The next day, Tom anxiously watched the pub door each time it swung open. The demon didn't return, and nether did Phil or Torin. The day after that, Tom often thought about the contract he made and wondered if the demon was staying away because of him.
As the days rolled by agonisingly slow, Tom stopped thinking about the soul stripper. He cut the grass and pressure-washed the path leading up to the pub. He watched a big football match with the locals. He took his five-year-old niece to the park where she grazed her knee. Tom had bought her some sweets on the way home to make her feel better, which angered Gerry- his sister's husband.
Tom avoided him for the rest of the week, creating tension in their small apartment above the pub. A lifetime went by before he could be happy that it was Friday. He finished a few hours early and couldn't wait to get out and into the fresh air, especially when Gerry finished early too. Tom wanted to be gone before he strolled in to complain about everyone he worked with.
"Tom, hold up a second!" Neasa, Tom's older sister, shouted across the pub. She ran up to him with a ten-pound note flapping in her grip.
"Can you pick up some milk?"
"I have change already, I'll just use-"
"Please take it," she urged. "Get Rina some of those raisins covered in yoghurt that she likes."
"You want me to buy my niece more treats after the way your husband reacted?" Tom recalled the way Garry snatched the chews from Rina's sticky hands and threw them at him.
"He's really sorry for yelling at you on Tuesday. And I know this is a shitty excuse, but he was having it tough at work. He won't mind if you get these." She pushed the note into his chest.
Tom made no effort to take it. "Well, I haven't heard an apology from him."
Neasa sighed and shoved it into his jacket pocket. She hugged Tom, but he didn't hug back. "I love you," she whispered into his shoulder.
"Love you too," he grumbled. "I'd love you more if you moved out."
Neasa chuckled. "I'd love you more if you moved out."
"You're the one with your life together sis," he reminded her, which was a running joke between them. Gerry would often marvel at the fact that he was married, with a child, and good money. Tom was often slapped with the come-back of 'At least I've got it all together. What are you doing with your life? Working behind a bar?'
Tom's mother had walked in at the right moment and yelled for almost four hours about how insulted she was. Even now, Moira still despised Gerry for it and reminded him almost weekly that he was still a guest under her roof, which happened to be above a pub. She could hold a grudge to the end of the universe, and Tom had been glad of it only once.
Gerry always insisted that they were saving to buy their own home, he just had to find the perfect one. Tom couldn't wait to only see Gerry when he chose to visit Neasa and Rina. He had no idea how his sister put up with him, and sometimes, neither did she.
"Life together my arse," she scoffed. "Now go, have a social life. You've been working too hard." Tom then hugged her strong enough for her back to crack. "And maybe lay off the gym," she breathed. "Sibling rivalry is becoming unfair."
"Or maybe you should start going to the gym," he said, shoving his growing bicep into her face.
Neasa turned him round and pushed into his broad back. Tom pretended to stumble through the door and smiled all the way down the path. His smile turned into a smirk when he saw sheep all over the road, and a line of cars honking.
The O'Connell family had always disliked the Brellham family who owned the nearby farm. For whatever reason that started generations ago, they found an abundance of joy in each other's misfortune. The Brellham's laughed when their toilets were blocked, or another news site gave them a bad name, or if their most popular beer ran out on the busiest nights. The O'Connell's laughed when drunken customers fell into their bushes that made holes, when large tractors broke down on small country roads, or when their sheep escaped and caused chaos all day.
"Farmer Joel," Tom said with a grin. "I don't know if you've noticed, but your sheep are out again."
Cal, who had been watching the farmer running around after them for almost five minutes, bent over in fits of laughter. Farmer Joel stuck up his middle finger and yelled at another car who honked.
Tom paused next to his best friend, watching happily. "This has made my day."
"Mine too. It was only yesterday that Joel threw a rotten tomato at my dad's new car for speeding down this road."
Tom stared at him. "He deserved that."
"Yeah." Cal then clasped his hands together. "Guess we should help."
"Guess we should." Despite their mutual hatred, there was some level of respect between them. Joel might laugh when their toilets blocked, but he'd send his plumber son round. They might laugh when his tractor broke, but they'd send Tom's uncle round who was a mechanic. Joel might laugh when their beer ran out, but he'd offer some homemade stuff instead. Tom might laugh when the sheep escaped, but he'd help get them back into the field.
For two hours, they chased the sheep and dragged them back over the bushes. Tom and Cal were hot and out of breath by the time the last one was dragged through the gate. "You need a sheep dog," Tom breathed, pushing away brown hair that stuck to his forehead.
"I'll be able to afford a well-trained one next year if the harvest is a good'un," Joel said, wiping sweat off the back of his neck. He nodded curtly. "Cheers for that O'Connell."
"I helped too," Cal added.
"I saw a lot of running from you lad. Not a lot of helping." Joel hopped over the fence to walk back through the field to his farm.
Tom laughed, patting him sympathetically on the shoulder. Cal sulked for the rest of the walk into the village. He soon perked up when his girlfriend arrived. Tom hated being a third wheel and perked up too when the rest of their friends arrived.
They did the usual, which was finding somewhere to have food, then to sit around and shop around and talk about their week, until they all got bored and went their separate ways. Village life wasn't exciting. Tom liked how everyone knew each other, but that came with lots of gossiping too. The latest news was about farmer Joel's sheep. Last weeks news was about old Betty winning big at bingo. Glass Horns pub used to be the main topic on everyone's lips, but even locals got bored of talking about demon fights week after week.
Well, all expect for Gren.
"So, no fights this week?" Gren, one of Tom's newer friends, asked. He had met Gren through Cal because he moved in next door to Cal a few months ago. He was twenty-five and worked in the new butchers with his mum. He was harmless, but highly gullible and very nosey.
"Nope," Tom said, "But it is a Friday, so you should ask me again on Sunday."
"Are you working this weekend?"
"Yep." Tom stepped onto the road when Cal twirled his girlfriend around, knocking into Gren who had stepped on Tom's feet six times that afternoon. "Are you?"
"No. Do you think they'll be fights then? Demons are getting so daring."
"Oh there will be fights alright, but it won't be the demons starting it."
"I heard from Phil that he gave you a good beating, and a demon. Is that where you got that bruise from on your face?"
"You heard that from Phil, did you?" Tom muttered. "Did he also tell you about the demon who had him in a headlock for an embarrassing amount of time?" Tom rubbed his ring finger.
"Na, but I heard that Torin got that dodgy shoulder from elbowing a demon in the face."
"You shouldn't believe everything you hear."
"So, it's not true?" he asked, forcing Tom to step onto the road again. "My mum was so sure they'd done just that!"
"No Gren, it's not true."
"So, how'd you get that bruise on your face?"
"From another fight." Tom looked elsewhere, and Gren's conversation drifted away too when he didn't reply. As they walked, he felt spots of rain on his face. The cold air tried to bury under his jacket, so he zipped it up to his chin. The sun was setting. A beautiful pink sky painted the cute village of cobbled streets, Victorian houses, Tudor-style shops with white walls and black beams and misshapen roofs. A café was still open for dinner, with small tables and chairs for the locals littering the path. An old couple stood by the village's water fountain, holding open a map and pointing at the distant fields.
They soon passed the small library which was one of Tom's checkpoints to say that he was nearly home. But outside its worn stone steps, an argument was echoing openly for anyone to listen.
They all slowed down when the only librarian, who happened to be a good friend of Moira's, pointed a stern finger at a tall figure with their hood up. Tom was familiar enough with that stature to know she was shouting at the soul stripper. Now he knew him as Ezrakhell, but he would most definitely keep that to himself.
"I'm sorry but you're just not allowed to take out any more books!" the librarian said.
"I don't understand why," Ezrakhell argued back. "I looked after the one I borrowed. I brought it back on time. I'm not causing trouble."
"Nobody wants to come in anymore in fear that more demons will use our facilities. I'm sorry, but you're no longer welcome. You might not be causing trouble, but you're making others feel uneasy."
"That's not my problem. If I'm doing nothing wrong, I shouldn't be banned."
"My word is final. Leave, now."
Tom and Cal stopped walking, in case the demon was a little too short tempered and decided that tonight was the night for violence. But Ezrakhell didn't look around. He stepped back, and Tom could only imagine the glare because the librarian stepped back too, pressing a hand to her chest before he vanished.
"Well, that was mean of her. Do you recon that was the demon who was reading in your pub?" Cal asked.
"Yeah." Tom shook his head. "This village used to be far more accepting."
"It's probably because the angels are having choir practice in the library now, you know, for the Village fair in a few months," Gren said.
Tom was dreading the village fair. It always brought in tourists who were fooled by the nice exterior of their pub, only to write horrible reviews the next day because they had to share their space with a demon.
"Time to make a huge sign again then Tom. What should it be this year . . . Demon's-only tonight!" Cal mused. "Farmer Joel would be hysterical."
"Good," Tom said with a smile covering his concern.