Heven & Hell Anthology (Heven and Hell) Read online

  In actuality, I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on the book if I wanted too. I was closer than I had ever been to her before. Her voice captivated me, held me prisoner, I sat there drinking the okay coffee drink and not even tasting it.

  They – she – was talking about a party, apparently the party of the year. It was going to be in a couple weeks and apparently everyone was going to be there. The girls were all excited, talking about cheerleading. Apparently Heven was just named next year’s varsity squad captain.

  I was proud of her.

  There wasn’t anything especially enthralling about their conversations; it was really more the sound of her voice and the feeling of camaraderie that they all had together that kept me involved. It had been a long time since I felt like I belonged any place or even to anyone like that. The familiarity they had with one another, the ease with which they teased and talked, it was something that I missed but not really something I had longed for. Until perhaps now.

  I thought maybe that it was enough that she had this. That this was her world. She represented so much of what I had wanted for myself (except the head cheerleader thing – that would be weird.) and if it wasn’t meant for me then she was my choice for who should have it.

  I don’t know how long I sat there, not quite part of, but as close as I could get to her world. It must have been a while because eventually her crowd started dwindling. I looked up and she was walking past the booth I was sitting in. I caught her profile as she walked by, and she was smiling.

  “Drop me at the library?” she said to her red headed friend whose name I didn’t bother to catch.

  The girl sighed dramatically. “Sure, then I’m going home to purchase an essay on the black market.”

  Heven’s laugh lingered long after she’d gone.

  I gathered my comic and tossed the mystery coffee in the trash and headed to the library.

  Heven

  The library was empty. It had been for about half an hour. The librarian just flicked the lights, reminding me, the last one here, that it was closing time. I stared down at the essay, still not complete. But it was almost done, I just needed more time.

  I shouldn’t have spent so long at the café after cheerleading. I shouldn’t have gone at all. But I wanted to, and besides it was way more fun than this. With a sigh I pushed away from the table and went to find the librarian.

  She was shelving books in the children’s section, humming softly.

  “Excuse me.” I said, whispering. It was the library after all.

  She turned and smiled. “Are you all finished then? Have a wonderful night.”

  “Actually, I’m not. I’m almost finished, but I need some more time. I have this essay due tomorrow and…”

  She smiled again, not seeming the least bit annoyed. “How much longer do you need?”

  “Forty-five minutes?” I said, knowing it was more like an hour.

  “Hmmm. All right. then. Hurry and finish, I have some paperwork to do anyway.”

  “Oh, thank you!” I rushed back to my seat and buried myself in my work. Sure enough, an hour later my back was stiff but I was done. I stood and packed everything in my bag. Thank goodness that was over. I was soo tired of homework. Thankfully, it was almost summer break.

  “Thank you, so much.” I told the librarian on the way out the door.

  “You’re welcome, have a great night!”

  I let myself out into the cool night air. I couldn’t wait to get home and put on my PJs. It had been a long day but a good one. Things were going so good. They couldn’t get any better.

  I had no idea how quickly things could change.

  Sam

  The library closed and hour ago but I still hadn’t seen Heven come out. It was dark outside and there was no sign of her ride. It was possible that she went out the back door but I would have seen, I would have heard, but I knew she hadn’t gone out the back because the front door pointed her in the direction of her house.

  I paced the street and all the dark shadows that I could conceal myself in while waiting impatiently for her to come out. What if something was wrong? What if she needed help?

  I had just made up my mind to go in there when the front doors opened and Heven stepped out. She slung her backpack over her shoulder and looked off down the street in the direction of her house.

  I melted further into the darkness, preparing to follow once she was a bit further ahead.

  My attention slipped away from her when I heard someone nearby. The monster appeared in front of me, grinning like the Cheshire cat.

  “What have we here?”

  I had no explanation. I got caught watching the one person I was suppose to not care about, the one person I was supposed to pretend didn’t exist.

  “We had a deal; you broke your end of the deal.”

  Before I could do anything else I was alone, the monster disappeared into the night.

  Moments later, I heard a scream.

  Between

  Heven and Hell #1.5

  By Cambria Hebert

  Logan

  I kicked at the pavement as I walked, in no hurry to get home. I was glad that school was out for the day, but unlike most kids my age, I wasn’t that thrilled to go home. At least it’s Friday, I told myself, which meant no homework. That was something to be thrilled about. I hated homework. I hated studying, but if I didn’t bring home a glowing average every grading period, Dad would have a cow. Mom would try to step in and then Dad would yell at her, too, and no doubt the argument would escalate and it would end the way it always ended.

  With Sam.

  He didn’t even live with us anymore, yet every single thing I did that Dad didn’t approve of somehow always came back to him. Dad never said his name. It was like the minute he left with Sam and came back without him, we were all expected to pretend he never existed. Like all the times we played football in the backyard were something I made up. I was supposed to forget the time I took Dad’s watch off his dresser to pretend I was 007 and accidently broke it. Sam took the blame, the lecture and the punishment for me.

  The sound of running feet came up behind me and, inwardly, I winced.

  “Hey, look,” an obnoxious, familiar voice said from behind. “It’s Loogie.”

  Laughter followed the words and I did my best to ignore it and keep walking. I guess I should have moved a little faster to put more distance between me and the school. It was a tough call sometimes deciding which place I wanted to be at less. Home or school?

  A rough hand shoved me from behind. “Hey, dorkface. I’m talking to you.”

  I sighed, stopped, and turned. “What do you want, Brent?”

  The guy in the center of the foursome looked at his buddies. Then he smirked. “That paper you volunteered to write for me? It wasn’t good enough.”

  Internally, I scoffed. Yeah, the paper I volunteered to write. More like his buddies held me down last week while he went through my backpack, took it and turned it in with his name at the top. I had to pull an all-nighter just so I would have something to turn in.

  Brent pulled a rolled set of papers from his back pocket and tossed them at me. They hit the center of my chest. I grabbed them and looked at the giant red “B” written at the top. “Ah, what’s the matter, Brent? Mr. Sorrell didn’t believe you wrote this ‘cause the grade was too high?”

  His buddies laughed and Brent’s eyes about bulged out of his head. I knew I shouldn’t have said it. Antagonizing him only made things worse, but I had some pride. Getting tortured everyday was one thing, but taking it so easily was something else entirely.

  As expected, Brent launched himself at me and I swung my book bag out and hit him in the stomach, causing him to fall to the side. Yeah, that wasn’t smart, either, but I had been feeling edgy all day and I wasn’t in the mood.

  “That was stupid,” Brent snarled, partly hunched over from my hit. “Get him!” he yelled.

  The three stooges (I knew about them because my grandpa
used to watch them all the time) rushed me and though I tried to fend them off, it was three against one, and it didn’t take them long to have my arms pinned back, holding me in place.

  Brent smirked and picked up my discarded book bag. I tensed my muscles, getting ready. The bag slammed into my stomach and all the breath whooshed out of me. I would have doubled over if not for being held.

  White-hot rage filled me. I hated them!

  Then his fist connected with my jaw and my head snapped back. I prayed it wouldn’t leave a mark. I could only imagine my dad’s reaction to his son being beat up on at school, when I should be the one beating up on everyone else.

  I watched as Brent unzipped my bag and dumped the contents over the road and into the dirt. I didn’t mind so much because this part usually meant he was done and was about to leave.

  “The next time you write a paper for me, get an A,” Brent shouted, then walked away without a backward glance. “Let’s go.” I was finally released, watching the retreating backs of the four jocks.

  What I wouldn’t give to kick all their butts one day and wipe that smug swagger away. Instead of running after them, I bent down and began scooping everything back into my bag and swung it over my shoulder.

  As I walked home, I did what Dad expected and tried not to remember how, when Sam was here, no one messed with me. They were all too afraid of him. He had this look, this way of staring someone down that would scare them off before they even thought about messing with him. Or me.

  At this moment, that’s the part I missed about him most.

  There was a mark. A bruise. It was faint, but not faint enough that Dad wouldn’t notice. I stood in the bathroom, studying my reflection and trying to come up with an excuse. While I was in there, I tried to practice doing “the look” that Sam always had, the one that told people not to mess with him. The only look I seemed to make made me look like I belonged on an ad for diarrhea medicine.

  “Logan? Are you home?” Mom called from the kitchen.

  Giving up on “the look,” I went out to the kitchen where she was putting some chocolate chip cookies on a plate. “How was school?” she asked, getting out a glass and filling it with milk.

  “Fine,” I said, snagging a cookie and shoving it in my mouth. It didn’t taste good at all; the normally sweet and sugary flavor was like sand, and when the chocolate taste spread out over my taste buds, I almost gagged. Mom was watching me so I kept chewing and took the glass of milk she sat in front of me and chugged the entire thing.

  Mom just shook her head and smiled. “You boys sure can eat.”

  She froze, realizing what she said, adding that “S” onto boy, implying that Sam still lived here. She always acted like she had forgotten that, about two years ago, my brother was sitting at this very table doing his homework and most likely eating these same cookies when he suddenly shifted into a hellhound and ran out into the backyard.

  Mom looked at me with alarm on her face, her eyes wide, and then she blinked. Just like that, the moment was over. “More cookies?”

  I shook my head. “No, thank you.”

  I saw her looking at the bruise on my jaw and could see her internal debate about asking me about it. But when I looked up and met her eyes, she slid her gaze away. Anger whipped through me like lightning. This wasn’t the first time I had come home with a bruise or mark. She knew what was going on at school. She knew I was the kid the jocks used as a punching bag.

  She never did anything.

  She pretended not to see the marks. She pretended that she didn’t hear the lies I made up when Dad asked about them. She pretended a lot.

  I stood abruptly from the table. “Can I go play Xbox?”

  “Sure, honey.”

  I fled the room for the quiet sanctuary of the family room. A big TV and media cabinet filled up the far wall; a large, tan couch filled the center of the room with pillows of every color lining the back. Off to its left, there was a leather recliner that no one but Dad sat in (‘cause it was his chair) with a small end table next to it that held the various remotes. There was a big wooden coffee table that was scuffed up and held old crayon scribbles from when we were kids.

  The right side of the room was a wall of windows that looked out over the front yard and a big tree that grew there. Striped curtains lined the windows and there was a small round table that sat in the middle, holding some kind of flower arrangement.

  I walked in, ignoring the long table behind the sofa with all the family photos lined up in matching frames. I ignored the empty spaces where there used to be pictures of Sam. I turned on the TV and the Xbox and put in the most violent game I had, the one Mom refused to buy me. I bought it anyway and stashed it in my room. I didn’t care if she saw me playing it anymore. Maybe she would pretend not to notice.

  The thought made me snort; then I turned on the game and began shooting people up.

  * * *

  I was still in the family room when I heard Dad get home from work. I heard Mom greeting him and the sound of the refrigerator opening and closing as he got out his customary “I made it through another day of work” beer.

  I clicked the game off and flipped on some show on the Disney XD channel. A few minutes later, Dad came into the family room. I didn’t bother turning around to say hello. I didn’t feel like pretending today. In fact, I wasn’t feeling well at all.

  “Hey, son,” Dad said, coming around the couch and standing in front of the TV.

  “Hey, Dad.”

  “How did you do on that paper you wrote?”

  “Got an ‘A.’ ” I smirked because Brent got a “B” on “his” paper.

  “That’s the way to do it.” He took a sip of his beer, watching me. Then his eyes narrowed. “What’s that bruise on your face?”

  I had the story worked out in my head. I was going to say we were playing baseball in gym and the ball bounced off my glove and hit me in the jaw.

  But those aren’t the words that came out of my mouth.

  “I got in a fight.”

  “A fight,” he said the words incredulously.

  “Yup. Some kid had been running his mouth at me for days and I’d had enough.”

  “Then why are you the one with the bruise?” He didn’t ask me who or why. He didn’t ask me if I was okay. He wanted to know if I lost.

  I shrugged. “I provoked him into taking the first shot. It’s the only hit he got in. Not only did he lose the fight, but he got in trouble for starting the fight. I was just defending myself.”

  The lies just poured right off my tongue and my stomach heaved.

  Dad grunted. “Way to take care of yourself.”

  “Dinner’s on the table!” Mom called from the kitchen.

  The thought of food was not appealing at all, but I washed up and took my usual spot at the table.

  “I made your favorite tonight, Logan,” Mom said and sat a heaping plate of spaghetti in front of me.

  Spaghetti wasn’t my favorite. It was Sam’s.

  I looked up to my parents’ faces to see if there was even a flicker of the truth or recognition in their eyes. But there wasn’t. It was like they completely believed the fake world they lived in.

  “I’m not feeling well,” I announced and pushed away from the table.

  Mom’s face clouded over with concern. “What’s the matter?” She got up and felt my forehead.

  “I think I’m just going to go lay down.”

  “What can I get you? Would you like some toast? Some tea?”

  “Don’t baby him, Gwen,” Dad said and I took my chance to flee the room.

  In my room, I flopped down on the bed and stared at the comic book posters that covered the walls. My head was swimming and my vision was a little blurry, which made focusing on the characters hard, but I did it anyway. My skin wasn’t hot, but I felt warm, like my body was sweating on the inside. My stomach roiled and I regretted that cookie I ate earlier.

  I could hear my parents’ voices out in the kitchen
as they talked about their day, and Dad went on and on about his job. I never could understand why Mom let him push all of us around. Without really moving, I reached into my nightstand and pulled out my iPod and shoved the ear buds in my ears. I cranked up the music so I couldn’t hear anything else and I closed my eyes.

  But the music wasn’t loud enough to block my own thoughts. Thoughts that scared me pressed in on me and left me feeling confused.

  Underneath it all, one thing repeated like a mantra, eventually lulling me to sleep.