SIX
Delaney had no idea where to start. Honestly, she was struggling to even wrap her mind around what was happening to her now. For years, she’d believed in what she believed in, despite the fact that they were things most people thought were ludicrous. She had grown used to defending herself, to fighting back when people treated her like she was looney tunes, that having someone acting like she was legitimate felt completely bizarre.
On top of that, she was still struggling to adapt to her new surroundings. After the initial shock of the mansion and its macabre glory wore off, she was left with the slightly giddy, uneasy feeling of a child who had been subjected to far too much stimulus.
Everywhere she looked, there was something she wanted to look at, to pick up in her hands and examine. In front of her was Augusten Grady, who looked at her as if she were someone to be respected instead of made fun of. All in all, it was a lot to take in.
“Are you quite all right, miss? You’re looking a little pale.”
“Yes, I’m... Well, I’m okay. I’m just trying to get my bearings. And to be honest, I’m trying to figure out what exactly you want from me.”
“Ah, of course. Rightly so. It’s a lot to take in, I imagine.”
“It really is.”
Delaney was grateful for Augusten’s modicum of understanding, but she wasn’t sure it was going to help. She was confused and tired and still hungover, not anywhere close to being in the state of mind she needed for something life altering.
“What would you do if I told you that everything you’ve ever believed in was real?”
“I’d tell you I needed a little bit more explaining. That’s a pretty bold statement.”
“And you would be right. It is a bold statement. That’s my favorite kind of statement. Just because it’s bold doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
“You’re right on that account. At least I think you are.”
“I most certainly am. Now, let us explore the implications here. If everything you’ve believed in, everything you’ve hoped to believe in, is true, what does that mean for this world?”
“I’m not sure I understand what you’re asking.”
“Exactly what I said. What does that mean? Look around this room, Delaney. What do you see?”
She peered around her, almost grateful for the invitation to stare. She saw the books on vampires and the occult, so many she wouldn’t be able to read them in a lifetime. She saw artifacts from times long past, the meaning of which she could hardly grasp. She saw relics of an entire world that had existed right below the surface of ordinary people since time began. She saw many things, but how in the hell was she supposed to put all of that into words? She was ashamed of how unsure she was on that front, being an aspiring journalist and all, but her shame didn’t make it any less true.
“Well?”
“I don’t know,” she answered quietly, feeling defeated.
“But you do!” Augusten shouted, causing her to jump high off the seat of her chair and to clamp down on her own tongue. “You do know! You’re just used to pretending not to believe the things you know in your heart to be facts. So, we’ll try this again. What do you see?”
“Proof, okay? I see proof!”
“Wonderful! Elaborate, my dear girl, proof of what?”
“Proof of all of it. Proof that we’re not the dominant species on this planet and never have been. Proof that we don’t have things nearly so figured out as we like to think. I see proof that the world isn’t anything like what most people like to think it is.”
It was only after she got all the words out that Delaney realized she was shouting. Something about the way Augusten had pushed at her had struck a chord. The sound of his demanding, booming voice compelling her to speak her mind truthfully had brought her to her feet.
She had even knocked her chair over as she stood. That was how impassioned she had become. She could still feel the adrenaline coursing through her veins, causing her entire body to shake. Now that she was out of the moment, however, she could also feel a white-hot shame taking hold of her.
“I’m sorry. Really, I’m super sorry.”
“For what? What on earth could you have to be sorry for?”
“For shouting at you. That’s so incredibly rude of me, you know? To come into your home, a lovely home you invited me into, and shout at you? My parents would be mortified, I can tell you that much.”
“Well, first of all, let’s call a spade a spade, shall we? This home isn’t lovely.”
“But it is!”
“No.” He laughed, a surprisingly youthful laugh for a man with his look and age. “It’s not. At least not most of it. This room yes, I’ll give you that. The rest of the place? I’ll admit to its having a certain amount of charm, but that’s as far as it goes.”
“All right, but still.”
“But still what? You’re passionate! That’s precisely why I’ve brought you here! Because of your beliefs, or at least what I took to be your beliefs from what I’ve managed to glean about you. Have you any idea how disappointed I would have been if that had all turned out to be a ruse? Just some persona put on for the sake of ratings?”
“Well, nobody wants to hire me or read what I have to say, so there’s no concern about ratings playing into anything.”
“So, then the passion is genuine, which brings me back to my initial point. That kind of drive, that kind of belief in a person, is nothing to apologize for. Not ever. It is to be celebrated. I like to think your parents would agree with me on that front.”
Delaney couldn’t help smiling at that one. It was a nice thought, but he was pretty far off the mark there. Augusten couldn’t have been more wrong if that’s what he’d been aiming for if he actually thought her parents were cool with the idea of her running around and trying to make a career out of writing about the paranormal.
She was pretty freaking sure that if he ever got to the chance to ask them their feelings on the matter, pride and celebration would not be adjectives that came up in the conversation. Still, it was a nice thing to hear, even if it was wrong and coming from an eccentric man she’d only known for all of five minutes. Validation was nice, almost regardless of where it came from.
“So! Then we’ll leave your embarrassment and any residual feelings of shame at the door, shall we? You’re never to apologize me for being invested, all right? Especially not when that investment is in something I’ve dedicated my whole life to.”
“You’re whole life? What do you mean by that?”
“I mean what I said. My whole life. Probably much as it has been with you, I developed my fascination with the darker elements of this world when I was quite young indeed.”
“Did you really?”
“I did. Some of my earliest memories are of me looking out the window late at night when I was supposed to be sleeping. Everyone else in the house was, but not me. I was just standing there and looking.”
“Looking at what?”
“Not looking at, looking for. I was looking for the things I already knew, in my heart, were there all around me. I did that almost every night, did it for years. That’s where my stories come from, you see. All of the acclaim, all of the stupid accolades that regrettably have meant too much to me over the years, it all started there. With that little boy standing in his window and looking for the things unseen.”
Delaney could feel that her mouth was hanging open like a fool, but she felt powerless to do anything to change it. She knew this guy was a writer, but still, she was shocked. He’d managed to verbalize thoughts she’d had for as long as she could remember. They felt so much like her own that they could have been ingrained in her blood. They were a part of her, and the fact that he had spoken them meant they were a part of him as well.
Without any idea it was going to happen, she felt her eyes well up with tears. Augusten saw it and his face blanched, then formed bright spots of embarrassment right in the centers of his cheeks. It appeared that while he was wonderful with words and describing emotions, he wasn’t so good with dealing with feelings in person.
“Oh dear, I’m sorry. Terribly sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. Perhaps I over-spoke. I do that from time to time. I’d like to say it was because of my long bout of hermitage, but that would be a lie. I must confess, talking with people has never been a talent of mine.”
“No.” She laughed, reaching out impulsively and touching his hand in a gesture of reassurance. “Please. I’m not upset. It was just --it was a huge relief to hear someone describe things I’ve always thought. To see that someone else gets it, you know? I didn’t even realize how much of a weight it was on my shoulders.”
“Of course, it was. Isolation is a brutal thing.”
“There’s still something I don’t understand, though. I’m sorry, I’m probably just being dense.”
“I very much doubt it.”
“I just don’t see why you need me here. Or why you want me here, I guess. Does that make sense?”
“Ha!” He laughed out loud, loud enough to startle Delaney into jumping almost out of her chair, and shook his head. “My dear, that’s the perfect question. I haven’t quite told you, have I?”
“Not quite, no.”
“Well then let me tell you now. I have the knowledge, I’ve made that clear. I also have the desire to see some of this brilliance in action. What I don’t have is the youth. Not the youth nor the constitution for adventure.”
“But the things you write! They’re all about adventure!”
“They are, you’re correct about that. But tell me this. Have you heard the saying, ‘those who can’t do, teach’?”
“Well, sure, but-”
“But nothing. Sure, these days I have my advancing age and failing health to hide behind for my inaction, but that certainly hasn’t always been the case. In my youth, which despite all current appearances I did have, I was every bit the coward you see before you today. I spent a lifetime knowing something was there, wanting to reach out and touch it, and being too afraid to take even one step.”
“That’s awful.”
She spoke before she could stop herself, then promptly clapped both of her hands over her mouth. She was totally mortified at her statement, of course, but Augusten didn’t seem to be. Far from it, actually. He let out a delighted chuckle that made him look at least a decade younger than he had only moments before. Although Delaney still wished fervently that she had at least some ability to filter the things that came out of her mouth, seeing his levity made her feel a little bit better. At least this guy seemed to find her big mouth charming. That was something.
“You’re right. You’re absolutely right! It is awful, and one of the greatest regrets of my life. Make no mistake, a man my age has almost certainly amassed quite a few and in this matter I am in no way exceptional. Still, my inability to tap into my latent adventurous spirit remains my greatest disappointment. A goddamned tragedy, if you’ll indulge my dramatic side.”
“And you think there’s something I can do about it? Something that’ll help you not feel so bad?”
“I do. That’s exactly what I think.”
“But why? How?”
“Those are big questions, as I’m sure you know. The most important questions to ask, but often not so cut and dry as one might think. The simplest answer I can give you is because you can.”
Delaney considered this for a moment, feeling perplexed and far too energetic. It was the kind of energetic she felt after working a double fueled by way too many energy drinks. Her body felt like it was vibrating with something she didn’t even really understand. Part of her wanted to get up and walk out, just leave Augusten and all his strange ideas behind in favor of a long afternoon nap followed by several hours of Craigslist job hunting.
It would definitely be the easier thing, the less complicated thing. As far as Delaney was concerned, the easy way out always held at least a little bit of attraction, even for people who rarely took it. Anyone who said that wasn’t true for them was lying. But the other part of her?
The other part of her was already totally hooked on the dark magic of what this odd man was telling her. He was handing her the story of a lifetime, the adventure of a lifetime, and he was doing so with open, trusting palms. Even if the part of her that wanted to get out was whining shrilly into her ear, the other part of her was too much of a bully to listen. Basically, there was no way she was going anywhere. Not a chance in hell.
“What do you want me to do?”
Augusten clapped his hands together like a child who had just convinced his mother to let him eat his dessert before his supper. So, he had seen it in her, the hesitation threatening to foil his plans. He had been worried that she would tell him thanks but no thanks, and somehow that made Delaney feel just a little bit better about the whole thing.
At least she couldn’t be considered predictable, when it was all said and done. At least it wasn’t like he had known from the outset that she’d do exactly what he wanted her to do.
“I want you to go and have my adventures for me.”
“That’s all? Seriously?”
“No, not quite.”
“A catch, huh? Of course, there is. There’s always a catch.”
“No.” He laughed easily, a sense of relief having taken over his whole being with the evidence that he wasn’t going to be immediately rebuffed. “No catch. At least I wouldn’t consider it to be one. Hopefully you won’t either.”
“Well that kind of depends on what it is, you know? I can’t say without knowing what the other part is.”
“Smart girl. Very smart. But what I want is quite simple. I only want you to come back and tell me about it.”
“Tell you about what, exactly?”
“The adventures, of course. I want to know about your adventures, the ones I can’t go have for myself. I want to hear all about them, dear, so that it feels like I was right there with you. Do you understand?”
“I do. At least I think I do. But is that really all? You just want me to talk to you?”
“Yes and no. I’m sure you’re going to want to write something about your escapades, yes?”
“I don’t know. Probably. If I can get anyone to take me seriously.”
“But you don’t have to do that, do you? You can write as fiction, the same way I do.”
“Is that what you want?”
“It’s something I’m all right with, but with one caveat.”
“So this is the catch.”
“I suppose you could think of it that way, although I hope you don’t. It’s only that I get to choose what you can write.”
“Um, why?”
“Because, I’ll want first choice, you see. My creativity isn’t limitless, dear. The kind of new material I could attain with the stories you might find is very valuable to me. Valuable enough so that I’m willing to offer you financial compensation for them.”
“Hold on. So you’re going to pay me to go hang out with creatures that aren’t even supposed to exist? And all I have to do is tell you stories and let you have your pick?”
“That’s exactly right. That’s all you have to do.”
The first thing that occurred to Delaney was that this all sounded like it was too good to be true and that, in most cases, when things seemed to be too good to be true, they almost always were. The second thing that occurred to her was that she couldn’t care less. She was all in. Whatever it was that Augusten Grady was really trying to sell, she had fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.