The Demon's Half

Chapter 17

No.
Gods, please no.
My legs were giving up, but I needed to move, needed to breathe. The oxygen felt like inhaling sand. No. How? No.

I shoved past people, their laughter and chatter blurred and meaningless. A little boy passed, gripping his father's hand, his other clutching a blue balloon. His wide, innocent eyes met mine, and he smiled.
I couldn't smile back.
How could I?
A demon was my other half.
A monster, a murderer.
And we shared a fucking soul.

Bile clawed up my throat. Had it been his plan all along? Not to steal my soul, but to reclaim what was already his? I had always known something was wrong with me.
Nearby, the demon appeared, but he wasn't watching me. His cold turquoise eyes were locked onto the little boy.
Surprisingly, he smiled—a real, genuine smile. The boy didn't smile back.
The demon's expression went cold as he turned back to me.

"Are you done?"

"Am I done?!" I yelled. "We share a damned soul."

"Half-damned."

"You and me. My soul... isn't even fully mine," I spat the words like poison.

"True." He nodded. Nodded!

"I would rather die than have anything to do with you." I snarled.

"Get the fuck over yourself. No one chose this."

"Yeah, because I would never choose you."

I didn't let him finish whatever smug thought was forming behind his lips, and stormed off, pushing through the crowd without knowing where I was going. The hallways were alive with noise—laughter, chatter. But the warmth in their voices only made me feel colder.

Souls were supposed to be scattered, to the endless ocean of realms and lives. The odds of two halves finding each other were impossible. Elena said it multiple times. And yet here I was. Shackled to him. Was I like him? It didn't make sense.
I kept my eyes down, trying to ignore the families around me, but their happiness felt like a knife twisting in my chest. A little girl skipped ahead of her parents, tugging them toward the animal exhibit. A tear slipped down my cheek.

We never did family trips. Didn't do dinners or birthdays or holiday mornings. My father was never there for anything. Once, he came home smelling of smoke and left a grimy teddy bear on the table. Mia clutched it like a treasure. I remember the hot, sharp jealousy I felt—not for the bear, but for her ability to still be fooled. I saw the gift for what it was: an apology that changed nothing.

I went outside and sank onto a cold stone bench near the entrance. What would Logan and Elena think of me? My fingers curled around Mia's rosary. My tears soaking into the beads.

"Forgotten Gods damn me, you do enjoy a self-pity party, don't you?"

I was so done. "Can't you just kill me and be done with it?"

"No," he answered. "If you die craving death, our soul shatters. And a broken soul?" His gaze flicked to the distance. "That's an eternity of torment."

It wasn't like I hadn't thought about it before... Ending it myself.

I sobbed. "You're telling me you never actually wanted to kill me? Mamadas."

"Don't play stupid, Brando," he said, my last name rolling off his tongue like a curse. "Why do you think I've never truly hurt you?"

"Sure, having the life sucked out of me didn't hurt at all."

He stared at me like I'd just sprouted wings. "What are you talking about?"

"When you turned into that thing and fed off my screams?"

"That wasn't me."

"Then what?"