It was a curious moment when the Bennetts asked me to babysit their little boy Ethan but didn’t provide much in the form of guidance.

  They’d heard of me through a friend of a friend—a family I’d previously babysat for that seemed to have had a good experience with me. I appreciated the positive word of mouth. Referrals were a big part of my screening process. They ensured, generally, that the next family I signed up for would be manageable and not at all housing the spawn of Satan himself.

  Always Church couples, it seemed. Maybe losing out on Sunday mornings made it all the more necessary for them to have a recurring, childless Friday date-night. Hey if it meant them proselytizing the good word to their fellow pewgazers that I was a rock-solid babysitter, I was down with it. I had my own gripes with faith of course—traumatic personal experiences and the like—but that never needed to get in the way of the work.

  I walked the street of the high-end suburb they lived in. It was a gorgeous evening, stars twinkling, light breeze. When I finally reached their home, I couldn’t help but feel jealous. Their house looked like it belonged in a TV show: the establishing shot of a place built for the perfect upper-upper-middle-class family. Cozy, modern, stunning all in one.

  The short confirmation email they sent me contained date, time, address, and of course, where the key was: under the mat. I lifted the “Bless this home and all who enter” rug and grabbed the key from the concrete. Into the lock and turn.

  The usual fare was for the rents to meet me in the doorway, introduce me to their kid, and then take off in their nice clothes for dinner, salsa dancing or movie night. Mr. and Mrs. Bennett must’ve been in quite the rush to no-show this basic staple of the parent-babysitter arrangement.

  I entered, a modest concern brewing within me that I was stepping into the world of questionable parenting. To their credit, the interior was spotless, beautifully furnished, and smelled like cinnamon.

  My eyes flicked over the space—stairs just past the door, a living room to the right, and a hallway stretching deeper into the house. On the entryway table, I spotted an envelope with my name scribbled across the front.

  I opened it and read it.

  “We thank you so much for doing this.

  Sincerely,

  The Bennetts, The McManuses, The Delaneys, The Springfields, The Jensens, and Father O’Riley”

  A strange note, for sure.

  I’d already received plenty of thanks individually from these families during the months where I’d made sure their kids, ranging from angels to anarchists, were eating their vegetables, not overdosing on Cocomelon, and brushing their teeth—properly. Circular motions, young ones. I wasn’t one to knock extra kudos, certainly, but I was more than a little perplexed by the community ‘thank you’ card—especially with its mention of Father O’Riley, our local pastor whom I had only seen in passing.

  I put the letter back where I’d found it, took off my shoes and placed them on the rack, and ventured in.

  “Hey Ethan!” I called, not too quiet, not too loud.

  Faint sounds from upstairs, but no real response. I creaked up the steps.

  “Don’t mean to startle you!” I said. “I’m Liz. Your Mom and Dad probably told you I was coming?”

  A soft shuffle. A few rattles. Toys being played with behind a door. Someone busy with something.

  I finished my ascent, turned onto the second floor hallway, and twisted the knob on the nearest door. Inside the bedroom sat a young boy in the dark, surrounded by Lego pieces, assembling a large, somewhat nonsensical set.

  “Ethan,” I said.

  He didn’t look up. His eyes remained fixed on his elaborate construction, choosing where next to place his blocks.

  I advanced slowly, then lowered myself to a crouch beside him.

  “Wow, that looks really, really cool,” I lied, squinting to make sense of whatever the hell he was working on. “You’re good at this.”

  He kept his focus like he was getting paid. Finally, he spoke. “Once it’s finished, I can hide there.”

  Uh huh.

  I wasn’t a child psychiatrist, yet—still in first year of undergraduate. But, my in-depth Google searches before taking on babysitting duties had given me some insight on how to answer. You want to build camaraderie. You want to respect the kid’s unique logic, unique worldview.

  “How long would you hide there?”

  A pause. Then—

  “Until I’m not scared.”

  ------------

  I held Ethan’s hand and led him to the dining room. On the way, I filled him in on the necessary details: his parents were out, they’d be home late, and I’d be his caretaker for the evening. I watched for signs that any of this was news to him–-given the half-baked nature of the invite I’d received—but his face didn’t betray anything. He seemed neither interested nor disinterested.

  He took a seat at the table. The Bennetts hadn’t given me an itinerary, but I knew full well that kids needed dinner, entertainment, space, and, eventually, sleep—all in that order.

  I searched the kitchen for eats, spotted some Pop Tarts in the pantry and toasted them. One night of unhealthy eating couldn’t kill him, right?

  To my relief, he began scarfing them down the same way every kid I’d ever babysat did. Food—the great equalizer. And suddenly, Seinfeld’s obsession with this square-shaped breakfast pastry made more sense to me.

  “Hey, did your Mom and Dad say what they wanted you to eat for dinner today?” I asked.

  He took another bite of vanilla-flavored empty calories, blank stare accompanying, and shook his head.

  “That’s fine. And if you wanted something else from the fridge, let me know—I can get that for you too.”

  No response. Trying too hard—message received.

  I pulled out my phone for a quick scroll because hey, I’m human too. The screen glitched for a second, static rippling over it.

  No new messages.

  Compelled to give him a bit more space, I took a quick trek around the first floor.

  Christian family—that’s for damn sure. A giant, and I mean giant cross hanging in the middle of their living room. Paintings of Jesus and a portrait of The Last Supper filled space alongside it. Besides that, other framed photos: the Bennetts with their peers at camping trips, road cleanups, barbecues, Christmas dinners.

  It was unsettling to me that they didn’t have a single picture of Ethan on the wall or placed on a mantle. The group photos where he was standing awkwardly in the corner didn’t count.

  I returned to the dining room.

  “Hey,” I said. He was done with his meal, hands folded out in front of him. “Did your parents say what time they wanted you in bed tonight?”

  He answered with a soft shake of his head.

  “Did they say anything about me? About someone coming over?”

  He tilted his head again—no.

  Unbelievably disappointing.

  I grabbed a glass and poured some milk for him. Felt an ache in my heart I couldn’t exactly place as I saw the dork sip away.

  “Ethan, are you okay? You can talk to me, you know.”

  Yet again, no verbal response—par for the course. But he did keep eye-contact for a second longer.

  I changed gears. “What do you want to do now?” I asked.

  “Read.”

  I nodded. Alright, little buddy. In a betrayal of all things Gen Alpha, or whatever your generation’s called again, we’ll read.

  I took his hand in mine again and let him guide me to where the books were, my eyes glazing past religious artifact after artifact along the way. Feelings of frustration at my eternal achilles heel—bad parenting—surfaced but I did my best to let the shovel in my soul keep that shit buried.

  Down the corridor. We passed a closed door on the left. Ethan remarked:

  “They said I can’t go in there.”

  I stopped. “Where?”

  He let go of my hand, pointed to the aforementioned room. “There.”

  Huh.

  I went to the door and tried to open it—locked. I put a bit of weight into it to see if there was any give. Nope.

  “They have meetings there. When people are over,” he continued.

  I studied him.

  “They don’t want me to go inside.”

  I gave him my best poker face. “I’m sure it’s nothing,” I said, smiling. We continued on our way.

  I knew I’d have to check that out later.

  --------

  The library was not the deviation from faith I was hoping it would be.

  If nothing else, the Bennetts bookshelves were stacked tall and completely filled.

  But it was all theological stuff. Religion-adjacent. The most accessible work I could find for little old me was ‘Cooking with Faith’ or ‘God Never Blinks: 50 Lessons for Life’s Little Detours’. The rest of it was deep cuts: revelations and parables dissected, and of course, the creme de la creme—thick leather-bound bibles placed exactly at my eye-level.

  I felt for poor Ethan. It was rare enough to have a kid who actually wanted to read. For goodness sake, let the boy have his Dr. Seuss… or, err, whatever the modern equivalent of that is nowadays.

  He maneuvered the shelves within his reach deftly, and it dawned on me that his bringing me along was probably more for my comfort than his. He pulled out a kids book that was hidden behind a row of literature much more on-brand for the Bennetts.

  He flipped it open.

  “Do you want me to read it to you?” I asked.

  He shook his head no.

  I got it. I saddled up beside and watched as he underlined each word carefully, enunciating clearly all the while. Page after page.

  He was doing a good job.

  Eventually, as we approached the end of the reading, I felt compelled to brute force another olive branch his way.

  “Do your parents ever read to you?”

  To my surprise, his eyes shot up quickly this time. I’d assumed his trance would’ve lingered much the same as it did when he was playing with his Legos.

  “Only that one,” he said, pointing to one of the Bibles. “I don’t think I like it.”

  “That’s alright,” I said. “You don’t need to—you don’t need to believe in anything.”

  A tight-lipped but polite look, then back to his story he went. He powered through some pretty long closing sentences with big words. Loneliness must’ve made for a pretty smart kid.

  He reached the final page and finished up, whispering the disturbing sentence nonchalantly, as if it too were written down:

  “I think my Mom and Dad want to hurt me.”

  It took a second for the weight of it to land on me.

  “Ethan—”

  His head lifted again.

  “Why would your parents want to hurt you?”

  “Because I’m different.”

  “Different makes you special,” I said, a platitude born out of gut reaction, I’ll admit.

  And then, an immediate subject change from him. “Can you bring me other books that are like this one but not the same as it, I’m tired of reading it,” he said. “I want to learn more things.”

  His all-of-a-sudden rapid way of speaking reminded me of someone who was near and dear to me.

  “You’re sick of that book, hey?” I said. Aaaand it’s probably the only one that doesn’t have to do with the father, the son, and the holy spirit—I wanted to tag but didn’t.

  He didn’t say anything more. But at the very least, he’d blessed me with an action item.

  “I’ll make sure your rents let me babysit you again, and yes, I’ll bring you more books. More books like that one.”

  No smile from him. “I can go to bed now.”

  And with that, he closed the hardcover, returned it to its hiding place, and shifted towards the stairs.

  I held his hand again, which he squeezed tighter than before.

  I guess he trusted me.

  --------

  He was a pretty self-sufficient little guy. Didn’t need me to tuck him in, turn on the nightlight, or read him a bedtime story.

  I guess he was right. He was different.

  We had one last short conversation as he drifted off, head on the pillow. “I wonder if bad things are gonna happen,” he said.

  The red flags about his family had already stacked up plenty high in my mind. “What makes you say that?”

  No response.

  “Ethan, what are you scared is gonna happen?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Has something bad happened before?”

  “I think they wanted it to, but…”

  “But what?”

  “They couldn’t find me, when they were looking for me.”

  “Ethan, who is they?”

  He hesitated for a bit. Held my look. As if he were waiting for something to click.

  “I think it’s okay,” he said, keeping his eyes closed this time.

  I stayed with him until I knew he was asleep. Then I left without making a sound.

  --------

  We were fast approaching my usual babysitting ‘sign off’ time. Ethan had eaten, “played” (see: read one boring kids book in a sea of religious mythology), and set off for dreamland. My job was done.

  I pulled up my phone and responded to the unbelievably short email thread I’d had with the Mister and the Missus.

  Thoughts about negligence were front and center in my mind, but I kept it cool:

  Hey,

  When are you all planning to head home?

  Also, I would be interested in babysitting him again.

  I pocketed my phone, fussed around the house some more.

  I looked for something more—anything, really—to help me wrap my head around this family.

  Into the entranceway again, past the original letter I’d opened. I crossed the threshold and opened the drawer of the entryway table. Bills, pamphlets, flyers. Nothing insidious.

  I checked my phone again.

  A response—faster than I’d imagined it coming:

  We are so sorry.

  We are running late.

  Please stay there with Ethan. We will pay you double time.

  We don’t want him to be alone.

  Late night, huh?

  The fleeting, selfish thought of heading home crossed my mind. I could lock everything up nicely, and they could come when they’d come.

  I wrote back.

  What time do you think you’ll be arriving?

  More wandering.

  I opened drawers and cupboards as I went.

  In one—a high kitchen cabinet—I found a pocketbook.

  I nabbed it and thumbed it open.

  It was a logbook.

  Amidst the pages, entries diligently filled in.

  Most of it was littered with random chores—don’t forget laundry, pick up vitamins from store—but peppered in-between were:

  06/29/2024

  Holy water did not work.

  Okay.

  07/29/2024

  Priest is not optimistic.

  Alright.

  08/29/2024

  Scripture had an adverse effect.

  Huh.

  09/28/2024

  We are praying that it is just possession.

  What…

  09/29/2024

  God has not answered us.

  We are praying that it is just possession.

  What even—

  09/30/2024

  We have received no word.

  We are praying that it is just possession.

  We will torture the possessor inside him. We will destroy it. We will restore him.

  I—

  10/01/2024

  We have received no word.

  We are praying that it is just possession.

  We will make him whole. We will restore him.

  Jesus fucking—

  10/03/2024

  We had a breakthrough. He cried a lot today!

  Okay, I needed to call Child Protective Services—

  10/10/2024

  It is confirmed though now we cry and ask why we were forsaken.

  Lord to give us this rollercoaster of relief and plunder it away.

  Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

  We accept your word.

  He is the Antichrist.

  My throat caught.

  These folks had completely drunk the Kool-Aid.

  --------

  I stood in front of the locked door from before.

  I needed to break in. I was willing to rush it full force if I needed, even with the fear that it’d wake, and likely terrify the poor boy.

  Was there anything else I could try?

  I remembered a toolbox I’d spotted during my journey of opening every single cabinet I laid eyes on. A flathead screwdriver, paired with my old lockpicking knowledge from a much more rebellious phase of my life was really the only other play I had at my disposal.

  I darted to the toolbox near the garage, grabbed the instrument, and returned.

  I got to work on the door, immediately wondering all the while—

  What am I doing?

  I wedged the tip of the screwdriver into the keyhole, twisting to hold just a bit of tension.

  I remembered this sensation of powerlessness. The feeling that someone you knew wasn’t in good hands—

  With my free hand, I pulled a bobby pin from my hair, straightened it, and slipped it inside. One click, then another, then the slow twist of the screwdriver.

  But I was older now. Smarter now. I could actually do something this time.

  The lock gave. I eased the door open.

  I was inside.

  The room held a circle of chairs in its center.

  Against the far wall, a bulletin board loomed over a table stacked with papers.

  I closed the distance. Among the scattered documents were Bible verses and discussion notes on possession.

  I turned to the board. Clippings, carefully pinned, all of them hand-written:

  “May 7th, 2024 - Madeline Webster had a dream about Ethan falling from the sky into the ocean and the whole ocean turning blood red. The sky turned dark immediately afterwards. Madeline kept returning to this nightmare.”

  “June 13th, 2024 - Little Marlene had a dream where she got a phone call. The Bennetts were calling to tell her that the Antichrist had been born.”

  “August 16th, 2024 - A member of our Church who would not like to be identified mentioned that when he arose from a nap, he felt static and a whisper that a great evil was growing in our town.”

  “September 9th, 2024 - It came to Father O’Riley in a vision clear as day. Ethan is the Antichrist.”

  There was plenty more like this tacked to the board—journal entries recounting dreams, some explicitly naming Ethan, others more cryptic. And jagged, frantic scribbles describing a wicked force looming over our small town. Likely ‘visions’ sketched by members of the community.

  I wondered just how long this group had been meeting for. Wondered exactly when this twisted notion first sprouted in someone. The idea that this strange, quiet child wasn’t just different—he was evil incarnate. There must’ve been a day when the rumors and gossip began, then turned to fever dreams and revelation, and finally to action.

  I pulled out my phone and checked my emails again. Nothing from them. I wrote:

  When will you be arriving?

  It’s getting late.

  Also, this is very serious. I want to talk about something I’ve discovered.

  Sent.

  Hopefully that would get through to them.

  I left the room, closed the door, and slipped back up the stairs to Ethan’s room.

  He was fast asleep. Rhythmic inhales and exhales.

  His intricate lego construction was obscured by dark—a big little world he was building.

  And as I looked at him, for just a brief second, I saw a flash—no longer Ethan lying in that bed, but a different kid. A girl. She must’ve been right around his age when she passed.

  I blinked and it was him again. Man. was he as awkward, dorky, and shy as she ever was. I supposed I couldn’t blame myself too much for seeing a bit of her in him.

  I lingered, wondering who I’d even tell about this weirdness. Who I’d inform about the cultish spinoff of our local church that was convinced that this boy was—well, y’know.

  My internal monologue was interrupted by the sound of the front door opening downstairs.

  That must be them.

  I exited, approached the stairs, but as I did I felt the strangest bit of instinctual terror. Something in my gut that felt like it’d been passed down over hundreds of thousands of years.

  The front door was indeed cracked ajar, but only by a hair. I saw it move way, way, way too slowly. Whoever was guiding it was doing it carefully. Trying to avoid making a sound.

  Finally, a black gloved hand curled around the edge of the frame.

  I stopped peeking.

  I quickly doubled back to the room to see Ethan sitting upright, with as close an expression to fear as I’d ever seen on his face.

  I held a finger to my lips. I used my other hand to grab the phone in my pocket to check my messages. I prayed that the note from the Bennetts would read: “We’re home, just entering quietly so we don’t disturb. Thanks!”

  But instead it read:

  We are glad that you’ve reached the same discovery we have.

  We knew you were good of heart.

  Lock yourself in a room, alone. That will keep you safe.

  Close your eyes, cover your ears, and pray. Pray for our salvation.

  Amen.

  What the fuck, what the fuck—

  “This is the bad thing,” Ethan whispered.

  “Shhh,” I said as quietly yet intensely as possible. He needed to listen to me now. He needed to understand.

  “Are you gonna hurt me too—”

  “Shhh!” I said again, trying to stress the severity to him with every muscle in my face. “No, but quiet Ethan.”

  The echo of steps reverberated in the entranceway.

  Operating on instinct alone, I returned to the hallway, reached the corner by the stairs and snuck a quick glance—

  Three men standing in the lobby, all of them dressed in dark clothing.

  Back to the room—

  Think. Think.

  I committed to a mental decision. I grabbed Ethan’s hand, slowly pulled him off the bed. I started fluffing up his blanket so it would look like someone was inside.

  I guided us down the hallway—the other way—dodging scattered toys and hoping with every bone in my body that our careful movements wouldn’t lead to an over-the-top creaking of the floorboards beneath our feet.

  At the end of the stretch was the master bedroom. I brought us inside. More distance. More time to think.

  We hid behind the bed, in the darkness. The thud of movement up the stairs met my ears.

  The men were whispering. I couldn’t understand what they were saying.

  “Stay down,” I said to Ethan, who kept his gaze lowered to the floor. I took a quick peek over the bed. Nothing.

  “Those must be Mommy and Daddy’s friends,” he whispered.

  “Shh, don’t say anything unless I ask you to talk,” I said, feeling awful, ducking back behind the bed.

  I tried to ground my spiraling thoughts and denial at the unreality of the situation within the same breaths—

  Could I grab a weapon maybe?

  Maybe we could jump out the window?

  If I called the police, would they show up in time?

  I lowered the brightness on my phone, tilted it down to keep any remnant light obscured best as possible, and dialed 911.

  Another static disruption to my phone’s screen. Just like in the kitchen. Jesus fucking—

  I looked up again. Stillness, at first. The hope that the strangers would just disappear shattered the moment their bodies came into view in the hallway, past the staircase. Whatever this was, I wanted to wake from it.

  Ethan placed his hand on mine, trembling now. “It’s okay,” he said, about as softly as a person could speak.

  But it wasn’t okay. I continued sneaking glances while trying to keep myself still in the silence.

  Please don’t come here. Please, please don’t come here.

  The men immediately turned into Ethan’s room. I caught a silver glint of something I couldn’t make out in one of the intruder’s hands.

  I dialed again. 9. 1. 1.

  This time, the call went through. The volume was hovering just a fraction above zero.

  “911, what’s your—”

  “Someone is after us. We’re hiding. Please come quick.”

  I hung up, hoping my grunted, raspy whispers meant something to the operator.

  My eyes crept up from behind the bed once more—the most nervous of these instances yet.

  Nothing. Just quiet—

  Interrupted by the muffled sound of something striking—twice. A soft, sinking impact. Like a fist into a pillow. A punch swallowed by fabric. Placing the noise felt impossible until I realized it—

  That must’ve been a knife descending into the bed.

  The light in Ethan’s room flicked on. It illuminated the hallway.

  Shit. Shit.

  Back to my phone. I quickly typed up a response to the email thread.

  I had to break character. This was about survival now.

  I’ve locked myself in a room.

  I told Ethan to hide in the downstairs living room.

  He should be there.

  Dear God. Please God.

  No, fuck that—

  Dear chaotic, uncaring universe—where survival and destruction hinge on dumb luck and dumb luck alone—fucking save us.

  We stayed where we were, but I could hear the men speaking in hushed voices in the hallway.

  “Did he have a premonition?”

  “Should we try another night?”

  “No—we stay the course.”

  Fuck.

  I tuned out the trio, held Ethan close, and checked my phone.

  There was a new email:

  Thank you and God Bless darling.

  Immediately I heard a ringtone go off and almost had a heart attack until I realized it’d come from the end of the hall.

  One of them must’ve received a call.

  “Hello?” a man said.

  Please. Please be about my email.

  I let the quiet sit for a half-minute before I peeked up again—just in time to catch a glimpse of them rounding the stairway’s edge.

  I turned to Ethan.

  “They’re gonna get me,” he said.

  “No they’re not, stop it with that.” I looked at him—carefully, composed. Seeing fear in me wouldn’t help right now. “Ethan–-is there any other way out?”

  No response.

  “Or anywhere else we can hide?”

  He shifted from our hiding spot, lifting a finger toward the hallway—then up.

  The attic.

  I had to improvise now. It was all improvisation.

  We had to move forward. And not fuck up.

  The words played in my head like a mantra as we left the master bedroom and returned to the corridor.

  Move forward. Don’t fuck up.

  The thuds and shuffles of movement from the search party downstairs confirmed that we only had a small window of time to leverage.

  Ethan guided me around a corner. I spotted the pull-string and tugged carefully to unfold the ladder to the upper level.

  I grimaced with every squeak and strain that followed.

  Please. We can’t afford any noise.

  It settled onto the ground. I thought about how next to play this hell scenario. I turned to Ethan. “You have to go up there, alone.”

  To my surprise, the brave weirdo didn’t protest too much. He started forging his way up into the darkness, climbing deliberately, then pausing at the halfway mark to glance back at me with an expression I couldn’t exactly place.

  “I’m gonna stay down here. I’ll distract them until the cops come.”

  And then—realizing—I quickly unhooked something from my cellphone, kissed it, and put it into his pocket.

  “Good luck charm,” I whispered.

  As soon as he reached the top, I lifted the ladder while he pulled from above, guiding it in as he closed the attic door—careful, but not silent. A muffled thump still landed.

  I froze.

  I wondered if they’d heard it.

  The lack of anything in the form of noise from below made me think they might’ve.

  My heart started pounding like it was going to break out of my chest altogether. A flurry of questions tore through my head:

  What the fuck do I do now?

  Is he gonna be okay?

  Does he know not to come back down—no matter what happens?

  A miniature moment of relief as the rustling and the shuffling from downstairs resumed, paired with words I couldn’t exactly hear, but that held the delivery and tone of “we need to keep looking” and “the intel was wrong.”

  And then—what at first felt like a mirage—the flicker of a blue light.

  I took muted but hurried steps down the hallway towards the stairs. I peered out past the chandelier hanging in the open lobby, through the curved window high above the entrance door. I was sure.

  It was the lights of a police vehicle.

  It was close.

  Help was coming.

  And then, the sound of footsteps gathering—

  Walking down the first floor hallway—

  Was it best to just hide in the master bedroom again?

  Should I have gone to the attic too?

  My eyes stayed fixed on the door.

  No.

  My feet compelled me down the stairs.

  If I just got to the outside—even if they spotted me—I could run. I could scream. Neighbors would hear. The cops, even, would hear.

  I committed to the plan.

  I dashed to the front door—I heard conversation in the hallway behind me but the assailants hadn't clocked me yet.

  Hand on the doorknob.

  Run. Scream. Keep them away from Ethan.

  An almost instinctive peek out the door’s peephole as I turned the handle—

  To see a person standing facing the door. Dressed in clerical robes. My eye to his eye.

  I saw his reaction to seeing the doorknob turn.

  Fuck.

  Back—back upstairs?

  Even if that’d give ‘em wind of where Ethan was?

  No.

  “That’s her! That’s the sitter!” I heard from one of the voices down the hall.

  The door swung open in front of me as frantic footsteps pounded behind.

  I didn’t even have time to pick between fight or flight as they swarmed me—I only had the one singular second to realize I was going to die. I had fucked up.

  I screamed with everything I had but it was cut off in a microsecond as a hand clamped over my mouth with a cloth and it all went black and the last thing before I disappeared was the thought that I’d doomed Ethan to descend the stairs to his death too in what would now be two people gone before their lives ever really started.

  —-

  In the haze, I remembered my little sister.

  I remembered the feeling of hopelessness when she was first diagnosed with cancer.

  And then the feeling of righteous indignation when my parents—unwavering in their faith—went the naturalistic route only. No chemotherapy. No medications. Only faith.

  I remembered it. I was a kid then. Really—I was a kid now.

  —-

  I woke up, gagged and bound in a chair in the room with the bulletin board.

  I guess it wasn’t just a movie cliche—this is what real-life psychopaths did too.

  The blurry image of four men in front of me, mid-conversation, gained clarity and reflexively I screamed into the cloth. One of the men, the only one not dressed like the others, leaned in front of me—

  The priest from our local church, I now realized. Father O’Riley.

  Were they going to torture me?

  “I’m so sorry!” he said.

  The others stood behind or beside him, stoic but with expressions that hovered on the 'apologetic' spectrum. I caught one of them mouthing 'I’m sorry' under his breath, while another kept his gaze lowered in shame.

  Another muffled scream from my end.

  “I get that,” Father O’Riley said. “But you need to understand now that I won’t be able to remove your gag until you stop screaming.” Then—“It was a miracle of the lord and nothing less that Mr. Jensen was the officer dispatched to this house.” I remembered that name from the letter. “Anyone else and this whole thing would’ve completely fallen apart.”

  Survive.

  I have to survive.

  Think. Don’t be reflexive.

  The human body is one dumb motherfucker because despite my thoughts, I had to fight every nerve ending in my godforsaken torso not to belt out another pointless wail.

  Eventually, I was able to feign calmness.

  I nodded.

  “I want you to think about the following idea,” he continued. “When an unimaginable amount of information, anecdotal though it might be, pushes towards a certain conclusion, do you ignore it? Even as it compounds and compounds and compounds? Or, rather, do you accept that the unscientific thing to do in this situation would be to deny it? That it’d in fact be reckless and illogical to cover your ears?”

  The slight flicker of madness in his eyes.

  “Everything in the past that science couldn’t explain was once seen as a miracle, you know. Or a curse. Things like this exist today. Things that will only one day be explained”

  I already read the notes you fucking asshole. Planting an absurd idea into people’s minds and then watching and tallying as they confirm your suspicions isn’t science.

  Fuck—shut up, brain. Shut up, body.

  Survive.

  He pulled the fabric from my mouth.

  Don’t scream.

  I didn’t say anything.

  “I am now going to share something with you, and you’re welcome to scoff at it, you’re welcome to disagree, and we can even have a discussion about it, but then—”

  Survive.

  “You think Ethan is the Antichrist,” I said, desperately.

  He squinted his eyes but didn’t say anything.

  “You sized me up correctly,” I continued. “I don’t believe in any of that shit, and I sure as hell am not religious but after spending a couple of hours with him, I’m inclined to believe there is something very, very wrong with him.” After a beat—“I even emailed his parents about it,” I tagged.

  It was a breathless word salad. I certainly wasn’t the best liar but I hoped today would be the exception.

  To my surprise, his eyes lit up.

  “Okay,” he said. “This might not be the insurmountable challenge of faith I thought it would be.”

  He bit the hook.

  “Don’t get me wrong, all of this—breaking in, tying me up—is fucking insane—” I started.

  Don’t lose them.

  “But yes, there’s… there’s something very wrong about that kid. In all my time babysitting, I’ve never really… felt anything like that. It feels like he’s…”

  I pretended to be at a loss for words. They were all following so far, but I needed them to give me something to piggyback off.

  “Like he knew what was going to happen before it happened?” one of the men cut in.

  What the fuck are you talki–

  “Yes, what the fuck,” I said, my eyes widened in faux ‘Wait, it wasn’t just me?’ disbelief.

  “Like he was repulsed by scripture?” another.

  Don’t oversell, play it cool.

  “Maybe? I guess that would explain the bookshelf?” I said.

  “The bookshelf?” the priest asked.

  “He pointed to the bible in the Bennett’s study. He said he hated it.”

  A bit of narrative embellishment, but what the hell.

  “Well, uh, alright, I was actually going to—take you through, uh, some of the proof we had gathered,” the priest said, nervously shifting his gaze from me to the others, then back again. “We kept having dream after dream in our little community, and I have to stress to you, you do not know our community. Collectively, they have seen many things. When Margaret Delemar was sick—”

  “Marge was a very beloved young lady at our church—” one muttered. .

  “We all dreamt about it. Nasty premonitions. Hopeless visions.” Then—“She was dead by twenty-three.” His stare at me bordered on a glare. “Hundreds of examples like this one, of premonition. I’d be happy to spend the hours to walk you through each and every one of them. But what’s important to mention is there’s never been a vision for our community as unified as the one about Ethan. God speaks to me. God himself told me the truth.”

  I wondered if there was even a sliver of a chance I could convince him otherwise.

  “You can tell, just by looking in his eyes, that he isn’t human,” he said.

  I had to steer them somewhere sane.

  “But what if there’s a heart somewhere in there?” I asked.

  I could sense their resistance. But I had to push. I had to try to persuade.

  “Seriously,” I said. “I came into this room earlier by the way—”

  Surprised looks now.

  “Sorry but if a room is off-limits, I’m gonna break in. Call it… trying to find the truth.”

  My attempt at playing to the religious gallery.

  “I read all of the notes. The journal entries, studies, and yes I’ll admit there’s a lot of proof, I get it, but it’s just—the Antichrist? What if he’s just possessed?”

  O’Riley didn’t budge. “WhaI this is is established,” he said. “We must meet the situation where it is.”

  I couldn’t help it anymore. No part of my moral compass saw any overlap with what the Father and his parish were espousing.

  “But why would God allow this? He’s just a little boy. And—” I met them all individually in their eyes, “I’m assuming you all want to hurt him.”

  “We would be killing him, yes,” Father O’Riley responded. “But you misunderstand God. We can save this as a longer conversation for another day, but in short young lady, the world isn’t sunshine and rainbows and handholding. It is sin. It is horror. It’s the brutality of nature all around us. This is why we want to return to the kingdom of heaven—”

  The magnification of that look in his eyes.

  “And if you are kind and good in this world, then you mustn't lie on your side and let the brutes tear your belly open. Psalm 82:4. ‘Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.’ You have to fight with vigor, with strength, with cunning, with decisiveness, with intentionality. It’s why we dropped the bomb. It’s why we dropped another. Vengeance, anger, jealousy, they are sewn into the human condition. This is the state of the world. Righteous vengeance and nothing less is what it takes to stamp out evil.”

  And it was as if it was the climax of his sermon and I was the only one sitting in the pews:

  “And evil does exist.”

  It sure did. I was looking at it. And in my heart of hearts I wished for lightning to strike the fucker down where he stood, but I knew the supernatural wasn’t real and that my prayers would go unanswered. After all, no unkind deed goes punished.

  A new question hit me.

  “Why is it tonight? Why on a night when a stranger of all things is babysitting him?”

  Father O’Riley stepped back. He looked to the side.

  “That boy can see the future,” he said. “He’s done well enough so far to protect himself—run away, hide, call for help, even call authorities. The whole thing was feeling fruitless. But, clever as he is, the boy is not impervious. The divine hand pushed us to improvise. To fold in a wildcard even we didn’t anticipate. A last-minute guest. A babysitter, I realized. And then we’d strike. And then, it would end.”

  I chewed on his words.

  I’d have to stamp Father O’Riley out with my own cunning—my own vengeance.

  “I think he trusts me,” I said.

  “Do you know where he is?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “But… I go to him alone.”

  “And do what?” one of the other men asked.

  “I’ll sedate him, and I’ll bring him down to you. I don’t care about all your riffing about brutality and God. There is a kind way to do this, and a cruel way. If you have to vanquish the Antichrist, you make sure he’s asleep first.”

  —------

  They followed me along the way. There was no doubt in my mind that they were skeptical.

  The truth was—they had no reason to be. There was no plan. I had nothing. I was heading upstairs with chloroform and a rag in a side bag.

  I’d convinced them that the trust Ethan had in me would be enough to trick him, even with his premonition abilities. That the wildcard of me being here and coming to the same conclusion they all had was enough to see this through.

  I had no way to tell if they actually believed me, or if they were merely letting things play out—hoping the divine would guide this to their desired conclusion: the murder of Ethan.

  The men stopped at the bottom of the stairs. Meanwhile, I was already moving through the hallway on the second floor, approaching the pull-string.

  I brought down the ladder and crawled up into the void, step after step. Upon reaching the top, I turned, pulled the ladder up behind me and folded it into place.

  I secured the latch as quietly as I could.

  Then looked back out at my surroundings.

  Hidden in the corner, amidst all the boxes, battered furniture, and even more Christian memorabilia, was Ethan. Huddled. Making himself small.

  I approached him. He didn’t recoil.

  “I’m not going to hurt you Ethan,” I said.

  We were shrouded in shadow, but what little I could see on his face told me he believed me.

  “I don’t want to lie to you,” I said, showing him the bag almost as a symbolic gesture, “the people downstairs want to hurt you, and they want me to help, but I’m not going to.” My hands on his shoulders. I whispered intently. “I know this is scary, but you’re gonna need to be brave now. More than ever.”

  I looked around—spotted a window. “I’m gonna get us out of here.”

  I reached it, peered outside. Nothing useful—just a reminder of how high we were.

  I maneuvered to the other side of the attic and found another opening. I lodged this window open, my eyes landing on a sturdy pipe running down the side of the house, just beside the frame.

  “Ethan,” I whispered, calling him over. He stumbled through the clutter to reach me. “I’m gonna lift you outside. You’re gonna hold onto the pipe, tight as you can, feet against the wall. You’re gonna slowly, carefully lower yourself until you reach the ground.” Then–-“I’ll distract them in the meantime.”

  He hesitated—eyes full of concern.

  “I’m not big enough to do this,” he said.

  “Yes you are,” I said. “You’re tough, you’re strong, and you’re bigger than you think. Don’t be scared now—just do.”

  With that, I started lifting him out the window. I kept him secured in my hands as he fastened to the pipe.

  “It’s gonna take all your strength, but I’m right here. You got this.” The moment finally arrived where it felt like he had some semblance of bearing.

  He lowered himself, inch by inch, while I continued holding onto his back and shirt.

  What the fuck had I just asked this kid to do.

  And yet, he’d found a rhythm with this nay-impossible task. His face, lit by the moonlight, wore determination.

  And then, once he was out of my reach, I sprinted back to the attic door.

  “Ethan, it’s okay,” I said, loud enough for the men to hopefully hear me. Their soft footsteps echoed right underneath me—they had already come up. “I promise I’m not gonna hurt you. You just have to come closer to me,” I said.

  Sensing a stillness—bought time—I scuttered back to the window.

  He was at second floor height now, but his foot was stuck on something. He struggled to tear it off, his balance waning.

  “Do it slowly,” I whispered. “Slowly, intentionally, you got this. Believe in yourself.”

  He looked up at me, nodded, restabilized himself and carefully detached the heel of his shoe from the pipe bracket.

  Relieved, I returned to the hatch again. I spoke close to the floor. “That’s right Ethan, everything’s okay.”

  Beneath me, footsteps rushed down the hallway—down the stairs. One of the men was moving.

  No.

  Change of strategy—

  “Hey! Hey Father O’Riley! Hey all of you fucking psychopaths!”

  Movement halted below. The floorboards settled. This was good. I had to keep this going.

  “There’s no fucking chance in hell you’re gonna get Ethan without going through me first!”

  A heavy rustling all of a sudden. The creak of tension. They were yanking at the pull-string, trying to force the attic open. I braced against the hatch, pressing my weight down.

  “Liz, let’s talk.” O’Riley.

  “Fuck you!” I snapped.

  Good. They think we’re both here.

  The monsters continued their campaign to force the passage open but I fought to keep it closed.

  “I’m gonna scream out the window!” I shouted. “We both are. So leave now—-”

  I was interrupted by a sharp, splintering crack from outside. What?

  A split-second of indecision—then I let go of the hatch and sprinted to the far window. Behind me, a click: the panel giving way.

  I reached the window. Ethan was halfway down, clinging to the pipe, but it had partially torn from the house and was swaying wildly, barely holding.

  I looked over my shoulder to the sight of the attic door cracking open, the ladder starting to unfurl.

  Back to Ethan. “Jump! Run!” I screamed, but the pipe snapped before he could let go.

  A jolt. A gasp. Then freefall.

  He crashed to the ground, landing in a heap, his ankle twisted at an unnatural angle.

  My breath caught. He wasn’t moving.

  He just lay there, motionless. While my soul sank to the earth’s core.

  I turned to check if O’Riley and the men were ascending, but my ears already knew the truth—thumps and pounding movements reverberated below me, storming down the stairs, then to the lobby—

  And I forced my eyes to look at reality—down at Ethan again.

  His motionless body was pulled by legs, off the grass and out of view, back into the Bennett home.

  I ran with everything I had.

  Stumbled and nearly fell down the ladder to the second floor, then bolted—down the hallway, down the stairs again—throwing myself toward the noise, to the—

  Kitchen. Where Ethan was pinned down by two men, Father O’Riley standing over him.

  And before anything, a force struck me from behind and took me down. I watched, arms wrenched behind me, a hand crushing over my mouth, as the priest turned to me.

  “I forgive you,” he said. “I’m sure deep down you were doing what you thought was best.” Then, tenderly. “Close your eyes. It’ll all be over soon.”

  Ethan—now awake—struggled uselessly. We met eyes.

  “It’ll be okay. It’ll work out,” I whispered, but the words died in the stranger’s grip.

  O’Riley started his sermon.

  “As God sayeth—‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’ We, here today, stand as the lord’s eyes, ears, and will. We’ll cast you out—not just from this earth, nor the kingdom above, but from anywhere you may seek dominion.”

  He turned to his men.

  “In the vision I had, he was reborn twice. We will do a knife in his heart. When he returns, a second through his head. Then, finally, for the third, into his stomach. Keep it there until he’s gone.”

  I fought and clawed and bit and shouted but it was to no avail. Meanwhile, it looked as if Ethan had resigned to his fate.

  I heard him mutter something under his breath:

  “Believe in yourself.”

  The priest turned to one of his men. “Hand me the knife.”

  “No!” I tried to scream but it was smothered by the man restraining me.

  Father O’Riley received the knife. He prepared it.

  “You are delivered to the pit!” and then he stabbed the knife right into Ethan’s chest.

  The universe froze for a moment.

  Then Ethan’s head fell to the side, his mouth slightly open. I watched the light leave his eyes.

  Nothing supernatural.

  Just a boy.

  Father O’Riley stood up and examined the body carefully.

  After a few seconds, he said—

  “He’ll be returning to life in another minute or so. That’s what the lord showed me.”

  “You fucking maniacs!” I let out but it was only muffled and no word gained clarity. I looked at the kid I was supposed to watch after. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry,” I melted, clearer in my head than in my voice.

  His dead eyes lingered with mine. More eye contact than he’d ever given me when he was alive.

  I failed you Ethan.

  And for a moment, I didn’t see him anymore.

  Rather, I saw my little sister in the hospital bed. I held the charm she gave me. I matched my Mom and Dad’s desperate prayers—all they could do to make the Lord intervene—as the line on the machine oscillated less and less until it flatlined.

  Then back, yet again, to the sight of Father O’Riley, looking at his watch rather nervously. “Ten seconds,” he said, with less confidence than before. “Then the boy will return. We’ll need to work even harder to restrain him this time.”

  It was the calmest case of schizophrenia I’d ever seen.

  The moment struck, and he brandished the knife again—

  “You don’t need to! He’s already fucking dead!” I forced the words out for no other reason than the pointless moral victory of sparing Ethan from being completely and utterly bludgeoned despite his already cruel death. All the while, my mind replayed everything that had happened—everything I could’ve done differently. Jumping out the second-floor window. Hiding in the attic with Ethan until the cops came. But—no, none of that would’ve changed anything.

  I looked at the boy again and watched as he was about to get his head caved in by God’s love.

  But a light returned.

  And all of a sudden I was staring, eye to eye, at someone who could stare back at me.

  A miracle.

  A… miracle?

  “You are delivered to the pit!” the priest screamed again, forcing the knife down, except—

  Ethan turned his head. The knife still struck his skull—at a rather horrific and awkward angle—but it wasn’t the blow the Father intended. Desperately, he yanked at the blade, trying to free it for another chance to land the fatal strike he had meant.

  And I felt a force.

  An energy around me.

  No tangible wind or tornado yet it seemed something just like that was building from within the house, manifesting from nowhere.

  A cross fell from the wall to the floor, then slid away to the ends of the house, as if moving magnetically.

  Then another dropped.

  And another.

  The invisible tempest strengthened as O’Riley finally resecured the knife. The men holding Ethan were—

  Struggling?

  Or so it seemed, to keep him restrained. I noticed him start to twist their hands with a power that I could never have imagined in an eight-year-old.

  As more and more crosses slid to the ends of the house and the energy coalesced—even the priest, it seemed, struggling to hold onto the knife—I wondered:

  How in the fuck was Ethan even alive?

  What was I looking at?

  The man restraining me dashed to Ethan as well, but the ravaging force was already becoming too much. O’Riley’s body was getting pushed back. The others went from struggling against Ethan to buckling quickly. Then—

  The sounds of bone snapping.

  The sounds of glass shattering—fallen crosses no longer sliding on the ground but flying through cracked windows altogether.

  What the fuck.

  Despite being free now, I could only watch with confusion as the epic event unfolded in front of me. The giant centerpiece cross from the Bennett’s living room finally collapsed to the ground, then flew out with impossible speed to the yard.

  The lights flickered in and out, the whirlwind crescendoed, and Father O’Riley drove the instrument downward with his full weight, his other hand yanking his cross necklace free and thrusting it forward, unwavering, as if to brandish divinity itself.

  “You are not welcome here, beast!” he screamed. “Be gone now!”

  The knife met Ethan’s skull straight-on this time, but as it did Ethan too broke out from the grip, grabbed Father O’Riley’s pendant—along with a handful of his chest—and tore it out, throwing it to the side.

  No sooner had he done that than it all went black. Images that made no sense appeared before me, within them the sight of O’Riley’s men twisting into shapes unrecognizable. A choir of hellish sounds rang in my ear—a song of destruction, splitting, and exploding, until—

  The lights turned on again. And the room settled.

  The priest, recognizable by torso only, lay dead on the ground, surrounded by a smattering of body parts and blood that best resembled the discarded scraps of a second, unnecessary meal. A canvas of the remnants of all four men who broke into the Bennett home.

  And in the center of it all, Ethan, lying on the ground with the knife still lodged in his head.

  I got up and walked over to him. In the corner of my eye, I saw the knife block on the kitchen counter—a few knives in it.

  What do I do.

  After a moment, Ethan’s eyes brimmed with life yet again—his second return—as I could’ve sworn I heard, or maybe it was just an auditory hallucination, a voice in my head say:

  Lower the blade into him again, and the deed will be done.

  I—

  Didn’t do anything as Ethan lifted himself up. He pulled the knife out of his head, then dropped it on the floor.

  He stepped through the blood and guts like it was merely an inconvenience, then made it to the front door. He opened it.

  “Where are you going?” I asked him.

  “I feel like I’m bigger now,” he said. “I’m gonna say bye to Mom and Dad. They’re in the eighth row of the pews at the Gracewell Church, praying that my death was successful.”

  How did—

  Why was I even questioning anything anymore?

  He gave me a smile.

  “Thank you for telling me to believe in myself.”

  Then—

  “When it’s all done—I’ll give you a city.”

  And then he walked out the front yard, past the crosses big and small that littered the grass. I ran to the door frame and watched as he disappeared down the avenue, each street lamp he stepped under flickering momentarily as he moved past.

  Almost instinctively, I went upstairs. I needed somewhere to sit that wasn’t marked by blood.

  I crept up, still unsure what had just taken place, and turned into the first room—Ethan’s.

  I turned on the lights.

  And saw the toys in the corner that I’d missed the first time—arranged in what looked like a sacrificial ritual.

  And the giant lego set, now much more elaborate and in-depth than I’d imagined when it was first obscured. Cavernous, with incredible depths and complexity, as a horrible feeling sat in my chest.

  Is this what hell looked like?