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

and getting ready for the beach. Don hated thinking he
was the last person to wake up. It made him feel so lazy.
    He went to the
bathroom and put on his swimming trunks, then went downstairs and met up with
everyone else. Mom was wearing a black one-piece bathing suit that did nothing
to hide her pregnant belly. She also had on a wide-rimmed hat and sunglasses,
and said she wasn’t getting in the water anyway.
    Everyone
crossed the street carefully and made their way onto the hot white sand. Don
was barefoot and regretting it as his feet burned. He asked Dad to carry him
but he refused because he was carrying a cooler filled with ice and soda.
    Don gritted his
teeth and bared it.
    The family
claimed a table with a canopy and set everything down. Then Don’s cousins ran
straight for the water. Don sat at the table and watched them. He didn’t know
why he was so shy; he was with family.
    After a while,
he finally took off his shirt and made his way to the roaring waves. Dad
eventually joined and pretended to be a sea monster, grabbing the kids one at a
time and throwing them about.
    Overall, Don’s
time at the beach hadn’t been as bad as he thought it would be.
    *   *   *
    As soon as they
got back to the beach house a few hours later, Don went straight to the vent.
Mom eventually got him to take a bath to get the sand and saltwater off, but
the vent was his after that.
    He lay there,
thinking about the dog that had bitten Mom. He wondered if it was the same one
from his dream. Well, of course it couldn’t be. But, at five years old, Don was
capable of believing anything.

Chapter 5
     
     
    It seemed cruel
to Don that his favorite movie would be closely associated with the birth of
his baby brother. Mom went into labor while the family was watching The
Unstoppable Titans , her water breaking in her seat. Had Don been older at
the time, he would’ve been embarrassed but, luckily, his mom had been discreet
when the pain hit, so they all quietly left the auditorium and went to the
hospital.
    They had only
been a quarter into the movie, but Don had seen enough to love it and would
wind up seeing it many more times in the future. Unfortunately, every time he
did see it he was reminded of his brother. And that wasn’t a good thing.
    Ethan Scott was
born in Eisenhower Hospital on July 27th, 1987, and weighed ten pounds, ten
ounces. He and Don had been born in the same hospital, a place Ethan would
visit often over the years for little reasons like headaches and stomach
problems—ailments not caused by natural reasons.
    Don didn’t know
what to think of Ethan when his parents brought him home from the hospital. He
was Don’s only sibling and Don knew from the start there was something wrong
with his little brother. For one thing, the baby never cried. Dad even told Don
the doctors thought Ethan was dead when they delivered him—they slapped his
bottom to get a reaction, but the baby only looked around, “quiet as a mouse.”
    For another,
Ethan was always staring at things. Dad told him babies were supposed to be
curious when he brought this up, but Don felt there was more to it. Ethan
didn’t seem curious ; he seemed to know what he was looking at, no
matter what it was.
    Mom started
acting weird a month after Ethan was born. Don could hear her screaming and
crying in her and Dad’s room, which was right next to his, but he tried to
ignore it. Why was it she cried and Ethan didn’t?
    The first
really strange incident occurred when he turned a year old and he and Don were
in the living room by themselves while Dad was at work and Mom was cooking in the
kitchen down the hall. Don was watching Looney Tunes on TV, his leg
draped over the armrest. Ethan was playing with lettered blocks on the floor.
    The
window-mounted air conditioner was humming just next to the TV, freezing the
living room. Don didn’t mind—it reminded him of his vent at the beach house.
Ethan, who still hadn’t cried, occasionally looked at the air