Page 25 of The Devil and His Sparrow

Kalypto, the girl with the walker and IV pole, gasped and exclaimed, “That’s where we’re headed. We can take you guys.”

I nodded happily. “Lead the way.”

Iyla and I trailed along with the group of boisterous girls. At one point, Nurse Patrice pulled Noya in close, and she threw me a cautious glance as she not-so-subtly questioned Noya about whether the kids were safe around me or not. It made me chuckle under my breath.

Humans never stopped judging. I’d gathered by this point in life that it was just part of their nature. They see someone and decide they know everything about that person just by their appearance. Full sleeve tattoos of vines, webs, and snakes or lip and brow piercings like mine gave people like Patrice a lot of ammunition to fuel their misguided musings. In the past, those kinds of people were my favorite to fuck with. To torment. To seduce to the dark side.

“You were really nice to all those girls,” Iyla observed. There was no missing the edge of bewilderment in her voice, which only confirmed my previous idea that she’d expected me to dismiss them.

“You sound surprised,” I noted.

She shrugged. “I guess I am. I’ve not met many demons, but I thought you’d all be, you know—”

“Evil,” I finished with a knowing nod. “Don’t get it twisted, Sparrow. Just because I indulge my fans here and there doesn’t change that I am, in fact, evil.”

She inhaled sharply, like the reminder scared her, and she turned away from me. For some reason, this whole exchange annoyed me. I couldn’t decide if it was because of Iyla’s assumptions about me or if it was the building itself. I stared ahead, fighting the urge to burn the obnoxiously bright paint off the walls on our way by, when I noticed one of the girls continuously looking over at me.

Marla, the girl with the burns, had been quiet this whole time. She didn’t share the same glee as the others. She’d barely managed to tell me her name, but her fumbling hands and tightening of her mouth told me she desperately wanted to say more.

I had a hunch what her timid silence and distance stemmed from, and I couldn’t let that slide. When I saw a tortured soul in need of attention, I was compelled to offer my sway. Sprinkle in a bit of self-thought, self-expression, self-empowerment, and eventually, it would bloom into what people liked to call defiance, the work of the devil, and sin. Because being bold and having your own thoughts meant you weren’t “drinking the kool-aid” that the world wanted you to. It meant you couldn’t be controlled, and that, for those who needed to control you, got labeled as sin.

Drawing closer to Marla, I met her fleeting, startled glance before she ducked her head again. There was no missing the look that crossed her face before she looked away, though.

Shame.

“You seem a bit down, Marla,” I said softly.

She shook her head hard, and she sniffled beneath her curtain of hair.

“It’s okay,” I soothed, ensuring my tone came off as gentle as possible.

Her burn-covered hands came up to gingerly touch her face. “I never, ever dreamed I’d get to meet you in person. You’re so famous and wonderful and handsome. How am I supposed to face you looking like—like—”

Her steps slowed before finally stopping all together. I stayed right beside her, and the others turned back to look at us. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Patrice inch her way toward us like she thought I was about to abduct Marla right on the spot.

I ignored our audience as I bent down just enough so that the teen had to look at me. “Do you not like your scars?”

Tears filled her eyes, and she shook her head.

“Why not?”

Nurse Patrice scoffed, and I looked sideways at the old woman as she said, “What an absurd question! She’s covered in scars. Do you not understand that? Please consider what you’re saying before you speak to my girls.”

Marla’s eyes pinched in anguish, and she tried to hide even more behind her hair. “My scars are ugly. I’m ugly. I know I am.”

“Ugly?” I repeated in disbelief. “They aren’t ugly, Marla. You know what they look like to me?”

She shook her head.

“Like a cluster of shining stars.” I looked over the shining, raised red and pink skin. “They’re like your very own galaxy of stars, creating a constellation that is so unique and so you. The rest of us?” I said, gesturing at myself and the lingering party. “We’re just like plain, boring rocks. All the same. All lack-luster.” I placed a finger under her chin to tilt it up so her hair had to fall back and she had to hold her head high. “Don’t hide that pretty face from the world. It would be a shame for us rocks to never get to see such a beautiful star.”

Her lip trembled as she seemed to soak in my words. “I’m a star?”

I grinned. “A whole entire glittering constellation.” I leaned closer to whisper conspiratorially, “And between you and me, that nurse over there really needs to see some stars because she’s the roughest and plainest rock of us all.”

She laughed quietly, and her lips lifted into a smile. She nodded once and squared her shoulders to stand taller. We rejoined the group, and Marla kept her head raised so her burns were on full display. Patrice seemed annoyed by my encouraging Marla to embrace her body, and part of me was glad to see that irritation. I hoped Marla took my words and used them to build up the courage she needed to face assholes like Patrice.

It was a pity the world told people like her, people who were different in one way or another, that they were somehow less than. Unless you looked a certain way or believed a certain thing, humans were quick to slap labels on you that they had no business handing out. And people wore those labels, because others gave them no choice but to do so.

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