The Unseen (24 page)

Kieran looked between them.  Matt and Deena waited calmly for his reaction.

“So you’re Satan worshipers?” he asked.  He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but he was definitely feeling confused. “That’s what you’re saying?”

“
We don’t use that word,” Deena said, and she glowered for a moment, and he realized that she could be sexy. “It’s used to besmirch the Undying, to portray him as what he is not.”

“
He is not the devil,” Matt said. “He is not at war with the creator—neither side is.  He has not been defeated, though his influence has been driven back by those who wish to return us all to blind ignorance and sheepish obedience.  The forces of Uriel have long been ascendant.  You see the results in the world around you, famine and wars, the rapid sense of decay.”

“
Haven’t you ever felt the world isn’t how it’s supposed to be?” Deena asked. “That things are far off course?”

“
Definitely,” Kieran nodded.

“
The Undying—Lucifer, though he has many other names, too—has a plan to open all the eyes of humanity.  He has sent us a messiah.  The messiah will drive back the forces of Uriel by making the unseen world seen to all people.  He will bring an age of enlightenment, knowledge, and for his disciples, immense power,” Matt told him, sounding very casual about it. “And from our talks with you, Kieran, we think you might be the messiah, or one of his disciples.”

“
Seriously?” Kieran wasn’t sure what to make of that.

“
It’s just a feeling.” Deena took Kieran’s hand and squeezed it.

“
Is this what you tell everyone?” Kieran asked.

“
Our private conversations stay private,” Deena said.

“
This is, like, a lot of stuff to think about,” Kieran said.  His head was starting to ache. “How am I supposed to believe it, anyway?  This is where you tell me to have faith or something?”

“
No.” Matt smiled. “We don’t expect you to believe anything on faith.  You can observe with your own eyes.”

“
Observe what?” Kieran asked.

“
Are you going to show him?” Deena whispered to Matt, her tone excited.

“
I’ll show him.” Matt leaned back in his seat.  He scratched his goatee, closed his eyes, and held out one hand, palm down.  He took a few long, deep breaths through his nose.

Kieran threw a questioning look at Deena, but she was staring at Matt, her eyes rapt, taking short breaths through her mouth and leaning forward on the edge of her seat.  It occurred to Kieran that she suddenly looked really, really horny.

Matt’s mouth opened and a strange sound buzzed out of it, like a thousand insect wings humming inside an echoing well.  Kieran felt something like a cold ripple pass through the room.

The cardboard boxes full of pamphlets and stickers shuddered and rose from the floor.  They continued rising, shifting unsteadily, until they levitated at eye level.

“What the fuck?” Kieran hopped out of his chair and walked around the levitating boxes, waving his arm.  Nothing was holding them up.  They turned and spun in the current from the air conditioner.

“
You see?” Matt had opened his eyes.  “It’s a small trick, but I think you get the point.  Discipleship brings power, Kieran.”

“
Power,” Deena breathed.  She’d risen and moved to stand over her husband, brushing his face with her fingertips and staring down at him as though in awe or in love.  The floating-the-boxes-in-the-air trick really turned her on, apparently.

“
Do you believe us now?” Matt asked, while Deena’s finger touched his lips.

“
Yeah,” Kieran said. “You’ve got something serious going here.”

“
I think we’ve made our point.” Matt clapped his hands, and the boxes crashed to the floor. “Any questions?”

“
I, uh...” Kieran shook his head.  He could barely think.  Had that really just happened?

“
I’m sure he’ll think of a few.” Deena approached Kieran, who was still looking down at the crashed boxes, and took his arm. “Want to hang out with the other kids in the activity room for a while?  The girls were talking about ordering pizza.  Does that sound fun to you?”

“
It does,” Kieran said, still in awe.  Then he thought about the chestnut-haired girl who’d blown him a kiss. “It definitely does.”

Cassidy arrived early at the restaurant on Friday night because she didn’t want Reese to watch her hobble into the place on her crutches.  She’d had her final physical therapy appointment during the afternoon, and her leg was in pain.  She hoped it was getting stronger and more flexible, but it certainly didn’t feel that way.

The Imperial Garden was lit mostly by hurricane lamps glowing softly on the individual tables.  It was dark and serene despite being crowded, an atmosphere created by low lights, carefully placed paper screens, soft woodwind and string music, and a few electric-powered rock waterfalls that seemed to absorb sound.

She’d called ahead to reserve a booth, but it wasn’t available yet, so she walked to the bar, leaned against one of two enormous dragon statues that served as support columns for the bar’s upper racks, and ordered a shot of
baijiu
, Chinese liquor made from fermented sorghum.  The warm, sweet drink helped steel her nerves.

Luckily, she was already at the booth table, crutches stashed and broken leg hidden out of sight, when Reese arrived.  Reese wore a professional black suit with matching heels and a white shirt, and her missing blue eye was replaced with a glass one.

Cassidy had taken extra time with her makeup and hair tonight, and had selected the best-looking blouse she had.  She didn’t want Reese looking at her with condescension or pity.

“
Cassidy!” Reese announced and waved as she walked over.  She hugged Cassidy around the shoulders. “It’s so good to see you.”

“
Hi, Reese,” Cassidy replied.

“
I love this place.  It’s so pretty.” A waiter appeared and asked for Reese’s drink order while he served her a tall glass of iced water. “Um, what are you drinking, Cassidy?”

“
Baijiu
.”

Reese snickered. “And that is...?”

“Chinese whiskey.”

“
Ooh.  Do you guys have like a virgin daiquiri?” she asked the waiter. “Like a strawberry one?”

“
We have black tea,” he replied.

“
Ooh, perfect.  That with a teensy pinch of sugar.  Thanks!” Reese slapped both hands on the table and leaned forward at Cassidy as the waiter left. “So!  Cassidy!  What have you been up to for six years?”

“
Just working, hanging out.” Cassidy was much more interested in the menu than in conversation with Reese.  She looked down the list of dim sum offerings—shrimp dumplings, rice noodle rolls, the c
har siu baau
buns with barbecued pork stuffing.  Her mouth watered.

“
What kind of work?” Reese asked.

“
I’m a tattoo artist.”

“
Aw, that’s so perfect for you!  You were always drawing and stuff.  I could never draw, I’m just not creative like that.”

“
So what have you been up to?” Cassidy asked, sipping her drink. “Besides fucking my boyfriend, obviously.”

“
Hey, that’s not fair!” Reese pouted. “We haven’t done that, or anything close to that.  He’s got broken ribs, anyway, so he couldn’t.  But he hasn’t tried.  And sure, if I knew he was your boyfriend, I would have acted a little differently.  But really I was just trying to help him.  The important thing is that all of this brought you and me back together again!”

“
Why?  How do you know him?”

“
I met him in the hospital when I was doing church outreach.”

Cassidy stared at her for a moment, then burst out laughing.  The waiter arrived with tea for Reese, more liquor for Cassidy.

“What’s so funny?” Reese asked.

“
Good luck with that.  He’s the most die-hard ‘scientific materialist determinist atheist’ you’ll ever meet.  And I want to order dim sum, it’s awesome here.  We’ll take the phoenix claws and fried octopus tentacles,” Cassidy told the waiter.  She didn’t like creepy seafood herself, but the grossed-out look on Reese’s face was completely worth it.

“
What are phoenix claws?” Reese whispered when the waiter left.

“
Deep-fried chicken feet in black bean sauce,” Cassidy told her, relishing again the look on Reese’s face. 
You’re paying for it, too,
Cassidy thought, with a little smile.

“
You know, you might be wrong about Peyton,” Reese said. “I think he might come around.”

“
Come around to what?”

“
To believing in the unseen world.”

“
Don’t hold your breath.  I remember you got really into church by the end of high school.  Sounds like you’re still doing that.”

“
You should understand better than most people,” Reese said. “After what happened that night, you know, I was looking for answers.  I’m sure we all were, in our own ways.”

Cassidy thought of Barb turning to witchcraft, but she only shrugged.

“I needed to know something out there was even bigger and more powerful than...that
being
that was inside me,” Reese continued. “It was so powerful I could feel it tearing me apart.  So I turned to religion for answers.”

“
And you found them?”

“
Not right away.  It was a winding road.  I went to my parents’ church, I went to Bible college...” Reese shook her head. “But that was where I ran into trouble.”

“
Trouble?” Cassidy smiled as the dim sum arrived, smiled a little more when Reese blanched at the little plates of chicken feet and deep-fried tentacle.  She beamed at the waiter. “This looks so great. For my entree, I’ll have the frog legs on lotus leaf.”

Reese shook her head and ordered steamed chicken with green vegetables, possibly the most boring item on the menu.

“So tell me how you got into trouble in Bible college.” Cassidy crunched into a chicken foot and leaned back, ready to be entertained.

“
Asking questions.”

“
That’ll do it.  You have to try these, they’re my favorite.” Cassidy slid the octopus tentacles across to Reese, who lifted her elbows from the table as though scared the food would grab her.

“
Maybe in a minute,” Reese said. “So one of the teachers was supposed to be an expert on demonic possession.  He’s supposedly cast out demons, like, all over the country.  I took his class on the devil, but it was mainly so I could go and talk to him about my experience.  So I went to his office and started talking.”

“
How did that go?”

“
He didn’t know anything!  I had a million questions.  I wanted details.  I wanted to know what the demons wanted, what they looked like in their natural form, what their own environment is like, what their names were, how specifically to deal with them if you encountered them.  I wanted to know everything.  And this guy just said too much knowledge was dangerous, especially for a
woman.
” Reese’s look of righteous outrage was so intense Cassidy almost laughed.

“
I’m sorry,” Cassidy said. “Phoenix claw?”

“
No, thank you.  But I found videos of him on YouTube doing his exorcisms, and all he ever did was basically say ‘I cast thee out, Satan!’ and smack people on the head.  I mean I don’t think he really
knew
anything.  And then I tried talking to other teachers, and they knew even less, and they all told me to just pray and not think about demons.”

“
But that didn’t work for you,” Cassidy said.  She poured another cup of the sorghum liquor from the little ceramic bottle on the table.  She was getting drunk and felt glad about it.  No hints of the transparent critters were visible in the air around them.

“
No, I needed answers!  And nobody understood.  So I had to think and think about it.”

Here’s where she loses her mind
, Cassidy thought.  She was starting to feel sorry for Reese, even if the girl had slept with her boyfriend by some bizarre and unlikely accident.

“
And I started to figure it out,” Reese said. “There
are
these huge supernatural forces and beings out there, but they don’t care about us.  They care about themselves and whatever it is they want.  Nobody’s going to drop down from heaven and help you just because some huge evil
thing
takes over your body.  No, you’re on your own.  The supernatural world is just like this one—you can’t expect anyone to be there for you, because you’re so insignificant.  Why would some ancient or immortal being really care about you?  Maybe the celestial beings are at war with each other, and we’re just the little pawns they use along the way.  Maybe we’re not even the pawns.  Maybe we’re the little insects on the ground, and they walk on us and never even know we’re here, not as individuals.  That’s what I think.”