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After Jennifer vanished into thin air, Needy lay awake all night, tossing and turning, sleep evading her, no matter how much she willed herself to surrender to it. Around three thirty she just accepted that it was going to be one of those nights and resigned herself to lying there in the dark, replaying what Jennifer — or whatever remained of her — had said and done.
"I could never bring myself to hurt you," in particular kept circling around her head like the Devil's Kettle waterfall.
And the kiss.
God, that kiss.
It wasn't as if Needy hadn't enjoyed kissing Chip — it was nice, comfortable, pleasant.
But that was all it ever was.
The kiss with Jennifer on the other hand made her feel like someone had poured liquid fire in her veins and thrown a match at her feet. It felt like something she'd been waiting for her entire life.
Maybe she had.
"But it's not Jennifer anymore. At least not totally," Needy was forced to remind herself, standing at a distance from the other mourners at Colin Gray's funeral, watching his friend's performance and his mother break down over his coffin.
A wave of sadness washed over her as she slipped quietly out of the cemetery. For Colin, who'd just wanted a date. For his family and friends who had to spend the rest of their lives with the knowledge that he'd been cannibalized.
And for Jennifer.
Jennifer who had just wanted to make out with the lead singer of an indie band like any other girl their age, but ended up another body tossed aside after being brutalized by men who thought the world owed them something just because they were them.
White hot anger like none she'd ever known coursed through Needy, was still igniting her a couple of weeks later as she made her way to the library, intent on finding out what exactly was living inside of her best friend. She'd heard about the Catholic church performing exorcisms before. Maybe there was still time to save Jennifer, to reverse whatever the fuck Low Shoulder summoned when they mistook Jennifer for a virgin.
They were shit out of luck, she realized by the time she'd finished reading the one book that detailed how to offer a virgin to Satan and explained what a succubus was.
What Jennifer now was.
It had been raining and the smell was a welcome relief after being shut in all afternoon. Needy inhaled deeply and walked home slowly, her thoughts a scrambled mess. She'd been so sure there was something, anything, she could do about this.
But there wasn't.
The ritualistic killing of Jennifer hadn't worked, so she wasn't truly dead, but neither was she truly living. She was still alive - technically. Her body was animated, and to anyone who didn't know better, Jennifer Check was alive and well. But Needy did know better. Vestiges of Jennifer remained, but the demon sharing her soul was taking more and more of its vessel as time passed.
Jennifer had gone from high school evil to real evil.
Still, Needy couldn't find it in herself to feel anger at this creature inside her friend any more than she could summon it for the girl she'd always loved. Low Shoulder were the ones to blame as far as she was concerned. Everyone's blood was on their hands: Jennifer's, Ahmet's, Jonas' , Colin's and whoever became Jennifer's next meal.
Arriving at her house, she but didn't go inside. Instead she dumped her bag and herself on the porch and sat watching as the sky darkened and unleashed another April storm.
It should be them, the thought came to Needy just as a low rumble of thunder echoed throughout the neighborhood. The members of Low Shoulder should be the ones lying disemboweled somewhere. Them and everyone like them.
That would be justice.
That would be fair.
And maybe, just maybe, that was something she could work with.
"We have to talk," she greeted Chip when he arrived an hour later, just as she'd asked. The storm had dwindled to a drizzle, but Needy remained on the porch. Hurting Chip was going to be hard enough and the less her mom heard the better.
"That doesn't sound good," he half joked, smiling, but an unmistakable look of uncertainty danced in his eyes.
"I'm sorry Chip, but this just isn't going to work."
"What?"
"This. You. Me. It's not working."
"Since when?"
"Since I realized I love you but I'm not in love with you," she snapped, the truth finally escaping its confines deep within.
She'd suspected it for a long time. The kiss with Jennifer had only proved what she'd known since the sixth grade.
"Is this about Jennifer?"
Yes.
"No. Of course not, why would it be?"
"Isn't everything?" Chip scoffed, tone bordering on snide now.
"Yeah, because you're always making it about her! You're the one that brings her into every conversation or fight we ever have. Like now! Why are you so obsessed with her?" Needy knew it was kind of a low blow, turning it onto Chip, but she needed to make sure he was safe.
She might be in love with Jennifer and the sliver of her sandbox bff that remained, but she couldn't let Chip meet the same fate as the other boys; being found with his insides on the outside.
"Fuck you, Needy!"
"No thanks, it wasn't that great the first time," she aimed a retort she'd heard Jennifer use on Roman last year, knowing that would hurt him.
It did, she could tell from the way he swallowed hard before he spoke again.
"Fine. Maybe I'll ask Jennifer to the dance instead!"
Needy knew he was only saying that because of her accusations, trying to hit her where it hurt the same way she had him, but a wild panic flooded her senses at the thought of him actually trying to use Jennifer to get back at her. Jennifer would accept and make him her latest midnight snack.
"NO!" she lunged from the porch steps, grabbing at his hoodie. "Chip, stay away from Jennifer, I mean it!"
"Why? I'm a single guy now, right?" he wrenched his arm from her grip, and without another word, turned on his heel and practically power walked away from her house.
She opened her mouth to call out to him, but couldn't think what to say. Yelling "Jennifer is a Succubus and is eating boys!" somehow didn't seem like the right thing. But there was nothing else to say.
Her mom's head appeared around the door a few seconds after Chip left. Needy didn't bother explaining to her mom that they wouldn't be seeing him for dinner ever again. Or that he might end up being someone's dinner if she didn't act fast. Which would mean this was their last family dinner too.
It was past midnight and storming again when Needy drove over to Jennifer's house, climbed up the trellis that lead directly to Jen's room and pushed herself through the open window.
"Needy?!" Jennifer's voice caught her off guard for a minute. How could she sound like her old self and be so irrevocably changed?
"What?" Needy attempted nonchalance from where she lay on the floor. "You jumped out of my window, I crawled through yours."
Jennifer smirked where sat up in bed.
"We need to talk," Needy used the same words she had with Chip, the irony not lost on her.
"Are you breaking up with me?" Jennifer fake pouted as Needy rolled her eyes and got to her feet.
"Can you be serious for one minute?"
"Okay, Mom!" Jennifer threw back the covers and swung her bare legs out of bed. For the first time, Needy allowed herself to feel the pull of attraction to the other girl.
Jennifer's gaze met hers and Needy idly wondered whether or not she was able to read everyone's thoughts.
"I broke up with Chip. I don't love him, not like that. It's not fair to him. It's not his fault I used him in my fucked up game of pretend _"
"-Did you just curse?"
"But I do care about what happens to him. I love him as a friend. And I'm not going to stand by while you make him your latest take-out lasagna."
"And what are you gonna do to stop me, Needy?" Jennifer asked somewhere between bored and amused.
"Help you find other guys to eat. Guys who deserve it. We can start with Low Shoulder. Get those fuckers back and give them a taste of their own medicine. Also, I was thinking about what you said, how when you feed you're invincible and shit and I figured it might be a good idea if you bite me. Not too much just enough that I get some of that power you're packing!" Needy finished with a grin.
Jennifer stared. She'd been expecting a final showdown here. Needy crusading for Chip's safety, determined to stop Jennifer no matter what.
This was... something else.
"You're just full of surprises aren't you, huh, Needy?"
The response was a shrug and unbroken eye contact.
Cracks like "Who are you and what have you done with Needy Lesnicki?" or "I thought I was supposed to be the possessed one" went through Jennifer's mind but she said nothing, choosing to think about what was happening right now. And how Needy was almost unrecognizable to her.
Gone was the unsure of herself girl who dated Chip Dove because he was "dependable". In her place was a woman who was comfortable making a deal with a demon to ensure she got what she wanted.
Almost unrecognizable.
Almost.
Only Jennifer knew that this was who Needy always was, that she hid behind the role of "good girl" that was expected of her by everyone in a memory of a town like Devil's Kettle.
"We should leave here, early in the morning, while it's still dark out. Leave a note for our folks that we've gone on a weekend road trip. They won't start getting concerned until Monday night and by then we'll be long gone. What do you say?" Needy felt the urgency growing inside of her. Why was Jennifer not responding?
"You're wearing makeup. And no bra," was all Needy got by way of reply, and both Jennifer and the creature that was sharing her body both felt a thrill at the discovery.
"Is that a Yes?" Needy grinned, taking a couple of steps towards Jennifer so that they were just inches apart.
"We still have time before we need to leave. We can play boyfriend-girlfriend like we used to," Jennifer delivered the same line as she had in Needy's room, closing the space between them before leaning forward and waiting for Needy's next move.
"Yes," Needy pulled Jennifer towards her, kissing her hard and pressing their bodies together as they fell backwards onto the bed.
________________________________________________
Hours later, just as the pale dawn was beginning to filter through the darkest parts of the sky and the spaces in the trees, two shadows crept through the Check household and out the front door.
Two shadows made their way to a car, and hand in hand, drove away from everything that had ever been expected of each of them, towards everything that wasn't.