Free Hellhole by Gina Damico Page A

and be all like, hey girl, wanna talk about Satan?”
    Â 
    â€œUm, hi,” Max breathed into the phone. “Wanna talk about Satan?”
    â€œWhat?” said the voice on the other end.
    â€œOr—sorry, the Prince of Darkness. Or, um, His Evil Lordship. Whatever you call him. I don’t want to be disrespectful.”
    â€œWho is this?”
    Max nervously drummed his fingers on the fiberglass of the small pay phone enclosure, feeling a sudden swell of affinity for the antiquated thing. Its phone book had given him the right number, after all—only one listing under the name Nedry—and she’d picked up after the first ring. He didn’t want to think about how he would have reacted if a parent had answered instead.
    He took a deep breath to calm himself. “This is Max Kilgore.”
    A pause.
    â€œIsn’t that the new Michael Bay movie?”
    â€œI can see why you might think that, but no,” he said. “I go to your school. I don’t think we’re in any of the same classes—actually, I don’t even know what you look like—”
    â€œThen it must be hard for you to picture the face I’m making right now,” she answered dryly. “I’ll give you a hint: it’s the one that precedes me hanging up the phone.”
    â€œWait, don’t hang up!” Max wiped a drop of sweat from his eye. “I was hoping you might be able to help me. I’ve heard that you dabble in the satanic arts, and—”
    A long, guttural noise rumbled out of the earpiece.
    Once it was complete, she grumbled, “I don’t do that stuff anymore.”
    â€œOh.”
    Max did not have a Plan B, so he had to resort to Plan C: awkwardly breathing into the phone until she elaborated.
    Which she did not.
    â€œUm,” he said after a time, “why not?”
    Another pause, as if she was being careful to think before she spoke. “It was just a phase. Not that I need to explain myself to you, whoever you are.”
    Max’s palms were so sweaty they could barely grip the receiver. Confrontations always did this to him. He was practically hyperventilating, fighting a strong urge to sink to the ground and start rocking back and forth in a fetal position. “Look, I’m sorry to have bothered you,” he heaved. “I heard that you were into satanic worship, and due to some unforeseen circumstances that have recently cropped up in my life, I am now very desperate for more information on the matter. But obviously that rumor was untrue, and obviously it’s kind of a sore subject for you, and obviously I’ll just be hanging up now and dying of embarrassment, so have a nice life, bye-bye then—”
    â€œWait.”
    Max paused, then coughed because his throat was so dry. “Hmm?”
    â€œWhy do you need to know more about Satan?”
    He blew out a puff of air. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
    More silence.
    â€œMeet me later tonight at the craft store on Main Street,” she said.
    Max nearly dropped the phone. “Huh?”
    â€œJust Glue It. Around six thirty, back door, near the dumpsters.”
    â€œUh, okay. Sure. Thanks!”
    Max hung up, so thrilled at this positive turn of events that he forgot about the vengeful swinging phone book, still hell-bent on destroying his crotch.

Frequently
    MAX SPENT THE REST OF THE DAY sitting in his living room, looking at his dinosaur watch, and listening to Burg play
Call of Duty.
It wasn’t the game Max would have chosen; the near-constant firing of machine guns didn’t exactly soothe his troubled soul. But as long as virtual soldiers were being killed downstairs, no real people were being killed upstairs. Hopefully his mom would think he was the one playing, and not abandon her Sunday reruns to come out and investigate.
    At one point—and then another point, and another—Audie rang the doorbell and demanded to be