Page 16

Theo

Once Annoth is gone, I sink into a chair at the kitchen counter, trying to wrap my head around how my life got this fucked up this quickly, and Ben approaches me slowly.

“So,” he says, and I lift my head from my hands, “you wanna…catch me up to speed?”

“On…what, exactly?” I try not to let myself stare too long at the cut of his jawline, or the deep brown color of his eyes, or the way his lips are perfectly bowed. Technically, he’s not a priest, says the voice at the back of my mind, which may or may not be Annoth trying to convince me to sin.

“All this,” he says, waving his hand around at my disaster of an apartment: empty picture frames, containers of Thai food littering the coffee table, a few dead plants by the window, the layer of dust. At least I managed to do laundry this morning.

All I can do is sigh. “I’ve been in a bad spot for a couple months, and she says that’s what made me vulnerable to…possession. She couldn’t find an ‘emotional foothold’ though, and she got pissed about it, so she tried to bring you in. That obviously didn’t work–”

“Wait, she’s the one who found me?”

“Yeah. She got on my phone while I was asleep and looked you up somehow. What platform do you normally use to scam little old Catholic ladies anyway? Craigslist is a bit old-fashioned. ”

Ben frowns. “Look, I’m not here to be judged by a man who doesn’t even use a bag in his trash can.”

I can’t help but laugh. “I told you: rough spot for a few months.”

“Fair enough. What happened to get you into that spot?”

“What are you, a shrink?” I ask, echoing his taunt from earlier.

“Well, Theo ,” he says slowly. God, I hate how good my name sounds coming out of his mouth.

“You’ve got me trapped in your health hazard apartment with an incredibly unstable but sexy demon lady and a couple of cats, so I think, maybe, I have a right to know what I’ve been thrown into here.

” His smile is softer now, but no less dazzling. Fuck , what have I gotten myself into?

“Ok,” I relent. “About two months ago, my girlfriend and I broke up. It wasn’t bad.

It was…a mutual thing, but we’ve been together since junior year of college, and I was saving up money for a ring, so it hurt.

I was doing fine, but then a week after she left, I also got laid off, and… just hit a downward spiral since then.”

Ben runs a hand over his stubbled chin.

“Alright, well, thanks for being honest with me. I’ll do what I can to help. Now, I hate to ask this, but…could I…use your shower?” He pretends to sniff his own shirt. “Been sleeping in my car for a couple weeks.”

“As much as I’d love to hear the story of why my new roommate, the con-man ex-priest, has been sleeping in his car, I think I’ll enjoy it more once you’re not stinking up my apartment,” I say with a wry smile, trying to show him that I do, in fact, have a sense of humor hidden under all this stress and angst.

He grins. “Unfortunately, your apartment smells worse than my car.”

I show him the bathroom and he grabs some clothes and toiletries out of his duffel bag.

Once I hear the water running, I search the bag myself to make sure he doesn’t have anything I need to be concerned about.

There’s nothing in here except some wrinkled clothes, his clerical collar, a worn-out, dog-eared Bible, a rosary, a wallet, a flask full of what smells like tequila, and a few other random items. No weapons, thank God, so I take the nearly-expired driver’s license out of his wallet.

He’s two years older than me and his full name is Mateo Benjamin Cardenas de la Cruz.

I pull out my laptop and sit at the counter, then type his full name into the state’s criminal record database.

Petty theft, possession of alcohol, and trespassing when he was seventeen and eighteen.

He did community service for it. Next, I put his name into the Sex Offender Registry. Nothing. So far, so good.

“What are you doing, Theodore?” says a smooth voice behind me. I nearly jump out of my skin and turn to see Annoth standing incredibly close, looking over my shoulder. I didn’t even hear her come out of the bedroom.

“Jesus fucking Christ, don’t do that!”

“Might we dispense with that particular curse?” she says, going to sit on the couch.

“Can you dispense with calling me Theodore?” I grumble as I get up to put Ben’s ID back in his bag. “My mom doesn’t even call me that.”

“Very well, Theo . I would like to watch more films now.”

“What’s the magic word?” I say with a smirk. She simply stares at me, then picks up the remote and turns the TV on.

“There is no magical incantation required,” she says with a straight face. I think I might pull my hair out. If I have to live with someone who has absolutely no sense of humor, I’ll go nuts. At least Ben seems funny…not to mention insanely hot. Stop it right now, I tell myself.

“What are you gonna watch?” I ask Annoth.

“I should like to watch more Star Wars .”

“Ah, no, come on!” says Ben, who’s now standing in the hall, wearing only a towel that’s wrapped very low around his hips and drying his hair with the Green Day t-shirt he had on earlier.

“Let’s watch something good, at least! Have you shown her The Exorcist ?

” He chuckles at his own joke, and it’s all I can do to keep my eyes on his face rather than letting them roam lower.

“She watched some Star Wars , some Friends , and a couple Disney movies,” I tell him. “And hey, what’s your problem with Star Wars ?”

He shrugs. “Eh, just not my thing, I guess. I only ever watched half of the first one. Or is it the fourth? The 70s one.”

“You’ve…you’ve never seen Star Wars ?” I think my eyes might have bugged out of my head.

Ben runs the t-shirt over his face and I let myself look for a moment.

He’s thick and muscular everywhere, like a rugby player, with dark curly hair covering his chest and stomach and a happy trail running beneath the towel.

Around his neck is a silver chain with a pendant that looks like some kind of Saint, but I can’t identify it from here.

I move my eyes back up and… oh, fuck . His face splits into a sly grin.

“Maybe she should watch Brokeback Mountain ,” he suggests. I think I might melt into a puddle on the floor.

“What is that film about?” Annoth asks curiously, looking over at me. “Theo, your face is quite red. Are you having another panic attack?”

“I’m fine!” I snap, and stand up to look around for something else I could use as a trash bag.

“Father Benjamin, perhaps you could suggest a good film, since Theo is not feeling well.”

Ben cringes. “Ok, I’m setting another ground rule for this little shitshow. Can you, for the love of God, not call me ‘Father Benjamin’?”

“I shall call you Ben because it is easier to say, and not for the reason you have requested,” Annoth says, then continues scrolling through movies.

“Great,” Ben quips. “Lemme get dressed and I’ll find you something good to watch, Annie . ”

She turns to stare at him, her mouth set in a furious line and her black eyes blazing with fury. “Do not ever call me that,” she hisses, and he holds his hands up, laughing.

“Lord, everyone’s so touchy.” He goes to the office to change. When he comes back out, he’s wearing jeans and another black band t-shirt, this one featuring several holes and bleach stains which may or may not be intentional.

I raise an eyebrow. “Fall Out Boy? What is it, 2009?”

“Gimme your phone and let’s see who has better taste in music, then, vaquero ,” Ben taunts. “I bet yours is all hillbilly bullshit.”

I’m silent and his grin widens.

“Called it.” He walks past me to the fridge and opens it. “What the fuck? What’ve you been eating for two months?”

“Pizza,” Annoth and I say at the same time. She laughs and keeps scrolling.

“Hey, I had Thai the other night!” I say loudly.

“I know what both of you need,” says Ben, throwing himself onto the couch beside Annoth, who gives him some side-eye that could burn a hole straight through anyone with a bit more shame. He holds his hand out for the remote, and she reluctantly passes it over.

“Nothing that’s gonna give her ideas, please,” I tell him, then open my phone to see what food we could get delivered. More texts and calls from my family and Mak. Still nothing from Ros.

“Now, this is a cinematic masterpiece of the highest order,” Ben tells Annoth, and I look up just in time to see him select Guardians of the Galaxy .

“How can you like that and not Star Wars ?” I demand to know.

“Because Star Wars takes itself too fucking seriously!” Ben groans. “It’s sci-fi! It’s not that deep!”

“Oh, come on! What about the–”

“Be silent, both of you!” Annoth growls, tucking her knees under her chin, eyes fixed on the screen. Ben starts the movie for her, then comes over to where I’m scrolling through delivery options in the kitchen.

“Pizza, Thai, or Chinese are the only options tonight,” I say, showing him my phone screen.

“Got enough unread messages and missed calls?” he remarks.

I sigh. “My family and friends have been…worried about me. I’ve been trying to keep up, but…it’s just hard, when you’re not in the right space for it. My mom is a bit overbearing, Dad doesn’t understand mental health. My friends are great, but…”

Something shifts in Ben’s face, then immediately vanishes.

“I could help you out with that while I’m here anyway, if you want,” he offers. He’s standing so close that his scent fills my nose–classic Old Spice, I think. It makes me a little lightheaded, and not in a bad way.

“Uh…with texting people? Is that one of your many services?”

His voice becomes even more gentle as he says, “It’s just something I’ve got experience with, and I know how hard this shit can be.” The offer seems earnest, and I can’t help but smile.

“Yeah, I might take you up on that. Now, dinner?”

“Moving a little fast there, aren’t you?” Ben says with a wink. “You’re supposed to buy a guy dinner before you and your demon girlfriend kidnap and blackmail him.”

My body burns and I laugh softly. “Entirely in the wrong order, I know.”

“ Be silent! ” Annoth hisses at us. She’s pulled one of my random couch blankets around her now and is very intent on the movie. Ben and I order dinner in whispers, then he moves back over to the couch and sits beside Annoth, who doesn’t acknowledge him.

I want to relax, but I can’t. Instead, I sit there at the counter, anxiously drumming my fingers and thinking.

I just need to lay low until Ben can find us someone else for an exorcism.

A few days, maybe? A week? I have no idea how long it could take.

Should I be texting my family and letting them know I’m alright when I’m really not?

I don’t want my mom showing up here randomly, or Molly.

And then there’s the thing Mak said about Ros, that she’s apparently now working at the high school back in our hometown.

I haven’t had a chance to really think about it, but now I can’t help myself and it just makes me feel worse.

That’s what she always wanted: to move back, to have a nice, slow, quiet life out there.

Go to church with her family, have Sunday dinners and barbecues, raise kids in the same house where she grew up, send them to the same schools we went to.

She can have that now, and I can have…this.

Whatever this is. I should be happy for her.

I’m going to do my best to be happy for her, despite the gaping hole in my chest.