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Authors: J.A. Kazimer
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form of Lilith to our doorstep rocked my
otherwise iffy mental state.
47
I picked my way through the rest of my apartment. Someone had
searched it, knocking over my milk-crate dresser and cardboard-box
bookcase. The kid’s crib lay smashed on the floor. His ragged teddy bear, the
only toy he owned, lay decapitated in the corner. I focused on the bear parts,
channeling my rage.
From the kitchen counter my cell phone rang. I swallowed hard,
listening to God’s ringtone, Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door. Fuck. Could this
day get any worse? A small explosion on the street below answered that
question.
48
Fourteen
I ran for the window. Four stories below, Lilith stumbled to her feet,
the big-ass gun smoking in her hands. The barrel swung toward Mary once
more.
“No!” I yelled through the closed window. Lilith glanced up, her face
burning with rage, eyes glowing like diamonds. Why the fuck was she mad?
I was the one who had been drugged and locked underground for two days,
not her.
She turned to Mary, and the boom of the big-ass gun rocked the
street, setting off car alarms and fits of dogs barking. Lilith flew backward
ten feet landing hard on the ground. But Mary remained standing. How? Had
Lilith missed? It didn’t seem possible.
I ran from my apartment and down to the street, pulling my nine-
millimeter before exiting the building. I frowned, watching as Lilith’s pale
blue Gremlin disappeared around 11th street.
Mary ran to me, her face pale, limbs trembling. I folded her into my
body, running my hands over her unmarked skin. No bullet holes. No blood.
I lifted my dog-tagged talisman from around her neck and smiled. I’ll be
damned. It worked .
“What happened?” I tilted her chin to face me.
“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “One minute I was standing
there, waiting for you, and the next your girlfriend started shooting.”
“She’s not my girlfriend,” I mumbled.
“Then who is she, and why did she try to kill me?”
“I wish I knew.”
~ * ~
Back inside my apartment, a barely audible twerp echoed from the
mobile phone in my pocket. I glanced at Mary, checked the caller ID, and
flipped it open with a mixture of dread and inevitability. If I didn’t answer
they would only call back, and keep calling back until I finally answered or
shot myself.
“Hey, Mom,” I said into the phone. “I’m kind of busy right now.”
Like that mattered. My mother was a talker, and that trait exploded when her
49
first-born son answered the phone.
“I’ll just be a minute, Jace, baby. I miss you. We all miss you. When
are you going to come home? Last week I ran into.”
I tuned out, picturing the house I’d grown up in with its pink
flamingos and white picket fence on a couple of acres of farmland in the
middle of Nowhereville, St. Francis, Wisconsin, population 8,800, and
growing smaller as years passed.
“And your father said to the reverend.”
Stepfather, I nearly corrected but swallowed the bitterness that
haunted most of my childhood. Don’t get me wrong, Joe was the perfect
father. He loved me like his own kid. He took me to baseball games, and
taught me to target shoot. But he wasn’t biologically mine. I’d grown up
longing for a nameless, faceless ‘real’ father.
My brothers took after Joe, each blond and big. I, on the other hand,
resembled anyone from the mailman to my high school principal. My mom
swore my biological father was a Peace Corps volunteer passing through our
small town, but I had my doubts.
My mom had met Joe while giving birth to me at the hunting &
fishing department at Wal-Mart. An electrician by trade, Joe worked part-
time as a salesman at the store and had just come on shift when my mom’s
screams rocketed from the aisle.
The rest, my parents claim, is history, but I knew better. I owed Joe
more than I would ever be able to repay. He had given me his name and his
love without condition, and I had failed him
otherwise iffy mental state.
47
I picked my way through the rest of my apartment. Someone had
searched it, knocking over my milk-crate dresser and cardboard-box
bookcase. The kid’s crib lay smashed on the floor. His ragged teddy bear, the
only toy he owned, lay decapitated in the corner. I focused on the bear parts,
channeling my rage.
From the kitchen counter my cell phone rang. I swallowed hard,
listening to God’s ringtone, Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door. Fuck. Could this
day get any worse? A small explosion on the street below answered that
question.
48
Fourteen
I ran for the window. Four stories below, Lilith stumbled to her feet,
the big-ass gun smoking in her hands. The barrel swung toward Mary once
more.
“No!” I yelled through the closed window. Lilith glanced up, her face
burning with rage, eyes glowing like diamonds. Why the fuck was she mad?
I was the one who had been drugged and locked underground for two days,
not her.
She turned to Mary, and the boom of the big-ass gun rocked the
street, setting off car alarms and fits of dogs barking. Lilith flew backward
ten feet landing hard on the ground. But Mary remained standing. How? Had
Lilith missed? It didn’t seem possible.
I ran from my apartment and down to the street, pulling my nine-
millimeter before exiting the building. I frowned, watching as Lilith’s pale
blue Gremlin disappeared around 11th street.
Mary ran to me, her face pale, limbs trembling. I folded her into my
body, running my hands over her unmarked skin. No bullet holes. No blood.
I lifted my dog-tagged talisman from around her neck and smiled. I’ll be
damned. It worked .
“What happened?” I tilted her chin to face me.
“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “One minute I was standing
there, waiting for you, and the next your girlfriend started shooting.”
“She’s not my girlfriend,” I mumbled.
“Then who is she, and why did she try to kill me?”
“I wish I knew.”
~ * ~
Back inside my apartment, a barely audible twerp echoed from the
mobile phone in my pocket. I glanced at Mary, checked the caller ID, and
flipped it open with a mixture of dread and inevitability. If I didn’t answer
they would only call back, and keep calling back until I finally answered or
shot myself.
“Hey, Mom,” I said into the phone. “I’m kind of busy right now.”
Like that mattered. My mother was a talker, and that trait exploded when her
49
first-born son answered the phone.
“I’ll just be a minute, Jace, baby. I miss you. We all miss you. When
are you going to come home? Last week I ran into.”
I tuned out, picturing the house I’d grown up in with its pink
flamingos and white picket fence on a couple of acres of farmland in the
middle of Nowhereville, St. Francis, Wisconsin, population 8,800, and
growing smaller as years passed.
“And your father said to the reverend.”
Stepfather, I nearly corrected but swallowed the bitterness that
haunted most of my childhood. Don’t get me wrong, Joe was the perfect
father. He loved me like his own kid. He took me to baseball games, and
taught me to target shoot. But he wasn’t biologically mine. I’d grown up
longing for a nameless, faceless ‘real’ father.
My brothers took after Joe, each blond and big. I, on the other hand,
resembled anyone from the mailman to my high school principal. My mom
swore my biological father was a Peace Corps volunteer passing through our
small town, but I had my doubts.
My mom had met Joe while giving birth to me at the hunting &
fishing department at Wal-Mart. An electrician by trade, Joe worked part-
time as a salesman at the store and had just come on shift when my mom’s
screams rocketed from the aisle.
The rest, my parents claim, is history, but I knew better. I owed Joe
more than I would ever be able to repay. He had given me his name and his
love without condition, and I had failed him
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