The Last Days of Jack Sparks by Jason Arnopp Read Free Book Online Page A

priest and exorcee!!! Shame on you!!!’ writes GodsAmy12 from Tucson, Arizona. Loving the word ‘exorcee’. Is that really a thing?
    ‘Your [
sic
] gonna be laughing on the other side of you’re [
sic
] face when you burn in hell!’ suggests the incongruously named TickleTumTina from Ipswich, Suffolk. Sorry for reposting your post, Tina! Hope you didn’t get
too
much grief from the rest of my 251,043 followers . . .
    ‘You are SO self-obsessed,’ offers TheRossotron in Tampa, Florida. ‘Not just laughing during an exorcism, but telling everyone. Why do we need to know? Is it impressive?’ I should point out that TheRossotron is following me. Presumably by choice.
    I learned a while back that it’s pointless to try and reason with individuals on the internet. Even if you do succeed in changing one person’s mind, ten more will spring up asking the same questions and making the same stupid points. When you have as many followers as I do, the whole thing becomes untenable. You may as well try to scoop up the sea, one cup at a time. I soon realised that addressing everyone collectively was the best use of my time and energy. As was following no more than fifteen people.
    It’s famously unwise to feed the trolls, but on this occasion the stream of abuse riles me. As I watch Di Stefano gruffly berate the paramedics who are trying to make him more comfortable, I see a stupid old man with way too much power over the ‘little people’. I see a man who, just like most people who promote the supernatural, is
trying to deceive others
.
    I post a new missive: ‘Everyone, seriously. If the Devil, ghosts and ghouls existed, don’t you think they’d be all over YouTube by now? Where’s the EVIDENCE?’ Then I return to the ambulance to try and prise some final words from exorcist and, ahem, exorcee.
    It seems Father Primo Di Stefano, now in the back of the ambulance and impatient to be off, has nothing left to say. When asked to sum up how the exorcism went, he bats off an imaginary fly with one hand.
    ‘I did not expect it to be like this,’ is all a distressed Maddelena can manage, several times.
    Maria winces as a paramedic carefully bandages her forefinger. ‘I can’t remember anything that happened,’ she says, with more than a note of despair. ‘It is just like all the other things Mamma tells me I’ve done, at night. But this is the first time it’s happened during the day.’
    A shadow crosses Maddelena’s face – I think she just twigged that Di Stefano’s rite has only made her daughter worse.
    I’m concerned about Maria and can’t help myself. Screw journalistic impartiality: I implore – no,
tell
– Maddelena to take proper medical advice at the hospital. Hopefully, this time, my words sink in. I wish them well and head for my Alfa Romeo rental, keys jangling in hand.
    ‘Hey there,’ calls Maria, in English. ‘Hey, Jack Sparks.’
    Except her voice doesn’t come from the ambulance. It comes from the opposite direction. It comes from Translator Tony, who is approaching his own car. As if on cue, he spins around to face me, a dazed puppet, his centre of gravity awry.
    His mouth opens and continues to move as Maria’s voice comes out of him.
    ‘Enjoy your journey,’ he says. Or, rather, Maria says it. His mouth, but her voice. Tony looks as surprised as anyone else that a thirteen-year-old girl’s words just sprang out of him. Then his jaw drops again and Maria’s voice says: ‘I’ll be back in a few hours, okay?’ Whatever that’s supposed to mean.
    Back in the ambulance, Maria regains the power of speech and emits a childish giggle. She wears that same knowing smile she had during the exorcism, the one just after she looked at the window. The eyes are back jaundice-yellow.
    Maddelena’s face falls, as if this is the final straw. Father Di Stefano begins to pray out loud, on his stretcher.
    The effect is disorientating and I don’t know how to react. We’re now all so accustomed to