The Sensitives Read online

  April gestured Oscar in and shut the door behind them. She led him to a chair behind Julian and sat next to him.

  The room was marginally lit by the moon seeping through a narrow gap in the curtain. Besides that, there were many shadows and many pitch-black corners Oscar grew increasingly wary of. There was an eclipsed figure across the room, sat on a bed made up of a single mattress and a wired, metallic frame. This figure was encased in black and barely moved. The silhouette was in the shape of a young girl, but the way it breathed, moved ever-so-slightly, sinisterly twisting its head – it did not feel like a young girl.

  “Julian will try and talk to it,” April whispered to Oscar. “We need to sit back and watch, then report on what we see.”

  “Hello,” Julian greeted the dark figure.

  A croaky, deep-pitched chuckle responded.

  “How old is she?” Oscar whispered to April.

  “Nine,” April responded.

  “Then how is her voice so deep?”

  April didn’t answer. Oscar was pleased she didn’t. As soon as the question escaped his lips, he knew he didn’t want it answered.

  “Can I ask who I am talking to?” Julian prompted, standing tall a few steps away from the bed the little girl propped itself upon.

  “Kaylee,” the girl responded in a high-pitched, girly voice – but a little too girly, as if it was someone imitating how a girl’s voice should sound. It made Oscar’s entire body shudder.

  “No,” Julian stated, shaking his head. “No, I want your real name.”

  “Kaylee,” it responded again, with the exact same tone of voice. “My name is Kaylee.”

  As Oscar’s eyes adjusted to the light, he could just about make out some of the girl’s face. Except, the facial features didn’t seem like that of a girl. Yes, they were a girl’s nose, a girl’s mouth, and a girl’s eyes – but something about them was off. As if her features were being manipulated into a knowing snarl.

  Cuts marked her face, open slits that were yet to close hanging open upon her.

  “My daddy molested me,” the girl sang, in a happy-go-lucky sing-song voice. It was strange, how such a dramatic, awful accusation was blurted out with such a playful happiness.

  “Molested?” Julian responded, sticking his bottom lip out. “That’s a big word. Where have you heard that word before, Kaylee?”

  “My daddy does it all the time,” she sang out again with a buoyant grin. “He molests me all the time.”

  Something else was there. Oscar was starting to make it out. Something in the shadows around the girl. Something with hazy, indefinite lines, towering over her, consuming the air that surrounded her fuzzy hair.

  “What is it?” April whispered. “Are you seeing something?”

  “Are you seeing it too?” Oscar asked, growing scared.

  “I can feel it, I can smell it – but I can’t see it,” April confirmed. “Can you see it?”

  Oscar stared at a slight movement in the shadows. A cloud of grey breath became momentarily visible, and it petrified him. His hands gripped the side of his chair, his entire body stiffening.

  “Yes.” Oscar nodded profusely. “Yes, I can.”

  “Is Kaylee in there with you?” Julian continued. “Is she in there, right now?”

  “I am Kaylee.”

  “No, you’re not. You look like Kaylee. You sound like Kaylee. You may even sometimes act like Kaylee. But you are not Kaylee, are you?”

  Silence.

  The creature behind her moved once more.

  It grew larger. A looming shadow, creeping up the walls, creeping over the ceiling, growing larger, coming toward Oscar, coming toward him faster and faster.

  His paralysed body shook, seizing in terror.

  That’s when he saw it.

  A female figure, long, black hair reaching down to its waist, large breasts that consumed half its chest, thick black lips – except its eyes were less female. They curved inward to large, dilated pupils that grew to the entire vicinity of its eyes. Below its navel, its waist turned into a long tail, like that of a snake. This tail slithered out, consuming the room, at least three times the size of its torso.

  Then in its arms. A baby. Squeezing tightly onto it. The tail wrapping itself around the baby’s neck, lifting the baby up, holding it in mid-air.

  Oscar could feel April’s eyes on him as his eyes grew wider and wider, and his fingers dug further into the arm of the chair.

  He didn’t notice her stares, nor the fact that Julian and the little girl had now turned their attention to his screams. He couldn’t even feel the screams exuding from his throat. He couldn’t feel the soreness they were creating, couldn’t hear the echoing of his wails around the room.

  “Oscar, calm down,” April insisted, but the words just blurred into the background with the rest of the room.

  The creature loomed further and further over Oscar.

  Then the baby it asphyxiated with its tail moved. Its head rotated toward him, its eyes just like its owner – black, full. Its face a ravenous growl. Its mouth open.

  It was an abyss of black matter, thinly pointed fangs curling out, dripping with excess saliva.

  Oscar fell to the ground, stumbled to his feet, and ran for his life.

  10

  Oscar burst out the door and fell to his knees. Before he could even register his need to gag, he was throwing up over a well-laid flower bed, retching repeatedly.

  The acidic gunk of his vomit lurched up his throat once more, forcing him to blurt out another mouthful.

  He clambered to his knees and attempted to balance himself. The whole world was spinning around him. The house, the lawn, the gravel, spinning and spinning, until he felt so dizzy he was sick again.

  “Yo, Oscar!”

  Oscar lifted his head with a jolt, expecting to see the beast once more. But it wasn’t the beast – it was April. Crouching down beside him, putting a hand on his back.

  He hadn’t heard her approaching, but somehow she was at his side.

  In that moment, he wished he could be anywhere else. He felt his cheeks burn red. He bowed his head in humiliation that April had to see him puking over a family’s garden.

  “Oh, Jesus,” she declared, frowning at the destroyed flower bed. “You could have at least aimed it away from the roses. They probably took friggin’ ages to do, too.”

  Oscar slumped onto his arse, grimacing at the pain of the bumps of the drive-way digging into him. He shook his head, willing himself to overcome his embarrassment and ask the questions he wanted answered.

  “What was that?” Oscar gasped between hyperventilating pants.

  “Just breathe, dude,” April reassured him, patting his back. “Just keep breathing.”

  The door creaked open and Julian took a few judgemental steps toward Oscar.

  “How bad is it?” Julian prompted.

  “Oh, about five times worse than my first demon,” April decided. “About ten times worse than your average pussy. I mean, seriously, dude, the orchids?”

  Oscar pushed April’s hand off him, not taking kindly to the ill-timed jokes. He felt enough of a tit already. He went to stand in a spurt of anger but only ended up stumbling onto his back.

  “What was that?” he demanded once more.

  “All will be explained,” Julian announced, pressing a button on his car keys to unlock his car. “We need to get you home first. Get you a glass of water.”

  “You want to take me home? After I’ve seen that?”

  “Not your home, doofus,” April sighed. “Back to our home.”

  “I don’t even know you people.”

  “Yes, you don’t,” Julian agreed. “But as it is, we are the only ones who will believe you saw what you just saw. Everyone else will call you a delusional prick. We, however, need to know what you saw to identify what demon we are dealing with – so, to us, you are a helpful prick. So, what’s it going to be?”

  Julian turned to Oscar and gave an award-winning smil
e, his white teeth sparkling.

  “Are you going to be a delusional prick or a helpful prick?”

  Oscar’s breathing slowed down. It was nowhere near calm, but he could at least take in his surroundings without becoming nauseous. He glanced from April to Julian, and back to April.

  “Fine,” he grunted. “Just – take me anywhere but here.”

  April offered Oscar a hand and helped him up.

  “See, bud?” she grinned at him. “You’re not as much of an irritating cowardly dick as I thought.”

  Oscar frowned, not sure whether to take that as a compliment. She helped him hobble to the back seat of the car, which he climbed into and laid down upon.

  For the whole drive, Oscar stared at the roof of the car. All he could see were the ghastly eyes of whatever it was that he saw. If following these people meant he was going to see more of that, he wasn’t entirely sure it was for him.

  11

  Everything Henry had heard about prison was true.

  Even though he was only in holding, being denied bail – it was still full of people that terrified him with a glance. He was a middle-class family man. A doctor. He had never mixed with drug dealers or criminals before, and it was wearing him down.

  The constant looking over his shoulder. The knowing there was nothing he could do if he saw something over his shoulder. The unbearable tension of how he might be woken up the next morning.

  But the most unbearable thought was knowing that he was innocent, yet still stuck there.

  And that there was nothing he could do about it.

  Once again, he was restrained and guided out of his cell, down the vacant corridors, to another interrogation room. Another desk, with another tape recorder, with another interview, with a blank police officer trying not to be judgemental despite having automatically presumed him guilty.

  This police officer allowed silence to fill the room before he started. He was methodical in his approach – making sure his pad was out, his pen was ready, and the tape rewound to the beginning.

  Finally, giving a vacant look to Henry, the police officer began the tape.

  “This is Detective Inspector Jason Lyle, interviewing Doctor Henry Kemple. The time is twenty fifty-eight. It is noted that Doctor Kemple has waived his right to have his attorney present. We’ll begin.”

  Henry let out a deep breath he didn’t realise he was holding. He tried to relax his tense muscles, only to find that they tensed again a moment later.

  “Doctor Kemple–”

  “Call me Henry, please,” Henry interrupted. “You’re not a patient, Henry will do.”

  “Henry,” Jason corrected himself. “Could you just explain briefly why you have waived your right to an attorney, just out of interest?”

  “Because I am innocent,” Henry pleaded. He thought he was sounding assertive, but in truth, he came across as desperate. His voice was soft-spoken, like a caring father; nothing like the hardened criminal he was being made to feel. “I’m tired of these ridiculous impromptu interrogations. Why am I here?”

  “Because I am taking over this case, Henry,” Jason answered, noting something down on his pad. “And I just wanted to find out a bit more about you.”

  “A bit more about me?” Henry repeated, shaking his head, wiping his tears on his sleeve because he couldn’t lift his restrained hands to his eyes. “I’m a doctor, a husband – and a father! I love my family. What do you need to know?”

  “Your daughter is saying you molested her, Henry. She is nine years old. Why would she accuse you of such a thing?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Could she have heard the word ‘molest’ in the playground, perhaps?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I just seems a strange thing to accuse–”

  “I don’t know!”

  Jason rested the end of his pen in his mouth, his eyes hovering over Henry as if inspecting a difficult clue. Henry did not know what to make of this officer. He was unlike the rest, though Henry couldn’t decide how.

  “I understand your attorneys have called in a group of paranormal investigators,” Jason offered, again keeping his expression null and his voice flat.

  “Have they?”

  “What do you think they are hoping to find?”

  “How would I know?”

  “Have you seen your daughter since your arrest?”

  Henry’s weary face morphed into a passionate frown. Scowling at Jason through gritted teeth, he felt his nails dig into his hands in frustration.

  “How the hell would I see her?” Henry’s lip quivered, his eyes welling up, his emotions spilling from his feeble mind to his fatigued face. “When you are accusing me of doing such things as – as you are accusing.”

  “Because I went to see her the other day, Henry.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “What kind of girl is your daughter?”

  Henry vehemently shook his head.

  “What’s that got to do with anything?” he protested.

  “Please, Henry, just answer the question.”

  Henry closed his eyes, clearing his mind, doing all he could to contain his inconsolable grief at this ridiculous situation.

  “She is a happy girl, a delightful girl. Friendly, outgoing, boisterous. The life and soul of the party. Would never say a nasty thing about anyone.”

  Jason nodded as if this was confirming something, though Henry couldn’t figure out what.

  “When I met your daughter–” he began, then paused. Taking a moment of clear thought, he stopped the recording.

  “What are you doing?” Henry asked, shocked at this lack of procedure.

  “When I met your daughter, Henry,” Jason continued, ignoring Henry’s brief outrage, “she was anything but happy. She was far from boisterous. And she was definitely not the life and soul of the party.”

  “What are you saying?” Henry pleaded.

  “I’m saying, whatever your investigating friends find… It’s not that I believe in that kind of thing, it’s just… I…”

  “Officer, if there is something you are trying to say?”

  Jason looked around the room. He straightened his sleeves, smoothed down his collar, and clasped his hands over his mouth. Then, after finally gathering his thoughts, he turned his gaze to Henry.

  “Whatever is in that room, it’s not… What I’m trying to say, Henry, is that I believe you. I think you’re innocent.”

  12

  Julian slammed a notebook and pen on the table before Oscar and stood, arms folded, gazing at him inquisitively.

  “What do you want from me?” Oscar pleaded.

  “You saw the demon,” Julian replied, a dead stare and a flat voice. “Now we need to know what we are dealing with.”

  “I didn’t see a demon!” Oscar claimed. “I just saw something because I have mental issues. I’m batshit crazy, I’m off my rocker, I’m–”

  “Oscar,” April interrupted, leaning coolly against the far wall, her voice coated with relaxation. So much confidence, so much control; Oscar envied it.

  He realised he was sweating. Panting, even. Looking back and forth at these two people. Julian, standing expectantly with a bored look on his face; it wasn’t even impatience, it was an expectant wait for Oscar to get his shit together. April was a little different. She had a tinge of a smirk, as if she found the whole thing amusing.

  Neither of them were anywhere near as out of sorts as Oscar was.

  Finally, he forced his heavy breathing to subside and willed himself to raise himself to their level.

  “The demon,” Julian demanded. “What did it look like?”

  “Erm, okay…” Oscar began, resolved to comply. “It was a woman.”

  Oscar looked back at Julian expectantly, who returned his stare with a close of the eyes that accompanied a sigh and a raise of the eyebrows.

  “There are many, many female demons, Oscar,” Julian pointed out, speaking as if he were addressing a petulant chi
ld. “We are going to need you to be a little more specific than that.”

  “Erm, okay, okay.” Oscar’s thoughts shot through his mind as he frantically tried to make sense of them. He willed himself to somehow focus on the inexplicable image of what he had seen. “Long hair. She – she wasn’t wearing her top. I mean, she had breasts out and everything.”

  Julian raised an eyebrow to April, who sniggered knowingly.

  “She had no legs. It was like her bottom half was turning into a tail, like a snake’s tail, like she was half-snake, half-woman.”

  Julian clicked his fingers and instantly picked out an old, broken, leather-bound, dusty book off a shelf behind him and started sifting through the pages.

  “Go on,” he prompted.

  “Okay, I – I don’t know what else to say.”

  “Was she holding anything?”

  Oscar paused for thought, thinking carefully.

  “Actually, yes,” he answered. “She was holding – I think it was a baby.”

  Julian nodded, opened the book, and slammed it in front of Oscar. It was open to a page that displayed a woman exactly as the one he had described.

  “Oh my God,” he choked. “That’s her!”

  April moseyed over and peered at the page. She got very close to Oscar. He could faintly smell her and it made him nervous.

  “We got a name?” April prompted, forcing Oscar to return his focus to the demon.

  “Yes,” Julian replied, smiling as if demonology was his time to shine. “She has had various names, known as Ardat Lili, or Lilitu – or, most commonly, Lilith.”

  “Lilith?” Oscar echoed. April shushed him.

  “She is a succubus, associated mainly with either pregnant women or young children, hence the child.”

  Oscar feebly raised his hands, and the other two looked at him as if he were an idiot.

  “Sorry, but – what’s a succubus?” he innocently asked.

  “A female demon that shags blokes, often when they are asleep,” April answered matter-of-factly.