people were clearly crazy. But they used to be my family and friends. And shooting people was...

"Azazel, do you want to get out of here alive?" asked Jason.

"Yes," I said.

"Okay, then," he said. And he shot someone.

Down one of the streets, I saw a figure crumple.

"Oh my God," I whispered.

"All of you stop," yelled Jason, aiming his gun at another approaching figure.

They kept coming.

"Did you...kill him?" I managed.

"No," he said to me in irritation. "I've been shooting guns since I was five. Give me some credit."

Five?

"I'll shoot someone else," Jason threatened in a loud voice.