I hated the suburbs, especially in Los Angeles. At least in most cities, suburbs were outside the city. In LA, everything was stacked on top of and next to each other so that perfectly manicured and patrolled “suburbs” were nestled between crime dens and decrepit shitholes.

Suburbs were also nicer, cleaner, and better maintained in most other cities. There was some modicum of charm to them, even. Not in LA. In LA, suburbs sprang up with no rhyme or reason, like a nasty bout of herpes. It was as if a big, weird God of Housing and Urban Development pointed his finger and said, “The suburbs start here” and “Yes, I know the houses are EXACTLY the same as the ones on the other side of the street, but THESE ones are better for some stupid reason or another”.

My mother’s house was part of a small, gated community that the HUD god chose to build on that specific block even though it was beset by low-income housing in every direction. Still, she was very proud that she could afford that specific block, and she absolutely hated when I brought home strays, which meant I did so every chance I got. She fussed about my hoodlum friends from “the other side of the track” but, of course, in LA, that was a funny demarcation line. Everything in LA was arbitrary, including where the HUD god placed the train track. That didn’t stop her from labeling all my friends. She only wanted me to bring home certain children from certain neighborhoods, which meant I fell into the wrong crowds again and again just to piss her off.

“Come on,” I said, clicking open the door to the ostentatious house.

“Is this your house?” Anjelica gasped, looking around at the walls.

“No,” I said. “I would never buy property in Los Angeles. I pay extra to be month to month on my apartment so that I can leave at a moment’s notice.”

“If this isn’t yours, then—”

“Who’s there?” My mother’s shrill voice sounded from the second floor.

“If I were a robber, what good is asking who I am?”

“Ollie?” I heard footsteps upstairs, and my back seized up. “Hang on, I’m coming down.”

My mother hadn’t aged much in the thirty years since I’d popped out of her, except for the invading white in her hair. She had it pulled back in a ponytail and was wearing a white sleep shirt that fell to her knees. Even then, she was beautiful, which was the only thing she cared about.

“Hi, Mom,” I said as she wrapped her arms around me. “You can let go of me now.”

“Not until you hug me back,” she murmured into my shoulder.

I grumbled and wrapped my arms around her. “Happy now?”

“I’m always happy to see you, sweetheart,” she said before turning to Anjelica. “And who is this?”

“Hi,” Anjelica said, waving. “I’m Anjelica.”

Mom gave her an appraising look, and then her face dropped. Another stray. “Well, come on. I’m guessing you haven’t eaten yet.”

“Actually, I ate two hamburgers with fries.” Anjelica stopped talking. “Oh, you meant Ollie. She said she doesn’t eat. Who doesn’t eat?”

“Exactly.” Mom walked through a rounded archway into the kitchen. “My Ollie was always a brooding type, and thought not eating added to her mystique.”

“I’m not hungry,” I said. “And it’s not like you’re the paragon of health. When was the last time you—” I stopped myself. “Can we not do this?”

“Fine,” Mom said with a smile that really meant “screw you.” I was very familiar with that smile. “Well, come on. You will at least have coffee, won’t you?”

“That I will do.”

I felt a tug on my shoulder and turned to Anjelica. “She seems nice. Why do you seem to hate her?”

“Trust me, this is a front. She can only keep it up for so long.”

“Why are we here then?”

“She’s the most powerful being I know, and if you’re gonna be safe anywhere while I figure this out, it’ll be here.”

I walked Anjelica into the kitchen. The floor was the same yellow linoleum with pink flowers from my youth. In fact, nothing had really changed. Something my mother cherished was consistency. I embraced chaos.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

“Two sugars?” Mom said, spoon in hand.

“I’ve taken it black for a dozen years.”

She set down the spoon and handed me the coffee. “Of course. Your taste for bitter things has grown in recent years.”

“Truce,” I said. “Just in front of the kid.”

“What am I doing?” She scoffed. “I’m just saying that—”

“I know what you’re doing, Mom.” I placed the coffee down on the counter. I knew better than to accept a gift from her. She held every nicety she ever done for me cataloged in her head, ready to rattle off at a moment’s notice.

“I don’t see why you are so upset. I am not saying anything about the underage demon you’ve brought into my house. I’m just saying—”

“What does she being a demon have to do with anything?” I said. “She’s a kid.”

“A demon kid,” Mom grumbled.

“No, a demon kid. She is having a really bad night, and she could really use a friend right about n—”

“Actually, I’m okay,” Anjelica interjected.

“Stay out of this,” I replied angrily, without taking my eyes off of my mother.

Mom sighed. “You know how I feel about demons after your fath—”

I held up my hand and spoke in terse syllables. “Don’t. You. Dare.” I dropped my head. “This was a mistake. Anjelica, let’s go.”

“You don’t have to go.” Mom shook her head. “This is ridiculous.”

I grabbed Anjelica by the arm and led her toward the door. “You’re ridiculous. I should have known better to turn to you when I needed help.”

***

It was a stupid, desperate plan to think my mother could have an ounce of compassion for even a minute. I should have gone to Phil in the first place. He had been my only friend when I was in high school. He didn’t care that I was—what I was. Hell, he was an alien and not a particularly handsome one, either. Even his holographic disguise was lumbering and awkward. I beat up anybody that messed with him, and he made me not hate my life so much. It was a good pairing.

“Can we please talk about what happened with your mom?” Anjelica asked, following me out to the ice cream truck. I brought the dagger and the duffel of money. Even though Phil lived in the same white bread, upper-class neighborhood as my mother, I was keeping my three million dollars close.

“No,” I snapped. “Let me do the talking.”

“Really?” Anjelica replied. “Because you are just about the worst talker I have ever met.”

She wasn’t wrong.

“Yes, really.”

I knocked on the door. There was some shuffling inside before it opened. When we were younger, Phil masked his appearance behind a hologram, but as he aged, he became less concerned with hiding who he was, even if he was a green-skinned alien with a single, glowing eye popping out of his long neck.

“Hi, Phil.” I smiled in spite of myself.

“Jesus Christ, Ollie. It’s two in the morning.”

I chuckled, but Phil didn’t get the joke. “What’s so funny?” he asked.

“Oh, blasphemy is particularly funny in this particular situation.” I slid to the side to reveal Anjelica. “Phil, meet Anjelica. The antichrist.”

“Jesus Christ,” he repeated, eye wide.

“Not exactly,” Anjelica said with a curtsy. “But I appreciate the comparison.”

He shooed us inside. “Come on.”

Phil had lived in the same house for the entirety of the time I had known him, and with every passing year, he seemed to just accumulate more stuff but never threw away anything he had acquired. Nearly every room was packed with garbage, and it stank something fierce. He said it was all research, but in truth, he was just a hoarder.

A trail of green ooze marked Phil’s path into his office at the front of the house. It contained just about every piece of electronic equipment that RadioShack ever sold and several they couldn’t even imagine. Phil’s race was a million years more advanced than us, which meant even our distant descendants couldn’t dream up the tech that Phil found banal.

“Aside from this thing—no offense, sweetie—did you bring me anything else?” Phil asked.

I pulled out the dagger and placed it into his gooey hand. “This dagger was supposed to kill her, I think.”

Phil squinted at it. “Looks the type. I’ll throw it under the magonomascope.”

The magonomascope looked like a standard-issue microscope, only a billion or so times more advanced. If anyone on the planet could figure out why the dagger was needed to kill Anjelica, it was Phil.

“This place is cool,” Anjelica said, poking at something that looked like a VCR. “Why didn’t you bring me here first?”

“I didn’t want to drag Phil into this or get him hurt.”

“That’s very sweet,” Phil said, looking into the eyepiece of his magonomascope. “But nothing yet has hurt me on this stupid planet. Of course, I suppose your survival rate is 100 percent until the day it isn’t, and even then, your survival rate is still 99.9999999 percent. Although, if you look at it on a universe level timeframe, I suppose any survival rate is indistinguishable from zero on a long enough time horizon.” He looked up from his microscope with a whimsical look in his eye. “Isn’t science fun?”

“No,” I said. “See anything in that thing?”

“Patience. Science is an inexact science.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Anjelica said.

“Precisely.” He swung around and began typing on his keyboard. “Your technology is too primitive. Luckily, I was able to supe up your ‘advanced’ tech with my own modifications.” A bunch of numbers and letters flew across the screen. “Ah yes, it’s what I feared.”

“What is it?” I asked, moving closer.

“This dagger was made in the pits of Hell. I need to call in backup.”

“Backup? You always told me you know everything.”

“Only what is and will be, not everything that ever was. That’s my friend’s department.” He picked up the phone and dialed a number. “I know it’s late…yes, I know it’s late…of course it’s important…sorry for waking your mom…Okay, thank you.” He hung up and looked at me. “She’s coming, but she’s pissed, and she’s surly even in the best of times.”

A giant puff of purple smoke plumed into the room, accompanied by a flash of purple light. When it dissipated, a tall girl, not much older than Anjelica, floated in the air. Her hair was dark like her skin, and she was built like a ballet dancer with hard, strong legs. Long, blue wings fluttered behind her as she touched down lightly on the floor.

“Thank you for coming, Kimberly,” Phil said.

“This better be good,” she growled. “I’m so getting grounded for this.”