Holes

Ch. 2- three days after

I wake up late, the blue-white light of mid-morning glaring into my eyes. I blink a few times, then head downstairs drowsily wondering why I didn't wake myself up earlier.

"Hey, why's the bathroom locked?! I need to piss!"

My older cousin Matt yells. That shakes the cobwebs from my head as I realize what didn't wake me up. I'm no longer playing Host to a demon. Or, rather, my body isn't. I jog blearily towards the kitchen, cursing as I realize I have no clue where my glasses are. I'll find them later. I sigh as Alice and Eriez use up the last of the jelly on their probably-thirds pieces of toast. I don't bother to look for another jar, I know that there's a probable chance of every one of them being expired for decades.

"Heya, Eric. Morning. Quick Q, Why did I wake up with creeper mc-creeperson asleep on the floor?"

Alice asks as I grab the last pieces of bread and shove them in the toaster. I shrug.

"Didn't particularly trust him with a knife, and didn't want to risk getting a warning shot from Uncle Victor."

"And didn't want to lose his prisoner, no doubt."

Eriez adds unhelpfully as Alice gasps.

"Wait, he tried to kill us and you just let him sleep in our room! The hell were you thinking?"

I catch the toast as it pops, then stick it in my mouth before it burns my hand. It manages to burn both hand and tongue before I can grab a plate. Eriez is unusually quiet. I stall, sticking the toast onto the first plate I grab and poking the first bite of toast to my cheek while I debate responses. I run my hand under the ice-cold water from the faucet as I finally answer my sister.

"No, he tried to kill himself, probably so we couldn't get information out of him. Or maybe because he's a cowardly idiot, but either way I didn't really want to leave him passed out in the bathroom because basic morals suggest you won't live very long that way."

Alice gapes even more, if possible. Matt storms in, muttering under his breath and grabs for a wrench that usually hangs precariously over the edge of the fridge. The wrench is nowhere to be seen. He turns on us, glaring at Eriez especially. Eriez shrugs.

"Your cousins can testify that I wasn't stealing your wrenches in the middle of the night. And even if I could have, what'd I do with it? Unbolt myself into a different reality?"

Alice looks incredibly uncomfortable. I roll my eyes and flick water at them.

"Stop making Alice uncomfortable. It got old yesterday morning."

I say through my half-swallowed mouthful of toast. Eriez shrugs again.

"I'm a demon for all intention's sake. It's not like I can normal people to hell."

At this moment, I'm vaguely glad to have Hosted for him, because it's almost second nature for my fingers to form his equivalent of the middle finger. Alice's eyebrows shoot up, and Eriez bursts out laughing.

"Vasr, kid. You learned fast."

I grab my toast back off of the counter. It only mildly stings in my burnt hand.

"The most important things to learn in an enemy's language are the swear-words. I read that in a really useful book on... Oh wait. No. It's your motto or something."

Eriez laughs until he's doubled over and almost choking from it. Alice shoots me an "explain" look, and I flip the bird. She smiles, still looking confused and worried but more like my sister. Matt also grins, and tries to copy the move badly. Uncle Victor walks in with the wrench. He looks around, takes in the many middle fingers raised, then raises his own.

"Now the salute is over, I fixed the bathroom door. Oh, and Eric? Thanks for the samples.

Eriez freezes, midlaugh, then attempts to retain his smirk.

"Well, hope you got enough for a long while old man."

He tracks our uncle with his eyes as all of us pretend to go back to normal. It's awkwardly silent as we all pretend to not watch him leave. The door to the basement lab slams. The awkwardness persists, and I can tell it will continue unless I break it.

"Soooo, anybody got plans for the rest of the day? Aside from glare each other to death?"

Matt asks, proving me wrong. Alice shrugs.

"I'm going to Reeba's place, we're meeting up with Jennifer and Orli to hang out somewhere."

She says. Eriez raises an eyebrow, and Alice smirks.

"What, I'm not hiding in here with you nerds all summer. Nothing's happening yet so I'm going to pretend nothing will."

She drops the last piece of her toast into her mouth, and heads to the door, grabbing a set of tranquilizer darts and a blow-dart-pipe on the way.

"I thought you were being normal."

Eriez calls peevishly after her. She flashes a glare at him.

"Pretending. I'm really good at that. You should know that by now."

She slips out the door before Eriez can come up with a response. He looks a bit shocked.

"She likes you."

Eriez gapes at me.

"She accuses me of maybe trying to kill her in her sleep, and you say she likes me."

He retorts as I head for the lab.

"Yeah. If she didn't, you would have gotten more holes this morning."

Eriez splutters. I stop just inside the door to the stairs.

"You coming, or are you just going to just poof downstairs before me?"

I call to the still frozen in place demon. Eriez pauses for a few seconds, then shakes his head.

"I'll be raiding your spare parts, see if I can't make you something better than blowdarts to fight the monsters."

He says, eyes pointedly at the ground. I grin.

"Alice may just worship you for that."

Then I slip into the perpetually green light of the basement and go analyze the blood of my demon.