Lily Madwhip and the Other Knife That Pierces the Veil by William Dalphin (26/26) (Guest Storytime)

insane they died in a murder suicide, seemingly unkillable. If she looks your way, you have to cross yourself or you'll die within a week, unless you're Hindu were Jewish. I kind of like that one. Sometimes I stare at the other kids in my class, just to watch their reaction when they realize it. Don't ask me how they came up with suicide for missus Lake's cause of death. I mean, the lady was missing several bits and had burned to death in a very localized fire that failed

to touch most of the things around it. Besides, despite her eggy waffles, and she loved her husband very very much. From what I could tell, she definitely didn't deserve to be remembered as a murderer. I think anyone who really knew her knows it's not true. Last week, I sat down in a fairly bare looking room at the police station with Detective Guthrie, right after he'd finally got done listening to a doctor. Explained to him that the dog he killed had bones more like those of a human

than a canine. He wanted me to go over the details of that day, the day Passion, Nathaniel and I sent Furfur back to Hell. I told him again how Missus Lake was possessed by a demon and an angel had burned her to drive the demon out. Of course, I continue to leave out the part about using my powers to slice her bits off. Pastor said it would

be best to not include that. I agreed. Guthrie listened to me tell him everything, and then started writing on his little pad of paper he always keeps on him, mouthing the words spontaneous human combustion. I asked him with that mean. He said, it's where a person suddenly catches on fire for no apparent reason. I told him that when the Angel of Fire snaps his fingers, it's a

pretty good reason to catch on fire. So to repeat what you just said, the archangel and Nathaniel descended from heaven into the Lake's bedroom, snapped his fingers and burned missus Lake alive, he asked me, and then tip of the hat flew back up to heaven. He put his hands together like a pair of wings and flapped them up toward the ceiling to represent this. No, Like I told you, he came in the front door, snapped his fingers,

burned her alive, then went into the closet. Right into the closet, he said, in that condescending tone adults use, you know, the one where you're caught with your hand in the bowl of cookie dough that your mom was chilling in the refrigerator, and you tell them you thought you saw the chocolate chips trying to escape and was in the process of putting them back. Well, it wasn't

a closet at the time. It was a portal to the other side, of course, it was at that point he sighed and turned, looking at the mirror in the room for a bit, and then shrugged and shook his head. I banged my fist on the table, which hurt because it was made of metal, and yelled at him. In his reflection, why do you act like you don't believe me? Huh, oh,

Lily's just making up stories again. But then you stopped me on the sidewalk and ask me questions like I'm some sort of magic eight ball you can just shake and get the answers you want out of me. Hey, Lily, is my son going to join the baseball team? I shook an imaginary magic eight ball in my hands and pretended to look at it. Reply, Hey, is he Guthrie? Try again? Shake? Shake out? Look not so good or better? Yeah?

How about No, he's not because he hates sports and he wishes you'd stop forcing them down his throat, but he's too scared of disappointing you to say it. We sat there in silence for a bit while Guthrie's face slowly descended from a smirk into a scowl. He's made angryish looking faces at me before, but this one was like someone was trying to hold back a really strong fart. Finally, he snapped, Lily, we've got an officer in the hospital who may never see again the mutilated bodies of your

foster parents cooling in the morgue. My friend's body is down there with them, who I saw walking around and had a full conversation before he just dropped dead out of the blue. His autopsy later showed that he'd been dead for the better part of an hour at the time. Not to mention that bizarre mutation of a dog being dissected, and your explanation for everything involves mysticism, devil worship, angelic

interference and magic. That's fine for a child, but we need hard evidence of what really transpired so these people's loved ones can have some closure. With that off his chest, he pulled something out of his little notepad and then slammed it shut. The notepad was very small, though, so it came off less dramatic than I think he wanted it to. One day, you're going to wake up and wish you had been honest so that these dead people could rest in peace. He slid the thing across the table.

It was my Foyle charzyard, sealed in a little plastic case. Bart donated the protector from his baseball card collection, and then he left the room without a friendly wave goodbye. We haven't spoken since that day. I probably heard his feelings with the thing about his son. I don't care. Despite everything I've shown him. He picks and shooses what he wants to believe in what not to believe. I probably did his son Bart a favor by telling Guthrie he didn't like sports. Hey, I look up from doodling

in my notebook. We're in the middle of a social studies class and the teachers talking about Eli Whitney and the Cotton Gin. I already know all about it, so instead I'm drawing a picture of my blue cat, dolf Freddy Lapel, the one I last saw Meredith in. I need to make some flyers and put them up after school in the hope that someone is seen her. The boy in front of me has turned around in his seat and is looking at me. He doesn't cross himself

when I meet his gaze. Maybe he's been dared to see how long he can last staring into my soulless eyes. He's got shaggy blonde hair and freckles all over his nose and cheeks, and uh oh, here comes the info dump. His name is Ryan Blanchard. I already knew that, thanks brain. Also, he's got a little brother named Robbie and a much

older sister named Rebecca. Apparently his parents have a thing for names that start with R. They also like to drop their three are children off at a summer camp every July and spend a week at a nudist colony. What I really didn't need to know about that? Come on, brain, give me a break. Don't tell Ryan this. Of course, poor kid doesn't need to know his parents let their dangly bits dangle while he's off weaving baskets and getting boison ivy, did you really fight off a serial killer?

He whispers to me. I glanced to my right. The girl sitting there is bugging her eyes out at him. She sees me look and quickly crosses herself and looks back down at her history book. I don't tell her that she crossed herself the wrong way. You're supposed to go head, heart, shoulder, shoulder. She crossed her self shoulders first, then heart, then head. That doesn't mean anything. You're just

waving your hand around. No, I whispered Oryan, looking back down at my drawing of the doll containing my best friend Meredith's ghost. I wish I'd brought a darker shade of blue marker with me to school. This one is robin egg blue, and it's way too light. Freddy lapel is royal blue. I just sat there and let him stab me. Oh. He turns away. Then he turns back and looks at my face again. This guy really isn't afraid to get cursed, I guess, or maybe he doesn't

believe in curses. I stare at him with my soul sucking eyes. This is that how you got that scar? He asks, you know, like you do? I instinctively reach up and touch the scar on my cheek. I don't remember I have it half the time, but when I do, it starts to itch. No, I got this in a knife fight. Whoa. He turns back around in his seat, but I can still hear him whisper cool. Someone nearby gives a snort like they're trying to hide a laugh.

I'm not sure if they're actually trying to hide it or they're trying to make it obvious that they're laughing, but in a way that they have plausible deniable later. Plausible deniability means being able to say you didn't do the things you did because you do them in a way that nobody can prove it, Like when Roger would take my hand in the back seat of the car on road trips and make me hit myself with this so he could deny hitting me because she was doing

it to herself. Just ask her. Well, yeah, getting in a knife fight real cool. I'll be sure to thank Lisa Welch for making me cool if I ever see her again. I hope I never see her again. I hope she slips on a banana peel and falls down the stairs, breaking in every bone as she goes. I hope her bones heal funny and she looks all crooked and bent. Because daddy's a dentist, is not a bone doctor, that he'll wish he'd gone to bone school. Then I

finished drawing Meredith Stall prison badly. I should add and write have you seen this toy? Call and ask for Lilian, along with the phone number for the Foster Care Center. One poster down, ninety nine more to go. There's a photocopy machine at the Winslow Library that costs ten cents a copy. I've got ten dollars in my shoe that my care worker, Miss Darcy, gave me for lunch for the week. Ten dollars can make a hundred copies. Cafeteria food tastes like garbage anyway, Maybe it is garbage. I

don't know. I'll be honest, I don't really eat the cafeteria food because everyone else does. It tastes like garbage, and I don't want to taste garbage. For all I know, it could be really freaking delicious, and they just say it tastes like garbage, so there's more for them Anyway, I got ten dollars in my shoe. Freckle faced Ryan Blanchard turns around again his seat. I see the teacher, mister Cromby give him a glare. Mister Cromby is well aware of how much every student in his class is

paying attention, except for me, that is. He thinks I'm taking notes when I'm really just making posters to find my lost cat doll with the ghost trapped in it. Ryan has approximately ten seconds to ask whatever the hell it is he's going to ask me this time, and then mister Cromby is going to check a piece of chalk at him and tell him to turn around. Mister Cromby has really good aim too. He was the pitcher for his high school baseball team back in the sixties,

but he got his sweetheart pregnant. Oh stop it, brain, Hey, that's a great drawing, Ryan says about my shitty drawing. Can I get a copy. I'll put it up in my neighborhood for you. Really, I ask, cross my heart and hope to die. He crosses his heart. I don't think he hopes to die, though, sure. I tear the paper out of my notebook and hand it to him. I'll draw a better one for the copy machine. Thanks. He turns back around just as mister Crombie's clenching his

talk piece in a planned attack. Instead of throwing it, he points it at Ryan and gives him a look that says, do that one more time and they'll be pulling this truk out of your skull down at the Morgue. From what Guthrie told me, he'll have good company. At least. I spend lunch recreating the missing Doll poster. I still don't have a good blue marker, so Freddy Lapel continues to be poorly represented, but the gist of what he

looks like is clear enough. I think should I add a reward, people might be more inclined to return a missing cat doll if there's the promise of a reward. The only thing is I don't have any money, except when Miss Darcy gives me. I know I have some sort of inheritance, but I don't have access to it until I reach a certain age. When I stop by my locker later the drawing, I let Ryan take his

tape to it. Someone has written call Lily Madwick for hot sex and witch curses in sloppy red handwriting, placing the part of the poster about the missing doll. Ugh. They drew over my crappy drawing freddy lapel with a permanent marker to make it look like your classic representation of a witch in black with a point he had in broom. Also, it smells faintly like someone use the

drawing to wipe their butt. I can't imagine that they would actually do that, since the paper would not be the least bit comfortable, but there's definitely a toilet smell. A bunch of kids snicker and laugh when they see ME find the paper. Ryan is there. He gets a high five from another kid named Preston, whose family owns a car dealership. There's a couple kids who don't look happy about this prank, but I know they'll never say anything. None of them want to become the next target for

kids like Ryan and Preston. And if you are afraid of me is evident by the way they turn around and cross themselves when they see me looking at them. I don't react. I just tear the drawing down and wad it up to throw away. People like Ryan want you to react. They want to see you get mad or cry. The best way to get them to stop

is to not give them what they want. Of course, as soon as everyone turns away to go back to pretending I don't exist, I take my right pinky, and with careful precision, I cut the veil right where the butt of Ryan's pants are. I've been practicing the ability whenever I'm not at the center where I'm staying, so Pastor doesn't find out it took days to figure out how to control exactly where the cut was happening. If I'd done this on my first day, I might have

very well dissected Ryan's intestines or something. But instead I just split the seam in his pants. He reaches back immediately feeling his pants split. I might have nicked his butt cheek too, but oh well, Nobody notices his face turned bright red when he realizes his pants are split up the butt crack. He looks around horrified, afraid someone will notice and laugh at him. He sees me looking back. I raise an eyebrow at him, then turn shut my locker and walk away. He's not going to know what

to think. Did I make it happen? How could I have? I was across the hall, nowhere near him. Did I curse him? Yes, that's the conclusion he'll probably reach, but he won't call me out on it because that'll just draw attention to his plight, And right now he's got three more classes to get through while trying to make sure nobody realizes what's happened. Sucks to be you, Ryan. I won't give you what you want from me, but I hope your butt enjoys a breath of fresh air

for the next couple hours. Jerk. After school, I returned to the center and pick up Passion. We go to the library together. I have to sign out where I'm going so they know where I am. It's a dumb role because I could write that I'm in the library, but really be in some alley doing drugs or robbing a bank. Not in the alley, I'd have to go to a bank to do that. Ali is for drugs, bank is for robbing anyway. It only matters if they go looking for you for some reason, and nobody at

the center cares enough to go looking for me. There's a familiar looking bicycle chained outside the library. When I get there, recognize it as I've borrowed it a number of times. It belongs to Jamal. I was ready to handle more school bullies, maybe a child stabber or too, but not Jamal. What do I say to him? Sorry, Jamal, I didn't want to punch you, but a demon was possessing me at the time, and if I hadn't done that, he might have killed you instead. That's actually not bad,

and it's true. I can't lie to Jamal. I mean I can, I've done it a number of times. But I can't lie to Jamal now because I feel awful about punching him. You don't start an apology with lies. Maybe I can just avoid running into him altogether. As I approached the library's front door, someone comes walking out backward, pushing the door open with their butt because they've got a bunch of books in their hands. And of course

it's Jamal. He looks right at me. Crap. He doesn't say a just walks over to his bicycle and puts the books in a backpack hanging off the rungs. Leave it to Jamal to lock a bike, but leave the backpack where anybody can snatch it. He's such a goof sometimes. After emptying his hands, he turns toward me, still not saying a word, and walks right up to me, just staring me in the face. Jamal, he throws his arms up. I flinch, thinking he's going to punch me. Instead, he

wraps them around me and hugs me tight. I go well stiff, because maybe he's planning on crushing me in some sort of bear hug embrace smooth. If you go stiff, then when they squeeze, you can go slack and slide right out of their arms. I imagine it works less well on actual bears. I'm glad you're okay. He digs his chin into my shoulder. I reach up and pat him on the back because I'm not sure what else

to do. After a moment, he puts his hands on my shoulders and holds me at a distance, like my nana used to do when she was sizing me up. The let me look at you, Oh my, look how you've grown maneuver. Jamal smiles for a second, but then turns serious. I heard about what happened with that crazy guy who tried.

anyone who punches them. It's like there's some age somewhere between being a baby and being a dusty old mummy where it's perfectly all right to punch that person, but leading up to it and away from it, things get progressively worse for you if you do it, unless you're a real little kid who doesn't know this weird punching people rule. Then you just get scolded and told not to do it again. That's your one time free punch

of pretty much anybody. I highly suggest spending it before you reach six years old, because that's about the time free punch goes away, and you're expected to know not to do it, even if you haven't yet. But still don't punch babies. That's never okay. I thought you'd be mad at me, I say, examining my shoes, I'm not really looking at them for any reason except that I can't look him in the eyes. Checking my shoes for dirt or stuff is a good excuse for looking down,

you know, for hitting you. He puts a hand on his chin and pretends to adjust his draw Was that you? I thought that was someone else pretending to be you. Why are you being so calm about this? I said awful things, and then I punched you. We look at each other for a moment. Then I turned back to my shoes. They have little sparkly stars on the laces. You can only tell when the sun hits them just right or a strong flashlight. They actually glow in the

dark too. The stars do not those shoelaces. I figure it must be for when you're trying to find your shoes in the dark. Did you mean them the things you said and the punch, Did you mean that, he asks pastors looking up at me. He hasn't said anything, just hanging from my hand and listening. Maybe he's not there again, but I have this feeling in my gut that he is and he's watching. No, I say, finally,

that wasn't me. I don't tell him that the words were fur first, nor that the punching I did only because I was afraid that if I didn't Furfur would hurt him worse. Jamal believes me when I tell him about things, But would he believe me that I was possessed? Sometimes people say and do things they don't mean when they're hurting inside. He says, like he's a sage on a mountaintop passing down wisdom to a weary traveler. They

already feel bad when someone hurts you. You can either hold a grudge and let it continue hurting, or you can forgive them and help them heal. I vote for holding the grudge. After all, Splitting Ryan Blanchard's pants in the middle of the school was very satisfying. Maybe tomorrow I'll help him heal, but not today. He squeezes my shoulder. You've had so much awful stuff happen to you. Enough to drown an adult, and you're only what eleven I

forget when your birthday is. I'm sorry anyway, you and me, we should be going to school, playing outside, reading comic books, catching fireflies, digging up worms, and going down to the brook to fish with our parents, not visiting their graves and hiding from serial killers. He pauses to let his words sink in. Someday he'll be a great public speaker and give lots of speeches. You aren't the cause of these things, Lily, this is happening to you. What kind of friend would I be if I can't take a

hit when you're at your lowest? He leaves after that. I don't watch him go because my eyes are kind of blurry and watery, but I hear the clickety clack of his bicycle chain as he pedals away. I just stare down at the ground and my glow in the dark shoelaces and watch a tear fall onto the tongue of my shoe. Pastor still doesn't say anything. Did you feed him all that? To say? I ask? Finally, Pastor makes a chuckling snort. No, that's just who he is.

I slide my backpack off my shoulder and pull out the shitty drawing of Freddy lapel that I made to replace the worst one that Ryan ruined at school. Will we find Meredith? If we do, I can't see it happening. I've tried and tried to focus, but the future is fuzzy, like the higher channels on a TV without cable, a blurry picture that you can just make out bits and pieces of. Are you watching Flight of the Navigator or

something inappropriate? You can't even tell. You just know that there's a sleek, silver looking thing flying around, and everything's tinted purple, and there's no sound, and when your parents catch you, you're going to be sent back to bed. Yes, Pastor says, Meredith's not gone, She's just hidden somewhere, and wherever that is, we will find it. I feel pretty certain you're not just saying that to make me feel better, are you, I ask him. I don't want any false hope.

There's no such thing as false hope, Lily, there's just hope. I wipe my eyes with the back of my sleeve. I hope we find her. I hope so too. We walk into the Winslow Library together. Sean, the librarian smiles and waves from the card catalog, where he's helping a high school student named Francis find a book on the Peloponnesian War. Using the Dewey decimal system. He's going to get a B plus on the report, mostly for grammatical errors and a lack of specificity regarding the outcomes of

the major battles. Oh, for the love of Pete, stop.

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