As one, the demons cowered, crying out as the cool night of Mesopotamia vanished and was replaced in a blink with the hot reality of the Arizona desert in June. “My God!” I heard one say, but most were silent with awe.

“Dali!” Al shouted, his thick-fingered hand cupping my head as he held me to him. “Did it take? Did I do it right?”

“We’re here, aren’t we?” the older demon called back, and I blearily looked, seeing the jukebox standing beside the memory of my mother’s blue Buick. The trunk was open, and there was a picnic basket inside. I hadn’t thought of the basket. Someone else had. I’d made something that the demons could twist to their own reality. I’d done it.

“A picnic,” Newt said, snapping a red-and-white-checkered blanket out right there on the side of the road. “What a splendid idea. Dali, you must remember to give Rachel royalties every time someone uses this, seeing that she’s still alive. I’ll be watching your books. Us demonesses must stick together.”

Demoness. I’d done it. I was a demon. Yay me.

My head fell onto Al’s chest, and I whimpered, my hands balled up as I tried to keep my eyes open. At the outskirts of my vision, I could see the demons standing on the edge of the drop-off, throwing rocks to see how far the illusion went. Fists on his hips, Dali stood between me and Newt, gazing at clouds that somehow never seemed to cover the sun. Newt had sat upon the blanket with a bucket of fried chicken and a wineglass.

Al jiggled me up into a more comfortable posture. “She’s not well. I’m taking her home. Anyone still think she’s not a demon?”

“I’m fine,” I slurred, clearly not.

“No!” Ku’Sox shouted, and my pulse hiccupped. “It was Newt! Newt made it!”

My eyes opened, then squinted. “Screw you. I’m a demon. Deal with it.” Oh God. I’m a demon.

“Don’t be tiresome,” Newt said coyly. “I don’t remember the sun. Or colors…like this.”

She had cried. The tears were gone now, but she had cried when we’d been alone. I think she did remember, and it made her crazy. Was I going to go crazy, too?

“Al?” I warbled, feeling it all come down on me. “I don’t feel so good.”

Immediately he held me closer, his warmth doing nothing to stop my shaking.

“Take her home,” Newt said, having left her blanket to shade me with her own body. “Her construct stretches the entire breadth of the collective. It’s only hampered now by the size of Dalliance.”

“She filled the entire collective…” Dali breathed.

“The whole thing. You could walk for most of a day and not run into the wall. I’d suggest we make this our new wallpaper, even as bright as it is. At least we could all fit in it.”

“Al,” I whispered, feeling the world start to spin. Shit, I couldn’t go back. This was for real. I was going to spend the rest of my life here. Under the ground. Away from the sun. Every day exactly the same, surrounded by beings who had lived too long, trapped in their own hell. If I turned around fast, would there be barren wall behind me?