Taking a shaky breath, Ben hefted his bag higher onto his shoulder and headed upstairs.
The house had four floors. The basement, the first floor, second floor, and then the attic area where they kept storage. The bedrooms were on the second floor, though Tiana stayed in the attic.
The second floor had six bedrooms. One for his father, one for Ben, and four guest rooms. Ben knew Tiana would be in his room, as his dad didn't let her in his room.
Tiana was folding his clothes, and when she heard him, she turned around with a bright smile and waved. "Hi! I've got all your clothes folded. I also made you an afternoon snack - peanut butter and crackers with a little bit of whipped cream to the side. Would you like anything else?"
Ben shook his head, swallowing nervously. "No. Um... I'm allergic to peanut butter, actually." He eyed her sadly, eyes cascading over her figure, checking for flaws or problems. There were none - physically.
The woman scoffed. "My, my! How could I forget that? Silly me... how about I just give you crackers and whipped cream, then?" She smiled mischievously, putting her hands in her jeans pockets. Her blue eyes scanned him before she tilted her head. "Have I seen you in that jacket before? You look so handsome in it."
"No," mumbled Ben, looking down at himself. "No, ah... this is new. I got it... today. That's why I'm home late. I went to, uh... pick up a jacket." His eyes wandered to his dresser.
Tiana chuckled. "Of course you did. Sorry, I've been forgetting just about everything today... It really is just so silly, but I promise I'll get better."
"Tiana-" Ben started, wanting to tell her there was absolutely no reason for her to need to get better, but she continued, "Right. Well, I'll go make your snack."
And then she left with a smile, shutting the door behind her. Ben grit his teeth, standing there, soaking in the knowledge that she was falling apart.
Walking over to his balcony, he opened the doors slowly. No one was there. He walked out, slowly, approaching the railing and looking down. Still nothing.
"Ezra-"
"Ben?" asked Ezra.
Ben whipped around to find Ewan and Ezra behind him, with Ewan clutching the other boy's arm.
"She didn't see us, did she?" asked the boy. "Because we were standing right here and I could've sworn she was talking in our direction but I - I mean, I don't know, but Ewan grabbed my arm and it was a little weird, so maybe -"
"I made us invisible," Ewan mumbled, rolling his eyes. He looked even paler than before, his eyes now bloodshot and his hands trembled as he moved aside the hair in his face in aggravation.
"So she didn't see us?" Ezra asked, astounded.
"That's what invisible means-"
"Wouldn't that have been a better power to show to prove you're a demon?" suggested Ezra.
"I lit my finger on fire, Ezra, I very well thought that would have been enough-"
The two went silent, then Ewan cleared his throat. "Me, then? Can we get to me? I can feel this body withering."
"Maybe you shouldn't have possessed it," snapped Ben.
"Maybe you shouldn't have-" Ewan halted, unable, it seemed, to come up with a valid reply. And rather he just huffed in irritation, looking to the side. "Maybe you shouldn't have let him die."
"I didn't know he was going to be possessed," Ben scoffed.
"You haven't even told me how he died. For all I know, you killed him!"
"I didn't kill him," Ben growled, the lie feeling like a ton of bricks in his stomach. "I didn't... I didn't kill him."
Ewan rolled his eyes. "I know, I just..." He crossed his arms, then raised an eyebrow. "How did he die, then? Because the plague doesn't involve that much blood."
Ezra bit his lip and Ben looked over at him. He knew the situation was bad - he knew it really was starting to sound like he'd killed him, so Ben quickly said, "He got hit by a car. Outside. So we brought him inside to help him."
"So why are your fists scabbed up?" Ewan asked. "Because it looks to me like-"
"He got into it with the driver," Ezra said quickly. "It was bad. But, uh... you should see the other guy."
This made Ewan raise his eyebrow with a sly grin on his lips. "Did you see the other guy?"
Ezra blushed. "It's... It's a phra-"
"I know," snapped Ewan, "I've been dead for hundreds of years and believe me, I have heard that phrase. I've tortured enough... w-woke souls to know some common slang."
Woke souls. Ben almost had it in him to laugh, but he kept his lips sealed and just gazed at the other, waiting to see if he would catch on.
He didn't.
Ezra chuckled awkwardly after a bit of silence. "Alright, how about we get Ewan fixed up before he dies?"
"Would that be so bad?" whispered Ben, turning around and heading inside.
Inside his room was a king sized bed, a desk, dresser, bean bag chair, bathroom, and a shelf the height of the wall. It was littered with trinkets that hardly mattered at first glance, but he liked the sight of most of them. On the wall beside the door was a device that said the time, date, weather, and how many hours Tiana had left. He licked his lips, staring at the number absently before drawing his attention back to Ewan.
Right. Different matters.
He opened the bathroom door, allowing the two in. Ewan strolled in, sitting on the toilet and sighing. He didn't really speak, just lifted his chin and looked to be waiting for Ben to get to work. A second's thought made him take off his glasses, setting them gently on the sink.
The supplies were in the cabinet that was also the mirror. After retrieving the supplies needed, he wet a washcloth and looked at Ewan quietly. This was an incredibly awkward moment, and he hesitated before simply handing the washcloth to Ewan.
"Wash the blood off. Try not to reopen any of your wounds," mumbled Ben.
Ezra sat on the sink after some difficulty. His eyes were cast to the opposite wall and he smiled gently. "Can you tell me about Hell now?"
Ewan raised a glance to Ezra, then scoffed. "I'm not sure you'd like to hear," he warned, "and I honestly don't know the rules of telling mortals about Hell. I've never exactly been here before." He spoke casually and finished cleaning up the blood on his face, glancing in the mirror and scoffing at his appearance. "I saw myself in that bathroom but now without as much blood, I look... hideous. Maybe it's because I don't have the glasses... He needs them, doesn't he-"
"Do you normally have red skin? Horns? Claws? A tail?" Ezra interrupted, grinning eagerly. He swung his feet, heels of his shoes thumping against the cabinet beneath him. Ben found it oddly centering as he tried to thread the needle.
The demon chuckled. "No, I'm a normal person. Just because I became a demon doesn't mean I got a new body or whatever. I just... well, I don't look like this. Oh, finally." He sat back as Ben finished tying the end of the thread on the needle.
It was clear Ewan couldn't feel pain, which may have been a good thing, considering Ben had never done anything like this before - at least, on someone else. He usually did it on himself, and he had a high pain tolerance, so he was reckless and careless. He didn't know how to be gentle with someone.
"What do you do in Hell?" asked Ezra, leaning forward. "Do you torture the souls of the damned?"
Ben leaned back, interested in the answer.
Once again, the demon laughed, void of humor. "Yes. I do. But we just call them Sinners, not... 'souls of the damned.' That makes them sound like they don't deserve it."
"Did you?" mumbled Ben.
At this, the demon tensed, and Ben did as well, looking down at him. The two were silent as they stared at each other. Then the demon simply chuckled heartlessly, looking to the side. "Yes. I had to have if I was down there, right?"
To clear the air, Ezra hopped off the counter, fumbling a little as he grasped for the door handle. "How about some food?" He cleared his throat. "Tiana might, uh... I guess she won't notice me, huh?"
Ben sighed softly, not answering directly. "As long as you can find your way dow-"
"I've been here before," Ezra said slowly. He smiled kindly. "Thanks, though."
Ben swallowed down an apologetic retort and simply nodded, then listened as the door closed behind the sightless boy.
"What, has she got dementia?" asked the demon, tilting his head to look at Ben. "Tiana, I mean."
"No, she's... She's fine," he whispered, unable to bring himself to tell the other anything.
"Doesn't sound like it," Ewan retorted.
"Doesn't sound like your business," snapped Ben.
"Doesn't sound like you trust me," grinned the demon. "Why not?"
As if it wasn't obvious. Ben narrowed his eyes at the demon before tightening the thread on the needle. "I don't think I need to answer that."
"Is it because you think demons are inherently evil?" Ewan asked, raising an eyebrow. "Because that's an incorrect stereotype. I've met a few very kind demons that deserved to be down there."
All Ben could do was sigh. He put one knee to the left of Ewan, leaning down and letting out a shaky breath as he began to sew up the others three major facial wounds. There were plenty of others, all of which had contributed to his death, but the three major ones had gotten so deep that Ben could see bone.
He grimaced in distaste as he felt the needle skim the bone, biting his lip. It probably hurt like a bitch. He could only imagine the burning sensation associated with metal to bone.
The other just grinned knowingly, seeming unphased. "You look... particularly displeased."
"This doesn't hurt?" Ben mumbled. He cut the thread, beginning on the next wound.
"No," Ewan said nonchalantly. "This body is just a host. My soul is in here but... well, otherwise, this body is useless."
"So you're invulnerable?" Ben asked. He didn't want to seem curious or even like he cared, but he was a little interested in the idea that Ewan couldn't be harmed. It almost sounded like a challenge.
Ewan shrugged, making the needle jostle in his skin. Ben shuddered. "No. Things..." He sighed, rolling his eyes as if he had begrudgingly decided to tell Ben about Hell. "Things that come from Hell can harm me, or things done by someone from Hell. If a demon, for instance, also came from Hell and possessed someone, anything they do can harm me. Or if I, as with the fire, decided to use something to harm this skin, I can feel it. I can also feel gentle touches, apparently."
Without warning, he ran his hand over Ben's arm.
"I can feel that, like," Ewan said.
Ben shuddered at the touch and moved his arm away from the other.
It sounded dumb and unreal, though. Why would the rules be so messed up when it came to demons coming from Hell? Why not just make them invulnerable and have that be it, in a host or not? It was overly complicated.
"So I can't hurt you," Ben mused, biting off the thread again and beginning on the third wound.
"No mortal can," Ewan corrected. "So don't get any ideas."
Ben finished the stitches just in time for Ezra to come bounding in, the door slamming against the wall as he carelessly cast it open with an armload of food.
There was mainly only food Ben liked. Tiana didn't often leave the house and his father was always in his study - the only thing he really ate was peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Ben was the only one that did the shopping, so he bought things he liked and let Tiana deal with his father.
"Is that... actually food? Human food?" asked Ewan, standing up. His brown-eyed gaze drifted over the food before letting his gaze flick up to Ezra in anticipation.
"Why?" asked Ezra. "Do you only eat flesh?"
Ewan scoffed. "No. Well, I could. I had the option. But being dead and all, I didn't need to eat in Hell. No one did, so we didn't get actual food. But if we wanted to truly torture our Sinners, we could consume their flesh. That... well, that mainly only happened in Lust. I didn't do that, though. Flesh is... I don't think it tastes good, even cooked."
"That sounds really cannibalistic," growled Ben, grabbing an apple.
"Is it really cannibalism if he's a demon and he ate people?" Ezra asked.
"I was a people, and I still am. Just because I'm a demon doesn't make me any less than any normal mortal," retorted Ewan, seeming to be truly irritated and touchy of the subject.
Ben glanced over to Ezra, who looked like he was holding back a giggle, and the two gradually sat down on the bathroom floor. Ewan did so after a second.
The demon then sighed quietly before grabbing a Poptart and trying to take off the wrapper. After a few minutes of struggle, he cast the plastic to the side and inhaled, soon gasping and beginning to devour it. The two boys watched in awe as Ewan managed to eat both pastries in a matter of minutes.
Ezra cleared his throat. "So is Hell, like... the seven deadly sins?" he asked, biting into a Poptart of his own.
"Um..." mused the demon. He went quiet for a while, skeptically glancing between the two.
Ben had to admit, he was interested in what the answer was. This was the after life, after all. It would be nice to know.
"Well, fine, I'll tell you," Ezra decided. "There are actually eight deadly sins - Despair is the one that everyone leaves out. And throughout your demon life, you go through each Sin, torturing your own Sinners, until finally, you end up in the Sin that you died for. It's this big old thing about remembering why you were there in the first place, like some sort of demonic self-reflection. And then when you've finished, you go to The Devil - right up to him, on the ninth floor, and then you say an elaborate, heartfelt version of 'sorry for being a wimp in life.' And he makes you... important." He ran a hand through his hair. "I've been told it's lovely."
"You never did that?" asked Ezra.
"No, not really. I finished my last Sin and I didn't really have time for the whole confession thing since he just threw me up here. Thus, here I am. Half dead with two... high school students. But I'm not complaining... mostly. Do you have any cigarettes?"
Ben was dwelling on it. Ewan sounded... sad about it all. As if he hadn't wanted to come here, which perhaps made sense, perhaps didn't. Torturing souls was an... interesting idea. If they were in Hell, didn't they deserve it? And if they deserved it... why not?
He sighed. "I do," he mumbled.
"Why?" asked Ezra, raising an eyebrow.
"I stole them from Dad's groceries. Thought I'd want to try, but..." He shrugged, retrieving the box of cigarettes from under the sink. He took one out and handed it to the demon.
Ewan took it in his own shaking hands, still trembling from the blood loss, probably, and he put his finger under it.
Ben cleared his throat. "I don't think you should-"
But the demon lit his finger on fire before Ben could finish, and he howled in pain, hurling the cigarette to the ground. Panting heavily, he looked down to his now burned finger before growling in irritation.
"What happened?" gasped Ezra, scrambling to his feet. His eyes were widened in panic.
"I forgot..." Ewan sighed. "I forgot I'm not immune to my own abilities in this body. My... well, my dead body didn't get burned when I used my fire. But not this body. Of course not. Of course I can't use fire here. Just my luck."
Ben rolled his eyes, taking a lighter from the cabinet. Then, picking the cigarette up from the floor, he held the lighter under it and lit it. The demon was quick to take it from him.
"So why are you here, actually?" asked Ben, leaning back against the tub and raising an eyebrow at the other.
"The Devil and God decided I should be, I suppose."