Slate Gray

Chapter 11: Ace Slate

The aroma of books and coffee settles my nerves the second the automatic doors slide open. I'm pretty sure I've been to at least one library per state and they all smell the same. Like paper and ink and mustiness. Like A/C in the summer and stale heat in the winter. Like safety.

And when your life is as nomadic as ours, it's nice to have familiar spaces where you know all the rules. For my sister, it's the gym. For Dad and me, it's the library.

We plunge between the tan stacks with their rows of stories, the overhead lights warm and inviting as we surrender to the silence. Eventually deviating towards our individual areas of interest, we reconvene an hour later at a heavy wooden table near the back, nestled between two taupe walls.

Withdrawing the spiral notebook from my backpack, I lose myself in a biography of Johann George Faust, the eponymous protagonist of Goethe's masterpiece and inspiration behind the term, "Faustian bargain". He was a real-life alchemist from the 1400s and in the wake of my own looming deal with the devil, it doesn't hurt to read up on the guy.

"When'd you start that again?" Dad's voice makes me jump as he eyes the finger between my teeth.

"It's been a doozy of a day," I admit, nibbling at a particularly stubborn cuticle.

He hums in sympathy and returns to his large tome on Judaic mythology, pencil scratching softly as he takes notes. "Let me know if we need to buy more bitter polish."

My tongue pops out in disgust and I hide the bitten nubs under our table. "I'm sure I'll lose the urge once I'm, you know, less stressed."

"Won't that be nice," sighs my father, stress incarnate.

I try to refocus, but my eyes keep skipping across the page, skimming over mentions of Marlowe and Goethe, hunting for specifics of the actual deal the alchemist supposedly made. Reading between the lines to separate fact from fiction.

Aggravated by the lack of anything useful, I blurt, "What's the deal with deals?"

"'Scuse me?"

"Like, why do demons make them? If they want our souls so bad, why don't they just snatch 'em and be done with it?" I snatch his pink eraser to underline my point.

"The power comes from the actual exchange," Dad pronounces, eyes on his notes. "In striking a bargain. In corrupting a soul. High-Levels wouldn't be able to sow as much discord if humans didn't agree to do business with them."

"So why even do business?" Shutting my book, I stack my fists on top of it and lower my chin. "From a human standpoint, I mean?"

"Tons of reasons," is his preoccupied response.

"Sure. Love, money, power, fame," I rattle off, trying to engage him. "But is any of it worth a hoot when your soul belongs to something evil?"

"Are they truly evil? Or do demons come in shades of gray, like everything else in the universe? Take Lows for example. I would argue for the most part that they're just hurt, confused and lashing out." He lowers his glasses meaningfully. "Like some teenage girls I know."

I sit up and point to myself, feigning shock. "Who? Me?"

"And Mid-Levels are mindless Hell beasts, acting on pure instinct. Summoned against their will and simply trying to survive in an unfamiliar world."

"Fine, you get two points. But you can't convince me High-Levels aren't dicks," I counter. "You just said their whole thing centers around corrupting us."

"Ahh, but what does corruption mean?" He sets his pencil down and I recognize that twinkle in his eye. Welcome to the party, Professor Slate. "If we break down the Latin word, corruptus, 'cor' means together and 'ruptus' means to break. So, to corrupt someone is to altogether break them. But you can't break something that wasn't whole in the first place. And what makes human beings feel whole?"