Sometimes I think I’d be dead by now if it weren’t for Fadwa and her patience and her magic. My visions brought me to her. Scared, homeless, terrified and on the verge of sobbing, they led me to her.

It’s the only good thing these visions have ever done for me, really.

She thinks it was a sign. Some great indicator from the universe trying to point me to the person who can heal me. I think it was more about balance: the universe has shit kicked me six ways to Sunday, but it was nice enough to pause for a moment to lead me to someone who keeps me fed and moderately sane.

“Maybe you should go lay down,” Fadwa says as I fill a glass of water from my sputtering tap. “I can whip up a sleeping draught.”

The concern lining her eyes and the compassion in her voice puts me on edge, and I want to fight her on it, but she’s right. I’m exhausted. I’ve barely slept this week because every time I close my eyes, the creatures show up. (Or he does. I’m at the point where I’d happily choose to see the creatures instead of having to deal with him.)

“I’m fine,” I repeat, downing my water in one and pushing past her to return to where the girls are. “I’m just tired, it’s nothing.”

The twins smell weakness and are on me in a flash, abandoning their seat at my table and advancing menacingly. Rimi walks like she’s made of air, and Resha is the bruiser. Her footsteps always shake my floor.

“Are you sick?” Rimi asks, a bit too eagerly.

“You kind of look like a skeleton,” Resha says.

“A skeleton with shite hair,” Rimi adds with a sly grin, ducking as Fadwa swats at her. Fadwa has her watch on the wrong wrist and facing the wrong direction, and it clunks against the two large bracelets next to it when she reaches out for the smack.

“You two are terrible people,” I say, feigning offence. “Really, genuinely terrible, and I won’t miss you. I think I’m glad I’ll never see you again.”

It’s a lie. We all know it’s a lie. I’ll be back by December, dejected and depressed after another failed exorcism attempt. Fadwa will have me over for a shitty dinner and the girls will try to resurrect the chicken or something and I’ll sit there, silent and stressed while her father makes threatening eyebrow gestures at me and I think of all the different ways I could go drown myself.

Fadwa can tell I’m spiralling, because she rounds on her sisters, taking the attention off me.

“Get your things together and wait here, alright?” she says, snapping her long fingers to get her sisters’ attention. “I need to talk to Thomas.”