23 A Swearing Situation

Lily

The day after their trip to Valhalla, Sharkie surprised Lily by having more energy, not less, after their explorations, and requested to go see Luci. The realization that there was no pattern to Sharkie’s healing was a stupidly obvious one, given her own experiences, and she’d resolved to simply be observant and responsive instead of aspiring to some psychological formula.

Admittedly, it took a weight off. She’d never been good at following formulas anyway.

Lily brought her down to Hell to show her the Hellp Desk and to meet the gate demons in a calmer context. While she was initially hesitant, the demons were beyond respectful of her personal space, and within half an hour, she was giggling at their antics. She still stayed close to Lily though. The demons answered all of her questions about working at the gate, and when the questions about the operation of Hell began, they kept their responses age-appropriate and nongraphic.

Eventually, Lily and Sharkie ended up in the breakroom with a small “committee” of demons huddled around the whiteboard while they explained the layout of Hell. The picture Zagan drew resembled an hourglass, with the levels for the souls taking up the top half and the demon levels on the bottom, separated by an exceptionally thick layer of rock. Lily found herself equally fascinated by the information, asking questions of her own.

The upper three levels of the demons’ part of Hell were training fields, followed by an administrative level, then six residential floors. As Lily understood it, each residential level was like a different county, with their own subcultures and schools. Finally, the largest and lowest level of Hell was simply labeled “The Hearth.” Moura explained that it was where they took their dead to become part of the fabric of the Afterlife.

Lucifer showed up at that point, offering to escort them on a tour of the town he lived in on the lowest residential level, known as R6. Sharkie accepted, but then glanced at Lily for reassurance. Lily counted it as progress.

Her decision to hang back during the tour of the town and their time spent at an arcade was a conscious one. She wanted Sharkie to have another familiar adult she could trust, and the foundations of her relationship with Lucifer had already begun to solidify. The two of them grinned at each other during a dance battle game, silly and free. Lily snapped a picture of Sharkie and Lucifer and sent it to Bel. She hoped it would make him laugh when he saw it.

Afterward, they headed towards the central hub of elevators, but Sharkie pointed at a large building.

“What’s that?”

“That’s one of the schools,” Lucifer explained. “Would you like to see inside?”

Sharkie scrunched up her nose, glancing up at Lily. “Is this the school I could go to?”

Lily looked to Lucifer for that information.

“It is,” he said. “You are free to attend school on any level you like.”

“What do you think?” Sharkie asked, looking up at her.

Lily grinned and shrugged. “Why not?”

After checking in with the office, by luck they poked their heads into a classroom in the middle of science class. Sharkie was so immediately enraptured that Lily and Lucifer ended up leaning against the back wall, listening to the kids learn about the life cycle of frogs. Beyond bioluminescence, a fifty-year lifespan, and immediately dissolving into nothing upon death, Afterlife frogs and mortal frogs seemed to be pretty much the same. Sharkie’s eyes had lit up with curious wonder anyway.

At the end of the lesson, before the kids had filed out for what Lily assumed was the equivalent of recess, a demon girl paused by Sharkie to ask her about where she was from (Paradise), why she was visiting (she knew Luci), and if she liked frogs (she did). The girl beamed at the last, then waved and said goodbye.

Sharkie was quiet and fidgety for the rest of the day, but Lily waited until they were at home and making dinner to start asking questions.

“What are you thinking, Sharkie?” Lily asked, nonchalantly checking the sweet potatoes in the oven.

“I want to go to school.” It came out in a rushed blend of excitement and nerves, her natural curiosity warring with her conditioned fear.

“Sweet,” Lily said, closing the oven. “Do you want to go to that one, or do you want to check out the other ones first?”

Sharkie pulled her legs up onto her chair, hugging her knees. “I liked that one. It’s on Luci’s level. Luci’s nice.”

“Yeah, he is. When do you want to start?”

“Can I go tomorrow?”

Lily smiled and handed her a plate. “I don’t see why not.”

“Really?” The soft hope in her voice made Lily’s chest ache. How often had the simplest things been denied to her?

“Really,” Lily said. As Lily pulled the sweet potatoes out of the oven and set them on a trivet, Sharkie spoke again, this time even quieter.

“And what if I want to come home?”

Lily turned around, tugging off the oven mitts and meeting her eyes. “Then I’ll come get you and bring you home.”

When Sharkie held out her pinkie, Lily was already halfway there.

* * *

Sharkie spun around in Lily’s office chair, recounting her day at school while Lily sat cross-legged on the warm floor and organized the new built-in tool rack that had appeared next to the Hellp Desk.

“It kinda sucks that I’m so much smaller than everyone, but the combat teacher, Mr. Damien, had a whole bunch of tricks just for me! He said that anyone can be fierce, no matter how big or small they are. Do you believe that?”

Lily leaned back on her hands, grinning up at her. “Of course. I think it’s actually cooler to be small and fierce.”

“’Cause people don’t expect it?”

“Exactly.”

Sharkie spun in the chair a few more times. Her voice was small when she asked, “Can you still be fierce even if you’re scared?”

Lily’s stomach twisted at the wobble in her tone.

She got up to sit on the desk, facing Sharkie. “Yes,” she said simply. “If you’re scared and choose to be fierce anyway, that’s called being brave.”

“But you don’t get scared, and you’re brave.” Sharkie seemed confused.

Lily smiled at her. “Want to know a secret?”

Sharkie’s eyes lit up.

“I used to be scared all the time. Especially when I was alive. All kinds of things scared me. Sometimes they were silly things, like spiders, but the things that really scared me? Those weren’t silly. I still get scared, kiddo.” Lily huffed out a breath. “I was scared when I arrived in the Afterlife, and I thought I would end up down here. I didn’t know about the therapy levels, or that it’s a place of justice and growth, so I was scared. When I met Bel I was scared, because I didn’t want him to see me and decide I wasn’t worth knowing. When I met you I was scared, because I didn’t want to say or do the wrong thing and hurt you by accident. But I had to trust myself and my ability to figure things out. I had to try .”

And I have to keep trying. No more being afraid all the time.

Sharkie scooted the chair closer and climbed up next to Lily, pulling her feet up to sit cross-legged. “That just sounds like you cared. When the souls are angry at you that doesn’t scare you, because you don’t care what they think…Oh wait, but aren’t you scared they’ll hurt you?”

That just sounds like you cared…

“Not really. I know the demons will always protect me if I need it, and even if the souls do hurt me, I’ll regenerate. Pain doesn’t scare me, because… it ends.” Those last few weeks in bed, her body shutting down, the shooting pain, the primal fear of life trickling away…then blessed nothing. “One way or another, it ends.”

Sharkie opened her mouth, then shut it, her little shoulders curving up and in. She pulled the mittens of her onesie over her hands. Tucked her head farther back into her hood.

Lily silently held out her hand in offering and Sharkie took it. Her palms were clammy through the soft fabric of the mittens.

“Was I scared of Mr. Pastor because I cared?”

Fuck. Way to go, Lily. You sure nailed that one, you jackass.

“No,” Lily said immediately and firmly. “You were scared of him because he hurt you, because he wanted to make you scared. Because he was bad. He was evil and fucked up.”

A little gasp. “You said a bad word.”

“There’s no such thing as bad words, baby, just words that need to be used in context. There are words that some people aren’t allowed to say ever, but swear words are just words that need to be used in certain situations and not used in others.”

“Oh. So…but if he was bad, then why was I scared? I don’t understand.”

Lily took a moment, sifting through everything she knew about Sharkie’s past, about the way that brilliant little mind worked, her own life experiences.

“I think you were scared because you cared about yourself . You didn’t want him to hurt you, and you didn’t like not being able to protect yourself.”

“I think…I think you’re right,” Sharkie said quietly. A moment later, she huffed, looking up at Lily solemnly. “This is very complicated.”

“Life usually is.”

“But we’re dead.”

“Existence usually is,” Lily amended, a surge of affection for her clever girl washing through her.

Sharkie seemed to accept that.

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing,” a female soul shrieked behind them, and they both turned to look at her, “but I will have you know that this is UNACCEPTABLE!” Her eyes were wild, and she looked seconds away from launching a physical attack.

“Lily,” Sharkie said.

“Yeah?”

“Is this a swearing kind of situation?”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck.”