“I’m looking for you.”
“Some idiot throw up or something?”
“No, I don’t need you to clean anything.”
Watching me from the corner of his dark purple eye, he pushes the bucket past me, jingles with his keys until he unlocks the door, and shuffles into the cramped space of the janitor’s closet. I follow him in, almost pass out from the muggy chemical stench, and close the door behind us. Lou dumps brown water out of the bucket and sticks a hose in it to rinse the remaining grime down the drain.
There’s nowhere to sit.
“Cut to the chase,” he says over the rush of water.
“Pilot said you know something about my soul. My history. Something that makes him think I’d be successful in life”—ridiculous— “on my back.” Old pipes squeal as he shuts the water off. “Were you guys just being pervs, or is there something I need to know? About my soul.”
Lou faces me. His blue coveralls are wet with mop water, and a smear of mud or oil crosses his stubbly cheek. With the set of his jaw, if he weren’t so thin, he’d almost look like a bulldog.
“Pilot told you that?”
“Tell me what you know, Lou. Please.”
“It don’t work like that.”
“Well what do it work like?”
“If a demon’s gonna get me to cough up what I know about their soul, they’re gonna have to be my master or twist my arm a good deal.”
“And if a human wants to know?” I tap my foot.
“I ain’t high ’nough ranking to give no human what they want, unless I serve them.”
“Demons can serve humans?”
“And humans go ’round serving us, too. Happens lots. Usually don’t work out though.”
“Your master is…Mephisto?”
He nods fast and taps the pin on his shirt pocket. It’s just as I’d suspected.
“Then how come you told Pilot about this secret you’re keeping about me? Did he twist your arm?”
“We was just shootin’ the shit at work. It came up. Wasn’t a favor or special request or nothin’.”
“Well, what if we were to shoot the shit?” I ask hopefully. “You and I.”
His lips curve. His stringy black hair shakes. “It’s never been that the likes uh you’d do that with the likes uh me.”
The bell rings, and Lou takes that as his cue to limp out of the janitor’s closet as if we weren’t just in the middle of a conversation. Frustrated, I give the messy closet one last look, hoping to see something I can use, but come up empty-handed.
I boot it to my next class: Exploring the Science of Consciousness. There Mr. Farid—whose first name is Moses and whose power, I spend ten minutes working through, is to disarm foes—drones on about anesthesia, cognitive unbinding, and seeing visions. His words remind me of the woman I saw in the mirror last night. That’s a vision I’ll never, ever tell Ben about.
Which is exactly what I think when I find Ben waiting in the hall for me after class.
As I walk toward him and watch his smile turn into that crinkle-nosed grin I love, I privately will whatever that weird vision was last night to go away and never return. Let me be as normal as Ben is. Please.
“Hungry?” he asks.
“On Wormwood Island?” The upside of vivification is you can’t die of anything, including hunger; the downside is that your will to eat virtually vanishes. “We could go for a walk.”
“That sounds good.”
Our fingers touch, twine, and release in a way that gives me shivers. I know that, eventually, I’m going to have to convince Ben to leave me and tell Garnet he’s made a huge mistake in rejecting her. But for now—just for now—I’m going to enjoy it.
Or so I think.
As we push into the cold air, I spy Pilot sprinkling salt on any icy patches of sidewalk. Although Lou may not have opened up about the skeletons in my closet, Pi is going to. Even if I have to force him.
“Gimme a sec?” I ask Ben. “I’ve gotta talk to my, um, Guardian. I’ll meet you by the dorms in five.”
He suspiciously eyes Pilot, whose back is to us, but finally agrees and turns away. I rush behind Pilot and tip over the broom he’s rested against a tree. He stumbles, curses, and scrambles after it. But when he pushes up his woolly cap to see me glowering at him, his eyes light up.
“Anne! You ready to talk about the Big V? Great! We’ve gotta get prepping for the Scrutiny.”
“The what?”
“I’ll tell you all about it—don’t worry, it’s not till Christmastime. Short-list stuff.” He hurriedly starts shoving the bucket of salt to the side. “We can meet now—that’s cool, let me put this stuff away— but I want a session every single day, got it?”
“Cut the crap, Pilot. I asked your little janitor buddy what he knows about me.”
“You did? Even better! So you’re ready to change your PT?”
“I might consider it.”
“If ?”
“If you tell me what he wouldn’t.”
“Lou didn’t tell you?”
With my hands on my hips, I shake my head. “So go ahead. I’m listening. What’s my story?”
“I—I can’t, Anne. Lou outranks me. I’m just a punk. I’m still trying to become a demon. If my superior won’t tell you, I sure as hell can’t. We get destroyed for breaking rank.”
“Get real, Pilot. Your chances of escaping this crappy life of yours hang in the balance.”
“I know, but rank is everything. If I knew Lucifer—the leader of Hell—was plotting against Mephisto, I couldn’t tell him, even though I serve him. Rules are rules.”
“‘Rules are—’? What happened to the Machiavellian son of my favorite sex-addict senator? You make up your own rules.”
“I wish I could help you, Anne. I really do.”
“So Hell has turned a sinner into a saint?”
“I don’t know what to tell you.”
“The truth! I know that Lou’s power is to know my soul.”
“How do you know that?”
“I figured it out. And Kate Haem makes people hate each other.”
“That’s great. See? You could easily win this thing.”
“Only if you tell me what Lou knows about my soul.”
He shakes his head. No matter what I say, Pilot’s adamant that he can’t tell me a thing, insisting that the underworld follows a medieval caste system he’d be a fool to ignore.
“So what’s your power?” I ask him.
“I’m a punk. I don’t have one yet.”
“Great. What good are you to me?”
“Don’t give up!” He calls as I storm away, “Use your PT, Anne. The one you’ve got now—use it!”
Look closer. Look bloody closer. It’s become code for You’re on your own, sucker.