Ezzie lay in her pool of water, purple flowers and ice chunks floating in it, despite how hot the water was, but no matter what she was always cold. She shivered, willed the warmness of the water to seep into her sallow skin and into her bones. Broken brick walls surrounded her, and water dripped from the rusted faucet of her tub, loud in the silence. Above her, above the broken roof, gray fog swirled.
Hollowness filled Ezzie, and a deep hunger she always felt, even after drinking her one vial of blood a day. She limited herself to only one. She wanted her sisters to see the hollowness and sadness she always felt in the pit of her empty stomach, but they didn’t understand, and Ezzie couldn’t blame them because she didn’t understand either.
“What’s wrong with me?” she whispered, touching one of the purple flowers with her bony fingers.
She thought she’d wither away into nothing before her sisters saw that there was something deeply wrong inside of her. It was in her mind and in her heart and in her stomach.
Of course they noticed she wasn’t drinking enough. Of course they noticed that, but they didn’t know why, not even Rosalie, who knew everything. And of course Ezzie didn’t know what was really wrong with her.
She sighed and dipped her head under the water, wetting her knotty pink hair completely. She never brushed her hair. When she came up for air she decided it was time to walk the fog lands alone, to get to that abandoned city she always liked visiting.
She stood up, naked and shivering, and grabbed a towel off the concrete floor—pale yellow with daffodils on it. She toweled herself off and her wet, dripping hair, and stepped out of her pool of warm water, the concrete cold on her bare feet. She quickly dressed—long flowy green blouse over light blue, holey jeans and put on her brown sandals.
She looked longingly at her pool of warm water, at the ice chunks floating in it and the pale purple flowers and sighed. She wished something would make her warm. It was time to go.
Ezzie avoided Luna and Amelia and Rosalie and the temptation of the fountain of blood and left their little oasis through a back way, all concrete and broken bricks, and entered the fog lands. Fog swirled around her, gray and smelling wet and cold. She shivered again as she walked further into it.
She knew the dangers of walking the fog lands alone—bad men lurked in it, eager to collect unique creatures and things, and strange six-legged creatures scurried away, and there was always the danger of walking through a portal into one of the spinning worlds, but Ezzie had walked this path many times before, memorized every rock and boulder and gray arch that led into a spinning world, the arches melding in with the gray fog. Her sisters didn’t like her walking the fog lands alone.
“It’s too dangerous. The spinning worlds—” Rosalie had said.
“The bad men will get you!” Luna had said.
And Amelia had never said anything at all, too busy looking at her reflection in the hand mirror she always held.
They sat around the fountain, drinking cups of blood, faces chubby and rosy and healthy, and Ezzie was more than aware of her gaunt face and bony frame. She didn’t even need to look in Amelia’s hand mirror to know this, and she didn’t like looking at her reflection anyway.
“I’ll be fine,” she always said, uncertain if she would be or not but not really caring. She needed to get away from temptation. She needed to get away from the fountain of blood and the temptation it spewed.
Now she walked the fog lands alone, carefully avoiding every rock and boulder, and an archway into a spinning world, pale gray and almost melding in with the fog. The abandoned city wasn’t too far away. She shivered as the fog swirled around her, longing to be back in her warm pool, even if it didn’t offer much warmth.
#
The abandoned city had once been an oasis, but now it lay in ruin, the occupants of it mysterious and long gone. Ezzie walked its cracked and broken streets, feet quiet in the silence of the city, tall broken buildings rising on either side of her. She liked walking further and further into the city, each time she visited it, tempting the danger of getting lost forever in it. Fog swirled around her and around the buildings, and above that the sky was dark and dotted with bright stars. She entered one of the massive buildings, which must have once been an apartment complex, that now lay forgotten. She’d never been in this particular building before, but it looked promising and interesting, and quietly she walked down the dimly lit hallway, carpet moldy and wet from the encroaching fog. Paint flaked off the walls, water stained yellow from the dampness. She didn’t dare the stairway or the elevator, and entered one of the first floor apartments instead.
The door creaked as she opened it, loud in the silence and stillness and Ezzie smelled mold. A six-legged creature scurried past her legs and disappeared down the dimly lit hallway behind her.
Ezzie stepped inside and silently closed the door behind her.
The room she now stood in was empty, walls water stained and a huge window off to the side broken and revealing the equally broken street outside. She doubted anyone had been in this room in centuries. In an eternity. She wondered about its previous occupants.
A book sat on the floor, covered in mold, as though it had been perfectly set there for her to find it.
“That’s strange,” she whispered.
She knelt down on the moldy carpeting and picked it up. It was heavy and damp in her hands and made her shiver. The book had no title. Inside the pages were yellowed, and her heart skipped a few beats as she read the words out loud—whispered them, so the bad men wouldn’t overhear if they lurked anywhere nearby.
“Where the rivers flow with sweet blood.”
The mortal world. The book talked about the mortal world. Ezzie didn’t really know what that was, but the book spoke of it, and as she read further and further, she became more and more alarmed, and fear began to fill her.
“In the mortal world, where the rivers flow with sweet blood—”
Oh how her sisters would love that! Rivers of blood? It sounded even more delicious than the fountain of blood! And the book talked of a portal to the mortal world and those rivers of sweet, ever flowing blood, a rollercoaster—a rollercoaster that was in this very city!
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Dread filled Ezzie and icy cold panic, and she shut the book and clutched it to her chest. They could never find this book. They could never discover this rollercoaster. Just the temptation this mortal world and those rivers flowing with blood made Ezzie’s empty stomach grumble. She certainly couldn’t go there, and what if her sisters wanted to go there? What if they chose to leave her? They couldn’t leave her! She couldn’t be completely alone! What if this mortal world was where the previous occupants of this abandoned city had gone?
She took deep breaths, trying to ease her panic. It was simple. She’d go to this rollercoaster and send this book to the mortal world, where her sisters would never find it, and then destroy the controls on the rollercoaster.
It was really that simple.
Her heart thudded in her chest, behind her bony ribcage. She could do this. Her sisters would never be able to leave her if she did this, and she could never risk them discovering this book.
Panic filling her, she left the apartment and the building, blinking through the swirling fog. She followed the broken street, blind panic making her trip over broken cement. She went even further into the city than she’d ever gone. The book said the rollercoaster was in the very center of the city. The center couldn’t be far, and as she walked the sharp, broken buildings became further and further apart, and great alleyways yawned on both sides of her, and furry, six legged creatures scurried past her feet, but Ezzie barely noticed in her cold panic. And then there it was—the rollercoaster the book she clenched to her chest spoke of, the very top reaching the stars above.
It was made of cracked, rotted wood, but still appeared intact. Lights blinked on as she ascended the steps to the main platform, illuminating the purple and blue paint on the train cars and the control booth, a dim orange light.
Fog swirled around her ankles as she went to a train car and put the book on one of the moldy seats.
Panicked, Ezzie went to the control booth.
If her sisters ever found out what she was about to do--
Ezzie didn’t want to think about that.
There had to be a tool around here somewhere, something she could use to destroy the controls once she sent the book over the rollercoaster and into the mortal world the book spoke of, where the rivers flowed with sweet blood.
She needed a hammer. She needed a sledgehammer!
She found an old, rusted red wrench underneath the booth. That would do.
She pressed one of the buttons on the control booth and the rollercoaster started up—old gears and chains creaking, loud in the silence of the abandoned city, and Ezzie sent the book to the mortal world.
#
Ava floated above her body in the dark.
A demon ripped its way out of her, clawed hands wrapped around her neck. Ava couldn’t breathe. Terror filled her, icy cold and uncomfortable. She struggled to gasp in air. The cloudy sky above parted and she saw stars, multitudes of them, like when they visited her grandparents who lived in the middle of nowhere up north, and she didn’t know why she was seeing the sky when she floated above her body in her warm bedroom. Clouds covered the stars again, and Ava made herself wake up.
She stared at her darkened ceiling, happy the nightmare was over with. She hated it when she had dreams like that. She reached to check the time on her phone. 4:30AM. Way too early for her to get up, but she was afraid if she closed her eyes again, she’d feel the demon ripping out of her body, and she definitely did not want to have a repeat of that nightmare. No way, man. Ava didn’t like feeling like she was choking. Her greatest fear was of drowning to death. She decided to text her friend Elizabeth. Elizabeth never slept, so she’d be up this time of morning.
I had a nightmare. A demon was trying to rip it way out of my body! It was terrifying!
Pause, then reply.
That’s not good. ☹ Need me to come over?
No. You know how my parents would feel about that!
True. They’d get mad, right?
Very mad, and you know how scary my mom is when she gets mad! Everything pisses her off. My mere existence pisses her off.
LOL.
Ava set her phone down next to her and took deep breaths.
In and out.
In and out.
She turned on the light on her nightstand, illuminating her messy bedroom in a dim, orange glow. She really needed to change that lightbulb. This really sucked. It was Saturday, so no school, but she had a date with her boyfriend Mark—a romantic date he had said—at six, and she was going to be so tired. She couldn’t nap during the day for whatever reason. She reached for her notebook and pen and began to write in her journal, until the morning sun began peeking its way its way through her dusty blinds.
#
Ava’s parents liked Mark. They considered him a “good Christian boy”, and he was really the first boy who had ever showed Ava attention. In high school she was a loner and an outcast, always wearing baggy black clothing and hair dyed a bluish black and writing in her journal or reading books in the hallways. She was a good student, but the only college she’d been able to get into was the local community college, which her parents liked because it meant she could stay home and just drive to school, but Ava was disappointed. She’d wanted to get away from home, to go somewhere far from her overbearing, Christian parents. She was only a Freshman in college, and it was only October, so she hadn’t known Mark long. They seemed to get along okay. She wasn’t really attracted to him—she was more attracted to her best friend Elizabeth, but she would never admit that out loud, that she thought she was more into girls than guys. She couldn’t imagine the repercussions she’d receive from her parents. It was truly an unfortunate situation, but Ava didn’t know what to do. Her sexuality confused her, so she tried to make herself as invisible as possible.
Ava yawned as she got ready to see Mark. It was hot, so she wore a baggy black shirt over a long, lacey skirt with fishnets and her boots. She looked at herself in her full-length mirror. Her skin was pale and there were dark circles beneath her eyes. Her long black hair framed her narrow face. She didn’t wear makeup. She grabbed her bag off her bed and put it around her shoulders. She made sure her phone was in there and her cigarettes and lighter—to her knowledge her parents didn’t know she smoked—and her journal and pens. She sighed. She wished she could just hang out with Elizabeth instead of Mark. She took her phone out of her bag and texted Elizabeth.
All ready to see Mark.
Are you excited?
Not really. Sigh.
Oh no! Need me to come and rescue you? LOL.
You know how my mom would feel about that. She loves Mark.
Good Christian boy, right?
Unfortunately, yes.
Ava checked the time on her phone. 5:50PM. She wished she could go outside for a smoke, but her parents would freak. She’d have to wait until she saw Mark.
Ava went down the stairs.
Her parents sat on the couch in the living room, both drinking blood red wine out of long-stemmed wine glasses and watching a movie on mute, while listening to music—some new age stuff that Ava didn’t like.
Her mom’s face brightened when she saw her, but then her expression fell.
“You’re wearing that?” she said.
“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?” Ava asked.
Her mom frowned.
“Don’t you own anything that’s not black and baggy? I think we need to go shopping.”
“No we don’t!”
“Okay, well, I guess if you want to look unattractive—”
Ava’s phone beeped. It was a text from Mark.
Here.
“Mark is here,” Ava quickly said, cutting off whatever her mom had been about to say.
“Well, okay,” said Mom, frowning.
“Don’t go to his apartment alone,” said Dad, taking a sip of his wine.
“Shhh, Thomas,” Mom quickly said. “Mark is a good Christian boy.”
Ava did everything in her power not to roll her eyes.
Dad didn’t say anything.
“Be home by eleven!” Mom said. “Have fun!”
“Okay, bye,” said Ava.
Mark drove a jeep. He wore combat shorts and a red t-shirt. His hair was disheveled around his chubby face. He smiled when he saw Ava, and Ava sighed. Her hair was going to get all messy. She wished she would have brought a brush. Oh well. She’d just have to deal with knotty hair.
(C)Copyright 2023 Sarah Kelderman