Deamons

Chapter 7 Get in the Back Jack/ The Hearse part 2

     He rode a school bus and got left off at the bottom of a big hill he had to climb to get to his house. He Is not the only one. Among the others Are two boys his age. "Here Starke carry my books," the bigger of the boys demands. "Yea, you little bitch!" yells his redhead accomplice. "Just keep walking. Ignore them and they will go away," Diligence whispers inside him. Diligence listening through the boy's ears and hears the rustling of the others boy's backpacks bopping on their backs, "better get moving then, because they are coming up quick," Starke's heart starts pumping out of his chest. He is scared. He does not want confrontation. The deamons rush to the orbs of the eyes. Starke looks back for fraction of a second and the deamons see the boys and rejoice. They start feasting on the fear. "Keeping it coming! Keep it coming!" they scream in unison as they feed likes pig at the trough.

"RRRAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!" the absolutely loudest roar imaginable comes from somewhere down deep. Strength could feel the surge and knew what to do. He put his hands on the walls, supercharged. "TURN! PIVOT AT THE HIP! SWING!" it is Anger's voice but neither the gifts nor the deamons see him. His voice comes from way down deep in the bowels. So much pent-up energy crystalizes and focuses into this one moment. Starke hears Anger or more accurately feels it and can see in his mind what Anger screamed to do. He reacts. Turns, swings and connects into the bigger boy's head hard. His fist like a bullet sighted in by the pilot in his mind. "Bawamm!" a sickening smack can be heard from Starke's flesh hitting the others'. The bigger boy knees look like an erector set carrying to much weight giving out sending him to the ground.

The surge of energy released in Starke is gone. A cold sweat pushes perspiration across his forehead. He feels faint. The venom of all that fury released at once was too much for his system to handle. The other kids gather around and are cheering. They look to want to lift Starke up if they could manage it. Starke sees no glory in what he has done. Not that day. He has been cracked so many times by his mother he knows what it does to a person on the inside. Had he done that to this boy? Does it feel the same as your own mother cracking you? He did not know. Of course, he did not threaten his mother to get her to hit him. He just wants to go home and go to sleep.

He creeps into his house. He has learned to do so after making the mistake of waking her before and paying for it with smacks across the face followed by two hours of floor scrubbing, then more smacks for doing a piss poor job. He never understood, because the floor was clean before he started scrubbing. He hears her snoring and feels lucky he did not wake her. He set his book bag down and slips down to the laundry room in the basement. He lays down in the dirty clothes pile even putting some on top of him. It is the closest he gets to a hug.

The gifts force their way in pushing the deamons out while he sleeps. They learned when the acrid smell of dirty laundry came wafting in that Starke needed them. They did not wear masks in his dreams mimicking people like the deamons did so their imagery is not so vivid. The deamons also were better listeners, by doing so they were able to exactly mimic the people they wanted. Deamons are great actors their scenes surreal. That's why their nightmares were remembered long after waking.

The gifts influence his dreams by telling stories to his spirit. Much the way ancients passed on knowledge for thousands of years. Influencing their person with words which seep in making their changes by way of that person's acceptance opposed to being shoved by fear. His great aunt had seen how her niece and husband ignored him. She has been telling him about her brother, his grandfather who died before he was born. Telling him the man would have loved him and done all the things with him his father does not. The gifts use those stories now. Telling one of his favorites of the two going fishing and talking all day. The grandfather taking interest in every word that fell out of Starke's mouth. It is something he lacks and needs so it fills a spot. His spirit calms and the three, his mind, body and spirit sort of cuddle each other.

Diligence is at the ear. He hears the mom stop snoring up above and then the thud of each of her heavy feet hit the floor alongside her bed. "Bubump, Bubump!" Diligence repeats the sound of her footfalls loud within him so that Starke will wake. "Get your ass up here now, boy!" she screams. Starke goes from half asleep to full throttle. His pulse quickens, blood pressure rises. He jumps to his feet running to her before she calls again. She trained him this way by beating his face if she has to yell twice. He gets to her quick. "Why do you make me holler at you?" she asks. "Have you done your homework?" she asks still screaming. He shakes his head to afraid to speak. "Well why not?" she screams and slaps him across the face. "Get it and do it right here where I can see you." He runs down gets his bag by the door and sits at the big table where she had him do it before. She hustles over to him. Knowing what is coming he covers his face. "Don't you cover your face you son of a bitch!" She hits him in the ear with heel of her palm. The cartilage smashed into the bone behind it. The pain is electric. Hot tears pour down his face. He cannot help it. It hurts to bad. He knows what is coming next. He takes his hands away from his face. Seeing his tears, she lights up. Thwack! She hits him again this time across the face. It does not hurt as much as the ear and his face has started to get used to it. Toughening up from the constant abuse. "Sissy boy!" she screams. He then thinks of how he stood up for himself today and it feels good. She is wrong. He is not a sissy boy.

The next day at school the kids are talking about him. The boy he hit Danny is not, he is livid. For days after their fight Danny mulls over the idea of trying it again when they walk up the hill after school. He does not though. He is scared. The deamons in Starke feel his fear. "We need to be over there," Envy complains. "They are feasting over there." "And we're not?" Rejection chimes in. "As soon as he gets to the top of that hill and sees his mom's home he shakes with fear and you all eat up," Rejection lectures. "True," the deamons all agree. "How close are we?" they ask Rejection who is always at the orbs of the eyes. The deamons are putting their bibs on in mockery of the frightened boy they live in.