“You know too well that thing there doesn’t work on me, Maria, dear,” said Apotato, as it watched Emily doing the Christian sign of the cross over her chest over and over.

“You… Go back to hell, demon! What are you?!” cried Emily.

“But… But it was YOU who called me. Now you want me to go home. Pfft. I know your mind hasn’t been well for years, but I still had some hope, since you were able to say the enchantment.”

Emily snapped. She grabbed her heavy backpack, that rested on her bed, and threw it at the potato, who fended it off with magnetic powers.

“Maria, come on…” Apotato had just started to complain when Emily lunged at it, yelling and slapping it all over its peel.

“GET OUT!!!”

Apotato barely felt Emily’s tiny hands on it. They felt like a desperate mosquito trying to fight against a hand that was just about to smack it down. It shook its potato head, clearly disappointed at its “Maria”. Then, in a flash, its supernatural force grabbed Emily’s arm and lifted her up from the ground.

“Enough of this shit. What’s gotten into you, Ma…ri…a?” said it, arching its eyebrows at the sight of Emily’s face, “You… you are NOT Maria! Deceiver!”

Emily was shoved away from the mysterious vegetable and fell on her bed. Immediately, she started to beg for her life.

“Please, please, please… don’t kill me, demon… Let me be…”

Apotato flicked the light switch on, then leaned forward and directed a stare full of angry daggers at Emily.

“Kill you? You should know better, girl. You summon me, and you don’t even know who I am and what I like?”

It moved closer to Emily, who yelled, “Stay back!” Apotato rolled its eyes It took Emily a while to see that whoever Apotato was, it didn’t have any intention of outright killing her. She let a relaxed sigh out, even though tension was still lingering.

“Can I get closer? I need a better look at you,” said Apotato.

Emily didn’t answer. The hellspawn insisted.

“Come on. It’s not like I have all day, you know. Just a closer look, that’s all”.

Sprawled on the bed due to the push from before, Emily nodded at Apotato. The delicious piece of root rushed closer to her and observed every inch of her existence.

“Yeah. You are not Maria. Who are you?”

Emily shook her head.

“I am Emily. There’s no Mari…oh. Don’t you mean my grandmother? Her name was Maria.”

Apotato looked back at her, eyes squinting hard. Suddenly, something clicked inside that beautiful starchy head, and it opened its eyes wide.

“Sweet Satan… Has that much time passed? Maria has a granddaughter now…?”

“Well… Maria had a granddaughter. My grandma passed away two weeks ago.”

“...what? Bullshit. If she had died, her soul would pop smack dab in my circle of Hell. That was what we had agreed.” Apotato thought it would be a good idea to sit on Emily’s bed, by her side, as it spoke. “When she died, her soul was to drop so deeply and quickly it would make waves in the Earth’s lava core”.

It chuckled. Emily moved away from Apotato, toward the headboard of the bed.

“I mean it… my grandma Maria is dead. That’s how I got the journal. I would have never found it otherwise, as it was so well hidden.”

The demon’s eyes blinked twice. Reality was starting to sink in.

“But… Does that mean she went to Paradise? How come…? Her soul was as rotten as a vulture’s carcass…”

“Hey!” Emily sat upright at once, “Watch what you say about memaw.”

“Me…memaw?”

Apotato cackled madly.

“Is that what you call that wench? Honey, if you knew what I know, you’d be calling her a perverted monster.”

There was so much amusement to be found in Apotato’s face. A debaucherous smirk crossed its tuber lips, as it gazed at Emily.

“What? That’s the truth, like it or not. Maria used to have a hankering for the taters and went hardcore on what that Mrs. Smith cooked. Hell, she would be eating from the Smith’s plates all day, happier than fresh French fries.”

Emily’s heart was beating faster, now not out of fear anymore. It was wrath, welling up inside her with each of Apotato’s insults to her memaw’s memory. Yet, the beast went on.

“To think that her asshole of a father tried to summon ME to make her stop being a potato eater. I guess he wasn’t aware that I would show up, but that doesn’t make it any less ridiculous. When your “memaw” wasn’t being fed by that married bitch, she would get home and meet me in her bedroom. The next morning, the poor thing could barely walk, because she was all full of gas from all the mashed taters.”

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It chuckled again. Emily tightened her fists in secret.

“She would eat my cooking like her life depended on it! And my, my, how she lov–”

The maniac insultfest was interrupted by Emily’s fist knocking Apotato’s jaw. It coughed and choked, and some thick yellow liquid spilled from its mouth onto the sheets.

That was it. Emily was going to die. She had acted out of impulse, and now she would be exterminated for her insolence.

Except she wasn’t. Apotato checked to see if its jaw was still in one piece and stared back at Emily.

“Well… I guess I deserved that,” it said, lowering its potato head. “I got carried away. I’m sorry.”

To Emily, that was more shocking than having a demon in her bedroom: she had a demon asking for her forgiveness. She lowered her head a bit too, ashamed of punching the hellish yam. Apotato was still checking if all its teeth were in place, and it wiped the yellow liquid off using unforeseen appendages.

“I am sorry too. It's just… I can’t bear to hear anyone say such things about my grandma.”

“Yeah, yeah. My bad. I guess it’s been a long time since I last talked to someone from the ‘surface’. I lost my touch.”

Emily raised an eyebrow.

“How long, exactly?” she asked.

“Mm. It was around the nineties. Your grandmother made me come around often, so I did it to please her, as she wanted to have me as a… vegetable version of a friend.Like the Teletteebbes, if I recall it correctly.”

“Don’t you mean Teletubbies?”

“Ah! That’s it! Yeah, we partied like there was no tomorrow when I was around. Sorry. Like I said, it’s been a long time. Back then, Maria had this kid, who must be your father, I assume. James, right?”

“...Yes, that’s my dad. Don’t you dare say bad stuff about him too.”

“Relax. He was just a kid. And Maria treated him nicely. He never suspected his mother was a… well, a potato eater.”

That was almost too much information coming at Emily at once. Not only was she learning about her grandmother’s history, but it was all coming straight from the mouth of a wicked demon that she had summoned somehow.

Amid her inner reflection, Emily hadn’t noticed that the talkative and extroverted legume had gone silent for a bit too long. On its pale peel, there was a drop of something that came from its eye - it looked like a tear, but it was as yellow as the stuff Apotato had coughed up earlier.

The demon sighed.

“Oh, well. I wonder why she didn’t show up there in Hell. We were supposed to reign my circle together. Now what will I do?”

For some odd reason, Emily felt Apotato deserved compassion. That feeling was creeping up on her heart, making it heavy. At the same time, another sensation showed up, and Emily felt it as she moved on the bed to get a bit closer to Apotato. The rumbling of her stomach made itself present. She was craving some chips, for whatever reason. The situation was not appropriate for any kind of hunger, but still, there it was.

“Apotato, is it?” Emily started, “Look, I think I brought you here by accident. I didn’t mean to. I just read those words out loud and then you showed up.”

Apotato looked back at her, another yellow tear rolling from its eye.

“Yeah. I know you don’t want me here. I shouldn’t have come, but I had no choice. Whenever a mortal says those words, I am brought right by their side.”

“Oh. That sucks. But wait, what’s the reason for people to call you? What did my memaw want with you?”

Apotato slowly shook itself.

“Quit being ugly, Emily girl. You oughta be smarter, coming from Maria’s line.”

It took Emily some time to understand she was being chastised for her supposed stupidity. Apotato then stated:

“The first time Maria called me was an accident. Well, the woman to whom I was bound passed me to your grandmamew.”

“It’s memaw.”

“Whatever. The woman was a trickster who had tried to make me a roasted potato. Then she got bored of old me and tossed me to Maria. That bastard, her father, thought it might cure her potato obsession. Little did he know it was going to make it even stronger.”

It giggled; devilishly, of course.

“Go on.”

“After our first time together, she was addicted to me and called me every single day to feed her tummy. And I loved it, as it was just the thing I needed to have all my power back; that savage magician had extracted it from me.”

“So… you needed to feed her for that?”

“Hello! I’m a potato!” Apotato revealed. “I was made to be eaten.”

Now it was Emily’s turn to let a hearty chuckle out. Apotato stared at her, eyes squinted and teeth showing.

“What is so funny?” it asked through its potato teeth.

“You are so lost, demon. As far as I know, potatoes can’t cook, can they? So, there is nothing for you here, and all the story about you and my grandma was nothing but a hill of beans.”

Apotato tilted itself to the right and proceeded to shake itself once again, in pure disdain.

“Girl, you are outdated. Where did you read that? Was it in that trash, Child’s risible mess of paper, Mastering the Art of French Cooking?”

“Who?”

“Ugh. That smart-ass chef, Julia Child – she thought she knew all there was to know about potatoes. She forgot to add her heart to the ingredients, though.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Nevermind. All you need to know is what you know about me is wrong. Well, not every single detail, but still. Enough of this drivel. Let me cook up an introduction.”

After its last word, Apotato moved its occult appendages in a way Emily couldn’t perceive. They became a blur only. Then, Emily felt something strange. It was as if she badly needed to eat potatoes, out of nowhere.

“Try ignoring it. It’s common hunger, mind you.” Apotato stated.

Something… was wriggling, inside Emily’s stomach.

“What… What the fuck is this?!” she cried.

Apotato snapped its inexistent fingers, and the unwanted sensation stopped.

“That is something I am sure you didn’t know about us potatoes. It is just a minor invoking spell. Do not fret, because I have already dispelled it. Relax.”

“What did you–”

“I summoned a tablespoon of mashed potato up your stomach!”

Emily felt her stomach turning. Apotato saw the look of complete panic and disgust that swept up her face and laughed.

“I kid, I kid. Relax. It was just a small and harmless input spell to force some jinx into you. Or was it?”

And she cackled again. Emily’s eyes were now welling up, as she was back into the vibes of being terrified by the supernatural presence sitting by her side.

“Please… just go away… You freak!”

Much to Emily’s surprise, that was exactly what Apotato would do, as it simply vanished without a trace. It was as if it had blinked out of existence. That was enough for Emily to think she had probably fallen asleep and was just having a most unpleasant nightmare. But it felt so real to her…

Apotato’s voice rang inside the young scientist’s mind, reminding her that it was by no means an illusion or nightmarish fever.

“I’ll tell you what: you have a full day before I come back for you. You called me, I will be bound to you until your belly is full of tater. Juuuust like your mamew used to be when we played together. I never fed for good, though – she always had a few days to recover in between our encounters, so I could keep giving her mashed potatoes ooover and over. Oh, your mamew and I had the best of times, and the worst of times! Oh, blissful nostalgia!”

Emily was unsure if she had any way of talking back telepathically, or whatever that mumbo-jumbo was. Before she could attempt some deep-thinking communication, though, Apotato’s voice filled her mind up again.

“We will have a fantastic time, Emily lady. What I set inside your stomach will slowly drive you towards a healthy obsession for my starch throughout the day. By the evening, you’ll be desperate to meet me again. And I will be here, yes, feed you, spoon after spoon. And you… you are going to love it.”

After that, Emily’s body felt heavy and soft like molasses. Her lights went out – both those in the bedroom and in her conscience, and she blacked out on the bed.