Free The Rules of Survival by Nancy Werlin Page A

that winter . . . I’m trying to find a way to describe it.
    Okay. Emmy, this is what I think: Demons are real. Since I’m not religious, I think of them as metaphors for the evil desires and impulses all humans have. A religious person can think of them as separate evil beings that can possess you. Either way, I believe they exist, lurking patiently around and in us, whispering their twisted points of view, ever alert for an opportunity. The sudden chink in your armor when you’re tired, frightened, or angry. The invitation you issue in that moment of vulnerability.
    Come inside me. Tell me what to do.
    I believe that I could and should have known about the demons that were on the borderline of ruling our mother. I had actually seen something in her eyes and felt some force in the air around her for many years. The demons are unmistakable even when you don’t have a name for them. So, I knew. And yet, I didn’t.
    My mistake was that I thought the demons already ruled her. I thought they were already in control. But I know now that, in her own strange way, she had been doing her best all those years, the years before Murdoch, to hold them at bay. They had her ear, but not her soul.
    Now, I am not saying that she fought her demons in the years before Murdoch. Nikki played with them before. But she was not ruled by them before Murdoch and they did not own her.
    And then—at some point, right around this time, maybe even the very night I promised Callie that I would try to forget Murdoch—at some point right around that very night, our mother invited the demons into her soul. I really believe that this was what happened. The lock was opened. The key was thrown away.
    Come inside me. Tell me how to get what I want.
    I believe that she thought the demons would help her win back the love and dependence of her children from the thief who had stolen them. I believe she chose this route on the night that you prayed for Murdoch in order to spite her.
    One more thing. On that night I, too, was trying to think of some way to restabilize our lives. Callie had her own idea, as I’ve already described. And my idea involving Ben had already been shot down.
    Despite my promise, my mind kept turning back to Murdoch. The man I’d seen in the Cumberland Farms, and the man we’d gotten to know since. That man wouldn’t feel right, abandoning kids in trouble. Real trouble. He was trying to do just that, of course, but what if . . .
    What if I put some pressure on him?

20
     
    CHURCH
     
    Nikki didn’t come home that night, and by the next morning, when she did, she had a new man with her. He was the first man she’d brought home since Murdoch. She herded him into the kitchen, where we were sitting around the table pretending to eat cereal.
    A half hour before, Callie and I had begun trying to have our talk with you, Emmy. We wanted you to agree to a new family rule: Never, ever mention Murdoch’s name, at least not in front of Nikki, but preferably never.
    You had not wanted to promise. You folded your arms and stuck out your lower lip. “You can’t make me!” You were the defiant, powerful, and self-confident Emmy of the previous night, praying for Murdoch, defying Nikki.
    Callie wheedled. I pleaded. Callie threatened. I bribed. I was thinking we were making progress—you sighed and lowered your head—when we heard the front door and footsteps on the stairs. Nikki’s laughter. A man’s voice.
    We barely had time to throw together a just-the-kids-having-breakfast scene. You cooperated with that, at least. You were in your booster seat at the table, chomping on Froot Loops, when Nikki came in, pulling a large man behind her by the hand. The man was balding and ponytailed and very, very big. He wore an old leather jacket and frayed jeans, and had a big collection of keys clinking at his side. He could barely tear his hopeful, avid eyes away from Nikki.
    “This is Rob,” Nikki said carelessly to us. “My kids,” she said to