He leaned into the wind, squinting. The whooshing air dried the sweat on his forehead and brought a din of static, but it didn’t stop his hands from shaking or his body from shivering. The humidity was stifling, but his teeth were chattering. Why were his teeth chattering?

He wrapped his arms around his chest, curling in to stop the quivering. He thought he might vomit. A plop of liquid hit his forearm. He opened his eyes and stared at the little round droplet; it traced a path down the back of his hand toward the soft pocket between his thumb and forefinger. Another fell.

He touched his eyes. He was crying.

His house was smoking.

His hallway stretched like taffy and tried to gobble his feet.

His mother was a demon.

She spoke like his father.

She threatened to kill him.

Or did she threaten to kill everyone? Did it matter?

“Maxwell, Maxwell…” He could hear a voice calling to him. “Stay with me, Maxwell….”

His mother was possessed, sputtering nonsense, and collecting carcasses.

“Max, breathe. We’re almost there,” said the voice.

It was Vera. That was who he clung to now. Vera Martinez. The entire future of his family—his mother, his little sister, him—all depended on a girl he never before said hi to in the hallways. They said hi now. They said a lot more than hi.

“Max, you’re going into shock. Stay with me.”

There was a fog inside his house, swirling and pulsing. And the master bedroom grew three sizes. Ha! Like the Grinch. His mother’s room grew three sizes that day! But that wasn’t his mother.

Her voice never emerged. But his father’s did.

The car creaked to a halt. A hand tugged his arm. He didn’t want to move. He was safe in the car. Safe was good.

“Max, I get it now,” the voice said. No, she said. “I know how it lures people. I know why your mom bought the shrine, what she wanted.”

His head turned toward her. He parted his lips to respond, but his mouth was too dry to speak.

She pulled his arm again, and he let her.

He rose from the car and he followed her into the hospital.

He was given an IV drip of fluids, but other than that, Max was fine. So was Father Chuck, bruised but nothing broken. The only things really damaged were Max’s ego and his sanity. He almost wished he were having a medical emergency, because it would be a whole lot better than his current reality.

Vera took him home. Well, to her home. His house was currently under a dense fog advisory with an underlying demonic pressure system.

He sat on Vera’s floral sofa, which the demon inside his mother had accurately described. (What else did it see?) A pink fuzzy blanket was wrapped around his shoulders as he sipped a mug of mint tea. He was getting used to the taste, and he wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing.