Hell is a waiting room.
I know: rerun, right? You've heard this before, because I've said it before. (Also: thanks for paying attention!) But I never ceased to find it weird and unsettling. Of all the things I'd expected-waterfalls of lava, flames, the shrieks of the damned, no parking, no returns, no way out, no hope, no refunds-a waiting room seemed anticlimactic at the least.
Even worse, my odious dead stepmother, the other Antonia, was at her customary place in hell: the assistant's desk, the place where, if this had been a CEO's office (which it sort of was), her right-hand gal would have sat.
But the Ant did more than greet the damned (or the just-visiting). She helped Satan with all sorts of things to lighten the load of running hell every day for many thousands of years. They weren't friends, but the Ant respected the bejeezus out of Satan, while Satan was grateful to the Ant for bearing her (Satan's) daughter.
Oh, and almost being friends with Satan? Keeping the devil's appointment book? Speaking of the Lady of Lies in glowing and respectful terms? I was the least surprised person in the history of human events to discover all that was true about my loathsome, revolting, detestable stepmother.
"Not a chance," she said by way of greeting. I was annoyed to see she appeared on top of things-she'd sucked at day jobs while she was alive, but was a terrific assistant in death-and pleased to see that she dressed even more badly in hell. Though maybe that went hand-in-hand with being in hell. "Run along, children. And you, whatever you are." Her nostrils flared as she eyed Garrett . . . skinny, tense Garrett.
"I want Antonia."
"You can't have me," my slutty stepmother replied primly.
To his credit, Garrett didn't groan and vomit. "The other one."
"I'm not sure this is the way to go about it," Laura murmured, laying her fingers on Garrett's forearm. "Just blurting it out like that."
"I want Antonia."
"I guess ignoring everyone's advice is another way to go," I commented, then turned to the Ant. "I'll take a cinnamon hot chocolate, extra whip, with whole milk."
"You've never been nearly as funny as you imagined."
"But you always managed to raise the bar when it came to being greedy and selfish. Go fetch yon boss, pineapple hair, before I show you I'm my mother's daughter."
She snorted. Which I expected . . . threatening her with my mother only worked in life. Not only was the Ant right not to fear my mom anymore, she probably didn't have to fear me, either. What I found most interesting, though, is that the Ant showed no shock at seeing us step through Laura's doorway into the waiting room.
Laura had to actually cut doorways through space with her Hellfire sword . . . I knew what it looked like going through, but I'd never seen it when someone came through to somewhere I already was. I hoped it was cool and dazzling. That would be a nice change.
The Ant, I couldn't help notice, hadn't moved to obey my command.
"Where's your boss?" I whined. "I gotta go shrill all over her ass."
"None of you have appointments or are expected, and my boss, as you uncouthly put it-"
"Uncouthly? Don't make up words. Uncouthly. Please."
"-is busy, which even Betsy should be able to understand. She's quite busy. Do you understand quite busy, Betsy?"
"Yeah, it's a state of being you've never endured." Ha! Take that, pineapple hair.
"Oh really? Busy is putting it mildly. There are over sixteen billion souls on this plane."
"Sixteen billion?" If I'd had to guess, I would have tried . . . I dunno . . . ten million? "Get out of town! Sixteen billion?"
"Sixteen billion seven hundred ninety-four million eight hundred twenty-four thousand and three."
"It's so weird and gross that you know that."
"And they all have needs, of course. Which is why we're set up here. To meet their needs."
"So they need to burn forever or whatever their personal hell is?"
"Exactly. We serve them. It's not the other way around. I'm told it's never been the other way around. All of which is to explain how busy the boss is. Of course," she added, her tone softening as she looked at Laura, "I'm sure she'll make an example for you, hon."
"Don't you mean she'll make an exception?"
The Ant flapped her press-on nails at me, subtly painted Screeching Whore Red. "That's what I said."
"Because that's kind of a big Freudian slip," I tried again. Why was I the only one who found that unsettling? Simple: Laura had nothing to fear in hell . . . who'd be psycho enough to try to harm her? And Garrett didn't care about anything, and could focus on nothing, until he had his werewolf gal-pal back in his big, strong, neurotic, undead embrace.
The Ant patted her tall yellow hair. "Don't use words you don't understand."
"Okay. I understand pummeled. I understand maimed. I understand acid and burns and deface and mutilation and disfigure and scar and damage and-"
"Please find out if Mother will see us," Laura asked with the flawless manners taught by her preacher dad. It was just as well . . . as fun as verbally kicking the Ant's ass had been (Yahtzee!), it wasn't getting us anywhere.
And there it was again. Mother. Not my mother. And was it me, or was Laura getting less annoyed when she spoke of the devil or found herself in the devil's presence or found herself manipulated into a course of action by the devil?
Because she used to hate it. Her. Whatever. But now, even if she wasn't seeking Satan's company, these days Laura didn't seem to mind the company, if you get where I'm going.
"At once," the Ant said, and disappeared like a soap bubble: shiny and silent. Garrett was staring straight ahead, almost vibrating, but waiting for a command like a leashed rottweiler. Laura was trying not to look pleased, and I was trying not to freak out more than I already had.
I took my phone out of my purse-I'd pulled the beat-up handbag (I was a shoe girl, but gave not a shit for bags) from my (his) wrecked car, slung it over one shoulder, and brought it to hell, though I'm not sure why. Maybe I thought I'd want to buy a hot dog while I was here, pay for a few rides?
I looked at my phone and told myself, again, that it was good I didn't let Sinclair know what I was up to. He'd freak, he'd order, he'd worry, he'd have a nervous breakdown, he'd yell at me from inside my head, then he'd yell at me in person. And the tiresome lecture when he found me again . . . I could feel myself yawn just thinking about the droning.
Also, he might have insisted on coming with . . . and Laura might have let him.
So I'd texted that I'd been delayed (truth) but would get back as soon as I could (truth) and there was nothing to worry about (untruth).
Because knowing he'd want to come . . . well. That made it easy. Sure, I was acting like a scary movie heroine, someone from, say, Saw XXXVII. I went to hell with the Antichrist and a feral vampire on the spur of the moment and didn't tell anyone where I was going. I deserved to have my head cut off or my face eaten or whatever a script writer (if my life were a horror movie, and I were a busty starlet) could think up. And it was all fine as long as it meant Sinclair was (relatively) safe.
Sinclair? In hell? No way. Only one Sink Lair family member was going to hell three times in the same week, and it wasn't the guy whose entire family had been murdered before he was voting age.
Oh. Oh. Oh. Did . . . did I just refer to myself as a Sink Lair? Have things gotten as dreadful as that? Back in hell in the same week looking for Antonia while dealing with the other Antonia (a hellish curse all its own), a summerless future lurking a thousand years down the road, no Louboutin shoes since there was no Louboutin, and now this? Curse you, Satan, for poisoning everything you touch!
"I gotta sit down," I managed, seconds before I did so. And for the first time I was glad hell was a waiting room. No shortage of chairs, so that was good. But they sure were uncomfortable and that, I figured, went with the territory.