The Devil's Demeanor by Jerry Hart Read Free Book Online Page A

restaurants and
hotels, and “For the Longest Time” played on the radio. He hadn’t heard the
song before then, and would scarcely hear it much in the future, but whenever
he did he would think of this ride to the beach house in 1987.
    He fell asleep
on the floor after a few minutes on the road, but when Dad woke him to tell him
they were there, Don jumped out of the van to get a better look. Though he
couldn’t get a good view of the place in the night, it was still the most
beautiful place he’d ever seen. He could hear the ocean waves roaring from
across the street behind him, but he didn’t care about that.
    If anything, he
dreaded going there because it meant he would have to take off his shirt.
    Aunt Mimi
unlocked the front door and everyone rushed into the house at once. The first
thing Don noticed was the hardwood floor. He wasn’t used to houses without
carpets, so he just stood there for a moment.
    Then he noticed
his cousins running up the stairs around the corner, so he joined them. The top
floor had four bedrooms, each huge. The walls were almost nothing but large
windows with light-yellow curtains.
    In one room
there were two beds lined right next to each other, like a hotel. Jabari and
Quinton began jumping on one bed while Nina and Candice sat down on the other.
As for Don, he went straight to the floor and stared at a white vent sticking
up from it. The air conditioner was on and was blowing cold air into his face.
It felt so good, he stayed there for a while.
    Eventually his
cousins noticed. Jabari and Quinton joined Don on the floor and hogged his
vent. He stayed close to it, though, and got some of the freezing air.
    He was
exhausted and wanted to sleep there, on the floor, by his vent, but his mom
came in and told him to get away from it before he got sick.
    “You know,” she
said to him, “that wasn’t very nice of you not accepting your uncle Billy’s
apology. You hurt his feelings.”
    “I don’t care.”
    She lightly
swatted his bottom and said, “Don’t talk like that. These are your family, the
only family you have. One day you will care, but it will be too late.”
    Don had no idea
what she was talking about, so he didn’t argue. Instead he worked up enough
energy to explore the rest of the beach house with his cousins. It was the
nicest house he remembered ever being in at the time. The walls were white, and
where there were no walls there were large windows. A vase filled with yellow
and white flowers sat on a table behind the couch.
    “Anybody want
to rent some movies?” Uncle Billy asked, drink in hand.
    “It’s too
late,” said Aunt Mimi. “Besides, we should get to bed so we can get up early
and hit that beach.”
    Don sulked in
misery while his cousins jumped for joy. Eventually he and his cousins went to
their rooms upstairs. He shared the “vent room” with Jabari and Quinton while
Candice and Nina took one of the other rooms.
    Luckily Don did
not have to share a bed with Jabari.
    Aunt Mimi may
have suggested going to bed, but Don could hear all the adults downstairs,
talking and yelling and laughing. It sounded like fun being an adult. He would
find out later it was anything but.
    He tried to go
to sleep, but had a hard time of it. His insomnia had nothing to do with the
noisy adults but with the story Grandpa told him. When he finally did fall
asleep, he dreamt of a cute dog going into a cave at the bottom of a hill, and
when it came back out, it ran up to a rabbit and ripped its head off.
    Don remembered
the cave distinctively because it made him sick just looking at it. He was both
in the dream and watching it at the same time. The dog didn’t seem to notice
the part of Don that was there, thankfully, but that didn’t stop the evil from
enveloping him, squeezing his guts.
    Something was
in that cave, something that didn’t want to be found.
    He woke up to
see the sun outside the windows. The curtains did very little to mask it. His
cousins were already up