The Demon Senders (2 page)

“It was the twenty dollars Aunt Cheryl gave me for my birthday last month. Honest.”

“Your Aunt Cheryl is my sister, you ungrateful little fuck. My sister first, not your Aunt.”

“Yes, sir,” Henry said as he inched a step away from his father.

“You think you’d have an Aunt Cheryl if it wasn’t for me? You think some random, fat assed bitch named Cheryl would give a shit about you and your damn birthday if it wasn’t for me?”

“No, sir. I don’t think that at all.”

“That’s my money. It came from me and because of me. Give me my twenty,” his father said, recovering the lost ground between the two. “Every last cent of it.”

Henry plowed his hands into his pocket and pulled out a handful of cash and coins. “I think there’s a little over fifteen left.”

“I told you I wanted my twenty.” He slapped Henry with the back of his hand, cracking Henry’s nose and sending a stream of bright red blood across the living room carpet. “Twenty bucks. Every last cent.”

Henry had learned not to cry and never to fall down after being hit by his dad. Doing so always resulted in more blows. “I don’t have any more but I will next week. I promise.”

“Next week is when I pay you your allowance, right? You think I’m going let you float a full week on your debt? You think the fucking bank will float me when I can’t pay the full mortgage in two weeks because I lost my damn job today? You think they give a shit about me getting fired? Your mom certainly didn’t. She ran her skinny ass out of here as soon as I told her I got sacked. Bitch-whore.” Henry could see the starting of tears filling up in his father’s bloodshot eyes. “Twenty bucks now or you’ll pay another way.”

“I can check in my nightstand,” Henry said, again inching away. “I think I may have some money in there.”

“It’s my money!” his father screamed. “My money in your pockets. My money in your nightstand. My money in your mom’s fake tits. My money in this fucking house.”

Henry had been punched before. Hard knuckles crashing into his face or gut. But those were from kids, far less strong and less skilled than the punch his father delivered. The punch caught him square in the face, flattening his already damaged nose, creating a sickening cracking sound that filled Henry’s ears. The punch was so hard and hurt so much that he didn’t try to stay upright. As Henry felt his body land harshly onto the living room floor, he expected he’d regret not even trying to stay on his feet. His father was on him before he could finish wishing he had attempted to stay on his feet.

The first time his father had punched him had knocked him down flat on his back. The second, third and fourth times seemed curiously less intense. He could still feel the inflicted pain as his father rained blows down on his face, carrying on about money, his “bitch-whore” of a mother and the assholes at work and their “fucked up alcohol policies,” but each landed blow hurt less and less. Either his father was tiring—and would soon be too tired to continue—or something else, something much worse was occurring.

The fifth blow was the last Henry felt. It was more like his father had pushed his face rather than slammed a tight fist into it. He could hear himself breathing and could still clearly see his father kneeling over him, fists raised and a slick of drool hanging out of his face. He remembered hoping his father’s drool either was sucked back into his dad’s mouth or, if it had to fall, fell onto the carpet and not onto his face. He thought it was strange that his focus had shifted so quickly away from being punched by his dad and towards a four-inch string of dangling saliva.

He watched as his father cocked his arm back again and shivered when the dangling drool stretched out even further. Henry had no way of knowing how long his dad’s spit could stretch before gravity called it home, but still he only wanted it to fall away from his face. As his father twisted his torso back to create more torque to launch the sixth punch, Henry decided if the drool were to break free and fall on his neck or chest, he’d be okay with that. Anywhere but in his face.

There were two things Henry clearly remembered after that final spit-focused thought: One, was the sickening feel of his father’s saliva splashing down into his swollen and bloody face and the second was the cracking sound that halted the sixth punch from coming.
 

It took him several minutes before he realized his father’s body was half on top of him and half laying face down on the living room floor beside him. He looked up and saw Phillip standing above him, a frying pan clutched in his hands.

“Henry?” Phillip called. “Henry can you hear me? Are you okay? Don’t move. I’ll call the cops now.”

“Is he dead?” Henry muffled, his face and mouth swollen. “My dad? Did you kill him?”

“I don’t think so,” Phillip said, his voice shaking and wet with subdued cries. “I hit him pretty hard, though.”

“I owe you for this, Phil. You saved my life. I owe you, big time.” Henry’s head slipped back onto the carpet as the darkness that was dancing around the corners of his sight converged into light-dispelling darkness. Before he slipped completely into unconsciousness, he used the sleeve of his shirt to wipe his father’s drool off his face.

There really isn't anyone else who knows my story. It's not that I hadn't the opportunity to tell my tale, it's just I don't think anyone would believe me. Heck, I'm not even sure I believe it all. Plus, I have a feeling if I did tell anyone (or if I ever do tell anyone if I manage to find my way out of the situation you've found me in) that I would be putting them in a very dangerous situation. The last thing I want, or wanted, is to cause anyone harm.

Before we go any further, I should tell you my name. Trevor MacCreary, but people used to call me either Trevor Mac or just Mac. A few people call me Trevor but being called that makes me think my mom is talking to me. You probably never heard of me and, even if it was possible for you to see me, you wouldn’t recognize me. I wasn’t famous for anything though you probably don’t want to mention my name around here, just to be on the safe side. See, I had what you might call a gift and my gift made me very unpopular with some.

There were plenty of good things about my gift and plenty of things which fall deep into the “sucks” column of the balance sheet. But all in all, I’m not going to complain. I think I could have done a lot of good for people which, I had hoped, would have earn me favors when my time was up. The potential of doing good for others was one of the things I’d list on the “doesn’t suck” side of the balance sheet. Probably at or damn near the top. Another good thing about the gift was the potential for me to have made the world a much, much better place. I'm thinking I won’t ever get to test that potential out, though. Not considering where I am now.

I can’t say I liked doing it or that I’m happy about sending them back. It’s just what I was made to do. My gift is my curse, I suppose. When they know they’re beaten, the look in their eyes is pretty horrible. Scared about going back. Terrified, actually.

Anyway, I figure since I’m in the position I’m in, it’s time I let you know about me, what I do, how I do it and where I went wrong and ended up here. Like I said, I haven’t told my story before so I haven’t worked out a simple way to tell it. But I think if I start at the beginning and go from there, you’ll get a good idea of who I am, where I messed up, and how I ended up here with you.

I wasn’t always a sender. I used to be a normal guy trying to make my way through the world. I had my share of good times and bad but, up until I figured out what I was, I have to say I had more good than bad times. It was just a few weeks ago, shortly after I hit my mid-twenties when it all started. I was coming back from a bar in Syracuse, New York where I had just finished playing three or four songs at the bar’s open mic night. I was just cutting my teeth in the “gig playing” world so playing at that bar was a big deal for me. The name of the bar was “Shorty’s.” No matter what happens to me, I know I’ll never forget the name of the place.

One thing I’’ll always remember about the bar is how diverse the crowd was. You’d walk into the place and see doctors, lawyers, politicians, bikers, college kids and the obligatory teenagers who had convincing enough fake ID’s to get past the bouncer. You pick a class of people and sure enough, you’d find them belly to bar in Shorty’s.

Anyway like I said, I played a few songs which may not seem like a big deal since it was open mic night, but I was asked by the owner to keep playing after I played my first song. That didn’t happen too often, as most of the people who play open mic nights aren’t very good at singing, playing guitar or both. I’m not saying I was great at either, but I was good enough to be asked to keep playing. And believe me when I tell you, that was saying something.
 

Now that I think about it, the last song I played was one I wrote myself. “Roses and Stones” was the name of the song and, without coming off as cocky, it was a pretty damn good song.
 

Roses and Stones, remind me of you when I am gone.

Roses and Stones, are all I have now that you’re gone.

The problem is when you’re playing an open mic, you really are expected to play songs people know. Something from the Stones, The Who, Van Morrison or, if you’re brave enough, a sorrowful tune from James Taylor. No one in the crowd knew my song so I don’t think the owner was all that pleased I played it. Didn’t matter to me since I was only planning on getting to play one song, the ones that came after were gravy. Grab the brass ring when you can, my dad used to say!

I remember driving home from Syracuse after staying for the rest of the singers to finish. I lived in a very small town to the east of Syracuse, about forty-five minutes away. To say it was cold out that night would be a huge understatement. Had to be twelve below when I started home. I didn’t care, though. I was feeling pretty darn good about my performance, being asked to play more than anyone else and about my chances of getting a paid gig sometime soon. The cold sucked, don’t get me wrong, but it was more a part of the background than it would have been on any other day.

So, by the time I got to driving home, it was past two in the morning. I was a little short on cash so I took the back roads to avoid the tolls on the New York State Thruway. Damn thruway. It was built back in the 1960s or 70’s and the tolls were supposed to last only as long as did the debt the state took out to build the roads. Instead of the tolls going away, the Thruway Authority just kept bumping them up every year or so. I think the tolls would have run me only ninety-five cents but, like I said, I was short on cash.

Real short.

The back roads were okay on most nights: Less traffic and less cops. I may have had a couple of beers so avoiding cops was a bonus on top of saving a buck.

I remember I was cruising around eighty when I saw him standing right in the middle of the road about a hundred yards in front of me. He was standing off to the side of a pick up truck on the side of the road. Hood up, steam pouring from the engine. Instead of standing right next to his broken down Dodge and just waving to me, he walked right out in the middle of the damn road. There were two possible outcomes: Either I was going to run my Astro van right over him or I was going to be forced to swerve off the road and into whatever was waiting for me off the side of the road. I didn’t like either of those options so, as quick as I could, I slammed my foot on the break pedal, gripped the steering wheel like I’ve never gripped anything before and waited to see what would happen.

I was scared half out of my mind, but he just stood in the middle of the road, waving his hand really slow and smiling. Son of a bitch just stood in the middle of the road, smiling and waving at me.

It turned out I didn’t hit him and didn’t have to go off-roading. Astro van came to a stop about six inches from his knees. Swear to God he knew I wasn’t gonna hit him, can’t say that for sure but it was just the way he was standing there without a care in the world. Kind of freaked me out but not enough for me to get my ass away from him. He walked over to the passenger’s door, opened it up and stuck his head in and started talking like he was expecting me.

“Wasn’t sure you’d make the stop. Would have been a horrible pop.”

I was pretty pissed and more than a little bit still in shock. “You having some car problems?” I asked, partly because my dad always told me telling someone he’s a fucking moron wasn’t being a good Christian and partly because he scared the crap out of me.

“Old Dodge has seen some better days,” he said as he sat down beside me. I’m not the complaining type but the one thing I hated about my Astro was the driver’s and passenger’s seat were too damn close. Wasn’t bad when the passenger’s seat was taken by a girl, but that didn’t happen all that often. Which meant either the seat was empty or had a dude sitting in it. And this dude was now about eight inches from my face.

“Guess it’s time to send her on her way.”

“I can drive you up to the Thruway rest stop. There’s a service station there and an access road that connects with this road. Not sure if I can drive up that road but worst case you’d only have to walk a hundred yards or so up to the station.”
 

“Sure is mighty nice of you,” he said.
 

I lit up a clove cigarette and extended the pack to my passenger. “No thanks,” he said with an exaggerated wave of his hand. “Lungs aren’t all that good anymore. Breathing in too much shit over the years hasn’t done me no favors.”

The service station was about twenty miles down the road from where I almost made road kill out of him. Turned out to be the longest twenty miles of my life.

The first few miles weren’t all bad. He started talking about his life and his work. Didn’t mention any family or a wife but he did talk about his business quite a bit. I’ve never confirmed his story, but based on what he was telling me, I got the idea he did pretty well for himself.

He went on for a while, telling me stories about some of his jobs, a few of his failures and a couple tales about some people who used to work for him. To tell you the truth, the stories he told weren’t all that interesting. Actually, they were pretty boring. The fact that his stories sucked made the realization that my non-driving foot—that would be my left foot—was tapping along with his words, pretty disturbing. It was like he was speaking in rhythm, and I, being a musician, must have unconsciously picked up on it. I started listening after I noticed my foot tapping and noticed the old man was rhyming all his sentences. This is when it hit me. He was babbling on, never losing rhythm and never missing a rhyming chance, and all I could think of was something my grandmother used to tell me.