The Devil's Soul

Summary: Betrayed and hurt, emotionally and physically, Kim Wrath sells her soul to the Devil. But when she regrets it, he makes a deal with her—fine anyone who would want her back, and the promise is broken. It shouldn't be that hard… right?

Prologue

—×—×—

I had heard a saying a long time ago:

“You support life, but death supports you.”

And being here right now, I wondered if that was a true statement.

Would I slip and fall off the ledge of this building? Or would someone push me instead and watch me dive into the abyss below?

Staring out into the city, feeling the wind against my hospital robes and running through my hair, either pulling me along or trying to guide me towards my end, I smiled.

I was standing between life and death. The concrete rubbed into the soles of my feet, and I could feel almost every curve and every abrupt edge on it. It made me think I was alive, to have the sense of touch, to be able to smell the air in the atmosphere, and to see and hear the life of the city down below.

The cars rolled pass, unaware that someone was going to jump off, or that she was risking her life at the rooftop of one of the tallest buildings in downtown Ation, the place she had known throughout her entire life.

I vaguely recalled witnessing an event four months ago. It hurt me deeply, tearing the very life out of me, and gave me sleepness nights and lost appetites.

I wasn’t the brightest girl around, but I had the basics: a conniving best friend, a lost crush, a broken family.

My parents were having a divorce. Recently, it had become fierce, so fierce that I couldn’t stand to be in the same house as them. I had been stoling out for a couple of weeks at my best friend’s place, where we would stay up late and chat.

“Won’t your parents realize that you’re not at home?” she asked one night.

“They’re too busy fighting,” I said, laying out a sleeping bag.

“My parents fight, too,” she said. She rolled her eyes at me, an action I had gotten used to when my parents’ divorce were brought up. People get tired of hearing the same thing the same time, so I thought this was a natural reaction.

“Not as bad as mine.”

My best friend smiled sadly at me. She lived near my crush, Brad. She didn’t like him, but she liked to pick on me for liking him.

“He’s at his window again,” she said to me a few minutes later.

“Where, where?” I was beside her, my eyes squinting to see through the branches that separated her house from his.

“He’s taking off his shirt. Looks like he’s getting ready for bed.” She said this suggistively, and it made my blush.

“You’re lying!”

He was the best athlete in school, of course. He had good grades, better than mine. He had money. I’d ran into him a couple of times in the halls, whether on accident, with me bumping into him, or from the various gifts that the school sold for extra income. I was usually the one to pass those out. I was a model student for my volunteer hours, modest grades and appearance. I didn’t stand out like my best friend did.

She was a cheerleader. She’d tell me her encounters with Brad sometimes. Locker room, gym, weekends and summer practices. It was amazing how many more times she had walked pass him than me.

But I was a foolish child. I was tricked into believing her wholeheartedly. She was innocent, pure, the best of best friends.

Whoops—!

Thought I was gonna fall right there, didn’t you? Well, I won’t, not yet.

The night sky glowed down on me, the moonlight shining its light onto me. Up there, the moon smiled at me, showing me its huge craters, its surface glittering with sunlight. Noctournal birds were flying in the sky carelessly, wings gliding through the air, bodies as light as a feather. Now, if I was a bird, maybe my plumage would be the shiniest, and all the other birds would become green with envy.

But no, I was not a bird, and I would never become one. I was a human being, capable of life, capable of death, and more capable of feelings.

Little pieces of the concrete fell off the edge—too small to really matter. Adrenaline rushed to my legs and face, and I raised my arms. The air rushed through me faster and faster, more perilously, but I didn’t care. I tilted forward, but I didn’t fall right away. My heart skipped a beat as I fell back so the people at the ground couldn’t see me.

I was never good at checking my temper or holding my balance. I could be easily pissed off at the slightest change and fall from the smallest imbalance. But now, because my life was finally in my hands, I could control all of these things.

My hands… my left wrist was injured at my first attempt to die.

Fresh, warm blood was dripping towards the ground below.

“Kim—”

“Stop bothering me! I have people to see and places to go!” I spat.

The guy was running beside me. His light eyes stared at me, and he grabbed my arm. This made the books spill out of my hands.

“Allena isn’t here right now, so please—” I said, trying to brush by, ignoring the fallen books. This guy was always bothering me for some reason. I hated him.

“No, Kim, this isn’t about Allena,” he replied.

I sighed, exasperated. All the guys who went after me only wanted to be closer to my best friend. He was no exception. I wanted to tell him quick that Allena wasn’t interested in a nerd with glasses and a bad haircut. He needed a new closet, too.

He frowned. “How much trust do you place in her?”

At this, he got my undivided attention.

“What are you, a stalker? I trust Allena with all my heart. I know what she wants, and she knows what I want, so I know that she doesn’t like you.”

“Why do you trust her?”

“She’s my best friend! Is that all, you jerk?”

“Don’t—”

“Then this discussion is over. Now, if you would excuse me—”

He was right.

Why had I trusted my best friend? A “best friend” was nothing more than a title. That didn’t entitle her to rule my life, tell me what to do and what not to do, to close my eyes and look the other way.

I was blinded by her. Stupidly blinded.

She didn’t need me; she didn’t want me.

I gasped, feeling one of my legs slip.

My parents didn’t want me, either. They’d said it so when they were discussing who’d get custody of me. I was a financial burden, and neither of them could support me separately. I had no rich grandparents, no rich boyfriend, nothing.

It hurt, a lot.

I hated Allena. I hated Brad. I hated my parents.

“You deserve it, Kim,” she said, throwing a towel at me.

I was sitting on a bed. How long had I been crying? How long had it been since since it’d happened? I shook myself, curling into a ball, while my best friend sighed somewhere in my room.

“Get out of here,” I told her.

She looked at me, her eyes bored, irritated. I had never stood up to her before, and not over some guy. She claimed she wouldn’t let a guy come between us, but she had claimed that, not me.

“You don’t say that to your best friend, either.”

She rolled her eyes. A hand on her hip, she walked to my table, pulling out my diary. “I set you up, okay? I didn’t think it’d go that far. It really is your fault.”

I stopped sniffing to glare at her. She might have flinched, but I was too furious to care.

“Brad’s a man, anyway,” she stated lazily, getting up from the chair, dusting her skirt like she’d sat on something disgusting. “What’s there to worry about? And don’t worry,” she said, smirking at me, her fingers on the doorknob, “I made sure he had some experience before I set you two up.”

I wasn’t aware that I’d thrown my vase at her. It just hit the door, the impact inaudible to me, while I screamed.

My fantasies….

I had one fantasy.

Someone had once told me, “Be careful for what you wish, Kim.”

I didn’t know who that person was. It was a deep voice in my mind. Male, female, it could be either. I could distort it to be said by anybody I knew. I could have said it, too.

And my final fantasy….

I was standing at the threshold. My parents were shouting again, always shouting every time I got home.

“No, you take her!”

“Why should I? ‘Daddy’s little girl,’ remember?” my mother mocked.

“But it’s your job, woman!”

“Wow, a man should support his family!”

“Look, you don’t want her as much as I don’t, okay? So why don’t we—”

They stopped pacing in the kitchen to stare at me. I looked back.

“Ah, welcome home, Kim,” my mother said weakly.

“Honey, we—”

They saw the knife in my hand. I gazed at it longingly, retreating when they stepped up.

“Darling, can you give me the knife?” Mom said, holding out an arm. “I wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.”

I dropped my bookbag and ran. I wasn’t sure how long I’d ran, or how fast. I ran until breathing choked me, until I saw yellow dots in the sky, echoes in my ears. Inhaling hurt my chest. I had dropped the knife somewhere because it was slowing me down.

I wasn’t deliberately standing in the middle of the road. I hadn’t deliberately intended to get hit by a car.

My final wish… was to sell my soul to the Devil.

“I am selling my soul,” I said, gathering the last bit of courage within. “I am selling my soul… to you… to the Devil.”

It was good to let that off my chest and say it to the air. The air would listen. It always would. It was a listener, not a talker like the rest of us. It carried with it thousands of secrets it had collected throughout its life. The air was living, too. Everything was living. But like me, nobody would listen to anything without a voice.

I was going to jump…. I inched towards the edge, half a foot on the ledge and the other half resting on air.

“I am selling my soul to you, Devil,” I continued. I smiled, my heart slowing down. “If you want my soul, come and claim it, Devil.”

The fall wouldn’t kill me; the Devil would come to collect me, and my lifeless body would fall to the concrete. The blood loss from my left wrist was making me dizzy, and I leaned forward, my heart skipping a beat.

“Come and take my soul!” I said weakly. Wet tears flowed down my cheeks as I waited. “Surely, you want me! Come get me, you devil! I’m selling my soul to you, I’m offering it!”

I was getting weaker, mentally and physically. Physically, the blood was dripping still. Mentally, hating myself for being so weak. Nobody cared, so stop it! Stop wanting to be seen—stop wanting things you could never get!

“I sell my soul to you, Devil!” I declared, biting my lower lip. “If you want me, come get me!” I was tempting the Devil. I didn’t know if it were a good thing or not, to tempt something that could easily end my life and torture me forever in Hell.

I let one feet ride in the night air on top of the wind. The blood was soaking the cloth of my hospital robes. My arm was going numb, and I looked to my left. The fluid had stained the left side of my attire, and I could feel the wetness beside my skin.

“Time’s up,” I whispered. “It’s time… to go.”

A strong gust of wind pushed me forward. I allowed it to force me off the edge, and I was falling. I pushed the air aside as I fell, taken by gravity, towards my end. My hair followed me, flowing freely in the breezes. The wind was so strong, it was palpable. I felt it brush between my fingers and into my palms. My eyes watered as it was drying out, and my heart regained control.

I wondered if anyone had went to the rooftop and had seen me jump….

Someone should’ve.

I smiled.

The Devil was coming for me.

For a long time, there were only darkness. And an empty feeling in the air, the empty feeling of lost hope.

It was cold, but not too cold.

It was warm, but not too warm.

My insides were burning, but my skin was freezing.

I opened my eyes.

“Where am I?” I said, to no one in particular.

The hospital robes stuck to me; the blood was there. I was not in my hospital room, in my room at home, or at any familiar places I’d ever been. I was wrapped in an void, the atmosphere so dark and dry that I began to spurn life.

“You sold your soul to the Devil,” something said, in a raspy voice that made my skin crawl.

I gaped. This was a surreal experience, and I was speechless. I couldn’t see anything. This emphasized my anxiety so that words were harder to form in my head.

“You sold your soul… to me.”

“Where… who…?” I said, hushed.

“I am the Devil. Have you forgotten, my little Pearl?”

I shivered. I was scared and frightened. Where was I? Why was I here? Who was playing this trick on me?

“I sense a fear in you. Do you wish to retract your words?”

I gulped. For five long agonizing seconds, nothing was said. I was frustrated as to my location and reason for being here and the joker behind the scenes. If I found out who it was, I was going to have his head for this!

“Let me show you something,” the Devil said in his disturbing voice.

I felt lifted off my feet and my guts squeezed so hard I couldn’t breathe. I shut my eyes tight, waiting for actual death.

Voices rang in my ears. Feet shuffled and lights glared. Murmurs translated into words in my mind and doors opened. Cars squealed to a halt as an ambulance was quieted.

People were gathered around a scene. They had a sick look on their faces. The street lamps revealed a stretcher and people bending over something on the ground twenty feet from me.

I scoffed.

Some bastard got shot, didn’t he? Served him right, whatever he did. His time was coming, so he deserved to die.

I walked to it nevertheless and bent down. No one paid attention to me, or that I was wearing nothing but hospital robes in this weather, and no one stopped me. I widened me eyes at a pair of legs covered by the same material that I was in.

No, it could be a crazy coincidence! Surely, it wasn’t—

“A jumper,” one of the male paramedics said.

“She’s so young,” added a woman with a sad countenance.

“Our children are nothing like her,” the third one stated bitterly. “It was her choice. Let’s get her into the bag.”

It was—it was—!

Oh, dear God—!

I backed off, panting. No one said anything to me still, and I continued to wait for a rude remark from them. As the body bag was loaded, one of the paramedics passed right through me and trembled as he did. He scrutinized the area for a second, then shrugged it off and went his way.

Oh, my God—oh, my God—I was dead!

I dropped to my knees at where the blood were. I couldn’t touch it—and it couldn’t touch me. I was dead, that girl was me, that “jumper,” that young girl who was nothing like their children! But it wasn’t my choice—I didn’t jump—did I? No, the wind pushed me off the edge, and I—I just—I just—I fell, didn’t I? I didn’t kill myself, the ground did! If it wasn’t so hard, if only humans could—

I cracked my knuckles and panted harder.

This wasn’t the time to panic. I had really died, didn’t I?

The surroundings grew black, and everything darkened. I blinked, standing up.

“I want to go back. Take me back!” I screamed.

There was a silence.

I wanted to go back? What was I thinking? I was dead—I couldn’t go back! What a bunch of bullshit!

But I wanted to go back… to my family, my friends, to get away from this darkness. I was always afraid of the dark, and being present in this eternal blankness was driving me insane.

“You cannot,” returned that voice that made my head spin and my hair stand on end. “You sold your soul; you cannot retrieve your words.”

“I want to go back!”

Another silence. I glared at the emptiness that was all around me and spun back and forth, looking for something unreachable and untouchable. But I would find the trickster behind all this and murder him—show him that it was no joke to play with Death.

“Let me go! I want to go back!” I yelled.

“When did you come to that conclusion?” the Devil queried calmly. Wherever he was, he was probably sitting on a high throne and enjoying my dilemma.

“I saw my body!” I said. “Let me back!” I was shrieking like crazy. I clawed at the air and fell on my face. It hurt me, but the pain subsided as I stood on my feet again and searched for the Devil.

“That cannot be done, my little Pearl.”

“No!” I shouted. “You let me go, or—let me go!” I ran until I couldn’t run anymore. I panted, coming to a stop when I heard him contemplete out loud.

“I don’t want to force you against your will,” he said, as if he cared. “How about this…?”

I was getting desperate, desperate for a way out. Whatever he threw at me, I was going to take it like a rabid dog.

“I’ve been watching you for a long time, my precious,” the voice said lustfully. “Ever since you began to want an end to your life….” It paused. “Will you submit to my rule, then, when the deal is done?”

I bit my tongue. “No.”

“When you truly admit defeat, then I shall have you.”

“I will never!” I proclaimed.

He chuckled, and the sound sent chills up my spine. “We shall see….”

And then, I was on the sidewalk again.

“Find someone,” his voice said, and I wanted him to get out of my head, “who will want you back.”

The blood was there, and the caution tapes encircled the scene. It was so dark, but much lighter and livelier than where I was prior.

“Then you’ll let me go?”

“Of course,” he agreed, almost instantly. “It is in my best interest to have a devoted follower. Go. Go find the one who wants you, and the deal will be broken.” It had spoken in a brusque manner, put bluntly.

I had to look for someone who wanted me back. It shouldn’t be too hard, right?

A lengthened silence followed.

“Okay. I’ll find someone, and then you’re going to let me go,” I returned, equally dry.

“Your wish is my command, my little Pearl.”

I hated that, “my little Pearl.” I scowled and slashed at the air with my right arm. “If I find someone who wants me, then I am no longer yours, and you are going to let me go!” I tried to move from the spot, but I was immobolized, like I was floating and couldn’t control myself.

“Then I will allow you into the living world,” the voice said. “It should not be too difficult for you…. I will be waiting, my little Pearl.”

I started to wander the streets, and I witnessed… crimes. I heard a faint cry somewhere, so I went towards the cry. What I found… I didn’t want to see. I ran off and searched for a familiar figure or face.

The Devil gave me no time limit. Was he crazy? Or did he have more in mind?

I stopped for a bit, seeing an ambulance that had parked in front of the hospital I was staying at for my treatment. I remembered running from this place hours earlier and finding my way to the tallest building I could get to.

No one had seen me. It was amazing how ignorant the world had become, but I was no different.

The body bag—my body bag—was unloaded off the vehicle and brought inside. I trailed after it, feeling turbulence inside of me. I saw my parents crying as they identified my body.

“It’s Kim—oh, God, she’s dead!” my mom whimpered as my dad hugged her. “You stupid girl! Why did you die?! You stupid, stupid girl—”

My dad shushed her. “Shh, watch out for the baby—”

“How can she die?!” the woman went on. “She’s so stupid!”

I bit my lips, tears burning my face. I died and that was all she could say, that I was stupid? And what fucking baby were they talking about?! How can they not tell me that she was expecting and that I would be a sister soon?! What was wrong with them?!

“See how stupid she is?!” my mom insisted, pointing at my body furiously. “She’s dead—I told her not to be so stupid—stupid girl!”

“Yes, she’s stupid, now shh—”

No tears fell from her eyes as the tears were falling from mine. Dead, and still crying. What was wrong with me?!

“Stupid girl,” she said, running off without a look back. “I should never have given birth to her—”

I gaped, looking away. Yes, now that I was dead, she should be happy. My dad followed her. God, why wasn’t he here to mourn my death?! He should forget about his ex-wife and look after his dead daughter! Those two were in league with each other! They were waiting for me to die to have another baby! Foolish, foolish living beings!

I wiped away the tears and searched for a face I could recognize.

I saw more: abused family members, a father beating his children and a mother sitting by with a smug look on her face; a homicide, a middle-aged male had killed an innocent little boy; even a suicide, committed by a girl around my age, who had slit her wrists and had swallowed too many pills to count.

And then, I found myself in Allena’s house. The parents weren’t home, and there weren’t any baby-sitters. I ran up the stairs, going through the doors. Then I heard them.

“Don’t do that,” my best friend was moaning. “Ohh, no!” Her actions were opposite, as she let Brad do whatever he wanted to her.

He licked his lips, moving in, both hands under her shirt.

I bared my teeth and flew through him.

“What was that?” Brad said. He stopped, his head looking around the room.

“Forget about it,” Allena told him, pulling him in. “Probably just the draft.”

“Your friend Kim seems dangerous the other week.”

“She’s still in the hospital in the mental ward,” Allena said with a roll of her eyes, disliking the fact that I was brought up at this time, “so she’s not bothering us anymore.”

“Shame,” he said. “She was the pretty one.”

“Shut up. You’re so dumb, Brad,” she told him, giggling as he touched her. “She got things I could never get. She deserved to be deceived.”

I couldn’t believe that! Shrieking, I tried to get as far from them as I could.

Disgusting! Hateful!

I cried. Where, I couldn’t recall. For how long, I didn’t remember. The tears didn’t dry when I stood back up. I just stood there, lifeless, dull, unwanted. Where else could I go now?

So I wandered the streets, an unknown apparition, unseen by human eyes. The Devil didn’t come after me as I walked, as I thought about escaping from him even though nobody cared, anyway. I just—walked.

But maybe that wasn’t the best thing to do, as it made me a witness to many more things. Time and time again, I would see humans hurting one another: someone was mugged, and I couldn’t help him; a man was stabbed, and I ran to get away from the gore of the murder; a woman was yelling for a man to stop, and I saw that he was raping her.

Human cruelty, the dark of the world. It was lonelier and colder than merely being trapped in an unlighted room.

Left with all the time in the world to contemplate, I stopped. My own situation, the event that had led me here. I grew angry, frustrated, disappointed at myself. I was the dumbest girl alive! How could I have believed in a bitch like that?! All this time, I had kept my hopes up—I had believed in her—and she had let me down in the end! That was the final straw. I wanted revenge.

Yes, I wanted to get even. I would come back one day to get even. On everybody—innocent and guilty alike. The innocent were stupid for not standing up for themselves; the guilty were those who deserved to die by my hands.

Everyone was capable of deception, but Allena was the worst of them all.

I would come back.

“Take me!” I yelled. “I lost! Now, I’m yours! Take me, Devil!”

He took me to the black room.

“Take me away from here, from society,” I said.

“What you witnessed was not the worst, my little Pearl,” the voice informed.

I raised an eyebrow. “You know more?”

“Countless… of darker events… of more malicious doings.”

“Then show me.”

One day, I would have my revenge.

Need 'n' Know: This story was rewritten for the third or fourth time, I've lost count, on August 2009. Any criticism is welcome.