22. Bree

"Thank you so much for getting my necklace back!" I place Rellick on his feet and hold the pendent against my chest. I wish there was a way I could lock it to my neck. Maybe put it on a metal chain? But all of the Sins have super strength or whatever so that feels pointless.

"Hey, Mommy! Can my new friend come play with me?" What friend? He's made so many ‘new friends' since he's started at the daycare. Not to mention, half the time lately he's talking about one of the Sins. "The one with the rainbow hair. I like her!"

Oh. Josie. "Sure, sweet boy. We'll see if she wants to come over." I look into my backpack purse, retrieving the card she gave me. The pretty yellow font seems to glow in the light. I type in the number on the back of the card, and dial. Normally, I would text but it's a 1-800 number. Her melodic voice answers on the third ring with a simple hello. "Hey, Josie? This is Bree." After a slight pause, I continued. "We met at Jump Park? My son kept jumping off the tower."

A small chuckle passes through the phone. "Oh yeah! Rellick, right? How is the little guy? Was he exhausted after?"

She remembered! My smile is wide as I place her on speaker. "Actually, he's the reason I called." I motion for Rellick to speak.

"Hi, Ms Josie! Do you wanna come play with us?"

"Do I want to come play with you? What are we playing?" Josie sounds so energetic, like she's actually happy to be talking to a three-year-old.

Rellick shrugs his shoulders. "I don't know… a game, I guess."

She chuckles and her laughter is contagious. "Sure, Rellick! I'd love to come play with you!" Rellick jumps up and down, cheering in his excitement.

I take the phone off speaker and hold it to my ear. "Thank you for agreeing."

"Of course, girl! He's so precious! Just text me the address and I'll be over in a minute."

"See you then." Hanging up, I text the address to the 800 number, and she reacts with a thumbs up. "Alright, sweet boy. What are we eating?"

He pretends to think about it before yelling out, "Pizza!" Sounds good to me. I shot Josie a text, asking her favorite pizza. She responds with ‘I'll eat whatever!' so I ordered a large stuffed crust pepperoni and bacon, and a thin crust meat-lovers.

A little over twenty minutes later, Josie knocks on the door with the pizza in her hand. "Hey, girl! I pulled up at the same time as the pizza, so I figured I'd just pay and bring it up."

"Oh my God. You didn't have to do that!" I take the boxes from her, placing them on top of my dining table. "But thank you!"

She closes the door behind her, saying "It's not a big deal. I like helping in little ways."

Rellick comes running out of his room. "Ms. Josie! You're here!"

Josie holds her arms out and Rellick runs into them. They hug each other tight as though they've known each other for their whole life. "Of course, I'm here! I loved hanging out with you at Jump Park!" She moves in closer to his ear and loudly whispers, "I think your mom is pretty cool, too."

I pretend I cant hear them while I make Rellick a plate, cutting up his slice of pizza. I place it on the table and move to the kitchen, grabbing a yoo-hoo for him. "Want anything to drink, Josie?"

"Whatever you're having is fine." I grab two Sprites and move to the table. Josie makes a plate for herself, and I follow. We sit around the table, talking while we eat. "So, Rellick. What's your favorite color?"

"Blue," he says with a mouth full of food. "Mommy's likes red. What's yours?"

She thinks for a moment. "Hmm. Yellow? I like all the colors, but if I had to choose? I think it would be yellow."

He nods his head and I smile to myself. I love that she's speaking to him like an adult rather than a child. The Sins are also doing that too and it doesn't happen often. Even the other ‘teachers' at the daycare treat them like they're babies rather than children going to school in the next year.

I tune back into the conversation to hear Josie say, "I have seven brothers."

"Holy fuck," I whisper at the same time Rellick says "wow!"

She nods her head. "Yeah, it can be pretty frustrating being the only girl."

"The only girl?" Josie's eyes close for a moment, her smile turning sad when they open again. There seems to be a story behind it, but I won't ask in front of Rellick.

The small talk returns to shallow randomness until Rellick is finished eating. "Wanna play Lego with me? We can build a castle!"

"Sure!" Rellick runs to his room, coming back with his box of Lego blocks. He and Josie play on the floor of the living room while I put away the food.

Watching him play with another adult makes me wish that he had more child friends. I don't allow the children at the daycare to come to my home, as I don't want parents to know where we live. The amount of creepy dads or "Karen" moms is astronomical.

I lower myself to the floor and build with them. Rellick is building an actual building with structure rather than just stacking bocks. Maybe Josie is right in her career choice of helping others create.

After about half an hour, Rellick begins to rub his eyes. I know what that means. "Alright, sweet boy. I think it's time for bed."

"No, Mommy. I'm playing with Ms. Josie! We're building Lego!" The whine in his voice gets more prominent with every word. For a minute, I wished Sleepy was here to help me put him to sleep. I love his help.

I love him… and half the other sins as well.

God, I'm fucked.

I lift Rellick up onto my hip and kiss his forehead. "We can ask Ms. Josie to come back another day."

His eyes begin to water, causing Josie to stand. "Hey! I will totally come back to play with you whenever you want. Okay, buddy?"

Rellick nods his head, and they give each other a hug. After that, Rellick is easy to put to sleep. We brush his teeth and change into his pajamas. I turn on a random show on his TV, making sure he's tucked in, then head back to the living room.

Josie is sitting on the couch with a glass of my cheap red wine. "I didn't mean to snoop. I was looking for water and saw the wine." She points to another glass on the end table, and I gratefully smile at her, taking it with me as I sit. "He's such a great kid, Bree. You're doing an amazing job."

Compliments have always been hard to take because I constantly feel like I'm not worthy of them. Am I doing a great job with Rellick? All his friends are adults, and I don't have any friends other than demons and possibly a random woman I met in a kids trampoline park that day.

"Can I ask?" Her voice brings me out of my reverie. I cock my head to the side, letting her know I wasn't really paying attention. See. I'm a shit friend. "Where his dad is?"

"He was a one-night stand. I haven't been able to find him. I searched the bar and surrounding places, but no one remembered him." I shrug and give a self-depreciating laugh. Lucifer was probably right anyway. Who would want to help take care of a kid after one night?

"And you didn't have any other help?" I think back to my grandparents who died in the car accident a month before I met Rafe. Their death was the main reason I was even at the bar. Then, I think to the other reason…

When I graduated high school, my best friend and former neighbor, Brittany Taylor, and I decided to go to UNO three hours away from our small city of Bayou Livre, Louisiana and make something of ourselves. We got a dorm room together and decided we were going to be somebodies. She became the party girl! Ready to drink and rush and be the popular girl.

I went to one party and decided that life wasn't for me. I didn't care for the way people acted after alcohol or when they were trying so hard to be someone amazing when really, they were just ‘blah.' Brittany was gone all the time. Then she got a boyfriend… Chad. Chad was an asshole, but he was a gorgeous asshole on the basketball team. He was Britt's dream man.

He was my nightmare.

I want to say that Chad was the reason for Brittany and I's friendship breakup, but that's not true. It was all my fault.

Wiping the stray tear from my eye, I give a sad smile. "Nope. Just me. My dad died before I was born, my mom died of cancer when I was four. My grandparents died about a year before Rellick was born. It's… just me."

Josie places her hand on my knee and squeezes. "You are so strong, Bree." I nod in acknowledgement though I don't really believe her words. I need a subject change.

"So. The only girl out of eight kids! That's crazy! I wish I had so many siblings."

It was Josie's turn to be sad. "I wasn't always the only girl. There used to five girls, but they all passed after a traumatic event."

Oh my! To lose all of your sisters? I couldn't even begin to imagine. "Was it when your father died?" Her eyes narrow in confusion. "When you asked about Rellick's name and I said it was my father's, you told me your father was gone, too?" Did I misremember?

"Oh! Right! No, he's not dead. He left. My sister's passing was part of the reason. He and my uncle got in a huge fight, then my sisters died, then one of my brothers made a wrong decision that broke Father past his breaking point. He left and said he would return when he was meant to."

Both of us sat in silence for a minute, grieving the ones we lost. Josie was the first to speak again, her cheerful words contrasting her red puffy eyes. "So, what were you in school for?"

I couldn't help but chuckle. "English Lit and creative writing. I was meant to get my degree and then take a teaching certification. My goal was to work at the local high school with my grandparents." My smile grows as I think of what could have been. "And maybe write some books on the side. My grandmother was the librarian, and she loved to read me the craziest stories she could find."

"That sounds like so much fun! I heard there were books about dinosaurs." There were multiple books about dinosaurs. Rellick had three. "Erotic ones," she whispered.

Thank God, I wasn't taking a sip of my wine. I would have spit it out all over my couch. I was never one to judge when it came to someone's kink, but I just couldn't picture how that would even work.

We sat and joked for another hour or so until I looked at the time. "Thank you for coming over. I had a great time and I know Rellick would love to have you over again."

"And I would love to be here!" Josie gives me a long tight hug goodbye and I watch as she walks to her car, making sure she's safe before closing the door and locking it.

As I turn around, a giant gold hand reaches out and rips my necklace off. Again. I don't even think before I reach to follow. "What the fuck?!" I yell. Greed, the golden statue (no, seriously his skin looks like it was made of gold) holds the necklace above my head.

He thinks he's so special. I hide my intentions, before punching him directly in the dick. His mouth drops and he crumbles. Doesn't matter what species you are. Penis punches hurt.

Greed drops the necklace and I pick it up, running towards Rellick's room. Once I'm in there I can call Belphegor for a portal.

I barely make it to the hallway before Greed grabs a handful of my hair. "Fucking bitch," he mumbles. He throws me against the wall, the photos rattling at the force. His other hand moves to wrap around my throat. "You want a necklace so bad; I'll give you one."

Normally, a guy choking me would be a huge turn-on, but this is a demonic gold statue seriously trying to hurt me. Greed starts to squeeze and lifts me by my neck. My face is even with the photos of my grandparents. Maybe if I can reach it, I can hit him over the head with it.

His hand pauses, not squeezing anymore, just holding me still. I look up at him, wondering what's going on, but he's not looking at me.

The hand in my hair drops and moves towards the framed photo. "Anna?"