CHAPTER 2: The Soul Jailer

*Thelma*

(Three months ago)

“Whenever you are ungrateful for anything you get in this life, remember: Kwaad will come and take your little soul and trap it in the dungeon in his dark castle. He will torture you for the rest of your days!” Uncle Fernandez finishes by raising his hands in the air and waving them around for a dramatic effect.

The four little children sitting around his rocking chair look at him in shocked silence; they look like they have just seen a ghost. Roy looks like he is about to cry.

I chuckle as I put a small bucket under the leaking ceiling. The rain is coming down hard and the old farm house is barely managing to keep us dry.

I straighten my back, trying to stretch my poor muscles that are already worn out after my busy shift at the diner.

“Rest is for the rich!” I whisper my usual mantra to myself to give me some mock courage.

I remember this story giving me sleepless nights and the most vivid nightmares as a child. Kwaad is our family’s ‘Boogeyman.’

“I think they won’t complain about not having a PlayStation again, Uncle,” I laugh. I can’t help but feel bad for the small children.

Every child dreams of having some toys. I can’t blame my little brother and cousins for wanting a PlayStation. The children are left to be content with a few hand me down toys, including some that I picked up for them at garage sales.

Roy suddenly breaks out into loud sobs. I had known it would take one of my uncle’s ‘Kwaad’ story’s to break the little five-year-old. I walk over to my little brother and cradle him as I try to bring the child some solace.

“The little man must stop that whimpering and be of strong courage! Jonathans are not known to be weepy sissies!” Uncle Fernandez barks as he takes out a paper to roll his tobacco in.

‘Neither are they known to be lazy bums mooching on their poor late brother’s widow,’ I think silently. 

“He is just a boy!” I yell, as I continue to comfort Roy.

“From thousands of generations ago, the Jonathans have been known to be fearless fighters! We have stalked and killed monsters, while the world went to be thinking that monsters were only in twisted fairytales and those stupid television shows. We were sought throughout the land whenever trouble arose, and we were paid quite handsomely too!”

I close my eyes and inhale. I am trying my best to bite back the harsh response I have prepared for this man. It’s really hard to keep my cool, but I have to keep reminding myself to respect my elders.

“Uncle, this is a new millennium. All those hunter stories are tales that YOU keep telling us. I have yet to see any of us being hired to hunt whatever monsters you keep referring to. If that were the case, we wouldn’t have to be doing these tedious jobs and getting paid peanuts. Not to mention us having four families living in this six-bedroom farmhouse that seems just about ready to collapse!”

I can hear Uncle Fernandez suck his teeth. “Maybe that is because we eradicated most of the monsters. Except that hybrid, Kwaad! No one can kill him. Part demon, vampire and wolf. Rumor has it he even had a Leviathan transfer some powers to him. Who can defeat such a monster?”

“Nobody! Because such a monster doesn’t exist, Uncle. Now, with all due respect, enough! Let us talk about other stuff. I hear it might be a good idea to plant the black beans this season. There is a factory down in Orange town that pays a lot of money for any farmer that can supply them with some black beans.” I try to change the direction of my uncle’s crazy talks and tales.

Uncle Fernandez ignores me and walks out onto the veranda. The only way to get my uncle to shut up and leave is to talk about doing actual work that mortals do. Some monster slayer he claims to be, yet the idea of work seems to scare him to his very core. Priceless!

I roll my eyes. It’s still raining cats and dogs outside. I wonder if I should warn him about the potential of getting drenched, thus making smoking his tobacco nearly impossible. I open my mouth, but upon second thought, close it, and return to tending to my brother who is now sobbing softly in my arms. Maybe a good soaking would wake Uncle Fernandez up from the make believe fantasy world he has chosen to live in.

Vampires, demons, wolves and hybrids! Now who was the one living in a fictional world? Again, I roll my eyes. I am glad my mother is still working the graveyard shift at the hospital or else she would have said, “If you keep rolling your eyes like that, Thelma, they will get stuck at the back of your head.”

The thing is, I just wish my whole family would actually sit down and discuss profitable ways to get us out of these financial constraints. I am tired of taking on double shifts at the diner just to get food on the table. I shake my head at the depressing thought of how feeding a family of fifteen is so heavily expensive.

Only my mother and myself have jobs, the rest stay at home.

Auntie Maggie is a jovial woman, but I hate that the woman seems content staying at home and having more children. Her husband, Uncle Fernandez, is not working, and their family looks up to Ma and myself for shelter and food.

How could two grown adults be so lazy? They were all capable of going out and searching for jobs, yet even when I tried to get Auntie Maggie a waitressing job at the diner, she always comes up with one excuse or another. She either complains about having a bad knee, thus cannot stand for long periods of time, or because she is pregnant…again.

When Pa passed away twelve years ago, being survived by Ma, Roy and myself, most of our extended family members had come to the farm house to pay their last respects and had simply never left.

I wonder if they assume Pa left a fortune they could all have a piece of, or that they are just taking advantage of Ma’s quiet and kind nature. I wish Ma would grow a spine and ask them to leave. But, since Pa died, Ma has withdrawn into a shell. She has never stopped grieving for Pa, who had been the love of her life.

I think of how everyone keeps exploiting her and taking advantage of her generosity, and I feel a surge of anger rise in my chest. 

Just a day ago, I cooked some beef stew for her to eat when she returned from work, only for me to find the dish empty in the sink later on. Aunt Maggie had eaten Ma’s food and blamed it on ‘pregnancy cravings.’ Ma had just smiled and had a glass of milk before retiring to her room.

That memory makes me even more infuriated. 

But, suddenly, there is a loud bang outside as I see lightning strike one of the porch windows outside, pulling me from my overwhelming thoughts. I can hear Uncle Fernandez screaming before  running inside.

“I almost got struck by lightning,” he announces as he struggles to catch his breath. He looks like he just heard a cat bark. For a self-proclaimed, non-sissy who slays monsters, he is such a coward.

“It’s just lightning. And I think lightning strikes the tallest objects in the vicinity,” I say. The statement is a hidden jab at his height. He is short, with a protruding gut that matches his wife’s growing baby bump.

He looks at me with an eye I can’t decipher. “Did you do that?”

I peer at him from above Roy’s head. “Do what?”

“Did you try to kill me with that lightning?” Uncle Fernandez looks at me suspiciously.

I frown up at him. What was in that paper that he was smoking? How could I have tried to kill him with lightning? Who did he think I was? Storm from the X-men?

“Kill you? Using lightning? How do you suppose I would do that?” I restrained my eye roll once again.

He gapes at me and says nothing. Uncle Fernandez looks spooked for some reason, but I honestly think it’s because of those stupid mythical stories he is always cooking up in his head and whatever he has been taking a puff of.

“Damn, I overslept. I was just going to rest my eyes a bit and now it’s so late! I have to post new content for my followers. Being an influencer is a lot of work.” My cousin River’s voice beckons from the stairs.

I groan. My cousin is the worst. She is a few years older than I am and refuses to look for any form of employment.  River claims she is a social media influencer, hence she has her hands full. Who becomes an influencer with ten followers?

The other children sit in front of the fireplace whispering amongst themselves, probably about the story Uncle Fernandez has filled their young heads with.

“I have to go put Roy to bed!” I say as I get up, lifting the now sleeping child. I shift uncomfortably as I adjust Roy on my hip preparing to leave.

“Did you make something for supper, Thelma? I’m starving. No one cooked anything the whole day today!” River calls out to me while standing at the base of the stairs. Maybe if she wasn’t sleeping the whole day, she’d actually notice there was food made already, but I hold that part in.

She pouts her lips at her phone, probably recording a stupid, ‘I just farted rainbows and we have unicorns in our back garden’ video for her ten followers, while she waits for me to serve her dinner on a silver platter.