Page 76 of Beneath the Dirt

HARLAN

“Turn the water off,” Araceli demands. Her naked body looks as delectable as ever, even as she holds Tori's bible in her possession. A book that she and I detest. “And for the love of—”

“Lucifer.” Araceli cuts me off. The seductive grin on her face makes what we have to do feel impossible. But like the old saying goes, “thy shall be done.”

“Put the bible down.” I demand.

With a dramatic shiver and ample relief, she obeys, about to leave it on the floor and walk away. I click my tongue and Araceli’s eyes flicker over to mine.

“Yes?” she asks, sounding intrigued.

“Open it,” I instruct her.

“Ooh,” she hums. In excited obedience and the eagerness in her voice, the way it hangs in the air before plummeting to my cock is intoxicating. I must say, death is very becoming of her. The level of obedience that took over the brattiness I grew used to in her living days is refreshing… and hot as hell.

“Good—” I begin, but I’m cut off by Araceli’s red nails, flashing in my periphery as her hand lifts.

“Don’t say it.” She clicks her tongue. There’s that feistiness coming out to play. So it’s only half gone away. “Don’t call me a good girl, it feels so,” she drags her tone, searching for the right word.

“So deceiving?” I finish her sentence for her.

“Why, yes. Yes. It. Does.” She agrees, opening the bible to a random page as she kneels on the floor. “It feels like howshe—”Araceli pauses, to look at Tori—or ‘Beth’ as she knew her—who sits trembling in the cold bath water. Araceli clears her throat. “It feels like something that would suit her more. Since we all know that good is subjective and most good girls are bad girls who don’t have the courage to accept their demons. Isn’t that right?” Araceli juts her chin in Tori’s direction. Waiting for her to speak. To say anything to defend herself. Though the temperature of the water, mixed with the injection I gave her which still has her limbs partially numb, is too strong for her to mutter more than a breathy and broken “sorry.”

“Shh,” Araceli whispers. “There will be a time for your apologies, but for right now, I need to know what a good Christian woman like you is doing with this.” Now on her feet, Araceli moves to the necklace withmyrib bone on it. The rib bone that Araceli dug up from beneath the dirt of my grave. Snatching it in her grip, she lifts it up for emphasis before taking hold of her notebook.

“I thought you didn’t believe in this kind of stuff. Were you having a moment of weakness and thinking for yourself for a change?” She asks without giving Tori a second to respond. “You are familiar with what a moment of weakness is, correct? Or are you so lost in the Jesus sauce that you aren’t?”

Tori’s mouth trembles as she begins muttering a response, but Araceli speaks over her. “Shut up. See, I know firsthand that you are not the ideal Christian woman in the making that my stepfather claimed you were. Don’t worry, he was no prize either, I mean you heard the news reports. Which, might I add, was only a fraction of the atrocities he committed. Let’s not forget how he used to use me and Harlan at differing points of our lives as ashtrays. And let’s not forget what he tried to do to exorcise the ‘demons’, as he called them, out of me.” Araceli pauses. “With his dick, Tori Beth. With his fucking disgusting dick.”

It’s nothing I didn’t already know, but the anger that arises in me hearing that my father did that to Araceli. That he punishedher by violating her. That he took something that didn’t belong to him infuriates me.

“But I digress,” Araceli continues. “My point is that you’ve had many moments of weakness. Like when you used to suck Harlan’s dick in the church basement. Or when you snuck onto our property and watched Harlan and I in the bathroom, and stood there seething while you watched me ride his leg from the window as I begged him—and got my way—for him to break the rules and spend Halloween with me.”

“Fuck,” I groan, interrupting Araceli.

“What is it, big brother?” she pouts her lips as a devious grin curls her lips.

“You can’t talk like that,” I groan again, this time louder. Needier.

Her pout deepens. “Like what?”

“You know what you’re doing to me. It makes me want to—”

“Sin?” Araceli lifts her eyebrows.

“No, fuck.”

“Hmm,” Araceli hums. “Soon, brother. Very soon.”

She redirects her attention to Tori. “Anyway, let’s not forget when you inserted yourself into my life as my fucking literary agent. Hmm. That covers it. But wait.” Araceli lifts her finger in the air as if a light bulb just went off. “Oh, and then there is the pièce de résistance.”

I move from behind Tori, kneeling on the floor to the side of the tub, my attention on Araceli, dying to hear what she has to say next. I already know, but I want to hear it. I need to. We all do. Especially Tori.

“Don’t leave us in suspense.” I motion for Araceli to continue, but she’s too busy straddling herself on top of the open bible. Her arms stretch forward as her palm flattens, anchoring herself to the ground. Though her shoulders remain slightly hunched with her neck cranked down to read.

“Here it is.” Araceli breaks the silence. “Proverbs 6:34. Jealousy makes a man,” she interrupts herself, shooting her gaze overto Tori, “or woman,” she adds before looking back down to finish reading the rest of the verse, “rage; he’ll show no mercy on his day of revenge.” Araceli’s neck cranks up, settling her stare on me first, then Tori, who even with the drugs slowing her breathing, is still aware enough to grasp every word Araceli is about to say.

“Your bible speaks about jealousy. Quite a bit, actually. I got tired of skimming through all the bullshit in it, so I gave up counting after fifty. But either way, there are plenty of verses that you should know that speak about how jealousy is bad. How it can lead a person—even a godly person—to do bad things.”

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