But for the humans, it was a little different. They weren’t asked to keep watch, and actually got to spend some time doing whatever they wanted before sleep took them. They could sleep all twelve hours if they wanted; their afterlife bodies seemed okay doing that, too. But Mia had other plans.
She sat down beside Hannah. Adron took first watch, and Hannah found a spot against the mountain wall that cut in a bit, an alcove that covered her sides and overhead a little. Like an animal, finding a place that would protect her the most.
Hannah was a bit taller than Mia, but not by all that much. Short blond hair and blue eyes, and just as slim as Mia, too, with thinner legs, and slightly larger breasts. Very much a ballerina build.
Mia sat down next to her.
“You’re in great shape, you know,” Mia said.
“Had to be, to survive here.”
“Oh, you got in shape down here? You can do that? Your body shape isn’t permanent?”
“Yeap.” Hannah held out an arm, and flexed her bicep. It wasn’t a big bicep, but a lot better than most girls. “Being a betrayer only takes you so far.”
A betrayer, right. 666 etched on her forehead and everything.
“I–”
“I know you want to ask. Just ask.”
“I…” Wincing, Mia took a deep breath, and looked away to stare at Adron’s back in the distance. “What’d you do? To end up in Hell?”
Hannah let out a slow sigh, and shrugged. “Bunch of things, really. I was driving once, out in a remote area to visit someone. It was dark. I hit someone by accident. I drove off.”
A sledgehammer, to the guts.
“You didn’t… call 911 or something?”
“Nope. Didn’t want to get in trouble.” Oh god. “I did other things, too. When I was young, I stole money from other kids. Stole from my friends and strangers when I got older. I was good at that, good at being quick.”
“I… I…”
“Not long before I died, I lied about my ex-boyfriend beating me, and got him in a lot of trouble.”
“Jesus.”
Hannah laughed, shaking her head as she pulled her knees up. It wasn’t long before her head dangled, weighed down by something. On anyone else, Mia would have thought guilt or shame, but Hannah spoke about her past with the arrogance of a sociopath. For a few moments, anyway. The woman shuddered eventually as the mask crumbled, the sort of shuddering Mia had seen before, sometimes in the mirror. She was trying to not cry.
“I don’t think that’s what did it, though,” Hannah said.
“No?”
“No. It wasn’t actually… doing the things, that got me sent down here. I think it was the way I felt about it. I felt…” She pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged them. “I didn’t give a shit about whoever I hit with the car. The people I stole from, I thought they were pathetic for being so stupid to leave their stuff open like that. All the better for me, the only person who mattered. And my ex, I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to really, really hurt him. And when I did, I felt good. I felt great. It felt amazing, seeing him in pain.” After a sad laugh, Hannah managed to lift her heavy head and stared up at the burning sky. “Joke’s on me, right?”
It took surprisingly little poking to get the girl to talk about her apparently fucked-up past. Mia was probably the first person Hannah had talked to who gave a shit about her, judging from what she’d seen of the other humans and demons, except maybe Adron.
“Do you… still feel that way?”
“What’re you, a therapist?”
Mia smiled. “Second year psychology major at university, so just enough knowledge to think I know what I’m doing, not nearly enough to actually know what I’m doing.”
“Ha, fuckin’ right. I knew a lot of smart assholes full of themselves. But you seem to have a head on your shoulders.”
“So do you.”
Hannah laughed, tiny sobs choked away.
“Yeah, well, I learned a lot of shitty lessons down here. I’m not the same person I was, back on the surface. But it doesn’t fucking matter now. The only way out of Hell is dying, and now I have to die a fucking lot to make that happen.”
“Can I ask, how high was your number when you were sent here?”
“125.”
“That’s–”
“Not as high as a lot of people’s numbers, I know. But, fuck me, I didn’t want to die again.”
“But–”
Hannah dismissed Mia with a flick of the wrist.
“Don’t. Fucking don’t. I know, okay? I fucking know. I was stupid. No need to rub salt in the wound.”
Silence fell on them, a big heavy wet blanket smothering them. Mia wasn’t this girl’s sister or lover or anything, so why push so hard?
Because it hurt, seeing someone else in pain. She knew that about herself well enough.
“Can I ask how you died?”
“You just asked.”
“Trying to be polite.”
“Don’t. Being polite is a big flag over your head that something’s up, and will get you attention you don’t want.” Shrugging, Hannah gestured out vaguely. “I suppose I should have died in some poetic way, right? Get my comeuppance and shit? I died in a car accident. My new boyfriend wasn’t a very good driver.”
“Anticlimactic.”
“Ha, true.”
Mia smiled at her maybe, possibly, new friend. Yeah sure, Hannah had apparently been one colossal bitch when she was alive, the sort of girl who made her entire gender look bad, lying about her boyfriend and getting him in trouble. She’d been the sort of girl Mia would have detested. Except, the girl sitting beside her didn’t seem to be that other girl.
And Hell didn’t care. Hannah had changed down here, where it didn’t matter. Too little too late. What a fucking shitty afterlife.
Hannah glanced Adron’s way. Without his sword on his back, the lean shape of his waist connecting up to his broad shoulders was gorgeous, and both girls watched him as he scanned the cliff edge to the paths below. A damn handsome man, demon, person. And compared to the other demons, a nice guy. Yeah sure he was confident, and what girl didn’t go weak at the knees for a confident guy? The other demons were confident too, but they weren’t nice. He was. Sorta.
“You like him,” Mia said.
“He’s a bastard who’s got me wrapped around his finger.”
“But…”
“But, yes, I like him.” She rolled her eyes as she let her legs go loose in front of her. “He told me if I ever manage to kill him, I get to go up the respect ladder. Demons will treat me like one of them. I’ll be free.”
“Free.” Being free didn’t sound all that good, considering the locale. “How many times have you tried to kill him?”
“Over the years? Must have been ten or twelve times by now.”
“Yeesh.”
“Got close a couple times, too. Maybe someday I’ll pull it off. But… I don’t even know if I should.” Hannah shook her head and gestured to Mia. “You like him, too.”
“I mean, he seems nice, and he’s… dare I say it, fun.”
Hannah’s grin was positively evil.
“All you gotta do is ask.”
“Ask? Ask what?”
“If you can fuck Adron.” Hannah shrugged and gave Mia an all-too-playful slap on the knee. “I wouldn’t mind watching that. Tiny thing like you trying to fit him inside you? I bet you’d wriggle like a worm on a hook, all the way down.”
So much for not thinking about sex anymore. But before the vibration could start up in her guts again, Mia gave herself a nice slap on the face, earning a raised a brow and an eventual chuckle from Hannah.
“Maybe another time.”
“Suit yourself.”
“And, I’m kinda surprised you’d just share him like that.”
“Adron’s been fucking me and only me for years, but it’s not exactly a normal relationship. I’m his slave. He’s my master. I’ll kill him, some day.” She shrugged. “But either way, he’s not my boyfriend either.”
“But you like him.”
“What, you never wanted to share your boyfriend with another set of legs? Or get a girl’s lips around your clit while your boy fucks you?”
“Uh…” Uh oh. Mia squirmed, and damn it, her pale skin flushed red in seconds until she felt her pulse in her cheeks.
“Well well well, a virgin.”
“I’ll have you know I had plenty of toys.” Large, ridiculous, awesome toys.
Hannah winked at her. “It’s not the same, at all.”
Before Mia could stop her, Hannah hopped back up to her feet, and marched over the Adron. Double uh oh.